Tatterdemalion

Sunshards

Rose from the River falls, but (in a strange reversal of her battle with half of a castle and a naginata-wielding dragon) she does so gracefully. She hops from coin to coin, ruby to sapphire to statue, as if there was nothing at all unusual about the sight, as if she did so every day of the week and twice on Sundays. Her skirt is blown quite up by the wind, but she barely pays it any mind— and, besides, if you’re looking, aren’t those legs worth seeing in all their glory, anyway?

Her serenity is a fitting counterpoint to the wildly flailing, bucking, squirming fox trying to figure out both how to survive the fall (her current plan being “convince somebody to stop me from falling”) and how to grab as much of the treasure tumbling all around her as possible.

Whoosh! Scoop! Squish! Cyanis is picked up and cradled like the most beautiful of princesses by a silenced, smug monk. Her muffled pleas to be untied are met with a boop on her cutie nose and an intensifying of Rose’s smugness. Look at where your pursuit of vain riches and double-triple-trucie-crossies got you, little wish-thief! Smooshed up against the soft silks and firm body of Rose from the River, and the two of you definitely have some discussions to have about, oh, tricking a poor mind-locked girl into aiding and abetting fox crimes, heartlessly throwing her underneath a Countess-shaped bus (not that you have ever seen one, little fox), and attempting to escape your cutie jail sentence.

But then Rose from the River is distracted by a beautiful, perfect kiss. The sort that makes her press Cyanis’s face into paradise to be smothered while she half melts like a squeeing handmaiden. They did it! They really did it! Looking at the two, Rose from the River knows that she no longer has to worry about protecting Yue the Sun Farmer, even if she’s worth more money than the entire world could scrape together. Hyra has Yue well in hand, and if there were ever two girls who deserved to have adventure together, it was those two.

Which means that, really, her part in this adventure should be over. She should sling Cyanis over one shoulder, inform Yue of her windfall, and continue on her way. Unless something wonderful were to happen to her in turn, the sort of thing that would keep her away from her Devotion to the Way, if only for a little longer; a reason to delay Cyanis’s cutie jailing and her own pilgrimage across this beautiful and ever-surprising world. Something to keep her in this story— or someone.

Chen, darling? That’s your cue.

[Rose from the River finally uses her Gallant Rescue to take a string on Cyanis, having Defied Disaster with Grace and scored a hot, hot 11.]

Breathless Dead

Picture Skotia, held in the arms of the Praetor. Picture his golden mask, perched on his nose, its eyes flushed hot pink, its fringe drifting down his neck like a pretty silk veil, changed from a confident disguise to something demure and humiliating with one careful talon. Picture the way he holds himself to avoid flashing the flesh of his well-shaped thigh, or worse, the delicate lace, the bow now half undone by a probing thumb, knowing that Bella could nudge him open with careless ease, fingers pressed to his lips. Imagine the adoring, wondering look in his mismatched eyes, how he stares up at Bella as if he had known her all his life, had known her as simply Bella the maid, Bella the pet, and suddenly sees her as Bella the woman, Bella the Praetor, Bella Triumphant.

And even so, Skotia hesitates. He does not blurt out fealty, but considers Bella for longer than she would likely care to be considered. Aphrodite’s eyes, on the pair, are hot coals, hotter than the stub of his cigarette. In a moment like this, words have meaning. Oaths that cannot be broken are made in moments like this.

Imagine being seen for who you are, the song goes. Imagine being accepted anyway. Imagine being chosen, over and over again. Imagine being given a second chance.

“I belonged to you the moment our eyes met,” he concludes, finally. “And if the Rift slipped between our arms, I’d still be yours for as long as it took us to cross. Because I am yours until you release me, my Praetor.” And he does stand on tiptoe, and the fringe of his mask is such a thin thing between the heat of his lips and Bella’s neck, and he mouths her name like a hymn. Bella.

(And it is not a promise to follow, and it is not a promise to obey, but it is a promise to belong. Let his wife weep, let his dogs howl; he will never be free of Bella. But consider—)

“But I have competition,” he continues, as the Praetor’s hand explores the hidden places of his back. “Or so the rumor goes, from that privateer ship. When the Imperial Princess had word you were dead on some Hermetic wreck, she fell to pieces. She sang to Eleuthereus and had to be restrained, or she would have made her whole ship your funeral offering. Now that you are here alive, she likely means to kidnap you and keep you on her ship so she does not risk losing you again. Forgive me for waiting to tell you. I… I wanted you to want me, first. No. Needed you.”

