just say when

SUNJATA

angel loves to keep me spinning, much too high to see
that all these chains have started thinning & hell is breaking free

It is strange, he has to admit. But he’d rather stay in a space bustling with the sounds of people out and about than aloft in a space that had once been his home. Alone. Because Nate or Bart were back home with the twins and he’d taken a moment to reach out and check up on things. They’ve worked it out, the times home together and the times they need to spend ensuring their own little safety during the lead up to the war. Training and connections and all that.

Still, there’s surprise as the door closes and her hands fist in his shirt, soaked through with the rain. His eyes find her face, even if she won’t look at him, and he can’t help but to remain silent as her words leave him. It cracks something within him, something that has him working his jaw as he reaches up with a rain soaked hand to lift her chin, to finally look into that cracked, bi-toned gaze of hers. “Okay.” He agrees.

He imagines Nate would understand, at the very least. “We have to dry off first, though. I’m not fucked up enough to sleep soaking wet.” He offers her a small smile, thumb stroking her jaw before his hand leaves her. "I can start the fire?" He suggests, nodding his head toward the empty fireplace in the room.

every choice, every lie, demons that he kept inside
angel now that i've stopped spinning, could you come clean?

Hotaru

It feels like all of the world is held on a coin, and Hotaru is just waiting for it to topple and tell her heads or tails. She isn't asking for a night in his bed - or at least not in the suggestive sense - but it still feels like a monumental request. Frankly it is given everything between them. Which is why she can't bear to look at him, to see whatever expression she might find there. Too many of the options are painful and for once she wants to spare herself that. Sunjata doesn't give her the choice, and she shudders all over and then goes pliant and docile as his hand cups beneath her chin and lifts until she is staring into his eyes, her own wet in ways she can't blame on tilting her face to the rain.

Whatever he sees or finds in her, it has him agreeing, and her hands clench harder upon his shirt until her wrists shake. Her mouth works soundlessly for a moment before she is able to find her voice. "Thank you." Calling it a whisper would be doing it too much credit. She leans into the slow trace of his thumb along her jaw, eyes fluttering with the temptation to close, but she can't. They can't.

Instead she forces her fingers to release, and they object with a slight cramp but finally acquiesce. "I can get clothes and towels," she offers, and toes her shoes off at the door before grabbing her travel bag and slipping away with it into the bathroom to do just that. The vision of the woman in the mirror is foreign to her, and Hotaru can't keep eye contact for long, uneasy and uncertain what she's feeling. Instead she grabs the two full sized towels in reach, and shucks off all her clothes to dump into the bathtub where they won't wet the floor. Rubbing herself down briskly, she re-dresses in dry night clothes, dressing herself more than she otherwise would wear to bed alone. Tying her hair up in the towel, she emerges with the other towel and the complimentary boring natural linen sleep pants the Inn provided to their guests to offer to Sunjata. Dropping her bag back by the bed, she extends the towel instead of acting on the urge to dry his hair for him. "Not the softest or highest quality, but better than wet underwear," she huffs in amusement as she offers the pants next.

But I am just a broken machine
And I do things that I don't really mean

SUNJATA

angel loves to keep me spinning, much too high to see
that all these chains have started thinning & hell is breaking free

“You’re welcome.” He whispers back, letting her take as much time as she needs to withdraw from him – moving toward the bathroom where she can dry off. And Sunjata, in the meantime, crouches before the fireplace, placing a few logs within and a bit of crumpled up paper and leaves to get the fire started. He pulls out his lighter, letting it light, fiddling with the logs to make sure they catch before he’s pausing to pull out a cigarette, using the lighter to light that as well when she returns.

He drags from it, letting the smoke settle within him and calm any nerves that aren’t quite numbed yet from the alcohol, lifting his gaze from the flame to Hotaru as she arrives, dressed and dried for the most part, watching as she extends the scratchy pants that the Inn often offered to their guests. He takes it, leaving the cigarette hanging in between his lips, managing a soft snort before pushing his longer hair back, the ends falling around his shoulders at this point in wet, streaked waves. “Mm, well, here’s hoping they fit.” He murmurs, moving to stand.

