[Closed] The Light You Used to Bring

[Desiderio Morandi]

wherever 'here' is

late morning on the 27th of roalis, 2720

T

here was silence, at first, from her. Utter silence. Perhaps it was the silence of resignation; either way, he supposed she could not but agree, or at the very least concede.

Desiderio, she said then, and he stiffened. It was nearly more surprising to hear the full name than it had been to hear her name for him, some days ago. She had never quite been able to manage it, even that last year; now, it flowed easily into the air between them, and all in that soft, familiar-unfamiliar voice he found so unnerving. Gooseflesh prickled again up his spine, and the back of his neck – to which a few locks of hair were plastered with sweat – itched.

Very few people called him Desiderio. With Mother and Uncle Vicente in Muffey, and work altogether too busy to visit, it was only Amelie who called him by that name. Ordinarily, if a stranger – especially a woman – had said it, he would have been scandalized.

He was not altogether certain he was not scandalized now. But there were rather more important things than scandal to think about.

“I am not uncomfortable,” he replied. “I merely have a duty, and I shall fulfill it.”

At her next assertion, he grunted again, shaking his head, but said nothing. Perhaps she knew better than him how to tend to it – he knew very little about Brunnhold’s servants and their duties – but what did she expect to do, cuffed and blinded?

He stiffened as she stated then, quite matter-of-factly, that she would help. He heard a rustling.

“You will not –!” Another redshift crackled through his field, but he broke off.

She rather broke him off with a sudden, Ticks! and a hiss.

He had already started to get back to his feet, to resume his insipid waddling and rustling around in the grass – by himself, without an injured young woman wandering around to bump into or potentially lose. But now –

By Her deadly terrors, he was grateful she could not see the look on his face. He was very silent, waiting, listening to her shuddering inhale. His mouth had opened; he could feel it shaping the first syllable of her name.

His lips twisted instead. “You should,” he snapped, “and you shall. You shall wait right there for me, and you shall let me see to your ankle.” No matter how useful she wished to feel, now was hardly the time. A more restless girl he had never met, even back then. Had she grown in the least, the last ten years in –

Another, worse pang. This was not, he reminded himself, not that girl. This was not, was not… that girl had not spent ten years in…

“And do not think of slipping away. Among other things, banderwolves are native to this region.”

He clamped his mouth shut firmly, feeling around in the grass. It was a little while before he found it; he nearly lost hope. But then he felt a tangled strap in the grass, and he closed his fist around it.

“A-ha!” It was more a snarl than anything, if a pleased one.

He turned back, wincing against another lance of pain through his eyes. Another tear rolled down his cheek, and he palmed it away. “Can you stretch out your leg? Is your ankle numb, or only painful?” he asked.

It would have to be compressed, regardless, before she could walk, even with his – assistance – the thought prickled up and down the back of his neck, and he tried to put it off. That much he knew, at least. But what of her head? What of his? Their eyes? “Later, if the magister does not find us soon, I should like to apply rudimentary diagnostics,” he said matter-of-factly.

He had forgotten himself, and had evidently remained a great deal closer to her than he had thought. He reached out, brushed what must have been a shoulder with his hand, and fumbled. He cleared his throat.

[Aurelie Steerpike]

Roalis 27, 2720 - Late Morning
Somewhere, En Route to Nowhere

A duty—of course. Without thinking about it, Aurelie nodded. She caught herself partway through the motion, feeling extremely silly. Having her eyes closed was enough to make her forget, evidently, that neither of them could see even with them open. She opened them, just as a reminder.

He did not, she noted, tell her not to call him "Desiderio" either. It was difficult to say in a different way than it had been before, and it hurt almost as much as "Inspector Morandi". Perhaps she ought not to address him directly at all; he seemed determined to do the same to her. Aurelie held that one utterance of her name tight.

Tighter still through the snarl and the shift of his field; Aurelie had never been a good read of them, but she didn't need to be to understand that. She flinched, hunching her shoulders as she sat gingerly back down with her ankle out to one side. It was embarrassing, to have managed to hurt herself in the simple act of trying to get up—having Desiderio snarl at her made it all much worse. Was that part of his duty, too, to snap at her and treat her like... By every sacred Hour, she was tired, but not too much so to feel faintly irritated. With him, or with herself?