He looks up with a vulnerable lift of his neck, like a submissive little kitten, and waits for his punishment. And there’s more than one kind, isn’t there? Her iron talons pressing against his throat until she has cut off his breath and holds his lungs in thrall. A bitter word, a refusal to ever love the princess who abandoned her again, confirmation that Redana never meant anything to her but a ward to be resented. Or, worse, a longing cry, a boy forgotten, a wailing collapse at the Princess’s feet—

Because that’s your game, isn’t it, Skotia? That’s how you’re playing the Praetor. The terrible clarity of Aphrodite suffuses you. If the Praetor condemns the Princess, then you are damned in turn, born in immaculate conception from her roots; if you seduce her, you carry out a long and cruel betrayal. If the Praetor adores the Princess, who you once were and are no longer, then you will be damned in turn, punished in Tartarus as you deserve, a mirror of Bella’s past as you watch and serve and long for her love.

But if the Praetor is conflicted, if she is torn, if your words roll over her in waves, then maybe, just maybe, you can make everything right. You can perform a miracle tonight. Redana Claudius, perfected, better than she ever was or could have been, will continue her quest to save humanity. Praetor Bella will continue the chase of someone she could have cared for, if things had been different. And with her—

A second chance. No crown to come between you. The dreams you once had, entrusted to someone who deserves them more. The girl who suffered for the person you once were, now soothed, now worshipped, now allowed to be wanted. An apology carried out every morning and every night, a secret plea for forgiveness. A service from a servant who was never destined to rule.

The name you were given tonight will not last forever. You will need a new one. Maybe, if you are lucky, it will be Princess. A joke and a power play and a gender and a comfort all in one. If you sail between Scylla and Charybdis. If there is a chance she might accept you and your need that Redana Claudius was never allowed to express, most of all by herself.

Picture Skotia, placing his heart in Bella’s talons, frightened by his own plan, but unwilling to step away from it under the eyes and name of Aphrodite. Picture Skotia, ready to be unwrapped, his hidden lace whispering against his skin, his heart shining full of the power of a mean girl. Picture Skotia, throwing his whole being into a desperate plan without thinking about it, again, because his heart won’t fit in his chest and he doesn’t know any other way to live than following it where it pulls on his leash.

Picture the places where Skotia fits perfectly in his Bella’s arms.

Breathless Dead

The music comes from something descended, distantly, from a gramophone. It is a huge thing of turning gears, and from it issues forth music from a thousand years ago. An orchestra would be a security risk; a record cannot be a disguise, a trap or a traitor. So they are alone, the three of them: Xanthippe, Redana, and her Bella.

One-two-three, one-two-three, the waltz demands, unwilling to be patient enough for Dany to be careful, marching her forward relentlessly. One-two-three, one-two-three, and Bella must allow herself to be a mannequin, because the Imperial Princess must lead: on the battlefield, in the polis, and on the dance floor. Her duty is to be limp and pliable, to follow the movements of the princess without question, to be silent and never, ever offer a hint. No matter how distressed Redana might get, no matter how Xanthippe snapped at the princess, Bella is to exist for the benefit of her mistress. That’s what it means to be a good girl.

Skotia is not an excellent dancer, but he is an eager partner. He follows Bella’s footsteps smoothly, picking up every small cue that the Praetor provides; when he hesitates, he allows her to take control and show him where he needs to go. When dipped, he lets one hand brush against the floor ever-so-slightly, and the flash of his neck begs to be bitten, to be bruised, to be marked.

“I’m glad you’re here to show me what to do,” he murmurs. “Truth be told, I never was particularly good at it. Not like you.”

”—because I expect great things from you, your highness,” Xanthippe says, with cloying sweetness. “Now, go get a drink. A young girl’s head needs water to turn the wheels of the mills of the mind.”

Redana slinks over to the pitcher of water, head bowed, wearing that same look of slightly hurt frustration she gets whenever she’s bashing her head against something that refuses to budge. If it was about speed, she could do it; if it was about tossing Bella up in the air, she could do that too. If it was about making up whatever she wanted, well, she and Bella had already had their own dance parties, in this very room, jerking around and wiggling, laughing, as the strings on the record played something jaunty and bouncy. But dancing isn’t about fun. Dancing is about sending a message. It speaks to nobility, a life of leisure, absolute control of mental faculties and physical prowess, and a steady poker face— all things Redana lacks.