His gaze lingers on her a moment more before he’s stepping over into the bathroom, nicking the door shut behind him and shedding out of the clothes that are soaking wet, tossing them in the tub with her own to deal with later. By the time he’s done, his hair is damp now, no longer dripping, and his skin is mostly dry. He finds that the pants do indeed fit, but the shirt he’s found doesn’t, not in his broad shoulders. So instead, he’s forced to emerge without one, with all the new scars on display (most notably, the large ones that trail down both sides of his neck, tearing out the compass tattoo’s northern points, and the new little NW etched under his tattoo for Lusea).

“Pants fit. 'M surprised.” He hums, the cigarette now down to its dregs as he puts it out by tossing it into the fire, kneeling before it to poke and prod to make sure it’ll start up fully to go all night. He sits back on his heels, glancing over at Hotaru. “Warm enough?” He supposes it doesn't matter once they get in the bed, Sunjata able to radiate enough heat for the both of them. But still, he can't help but to ask.

every choice, every lie, demons that he kept inside
angel now that i've stopped spinning, could you come clean?

Hotaru

Though she doesn't smoke herself, she finds herself lingering briefly to inhale the scent of it, comfortingly familiar. It will slowly fill the room the longer he stays in it, and she hopes it lingers. Like some ephemeral sense-memory of Nate when he's not here. Catching herself in the middle of that thought and knowing how far from entitled she is to it, she retreats into the bathroom, and doesn't let herself think on it even when she has re-emerged and finds herself at a loss of things to distract herself with. Hotaru's fingers itch to run through his hair, and she's grateful when he wanders away into the bathroom to dry and dress, removing the temptation from reach.

She pulls the meager woven rug from the center of the room to the front of the fireplace, and sits down on it to stare into the flames. Legs coming up and arms wrapping around them until she's a small ball of a figure, cheek propped upon one golden knee. The flames are somehow even more hypnotic when intoxicated which she never thought possible. So when the door re-opens, she startles and knees herself in the cheek, causing her to curse and rub at it petulantly. Turning her gaze to Sunjata, the irritation fades into something morose as she takes in the new scars. Well, the painful ones. Nate's initials are a more positive thing, or so she thinks. They've all three always been possessive, and none of them normal about showing it.

"Good, because the only other option would have been one of my skirts," she snorts as she curls back around her legs, hiding her cheshire grin in her knees. Nodding drowsily, she rocks a little where she's sitting, watching him prod at the fire. "Mm, yeah. Run warmer after Attuning." Something Sunjata would understand, given animals usually ran hotter than humans as a general rule. Staring past him back into the flames, Ru lets her mind drift a little. "How's Nate?" she asks softly, scared to put it to words but incapable of not saying it. The words have been burning in her chest since she ran into him in King's End. Whatever they're doing here - mending bridges or fostering civility depending on how hopeful and naive she's feeling - it's entirely independent of her relationship with Nate, and she aches with the need for news of him.

But I am just a broken machine
And I do things that I don't really mean

SUNJATA

angel loves to keep me spinning, much too high to see
that all these chains have started thinning & hell is breaking free

He startles her and she knees herself in the face, which only sparks an amused snort from him as he makes his way to the fire, kneeling before it and poking and prodding at it – choosing to ignore not bringing up the fact he’d certainly seen it, in order to respond to her jest of her skirts. “You really think if I didn’t fit in these, I’d fit in your skirt?” He questions, amusement bleeding from him through the Attuned bond, distracting himself from thoughts of anything else.

When he’s managed to get it done, though, he pauses to readjust how he’s sitting, crossing his legs in front of him, bracing his elbows on it as he runs a hand through his damp hair hoping the warmth of the flame dries it off a bit more. “I did too.” He comments offhandedly about the Attuning. However, it had only started with his feline shift. The macaw hadn’t changed much on his end, he’d always been a furnace before hand.

