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It was late into the ship's night cycle, long past when Hostilia should have put down her work and gone to bed, when Idira burst into her study. She looked frazzled, wild eyes darting around desperately, and Hostilia could hear the sound of the ship guards following just behind her.
Hostilia was half way up and across the room in seconds, and had an arm protectively wrapped around Idira's shoulder before the guards could get to her. “It's alright, back to your posts,” she ordered, jaw set and voice firm, and neither of them dared even think to protest her orders. The pair retreated, one casting one last glance over her shoulder at the two of them, before returning to guard the entrance.
When the door finally clicked closed behind them, Hostilia turned her full attention to the young psyker in her arms. She recognized that far away look in Idira's eyes, the one that meant she was more in the world of her 'friends' than the material world with her. Her hands were clinging to Hostilia's shirt for dear life, and she realized as her attention refocused that Idira was talking – not the floaty, dreamlike voice she often had during her prophecies but fast, panic-stricken and desperate.
The voices, Idira's ‘friends’, had evidently started forecasting Hostilia's doom. In a minute, Hostilia would be heart-warmed by the fact that this had spurred Idira to practically break down the door, but in that current moment she was more concerned with bringing Idira down to earth before she had a full blown panic attack.
“- miserable fate cloaked in a friendly disguise, they said it would fill the world in red and gold, that you would end just as you started, that -” Idira sounded so scared, it broke Hostilia's heart. She gently pulled at Idira's hands, peeling them from her shirt and instead holding them in her own and squeezing gently.
She could piece together whatever the cryptic message was later. For now she cared more about her friend in front of her.
“Idira, there’s no end here, it’s alright,” she comforted, trying to find the words to break her from her haze.
“It’s coming, it’s coming still! The end and the beginning!” Idira’s voice was a choked sob. “Flame and fire and freezing cold all colliding into one great explosion that will be the end of us all!”
“Idira – hey, Idira, look at me. Look at me.” Even as Hostilia took Idira's chin in her hands and forced her gaze, she could see her eyes wandering and struggling to settle on just her form. “I'm alright, see? Completely fine.”
But Idira was still hyperventilating, mumbling something about what the whispers had told her – were likely still telling her. So Hostilia did the first and only thing she could think of to reassure her – she took Idira's hand and slipped it under the collar of her shirt, pressing her palm over the breastbone so she would feel the beating of her heart beneath her fingertips.
“Focus on my heartbeat. On my breathing. Let them drown out the whispers. Whatever they warned you of, it did not come to pass.” Or it hadn't yet come to pass, but Hostilia wasn't about to say that out loud.
For the first time in the past few minutes, Idira's gaze came into focus, staring at her hand as her palm pressed firmer against the drum of Hostilia’s heartbeat.
“Lord Captain I -” her voice was only cheerful by force, and Hostilia could tell the adrenaline of the moment was abating by the way Idira was starting to shake. “I swear, I wasn't peaking or spying on you or anything. I know better than to look where I am not supposed to! But my friends were suddenly so loud and I-”
Hostilia sighed gently, lovingly, and brushed a short dark hair back behind Idira's ear. “I'm not upset with you,” she promised firmly, cutting off Idira’s worry before this new anxiety could take hold. “You're not in trouble. I will never be upset with you for trying to warn me of danger, false alarm or -”
She was interrupted by a sharp, abrupt, regulation knock to the door. It came so suddenly and broke their intimate quiet so sharply they both jumped, pulling away and giggling softly like school children.
“Yes?” Hostilia turned to look to the door, wondering who else might be calling on her at this hour.
“Lord Captain? Forgive me, I saw the witch run this way and I feared something might -”
Hostilia was suddenly glad she and Idira had pulled away, so that the young psyker wouldn't feel her heart rate spike. She pushed off her desk, taking a deep breath as she walked to the door.
“Sister Argenta,” she greeted warmly as she opened the door, smiling at the woman.
“Thank the emperor you're alright! I -”
“Everything is fine Argenta. Idira was worried about me, but it was just a false alarm.” Was it? For Argenta to have seen Idira running this way – had she already been on her way over? For what? Perhaps Idira's whispers had been right – they could have seen a future where, without her interruption, there was a confrontation that ended badly.