"Yes, sir," she mumbled. Why choose when she could be annoyed with both of them? Honestly. Where was she going to go, when she couldn't even get to her knees without making a mess of it? Aurelie sat again, digging her fingers into the grass and then down into the cool dirt below with a clink of metal. The sun was still high, warm on her face—she was going to freckle even more, she could tell. Well, it wasn't like it mattered. No freckles or a thousand, who would look at her to care?

"Banderwolves?" Aurelie froze, fingertips buried in the soil, and strained her ears. Which was absolutely silly of her; it was the middle of the day, and mentioning them didn't summon the things here. She still shivered, and felt her heart beat a little faster. "I'm not going anywhere, don't worry." On the other hand, were wolves any worse than her current situation?

Aurelie tried not to listen to him rooting around in the field (or whatever they were in) for his things. Aurelie, of course, had no things to have lost. All of the things she'd held onto for so long were out of her reach, save the bracelet and her lockets. Even her embroidery kit was gone.

Sitting still was difficult, especially as she was trying not to pay attention to what Desiderio may or may not be doing. Without being able to look around, Aurelie found all she could really do was think about pain. Lucky her, she had plenty of it to dwell on. Chimes, her eyes hurt. Like something hot being lanced through them, right back into her skull. She was accustomed to ignoring injury, but this was so persistent. Somehow, despite everything, she found herself hoping that it was worse for her than it was for him.

"Oh good, you found it." She wasn't sure, actually, if that was good or not—he sounded so angry about it. Who needed banderwolves, with this snarling thing right here? That was—oddly familiar, also. Not the snarling, that was... new. But when they'd met, she remembered as if recalling a dream, he'd express lots of things as if he were upset about them. Hearing this variation was almost comforting, if not for the fact that she seemed to make him actually angry.

What do you care, she wanted to demand, how my ankle is? Or if I were to run off, to get devoured by wolves? Certainly, that would solve the problem of what to do with her. Brunnhold wouldn't have to waste precious time and resources, and he could go back to... to whatever his life was, now. It wasn't as if he... If she... Aurelie wiped at her face with a hideous clatter of chains, forgetting that she was covered in dirt until it was too late.

"It's—" Experimentally, she wiggled it again, wincing and swallowing another curse. Absolutely painful; no numbness here. "Only painful," she concluded, as evenly as she could. If the magister didn't find them...

Ah, the magister. Aurelie had almost entirely forgotten about anyone else, in her relief at the both of them being alive. But if they were, then the magister... Although, she was older and... Aurelie bit her lip. She should be worried for the others, but she couldn't seem to be except in a very abstract way. Diagnostics? He meant—Aurelie swallowed, an uncomfortable prickling on her skin.

A prickling not dispelled in any way by the brush of his hand against her shoulder. She jerked away, jostling her injured ankle as she did so. She couldn't contain a small squeak of pain, but she rather thought it was covered up by the clatter of these awful cuffs. She thought of that, and not how she felt such a miserable combination of horror and sorrow at something so simple as his hand coming into accidental (and it must have been accidental) contact with her shoulder.

"O-Of course," she managed. "If... Yes, I suppose that's... Why would you bother?" The last she blurted out, terribly. Her ability to say the wrong thing seemed perfectly uninjured. How delightful.

[Desiderio Morandi]

wherever 'here' is

late morning on the 27th of roalis, 2720

O

nly painful. He felt more than a little relief. He knew less what to do with a broken ankle than a sprained one, other than keep her off of it for as long as he could, which was a task he thought might be rather more difficult than herding cats. Yes, sir, he thought, scowling more deeply.

He found he could never quite tell when she was being impudent; the strange oscillation between politeness and snark – and, in fact, her tendency to do both at once – did not help. That was a new feature, and not one he had expected in the least.

He felt her jerk away from his fingertips as if burned.