He pauses, however, at the question of Nate – unsure how she’d take the information, unsure how much information Nate wanted her to have. But he’s still a bit fucked up and he continues to rake his fingers through his hair, head angling toward her, face alighted by the fire. “He’s good. Better since we moved.” All things considered. It’s likely Hotaru could see the ways where it was better, the way Sunjata didn’t have as heavy bags under his eyes, able to sleep better with Nate by his side to chase the nightmares away. And of course, the twins to distract him from anything else, like thinking about the void of Haai. “I think we’re both a bit less paranoid nowadays. Which is good for him, I know being here with everything that happened stressed him out more than he liked to let on.” He shrugs, fingers falling from his crown of hair. “He got his eye back from the Voice. And… Some kind of magic that sits under his skin. His skin lights up where you touch him.” There’s a soft smile that tugs on his face with that memory, the way each lingering touch sparked and put on display exactly where his hands or lips had laid.

“He one upped me on the LongNight gift this year. So I’m trying to figure out the details on getting him something really good for our birthday and anniversary.” It’s offhanded, unsure which parts would be too far for Hotaru, prepared to stop the second it becomes too much.

every choice, every lie, demons that he kept inside
angel now that i've stopped spinning, could you come clean?

Hotaru

Scowling at him half-heartedly as he laughs at her, she eyes his waist and hums contemplatively. "They have stretchy waistbands, and would keep your virtue in tact even if they wouldn't necessarily keep you warm," she chuckles, words half smashed into her knees alongside her smile at the image. She rides that amusement even as her own question drags them back to more delicate territory.

Admittedly, she thought it would hurt worse than it does. Instead she sits there listening quietly, the words soaking into her skin where she'll carry them for a long while yet. Though he turns to face her, Hotaru doesn't do the same. Staring into the fire as his words wrap around her and paint a picture more vivid than her own daydreaming could conjure. It's still undoubtedly like looking through a window to the perfect view beyond while being stuck outside unable to reach it, but...she's still breathing. Just happy that they're happy, even if they're happy without her. The ache is still there but it isn't choking her anymore. Whether it's resignation or acceptance is something she isn't sober enough to parse.

With all the information he has just given her, maybe she should have more to say, but all she can think is, "I'm glad. You both deserve to be happy." And she means it. The empty space they used to fill in her is scar tissue more than open wound, but nothing will ever fit there again. Hotaru is sure she's more scar than living flesh at this point, and isn't sure anything will ever find its place inside her now regardless of where. She's learning to be okay with it.

Watching a piece of log fall off and crackle into the deeper portion of the grate, the Valkyrie blinks and is relieved to find her eyes sting but are otherwise dry. Nothing for him to read off her. Head still spinning and reluctant to stand but aware they should both get as much sleep as possible before the inevitable hangover, Ru sighs and releases her legs to instead unsteadily clamber to her feet. "Think I'm ready to sleep before I get a second wind and do something stupid." Which is inevitable and will likely lead to her talking to him in bed, but at least her drunken body will be horizontal and less capable of getting her into trouble.

But I am just a broken machine
And I do things that I don't really mean

SUNJATA

angel loves to keep me spinning, much too high to see
that all these chains have started thinning & hell is breaking free

He snorts at the mention of virtue, a roll of his eyes offered as he huffs a sigh – half tempted to make a comment that it’s not like he has much to hide from, given everyone in this room has seen him. But it’s easier to keep that locked behind his teeth and instead, sink into more careful prompting of words, unsure where to stop and how far to go. So he keeps some things hidden, others not. And when she reacts rather positively, his shoulders sag a fraction in relief. “Trying to get as much in as we can before the inevitable.” He admits ruefully, turning his attention away from her to focus on the fire as well.

