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“And, of course, the way I see it, we have three major options,” Laudna continues. Or, rather, starts.
“Right, so, I think you might’ve been talkin’ to yourself in your head. And now you’ve just launched into a sentence like I’ve got any earthly clue what you might be on about?” Imogen questions with a smile that only widens as Laudna sputters out a lackluster defense. She straightens herself from where she had been bent over, seated on the foot of the inn’s little twin bed and unlacing her boots. She twists at the waist to look over at Laudna, who sits cross-legged with her back against the headboard.
“Oh, whatever,” Laudna retorts, very cleverly. “You should be used to this, by now.”
Imogen just shakes her head in response, endeared. Swinging her legs up onto the bed, she brings her fingers up to the thin metal band resting on her hairline, tapping it twice as if to emphasize her inability to tell what Laudna’s thinking about.
“Excuses, excuses, Imogen,” Laudna jokes, leaning forward a few inches.
“Mhm, right,” Imogen mumbles, crossing her legs to match. They sit facing each other, roughly two feet apart on the mattress. They share the same posture, spines reaching for the empty center between them and wrists draping over their knees. Laudna’s are exposed, her skirt bunched around her hips in a way that has made the fabric over her calves ride up. Imogen glances down at the bare skin. Pale, almost gray in her sickly pallor. Bony and thin. Imogen has always imagined that Laudna’s skeleton sounds like a xylophone, knees knocking together and creating music like she read about in those spooky stories meant to excite children in the autumn. A body and a mind can share a melody.
“Oh?” Laudna teases with a grin, raising her eyebrows and tucking her chin towards her chest as if to express a dramatic, knowing look. “Like what you see, darling?” she lilts, dropping her voice an octave in a mirthful play on sensuality as she pinches the hem of her skirt and shakes it around. She pulls it up an inch, then rapidly throws it back down. “I must protect my modesty, you understand,” she finishes, so close to sounding serious that Imogen might have believed her, were it not for the way that she immediately began to echo Imogen’s fit of giggling laughter from the other end of the bed.
“Of course, ma’am. I never meant to cause any discomfort, what with my wanderin’ lustful gaze an’ all. I’ll tell the deacon all about it at confession, cross my heart,” Imogen drawls playfully, pushing herself up on her knees and inching even closer. Laudna reaches out, twisting her fingers into the sheer fabric of Imogen’s shirt and gently tugging her forward. Imogen places her hands down on either side of Laudna’s thighs to balance herself, the closest to a smooth move she’s likely ever come. Her mind flashes to a recent loving encounter with a flight of stairs in a wizard’s tower, urging herself not to get too cocky in her newfound gracefulness. Laudna, with genuine elegance, uses two fingers on her left hand to tilt Imogen’s chin towards her face, brushing their lips together for the most fleeting of moments. Imogen feels her breathe out a stifled laugh against her mouth, confusion catching her for a millisecond before it’s replaced with a rushing gravitational sensation. Laudna had suddenly uncrossed her legs underneath her, severing Imogen’s loose grip and sending her crashing down into her lap. Imogen yelps as her nose jams into a sharp hip bone. Back to her old self. Laudna’s gleeful cackle covers up Imogen’s pained groan as she sits back on her thighs, restoring the distance between them with her head in her hands.
“You–” Imogen starts, glaring out from behind her fingers as she rubs the tender bridge of her nose.
“Sorry, dearest. I simply couldn’t let us fall any deeper into role playing some depraved farmgirl, Dawnfather-themed sexual fantasy. I mean, he’s really going through enough as it is,” Laudna explains, a grin splitting her face brilliantly.
“Call me a depraved farmgirl one more time, see where that gets you,” Imogen grumbles exaggeratedly, blush coloring her cheeks. She folds her legs so that she’s sitting on her feet and runs a hand through her thick hair to center herself.
“Ask me again next time we have our clothes off, yes?” Laudna whispers with spirit as she leans back into the headboard, sharp teeth still bared in a smile that scrunches her eyebrows together. Imogen stares forcefully down at the mattress. She shakes her head as Laudna’s shoulders tremble with laughter, so easily amused with herself. Imogen briefly wonders why kissing her on that street has made Laudna feel like she should say half the shit Pâté used to say himself with her own voice instead. She chooses not to muse on why she’s attracted to the gross confidence in such a downright unseemly manner. She clears her throat pointedly.
