Chapter Text
Safiya
It is in the deepest part of the old barrow that I find the one I am looking for.
She lies at the centre of a runic barrier. A halfling—stocky by their standards, though I doubt that were she to stand upright she would reach past my hips. A sweet face with rosy, sun-burnt cheeks is framed by a boyish mess of dark curls.
Whatever I might have expected—this halfling isn’t it. My mother is not prone to dramatics or hyperbole. The dire importance that she placed on finding this woman and the lack of answers to justify doing so have built a level of expectation that her appearance does not match. She doesn’t look like an important person, one worth more than all the lives in all the planes. She could be anyone.
As I step closer I notice more details: a thin scar along her jawline, more on her hands and forearms. Flecks of dried blood dot her neck. She stirs at my approach, and as she shifts I see, just visible through the loose strings at the neck of her tunic, a seam in her chest: freshly sutured, raw and bloody. She opens her eyes—
—betrayer, beloved, at last, at last, at last—
—and I feel a tug from within, like a finger crooked beneath my breastbone, pulling me. Toward her. And I wouldn't need the words of anyone else to know that what my mother said was true: whoever this woman is—she isn’t just anyone.
“Lie still,” I say as the last of the magical hold dissipates. “I’m here.”
“Where—”
She reaches for her chest and winces. Her hand comes away smeared with pink. “Where is the shard?”
I feel a pang of sympathy for her. I had hoped that she would be able to answer my questions, but she knows less about her situation than I do, and on top of that she has a ragged hole in her chest. Given her situation, she's very calm. She lets me bandage her wound, asks a few questions—though not as many as I would have asked, were our positions reversed—and her composure remains throughout. She’s hiding her pain well.
I wish I could take the time to properly examine the runes, or to question her, find out why she's so important, but there's no time. As I made my descent I could hear the walls groaning behind me, feel a charge growing in the air. The denizens of this place will not be asleep for much longer.
She pauses at the edge of the tunnel leading out of the chamber. "Was...was there anyone else with me?"
“You were alone when I found you.”
There is a flicker in her expression, a break in her otherwise stoic cheer, like a cloud passing over the sun. I’m not sure whether to press her on it or apologise, but then Kaji speaks and the moment is lost.
“Something ahead in the tunnel moving, mistress. Might be Ipsit and Sefi?”
They would be a welcome sight, but I know it isn’t them. Even if they had made the journey here in double-time (unlikely), they couldn’t be responsible for the rumbling vibration I feel beneath me.
The halfling woman takes a few steps forward, her head tilted to the side. “Your friend has sharp hearing. I heard nothing.” She glances back at me. “Even with these paddles.”
By most demi-human standards her ears are disproportionately large, though I would have thought her typical for a halfling. I think they lend themselves well to a kind of unassuming charm, but I keep this to myself. She might choose to joke about it now, but I think there’s more sensitivity than humour in her laughter.
“Oh—” I almost forgot. “I brought some weapons...in case you needed to defend yourself. Will these suffice?”
I take the short sword from my pack, and hold it out to her by the blade. As she grips the handle there is a subtle change in her demeanour, the releasing of a tension I had not realised was there before. Not so trusting as I had initially thought, then.
She tests the balance of the blade with a few test swings before turning to me.
"Thanks," is all she says, but this time her smile is as genuine as sunlight. I feel its warmth within my chest.
—
By the time we emerge from the barrow darkness has fallen. The Imaskari golem we assembled takes two wobbling half-steps and then collapses into a pile of component parts.
My halfling companion looks down at the pile. "I know exactly how you feel."
She laughs, but there's an unsteady edge to it—one that has been present since whatever magic of hers that claimed the spirit wolf emerged. Purple shadows mark the skin beneath her eyelids as if someone pressed their thumbs into the skin there, and there’s a wincing, tender quality to her movements.
I make a decision.
"We won't reach Mulsantir tonight," I say. "Perhaps a rest is in order."
“We...don’t we need to keep moving?”
—onto us, already found her, must be ready, ready for—
I wince, directing my focus back to the present. I’ve heard these voices all my life, but something has changed. They’ve never hurt before. And now there is a frantic quality to them, a grainy, ever-present anxiety bubbling in the back of my mind. It is...wearing.