The ice clinks in the pitcher; Redana doesn’t see Xanthippe put her hand on Bella’s arm and squeeze hard, doesn’t hear her whisper: “And as for you, slut, stop distracting her highness! Hold your upper body still and do not look her in the eyes again…”

“—and as I climbed,” Skotia says, eyes dancing quicker than his feet as the music goes slow and stately, “I decided to lie down on the slope. I didn’t even need a blanket; the grass underfoot was so soft that sinking into it felt like I was already in Elysium. So I propped up my head and stared down into the sweet-scented valley between, and considered myself, perhaps, the most fortunate young man in the world.”

They sway together, slowly, even as the Azura around them twine their bodies in elegant spirals; bereft of such lower bodies, all they can do is press close together.

“And that’s when I had the sudden urge to taste the grass,” he says, and rests his head against her. His heart, beating so fast and hard, knocks politely against her ribs. “I couldn’t help but wonder what it would feel like in my mouth— but what mountain climber hasn’t ever had a thought like that?”

His hand drifts lower and, for one daring moment, squeezes, lifts one cheek ever so slightly— and when he glances up, it’s both to be sure he’s allowed and to dare her to punish his impudence.

The trick is to imagine that her feet belong to somebody else, isn’t it?

That the pain belongs to someone else. When Redana is done, she can slip out of her heels and groan and sit down. But someone needs to refill the pitcher, doesn’t she? And someone needs to wind the great organ that spits out songs from ghosts long-gone, and someone needs to take dinner out of the oven, and someone needs to see Xanthippe to the exit and signal Alexa to let her out, that the chamber is locked and sealed behind Xanthippe, once the instructor of dancing has finished telling Bella what a useless little whore she is, and someone needs to not daydream about locking her in the chamber and walking away on feet like knives, no, waltzing away, and someone needs to do it with a smile and a curtsey, and someone needs to do it all fast, and her reward at the end of the day is getting to unbuckle the shoes from her numb feet.

And if she does it all right, her reward is that, alone, her princess wonders what’s wrong with her if her feet are pinched and sore in a way that’s so very different from running on the track, but her Bella doesn’t feel it at all. What is she doing wrong? Is she broken? She can’t be, but what if she is? What if Hera spoke to Terpsichore so that her feet would always hurt while dancing? What if she was going to make a fool of herself at the ball for her thirteenth birthday, and in front of Odoacer of all people?

When the music (does not stop but instead becomes a low and all-encompassing hum that is the spine of the world), Skotia remains pressed to Bella for a moment, willing himself to remember this when he is no longer confident and daring, when the clock strikes midnight and all his magic leaves him: that he was allowed to hold Bella in his arms like this, and she’d never know that he was ever anyone different.

In the moment between songs, when some couples choose to leave and more, many more, join the dance, Skotia holds to Bella as if afraid that she will toss him aside, unworthy, bad at dancing, a brat who takes liberties beyond what she invited. He holds her as if he is drowning and she is the whole wide color-clogged sea.

“Will you allow me another, Praetor?” he asks, simply.

TSL: The Excess of Flowers

Zhaojun!

That is too far. You realize it almost at once. The malevolence of the Green Sun is almost palpable. He will tell you things. Such things. He will reveal secrets which will ruin you. He will sing to you of the glory of the dawn of the world and you will stumble, blinded by its wonders, through a world that you no longer recognize. What will it be like? Perhaps it will be a blessing.

In a hidden forest in a cleft in the earth in a ruined pleasure-garden in a ruined kingdom in a ruined age there is a lake and the name of the lake is Mnemosyne and those that bathe themselves in the waters of Mnemosyne pass through into a world whole in a kingdom whole in a pleasure-garden whole in a grand mountain in an egg of meaning and they that enter into this world dress themselves in it and make of it a blindfold and they eat the dust of the earth and think it a feast and do not starve and they drink the rain and think it casks of wine and they do not thirst and all around them is a beauty and a shining and a story in which they are important and beloved and perfect forever and ever so here is the question Zhaojun which is the real world of those who bathe in the waters of Mnemosyne?