His face contorted wretchedly, and again he was achingly grateful she could not see it. He was just as grateful, this time, that he could not see her. He heard her squeak, too, and he knew that in moving she had somehow wrenched her ankle. It was quiet, though, underneath the rattle of her handcuffs; he could pretend he had not heard it. And so – pretend he did.

The questions were nothing new, at least, even if he seldom expected them. But what a strange question. Bother? Why would he bother?

“Because there might be some issue we cannot detect with our senses, even had we the use of all of them.” He imagined for a moment the way Tanqueray had spoken to her; he wondered if he should not have explained, and should not explain more. There was a reason, after all, why her kind were not permitted to know… Why her kind could not even understand such things.

A child, he had been told as a boy, when Mother had found him weeping. An embarrassing memory, and one that he had done his best to quash, like everything else about his embarrassing boyhood. But Aurelie would be like a child, she had explained to him then, for the rest of her life. That was one of the many reasons why her gating was for the best, even aside from diablerie: so that she could be among others like her, and so that neither of them would be forced to watch the other grow or remain stunted forever. For whom, he had wondered then, would that have been crueler?

He could not picture it then, Aurelie a child forever; he had tried to for a year. He had lost his appetite, lost track of his studies, lost everything. Until he had resolved simply to forget, as everyone had agreed was the best way.

He did not know why he continued on. Bastian manners, he thought bitterly, remembering his first days at Numbrey. Too heavy a touch. He had already frightened her with banderwolves, quite intentionally. Why not this?

His voice still sounded brusque and cold, but that was nothing if not his nature. “With your head, or your eyes. Or something deeper. This is why I would bother.” He bit off the words.

He had taken out the roll of compression bandages, now. “You should rather have Dr. Pettigrew, or even the magister. I have never been known for my light touch.”

That was hardly true, admittedly. But no one would know that; no one –

No one, save her.

His lip curled. “But it is Inspector Morandi that you have. Alas.” He scowled. He blinked away more prickling, painful tears.

His hands were clean, at least; that was one benefit to the gloves, however he had ruined them. He took off one glove, then the other.

He paused, lifting a hand. He imagined it was between them. “You shall have to guide my hand to your ankle. As best you can. I do not wish to hurt you by my clumsiness.”

[Aurelie Steerpike]

Roalis 27, 2720 - Late Morning
Somewhere, En Route to Nowhere

Aurelie couldn't decide if she wanted to smile or frown as he started to answer her. No, she wanted to say; that wasn't what I was asking. She knew the purpose of doing it, she didn't know—why he felt it was worth the effort to do it. Maybe he thought she was simple, just like all the rest. Like a child, she thought, and her face finally decided to pull into a scowl he couldn't see.

There was something, at least, in the brusque, clipped way he explained. Not the too-soft kindness of Tanqueray or the doctor; if he had misunderstood her question, at least he didn't make it worse by explaining as if she could not understand. It was straightforward, at least, and she supposed she still preferred that.

Had he cared, when they all knew? Aurelie thought, her whole life, that he would have. She certainly did. Her first year she had been torn between looking for him and hoping never to see him, not wanting him to see her in that first blue uniform that had been almost as big on her as the dress she wore now. She'd caught a glance, once or twice—and she'd stayed out of sight, fearing what his face might be if she saw it.

Well, now she knew. She wasn't sure if hurt more now than it would have then; time seemed to have softened the blow not at all.

"I would not," she said sharper than she meant. Aurelie did not want him to touch her, but she wanted that from the magister even less. Or Dr. Pettigrew, who had examined her plenty already. Smiling at her in that way that made her skin try to crawl from her bones and run away. "I mean, ah... I don't need a light touch. Strong constitution." Remember? she almost said, but veered away from it.

She heard him shuffling through the bag while he spoke. You used to, she choked off. What happened? Was it...? Are you, she wanted to ask, happy, at least? Inspector Morandi, alas. It was a shame, she thought, heart heavy, and for reasons that had nothing to do with lightness of touch. She didn't bother to stop her face from twisting.

The rustling stopped, and he spoked again. Aurelie swallowed. "Ah," was about all she could managed. It made sense; he couldn't see her to reach out. Practical, and not... The strangest request. She felt reluctant, all the same. "O-one moment, I... I have to, er. I'm still wearing my shoes," she explained, haltingly.