And that’s mostly that, she gets to her feet and he’s a few heartbeats after her from pulling himself up, too, swaying a fraction before he nods. “I think Torchline’s had enough of your drunken antics, if I’m being perfectly honest.” He rumbles, not a barb but a hint of honesty he’d otherwise keep locked down tight. But the amount of liquor in his system brings about a loose tongue and Sunjata’s never been good at picking apart his words to begin with.

So he lets her lead the way, a hint of apprehension coming over him when the bed is before him – not because of her, but because of everything else. Eventually, though, he pulls back the blankets and slips within them, sighing in relief as he feels his bones and body loosen the tension of the day. Mentally, however, the relief of the weight on the side of the bed beside him, makes it far easier for him to deal. So he turns, to face her, snaking his arm under the pillow to prop his own head and hers, letting his steel gaze focus on her, unsure what to even say.

every choice, every lie, demons that he kept inside
angel now that i've stopped spinning, could you come clean?

Hotaru

Her smile fades at the mention of the war, and she sighs mournfully. "I know. I talked to Wessex, and even though Frey couldn't care less about the war and the Gods couldn't care less about me, everyone is tangled up in choices by virtue of knowing each other." Of loving each other. Forming connections as humans are meant to do, and then discovering too late that they've now become nooses. All because the Gods can't figure their own shit out. Deigning mortal armies to be good enough substitutes instead of battling out their own problems one on one.

As she rises to her feet, his dry wit follows her, and despite how it edges a little close to sensitive territory it still prompts a bark of a laugh from her as she crawls into the bed gracelessly. There's not much to her, but what there is ends up sprawled and stretched like a sunning cat as she plucks the pillow on her side into her arms against her chest. It still feels natural to sidle over once Sunjata's arm is outstretched beneath the pillows, keeping her head propped up. The pillow between them is a meager barrier, but it gives her something to hold for the moment. Ru is sure she'll give in eventually, too inebriated to put up a fight, but for now they can hold a pretense of separation.

His stare is arresting even when he looks so lost, and Hotaru is scared to even blink lest he dissipate like so much mist. It's been a year since she's had someone in her bed for more than a night. Since she had him in particular. It's like a broken bone being set after a year; requiring a fresh break to do so, but the pain is worth how things settle into place. And in the silence, she offers one more golden bough of an olive branch; "Tell me about Kamaria?"

But I am just a broken machine
And I do things that I don't really mean

SUNJATA

angel loves to keep me spinning, much too high to see
that all these chains have started thinning & hell is breaking free

“It’s difficult.” He agrees quietly – though there is some boon to his thoughts with how she mentions that Frey couldn’t care less about the war. It makes his idea of a gift and whom to go for to retrieve it all that much more within his grasp. But that’s to be thought about later, because he’s crawling into bed with her, as they once had done so many times before but this time it feels stilted. She keeps a pillow between them while they face one another and his steel gaze swims with liquor and firelight as he studies her face, as if he were to easily pretend that nothing of the past year had happened, like things were normal, like they had once been.

He feels the weight of her head on his arm and the Flood shuffles a smidge closer, his chest to the arm that holds the pillow tight to her own chest as their eyes meet. Tell me about Kamaria? It’s a soft request, one that has him nuzzling his head into the pillow a bit, taking in a deep breath. “She’s a lot like me. Wants to Attune. That’s next on the agenda.” He rattles off with surprising ease, a hint of pride. “She’s been staying here in Torchline a lot lately to keep learning with her teacher while Nate and I get the house ready. But she stayed with us over LongNight.” But his smile fades a fraction and he heaves a quiet sigh, tugging the blankets up over his scarred shoulder as if he’s trying to close himself off a bit more, his gaze looking past her to the wall behind her.

“It’s been a bit more difficult as of late, though. She loves Nate but Safrin’s made him a monster in her mind. I’ve been trying to fix that.”

every choice, every lie, demons that he kept inside
angel now that i've stopped spinning, could you come clean?

