Chapter Text
The waves crashed into the sand, pressing into the gold grains and getting water on the feet and ankles of two witchlings, their hands interlocked as they walked together with giggles escaping their lungs. Coco turned around, her hands still holding on. Agott hummed, slowly walking towards the golden-eyed apprentice. “We need to stop doing this so often—” She squeaked as her lover’s lips met her own, soft and chaste.
Coco chuckled when they pulled away, their lips barely a centimetre apart from each other. “Doing what so often, Agott?”
“How we’re always sneaking away each time we go out.” She breathed out. “They will find out eventually, love,” Her free hand pointed at Coco, accusatory. “For all we know, they could be following us, and we would be too busy kissing each other!”
She pouts at the way Coco is smiling so smugly back at her, like she was the owlcat who got the cream.
“We’ll be fine.” She whispered, her arms resting on Agott’s shoulders, pulling her even closer than she already was. “The worst they can do is pester us with questions.”
“And I do not want to be pestered with questions right now, Coco.”
She giggled softly, burying her head into the crook of Agott’s neck, taking in the scent of wood, violets, and ink mixed in with the sea breeze. “We’ll have to deal with them eventually.”
Agott groaned, her arms wrapping around Coco’s waist and pulling her in. “Let us not dwell on it for now, love.”
Coco smiled against the fabric of her lover’s clothes “Okay.”
The cool wind did all that it could to tousle the witchlings' hair, to rustle their clothes, to mask them in the sea’s scent.
“Comfortable there, are you?” Agott’s head moved to tenderly bump against Coco’s own.
“Mhm.”
Agott could feel her hair start to crunch from the salt the breeze brought, not that it bothered her at the moment, not while the love of her life was holding onto her like she was the only thing that mattered. Her hands ran through Coco’s long hair. “I wouldn’t mind living here.” She mumbled absentmindedly.
The green-haired witch turned her head towards Agott’s eyes, soft gold meeting content purple. “Really?” Her lips curled into a relieved smile.
The witchling hummed, nodding along to her hums. “Yes.” Her eyes glanced to the waves that crashed onto the shore. “It’s peaceful here. Close to Kalhn as well.” She looked back at Coco intently. “Why do you ask?”
“I was planning on starting an atelier here,” Coco explained, her head rising from where her head laid. “I’ve always wanted to live by the beach.”
“As long as no sea creature ends up on the shore!”
Agott laughed. It was light, freeing, and melodic to Coco’s ears. “You’ve been through the Great Hall many times before,” Her mouth curved into an amused smile. “How are you still so nervous about the sea creatures?”
She rolled her eyes at Agott, her hand playfully shoving her lover back. “It’s in their eyes, Agott!” Coco exclaimed alongside her laughter. “Their eyes freak me out!”
“Their eyes?” She chuckled back, her feet taking a slight stumble back from the apprentice’s shove.
“Yes! Their eyes!” Coco repeated, her face red enough that Agott swore she could see steam coming out.
The wind practically smacked her own green hair in her face while her lover stood there, arms crossed and amused at her antics.
“But besides that!” She pointed a finger up, finding a second wind of energy past her flustered face. “I had a lot of plans for us on this beach.”
“Do you now?”
“Oh yes, I do,” Coco began, grinning while she shook with excitement, “For starters I—”
“Coco! Agott!” A voice rang out, elegant in its articulation. “It’s time for us to leave!”
Agott turned her heel, her foot dragging against the sand in the direction Master Qifrey’s voice must’ve come from. She sighed and looked back at Coco, offering a hand to her lover. “How about you tell me next time?”
Coco stood still; her lover looked like an angel sent from heaven under the rays of the setting sun and the tousling of the sea wind. She took Agott’s hand, letting herself get pulled along. “Yeah, I’ll tell you next time.”
“You’re going to take my memory, Agott.”
The wooden stump on her leg was placed haphazardly, digging into bleeding flesh. Not that Agott could do anything about it; branches and roots of the Silverwood tree wrapped around her. In front of her was a teary-eyed Coco, who, despite tears falling from her beautiful golden eyes, wore a look of acceptance and resignation.
She watched her lover scale the tree and stop just in front of her, the tree branches wrapping around her legs.
“Coco, I’m not taking your memory!” Agott choked, squirming against the tree with all her might; the branches recoiled with each tear that fell from her face.
Coco shook her head, pushing past some of the branches that slowly sank into the tree. It was working. In her hand was an uncapped vial of conjuring ink. “Listen to me, please!” She cried, placing the vial over where Agott’s tears would fall. “All the spell needs is the tears of a bitter memory—”
“I won’t let you!” Tree branches started to retract from below, freeing the witchling’s legs enough to try and kick Coco off with the use of her flesh and wooden feet alike, anything that could keep her beloved from even drawing the spell.
“Agott, please—”
“Don’t do this, Coco!” Agott squirmed away from the vial. The strife between the two witchlings had been enough to start recoiling more and more of the tree roots that trapped the now silver-haired witch. “You will not sacrifice your memory for me!”
More and more branches cleared and blanched in the middle of Agott’s anguish, the Arklaum doing the most she could to keep Coco from getting her tears.
It was but a futile attempt in the end, her lover managing to catch enough tears to mix them into the ink.
