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Reuniting with the rest of the group is not what Laudna had hoped it would be. When she’d woken up that morning, it had been the only thing on her mind. Seeing Imogen again would fix everything, seeing the others and knowing they’re safe and finding out what they’ve been through, it would make her feel better, make her feel less empty and hollow, less scared and lonely. So when it doesn’t, when it makes her feel even more so, it’s too much.
There is so much noise, so much talk, so much going on and the brief excitement and relief she felt when they’d first arrived has given way to deep exhaustion. Her skin doesn’t fit right - it never does, but it’s worse now. She can’t get comfortable, she can’t focus on what everyone is saying because something is wrong and she can’t figure out what it is, only that everything is familiar and at the same time completely unknown to her.
Across the table, Imogen is talking to the other automaton, the one they met on their journey. She treats them like a dear friend, and all Laudna can think, sitting quiet and alone, is that should be me . She doesn’t know which one of them she means - Imogen, whose journey was so much less traumatising than her own, or F.R.I.D.A., who is receiving Imogen’s full attention when that is a spot reserved for Laudna.
Something ugly rears its head within her - not the hunger, not the darkness, but something new. It unsettles her, such a visciousness towards someone she has only just met and who seems to be, by all accounts, a lovely person. She’s not like this, she’s not mean, but right now she’s wishing for a hole to swallow up everyone but her, and F.R.I.D.A. especially. It’s not fair, she knows that, but then what has been fair in the past few days?
She doesn’t say anything, just smiles along and eyes the two of them suspiciously whenever they talk to each other. It’s only when F.R.I.D.A. replays Imogen’s voice that she relaxes a bit. It’s sweet, if a little strange to hear that voice she loves so dearly from someone else’s mouth. The words are familiar, like Imogen has said to her many times, but it touches her regardless.
The past few days had been so hard and intense and even still, she had been thinking about Imogen so much. It’s nice to know that Imogen, somewhere across the world, had been thinking of her too. It makes her heart flutter like it only does for Imogen and if she could blush, she would. Imogen hides her face bashfully and it makes her smile, it’s such a familiar image.
The ugly thing in her chest, however, isn’t content. With every moment, it feels stronger, meaner. She worries that this is Delilah whispering poison in her mind but it feels different, it’s a feeling she remembers dimly from a time long ago, when a little girl watched other children play and wished desperately to be like them.
She plays along for the night, smiles and laughs, and when they talk, all crammed into that room, she doesn’t fall apart. She’s very brave and very strong and her shoulders are squared and her back straight and nothing can hurt her. Her hope is cradled in its hard, protective shell and no one can hurt it.
The feeling spreads through her veins. It’s not just Imogen and her new best friend, no, it’s all of them, it’s their journey, a breeze compared to hers. She keeps her smile on because if she didn’t, she’d be baring her teeth and asking why, why was it so easy for you? It’s not a fair question to ask, she knows, but nothing is fair, so why should she be?
Later, when they’ve all returned downstairs and everyone else is busy catching up, Imogen pulls her aside and asks: “Laudna, can we talk?”, so they go up to the room and close the door and finally, there’s quiet.
Imogen sits crosslegged on the floor and Laudna sits across from her. It’s familiar, like so many things have been tonight, and like all of them, it’s completely new as well. She remembers how wrong her skin feels tonight and shifts uncomfortably. The rattle in her chest from the night before picks up again.
It’s awkward. Laudna doesn’t know where to look, it’s all a reminder of something she doesn’t want to be reminded of. If she looks at her hands, she sees herself draining Bor’Dor of his life. If she looks at Imogen’s face, she’s overcome with guilt and fear and that nagging worry that things are different now. If she looks at the ground, it will swallow her whole.
She picks a spot on the wall behind Imogen and stares at it.
“So…who’s F.R.I.D.A.?” She does not look at Imogen’s face. It is not the question she wanted to ask, but it’ll do in its place. It is not: Are we okay? It is not: Do you love these new people more than me? It is not: I have done a terrible thing and I don’t know if I can be okay. Will you hold me through it?
“Oh, they’re FCG’s…something. Laudna, I…” Imogen’s voice wavers, an uncertainty in it that it has never had before, not with Laudna. It goes straight to her heart.
She can’t look at Imogen’s face. She’ll cry if she does, she’ll get angry if she does, she doesn’t know why she is harbouring these terrible feelings for something that is not Imogen’s fault - or Chetney or Fearne or FCG or even F.R.I.D.A. or Deanna. But the ugly thing is still rearing it’s head in her chest, on the verge of bursting out.
Imogen is silent now, just looking at her, looking at her face, and Laudna wishes she could look at her and everything would be the same as it always was. The pink sky above them, the wind in the weeds, and no gods or necromancers or world-changing events between them.
“Laudna, are you okay?” Imogen’s voice comes softly. She’s speaking, out loud, and it catches Laudna off guard.
She looks at Imogen, at her lovely face lined with concern, and the dam breaks. The jealous thing runs free. She grows tall, huge, towering, and fills the room with her sobs and wails of despair and the heavy breathing like the air just can’t quite get into her lungs. She’s tiny, smaller than a speck of dust on the floor, and no one can hear her cries.
“It’s not fair!” She gets out between sobs. “It’s not fair that you all had fun and made friends and we had to go through all this shit! You…why is it always me ?”
She breathes and breathes and breathes and there’s no air, there’s nothing for her to grasp, to anchor herself. There’s a low chuckle in the back of her mind, or maybe she’s imagined it, she doesn’t know anymore.
“And, and, now she’s back or at least I think so and I feel horrible, I’m scared, Imogen, I’m scared and weak and no one has time for it! I had to kill our friend and you…and you…” She stops speaking after this, just cries quietly. There are clumps of hair in her lap and angry red marks on her arms where she’s dug her nails in and she’s so tired.