“Between the miles of walking, violent elementals, and angry bear spirits...I don’t know about you, but I need to sleep.” I keep my voice soft. “And all that fighting cannot have been good for your wound.”
She looks like she might protest—a familiar reflex, perhaps—then she sags. Her smile turns wry.
“You’re right. I’m sorry—over the last couple of months I’ve become used to urgency.”
I watch her over the flickering light of the campfire. While at first I was merely waiting for an opening to ask my questions, now I watch in increasing incredulity as one of the smallest people I’ve seen eats enough in a single sitting to feed me for three days. She’s ravenous, tearing into the loaf of bread with single-minded intensity.
When she finally looks up long enough to catch my gaze she halts, mid chew. Though it is I who has been caught staring, she is the one that blushes.
"Sorry," she says once she has finally managed to swallow her mouthful. "I swear I'm not usually this much of a pig. I just...can't remember ever being this hungry before."
She brushes the crumbs away and holds out her hand to me.
"We never had the chance to be properly introduced. I'm Hazel Farlong. Knight Captain of Neverwinter."
“I—”
—your attentions were wasted on distant, capricious gods—
Her hand is warm, the callouses provide a pleasant friction against the skin of my palm. Her grip is strong, but not painfully so. Secure. Once again, I feel the tug; a small acceleration of my heartbeat.
She cocks her head. I have been holding her hand for too long. It takes an embarrassing second to remember what I was going to say.
“I...know your name, actually. My mother was the one who sent me to find you—she told me.”
“So you know who I am, then?”
“My mother does...or I assume she does, at least. I can’t be certain. She was maddeningly unwilling to answer my questions, or even to provide more than the barest essential details. I was given your name, a brief description, and told where I would find you. Nothing else—I didn’t know you were from Neverwinter, for example.”
Why? I wonder for what must be the hundredth time. What does this stranger mean to my mother? What does she mean to me? This woman’s life is more important to me than all the lives on all the planes, my mother had said. Treat her as if—
“Were you told that I was injured?”
I swallow. “Yes, hence the bandages. I know as little of you as I know of the woman I’m supposed to take you to—Lienna.”
“You sound frustrated about that,” she says.
I nod. “If I had answers to give you, I would give them.”
She stares at me for a long moment, and I meet her gaze. We’re close enough that I notice a faint band of freckles dusting her cheeks. Finally she nods.
“I believe you.” And then: “Would you tell me of yourself?”
So I do; I tell her of Thay, of my particular interest in the school of transmutation, my position at the academy, and of my mother.
“If you’re the headmistress’ daughter, aren’t you a little too important to be running errands like this?” She grins. “Or should I be flattered?”
My mother’s instructions echo in my mind again, but I shake them aside. “It means that she either did not trust the other instructors to do as she asked, or wanted to keep this a secret from them. Or both. Not an uncommon state of affairs between Red Wizards.”
I wait for the distaste that typically follows recognition of my place amongst the order, but it does not come. Instead, she simply nods, accepting it like any other detail of my life, then asks about Kaji.
I cannot help the fondness in my voice as I speak of him. I’ll never forget the first moment I was able to impart that transformative spark to inanimate matter. My study, my efforts, rewarded: before, mere mud and twigs, and in their place, a friend. It has been a great joy of my life to watch him grow into personhood, quirks and all.
Her smile is soft as she listens to my rambling. “You seem to care for him a great deal.”
That she sees, that she seems to understand—it means a great deal to me. Not everyone has understood—or if they have, it is only as a weakness that they can use to get to me.
In turn, I ask her of herself and, in between bites, she tells me a story almost straight out of a tavern bard’s repertoire; of a peasant hunter’s daughter who embarks of a great quest to stop an ancient guardian of a lost empire. It might be the sort of story that stretches belief to its limit, where one can only respect the teller for the brazenness of their attempt—only, I truly don’t think she’s lying. I’ve seen how she fights. She has the scars. She does not read to me as a braggart—though I wonder, briefly, if she is trying to impress me.
I don’t think she’s told me everything, but—
“...the last thing I remember are the walls of the temple cracking, stones falling all around me.”
“And nothing after that? Not the...shard’s removal, or your placement in the barrow?”