Hotaru

Difficult is an understatement, but are there any words to describe their torn loyalties sufficiently? Hotaru cannot risk talking to anybody else about her uncertainty, not when those closest to her are so aligned with their convictions, hardly straying. Sunjata understands best of them all. It's a relief, even when neither of them expands upon the topic, instead sitting in silence staring at one another as they reflect privately on the difficulties of war.

As he shuffles closer she can smell the hint of fading alcohol on his breath, the warmth as it ghosts over her face, the bridge of her nose and crest of her cheeks. It makes her eyes flutter with something she can't call exhaustion. All the same she lets them lid halfway as he speaks if only to better soak in the words he shares. The insight into a life she is not part of, a child she knew for only an afternoon and had already grown attached to. "I wonder what her shift would be, to be so young. Whether it would be a reflection or a prediction." How far did the cosmic etchings of the soul into animal forms extend? "When we met, she was enamored with A-Atlas," the name chokes and breaks on her tongue, and she forges on painfully, "but what little girl doesn't love horses?" The attempt at humor falls flat at his next revelation, and the fact that she is suddenly questioning whether she'd ever told him of that day, of who had dropped Kamaria off at their door.

Rage stirs anew in her, fueled by the recklessness of alcohol, and her eyes fly open even as his slide past her. "What? That's - Sunjata, that's awful," she spits, fumbling for words that aren't purely expletives. Elbow rising to prop her up slightly before sinking back down when it makes her head spin anew. "Why would she promise to save Nate, give you her own child knowing you would raise her with him, only to do that? What does she get out of twisting a babe's mind?" The newfound respect for Safrin she'd gained threatening to wither away at this new information.

But I am just a broken machine
And I do things that I don't really mean

SUNJATA

angel loves to keep me spinning, much too high to see
that all these chains have started thinning & hell is breaking free

He faces her, the alcohol from his breath drifting across her in their closeness as he settles on the other side of the pillow she keeps between them. And despite the way his gaze dances from her to the wall behind her, back and forth as if he’s worried about what he’d do so close to her if he looked at her too long, he’s surprisingly glad to be here – glad to be around her again (even if there’s that darker part of him that can’t forgive her for what she’d done, it’s some sort of strange dance within him, some sort of masochism that’s the root of his drunken mentality). “She wants a bird like mine.” He says gently, roughly, his accent thicker the more the liquor sifts through him, the more exhaustion weighs on his mind.

Her comment of Atlas, however, has him pausing – watching her briefly before he nods. “She loves animals.” He admits quietly, before confusion belatedly hits him and his brows pinch together for a moment. “When…? You met her?” He asks, jumbled as the confusion races through him yet again.

It doesn’t get time to last long, though, because suddenly there’s that rage of Hotaru’s and Sunjata’s feeling whiplash from the memories it draws up. It’s a similar sort of venom from when he’d crawled home to announce he was having a child with Safrin to save Nate. And now? Now it was the opposite, and he works his jaw silently as he shakes his head. “I don’t try to guess what goes on in her mind.” But his heart sinks with the reality. The idea that maybe, just maybe, Safrin didn’t plan to save Nate at all.

That maybe he was just a pawn to get her intertwined with him that much more. That she was using and manipulating him yet again. “She… Told us that the Voice could flip a switch and…” His fingers clutch the pillow a bit tighter, jaw clattering shut as he forces himself not to say it aloud. He wouldn’t be himself anymore. He’d be some soldier of hers, murdering us in our sleep. He finishes mentally, through the bond as all the worries and fears and the deep set adamance that his husband couldn’t do such a thing.

Idly, he picks at the pillow, his gaze finally finding her again, the crease in his brow a bit deeper than it was a few minutes before. And he takes the pillow, picks it up and plucks it out of her arms, dropping it on the other side of her to tug her in against his chest.

every choice, every lie, demons that he kept inside
angel now that i've stopped spinning, could you come clean?