“Alright, enough of all that,” Imogen states, chest tightening at the sight of the pout Laudna feigns in response. Imogen reaches out and taps Laudna’s ankle. “What were you sayin’, earlier?”
“Hm? When?” Laudna cocks her head a few degrees too far to the right, the tendons in her neck stuttering before locking it back into place.
“‘Three major options,’ yeah?” Imogen reminds. “Did I really distract you that much?” she teases.
“Oh, yes, you really did!” Laudna’s choice to turn the joke into a moment of authentic purity flips Imogen’s stomach over itself. “Anyway, I was just thinking about the market.” It flips again, for an entirely different reason.
“Yeah, I’ve been thinkin’ about it, too. Do you wanna talk about it, or anythin’? I mean, I want it to be easy for you to control what we–”
“Gods, Imogen, not that. Get your head out from between your legs,” Laudna reprimands, poking Imogen’s shin with her toes. Imogen balks, jaw falling slack.
“I’m just tryin’ to make sure you–”
“I’m an adult, darling. I know you love me, you know I love you, we’ve both known that for two and a half years. I’ll happily shower you with compliments and reassurances whenever you need, but, otherwise, is there anything else we need to say on the matter?” Laudna questions simply, cutting off Imogen’s indignant dispute. When she says things with that level of directness and clarity, Imogen has always found it hard to argue.
“Alright. Just promise to tell me if you ever… I don’t know,” Imogen trails off. Laudna sits up straighter, taking Imogen’s right hand in hers and ducking her head low so they meet at exact eye level.
“Sweetheart, I kissed you back. You aren’t corrupting my delicate self or whatever dark-sided thing your brain is threatening you with,” Laudna soothes, characteristically bold and open. Imogen averts her eyes, nodding to herself as Laudna rubs the back of her hand with her thumb. She brings Imogen’s palm up, brushing her lips over her knuckles and then her wrist. Imogen turns her hand out, briefly cupping Laudna’s pointed jaw before letting it fall back into her lap.
“You’re too good to me,” Imogen murmurs, eyes shining.
“Just what you deserve. Now, I wasn’t referring to our groceries or our lovely rendezvous, but rather our discussion about the great evils that lie within the both of us,” Laudna finally clarifies with a shocking nonchalance. Imogen barks out a surprised laugh.
“I remember talkin’ a bit about that, yeah,” she responds slowly, tentative and unsure of where Laudna might be taking this conversation.
“Well, we found two of our options there, do you recall? That we could view our respective mental intrusions as gifts and harness them for strength, or treat them as usurpers and cast them out. Very romantic how you said that, by the way. Destiny and all that. If I hadn’t already been so knocked back by the whole interaction I would’ve swooned right off my feet,” Laudna compliments. Everything she says takes on a nearly conspiratorial edge, like a secret that she can only reference with Imogen. It’s a quality of hers that Imogen has always found herself obsessing over.
“And I meant it all,” Imogen reiterates with sentimentality. “Whichever direction you take, I’ll follow,” she offers. “If I look over to you next time we get in some kind of confrontation and I see all that signature purple swirlin’ around you, I won’t hesitate to call on Ruidus and bring some help down. That’s all I’m sayin’.” Laudna smiles proudly as Imogen finishes, pushing forward so that their foreheads bump together for a moment.
“Exactly. I’ll make matching friendship bracelets for Delilah and your Reilora. We can arrange a playdate. But,” Laudna continues, leaning back on her hands. “If you decide that things get to be too much, that the power is too consumptive, too strong, I’ll destroy your moonman myself.”
“The same goes for you. I mean, I already took Delilah out once. Wouldn’t be hard to do it again,” Imogen assures. She stares into Laudna’s eyes for a beat too long. “I won’t let her do anythin’ to you. Nothin’ that you wouldn’t’ve done to yourself,” she says softly, a fervor roiling just under the surface.
“Yes, dear, I trust that you know me well enough. I wouldn’t be afraid to surrender that decision to your hands.” Laudna’s expression is saturated with care, yet hardened at the edges of her eyebrows and cheekbones with concentration and realism. “Just remember that I would give it all for you. I don’t want you to waste your time trying to hold me back if I’m only lashing out to protect you.”
Imogen shakes her head disapprovingly, half in jest and somehow more in sincerity. “Come on, don’t be so heroic. I won’t let you do anythin’ to yourself at my expense,” she says, attempting to will a boundary into existence. Laudna laughs it off.
