der-kazenprinze - Tumblr blog

der-kazenprinze · 9 months

Note

15. kiss on the back for the prompt thing!

Imogen has spent years submerged in the sweet, babbling waters of Laudna’s mind so, while she may not be able to hear her thoughts now, she still remembers their current. And besides, some things don’t need to be said. It’s an unspoken agreement between them—a quirked brow, the tilt of an answering smile—to return Zhudanna’s coin.

Laudna distracts their elderly friend with an enthusiastic—and slightly gooey—recreation of recent journeys while Imogen carries the groceries to the kitchen. She unpacks jars of olives and honey and jam, every pickled thing they encountered, wax-wrapped cheeses, smoked and salted meats, dried fruits and beans, bags of fine-ground flour and spices. She leaves the fresh fruit and vegetables on the countertop with the pumpernickel loaves and, as she does, pulls Zhudanna’s lockbox from its hiding place beneath the beans with a subtle bit of magic.

It’s easy to use her powers now. She knew she was getting stronger but something about being here—where she spent much of her time in degrees of agony with no way to control it or stop it, her powers flaring whenever they wanted to—the difference is stark. How reactive her magic is now, how finely-tuned to her will. A thought, and the lockbox opens. Imogen busies herself selecting and slicing an orange. Another thought, and the coins lift out of the shopping basket and zip over to the box. She arranges the orange segments on a colourful plate. The box clicks closed and slides back into place beneath the beans. It’s all done in a matter of seconds with Zhudanna none the wiser, even if she had peeked over to check on Imogen despite Laudna’s distraction—though how anyone could look away from Laudna for so much as a second during one of her stories - vibrant, enthralling as she is - Imogen doesn’t know.

She lingers a while, helps herself to a slice of orange. It’s tart, almost sour, the way she likes them. The sun blankets half the kitchen in a square of light. Standing in that warmth recalls fragments of an old dream—baking, home, Laudna. The details are too faded and vanish when she reaches for them; in the space where they had been, her memory provides instead the aroma of baked bread and the cool press of Laudna’s lips against her own. Fingers sticky with orange, Imogen twists her wrist and presses her smile to the back of her hand. We kissed, she thinks, giddy, and suddenly the handful of steps separating her from the sitting room and Laudna is too far.

‘—a shape like dripping tar, a great blob of malice, hovering in the air. It struck Orym with a spiralling bolt of shadow, pinning him against the rock!’ Imogen hears as she rejoins the story.

‘Oh!’ Zhudanna squeaks. Her eyes are wide, both wrinkled hands covering her mouth in horror. When she speaks, she sounds so old—had she always, Imogen tries to recall, or is it all of this…this fucking mess around them? The solstice, the god-damning speeches, the fear suffusing the streets like thick jungle mist, the moon, the way oncoming way tilts the axis of every heart. ‘Oh,’ she says in a small, quavering voice, ‘oh dear, oh no, is he alright?’

‘Who?’

‘Your friend. Orym.’

The question makes Laudna’s smile falter. Zhudanna, half-blind, probably doesn’t notice. Imogen does. She fills the agonising pause, steps between them to put the plate down next to Zhudanna. By the time she plants herself on the footstool, twin to the armchair Laudna has claimed, Laudna has recovered.

‘Yes. Yes, of course! He’s a warrior—a hero!’ Zhudanna heaves a sigh of relief at that, claps her hands. Laudna continues. ‘He pulled free of the shadow spear with a horrid yell and spray of blood—’

Geez, Laud, don’t forget she’s old as shit.

And? She has such a creative soul, she’s enjoying—ah. I suppose…heart attacks…hmm. Should I…tone it down?

Imogen rests her chin on her hand as she settles in to listen to the rest of the story and, catching Laudna’s eyes, offers a small smile. Just for her, darlin’.

With a wobbly nod—one that makes Imogen want to yank off the circlet and dive deep into Laudna’s thoughts, wade through them muck and all, hear for herself the knotted tangle of fear and nervy tension and trust she knows is causing havoc in there—Laudna launches back into her tale.