This is what the Green Sun means to do to you. His words will make themselves your Mnemosyne and erase all understanding of what is because you will know only what was; you will see the King stride from horizon to horizon, you will see the Judge write the laws of being into the souls of all who live, you will see the River ring round the world with its seven torments which barred the fair folk from entry. You will know the world to be right, because the hierarchy is upheld; you will know the world to be right because you are ruled by the creators.

And the little pink foxes in your blood grab at your spine and your nerves and your ankles and they make you run because they fear oblivion even more than you do, and you flail helplessly but you can't get away, your feet slide on the polished black stone as you draw closer to the Green Sun, and you can feel the heat that radiates off of him begin to suffuse you--

"Master!"

Some demon, some imp, some creature of the palace of the Green Sun bounds into the room, and for a moment, just that barest moment, his attention is not on you. It lifts from your shoulders like a shroud and you are gone, your mind a blind white-hot panic, witch abandoned, answers forgotten, the seething unreality in your blood urging you on. There is no cohesion in what you see; colors spin and sway and the connections between object and meaning, motion and result, name and being break down. Run, run, run! No good to us like that! Run, run, run! Your story doesn't end here!

You throw open a door and tumble down a flight of stairs that goes on forever and ever and ever and you're never going to reach the end of it.

Reality comes back to you slowly. You're being rained on. You're back where you started, and your disguise is gone, and it's starting to rain hard. (No, harder than that. Harder than rain should be able to fall. Hard enough to sting and turn the world into shimmering silver in all directions.) The witch is gone. You're full of jitters, for some reason, a brain full of sparks and a nervous energy that isn't abating. Everything that just happened is a whirlwind of impressions, like paint smeared over canvas by a child.

Tell us of the state that Kalaya finds you in, and how you draw her in, even in the midst of the driving rain.

***

Giriel!

The sky opens up. The gods, too, have come to the conclusion that they were embarrassed by what happened, and are settling it by spurring the clouds harder and harder. Right after Kalaya slipped out, unnoticed until this new (and bedraggled) girl pointed her out, that's when the deluge began. A famous can't-see-your-hands-in-front-of-your-face deluge, a Flower Kingdom special. If she's thinking clearly, she'll duck inside somewhere else-- but she's not, is she? And little use running out after her, not when it's pouring this hard.

Petony does not care about this. Petony is up to her feet and charging out after her charge, and-- well, now it's twice as awkward, because her retinue's not going out into that weather. That's knightly business, it is. So that means that you're, well, essentially in charge of this situation. What do you take from this news of demon-summoning? Do you carry out a divination to see the path forward?

Sunshards

There is one person in the room that Rose from the River dances for. One person who she is trying to distract, one person who finds Rose flickering around her, impossibly light on her feet for someone so large. Of course it is Chen, her little sweet Princess, the only one who accepts her for who she is, over and over again.

She did not fear Rose from the River, monster of the Burrows. She did not judge Rose, helpless damsel in distress. She chose Rose from the River, teasing and playful and voracious, and it’s for her that Rose from the River fights. Once again, the old story plays out: a monk has been seduced away from her duties for the love of a Princess. And now Rose from the River dances for Chen, who deserves to see Rose from the River’s skill at arms (in more than one sense), but not devoted towards victory, simply towards the dance, the display, the beauty.

Her sword moves and seems to tug her along after; when she tosses it across the room, one of her mossy braids sings along with it, wrapped tight about the hilt, and she follows on the balls of her feet, as if the sword is merely an afterthought, each sweep of her legs an excuse to draw all eyes to them, until she effortlessly slides the sword out of some pillar or tile where it has sunken so deep that Jessic herself could hardly pull it out. Where she goes, Keron’s minions scatter and dive for cover; lying face-down on the ground, they cannot be knocked from their feet by an explosion of stone or a scything leg.

One plucky young woman almost manages to grab Rose from the River’s bound wrists. Almost. When Rose from the River leans back into those outstretched arms, her momentum turning her into a collapsing mountain, she realizes too late the gravity of her error. Rose from the River falls hard enough to knock the wind out of the poor girl, crushed beneath a falling heavenly pillar, and uses her as a handrest to cartwheel back up to her feet, landing neatly where her sword lies so that she may kick it up into her hand and disarm a dozen guards with one massive sweep that she follows like wind after the storm.