“Oh, big scary Imogen won’t let me?” she scoffs over Imogen’s exasperated sigh. “Yes, darling, you’re very capable, but I have the shared soul of two entirely insane dead women. If I want to give myself away for you, I will,” she promises with ill-fitting brevity.
It's that humor that makes something in the room shift. Imogen feels her body shiver. It’s almost like revulsion. She stands suddenly, stepping back a foot from the bed. Laudna moves so they face each other, her legs dangling over the edge of the mattress. She stares at Imogen expectantly, hands pressed straight by her sides, raising her bony shoulders close to her ears.
“I don’t want you sayin’ all that,” Imogen breathes out, nostrils flared. She isn’t angry.
“I’m sorry if it is too much for you to hear, Imogen,” Laudna offers, tilting forward but not reaching out. Adjusting to the new energy. “I think that it’s better you know that this is my reality, though, rather than pretending it might be something different.”
“No, it’s– I–” Imogen stumbles, failing to find words as tears form in the corners of her eyes. She can imagine the way the skin around her eye sockets and lips is starting to blotch.
“Oh, sweetheart,” Laudna murmurs, face folding with concern. Imogen doesn’t step closer, and Laudna stays still. Imogen flexes her hands, clenching and unclenching her fists.
“I’m–” Imogen swallows a choked breath. She nods to herself one, two, three times. “I want to keep you safe. I want… I want to live with you. It sounds like you’re sayin’ you wanna die for me,” she whispers, trembling.
Laudna nods slowly, wide, black tea eyes boring into Imogen’s.
“Well, what– why do you– how is it fair that you get to decide that for us?” Imogen questions, voice rising in pitch and volume. She isn’t yelling. She isn’t angry.
“It would only be if the opportunity arose,” Laudna hums. Blunt, matter of fact, a trait Imogen holds dear in any situation other than this. She goes to interject, but Laudna continues over her. “And, well, it wouldn’t be a choice I would be making for us, necessarily. Moreso for myself.” Imogen stares at her, bewildered, frozen. “It’s not as if I could live with myself if I let anything happen to you, anyway. The outcome would be the same in this hypothetical regardless, just more noble my way.”
“Laudna, that’s– it’s fuckin’ selfish!” She isn’t angry. She is yelling. “It’s fuckin’ selfish and it isn’t fair and I’m beggin’ you to remember that I don’t want that, if this dumbass fuckin’ hypothetical ever becomes real, that I don’t want you to die!”
“Darling–”
“No! I’m– no! Don’t try to placate me or move past this or– it’s, I’m fuckin’ scared–”
“Please.” Laudna stands, too. She glides forward and takes both of Imogen’s wringing hands in her own. Imogen tries to step back, but Laudna holds her still at the wrist. There is silence in the room, cut by Imogen’s frantic breathing. Laudna watches the rise and fall of her chest, the way her distraught eyes dart around the room, landing on Laudna’s for fractions of seconds before running to new targets. She can feel Imogen’s feverish warmth, a sparking in her fingertips. “Please,” she says again, a whisper as she takes unnecessary deep breaths, serving no life-sustaining purpose but to encourage Imogen to do the same. Imogen gulps, shaking her head rapidly. Laudna pulls her close, the aspiration of a hug before Imogen pushes off her chest with both hands. She remains silent, tears spilling from her eyes. Laudna’s heart can’t break, but it does.
“Promise me,” Imogen finally starts, then stops, then starts again. “Promise me you won’t do anythin’ like that. You won’t sacrifice yourself. I can’t lose you,” she insists, stepping weakly towards the bed. Laudna ghosts after her, focus settling on the way Imogen’s weight sinks heavily into the mattress, the way the heels of her palms dig in and redden her eyes even further as she sniffles and tries to recover.
Laudna moves closer, pressing the cool skin of her standing knees to Imogen’s sitting ones. She threads one hand through the hair at the crown of Imogen’s skull, the other clutching at one of her bent elbows. Imogen keeps her gaze down, fixating on the stitching at the waistband of Laudna’s skirt and how the tuck of her loose shirt billows over it.
“Say somethin',” Imogen pleads, voice broken and soft.
“You don’t understand, do you?” Laudna’s question is plain. Not accusatory. Asking. Searching.
“How could I? How, when you’re so willin’ to give up–”
“Take it off.”
“You– what?”
“Take it off, the circlet. Take it off if you don’t believe me.” Laudna’s expression is calm, despite the insistence of her words. She speaks with a demanding conviction, undeniable. Her voice has taken on a darkness, a severity that makes Imogen’s breath catch in her throat. The back of her neck starts to sweat.