‘Together with our dear new friend Prism–’

‘I like her,’ Zhudanna says. ‘Sensible, for one of those wizard types. Getting out there and having a go of it. Good for her.’

‘Indeed. Very sensibly, she and I harried the foul spirit with our joined magic, giving our companions time to protect the Heirophant and dragging them clear of the danger of this hungry shadow. We threw everything we had at it—flaying it of its shadow piece by piece, cracking its sallow face, until there was nothing left of it but a slug of tarred shadow that I crushed, sending it back to whence it came, into the merciless dark,’ she hisses, hand closing in a tight fist, eyes a brittle, glossy obsidian. After a moment, her intensity relents; the faint gloom in the corners of the room disperses like an audience post performance, and as it leaves, air rushes in to fill the empty space. ‘Anyway,’ she trills, ‘apparently that wasn’t the first time it had appeared there, can you believe that? The Heirophant—the elf Orym and Ashton saved—told us that they had fought it before—or was it their order that had? Hm. Don’t recall. But yes - it’s like a recurring thing. Like a bad ex turning up on their doorstep. But not a bad ex because Evithorir—’

‘Evi- Evirerth-’

‘Evithorir. I think. It was so hard to tell, it hissed a lot. Regardless, the shadow spirit, it turns out it was some, like, ancient terrible hungry fey spirit that sought to devour everything in the world, blah blah, the usual. Starting with Oma-Dua who is this - get this - equally ancient druid who buried herself in the last moments of her life in the depths of this cavern centuries ago to sustain the land around this mountain for the rest of time and took on the form of an enormous glowing green crystal…’

Laudna drifts into an odd silence and sinks back into the plush armchair, into herself, looking small and troubled. Her teeth dig well-worn trenches into her bottom lip as she loses herself in thought.

Imogen clears her throat. ‘It’s been an awful long time since we got a proper rest, Zhudanna—d’you mind if we rest a while?’

‘Not at all, not at all. Let me move my easel, dear, and - ‘

‘No, please, don’t go to any trouble. I’ll set it aside, if that’s alright?’

‘Certainly, certainly.’

Zhudanna lets herself be distracted gracefully, pulling an old knitting project from the box by her chair. Her eyes—wrinkled, worried—linger on Laudna as Imogen helps her up from the chair, curling a gentle hand beneath each elbow.

She looks so exhausted and Imogen is certain she’s bearing most of Laudna’s weight for her when she pulls her to her feet but she’s so fucking light it nearly has Imogen stumbling, off-balance. A dozen questions cluster behind Imogen’s teeth, on the threshold of her mind. Did you eat at all? Did you rest? Who took care of you? The thought might’ve made her jealous a month ago but now it just hurts. Laudna is too light, bordering on frail. Her hair is stringy—dirty, greasy, like its been a week since she washed it, brushed it, cared for it (for herself)—and Imogen knows the answer. Knows Laudna. She cares like caring is what keeps her alive, will drag the energy out of her own fucking marrow for everyone else and when it comes to her, she shows them something dead and dying, shows them a grinning skull. Something beyond repair, beyond need of care.

Red flickers behind her eyes, smoulders in the cracks that split the tips of her fingers. But her hands stay gentle as Imogen helps Laudna to their old room.

The door shuts behind them, shuts out the world. Blissful. There’s no window in here to show them the ruddy moon. There’s no crowds, no intrusive minds. No guards, no traitors, no one but the two of them.

Laudna’s slow walk turns to a hobble. She sits at the edge of the bed, shoulders hunched.

Giving her a little space, Imogen puts their bags at the footboard of the bed and Pate’s birdhouse on the bedside. He’s sleeping in there or pretending to be. Creepy, beloved spy. She moves the easel like she said she would, tucking it into an out of the way corner.

‘She’s really very good, don’t you think?’

Laudna stirs. Glances over, dark eyes flicking between the easel and Imogen, and the smile she manages is a wavering thing but it holds steady at the corners.

She’ll be alright, Imogen decides. Promises.

‘Yes. Very talented, our Zhudanna.’

