Chapter Text
Neither of you can remember the last time you’ve seen the sea like this.
It’s strange, really. If you squint at it, if you risk the pain in the back of your head, you can remember washing ashore in a place like this. But that’s long since gone and buried, and tonight is not a night for risks. Even if the two of you can’t quite escape the dull pressure behind your eyes, you’d rather not vomit into the surf again.
It’s the smell that’s causing it- the pain. You can feel the salt and spray collecting in your lungs. You tend to know the things that bring about that pain in your head, especially these days. Mira can’t stand the odor of seagrass and detritus, and you can’t tell whether you agree with her. If you don’t, it’s the most wonderful smell ever to grace your nose, easily worth every little prick in your mind. If you do, it’s just… nothing. So much nothing it makes your insides hurt.
No. Don’t think about it. You’ll think about it tomorrow.
Bambouche wasn’t too far off, but the sea there just wasn’t the same. It was friendly and warm, and quiet. It brought out the best in your family. Or maybe that was just Petronille- you can’t quite remember that part. But Isabeau was smiling, Mira was splashing around aimlessly. You can’t stop the grin from blooming on your face. You’ve never much liked water, but it’s worth the pain for a day like that.
But this water isn’t the same. It’s cold and rough. Even now, as your boots dangle above the crashing surf, the tides threaten to drag away the wood of this tiny dock. Flecks of the spray kiss your cheeks every now and then, like little wings of fireflies as they take off. You still can’t tell if you like to be held so affectionately by this particular stranger- but you’ve already been here for a while, so what does it matter anyways?
It’s nice, here, still. It might be one of the only quiet parts of this town left with all the celebration. Until, that is, the quiet is interrupted by light footsteps over the dock. You straighten before she can react, standing and reaching for your dagger at the speed of lightning.
Odile looks at you with a cheeky smile. You breathe in, and out. It’s just her. Just her.
“Mind if I join you?” She asks it coyly, like a fox about to snap up its prey.
No. That’s not right. Try again.
She asks it in a soft tone, albeit one speckled with the amusement of Siffrin’s near attempt to kill her. That’s better. You whack yourself on the side of the head. She doesn’t hate you. Nobody hates you. And she doesn’t think it’s weird that you and Odile probably have equal experience in Craft now, between the binary stars orbiting one another in your skull. You’re fine. You’re normal.
Her smile fades. She’s already sitting down, and she pats the space next to her for you. It’s a good thing you didn’t waste your breath on an answer. You sit, but your eyes remain fixed on the sea.
“I know Mirabelle is your ‘feelings buddy’, but I believe she likes these sorts of things more than I do. The celebrations and whatnot.”
You smile softly and open your mouth to speak, but you decide against it. There’s a fine line between sharing feelings and revealing that you know everyone’s secrets, you advise yourself. You’d rather not have Odile push you into the sea for revealing that only Isabeau knows what she’s like drunk. Or, maybe you’ve already told her. It doesn’t matter.
“Nerves?”
“A little,” You respond. Odile adjusts her robe as the wind picks up, but you don’t mind. Your hands are preoccupied anyway, spinning the coin between your fingers round and round. Before Odile can respond, you correct yourself. “I’d tell you if something was wrong, though.”
There was a point in your life where that line was practiced. Act 5, Scene 6, Exterior, House of Change. Even that has begun to blur around the edges, and you’re not as versed as you used to be.
“Gems alive, Siffrin. Please don’t make me play a guessing game.”
You glance at her out of the corner of your eye. She’s got a slight frown on her face, and her brows have formed a scowl as she looks at you over the tip of her nose. You know that look too well. Your stomach drops, and you can’t help but look away, back to your coin, back to the sea.
“I’m fine,” you insist. “Totally, completely fine. Go have fun; don’t worry about me.”
“I’ll do damn well what I please.”
The two of you sit in silence for a while longer. You hate that she’s learned a tactic like that works- to just let you stew, to block your path of escape. Above all, you hate that she knows that you like her around, and that the song of the tides sounds sweeter with company. It soothes the sour feeling inside you.
“Back in Jouvente. You found your sister, and another family. You figured out her address, name, everything. But you never went to try to find her. You told Mira you did, but you didn’t. The innkeeper said you never left that night.” You give her a sidelong glance as the words slip from your mouth.
“How perceptive.”
“One might say I’m your greatest-” your lips curl deviously at the edges. “Pupil.”
She furrows her brow and smiles all at once in the way she tends to when she finds herself immensely disappointed. It’s okay. It’s one of your favorite faces she can make. It means you’ve won. “I didn’t think your puns could get any worse with time, but here we are.”
You chuckle to yourself as your gaze sinks again to the sea, as all things do eventually.
“Why bring it up? That’s in the past, now. And it’s my… thing. Secret Quest, to use Boniface’s words.”
“Why didn’t you? Do it, I mean.”
“What?”
“Why didn’t you go and dig it up? You could have had a nice reunion or something. Learn more about your mother.”
It’s Odile’s turn to have her eyes drift in the open water. Isabeau giggles madly about something in the distance, but that feels like a whole other world now. The silence drags on. “I realized that it doesn’t matter. No part of it does. I already knew it when we got to that point. Just sentimentality, I suppose,” she finally says.
Your smile stays right where it is. You like it that way, not strapped to your face against its will. Still, you wish you could remember your lines a bit better. Grasping for things you’ve heard hundreds of times over is a bit easier than trying to figure out the conversations you’ve had in the past few months. “You’re a stranger here, too. No matter where you go.”
She tilts her head one way, then another. “I suppose. I stumbled over everything else by happenstance. But when you almost tore apart reality for us, I realized another part of it.”