Bells and chimes, she had never been so glad for blindness. She could feel warmth creep up into her face. She took her shoes off first, carefully, and then—Gracious Lady. This was hardly the time to be concerned about this, given everything that had just happened and the situation, but she did have to take off her stockings as well. She was no clever hand with first aid, but she did know at least that much. That was easy enough, at least, and she managed with a minimum of pain, despite her cuffed wrists.

That left only... "All right," she began, then stopped. "I-I'm going to, er. Do that. Now. Uhm." There was still some soil on her fingers; she wiped it off on her skirt. It was oddly satisfying, to ruin the thing. When her fingers were clean, she reached out, groping in what she imagined was the space between them.

For a moment, she found nothing, and that was almost a relief. She found her heart was going entirely too fast, threatening to burst out of her ribs and leave her behind. A peculiar kind of nervousness she could not account for. Aurelie had been reaching for what she hoped would be his forearm or his wrist. What she found first was the palm of his hand, which she brushed with her fingertips. He'd taken off his gloves; Aurelie bit her lip, and moved as quickly as she could to gingerly take his hand.

"I-It, ah. Uhm. Here." Chimes, she hoped she wasn't as transparently anxious as she thought she was.

"I meant," she added quickly when she released Desiderio's hand, "w-why do any of this... F-for me, by the way. I understand the... the basic purpose of... Oh, nevermind." She was babbling. Absolutely babbling.

[Desiderio Morandi]

wherever 'here' is

late morning on the 27th of roalis, 2720

O

f course, he thought.

She had always been. Oh, he had envied her for it then, sometimes; he had relied upon her often enough, too. He had thought it a lovely and fortuitous thing, that at least one of them was strong.

Altogether strange to think of. He resolved to put it out of his head entirely. She would see, all the same. He was no gentle living conversationalist, nor delicate quantitative professor, either, but he would do. That was, when they found some safer place than this; he was beginning to believe, with a sinking feeling, that the magister would not in fact find them.

His face twisted. She did not sound terribly pleased to comply, but it was that, or – reach out like a fumbling idiot and chance touching quite literally anything else on her person.

Shoes, she stumbled out, finally. He cleared his throat very quietly. Shoes and, he imagined… stockings. There was an awful clang and rattle – there was something horribly surreal about all of this – as she reached, he presumed, to take the aforementioned items… off. He lifted his chin, shutting his eyes.

He was, of course, a young man. Women had long been among the ranks of the Seventen; he had served with plenty – had even trained a few. In the investigative and patrol divisions, he had never examined or dressed the wounds of a female officer, but he certainly could have been in the position to, had the situation been dire. There was nothing unusual about it in the least, and especially not given who, and what, the detainee was.

He listened carefully, despite himself; he could well imagine the pain of getting clothes off around an injury, strong constitution or not.

More stuttering. Suddenly he could not quite command the words to say yes, or even thank you; he let out a sharp grunt instead.

Her fingertips brushed his palm unexpectedly.

His throat tightened. More gooseflesh, creeping over all of him; it was all he could do not to shiver.

It was nothing, nothing at all. He snorted again, agitated. She took his hand in hers, warm and a little gritty. And small – almost shockingly small now, with his eyes shut. And he had not noticed before the textures of tiny scars here and there on the fingers, and others that he thought must be old burns. Kitchen scars, he thought; he had interviewed a sous chef once in Vienda, tracking a burglar, who had had a similar pattern of scars on his hands. They had been much larger, of course. His brow had furrowed; for a moment, he was too distracted even to be uncomfortable.

Then he heard her voice again, stammering, and his discomfort flooded back. She sounded horribly nervous. It was only right, he supposed; he was hardly – well, he was who he was. He was not made of stone, but he might well have been to anyone else.

He felt, too, the cool edge of her handcuffs against the side of his hand, and he swallowed tightly again.

He tried to listen as she guided his hand to her ankle. He frowned. Never mind, she had said, and rather wisely. He was utterly unsure why she insisted on the point; the question grew stranger and stranger by the minute. It was especially not one he wanted to answer while – doing this.