Her words trail off again and Imogen watches as Laudna begins to fidget, fingers twisting, tugging, pull and plucking in her lap. Was the closed room not blissful for her? Was it too crowded, with Imogen and her and all her thoughts and Delilah and now Bor’dor haunting her? Or was it as simple as the strain of her journey taking its toll? Or was it…

‘Do you regret it?’ Imogen blurts. Laudna stills. ‘The kiss, I mean. Me, kissin’ you. Because I know I asked and I know you kissed me back but if - if you got caught up in the moment or thought it’s what I want - Laud, you gotta know, it doesn’t matter to me how you care for me, I’m so - I’m so happy. So lucky. Just to have you near me. Truly.’

It takes a hell of an effort to shut up then—to bite her lip and give Laudna the room to speak.

Her stomach flips from nerves and her traitor heart follows suit; it flips, flutters in her chest, so gentle and so warmed by the memory of getting to take Laudna’s face between her hands, getting to touch her after so long of only being able to dream about it, getting to lean in and—that kiss! The memory of it fizzles through her, sweet lightning, and it’s ridiculous, actually, because her hands start sweating and her lips tingle and her skin goes hot all over, sensitive. It’s such a silly feeling; she feels like a stumbling foal - clumsy and awkward, unsure, but so fucking eager to get up, go, explore. It’s silly - she feels silly with it, giggly and warm - and then, of course, sense reasserts itself firmly because Laudna hasn’t said anything yet—is staring over Imogen’s shoulder with a tiny, worried frown—and Imogen’s stomach sinks, veins flooding with ice. If she could just take off the circlet, but…

‘Laud?’

‘Imogen.’

‘Do you?’ It’s harder to ask the second time. ‘Do you…regret it?’

‘No,’ Laudna says in that barely-there way. Imogen wants the shadows back. Wants the intensity. Wants Laudna cackling over one of Pate’s horrendous comments, or chiding her for mussing the bedsheets. Anything but this ghost. ‘No, darling. I was - I was only thinking,’ she sighs, ‘how silly it is, how hard it is to talk about…well. About what we want.’ She blinks, dim and distant. ‘I often think that if only everyone were honest, there would be less space for misunderstanding and heartbreak –’ The words send Imogen’s heart sinking ever lower, but Laudna doesn’t seem to notice and continues, ‘– and cruelty and war and, oh, I don’t know. People wouldn’t get away with murder or inheritance trickery and such. I think about all the people who lie whenever they speak and how foolish it is and then it is my turn to speak and I…I’m terribly afraid.’

At that, Imogen crosses to sit beside Laudna on the bed. She takes one of her delicate hands in both of her own. It’s so light; bird-boned, Imogen thinks distractedly, mind cluttered with midnight-plumed ravens and the Duskmaven, of scavenging vultures and red seeping into cracked desert soil, of a canary in the dark. She hopes—as it gets harder to breathe, lungs struggling to contend with the weight of hope and panic—that Laudna won’t warn her away.

‘You can tell me,’ Imogen says, and her words stay blessedly steady. ‘Even if you think I don’t want to hear it. I do. I do.’

For a long moment, Laudna examines their hands. Intertwined. Her own—delicate, long-fingered, pale. The dark web of stagnant veins. Imogen’s—broader, tanned, calloused. The cracked skin, red seeping out. Squeezing Imogen’s hand, Laudna says,

‘I won’t lie, darling. I won’t tell you I wasn’t surprised. I was. I am. You are—’ Dark eyes lift to meet Imogen’s; without thoughts to skim, all Imogen can see in the depths is warmth, a glittering fondness. Sorrow lurks there too, somewhere, even if she can’t see it. ‘You are extraordinary. Young and beautiful and so very alive. I - you wishing to kiss me - you understand why I might be startled. I don’t know what I can offer you, darling. I will always be at your side, of course—to protect you, to wake you from your nightmares, to support you, to - to tether you against the storm, as you said, but - ‘

‘But what?’ Imogen shakes her head with a gentle laugh. ‘Who could ask for more than that?’

‘And the kissing?’

‘We don’t have to do it again. If you don’t like it.’