You blush. It’s been a while, but the thought still makes you squirm.
“As cliche as it sounds, I already knew that part of me. It’s Mirabelle and Isabeau and Boniface, and, well. All the rest. I belong in Vaugarde because Vaugarde is a nation where everyone belongs, but I also belong in Vaugarde because I belong where they are. And you, too.”
The coin stops flipping in your hands. You let it land on heads, just for her.
She doesn’t resist glancing at it. “It’s fine to admit you’re scared, you know. Anyone here who says they aren’t is a liar.”
The pain in your head grows a bit sharper as your eyes climb to the horizon, and to the dark mass that perches beneath the moon. You can barely see it at this time of night. It twinkles just like the stars. It’s barely visible, but you know it’s there. That’s the one thing the Universe could never take from you- the pit in your heart, made manifest as a hole in the sky.
“Do you think it’s too late to go back? Or- somewhere else? We could take the ship and head to Ka Bue. You could show us all the food you wanted us to try.” You say, wringing out the smile for all it’s worth.
You can see her breath out of the corner of your vision as she sighs. She reaches out a hand slowly, letting it settle on your hair. You flinch despite yourself.
“Sorry-” She pulls her hand back.
“N-no. It’s fine,” You start, but Isa’s words echo through your mind. His little formula. You stiffen. “I would like you to pat my h-” You stop yourself suddenly. No, that’s a stupid thing to say, and you never should have even tried. What’s the point? You reach up for a hat that isn’t there, settling for instead burying your face in your cloak. “Nevermind.”
Odile just laughs, continuing the gesture she started. Your cheeks burn, but you can recognize how nice it feels to not have your family afraid to touch you. You let yourself lean into the cold of her hand. It’s not so bad.
“Siffrin. There’s a lot of overlap, but please don’t project my experiences onto your own. I got to make a choice. Your choice was stolen from you.”
“We could still choose to ignore it.”
“To forget it? No. No, you won’t. Not you.”
You stare at her, and she stares right back- once again trapping you here, in the present, in this conversation. You’ve had dreams formed in the King’s tears shorter than the time you stay locked. That same little part of you hates her at this moment. She smiles, knowing she’s taken victory.
Traveller 1, Odile 1.
“What are you afraid of?” She asks, like it’s the easiest question in the world to answer. You finally will yourself to look away, back to your hands. Your coin beckons. She adds on once she realizes your focus is starting to waver. “We’ll stay with you, no matter what happens. The fact that we already have should be proof enough.”
You know this. You don’t respond- not at first, anyway. It takes you a while of sitting there, kicking your feet over the edge of the dock, waiting, wondering. You eventually remember that you should say something.
“We can’t make sure this one ends alright.”
Something like that. It’s not the whole truth, but it’s better than nothing. You almost wish you could go back and come up with a different line. Something more dramatic for the situation. Anything less feels clumsy on your tongue, less staged. Come on, stardust, say it with more feeling! Aren’t you the greatest actor this world has ever known?
Odile just smiles, tracing your gaze downward. Her hand still runs through your hair in the same soft, rhythmic motion. She won’t abandon you just yet. “Nobody can. That’s life.”
You bite your lip. “You’re all doing this for..." You motion uncertainly to yourself, then cock your head at her. "It shouldn’t be your lives.”
Her gaze grows softer. She takes a deep breath. “First, we chose to be here. Don’t be so self centered.”
You frown.
“And because we care about you,” she adds. “But there’s no greater adventure than finding a long-forgotten island, making sure we don’t have another King rise to power. Second, we could get hurt doing anything. That’s no reason not to live life. If I was worried I’d be hurt, Vaugarde would be frozen in time because all you kids wouldn’t have a thought of common sense between you. Third,”
Her hand slips from your hair as she pokes you in the heart. You’re ready this time, and you fend off the urge to jump at the touch.
“This is not our first time dealing with Wish Craft, Siffrin. Especially not yours. Of everyone in the entirety of the world, I would wager we are the most qualified by far. I don’t know how much of a comfort that is, but. I hope it means something.”
You push her hand away, shrugging. You almost miss the days before your little episode, when she’d just let you be quiet for a while. She doesn’t let you come to her anymore. And that’s fine. Sometimes that’s good, but words alone won’t dispel the lingering feeling in your stomach. It’s a pull, but not a backwards one, not the sort you felt during your loops. It’s pressing down on you, down, down, like a black hole pulling you toward its center.
A- black hole?
You flinch from the pain and try your best to clear your head. “I know,” you respond softly, considering leaning into her. Would that be weird? You almost consider whacking yourself again on the temple, but you know how determined Odile is to stop those sorts of things.
She purses her lips. It seems as though she's about to say something, but she stows her thoughts away in kind. She doesn't feel the need to keep you locked in her eyes anymore. You feel your shoulders grow a bit lighter, but not much. Her wrinkled hands grip tightly to the edge of the dock, then loosen.
“Well,” she utters to the open air, without any intention of follow-up. You can imagine the half dozen things she could say, but you don't feel particularly in the mood for imagining anything at this moment. You know the feeling, and that is what matters. It's a conclusion, some understanding that she can't just fix your problems, and yet she remains beside you all the same.
Silence takes the two of you. You think you settle on liking it, letting it wrap around you like a blanket rather than having it suffocate you. The variety in silences is tremendous, you've discovered, and Odile seems to have mastered each and every one of them.
Still, you can't help but smile, even with the pit inside your stomach. Maybe she was right. She can't hide the mirth on her lips either. A true smile from Odile, neither a smug grin nor a sarcastic little twinkle, is another one of your favorite faces. You didn't even need a pun this time.
How convenient.