Imogen just sits there, not quite reaching out, not quite doing nothing, hovering somewhere in between. Some part of Laudna wants to lash out, wants to push her away, wants to make herself as lonely as she feels. She doesn’t know what she wants Imogen to do, only that it’s not this, or maybe it is.
Then Imogen starts quietly singing a lullaby she’d sung to Laudna once before (their first sleepover, when they had looked at the stars, and Imogen had held her hand, it seems eons ago now) and slowly, gently, her breathing slows, her sobs abide, and she’s fallen apart on the floor. She’s neither tall nor small, only a person-shaped void on the floor of this innroom. A split second, a brief hesitation, then she lays her head in Imogen’s lap and despite everything, they fit together like they always have.
Imogen runs her hands through Laudna’s hair carefully and Laudna traces circles on Imogen’s thigh and they’re pink skies, wind in the weeds, no red moon or betrayal, just Imogen-and-Laudna, like they were so many months ago under a starlit sky.
“I’m sorry.” She whispers eventually.
“It’s okay.” Imogen replies.
“No, I…”
“It’s okay .” Imogen says again, with emphasis. “Laudna, I would be more concerned if you hadn’t yelled at me at least a little bit, if you hadn’t…it’s okay, alright?”
“Okay.” Laudna nods and returns to her meditative task.
It’s still different, she realises. It feels the same, but neither of them are, and her head isn’t quite as comfortable as it used to be and there’s a slight tension in Imogen’s body that she can feel. But she doesn’t mind. It’s still them, even after everything, it’s still them. Her body fills her skin just right again and the rattle in her ribcage disappears.
After a while - it feels like an eternity - of being like this, the entity of Imogen-and-Laudna, she lifts her head, breaking the spell. Imogen’s cheeks have taken a lovely pink colour and her eyes are thoughtful. Laudna wonders what’s going on in her head, but she doesn’t ask.
“Can you help me put on the corset?” She asks instead.
Imogen shakes out of her thoughts, then smiles. “I’d love to.”
She gets up and holds out a hand to Laudna to help her up. She takes it and it feels electric. For a moment, she imagines her fingers elongating to reach Imogen’s hand more easily, and then she blinks and there’s no spark, no elongated claws, just their hands intertwined.
Imogen laces her into the corset in front of the mirror. It’s dirty, marked by the travellers who have come through here like ghosts. It’s strangely comforting to know that she’s not the only ghost that has haunted the room and she won’t be the last.
“This tight enough?” Imogen’s voice is soft and barely audible behind her.
Laudna nods. She’s mesmerised by the image in the mirror. It reminds me of a daydream that seems so long ago now, of a future of her and Imogen on a ranch, of iced tea at noon and a garden with a cherry tree. Of going out to a party and asking Imogen to lace up the dress she’d gifted Laudna for her birthday and Imogen would smile and do it just right and then Laudna would turn and kiss her nose and they would dance. And they would dance the whole night. And when the night retreated into dawn, they would walk home from the party, hand in hand, no words exchanged, no words needed.
She smiles at the thought of it. It’s nice, this future, even if it’s not real. There’s never been someone like Imogen in her life and since meeting her, she’d never been separated from her for long. It feels right to be back with her, even if things are different. She feels safer, warmer, like someone had wrapped her up in blankets and sat her down in front of a gentle fire.
Imogen’s hands have stilled on her waist and she is looking at Laudna in the mirror with a face that she can’t decipher. She thinks it must look a lot like her own. Imogen seems miles away in her head, a small, sad smile playing on her lips, the pink blush still lingering on her face. She looks beautiful, Laudna realises, and it’s not like it’s the first time she does so. Imogen has always been beautiful, from the first moment Laudna saw her at the stables, so quiet and lonely and small.
But it’s different now. And it’s not the different there was before, that is still lingering, it has nothing to do with that except that she has gone through yet another harrowing experience, has lost her mind a little bit again, her agency, and has been betrayed yet again. It’s different because they were apart for the first time since meeting, but they’re with each other now, and what else should matter?
“Can I kiss you?” Imogen cuts the silence and Laudna blinks out of her thoughts.
“Huh?”
“I…can I kiss you? I don’t know if I should, but I want to and…you just look so beautiful right now, you do, and I…yeah, can I kiss you?”
No one had ever asked her this before. No one had ever liked her enough to. No one but her mother before Imogen had ever looked at her and thought she was beautiful. She thinks her heart is going to explode.
Laudna nods. “Oh…alright.” She says and it feels so stupidly small in this room, in this moment.
Imogen takes her face gently in both hands, leans in slowly, and places the most careful kiss on her lips. Laudna knows from stories that there are supposed to be fireworks and a big burst of feelings, but all she feels is quiet content. It’s like the piece she never knew had been missing had finally been slotted in and the picture had been revealed and it showed a pink-and-orange sunset, weeds blowing in the wind, and two women laughing under a tree.
Imogen pulls back after a brief moment, the blush on her face so intense now that Laudna almost laughs.
“I…I’m sorry, I don’t know if that’s what you wanted, if that was okay. I’m…it’s okay if it’s not, you know that, right? I just wanted to-”
“Shh, Imogen.” Laudna interrupts her rambling. “I’m sorry I didn’t realise until now that I wanted this. Can you kiss me again?”
Imogen stares at her for a moment, then laughs and obliges her request. She’s more firm now, but still careful, as if worried Laudna is going to break in her hands.
‘I won’t break.’ Laudna thinks for her and in response, Imogen pulls her in tighter with her hand on her neck.
With her eyes closed, Laudna fills the room with a gentle sunset, the sound of weeds in the wind, and the smell of carefree summer. There will be time to worry later, but for now, they have this moment, they have the sky, and they have each other.