Her heart is pounding. Her lungs itch with something that feels like anxiety, or longing, or fear, or pain, or hope, or hunger, or. She can’t speak. She looks up at Laudna from under her eyelashes, finally making contact with the burning oil of her irises. She is not afraid of Laudna, of course not. But she is afraid of her devotion. Of learning the truth, and no longer being able to delude herself into thinking that Laudna only speaks to her in empty promises. To see her thoughts is to understand that Laudna means every word. Imogen is scared of that self-destructiveness, that abandonment of individuality that she can feel rippling under the tension of the velum of Laudna’s skin. Awakened, renewed in their time apart.
In Imogen’s still hesitation, she feels Laudna’s fingers drift towards her temples. Her thumbs push over her hairline, nails catching on the bottom edge of the metal ring encircling her skull. Imogen takes a shaky breath. She does not say anything. She counts the passing seconds in her head. Then, slowly, delicate as the jeweler who made it, Laudna lifts the circlet deftly off of Imogen’s head.
Instantly– nothing. They are alone, after all. The point of the circlet is to help drown out the thoughts of the dozens, hundreds of people Imogen often finds herself surrounded by. She thinks she should have been assaulted by that cognition, before she feels the grounding reminder of the off-white walls of the inn close around her once again. There is only Laudna, who seems to be gating off her mind like holding her breath while she waits for Imogen’s blessing.
“Alright,” Imogen whispers. She opens her eyes. She doesn’t remember closing them. Above her, Laudna looks at her with a reverence and an adoration outright sacred. She holds both sides of Imogen’s face in her hands. She lets her palms slip down over Imogen’s neck, shoulders, ribs, stomach, hips, as she lowers herself onto her knees. Imogen thinks of them. Bony and thin. The hardwood must hurt. From where she kneels, Laudna drops her head to rest in Imogen’s lap. They both breathe in, out, and–
–isn’t that i want to die i want to live you’ve made me want to live i have no reason to want that without you to end myself to save you would be the same thing there would be no me if you were not saved it’s much the same as how (i love you) it felt when i met you when i began to love you i saw at once that you were death to me death in the way i had craved it hungrily parched and greedy for it upon rising out of the dirt in (i love you) whitestone for thirty years i longed to be set free to surrender to die with death as my release and when we were found you killed me killed me because you satiated that yearning in a way i had only known that death could have (i love–
Imogen feels thick, hot tears drip onto the hands she now has fisted in Laudna’s hair.
–wish or a death wish or not you already killed me with a mercy and a kindness and a love that only you could feel for me you are death and i am your hound should your body ask me to die once more it would be (i love you) nothing i have been sealed away entombed this entire time since gelvaan since you since you breathed the air into my lungs that killed–
Imogen weeps, spine folding inward as her body is wracked. She hooks her hands under Laudna’s arms, pulling her closer.
–will grow old will be beautiful and then you will die you will be eighty-five eighty-six eighty-seven and you will (i love you) die and i will be born again wretched and alone and worse for having tasted the sugar of death in the spirit we shared and it is not it is it is not selfish for me to know that i will take whatever chance i can to (i love you) free myself from that life to come if it means you will live without me for a time it is selfish it is selfish it is the only way i can imagine going on it is–
“Please, stop, please, Laudna, baby, please, I need you to–” Imogen sobs, chest empty of breath and head swimming. The pain of the truth is too much to bear. The gate closes. Laudna buries her face deeper into Imogen’s lap, fingers clawing at her thighs and her own tears soaking through Imogen’s clothes. Without looking, she finds the circlet and shakily thrusts it back into Imogen’s hand. Imogen lets it fall to the side.
“It’s okay. It’s okay. I understand. I believe you. I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” Imogen murmurs into Laudna’s hair. “It isn’t wrong, how you feel, it isn’t wrong of you. I’m sorry I made you feel that it was. I’m sorry. You–” she sucks in a shallow breath, hiccups. “It’s not selfish. You aren’t selfish. You’re– I'm sorry. I would feel the same way, I would want the same thing. I'm sorry.”
Laudna cries something unintelligible into Imogen’s hip bone. Imogen pries her skull up with both hands angled under her chin, forcing them to look at each other. She kisses the black salt from under each of Launda’s hollow eyes.
“I want us to live,” Laudna mumbles. “But if it were to be that we can’t both–”
“Then we’ll die. Together, either way.”