Laudna tilts her head; it’s not a no, but neither is it a yes. ‘You could choose anyone—’

‘I want only you.’

‘Even though I am—’ Laudna cuts off the words with a snap of her teeth. Turns away, sending a gloomy look to the dim corners of their room.

Imogen’s heart thuds, hard, against her ribs. She rubs at at it, sympathetic. Her bruised heart. She wants what it wants—to be close, ever closer. To hug her, hold her tight. To love her. To rip Delilah out of her—fry the bitch, burn her to ashes, and the ashes to smoke, and the smoke to nothing at all in white lightning—and then offer up her own heart to fill the lack. To welcome Laudna into the red hollow of her ribs, already wondering what kind of home she could make out of them. To take back the ruby ring and present it again, with all the ceremony Laudna deserves. To kiss her. Again and again.

But right now, Laudna doesn’t need a storm, even one of love. She only needs Imogen to listen to her. So she asks,

‘Even though you’re what?’

Laudna’s hands curl into talons and a snarl erupts from her throat. Earlier, Imogen hadn’t known what to make of the idea that Laudna could summon a wolf but she gets it now. Hears it in that mournful, ragged sound.

‘Dead. Broken.’ She claws at her heart. ‘Weak.’

‘No. You’re not, sweetheart, no.’

Imogen cannot resist reaching forward. She keeps her touch feather-light. Skims a high cheekbone before sliding back to the strand of dark hair that has escaped its high bun. She tucks it behind Laudna’s ear with exacting care, thumb grazing the gold ear-cuff. I see you. Every bit. Laudna’s eyes fill with inky tears and, when Imogen lifts her other hand to cradle her precious, lovely face, Laudna leans into the touch.

For a moment, Imogen can only stare.

There is no one in the world like Laudna—so starkly beautiful, so sweet, so enchanting. There is no one half as creative. She knows Laudna’s story—saw her die—but no one could spend an hour in Laudna’s presence and leave thinking her anything other than vibrant. How could that be death? And as for broken, well, Imogen thinks of the mosaics in Uthodurn’s royal halls, and of stained glass windows in the Dawnfather’s hall—what little she had overhead of that part of Laudna’s story—and thinks of Laudna’s mendings and crafts and the hundreds of achingly beautiful smiles Laudna has made up just for her and yes, maybe she’s been broken, but who hasn’t? How can that make her less? Less lovely, less wonderful? It doesn’t. It doesn’t. She thinks of faith and lets her pinkie slip down to touch, so gently, the ragged mark of Laudna’s first death. She thinks of destiny and meets Laudna’s eyes.

Beautiful, she thinks, and then - because they are being truthful, because they are telling each other the truth - she says it out loud too.

‘You’re beautiful. You’re my—‘ Imogen falters, tries to think of a word that doesn’t stick in her chest like a knife, but pushes on because her love doesn’t make her fearless, it just makes her brave. ‘My favourite.’

Her blush blooms purple under Imogen’s hands. Laudna glances down, shy, then up from under lashes dark and sticky with inky makeup, splayed like delicate spider legs.

‘It is strange,’ Laudna says, covering Imogen’s hands with her own when she starts to pull away, worried. ‘Don’t leave, darling. Let me… Let me?’

Let her lean in, yes, let her press close, forehead to forehead, yes, stay so still when Laudna touches her cheek, fleeting. Laudna trembles—afraid? excited? damn this fucking circlet—but the contact settles her and when she retreats, she pulls Imogen’s hands from her cheeks but doesn’t let them go. She breathes in and out. Then says,

‘Waking from death is much like waking from sleep, except it hurts. Only a little but all the time.’

Imogen’s fingers brush over Laudna’s wrist, where her pulse plods away. ‘Laudna,’ she whispers, not to interrupt. Only because Laudna ought never go a moment thinking she didn’t care.

