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Beau’s room was entirely quiet but for the sound of contented breathing. Yasha’s breathing, her chest rising and falling against the monk’s back. Warm. Suffocating. This day had been the best of her life. The woman. The date. The sex. It was all so perfect, everything she could have ever wanted, and it made her nauseous.
Because her father’s words were plaguing her head now, goaded by her state of exhaustion. She had been happy, then he’d reminded her that she didn’t deserve it as she looked up at herself in the mirror, and saw how the back of her left hand glowed. Foolish, selfish child, he spat, voice like burning coals in the pit of her stomach. The smoke that drifted from them clouded her throat and made it very hard for her lungs to pull in air, but expertly, she kept her wheezing silent. You don’t care about anyone but yourself. When will you learn that the world doesn’t revolve around you. It doesn’t give a shit about you.
Beau worried that if she moved she would wake the angel next to her, so she stayed stock still when it felt like she was on fire everywhere that something touched her. Desperately she wanted to get away, wanted to be free of nothing. Because truly it was nothing. Just words, right? She could handle words. She was a badass monk, of course she could handle the whispered words of her father without freaking the fuck out.
Unfortunately, while her brain whirred on, her gaze remained locked on the eye. The glowing red eye that seemed to stare back at her. It proved the voice right, and she hated it.
Because she was selfish. She was everything he had ever called her: selfish, ungrateful, disgusting, self-centered, abhorrent, disappointing. Selfish, selfish, selfish. Gods, look what she had done. She had gone and read through that book like a headstrong idiot, and made herself a danger to the Nein. To Yasha.
Beau should have left the moment they found the eye. It was a gateway to all the bad they had pledged to fight. But instead of distancing herself as she should have, she had pulled the woman she loved into her arms. She had put Yasha in danger. She was still doing so by selfishly laying next to her.
Nobody's going to love you because you don’t deserve it, Beauregard.
But she remained still. The monk had a very impressive willpower, see, and this made it so that she could last out against her body as it panicked. She could stay motionless as more and more air squeezed from her lungs as if her chest was collapsing, or as her vision started to swim and her heartbeat became so loud in her ears that her head rattled.
If she woke up the assimar, her weakness would be revealed. And that was selfish too.
It seemed to be a cycle she couldn’t escape. For the first many years of her life she’d intended it that way because she hated herself and the others around her just that much. But now she had friends, a family, that she was trying to be better for. Except really what she was doing was being manipulative. Somehow she had convinced them to stay by her side after her actions had put them in jeopardy. Being ‘better for them’ meant leaving, meant being alone in life for the first time in months, and she was too selfish to realize that.
No. The reason she wasn’t moving was because she was scared that it would be the first step toward going for good.
Selfish.
So eventually she did move, slowly, professionally, she slid from the bed, swaying as she went to the bathroom. It was colder there, but this brought no relief as it seemed her skin was on fire. Bitch, hissed his voice. And for all the times she’d been called that in her life it never hurt so bad as it did then. Her chest twisted violently as a result, and suddenly Beau was losing the battle to keep this quiet. All the strength that remained went into closing the door without even a creak so that her collapse against the bathtub was muffled.
She couldn’t breathe.
Breathing burned and there was never enough air. Never enough. Never enough. Her hands couldn’t figure out whether to claw at her throat as it closed or her head to rip open the flesh, reach into the skull beneath, and wrench out all the vile words. Selfish. Selfish bitch, you’ll die alone. No one loves you. They should leave you. You deserve it. Deserve it. Die. Die. Die. D–
Something shattered, ripping her back to reality to see that glass littered the floor. She thought her muscles might have moved, vaguely remembered fingers grasping something, the motion of throwing it, and there was a cup rolling away from her now.
The bathroom lacked its mirror, but thousands of its broken pieces on the floor still reflected back at the monk as she gasped and gasped, showing her a picture of someone she couldn’t recognize. Was that blatant terror in her eyes? Her skin was flushed and wet with sweat. She looked so terrified that it must not have been her, because she didn’t look like that.
There was glass in her legs, little jagged bits of it. Typically she never would have minded, would have looked away and dealt with the pain as it came. But her fragile state pulled her instead to rip them out of her flesh, frantic, because it burned. It all burned, and she was dying. Suffocating. Burning. Selfish.
The eye was staring at her as her hand pulled out shard after shard, piercing straight into her soul, probably seeing all. She didn’t want it to see her. She hated it. Would it see how selfish she was? How she was a disgusting human being who deserved to be alone. It was it’s fault, this time anyway, that she deserved it, that she needed to leave. The eye’s fault. Her fault.