“Because it is my duty,” he said sharply. “Do you expect me to simply – ah. Ah, ha.” The noise dissolved into another grumbling snarl; he cleared his throat.

His fingertips were against the bare skin of her ankle, inflamed-warm. He cleared his throat again.

A sprain, then, as she had said. He reached for the bandages and set about it, very careful with his hands. He hesitated for just a moment with his right; he could feel the ring on his second smallest finger, though he did not know why it stopped him.

He compressed the ankle with the bandages as best he could, round and round. Once, he felt the brush of what must have been her skirt, or – petticoat – and his face grew oddly hot. His face had been hot for a little while; it was the pain, and the sun.

“Do you expect me to simply permit you to walk on a sprained ankle, and then risk – whatever harm might befall you, from some lingering effect or injury?” he snapped. “Bothering is what I do. I do not have these snaps upon my uniform for a lack of thoroughness.”

[Aurelie Steerpike]

Roalis 27, 2720 - Late Morning
Somewhere, En Route to Nowhere

This was absolutely ridiculous. Every moment of this seemed to her more absurd than the one before. It didn't help that Desiderio said nothing, and she couldn't see his face, so she couldn't even... Well, that very well may not have helped. And there was something of a comfort in knowing he couldn't see her having to reach so far up under this skirt to get to the top of her stockings. It was only when they were halfway down her calf that she realized she could have pulled them.

Lessons, she supposed, for an equally ridiculous future. She had the most absurd desire to turn away.

Not that she counted, she thought grimly. One didn't think it unseemly for a child to remove her socks, did you? Perhaps to—she did have to reach awfully far up her thigh to get to the top of them. A dog, she thought disparagingly, or an article of particularly uninteresting furniture. Wasn't that what she was? What she'd been all the years in another life she would have counted as a young woman?

So the fault was hers alone, and she needed to stop thinking about it. Aurelie felt him shiver when she touched his palm, and she bit her lip. He was the one who asked her to do it! If he found it so repellant for her to touch him so, he shouldn't have asked.

His hand had changed, since they were children. Of course it had, she scolded herself. Hers had, too. She was achingly aware of every scar and callous, even if she couldn't see them. Of her nails, bitten short despite her best efforts to break the habit. Desiderio's hands had been... Smaller, then, for one thing. Everything about him had been smaller; it was strange to see a version of him that loomed so large. Softer, too, rough only where he held a pen.

And kind to her, in his own strange sort of way. That she missed most of all.

Duty, he said again, and his fingertips had found her ankle. Aurelie went very still, as if it was less strange if she imagined herself made of stone. His fingers, she noticed, were cold against the hot skin of her ankle. Swollen then, after all; she tried to think of that and nothing more. He was careful, bandaging her ankle, touching her no more than necessary.

At one point, she thought she felt the cool impression of a ring on his right hand. It only hurt because of her ankle, she told herself fiercely; what else did she expect? Desiderio Morandi was a—a young officer, likely with prospects. He was older than her; it would be strange if... Aurelie put it out of her mind. That hardly mattered, anyway. She was about to be cloistered away with the Everine. And even if she wasn't, what did she care?

He didn't, she reminded herself, even want to look at her. Or be her friend. Aurelie still wondered what she was like, and hated herself for it.

When he was finished he spoke again; Aurelie's eyes widened in surprise. That was so—not the response she might have expected, and yet the one that seemed most fitting all the same. She started to laugh, and it was choked by a sob. She pretended it was from her ankle, which she carefully moved away.

"I see. Well," she said with half a smile on her face. Renewed tears pressed at her eyes; some things, she thought again, did not change. "Then I suppose I ought to be grateful for your thoroughness, Inspector Desiderio Morandi. Thank you."

She shifted, cuffs clinking, to feel around for her stocking. Oh, chimes. She'd set it in the grass... somewhere. This would be much easier without the cuffs on; they made her feel helpless and useless at once. Aurelie only realized when her fingertips found the scratchy wool that she'd said that thought out loud.