‘For all those years, even though I…I ran and built my huts and Pate too, of course, and of course I felt things—fear and loss and joy, too, sometimes—I was alive and awake but. So much of me was still dead. I was so - confused. And angry, often. I was surviving, you see. I had strength enough to hold myself together and fix things, here and there, but no more than that. I was hungry, all the time, I had so many teeth.’ Laudna searches her face. ‘And then I met you and you helped. Cared. These past years with you… It used to be that when I wanted something, it - it was hunger I felt. This endless hunger. A great pit in my chest. And it was hard to tell, you see, what it was I wanted except for everything, anything I could get my hands on. Do you understand?’

Imogen gnaws at her lip. Slowly, she shakes her head. ‘I’m sorry, I don’t.’ She dips her head, catches Laudna’s eyes. ‘Explain it to me?’

Laudna’s fingers shake as she slides them over the backs of Imogen’s hands. Long fingers curl around one of Imogen’s wrists and she lifts it to press a chaste kiss to her knuckles, lips cool against the burning ridge of her oldest lightning scar.

‘You have given me so much. You gave me friendship and purpose and trust. Food. Fun and stories. Strength. A bed. A home. And the hunger…it doesn’t gnaw so terribly, darling. Now, when I - when I want something, it isn’t an impossible task. I needn’t lose myself in that great black pit, blinding searching for what I lack. It starts to make sense. I start to make sense. What I want. Outside of her, and hunger. You’ve given me so much,’ Laudna tells her, and her voice creaks with the weight of her words. ‘How can I possibly take more? How - selfish, how greedy it would be to want… To want.’

‘Do you want me to kiss you?’ Imogen asks, voice soft. She tries not to sound to hopeful.

Launda holds her hands for a long time. It’s maddening, because Laudna never stays still for long; she doesn’t now either, instead stroking tiny patterns against her skin, fingers sliding over and between her own. At the occasional scratch of her nails, a frisson of electricity crackles down Imogen’s arms, through her body. Finally, Laudna nods.

‘I do. Oh, Imogen, I do. I didn’t know it - I knew I would be content for centuries, the rest of my days, if only I could sleep in your bed, stand at your side, content with any touch or favour you might share with me. And then - to be kissed?’ A shy smile creeps across her lips. ‘Would it be terribly unfunny to say it struck me like a bolt?’

Imogen snorts. Pulls her hands free so she can shove at her—lightly, though, barely enough to make even Laudna sway. Her hands settle on the tender branching of Laudna’s collarbones. The fabric of the new dress is silk-smooth under her palms; the lace neckline, though, catches against her work-rough, scar-rough fingers. She strokes it again, entranced. It’s so soft, the lace, in its reluctance to let her go. It’s so beautiful, the whorling patterns of leaves and flowers, and the contrast of blue-black fabric against Laudna’s pale skin is enough to make her glow. And beneath lace and skin, the steady tap of Laudna’s pulse—a knock on the door, on the coffin lid, here I am.

Beautiful.

‘That’s dreadful,’ she scolds, wrinkling her nose.

‘That’s me. Full of dread.’ A ghostly visage flickers across Laudna’s face, there—skin and skull shifting, FRIDA’s inspiration?—and gone. ‘And you?’ she asks. ‘You too?’

‘Full of dread?’

‘Do you wish to kiss me, I meant, actually.’

Imogen swallows harshly. ‘Yeah,’ she rasps. ‘Yeah, I do.’

A frown pinches Laudna’s forehead. ‘Have you been afflicted with this desire for long?’

‘Afflict— You say it like it’s a sickness or somethin’,’ Imogen teases, but Laudna flaps a hand for her to hurry up and tell, so she shrugs. ‘Um. Yeah. I ‘spose I’ve been wantin’ to kiss you for a while,’ she admits, cheeks burning. ‘When I could hear you, it was… Do you remember when Dusk was hangin’ around, you told me you hadn’t thought about it? Hadn’t accessed that part of your brain?’ Laudna nods. ‘I know. I knew that. Because sometimes, when we were close and you…’

Imogen pauses. Sucks in a breath—it’s a little stuffy in their room, no windows, but it smells of freshly laundered sheets and paint and wood polish and Laudna and Imogen lets it steady her.