“Agott, please.” Coco reasoned once more, watching silver branches quail away with each desperate push back from its host. “I swear to you, I will find a better solution, a cure!”
“But I can’t give you the cure if you’re dead!”
She moved farther away from the tree just as Agott — in her immense distress — freed her arm from the silverwood tree’s retreating branches. Reaching for the witchling. “Think of your mother, you fool!”
“I already did!” Coco shot back, stepping away from the roots that want nothing more than to reach her. “I always do!”
“Coco, just stop, please.” Agott croaked out, her arm going towards the branches, prying off the silverwood while she tried to pull herself out. “You don’t have to do this—”
“Yes, I do!” She snapped back, eyes wide with terror and desperation. “I love you, Agott! I don’t want you to die.” Her shoes took a pace back from the roots that continued to inch towards her. “I’m not going to let that tree end your dreams!”
Agott’s free hand continued to reach into the Silverwood’s branches, pushing it away to free her other arm. Her gaze swapped from the tree to Coco, her lover already casting the spell on her palm quire. “Stop that, Coco!” The branches that wrap around her torso rattle, shrinking back enough for the silver-haired teen to barely break free.
Coco had closed the spell circle; what a hassle to ink in the dark spell that reached out for her gold eyes. She was ready to put herself through it when a flurry of silver and seafoam green tackled her to the ground, hands reaching for the ripped page that threatened to seal their fates.
It was a mess on the ground, the two lovers fighting each other for the spell in a mess of arms and legs, all while the silverwood tree tried to reel their host back in its grasp. Coco was doing all that she could to keep Agott from reaching her spell, while Agott kept her wooden foot planted on the ground, silver roots lugging her back, her hands reaching for Coco’s wrist.
The silver witchling kept her grip on Coco’s wrist tight, her desperate amethyst eyes meeting equally desperate gold. “Tell me about the sea!” She demanded. “What were your plans for us?!”
“The sea?!” Coco coughed out, her hand trying to wrench her wrist free from her lover’s hold. “Agott, Stop—”
“Yes, love, the sea!” Agott cried, her feet kicking the ground to fight off the silverwood tree. “You told me we could have a future there! Tell me about it!”
“Tell me about the life we could have!”
Fresh tears spilt down Coco’s cheek, her hands digging into Agott’s hold, silver roots reaching them faster. “Agott, stop!”
“What would I have liked there?!”
“Agott…” Coco croaked out, watching the roots dragging them both into the trees. She looked upon teary purple, her free hand letting go of Agott’s tight grip, opting to cup her face. “Birds.”
The bile in her throat was acidic as it rose; how could Agott talk about this now? When she was on the line of death and life, when their dreams were being pulled apart by the seams. Coco let out a pained laughter. “Stars, you always loved birds.” She lamented, her words as low as a bittersweet whisper.
“…Is that it?” Agott laughed wetly, the roots’ strength recovering with each laugh. “Tell me everything, Coco.”
“It’s quieter there.” She mumbled through tears, her thumb wiping tears from Agott’s face despite her own teary situation. “No one will bother us.”
Her voice broke. “It would just be me and you, maybe an apprentice or two, a kid.”
“Let me guess, we would be married too?”
Marriage. Who knows how many nights Coco had spent awake, thinking if she would be married to Agott? She lets out another chuckle, tears falling like the crashing sea waves of her dreams. “Yes.” She said, choking on a sob. “Yes, we would be married.”
“What a dream that is,” Agott mumbled, her hand digging into the ground to keep the roots from dragging her back to the tree. “Tell me more, Coco, please—”
“Agott… Stop—”
“The chores.”
“Stop—”
“How would we wake up in the morning?”
“Agott, stop. Please…”
The roots yanked them back harshly, dragging them closer and closer towards their reality.
“How long would you stay up at night—”
“Stop it. Just… stop, please.”
Agott couldn’t find any more words, the words in their millions lost on her tongue as she looked at guilty gold.
Coco’s hand slowly brought Agott’s face up, the green-haired witch leaning down while they both got dragged by the silver-witchling’s roots. “I love you.” She whimpered before their lips met in the middle.
She heaved in the kiss, her hands releasing their holds just to pull Coco closer, her body wracked and trembling held on tight as tears fell past her.
When they finally pulled away, Agott found Coco’s shoes closer to each other.
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t do it.”
Her shoes glowed green, shooting away from Agott in a blink. Her lover’s eyes widened, immediately dragging herself forward despite the force bringing her back.
“Coco!” Agott cried out, pulling herself forward even with the futility of the ending set in her mind. “Stop! Don’t do it!”
“Swear to me you won’t die,” Coco called out, looking at the spell through a blurry, teary haze. “I’ll figure it out, I’ll save you, Agott, I swear on it.”
She took a steadying breath, looking back into amethyst hues she loved dearly. She put the spell over her eyes.
“All I have left to say is…”
“Just go easy on me, okay?”
Hurried footsteps ran past broken branches and white leaves, her destination straight towards where a green-haired witchling was left crumpled and motionless, the soil pressing against her cheek.
Agott’s trembling hands brought Coco into her hold; her face buried into her lover’s cloak as her body wracked in sobs.