[Desiderio Morandi]

wherever 'here' is

late morning on the 27th of roalis, 2720

H

e had been as gentle as he could be. He ran his fingers over the bandages one last time, feeling yet more helpless without his sight; he was angry, too – at all this helplessness, at all this loss of control – more than angry, but he held his field indectal and forced himself to breathe evenly. He thought he had compressed it enough. It was a sloppy job, no doubt, without –

No, no. Better not to think of that. The only thing worse than a sloppy job was wrapping the bandages too tightly in anger, or hurting her in some other way.

The force of his anger had surprised him at first, as a young man. His first year at Anastou had been quite numb and mechanical; he had wondered if he had lost his ability to feel at all. And then – everything, quite suddenly, seemed to agitate him, as if in remembering to feel, he had gotten too much of one thing and not enough of all others. He had never been like the other boys, had never expressed himself through the medium of drinking to excess or fighting wantonly, or – other... things, about which he knew even less. But it was as if in lieu of that, Hurte had simply shaped him into an angry man with a tongue that could do nothing but cut.

Is it too tight? he had been about to ask, when he heard her breath catch. It was almost like a laugh, which might have confused him, if it hadn’t tumbled chokingly into a sob. She took her ankle away, and his hands flinched back.

His mouth was still half-open. There was a soft rasp at the edge of her voice; and still, it was as polite as it had ever been. Worse, he could hear the shape of a smile in it.

Inspector Desiderio Morandi.

The click and rasp of the handcuffs was almost unbearable. Getting her – stockings, he supposed. He wondered if it chafed. He might have offered to help, had he not immediately realized how ridiculous and scandalous it was; if they both had not been blind, he would have already turned his back and given her privacy by now. How humiliating this all must have been. He would not have blamed her for crying, even if he had not already given her more pain than necessary.

“Well,” was as all he could say, another sharp grunt, lip twisting again. You are welcome, he might have said under ordinary circumstances, even more acidically. But it seemed utterly childish now, and most of all to – her.

To his charge, he reminded himself. For which he was now solely responsible, and the loss – or injury – of which would bring unimaginable dishonor on him.

Pull yourself together, Inspector.

“Give me – your hands,” he said brusquely, reaching inside his uniform coat for the keyring. “Assisting you in walking will be no easy task while you are handcuffed.” Nor was pulling a stocking back onto an injured leg, but he did not say that. “And we cannot stay here all day.”

Did she not understand what it would be like for her, if he played at friendliness – if he had been capable of such a thing, which he was not, and for the best – and then sent her to spend the rest of her days in the Church of the Moon? Ten years ago, he had laid down all his hope – more than hope; it had been… – whatever it had been, it had been dashed. There was nothing more cruel than giving hope. And this was crueler even than it had been ten years ago.

Well, that was all over; she knew what kind of beast he was now. Better no hope than misplaced hope.

Grateful, he thought bitterly. Grateful.

[Aurelie Steerpike]

Roalis 27, 2720 - Late Morning
Somewhere, En Route to Nowhere

The bandaging had not been comfortable, but she hadn't expected it to be. Not gentle, either, but—careful. Aurelie wouldn't have know what to do with gentleness, anyway, and thought this was better without. If she winced through any of it, well. He couldn't see her face, and for that she was once again grateful. She didn't, somehow, want Desiderio to think he had hurt her too much. The concern was unnecessary, likely dangerous, but she couldn't shake it.

Well, he said in response to her thanks. She had half expected him to be angry with her again, to feel some flare in his field pressing down on her. Another sharp reminder, maybe, of what he thought of her. Of what they were to each other now. He had done none of those things, just that one word.

Perhaps she had been dismissed too far even for anger. Aurelie insisted to herself that was it, as she listened to the rattle of the handcuffs and felt about in the grass for her stocking. One could not sustain anger at a lamp. Not even a lamp you used to think of as a friend.

What she hadn't expected was this: Desiderio asking for—no, demanding—she hold out her hands so that he could... release her from these cuffs. Aurelie blinked out of a confused reflex; the motion of her eyelids made the pain worse, somehow. How long would she...? The idea of this pain—to say nothing of the blindness itself—being permanent sat sour on the back of her tongue. She could bear it if it only affected her, but Desiderio...

