Chapter Text
Hours pass, maybe days. The Summer Society sisters stop in sometimes, leaving food, bandages. Perry lies in bed, her skin stinging. Laf and Carmilla sleep in shifts, always having someone up to keep an eye on her.
She’s floating, somewhere in between sleeping and wakefulness. She knows she’s killed people, knows she tried to end the world. Carmilla tells her again and again that it was the dean, but Perry knows. She remembers the fairy offering her control over the world, and pain on anyone who’d wronged her. She’d rejected the offer, but deep down she’d wanted it, and the fairy had seen that.
It was roundabout, but it happened. And now Silas has paid the price.
“Perr, sit up. You need to stay hydrated.” Laf gently pulls her up to a sitting position and holds a glass of water to her lips. Perry doesn’t move to drink it. “Please.” Perry lies limp, unseeing.
“Hey, anglerfish lackey. Danny wants to see you.” Laf looks terrified, and freezes. Mel is at the door impatient.
“Hey, I’ve got her.” Carmilla takes Laf’s place, and gently pushes Laf towards Mel. “If you see Laura can you tell her that I…” Carmilla trails of awkwardly and ducks her head. Laf nods, and leaves.
Perry is motionless in Carmilla’s arms.
“Hey, you need to drink.” Perry can feel Carmilla looking into her eyes, but can’t summon up the energy to look away.
Carmilla sets down the water and pulls some pillows behind Perry, leaning her back against them. She takes her hand, moving it in her own hands, feeling the small burn scars from years of baking, the rough edges where the sword had rubbed at her skin. The raw scars higher up.
“I know what it feels like. Like you’re impure, something yanked out of you and there’s nothing but the dirt of your own grave to fill it in.” Carm sets down Perry’s hand and takes her other one, examining the thin scar across her palm from a bagel cutting accident. “It makes you wonder what was there before. If you really were who you thought you were.”
Perry feels something small in her heart, something that isn’t her own. But it isn’t the Dean’s either.
“You just need to take it one day at a time. Every breath we take is revenge on her, every smile, every tear. I don’t know what she took out of me, but there was a space and I filled it. The first time with hate and courage. Later times with pain, fear, love. You have to keep moving, keep collecting memories. I saw her do this to my siblings, saw them waste away, give up. You’re stronger than that. So is everyone around her. Everyone has small pieces of themselves to give, small pieces that can fill you in until you learn to make your own substance. Lafontaine has so much they want to give, you just need to open yourself.”
Carmilla lifts the glass to Perry’s lips again, and she drinks. Not much, not as much as she probably needs. But she feels the cool water slide down her throat, together with the kindness that Carmilla has just shown her. It pools at the bottom of the pit in her soul, not even starting to fill the hole, but glowing softly. Maybe she isn’t as alone as she thought.