Her blood was the same color, it was everywhere now, but she hardly saw it, hardly saw anything at this point because her vision was warping and two other eyes stretched out from the first. And she couldn’t look away as the rest of the world became lost.
She had to get rid of it. Had to. Had to get rid of it. Now. Quickly. Before it saw… saw…
A pale hand grabbed her right wrist at the same time fingers grasped her chin and forced her head to turn. It wasn’t rough by any means, but Beau was so out of it that it felt like her entire world had turned upside down. There was nothing but hatred and guilt and pain. Then Yasha’s face, her lips moving as if saying words but sound didn’t exist. She didn’t need sound, the expression was clear enough.
Except this wasn’t Yasha, because Yasha looked terrified too, and that was unrecognizable.
She wanted to writhe, tried to, but she had no control over her own limbs as the trembling overtook those muscles and rendered them useless. And when sound did come back, the very first thing she could hear was her own sobbing. When had she started crying? Beau never cried. She hated tears. Hated herself. Hated the eye.
“Beau?” Yasha pleaded not for the first time. “Please, you’re scaring me.”
Yasha didn’t get scared.
The monk tried to say something but the words got caught in her throat, lodged there like food, and she was choking. Lucien’s hand clutching her neck, red eyes, nine of them, staring intently at her. Seeing. It was blood that she was choking on, head rocked with pain as it spilled from her mouth, her eyes, her ears, to the ground. The ground, the snow, the tile of the bathroom. Puddled, red, thick and hot and everywhere.
“S-sorry,” is the first of what she does manage. It burned to speak, but worse than that was the way Yasha looked at her and how it made her realize that she’d ruined their perfect night. How selfish of Beau. “Didn’t m– didn’t mean to—” she cut herself off with a gasp, so she tried to reach for her throat as if to pull it open but Yasha’s hold was strong. A death grip. She looked a bit like she’d seen a ghost.
Then for the briefest moment, that hold intensified as she pressed her fingers against pressure points that Beau distantly knew, and forced her hand which had been closed to open. Something fell out, clattering to the floor. The assimar didn’t allow her to see what it was.
Instead, she brought the monk’s hand to rest on her pale chest, just above where her heart raced.
“I need you to breathe with me. Please. In and out like this.” Yasha demonstrated, and Beau did her very best to follow instructions but it took a great many minutes and a lot of gentle coaxing. It was easier when she could feel the rise and fall of the barbarian’s lungs, the relentless pounding of a heart stable enough to grapple onto. Eventually she noticed how bloody her own fingers were. How much her legs hurt. How the back of her left hand hurt worse. She couldn’t move it.
“What are a couple things you can hear right now?”
It took several moments to process that, but when she did: “Th-the clock.” It was ticking in the other room, the pendulum swinging. If she focused hard enough, she could hear things scurrying from within the walls. “The cats. Your b-breathing.”
“Good, Beau.” The effect was tremendous. Subconsciously, her body was relaxing, tensed muscles easing up. There even sparked the beginnings of a flirtatious remark. “What can you see?”
“Your eyes. They’re mismatched.” Yasha nodded.
“What colors?”
“Purple and blue.” Beau knew that off the top of her head, but she looked anyway. “Recently, they’ve started to reflect a little gold in the light. It’s hot.” She was smart enough to know that she was coming back to herself, and that meant she had to quickly shove every single emotion that caused her episode into a box and fight to close the lid. Luckily she was an expert at that part. “I can see…”
Well she could see a lot of things now. The monk was extremely observant. But the things she’d almost chosen to point out were things the old Beau would, like in how Yasha’s lips were still swollen from her own because they’d kissed for so long. Or the dark bruise just above her collarbone, also from Beau’s mouth. The look of her disheveled hair due to bedhead. Beau’s bed. The incredible beauty of the woman before her in every aspect. But new Beau, in love Beau, also noticed the microexpressions. The worry and the fear as they had been hidden away. Selfish, she thought again, her own voice this time.
“I can see the texture on the ceiling, and a groove just below the door handle."
Yasha let go of her wrist, and she finally let herself look at her bloodied hand. Her palm was cut in a few places, but it didn’t hurt too bad. She noticed several things there as well about her nails and the scabs on her knuckles, but she kept them to herself.
“Is my other hand bad?” she whispered, a little scared to look.
“Yes.” Then she did look, stomach turning over. There was so much blood it was almost hard to see, but as observant as she was, she knew that the flesh around the eye was gashed and stabbed to expose bone and muscle. As if she’d literally tried to peel it off of her skin.
