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A bead of condensation drops down the cocktail glass, darkening and wilting the decorative paper hearts. It's pretty poetic, but everything looks poetic when you're on your second drink in forty minutes. Tally ebbs into the booth seat she'd chosen for them in the restaurant, dress sliding against the leather; she could easily use her Sight to look for her missing date, but she’s trying to get better at trust. Since her sisters staged an intervention over the fridge incident she's agreed that uncovering people lying to her on minor things is not healthy for her or them. So, she waits.
As she stares into her second Martini, the clear liquid reflects her flames. She's already skipped around the world to see sunrise in India, browsed the entire history of Boston around the granite building this cozy restaurant nests in. She curls her fingers around the cold stem of her glass in the low bar lighting, tempted to find the local cinema and go back in time until she finds a good film being shown.
Why am I nobody's first choice? Anxiety seethes beneath the bubbly surface as she fiddles with her glass. First Gerit with Hilary, then Gregorio, still mourning Libba and just drunk enough to forget. She couldn’t blame him, she’d felt the same way that day. Ready to throw herself into anything but what she’d lost. After him, there were two more that each lasted less than a month after she found them lying about one thing or the other.
Okay, maybe Scylla was right to do that intervention. And maybe Abigail is right about her high standards. But that’s why she’s here. For a fresh start. Trying a civilian; why not? Abs had to fish outside the cousins' gene pool to catch a good one, and what Rae and Scylla have is just dreamy. She could go for living in a lighthouse with two dogs and someone who actually cares for her, not another High Atlantic trying to bag the only single ‘Goddess’.
Idly she scans the nearby streets for the closest taxi rank. When her sight returns to the restaurant plunged in darkness her heart skips, military-honed senses on high alert at the prospect of action. It's almost a disappointment when it seems like it's a regular power cut. The older couple on the table opposite grip hands tightly in the pitch black. The overbearing man in the next booth slides his arm around his date and murmurs in her ear; it's only a matter of time before they start making out in the dark. Her eyes dim. She is so done with this. She tips down her drink like the badass brass she is now and stands to leave. The decision isn't a great one. She can feel the world rotating as she stares at the deteriorating romance of the paper table decorations. Martinis are strong.
Her breath leaves her when she sees another watcher in the dark. The familiar silhouette approaches among the tables, coat swaying as she effortlessly picks a path through the stumbling, blinded diners. Calm washes over Tally like a windless sea, the abrupt drop off of everything around her bringing both peace and dread. She shakes off any emotion resting on her face, folds her arms tightly across her chest to stop her thumping heart from fleeing her.
"No shots this time?" Tally cocks her eyebrows.
"I'm afraid not. May I sit?” Sarah Alder flashes a stiff, awkward smile - one of many things about her that's burned into Tally's memory. Always, she speaks as if nothing has happened between them, and without waiting for an answer she slides into the booth. Tally also plants her butt back down, still glowering, still guarding her heart behind crossed arms.
“Please tell me you're here because a global catastrophe is happening.”
If Alder is here, that means everything is going wrong. She's almost relieved; now she doesn't need to dwell on why her date didn't show up. She watches Alder's eyes scan her surroundings; the lone and empty martini glass, anxious civilians gripping tables and hands in the dark. The booth far from the windows with their backs to the wall, a lesson Tally learned from two assassination attempts in the last year.
"I was summoned at the anniversary of the First Song." An answer, yet not an answer. As usual.
"That was two weeks ago." Tally's arms remain folded.
"It was. It seems this was not the Mother’s doing. She appears to have no purpose for me, and so I am free to go where I wish."
"So you weren't sent? You came here on your own?" Tally tries to keep the expectation out of her voice. She's determined to keep this casual; after all the times she'd been disappointed, she wouldn't be caught off-guard by expecting anything from this woman again. But if Alder was no longer under the Mother's command, and chose to come here, that in itself…she sits up a little straighter. Yeah, she's angry, but if this is something else she's not about to let this chance go to waste.
"You are the first of the Stewards to have stepped off a military base in some weeks, and I do not want my presence to be known."
Tally doesn't bother hiding the hurt on her face as Alder stamps on all her butterflies. Of course this was only because she'd left first. She didn't get chosen. This didn't mean anything. The General was here for something she wanted, and being charming just helped her get it faster. She shifts in her seat. "Is that why you cut the lights?”
“It...was unintentional.” Alder seems caught off guard by the guessed accusation. “I came in through the basement. There were complications.”
“Well, I can't just join your secret mission or whatever to find your purpose in life. I'm on a date.” Tally hisses. Goddess, she sounds like Nicte. Oh, Goddess, is this why Nicte sounds like Nicte?
Alder’s languid sweep of the pitch black restaurant is almost insulting. "Your date doesn't seem very punctual. Perhaps he was caught up with his duties."