‘D’you know that you say the kindest, sweetest things sometimes? You always know what to do to calm me down or make me laugh, even when the whole world is—’ She gestures awkwardly to the south wall where the moon hovers in her minds eye. ‘You know. Going to shit. And sometimes—I wasn’t sure how much you…’ She stops again, lips twisting, frustrated. ‘I knew that you cared for me because, well, because you do.’

‘Naturally, of course.’

‘But sometimes I wondered if…if you wanted to kiss me, like I sometimes thought of doing. But when I looked into your mind, you were never thinkin’ about it so -’ Imogen shrugs, cheeks hot. ‘I never brought it up. You hardly ever thought about it when other folk were flirtin’ or talkin’ about it, so I figured it wasn’t something you wanted. And that didn’t matter to me! Just so long as you were with me, and we were together, I was happy with that. But then Dusk,’ Imogen strangles the name in her throat, hopes fiercely that Yu can feel it, wherever the fuck they might be, ‘put the idea in your head and then they…left…and you were confused and I’d sometimes catch flashes of it in your head but it didn’t feel right to bring it up, even though sometimes I thought—the way you were lookin’ at me, and not pullin’ away when I was lookin’ at you—I thought…maybe? Maybe it was - Maybe you could. Think like that. And when you died—’ Her voice cracks. ‘That wasn’t the right time either, obviously,’ she scoffs. Pulls a hand back to swipe at her eyes.

‘Darling,’

‘It had to be your choice. All of it. Everything, after what happened. And I was fucking terrified because of all those questions in my head like if I’d be pushin’ you if I asked, or makin’ you more of a target, burdenin’ you with all this Predathos moon shit—’

‘Never. Never a burden.’

‘—and then I got this,’ Imogen taps her circlet, ‘and I couldn’t hear you anymore, couldn’t check, and so, yeah, Laudna, you could say I’ve been thinkin’ about it for a while.’

‘Thinking about,’ she says, so carefully, like she’s afraid if she speaks it too loud or too fast the whole thing will break, ‘kissing. Me.’

Imogen laughs. Smiles at her with her whole face, her whole heart. Every soft, exposed, grotesque, tender part of it. ‘Yeah, sweetheart. Is that alright?’

Laudna nods jerkily. Eyes Imogen’s mouth curiously. ‘Can I - that is, if it’s alright with you,’

‘Please,’ Imogen whispers, and she isn’t sure if she’s reading her own mind or if Laudna’s is loud enough to overpower the circlet, if she’s letting the power of it subside in her eagerness to know if Laudna wants what she wants, but it’s so clear—Laudna’s dark eyes, warm and kind and wanting; her reaching hands, aligning them hurt to hurt, heart to heart; plum lips pressing, ever so gently, against hers.

The kiss lasts a heartbeat. Barely long enough to register the touch. Even so, Laudna flushes deeply. Touches her fingers to her mouth and breathes out, shaky.

‘Oh. Imogen.’

Imogen lifts a hand—‘Can I? Let me, please’—to Laudna’s neck, grazing the high collar she’d been so jealous of in the store for getting to touch Laudna’s neck, but adores now as she coaxes it down so she alone can see, can touch the soft skin of her neck. Feel the way Laudna’s breath hitches when she does, her shiver as Imogen’s fingers slide forward, following the path of her jaw and swiping beneath the hinge of it—tender, awed, lingering on the mottled silver marks of bullet holes and torn skin—before she slides her fingers into the curtain of dark dark. She presses gently, guides her forward for another kiss. Her lips find the corner of Laudna’s mouth and smiles at the noise of displeasure it pulls.

‘I think,’ Imogen whispers, kisses her more solidly. Tilts her head and loses herself in Laudna: Laudna’s nose nudging into her cheek; Laudna’s hands fluttering between her elbows and shoulders before laying gently on her back; a clumsy bump of lips, which is actually mostly chin, a giggled apology, and then something gives and Laudna’s lips are on hers again, steady and slow and careful, like they have all the time in the world, like now that she is here there is no where she would rather be. Imogen pulls back, licks her lips. Citrus bursts on her tongue.