“There were shadows. Then stones. Then you.” She glances away from the fire to me, her smirk a gesture of solidarity. “Maddening, eh?”
I smile, almost despite myself. How does she do that, I wonder. That someone I know so little of should prompt this shared connection. It is just one more question I don’t have an answer for.
I turn away to begin setting up my bedroll for the night. “We should be able to make it to Mulsantir by nightfall tomorrow. I’m told Lienna will be able to explain everything.”
She hums her agreement. “Hopefully we will both get some answers there.”
—
We don’t find answers in Mulsantir at all—instead we find the charred remains of the woman we were supposed to meet and, standing over her bones, an unfortunately familiar problem in an unfortunately familiar form.
“Safiya!?” The panicked jolt of recognition in his voice gives me little satisfaction. As Hazel comes to a stop beside me his eyes bulge even further.
“Why are you here? And why would you travel with this...thing?”
So he knows of Hazel. Interesting.
“This...” I tell her, ignoring him for now, “...overlarge pile of rat droppings is Khai Kmun. One of the most incompetent cretins to ever wear the red robes of Thay.”
She glances up at me, an eyebrow raised. “You two seem to have a history.”
I hear the insinuation. That she would even consider it a possibility rankles. “He’s just another climber who took my polite tolerance as an opportunity to get close to the headmistress.”
I don’t bother to hide my sneer. It’s been years since I willingly conversed with this man, and after all this time, his face still makes my skin crawl.
“He’s also a bottom feeder.” I direct my attention to him. “From the shadow of whose robes have you worked up the nerve to creep from?”
“Things have changed at the academy, Safiya. Araman rewards those who stand with him well. We who stood against Nefris have benefited greatly.”
“You—!” My heartbeat thunders in my ears. “If you have raised a hand against my mother I will extract a thousand screams from your worthless hide. Now tell me why you are here.”
Hazel flicks the blood of Kmun’s apprentice from her blade in a gesture as pointed as the sword she makes it with.
“You’ll tell Safiya what she wants to know, or I’ll show you why this Araman was right to fear me.”
Khai tells me that the disturbance my mother was dealing with when I left grew into a coup. He says that my mother is dead. And all the while, he sounds so pleased with himself.
I grip my staff. “And to think you once claimed to care for me.”
In the end, it is not a thousand screams that I extract from Khai but a water elemental, formed from the blood and fluid that I wrench from his now desiccated husk. The brutality, while appropriate, provides little comfort.
Hazel, standing amidst the remains of gnolls and summoned demons, wipes the blood from her eyes. That this woman, virtually a stranger, would not hesitate to face such danger beside me...it affirms what, in some intrinsic, intangible fashion, I have known from the start: she is important. Special.
“Thank you. For standing with me, against him.”
She shrugs affably. “It was nothing. You can make it up to me by helping the next time a rival wizard shows up from my past.”
She winks. I start to laugh, but it dies in my throat as Khai’s words sink in.
“Safiya...if what he said about your mother is true...I’m so very sorry.”
“He might have been lying. I should not have let him get to me like that.”
The voices have quieted and in their place is an absence that feels like pain. Something is not right. Khai may have been trying to get a rise out of me, but I fear that he spoke the truth. The story he told was certainly feasible.
The...politics of Thay have always been an ever-present reality of life, but I’d thought of it as something distant, a hazard of life outside of the academy walls. Always another’s problem. I was wrong, and here is the proof—lying all around me. The danger was here all along, and now it may have taken my mother.
“I understand if you need to go back to Thay. I’ll...miss you, though.”
I shake my head. “I appreciate it, but...if what Khai said is true, then this—my accompanying you, that is—was my mother’s last wish. Were mine and my mother’s positions reversed, she would be...utterly merciless in her retribution. I will honour her by completing this task, and when it is through I will see that Araman pays, and pays dearly.”
She looks down at what remains of Lienna, then back to me. “I would assist you in that...if you aren’t sick of me by then, of course.”
Her smile is crooked, and a little sad. I think: anyone else would have run off by now. Why haven’t you? And: Why do I feel like I can trust you?
We’re both on our own in this strange land. Alone, together.
—
We wander amidst the stalls of the bazaar. The colourful pennants and banners strung between each installation do little to mask the tension in the air, nor how empty this place is. Mulsantir is bunkered down against the oncoming storm. An army of spirits bays for blood at the gates and the one they want is—once again—trying to eat her own body’s weight in bread.