For a moment, it seems as if she will repeat the fall of the cloud-bearing pillar on her little Chen, rocking on her heels, threatening to stumble and flatten the littlest sword saint, but one branch-hand reaches out as she reaches perfect equilibrium and runs a thumb along Chen’s jaw as if it were the edge of a sword. Then she passes through the space where Chen fights, her body flowing through wherever Chen is not, a great shadow of mountains briefly blotting out the light over her head, and then she is through and spinning, leaping, twisting in midair, landing low with one leg sweeping around to carry her momentum through.

Then she leaps, and hooks one leg around Jessic’s mighty throat, continues the momentum upwards, hooks both mighty limbs around the scaled neck, and squeezes— not cruelly, just enough to convey the message. She leans forward, emphasizing the way the fingers of her bound hands flutter and curl helplessly, and presses her gagged lips to the top of Jessic’s head— and her eyes are only for Chen as she does so, wide and playful and delightedly impish, counting coup on a Princess who thinks herself invincible, and someone should make her kneel later and teach her a lesson about her place~

Braids curl around one horn, thighs clench tighter, and the celestial pillar of the peach garden topples to earth once more, bringing with it a confused and very decisively stopped dragon. Claws scrape across the tiles as she goes, a tail lashing furiously, but all the same Jessic ends up on her side, with Rose from the River smoothly ending up straddling her throat.

And that’s when she, wicked she, handmaiden she, squirms. Dragon Jessic may be, but she has a maiden’s heart all the same, and Rose’s performance is the sort to bring trains of thought screeching to a halt in a fiery multi-locomotive pileup, a damsel craving salvation from a fire-breathing beast and helplessly putting her shoulders into the thrashing from side to side, putting as much volume as she can into emphasizing how completely unable she is to say anything intelligible, and if you’re watching the rise and fall of empires, you’re not watching the sword she’s juggling to keep away anyone looking to “save” either damsel or dragon.

What an actress! She wanted to be in those trashy pulp novels, and the freedom to be director and lead actress and stunt coordinator all in one is what Cyanis and Chen granted her in Rose from the River and the Tyrant of the Sky Castle!! (A working title, likely to be available from any reputable fox publisher any day now, possibly with a cover where she’s got Jessic’s tail wrapped around her torso and fearsome claws pushing her scarf-swaddled face away from a certain dashing raven-haired princess.)

[Rose from the River Fights! Her condition cancels out her Daring, leaving her with a sweet 10. She’s earning a third string on Chen, creating an opportunity for Chen to duel Keron without interference, and seizing a superior position on top of Jessic~]

Breathless Dead

Bella!

Skotia does not flirt with disaster by constructing further on your assertion. That’s the simplest sort of trap! The magic of the stranger unravels if you pin yourself down, if you let your shadow be limned and sewn up tight. That’s why he doesn’t agree with you, he doesn’t explain his presence here, he simply offers a nod and a bashful look at Nero’s Praetor.

“You noticed me?” he asks, and his smile is like the rosy fingers of dawn on a world that is not Tellus as it is, tantalizingly glimpsed through the golden thread of his mask. “I’m surprised. Not that I expect you not to notice people, but even me? Well. You’re careful and have a long memory, Bella.”

He inclines his head, neatly lowers himself with a footstep back, an attempt to mimic the submission of serpents. “Allow me to add to your welcome to the Endless Azure Skies, Praetor. I’m sure there is little enough I could add to your understanding of this place, these people, given how clever you are— but I know how to dance, and I have two feet to do it with. If you are in a generous mood.”

He straightens, tries to look nonchalantly away, glances back at you as if he’s worried you might have somehow vanished between heartbeats. His ears, too, are that gentle pink. He doesn’t know where it’s safe to look— at your face? Too impudent. At your body, draped in lace? Too licentious. At your feet? Too meek. He settles, eventually, on your hand, on the wine glass, for the most part.

The boy has it bad, and in a way that might even feel strangely familiar. He honestly doesn’t feel that he deserves to dance with you, but the desire to hold you and try to be a passable partner, to win just a smile from you, would cause his heart to carve a tunnel through his ribs if he didn’t say something. Which makes no sense, except that he still sees you as a Praetor, and presumably that takes precedence over the ears and tail, or—

Ah. He’s also into those. When he looks he doesn’t see a servant, he sees a great lady whose approval he craves. Maybe even a Mistress. If you whispered a command in his ear, who knows what he would do?