Laudna stares at her mouth. ‘What - ‘ She has to clear her throat, voice breathy, like Imogen has kissed all the air out of her and the thought makes want crackle beneath Imogen’s skin. ‘What do you think?’

‘Amazing. Great. Perfect.’

Dark eyes gleam. Laudna smiles—no, she smirks. ‘Darling. You were saying something, that you thought…?’

‘Oh.’ Imogen starts to speak—and has to stop. She laughs. ‘Y’know, I’ve totally forgotten?’

‘Oh.’ Laudna’s blush deepens. She’s so fucking pretty. ‘It will come back to you. If it’s important.’ She fidgets. Reaches out a hand to touch Imogen’s elbow, her knee. She looks for a moment as if she is about to speak but then a calm settles over her and she only smiles and nods. ‘Do you mind, dearest, if I take a little time to fix the birdhouse? Only Pate said it’s dreadfully uncomfortable and I think - if I add some soft cushion fabric, maybe curtains - I can fix the place up for him.’

Imogen nods. She understands—and could do with a minute to calm down too. She crawls around Laudna up to the headboard, props herself up against it.

Laudna frowns. ‘Really? Boots on the bed?‘

She smiles, closes her eyes. ‘It’ll be alright, I’ll magic the dirt away after.’

‘It’s the principle of the thing,’ Laudna insists. After a few moments of Imogen ignoring her, Laudna sets aside the birdhouse and begins to unbuckle Imogen’s boots. Imogen watches, thoughts far too chaotic to pin down. It doesn’t take long—Laudna has helped her before, when migraines stopped her from doing just about anything—and she pats Imogen’s shin, tuts at the unhappy state of her socks, and mends the hole by her big toe with a needle and thread of black shadow. It looks good as new when she is done.

‘There,’ Imogen drawls, snuggling down into the pillow at her back. ‘What would I do without you?’

Laudna laughs. ‘You’d wear boots in bed and put your cups upside down on the shelves–’

‘First of all, I’m right about that and second of all,’ she nudges Laudna with her toe, ‘I never wanna find out.’

She smiles and, oh, Imogen thinks, Dawnfather, eat your heart out. You don’t know light like this. You couldn’t make a light like hers if you had a thousand solstices.

They spend a lazy afternoon together. They don’t kiss again—Laudna is far too intent on her work, and Imogen merely watches her and allows time and proximity to ease the tight, grating knot of nerves in her chest that had built with every moment of Laudna’s absence. She asks easy questions and retreads old, familiar jokes and stories, and everything resettles. In some ways, it is as it has always been. It’s the two of them, together. It’s also new in a way that makes Imogen’s heart flutter every time she remembers; I kissed her, I can kiss her.

‘Pate,’ Laudna croons, as she takes apart old clothes and blankets, stitches them into cushions for the interior of the birdhouse. ‘Come out, come out, wherever you are,’ she sings, and the rat-bird clambers out of his wooden house and up her arm, waits until she’s packed the cushions into place to skitter back inside, taking pride of place in the decadence. ‘What do you think of your new ho-ome?’ It’s so fucking weird. They both are. Imogen has to get closer to her. Tucks a foot under Laudna’s knee—who beams at her, wraps a chilly hand around her ankle and keeps her close—and makes a note to kiss Pate on top of his awful little skull soon. Just because. ‘What do you think? Will this be more comfortable?’

‘It’s nice!’ he croaks, little paws patting walls and floor. ‘I do have a suggestion, though—’

‘What! You’ve only been alive for a few months, what could you possibly know about decorating?’ she demands, aghast.

Pate flies from the house, landing on the roof. There are no eyes in his bird skull but Imogen swears he rolls them anyway. ‘Pfft! What don’t I know? I’m the whole package, you know. Bird brains and rat cunning, fanks very much.’

‘Fine, then, if you’re so smart! What’s your suggestion?’

‘Curtains.’

‘Curtains?’

‘Curtains. For, you know, setting the mood, or sleeping in the day. Or if you two need a little, heh, private time to lock lips—’

‘Alright, yes, fine!’ Laudna yelps. ‘I’ll make you some damn curtains!’