"Cyrollalee's bosom, this is good. D'ya want some, Safiya?"
Hazel offers the breast-blessed treat—fried bread, dusted with spices and sugar— up to me. I can't remember the stall she bought it from.
I flick a glance to the nearest one, and the old woman on the other side of the counter glares back. The hood I wear to hide my tattoos itches against my scalp. It's possible she's simply wary, distrustful of all foreigners, but I won't take the chance.
Hazel catches the motion, and follows my gaze to the stall owner. All my life I have found trying to decipher the inner workings of those around me to be tedious and inscrutable. Now, when Hazel turns back, I can almost see on her face the process in how her thoughts scatter, roll, and settle, like a handful coppers dropped into a beggar's tin.
Finally, she looks up at me. "Is it them, or me, that you think’d poison you?"
My surprise must show on my face.
She shrugs. "Educated guess. I had a...gods, I don't even know what he was to me in the end. A treacherous ally? A lousy vassal? Point is...he wouldn't eat anything he hadn't caught and cooked himself. From the little he told me of his past, I gathered he also came from a place where treachery and infighting between the ruling mages is the standard."
When I don’t immediately reply, she sighs. “I’m sorry for the assumption. Meant nothing. Don’t mind me.”
She's given me an out. I don't have to say anything. I also know she finds it difficult to talk about those she travelled with—a silence born from pain, I think. To speak of them now...it’s an act of trust on her part. And I don't want her to think I don't trust her—any more than I want her not to trust me.
"I was seven when my mother first taught me about poisons."
My voice is unsteady. This sharing is unfamiliar to me. She looks back at me, then away. But I can tell she's listening, offering me room to continue at my own pace.
"That is simply the way of it, in Thay. It would not surprise me if others had such conversations even earlier. It is all but expected that one should be willing to do whatever it takes to rise above their station. That is not the expectation that was given to me, but...well, I had more than a few classmates who did not heed the lesson not to trust food from...outside hands."
"They died?"
"The lucky ones did."
Poison is deadly, my mother had said, not because it is dangerous—fire, magic, and steel are all dangerous, after all—but because it comes masked as something else. Nurture. Sustenance. A gift delivered under the guise of friendship. Sweet wine shared between would-be lovers.
Be aware. Be alert. Trust none of it.
"Hazel, I meant no offence. Much like your...friend, it has been a long time since I have eaten anything I am not certain of. And you know what they say about old habits."
She grins. "Prob'ly the same thing they say about toothaches—that they'll make you miss out on a lot of tasty food."
She takes a large bite out of the piece she offered before, chews it, and swallows.
"I’ll let you know if I feel like keeling over. And in the meantime..." She tears off a small chunk and hands it to me. "If you change your mind. No pressure. And Saifya…"
She looks at me, soft and sincere, and for a moment I forget to breathe.
“...thanks for telling me.”
She walks off to inspect the wares of another vendor and I am left with this sweet piece of fried dough dusting my fingertips with sugar crumbs. I should throw it away.
As a frightened child I had asked my mother how I could protect myself against these poisons. Vigilance, she had responded. Vigilance and knowledge. Take a little of what is before you between your lips. Does it tingle? Does it burn? Does moisture wither from its' touch? Poison is insidious, but only to the unaware. There is no poison in the world that will not show itself under careful scrutiny.
All you need do is apply the right kind of pressure and it will reveal itself.
I tear off the smallest fraction, little more than a few crumbs, and place it between my lips.
I’m lost in my thoughts, so I don’t notice the men approach until they are all but on top of me. Their tunics are loose, skin tanned and calloused, palms marked by rope burn. Beneath the cloud of ale-stink that wafts in their wake is the briny smell of the river. The leader stands over me, anger in his eyes.
I curse myself for my distraction. If he decides to use that sabre, I won’t have time to cast a protection.
“You,” he rumbles. “We’re locked in here. The beasts ’re out for blood. Cargo’s rotting on the deck. And I know you’re the one to blame.”
A small cough comes from beneath our eye-lines.
“Actually, that would be me. I’m the one you want.”
