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The grime of the city streets feels like it clings to Emily as a shroud clings to the angular bones of a half-rotten corpse. When she looks at her hands the white of the nails is almost black with filth, and there's dirt smeared across the wrinkles in her palm.
The wind caresses her face as the skiff buzzes over the ocean waves, the salt in the air stinging against a small cut on her temple. For a moment she's tempted to take off her mask and let her hair down, feel the wind through it, but they're still close to the coast, and it isn't worth being potentially spotted by some sharp-eyed guard along the docks. She closes her eyes instead.
Meagan pulls the skiff alongside the Dreadful Wale a few minutes later and slows the engine to a stop. Neither of them say anything until they're both out of the skiff; Meagan gives Emily a small smile as she clambers onto the deck, which she returns. "I'm going to go straight to my bunk, if there's nothing I need to see to," Emily says. Meagan nods.
"I'm sure you're tired. Go ahead, everything can wait until the morning."
"Thanks, Meagan."
Meagan nods, heading up to check on the captain's booth, or so Emily assumes. Emily heads downwards, nodding to Hypatia when they pass each other but otherwise undisturbed. She hesitates by the small bathroom - even rinsing her face would be a blessing - but fatigue wins out in the end, and she makes her way directly to her room. Emily collapses onto the bed with a long, quiet sigh, and lets sleep pull her under.
~
She doesn't dream, which is a blessing.
Waking isn't a feeling she's ever enjoyed - unless she's sharing the bed with Wyman, their long legs tangled with hers - but today is particularly uncomfortable. Emily decides to always wash before she sleeps in future.
When Emily makes her way to the water closet it's taken, and she can hear Sokolov muttering to himself in there. She sighs. Sokolov isn't one for short trips to the washroom, even if he shares it with three others.
Emily turns and walks up the stairs to the deck. If she can't wash, she can at least feel the sun on her face without the pressure of hounds or guards or Overseers on her back.
Meagan and Hypatia are nowhere to be seen, or so Emily initially thinks; she spots them after a few minutes wandering in the sunshine. The two of them are perched on the edge of the Dreadful Wale, heads close and wreathed in sunlight. Emily decides not to disturb them.
Moving to the opposite side - port? Starboard? She can never remember - Emily gazes out across the ocean, glad that the other women are on the side facing the city. She's seen enough of it for a lifetime.
Her lips purse a moment later as she watches the rolling waves. She remembers Corvo returning from sea, the unshakeable feeling she had as a child that the ocean was somehow responsible for taking both her parents away, even if Corvo came back in the end.
If nothing else, Emily has always had a stubborn streak a mile wide. The ocean won't intimidate her, she insists to herself, and decides to kill two birds with one stone.
Stripping down doesn't take her long; she wasn't in her full mission gear, just her shirt, pants and boots. Emily peels her socks off and adds them to the top of the pile of clothing, pausing for a moment before unhooking her bra as well and stretching her arms upwards before she casts it aside.
Emily stands on the side of the Dreadful Wale, and lets herself tip forwards into the ocean.
The water's colder than expected, but nothing compared to the waters around Dunwall. It feels refreshing against the beating heat of the late-morning sun, rather than like being dunked into an ice bath. Emily treads water, letting the waves lap against her face, then ducks her head under so her hair floats on the water like an oil slick.
When she resurfaces, Sokolov is leaning over the rail of the Dreadful Wale. "Lady Emily?" he calls down. "Is everything alright?"
"Don't worry, Anton," Emily shouts back up. Hypatia and Meagan's faces appear beside Sokolov's. Meagan smiles, in contrast with the worried expressions of her companions.
"There's nothing in these waters that can hurt her, as long as she's careful around the hull of the boat. You hear that, Lady Emily?" Emily gives her a thumbs up. "Leave her to it, Anton, the Empress deserves a little time to herself, don't you think?"
Emily doesn't see them leave, closing her eyes again and sinking lower in the water until barely the top of her head is breaching the surface. The rocking of the waves is soothing, almost in time with her slow heartbeat. She stays under until it feels as though her lungs will burst, then bursts back into the sunlight with a gasp.
At some point Hypatia brings her a flannel and towel, and a bar of soap that smells like lemon thyme. Emily can't help but laugh when Hypatia averts her eyes from Emily's naked chest and blushes bright red, and after a moment they're both laughing together, Emily stood on the outwards swell of metal on the lower half on the hull and Hypatia leaning over the Wale's rail, almost dropping the towel directly into the ocean.
Emily goes for another swim, this time scrubbing herself down with the soap and flannel, before perching on the towel - the metal is too hot to touch with her bare skin, once the sun reaches its apex - to comb through her salt-stiff hair. The smell of lemon thyme and salt hangs in the air. The sun reflects off the water, casting a mesmerising assortment of different hues onto the waves, almost like one of Sokolov's paintings.
It's a much needed moment of peace.