“Fuck.”
The moment she saw it the pain became known to her, excruciating. But she didn’t let herself react outwardly, another thing she was good at. After all, she’d caused this for herself and had no right to complain.
“That’s… unfortunate,” she gritted out instead, and thought about hiding it so that Yasha wouldn’t try to heal it. However, no sooner had this thought occurred than the familiar sparking warmth of divine magic coursed through the wound, dulling it instantly. Beau didn’t want to watch it mend because of the eye, so she stared at the ground. “I’m so sorry, Yash. I didn’t mean to wake you.”
“I wouldn’t be a good partner if I chose sleep over you.” The assimar offered her a gentle smile that lifted some of the weight from her heart. Still, she decided not to admit that she had no idea what being a good partner meant, or how in the hells to be one seeing as it appeared that it was in her nature to be self-absorbed, to only care about herself. She didn’t want to only care about herself.
“I’m sorry,” said Beau again as she pulled away from Yasha to get up on unsteady feet. Her legs didn’t hurt nearly bad enough to stop her from attempting to walk out of the bathroom. If she thought about them like battlewounds, the ache the cuts made became an afterthought, and it didn’t matter if she bled everywhere because the tower would be gone in the morning and recreated good as new the next time. Unfortunately, Yasha had no interest in letting her out of the bathroom until she had some things settled.
“What happened?”
“I–” She wanted to lie but that would prove her father right and she couldn’t have that. Besides, character growth or whatever-the-fuck. The only problem was that it felt like if she were to tell the truth here, her throat would close up and her walls would fall down on top of her and she’d die. It’d be an unfortunate way to go.
“I wanted to get it off of me. I hate it.”
“But we already tried to get rid of them. Nothing worked.”
“I-I know. I think I panicked a little.”
“A little?” Yasha bit her lip, worry causing a crease inbetween her brows. Beau wanted to kiss it away. She didn’t. “That was— you looked like Caleb. Zoned out like he gets sometimes. You didn’t know you were hurting yourself, did you?”
“No.” Beau swallowed. The admission had come so easily that she didn’t realize the implications of it until it had leapt from her lips. Then she felt so unnerved that she turned to the tub already filled with water and began to wash the blood away. From her hands at least, seeing as they’d been mended and it gave her something to do. “I don’t even remember breaking the mirror.”
It was when Yasha caught her elbow that she realized she was swaying again. “So you didn’t come in here with the intention of… of–”
“Nope. I, uh, was just trying not to wake you up. Then I guess I lost my shit and did it anyway.”
“Well next time freak out in bed where there aren’t any sharp things around.” The assimer tried her hand at a chuckle while Beau did her best not to give away how shocked she was. It hadn’t hit her yet that there might be a next time, and it made her both happy and absolutely terrified. Apparently she didn’t manage to be as subtle as she’d intended. “You’re surprised.”
“A little.” Telling the truth is the selfless thing to do. But it’s hard. So, to stall, she started washing her legs of the blood, and was pleased to find that they were not nearly as bad as they seemed. But the water was a very vibrant red now to match much of the floor. She must have looked awful, and she sighed. “I don’t know if I’m going to be very good at this, Yash. I don’t know if I deserve it.”
“Me? You don’t think you deserve me? Why?”
“Because I should have left the moment this fucking thing appeared on my hand. What if I’m putting you guys in danger by being here? What if I’m being selfish? My dad always called me that and I-I—” Here was where Beau knew she was foolish. How was she supposed to talk about how her father was still fucking with her head all these years later? How could she explain all the wretched things she thought of herself? “Fuck.” Beau muttered when her shaking hands spasmed and she splashed bloodied water everywhere. “Fuck, sorry. Did I get it on you?”
“No,” said Yasha simply.
Suddenly big arms pulled her upright and into a hug. Beau wouldn’t have struggled if she had any fight left in her, and thus allowed herself the comfort of this embrace. The assimar before her was the woman she loved after all. She tried not to think about how no one would feel the same about her. Unlovable Beau. Selfish Beau.
“Do you think that Caleb should leave too?”
It wasn’t the question she was expecting, but it did make her think. What would happen if she and the wizard left together. Maybe they would do just fine, maybe it’d be the worst thing to do at this stage for him. How would he fare? He was healing so well, and Beau knew it was because of the Nein. Then there was Trent Ikithon, the man he only wanted to face with them at his side. “No.”
“Then you shouldn’t either.”