Hazel subtly situates herself between me and the sailor. The comparison between this lumbering ox of a man and my halfling defender would be almost comical. But I know what she can do, and now I have the room I need to cast.
"Is there a problem?" she asks. "We’re trying to take care of it. The witches have given us leave to prepare as we please. Do it right, do it once, you know?"
"We don’t answer to them, runt. And," he points a meaty finger at my face, "we know that one's a Thayan. And there's no way we've stooped so low as to allow one of theirs under our protection. We give you to the beasts, and we can all sleep easy."
Hazel's hand finds the hilt of her blade.
"She's with me. And if you don't leave her alone, you'll regret it."
"Hazel," I hiss. "I...appreciate you standing up for me, but it only seems to have made them more—"
Blades are drawn. I move to cast. When the smoke clears we stand over the broken bodies of four sailors, now staining the dust of the market with their blood.
I turn to Hazel.
"I can take care these sorts of problems alone, you know. You didn't have to step in."
"I know you can handle yourself. That isn’t—"
"This could have been avoided."
"I don't think it could. They wanted a fight—they only happened to find you first. Would you have left me to deal with them alone?"
“Of course not.”
She nods, as if I’ve confirmed what she already knew for a fact. But how can she know that? How can she be sure?
And yet, I already feel like I have an answer to that, because I am sure. I will not leave her to face this trial alone. I find myself looking out for her in battle. Readying spells based on what I anticipate she’ll do...in the same way that she seems to almost instinctively place herself between me and harm’s way. Is it so surprising, then, that she seems to trust me, almost implicitly?
She looks up, and I’m drawn to her eyes. Into them.
“It’s a bit strange—you seem sorta...familiar. Like I’ve known you for a long time. Is that...do you know what I mean?"
From anyone else I would dismiss it as a line. And yet...I can’t help but wonder. Because I feel the pull.
Feelings are not to be trusted. They can be manipulated and misled. They are vulnerable to well-spun words by those that would hide their true face.
If I would turn to facts, then what do they show? That, over and over, Hazel’s actions are those of a true friend. What do the facts say, if not that I am right to consider her...special?
And then, here she is, openly saying that this...bond, between us...is something mutual. Shared.
In spite of everything—in spite of myself—I want to trust her.
She rubs the back of neck, smile turning sheepish. “...eh. That was a bit weird, wasn’t it? Don’t w—”
"Yes," I say. "I know what you mean."
—
There’s been something off about me, lately.
When my mind wanders (and I find it wanders far too often of late), my gaze will drift, sliding, unseeing, over my work, our other companions, everything around me...until it comes to rest, inevitably, on her. And when it does more often than not I catch her as her eyes flick away, caught in a similar moment to the one I now find myself in. Sometimes, it is she that catches me.
Perhaps I should simply be grateful that the person I was instructed to watch over is someone I can tolerate. It doesn’t happen very often. And not merely tolerate—I want more of her.
She is kind. She is warm. She shows interest in the things that matter so much to me that I am almost embarrassed to admit that I care about them. But there is something else to our interactions. A weighted charge, the remnants of which I feel in every lingering glance, every time it takes a half second longer than it should for us to look away.
We circle each other. Coming close then swinging past each other, like celestial bodies in an unstable orbit.
I keep waiting for the moment the rug is pulled from under me, and she reveals her true intentions. It's what I've come to expect from life amongst duplicitous red wizards. Distraction is death.
Only, the knife never comes.
I learn quickly—watching her attempt to pull one over a pair of Hathran spirits for the sake of a hag—that she is a terrible liar. Everything she thinks is writ plain across her face. There are times when she cuts herself off mid-sentence, and becomes distant. Holding herself back from painful subjects. But whenever we speak she is honest and forthright.
For all my life I have felt incomplete. An aching, gnawing sensation in my heart, as if the boundaries in which I have expanded to fit into, to become the person I am today are...jagged. A sensation that what is there is not all that should be there, that what remains is not all that ever was.
When she is near me, close enough that I can feel the warmth of her skin; when I hear her laugh, see the way her eyes search for me wherever we go—that ache is...lessened. Not mended, exactly—I am not a broken thing—but...more whole. New growth over an old wound.
Is this what it feels like to have a friend? There have been so few over the years. None quite like her.
