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Madeleine had underestimated how much she would miss the sun. Not in the ways that one would expect, but in the way every one of her daydreams consisted of a dusty ray of sun shining over her lover's face. She longed for that, to see Claudia lit up by the sky itself. The way she saw Claudia in her mind's eye would be magical if realized, she was sure of it. This little vampire had walked into her life and changed it all. Claudia was something magical as it was, and Madeleine didn't want to seem ungrateful for the life they were building together by the moonlight.
But it prodded at her mind as they travelled, sleeping their days out in abandoned house cellars and sometimes under just the dirt on unlucky nights.
"Mon amour?" Madeleine decided one night as they walked the streets of London that she wanted to finally ask the question plaguing her mind.
"What is it?" Claudia replied casually.
Madeleine hesitated then. She'd hate to give Claudia the wrong impression, but she needed to know.
Claudia must've noted the hesitation and seriousness on Madeleine's face because she took her by the arm and guided her over to a nearby bench.
"Is something wrong?" Claudia asked.
"No," Madeleine clarified, "I just have a question. I'm unsure how you'll take it."
"Alright?"
"Will the sun truly kill us?" she asked finally.
Claudia's brows furrowed briefly, seemingly confused by how this was such a severe question.
"Well, yes. I wouldn't lie to you."
"I didn't think that. I only wondered if that was something the others told you. Maybe-"
"Madeleine." Claudia cut her off, making Madeleine look directly at her. "It's true. I've-" Claudia swallowed. "I've tested it."
Madeleine was not surprised by this admission, but she was worried about the manner by which Claudia revealed it to her. As if it were shameful.
"How did you?" Madeleine asked.
In a hushed voice, Claudia told her about Charlie. About his charm and accidental death and the depression that followed her afterwards. How she'd opened the skylight for purely selfish reasons. She stuck her arm under the light to feel pain because it was something to feel. Madeleine sat and listened to her lover intently, really chewing on each piece of the story.
"It isn't your fault," Madeleine told her once Claudia had finished.
"What isn't?"
"Charlie. What happened to him...If I had the gifts I have now at 18, I'm sure I'd have found myself in similar accidents. You didn't mean to, you said that yourself, so why do you still hold it against yourself?"
Claudia recoiled slightly. "I don't."
"I see it on your face, mon amour." Madeleine studied Claudia's expression and thought back to her conversation with Armand before she'd been turned. "Promise me that if something were to happen to me, you wont go into the sun."
Claudia opened her mouth as if to argue she never would, but by this point of companionship, she must know that Madeleine knew her well enough to ask for such a promise. So, Claudia closed her mouth and nodded.
They shared a tender embrace before rising from the bench.
"One more thing," Claudia said before they continued walking, "please don't test the sun's power against us. Just take my word this time. Okay?"
Madeleine gave Claudia's hand a squeeze. "I trust you. Don't worry. No more sun for me. You're all the light I need."
Claudia crinkled her nose with a chuckle at the light flirting, then they continued into the night.