TSL: The Excess of Flowers

Zhaojun!

No disguises. Not here. That was a mistake, and one that might be sending hot pink thrills up your spine, the giddy feeling of being in freefall and needing to twist so that you land on your feet.

The Green Sun is one of the most perilous princes of the Demon City to call upon, for his gravity is so great that it draws in those who call upon him, and how light your feet were in yielding, even with a wrapped-up witch in your arms.

The Green Sun is the heart of the Broken King, and in its heart is another heart, a palace of brass and glass and mirror-polished stone. And in the heart of this palace, this core with its crushing gravity from which no one may escape without his leave, is the workshop of the Green Sun. He is here. He has stepped away from his work in order to address you, by the laws that Heaven set in place over him and his kind.

His hair is the ruddy red of a copper bowl. His eyes are the flickering green of his light. He is wearing only an apron around his waist, and his shapely golden muscles gleam in the light of the forges. He could crack a mountain if he wanted to; he could weave spells about the two of you to doom you to bitter love forever and ever; he hates you and everything that you stand for. You are a brat, a child, papering your bedroom with posters of revolutionaries, while he continues to thanklessly embody true royalty.

And royalty never lashes out without provocation.

And the Green Sun is nothing if he is not the prince in exile.

And so you are safe and surrounded by terrible peril on all sides, Zhaojun.

”I do not have time to tell you what I know,” he breathes, and his breath is hotter than Scarlet’s fury. He stands in perfect poise, one hand holding his hammer behind his back, the perfect counterbalance. ”You do not have time to listen to what I know,” he continues, and the mockery is only implicit. ”You must learn to be more specific.”

“How may I blackmail Iupeter?” Peregrine blurts out, her eyes shining.

”If I knew, would I not already have done so?” His smile reveals nothing. He’s just trying to tilt you, Zhaojun. There’s no way he actually could have followed through on that implication. Right? ”Your efforts would be better suited to an exchange of favors. You deliver her an agent of one of her sisters, a secret for only the three of you to keep, and she gives you a secret— of equal worth, one supposes.”

Peregrine glances at you out of the corner of her eyes, and not subtly. The Green Sun patiently awaits your own question, Zhaojun. It would not do to keep him waiting.

***

Petony-phraya!

This is some real fertilizer, is what it is.

The kid was really getting at it! Diving in, knocking a highland bumpkin out of bounds (she definitely needs to be bigger in the version you’ll tell later, of course) and getting an entire town fired up to win those swords! And then one of those meddling witches comes in and says there’s fairies involved? What a load. Like you wouldn’t notice one of them meddling.

So here you are, the five of you, taking up a big table in the teahouse: you (with your retinue taking up positions at nearby tables), the kid (confused, and who can blame her), the bumpkin (who looks like she’s left her wits back home), the witch (definitely up to something), and the bumbling priestess trying to set up anti-fairy wards feverishly (somehow even cuter the more she fumbles the salt and squeaks, maybe you should make a move~).

“So do you mind explaining again, witch? I just want to make sure I understand what you’re going on about.” The more she talks, the more you’ll be able to see through her tricks. “While you’re at it: mountain girl, do you drink tea?” Sun only knows what sort of drinks mountain peasants turn to for comfort…

***

Piripiri!

This was a bad idea for the one simple reason that, as soon as Azazuka stepped to the restroom to make herself look presentable again, a knight and her entire retinue came crashing into the place, along with: a squire(?), the squire’s girlfriend(?), and the witch.

You’ve gone straight from being in the middle of something to being on the outskirts of something interesting and potentially valuable: how do you play this?

Breathless Dead

Bella!

The clocks chime: a conjunction of hours and moons, an auspicious moment. The music, for a moment, stills, and that is when he arrives, the Princess of some minor colonized power, slipping into the room with a casual nonchalance, a self-assurance that is not projected outward like a roar of defiance at the room but simply… inwards, echoing. Each step is both careless and precise as he makes his way down the stairs. He has left one button at his collar undone, and the skin underneath is a pale flash against his mop of ruddy curls, his velvet jacket, his golden hound-mask. A fringe of fine golden threads sways beneath the mask with each step, enough to catch a glimpse of a strong jaw, a soft mouth. A flower with fiery red petals pinned to his breast is a splash of ostentatious color against the muted swirls of the velvet.