To be human is to be alone within oneself—or so I am told. The voices that have plagued me all my life are, in a way, the exception that proves the rule. We cannot truly know the mind of another. Perhaps I am not unique in this feeling of incompleteness.
So when I look at her lately, I wonder: do you feel this ache too? A desire for completion? As you do for me, do I make you, too, feel a little more...whole?
—
The lake and its’ portal to Coveya Kurg'annis slowly recede behind us. By my thoughts remain in that dingy, underwater temple. Hazel was lost in the hag’s dream for almost the entire day. As I waited I found myself reconsidering Gann’s ability to walk in dreams as more than merely a romantic framing of his penchant for snooping through the minds of others.
She walks beside me as she usually does, her eyes distant, expression thoughtful. She glances up when she notices I’ve been staring at her.
"I realise that dreams are something of a personal subject, so forgive me for asking—but if you would, will you tell me what you saw in the hags' dream?"
She takes a moment to respond, thinking it through, choosing her words.
“I saw...I think it was Araman. And a woman in red—she looked just like you.”
“Was she me?”
“I don’t think so. The resemblance was...uncanny, yes, and she seemed to know me, but...she and Araman seemed to know each other. I get the sense there were some old wounds between them. Does that sound right to you?”
Before his uprising, I hadn’t given the man much thought at all.
“The only one who looks like me is my mother, but...why would you dream of her?”
She chews at the inside of her cheek. “Araman seemed to know me too. Spoke to me like I was his sibling—a brother.”
“His brother? There’s no way you’d have any relation to that backstabbing—”
She coughs into her closed fist. “Well...yeah. I know I’m not exactly a, uh, paragon of femininity,”—she gives her metal breastplate a quick rap with her knuckles—“but I think even Araman would know that a halfling isn’t his sibling.”
What are you talking about? I want to say. You’re beautiful. It takes me by surprise just how strongly I believe it, but it’s true—the more time we spend together, the harder it is not to simply stare, taken in by how lovely she is. She has a radiant vitality to her, a sparkling, unassuming charm. She is beautiful in the way that an apple can be beautiful, in the way of those first days of spring when the snow thaws and the buds sprout.
I shake my head. What is going on with me lately?
“...of course, you’re right. There isn’t really any correlation between the dreaming and waking world after all.”
“Or there’s something else at play. I think that in that dream I wasn’t me. I was playing a role of someone they both knew. Also, I...was made to choose between duty and love. I, uh. Chose love.”
Scarlet dusts her cheeks. It’s an appealing look on her, and I want to tease her, to see more of it. I could ask which of the two represented love, but the thought of what her answer might be stops me. It’s a line I’m not yet brave enough to cross.
“So that’s it. The hag’s dream.” Her laugh is awkward, self-conscious. “Would you tell me what you dream of?”
"You want to know...about my dreams? As in, the kind that come at night, while we rest? Sorry to disappoint, but they're only ordinary dreams—not like yours. I'll remind you, I wasn't drawn in by the coven in the same way you were."
"'Drawn in?' You say that like I wanted it to happen."
“It seems you tend to find your way amidst exotic, arcane women...masked witches, a coven of hags, a red wizard by your side. If such is what you want, you cannot deny that Rasheman has been very good to you.”
“You’re right. Perhaps I should be thanking whoever inflicted this on me.”
“So you’d say that a curse that I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy has been...worth it?”
“Well. I’d say it hasn’t been all bad.” She fixes me with a look, sincerity shining in those big, green eyes. The air hangs still, the world falls away, and for a moment it’s just the two of us. And then the slightest crook at the edge of her lips turns her smile to a smirk. “I can’t help that hags and witches are so desirable.”
“In that case you would certainly have found your ideal woman amongst the coven. Well...be careful then. Arcane women make for dangerous mates.”
She looks down, laughing, twisting a lock of hair at the base of her neck between her fingers. “I’ll keep that in mind.”
“Why do you want to know about my dreams?”
“Curiosity?”
“Are you asking me or telling me?”
“Uh. I guess...I am just curious. Like you said though—dreams are personal, so I'd understand if you don't to talk about them. But if you're willing, it would be a...worthwhile exchange of knowledge?"
Her attempt to engage me with academic terms is endearing in its transparency. "'Fair's fair', is it?"