“But—“
“Beau,” Yasha cut in, before pausing for a moment to think. “I’m selfish too. I should tell you that you can’t leave because we won’t be able to destroy Lucien and the city without you. But I don’t want you to leave because it’d kill me. I don’t know if I’d… go on.”
The monk's head snapped up from where it rested against Yasha’s collarbone. “What do you mean by that?”
“I mean that I would probably leave too. I don’t know.”
Yasha couldn’t leave. She needed to put that fucker in the ground for the mockery he’s made of Molly’s memory. She deserved that.
“We’ll kill Lucien together as a family. Then maybe it’ll get rid of the eyes, and we can build a life just the two of us.”
“That would be pretty amazing.”
“I could be your housewife,” her angel chuckled, low rumbling like thunder. Then she pressed her lips to the monk’s head and finally pulled her out of the bathroom. “I’ll have one of the cats bring you some new clothes, but maybe we go to my room? You might feel better.”
“Sure, alright.” Now Beau paused, because what she was going to say next would sound a lot like those first ministrations with Yasha. It made her grin despite herself. “We’ve only gone on one date and you’re already thinking about being my wife. I like that in a woman.”
The barbarian reacted just as she always had, blushing furiously without saying anything. Beau loved it. She loved so many things about Yasha. Truly, she was so enamoured it felt almost suffocating. But this was a good suffocating, warm like a light rather than burning like a fire.
It turned out that switching rooms was something Beau didn’t know she needed, but boy was she grateful for it. Whatever tension still remained melted quickly away once she saw all of the flowers along the walls, their smells pleasant and calming like fresh air. It was here that she changed and fully wrapped up the cuts on her legs, small and shallow and few, before climbing into the bed at the angel’s side. Yasha tucked herself beneath the covers, but that was a little too much for Beau so she sat on top of them with her feet crossed beneath her and started fiddling with her cuticles. They really were a mess, now that it had been pointed out.
Yasha let her have the silence for a while, because she was focusing very hard on shoving her father’s voice in the box with the rest and locking it tight. It was an arduous process because he refused to shut the fuck up, but eventually she managed to do so. The lid didn’t fit anymore, but she forced it shut regardless and tucked it away.
“Beau?” the assimar said eventually, and she looked up at once. “A couple weeks ago I almost killed you.”
“Yeah, but that wasn’t you.” The words were out of her mouth before she could realize the brutal irony of it all. Before she could realize how fucking stupid and inconsiderate she was. Of course Yasha would understand her fear better than any other in her life. It had already happened to her. Yet the monk had freaked out regardless as if it were only her dealing with those feelings.
Her father would call her dramatic.
“Fuck, Yash, she breathed, suddenly breathless again. “I didn’t think about it, I’m so–”
“The point is,” Yasha cut in quickly, and Beau shut her mouth dutifully with one look at the barbarian’s face. “I know how it feels to worry about hurting one of you because somebody else took control. I know how it feels to distance yourself from your family because one day, those nightmares, those memories, might become real again and you’ll be helpless to stop it. I know every ounce of what you are feeling, and I know how it feels to heal.”
Instinct told the monk to argue but she couldn’t because there was simply nothing to say.
“Every one of us is selfish, Beau. It is the only reason we thrive where we shouldn’t. But it’s the good kind of selfish, if that makes sense. The type that gets you to be an Expositer, or Caleb his high level spells. It’s the reason I’m still here now, and doing better than I ever have. It’s the reason you’re in this room with me.” Yasha kissed the back of Beau’s hand, and she shivered as she nodded along, considering. “But I don’t think I’ve ever met a more selfless person than you. Over and over again, I’ve watched you give everything for the Nein. Remember that time you tried to sacrifice yourself to that fucking hag for Veth? Or just several days ago when you put yourself in mortal danger to distract the tombtakers from Caleb and Caduceus? Lucien almost killed you then, but you didn’t care because in your head you were saving them. Because better you than them, right?”
“Yeah.” Beau’s voice was nearly a whisper.
“Fuck. As much as I hate that you view yourself that way, it proves that you are hardly selfish. Not when it matters.” Yasha exhaled a very long, very shaky breath. “Sometimes I think you’re too selfless. It scares me a little.”
The monk opens her mouth to apologize again, but stops herself because her “sorries” were supposed to be so sparing they were never expected in the first place. Gods, she must really be in love. In love enough to take in those words and not just brush them off as she would from any other. So instead she says: “I think that’s one of the nicest things anyone’s ever said to me.”
“Well prepare yourself for more nice things,” said the assimar as she pulled Beau down into her arms and peppered her with feather-light kisses. “Because you’re going to have a lifetime of them when this is all over.”