Pate chuckles. His wings peel open with a wet squelch that Imogen is never going to get used to—how could he be wet, he’s been dead for years, that’s what she wants to know—and he takes off with one, two laborious flaps of his wings, gliding down to the bed covers and scampering back into his now-comfortable home. ‘Thank ye kindly,’ he calls out from within.

Laudna grumbles as she pulls together curtains rather quickly, delving in her pack for supplies. She pulls out shards of metal–splinters, almost, but as long as her palm.

‘What’re those?’ Imogen asks, as she tries to bully the pillow under her head into a more comfortable shape.

‘Hm? Oh - one of Ashton’s climbing pitons. It shattered.’

The pillow refuses to be comfortable; Imogen gives up, gets up to search the room for wherever the other pillow went. She finds it, after a while, on the top shelf of the little linen closet and jumps for it before remembering she knows telekinesis. How in the nine hells Zhudanna even got it up there, she has no clue. Wandering back to the bed, Imogen watches over Laudna’s shoulder for a minute as she crafts.

‘You went climbing?’

‘When we were separated, that’s where we landed,’ Laudna says. ‘On a cliffside. Jagged rocks, Steam vents. Now that I think about it, we were rather lucky, actually, that we didn’t appear in the air above a sharp spike or roll off the cliff. But yes, we had to climb,’ she says, and tells Imogen all about it— finding Deni$e - Mona, at the time—and the climb and the endless valley of verdant trees.

Imogen listens carefully, heart heavy. She thinks of a long, cold walk and finding truly kind friends at the end of it - a celestial bull they befriended - shopping - the warmth and bustle and commerce and, yes, anxiety, of Uthodurn, and meeting royalty—and she thinks of Laudna, who dislocates something whenever she sneezes, having to pull herself up a cliffside. She rubs Laudna’s shoulder and dips her head, presses a kiss there on her back—because she can, because she wants to, because Laudna wants it too. Laudna hums, a happy sound.

‘I’m sorry you ended up there.’

‘It wasn’t all bad. It was rather beautiful. I would have enjoyed it, I think, if you had been there.’

‘Maybe we’ll go together someday.’

Laudna smiles. Affixes one of the piton curtain-rods into place as Pate guides her—’Higher, higher on the left - other left - all of it lower now - perfect!’

‘I think Ashton will want to go back.’

‘Oh?’

‘There was something of the Hishari there - a town. Cursed now, apparently. He wants answers.’

‘Then that’s what we’ll do,’ Imogen agrees. ‘Kill the moon, then go on holiday to a cursed town in Issylra. Sounds nice.’

‘You were right, by the way,’ Imogen says later, as they walk back from the Windowed Wall to their friends.

‘Of course I was.’ Laudna beams across at her, tone bright, teasing; it’s such a shift from her mood of the morning that Imogen can do nothing but smile back at her. ‘About what, though?’

‘You said if it was important, I’d remember what I was gonna say. And I remember now.’’ Imogen wraps her arm through Laudna’s, pulls her in tight. There aren’t many people crowding the street but she doesn’t need an excuse to hold her close anymore. ‘You know, the thought you kissed right outta my head?’

‘Imogen!’ Laudna slaps her hand lightly, but her eyes gleam. Imogen thinks she might be pleased by the idea of driving her to distraction. ‘Well, go on then. What was it?’

‘You asked if I’d been thinking about it for a long time. Kissin’ you. I was gonna say, I think I’ll never get it outta my head. I’m gonna be thinkin’ about kissing you forever. If that’s alright with you.’

Laudna’s chin lifts - proud, pleased by the idea, clearly - and she gains what could only be called a strut. Her cheeks colour faintly. ‘I’ll be thinking about it too.’ Her eyes glitter brightly over a sweet smile. ‘After all, you’re very capable,’ she teases, and laughs, delighted, at the blush her words pull from Imogen.

They’re still smiling when they rejoin their friends. It earns them strange looks, but fond, relieved. No one pries—though Ashton has a stare like a crowbar—and they say nothing, for now.

#this is so soft #op i love u #imodna #this is canon for me #cr spoilers #c3e65

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