No, she wouldn't think about that. She had to assume that it was temporary, at least for him. Otherwise she didn't think she could continue on.

Aurelie opened her mouth to say that she didn't need his help. Her heart hurt enough, didn't it? This efficient, obligatory kindness was worse than cruelty might have been. Duty, Desiderio had said—and she understood that. Her head did, anyway; her foolish heart kept searching for even the slightest trace of sentiment. Why? He'd made it perfectly clear, over and over.

"I— Yes, er. I suppose we can't. ...Thank you." She didn't, in the end, refuse him. All day, he said. Aurelie hadn't really thought about how long they would sit here, but it did seem ill-advised to stay here forever. She swallowed; it didn't matter where she was, because in the end, she'd be...

Aurelie held her hands out and shook them, so he'd know where they were from the clinking of metal against metal. "Here," she said carefully. Trying, and failing, not to think about how he would likely have to touch her again for this, and for the... For further assistance.

Think of something else, she scolded herself. Anything else. "So. Uhm. You're, ah, married now?" The question came tumbling out of her mouth before she could cram it back in. Yes, she'd thought anything else would be preferable but... Not that. Bells and chimes. He didn't even want her addressing him by name. She didn't want to know the answer, even! Not really.

What, she asked herself once again, was wrong with her?

[Desiderio Morandi]

wherever 'here' is

late morning on the 27th of roalis, 2720

A

nother thank you. This one, he supposed, was more deserved; all the same, he could not bring himself to reply. He merely grunted sharply instead, again.

At least this time he found her hands more easily. Clang and rattle. That, and the roar of the insects in the grass, was hardly helping his headache.

Again, the touch of her hands was altogether unexpected. He had reached in the direction of the rattling, thinking he would seize upon the cuffs, or her wrists, or perhaps her arm; instead, he found the backs of her hands, with their small, worn knuckles and handful of raised scars. He cleared his throat uncomfortably, finding the cuffs.

Her question, as polite and stammering as ever, froze him in place and knocked a sharp intake of breath out of him. He thought to snap, but then he stopped, his throat suddenly dry.

Married? Had she really – oh, but he had known she might. Why else would he have hesitated with his hand? She had always had an eye for the details, even as a little girl; perhaps he had learned it from her.

Say yes, some part of him told him. “No,” he said. “Engaged.” Again. “Recently. In fact.” Another deep, even breath. In, and then out.

He took out the keys with his other hand, bowing his head in concentration – as if by bending closer, by squinting, he might make up for blindness. Fool.

He froze. His breath was stirring her hair.

He had not realized how close he was.

Clearing his throat, he shifted back. He missed the lock once; he missed the lock again, key scratching impotently against the metal. The sound did not please his headache, nor the throbbing pain in his eyes. He was gritting his teeth. He missed the lock another time, then snorted frustratedly, another crackle of red seething out through his field before he could catch it and smooth it out again with urgency.

His cheeks were very wet; it was the damned pain. Just as he slid the key into the lock, he felt a cool tear patter on his hand, and then heard another land – on hers.

He grunted again, taking the cuffs off. “There,” he said. “Do as you will. Remember: there are a hundred reasons it would be unwise to run, not least of which is me. I may be blind, but I am a sorcerer and a tracker of no small skill.” He was not sure, really, if he could catch her, but by Hurte’s stripes, he would make good on that promise or he would die trying.

He crawled away a little, backwards, nearly stumbling over his gloves. He would leave them there, he decided. A trail of proverbial breadcrumbs.

(Gods damn it, those children’s stories. He could not stop thinking about them. A red thread, he had told Aurelie – he had told her once, remembering the first time he had gotten lost in Briarwood, and she had led him back; he had told her the old Bastian story, then, of Theseus and Ariadne.)

He let out a sigh of relief as the heel of his hand bumped into familiar frames. He snatched the glasses from the grass quickly, tucking them into his jacket. Then, slowly, he tested his feet. Dizzy, but he could orient himself now; and the pain, he thought, was not so bad. He was careful to stay off his bad elbow.