He looks to you and for just a moment, his footstep falters. A hitch, hardly noticeable. But you notice. One look at you and his breath caught in his throat.

He slips to one side, greets several Azura with a courteous bow, shakes hands with the humility of a lesser serving at the behest of a greater, but the confidence of someone who does not have any reason to worry for the security of his station. But even then, his eyes flicker to you for a moment. They are mismatched, charmingly so, almost familiarly so, but his lashes are long and demure and his gaze is gentle. He lingers a moment too long, watching you; he covers his jolt back to the conversation smoothly, but you see that, too.

He is slight, but moves with the grace of a swordsman (and a dueling saber hangs from the sash at his belt). The serving-staff approach him with trays, glasses, and offers to be seated in a private booth; he declines them all, politely, and redirects them to other guests. No, he has to keep circling the ballroom, watching the dances, watching you, standing in the lee of conversations to avoid the embarrassment of being obvious.

When he tilts his head, for a moment you see his mouth open, his lips parted in admiration; when your eyes meet, he does not blush or look away, but looks at you as if hoping to impress the fleeting moment of connection in his memory— and then nods, and looks away, until such time as you bid him come closer.

Do you?

Sunshards

Chen!

Rose from the River turns dressing you into a dance. Step, step, turn; step, step, lean. Twirl, little princess; the moment you feel like you’re going to spin out of control, you find Rose from the River there to hold you fast, and silk worked up around your hips, pulled snug over your curves, draped heavily over your face. She locks bracelets around your wrists while you are breathless and being suspended by one hand in the small of your back, keeping you from tumbling to the ground; she pulls you in close and taps the earrings you didn’t even notice her slipping in. She is showing off, incorrigible, just for you. Just so you know how much control she has, how much she can do all for you.

She spins you round and round, and then slowly, her grip on your wrists keeping your hands above your head, slows you down, tugs you up onto tiptoe, makes you show off how much you can stretch. Her hair whispers at the sides of your stomach, teasing, as she tilts your chin up, makes your veil drape itself over your features.

“Good girl,” she breathes.

Then, still holding you in place, she sets the gem in your navel, a sparkling amethyst, and runs one finger over its swell. Her chuckle is deep and indulgent. And when she looks over you, the strain of your muscles, the grace with which you hold the position, it’s with a delighted hunger.

She does not insult you by giving you anything less than her best. The ropes are thorough, folded back on themselves for safety, swaddling your arms behind your back, pulling them in close, wrists resting on the swell of your rear. Your legs she secures ankle to thigh, forcing you to kneel, but with knees so easily spread. And she frames you in the rope, pulling it snug in a net around your body, pulling your top tight against your skin, dimpling your sides, wrapping you up like a present.

And then… well. “Good luck paying me back double,” she breathes in your ear, packing even more silk between your lips, and pressed so tight against you, you can feel her wicked, monster’s heart beating like a drum. How she jumps when you huff through your nose! How delirious her smile grows when she dangles more packing in front of your face and watches your eyes widen! How she shivers when she leans forward to secure the knots behind your head, burying your face in her softness, and then leans back to take up another scarf from the stack! How vulnerable she is, for all that! A single sad shake of your head or crinkle of your forehead would destroy her.

But you don’t, do you? Because you want to see Rose bloom all for you; because the sparkle in her eyes over being allowed to control the scene is giddy and joyful and hiding behind the pretense of doing this for the Countess as if it were a gauzy silk sash draped over her body; because when she is done, she reaches down and tweaks you through your top just to check her work, and her fingers are so, so clever.

When she picks you up and sets you down on the couch, she might as well have been picking up a stray pillow; she is mighty, mighty, the kind of monster that could arm-wrestle Jessic for fun. When she climbs onto the couch and growls, drinking in the sight of you underneath her, it echoes in the small chamber.

“Now,” she purrs, and her teeth are almost fangs, and her eyes are too visible in the low light, “what do I do with you now, you silly little slave-girl~?”

***

Yue!

Rose from the River gives you something that she has in abundance: she gives you her attention. She drinks it all in! The furrow of intense thought; the slow blossom of realization over your face like the sunrise; your judgment of being a city girl that you lay upon her with such solemnity!

