Work Text:
She had scrambled a man’s brains so terribly, that he was no longer a functional person. And he deserved it. Jindosh was a bottomfeeder, a psychopath. He had backed Delilah, taken her throne, and taken Sokolov. Those were crimes against her. But she had done something that should have felt worse than simply killing him, and yet she didn’t feel bad. Should she? She knew what she was getting into the second her father had been taken from her, the second she had worked to escape from her own home with her life, the second she allowed The Outsider to burn his mark onto her hand.
The guilt was in not feeling guilty.
Emily buried her face into the pillow: flat and useless and so uncomfortable.
She just wanted to sleep and put this in a neat little box somewhere in the back of her mind. There were so many more important things to worry about, and allowing that jackass to take up any more space than necessary wasn’t what she wanted. Jindosh was gone. Sokolov was safe. She was a step closer to saving Corvo.
Her fingers dug into cheap sheets. She could really just tear this mattress apart with her hands.
It was a shift in the air, the cold smell of ozone burning her nostrils, that alerted her. She squeezed her eyes and sighed. There was no way she had fallen asleep, and yet the boundaries between reality and the Void seem to have simply dropped away.
The Outsider did as he pleased, whenever it was convenient for him. Didn’t seem much too different than an empress, really. But he could pretend like what he gave to the world didn’t matter. Emily had learned over and over and over that every one of her actions left an acrid taste in her mouth, the sharp tang of disappointment and failure. Gods don’t worry about failure.
What a load of rat shit.
“Will you not even greet me, little empress?”
She shoved the pillow over her head and buried her face into the mattress instead. It was childish. She was not a child, but if she could just ignore him for long enough, would he go away? Hadn’t enough of her time been encroached on by him?
A hand ghosted over her shoulder, tugged on her hair. A huff of amusement brushed by her ear.
With a groan, Emily flipped over to find him hovering above her, merely inches apart. “What?”
His lips had curled into a look of smug satisfaction. She could see him for what he was in this moment: just as childish as she was. A scowl crossed her own mouth, brows inching into a sharp “V”.
“I am not following you anywhere,” she muttered. “So you can go away and bother another one of your Marked.”
He watched her for a moment more, dark eyes pulling her in. An errant rock floated past her bed, and she gave herself an excuse to look away from him, to watch it spiral and hit the door to her room with a loud thunk.
“You surprise me,” he finally said. “I didn’t think the inventor would have made you start to doubt yourself.”
“I’m not doubting myself!” She was just wondering if there was a difference in morality between death and not. If she had any reason to question her morals. If morals had ever done her any good, and why was she only now considering all of these things. And having a would-be god pry her open to figure out the way she worked was not pleasant.
He moved until he was laying next to her on the bed. She felt the weight of his body on the mattress, the coolness of his body next to hers. Maybe she had fallen asleep, was dreaming, because this didn’t make sense to her.
If this was her dreaming, why would she want to dream of him? And if this was real…
Well, what did it really matter?
“I just don’t know if what I am doing is helping myself, or helping the Empire,” Emily found herself admitting. She had nobody else to talk to, and really, she never had.
“Perhaps both,” he said. “Or maybe your selfishness can’t fix any of the rot taking hold.”
She shot him a glare. “Very helpful.”
“Is that what you want me to be?” His tone, now, was curious.
It would have been nice if he could be more straightforward. “You wouldn’t be here to bother your investment if I had ruined things too terribly.”
His eyebrows shot up. “An investment?”
She remembered the few things that Corvo had told her about his time after her mother’s death. He had called it an experiment of sorts, the playthings of a bored creature who wanted to see what his chosen would do with his favor.
This didn’t feel much like a game. He was resting in her bed, pestering her about her feelings.
He wanted something from her, and that somehow made it personal. She just wasn’t sure what.
She sat up then, leaning over him. He wavered a bit, as if he might disappear on her. She placed a hand on his chest, as if she could pin this god down with a light touch. And yet, she did.
“I don’t want to talk about me,” she told him. Had he been any man, woman, this conversation would be leading down a very different path. And maybe there was still some of the reckless girl in her, because how fun would it be to top The Outsider.
“And what would you like to talk about?” His voice was amused, but his mouth had twisted, a look of bemusement on his face.
How easy would it be to slide her legs over his waist until their hips met together? How easy to lose herself in something so base to forget her questions, her anger, her emptiness?
“To sleep.” She lifted her hand away from him. “I just want to sleep.”
She laid back down, turning on her side to face him. He remained on his back, body still as death.
“I can’t help with that,” he told her, as if she had asked.
“That much is obvious.”
Still, after she had closed her eyes and tried to let sleep claim her, she felt his fingers in her tangle of loose hair.
Or maybe she dreamt that one.