“Lord Captain? Are you alright?” Curse Argenta for sounding so gentle, so honestly concerned. It made everything all the more complicated.
Not for the first time, Hostilia was glad that among Idira’s many talents, true telepathy and mind reading did not seem to appear.
“Just tired, and not expecting so many visitors at this late hour. I was just about to turn in when Idira came to check on me.” Hostilia did her best to inject some warmth into her voice. Argenta was, after all, a friend. One who seemed to be genuinely worried. “Was there anything else you needed?”
Argenta hesitated a moment. “There... there was, but you’re right, it's late. It can wait until another day.”
“Alright. Good night Sister.”
“Good night Hostilia.”
Argenta turned away, and Hostilia shut the door, willing her heart to stop racing. Things were fine. It had been a nice, pleasant conversation.
But what would it have been if Idira hadn’t gotten here first?
Hostilia turned back to Idira, and offered her a tired smile that was immediately reciprocated. It seemed that while the conversation with Argenta had only worked Hostilia up more, it had given Idira much needed time to calm down.
Impressive, given what spending time in close proximity to Argenta usually did to Idira’s moods.
“Lord Captain,” Idira started, leaning back against the desk. “I... apologize, for disturbing you so late. I can also leave, so that you are no longer disturbed for the evening.”
For a moment, Hostilia was caught in a prophetic vision of her own – Argenta, clearly still on guard after seeing Idira, running into her again in the halls as Idira made her way back. It was so easy to spark an argument between the two, and if Argenta was running at all hot. Did she ever not have a weapon on her – when did a Sororitas ever go without one? Hostilia didn’t, and she’d been out of the order much longer than she’d been in it at this point. She could practically hear the yelling, the gun shot, the pained cry.
It was a terrible way to think of a friend. But in her mind she could still see Theodora and Mort. Perfect, precise, practised shots, taken before even thinking to ask questions.
“Lord Captain?” Idira prompted, sensing something was wrong. “I will -”
“Stay,” Hostilia said firmly, a warm, protective fire burning in her chest. “Even just a little longer. I am not too tired to have you here – just too tired to adjudicate the inevitable argument that would break out if you were both here.” Barely even a white lie. “We can try and work out what the whispers were telling you. Or if you’d rather, I can pour us both a drink and we can relax. I believe we have both promised each other stories at one point or another.”
Idira gave her a smile, crooked but real. “Stories from our secretive Lord Captain’s life and her good alcohol? Aren’t I special.”
Hostilia laughed, moving to grab glasses and a decanter full of a deep golden liquid. “Perhaps I tell you about my adventures with Brobson’s Folly – which, luckily for you is not this bottle, but I believe I still have one or two of the only remaining bottles of on the ship.”
“You believe?”
“Well I’m fairly certain I would have heard if they detonated. Or if some poor sod broke into them and got a nasty surprise after taking a swig. But one can never be sure.”
Idira stared at her for a moment, waiting to see if she was joking, before taking her glass and settling happily at one of the little side tables scattered around Hostilia’s quarters. “By all means, please,” she requested. “I would like to know how to avoid these – not that I ever go stealing through our illustrious Captain’s private stash!”
Hostilia knew she should be turning in, but instead she sat down and began her tale.
The two passed a couple of hours and roughly half the decanter this way, trading stories, until Hostilia was pleasantly tipsy and Idira looked so tired she could barely keep her eyes open.
“Here,” Hostilia whispered, waving for Idira to stay seated as she rose to fetch a spare blanket she knew she had in her closet, and gently covered Idira in it. Her poor friend was too tipsy and tired to even protest, instead just making herself comfortable in her chair.
“Good night Idira,” Hostilia whispered, reaching out and ruffling her hair as she mumbled something that sounded like ‘good night lord captain’, but was a little too slurred to be certain.
The protective inferno in Hostilia’s chest had long since returned to it’s normal state of a small but steady flame, but a small flare did arise as she cast one last glance back to Idira in the chair. She was glad she’d stayed. Asleep like this, she seemed so much smaller.
She knew the fate of psykers, most did. But fate had a way of behaving strangely around her. Perhaps the Emperor had grander plans for her.
Perhaps she could convince him to have grander plans for Idira too.