"She..." Tally emphasizes for a reaction, straightening as much as the booth seat allows, "...is a civilian. A new witch." She receives no meaningful response to her revelation; Alder simply waits in that enigmatic way. Though Tally doesn't need or want to justify her choices to Alder, the words come out anyway. "It's hard to date in the Army when everyone sees you as a Goddess."
"Being treated as a figurehead and not a person. That must be truly awful for you." Alder crunches on a breadstick, discarding it with a wrinkle of her nose when she finds it drier than her humor. At Tally's lack of response, her head tips. "You've become better at controlling your reactions."
"Yeah, well, you've got worse at controlling yours." Tally retorts, arms wrapping closer around her. Her eyes wander to Alder's throat as she swallows.
The moment is interrupted by a waiter bringing candles. He glances at her new table guest for a beat too long over the flickering light but to the restaurant’s expensive credit, they are as discreet as suggested. The candle is placed on the table along with two sickly sweet red drinks, hearts and curled fruit things sticking out of the crystal goblet glass. Tally manages an unsteady glare from them to her not-date. She was used to Alder doing things that only made sense to her but…ordering these?
“Compliments of the kitchen for being out on Valentine’s Day.” The waiter moves on with a backwards glance, unsure if he just saw a ghost.
Alder regards her unnecessarily furnished drink, discarding the decorative flora and heart shaped straw to down half the sweet concoction straight from the glass. She looks over Tally, savoring a sweet taste she doesn't appear to dislike, and hums. "What's Valentine's Day?”
“Civilians." Tally shrugs. "It's, uh, a thing for lovers, apparently. To celebrate their love. You go to dinner, get the person you're seeing chocolates in heart shaped boxes. That kind of thing." She tries her hardest to keep from completely falling apart as Alder's rapt attention focuses on her, her gaze finding no refuge in the romantic table decorations.
“This civilian witch is your current lover?” Alder tips her head again, seeming to turn this in her mind like a raven picking at junk.
“I was hoping for...something like that. Until someone cut off power.”
“Would you like me to take you to her using the Mycelium?” Alder appeared genuinely willing to do this, which enraged Tally in ways beyond explanation.
“No! No…I don't want to find out if she's lying to me.” If her date had chosen TV and self care, or someone who wasn’t Tally, she didn’t want to know.
“Ah.”
“Don't look like that.”
“No-one worthy of the Craven name?” The veiled statement makes her boil.
“I'm a goddess now, who am I supposed to date? The Mother herself?” As Tally protests, the smile becomes more pronounced. “No! Not like that ..I mean .. Not like that.”
“It's quite all right. I don’t date. I don't believe I have ever been on a date, in fact.” Alder reviews her surroundings with interest. Another flutter of hope rises in Tally, and she slams it down. This is Alder.
“Why are you here?” She hates how her voice gets reedy when she's stressed.
“I would like to find out who summoned me. If the Mother has no use for me, then I fear the forces of this country are calling me back as a weapon.” Alder's jaw ticks. “That time has passed.”
“You’re dodging the call?” Tally smirks with irony, but her dimples dissolve at Alder's earnest, sad-looking nod.
“I am no longer bound to service.” Alder pinches the stem of her glass, watches the liquid. “These past few weeks I have had the ability to travel for myself. I enjoyed it immensely. Did you know the Bohemians rebuilt Prague after the glacier?”
Tally’s hand unfurls, her fingertips pausing a small distance from Alder’s knuckles as she continues to play with the glass.
“It's good that you're seeing the world. You carried it for so long.” She hears her voice wavering again, but she pushes though. The amount of times she's defended Alder's inherent goodness to her sisters, but to her face she's only ever challenged her to be better. She can't remember the last time she thanked her.
“Perhaps you would like to accompany me?” Blue eyes promise the endless frozen horizon they’d gazed at together in the Alps.
“I promised to carry your burdens.” Her voice cracks as purpose and desire split her in two. Alder is always temporary, and Alder does what Alder wants. If she gets closer, the pain next time she breaks a promise is only going to be worse. “I take my promises seriously.”
Alder's expression remains but she does not move her hand. Tally can hear the exhale from her nose, see her chest fall. Promise me. Show me you want this, even a little. The General is capable of incredible passion and commitment to a cause, but it seems never when it comes to other people.
It's the General who rears her head as Alder smiles tightly. “At your next leave, then.”
Tally mirrors her military nod and stands up. She makes it two steps with no clear idea if she's leaving-leaving or just going to the bathroom to hide the inevitable tears when the tether pulls her back.
Surprised blue eyes lift to hers as she kneels back into the booth and touches the surprisingly warm skin of Alder's cheek. They lock eyes and instinct draws Tally forward to press their heads together. She's so close she can feel Alder's breath. But her soul wilts as that breath tapers to nothing, and Alder goes still.
“Tally?”
A woman stands above them, tall and awkward with black hair, a jawline that could cut steel and bright blue-green eyes. She holds flowers. “Um, hi. I'm Katie?”