Hotaru

He is not the only one struggling. In that, neither of them is alone, and that is partially what is keeping them both going. The load shared between shoulders, a night otherwise guaranteed to be lonely now eased even with all the history between them. Perhaps all the more eased because of it in some ways, and made more difficult in others. Her eyes dip away from his at his confusion, and she knows she could let the topic pass by if she desired, with all else mingling about as the topic wanders. All the same he deserves an answer even if to keep her silence would be easier.

“The day she left her teacher, Atlas and I found her in the market. We spent the afternoon together, and I was the one who dropped her off that day.” She had been gone before the girl had ever crossed the threshold, sworn to secrecy in childish game. It had been easy to love her, as Ru loves every child, when not faced with the reality of who the girl was at the time.

That love is hard to find now, quailing beneath the anger and hurt that swells within her at notions of manipulation. The thing is, Hotaru knows how akin she is to Safrin, just as she’d been to the Moon Goddess. It was why they would always be battling for room in Sunjata’s heart. And Hotaru could not compete with a Goddess. But even she can smell the deceit here, and though she is reluctant to speak ill of the deity for a large variety of reasons, chief among them is the refusal to make this harder on the Flood. To force her own opinion when he is already torn between loyalties.

His voice in her mind has her shuddering, bile rising in her throat at the imagery, because damn it all she can see it. Because at the end of the day she loves Nate, she will never stop loving him, nor Wessex or Kiada. But Hotaru has seen what usurpers like The Voice can do, and whether it is a product of her past trauma turning her biased or a clarity of vision from witnessing such depraved acts, Hotaru cannot trust her. All the same she can’t trust Safrin either, not when this information so closely rides the heels of how she’s given Sunjata a daughter with half the Goddess’ blood, and asked him to raise her with Nate. A mother would never court danger so closely.

“I -” the pillow is plucked from between them, and the arm beneath her head curls as she is pulled against the radiating warmth of Sunjata’s body. Hotaru shudders all over, every nerve alight with fire, like she had been sleeping miles beneath snow and ice and only now is remember the touch of the sun. She has been cold for so very, very long, and every cell rejoices to be warmed by his touch. It shocks all words off her tongue, face pressing into the softness of skin and the knotted edges of scars by the crook of his neck. Arms rise to cradle him back in return, holding on for dear life. “I’ve seen so many die at the hands of a false God. I don’t know who to trust. They could both so easily be lying, I don’t…” despair chokes her, and it’s not even her own. Because she wishes with a desperation that aches in her bones to have an answer for him. To somehow ease this burden off his shoulders. Torn between the love of a parent and that of a husband. Unless…

“But even if he did, Jata, he couldn’t hurt her. He couldn’t, because she has protected all children for the duration of the war.” Kamaria would be shepherded away to her mother’s side. And perhaps Sunjata could use that in some way to help Kamaria, to make her break away some from Safrin’s whispered words. Ru can only do so much to help, but the press of her fingers into his skin along his spine tell how badly she wishes to do more.

But I am just a broken machine
And I do things that I don't really mean

SUNJATA

angel loves to keep me spinning, much too high to see
that all these chains have started thinning & hell is breaking free

She gives him an answer that he doesn’t necessarily need – but one that bolsters some wound deep within him all the same. He wonders if he remembers that day, the one where she’d shown up later than usual, the one when she’d come through the door and he’d asked her how her learning was going, how she’d answered with a simple ‘it was fine!’ and a snicker that he thought nothing else of.

He wonders what else he doesn’t know about his daughter.

It’s passed by quickly though, tucked away deep into his drunken mind as the conversation swings to something so much harder, so much more difficult as her rage and his sorrow collide in a form of a dance as they always had. Sunjata, the self sacrificer, the one that took what fate had to give him and wonder which would be the final straw to break him, taking it all in as if he deserved every second of the pain and torture he went through. And Hotaru, the one that held all the rage for the both of them, the flame and words and ability to fight back, to make everything make sense in a way that balmed Sunjata’s wounded soul.