“When you are ready to stand, tell me, and I shall give you my arms.” He wiped away the tears roughly. “Please.”

[Aurelie Steerpike]

Roalis 27, 2720 - Late Morning
Somewhere, En Route to Nowhere

Manners didn't seem to be high on a Seventen officer's training. She took the grunt as an intended response to her thanks. Bells and chimes but it made no part of this any easier; she would have thought it might make her less inclined to this foolish sentiment, but it didn't seem to. That was mercilessly intact.

It was Desiderio's fault, she tried to tell herself. For being so—if he were just... Just polite, or normal at least, she... Aurelie didn't expect to be friends. She wasn't that stupid, despite so much evidence to the contrary. But was it too much to ask to be treated with the degree of courtesy that...Actually, if she thought on it, she felt she might indeed be receiving the degree of politeness this new, strange version of Desiderio offered everyone else. He certainly wasn't overly friendly to anyone else she'd yet witnessed.

Either that, or her mere presence put him on edge. Her opening her mouth certainly didn't help. He'd found the back of her hands, at first, in searching for the handcuffs. That had thrown her off, despite her expecting it to happen. So she'd stumbled, and she'd needed a distraction, and Lady guide her, that was what she came up with.

"A-Ah. Well. Uhm. Congratulations, then. On... that." She swallowed, trying to keep her breathing even. I'm sorry, she didn't say, keeping it where it was on the tip of her tongue. Sorry for what? It was a—a perfectly reasonable question to ask. And a perfectly reasonable thing to be true. "I'm, ah, sure she's. Uhm. Lovely."

Why, why was she doing this? To punish herself? The loveliness or not-loveliness of Desiderio Morandi's fiancée, who she had not known existed until this moment, was not any concern of hers. She was just interested in how he was doing now, that was all. It would be nice to... be able to close that in her mind, knowing he was well. And wed. And having the life he expected—wanted, probably.

Even if she wasn't in it, and hadn't been for a very long time.

Desiderio moved on to the cuffs. He was so close she could—could feel it, even though she couldn't see him. So close she could feel his breath on her hair, and his field all around them both, which both repelled her and made her ache in a very different way. Aurelie held very still, in the hopes this made any part of this process faster. He was struggling with it; the scratching of the key against the metal every time it missed the lock was torment.

That was difficult when there was another surge of heat, hard to miss as close as they were (even after he pulled back, probably realizing...). More difficult when she felt something wet on her hand that wrenched through her. Miserably, she wished for nothing more than to not care.

But he undid the cuffs at last. Aurelie pulled her hands in to her chest, rubbing her wrists where they'd been chafed from the metal. Her bracelet felt a little worse for wear, too. If she broke that, too... Well, wouldn't that be fitting? Lose the drawing, break the bracelet. Maybe her lockets would fall off, too, and she could be shut away with no reminder that she'd ever had a world outside the Church of the Moon at all.

"Where would I go?" she asked, more sharply than she'd meant. This was just all—too much. It was making her snappish and overly prone to tears. The pain, of course. In her eyes. And nowhere else. (If she thought that enough, would it become true?) "I have every confidence in your ability to hunt me down, Desiderio." Like a hound, she thought as if in a dream, and her some poor rabbit. With no master, she thought, to tell him not to...

At least she could finally put her stockings back on, and her shoe. Being bare-legged under her petticoats and out-of-doors felt absolutely indecent. Even if nobody could see to care. It was easier with her hands unbound. Easier to wipe at her eyes, too, which were wet from pain.

Desiderio had moved away from her, a little. The grass rustled underneath of him. Looking for something else, she supposed. And then, after a moment, his voice above her. A command, and then, unexpectedly, terribly: "please".

"Oh. Yes. All right." Aurelie sat still a moment longer, steeling herself. She did not want to touch him (she'd done plenty of that already and felt only more wretched); she didn't want to hobble along on her own even more. She came to her knees, carefully, and sort of... put her arms up. Hoping he would find them, because she hadn't the faintest idea what else to do.

"Where, ah... Are we, er. Where are we going? Ah, I'm. I'm ready, by the way. To stand."