And then she curtseys again, still smiling that too, too clever smile, the one that says she’s got her own opinion as hot as five-alarm curry just simmering away. “Very good, ma’am,” she says, all prim and proper and inviting you to join in on the joke.

Then she does it, so smooth that it might as well have been choreographed—

Sorry, that it might as well have been practiced. Hopefully that’s better, dear.

She stops with her hand on the doorknob and turns back for just a moment to deliver the piledriver right to the heart, as best as she can, unable to escape the urging of the Way forever: “If you’ll forgive me for saying so, I think that your sister would appreciate a visit, should you ever escape the mistress’s grasp. You’ve got quite a few stories to tell her now, and a girlfriend to introduce her to. If you were my younger sister, I would want to hear the whole thing from you, start to finish.”

And she’s gone! But hopefully her words, they linger.

***

Chen! Again!

Rose from the River has been more mutable, hasn’t she? Ever since she had to lock her spirit away, she’s had a little more flexibility; like a young green sapling in the springtime which bends when the wind blows from the north.

Her braids snatch the sword out of midair, and there is a dizzying flourish as she tosses it up, to the squealing delight of her companions, and spins it around, catches it, makes it hum fast like a saw, and— lets it fall into her outstretched hand?

Four arms, again: two tied tight behind her back, two slender and smooth and quick and ready to fight. She doesn’t bother to undo the rope harness, just cuts away the rope about her legs and stands with a theatrical stretch, a faint groan, and then bows to the guards.

Look, she seems to say, the treasure is here for the taking, secured and silenced and swaying! Reach out and try to grab hold of her harness, if you dare! Her eyes are lidded, but not with playful distress, and her moans are ironically sharp. She is amused, and intends to enjoy herself; to prove herself so capable, she can win a fight seemingly while flailing about and squirming uselessly against her bonds. That stance is the stance of a master, and she is ready to prove that she could win against a host with two hands quite literally tied behind her back.

Breathless Dead

Skotos is without words for a moment. It hurts, after all. To be given a quest, then to have it pulled out of her hands; make things right, but do so yourself. This is the spite of the queen of the gods, a refusal to return power to the powerless. But more than that, she is in the presence of Aphrodite.

She should not accept. Aphrodite is, in his own way, as dangerous as Poseidon; not for nothing is he Aphrodite Androphonos. Perhaps even moreso. Both are gods of vast expanses, with terror in their depths; both drown the unwary and bring ruin to the mighty and the powerful. But where Poseidon lures the foolish into his grasp with the treasures of the sea, not least of which are the strange and wonderful lands beyond them, Aphrodite offers a different boon.

Imagine being seen for who you are, Aphrodite’s song goes. Imagine being accepted anyway. Imagine someone choosing you, over and over again.

And even if she doesn’t have that sort of story with Bella, Hera is right. Of course she was. Bella deserves an apology for everything. For leaving her behind, time after time, for not seeing what was placed upon her shoulders, for not being Redana Claudius. And Skotos, then—

Perhaps she will become someone new. The gods are capable of strange metamorphosis. But surely she will no longer be a shadow? Surely. Surely if Bella forgives her. Her palms sweat; her heart throbs almost painfully in her chest. Bella, who holds the keys to Elysium and Tartarus in her hands. With a contemptuous glance, she could tear Skotos apart; with a quiet word, she could make Skotos whole.

See me, and do not look away. Touch me, and do not flinch. Hear me, and do not condemn. The siren song of Aphrodite is sweeter and headier than wine.

Skotos does not address him by either of his greatest titles, as Redana would: Ourania, the god of high and portentous romance, the god of love-as-swords, or Pandemos, the god of ordinary loves, the god of the pulp novel and the bedroom closet. She simply says: “Please. She has to know she was… that she was special. To Redana. And how, if things were different…”

Her voice trails off. She doesn’t deserve anything more. She doesn’t deserve anything at all. She needs to do this for Bella’s sake. But if things had been different, could they have been— not like that, but could they have been, could she have been happy? Could Redana have made her smile? Could she have understood that Redana wanted to give her an entire universe?

Skotos curtsies before Tymborychos, the digger of graves, in her shapeless yellow robe, and awaits his judgment.