It's no surprise that he moves the pillow, tugs her close, lets the warmth of his furnace of a body soak into her cold bones. Her arms rise and snake around him, holding him close, and Sunjata can’t help that instinctual part of him affected by his shifts the most to wrap his own arms around her, to bury his face into the curtain of damp, golden hair, inhaling her ozone scent like a lifeline. “I never wanted it to come to this.” He manages, weakly, choking on his breath the same way that she chokes on her words.

Her face is pressed against his throat, against his scars, against a pulse that rabbits his anxieties even as the rest of him tries to remain mostly calm. She cuts herself off from what thought she was planning to continue and Sunjata’s hanging onto every word, waiting for the one that makes sense as she had always done, the ones that opened his eyes and made things feel more possible.

“All children?” He asks quietly, his warm breath pressed against her pale neck where it hovers above the scar Nate had left there, his scruff of a beard brushing against her soft skin. Her fingers press into his spine and his tense shoulders relax with each and every touch, his arms sliding around her to press her harder against him as if he’s worried this is all some sort of nice dream, a fear that he can’t trust it or trust her.

Or even trust himself.

He takes a few more deep breaths, steadying himself, letting the war play out within him. “She’s directly tied in with Nate, too. I wonder if she’s trying to influence Kamaria into slipping further away from him when they’re directly tied to one another.” He frowns. “I don’t even know if the deal is still good.” He manages hoarsely, his thundering pulse quickening. I don’t know how to ask her.

every choice, every lie, demons that he kept inside
angel now that i've stopped spinning, could you come clean?

Hotaru

That anger has always been in defense of Sunjata; all except once. It is so much clearer now with the bond, and she despairs over having not Attuned sooner. How much could have been avoided if she had? If they had understood one another this clearly, what might have been different in the way things went down? Even that temporary hurt burns away beneath the anger of injustice, of cruelty. Not for the first time she finds it overtaking her, fueled by the igniting force of alcohol, and she wishes she could stand on the level of Gods if only to rip Safrin from her throne with bloodied hands and claws like knives. How easily her loyalties change when swayed by those she loves, and this is Hotaru's Achilles Heel. So few held close, and yet they hold the power of the world over her. And she never, ever lets go. Even after everything, she is his in a way that hurts with every breath, every heartbeat, and yet she knows that to remove it would mean to change in a way that she would not survive.

"All children. Regardless of race, creed, or land. If they are not old enough to take arms, they are safe from the war. That means Kamaria - even if the Voice did such a thing, or even could, Nate would never be able to hurt her." For words meant to comfort, they blaze like fire across her tongue, trying to brand surety into his skin from where her lips brush against it with every syllable. For Nate, too, wherever he may be. If there is any doubt he harbors in his heart about his own Goddess, let those fears lie dead, let them both be freed from this shadow at least until the war is through.

Sunjata's beard is rough against the smoothness of her skin, which has a few extra scars of her own but still so few in comparison to his. Ru welcomes the slight burn of his touch, choking down a pitiful noise as his stubble glances over Nate's bite scar - a mark that she still traces with her fingers in the dark of the night when the cold creeps into her marrow and the sunrise feels like it will never come for her again. He holds her tighter, and she does so right back, palms splaying flat against his back and legs entangling to erase any minuscule amount of space between them. "Could you ask Vi? She is his herald, she must still answer to him." If anyone has the power and pull to draw down one of the Old Gods, it would be Sunjata. But perhaps if Vi is not as charmed by the Flood as Safrin is, he would be even more forbidding. "Or Ronin? Approach her at the side of another she favors, someone to witness?" The name burns, but she knows they are friends, and Hotaru is a fixer. She will exhaust every corner of her own brilliant mind if it means granting Sunjata an answer that will save his family.

But I am just a broken machine
And I do things that I don't really mean