"There’s no obligation. Only whatever you're willing to give."
And there it is. It is difficult to throw off habits formed over a lifetime. I have learned to give nothing away, lest it be used against me. It's been so long since there has been anyone other than Kaji with whom I can fully let down my guard. She makes me want to try. To be open, and honest. I want her to know me. For her to feel able to say those things that pain her to silence.
"I...dream of running late to practical examination. I dream that I’ve left the burner on all night and spoiled my batch of reagents. I dream of giving a lecture, only to realise halfway through that I am naked."
It could be my imagination that faint red flush at the tips of her ears. But I don't think it is.
"I dream...of the first time I found one of my humunculi friends...disassembled by one of the other students. I dream of a laboratory, deep within the earth, with hundred upon hundred soul vessels lining the shelves. I dream of the bones of something massive, ancient, and cruel, sneering down at me. I dream of a wall, crushing me within it, mortared by countless other screaming bodies..."
A hand takes mine, holds it tight. "You don't have to continue."
I shake my head. I want to. If I'm not careful that compassion might become something I crave. But I don't want to be careful.
"And I dream...of you."
I am deliberately looking ahead at the horizon when I say this, so I cannot see her face. I still feel her surprise though, in the way her grip tightens, ever so slightly, in my hand. But she does not let go.
Finally, she asks: "Are they...good dreams?"
I want to say that I dream of us in another place, another time—us, and yet not us. I dream of her on the steps of a great temple. She laughs at my poorly concealed disdain, seemingly charmed by my blasphemy. I dream that we lie on a hill, side by side, beneath open sky. The hours are endless, and they are never enough. I dream that she is missing, forever lost to me, and it is a hole in my chest that I can never recover from.
I want to say all that, but it feels like too much, too soon. I trust her, but there's only so much vulnerability I can stand. So I settle on a smaller truth.
"Sometimes," I tell her. "Sometimes, I dream of this."
I squeeze her hand, and she responds in kind. And we stay that way until the sun rises and the watery temple is long behind us.
—
From across the Veil, the sound of laughter draws my attention.
I see Hazel standing on one of the theatre’s seats, closer to eye level, her back to me. The celestial, Kaelyn, listens with her head tilted, her wings framing and bracketing their conversation. Those preternaturally beautiful, beatific features show something like fond bemusement. Warmth. Maybe even admiration.
An unpleasant prickling heat spreads across my chest. I roll my shoulders, attempting to shake the sensation off, and the ink pot I was dipping into is nudged off the tray. It rolls, leaving a semicircle of spilled ink on the floorboards. A growl escapes my throat, and I stand to my feet.
Hazel starts to call after me, but I cut her off.
"I cannot focus here."
I cannot help the hardness in my voice, even as I regret it. This possessiveness bothers me. I should be above this sort of thing. These are not the initiate dorms, and Kaelyn has not stolen away my favourite toy. The two of them have a lot in common—idealistic crusaders both, in their own ways. I’m not surprised they get along. With the odds against us, it should be a good thing that we do not face the dangers alone.
Hazel is warm, and good, and beautiful, and I would not be the first to notice as such. I shouldn't feel betrayed that her true smile is not saved solely for me.
I take a seat at one of the tables in the backroom of the Veil, but the sensation doesn't leave me—if anything, it has grown even stronger. It stings. It aches. It burns my throat with every breath.
Beauty is everywhere. So many pretty faces in passing, yet none have made me feel this way.
Watch for gifts delivered under the guise of friendship, Nefris once said. Guise—it implies a falsehood. But is it a lie if the one who tells it doesn’t know that they’re lying? If the one who hears it is not betrayed? This bond doesn’t feel like a lie. It feels like truth, in part. Not false—incomplete.
Perhaps the danger was never the lie. Perhaps it is that you will come to want what is offered—so much so that you forget to be suspicious.
I think of sugary crumbs between my lips. The warmth of her hand in mine. A dream of my hand in her hair, drawing her closer, closer.
My heart beats rapidly. Heat suffuses my skin.
Maybe this is a poison.
If it is, it has been one that I drank of deeply, willingly, drawing it into myself like it was the sweetest wine.
A sweet, sweet poison; infusing my blood, resting in my bones.