The session has concluded with a plan solid and hopefully Quinn-proofed, something King has assured the room would be nigh impossible to do but doesn’t complain as they begin preparing around and for her known abilities and methods.

At the end of the day, after each and every meeting has been done: the people that admonished her for her decision has come around and see it as a key part of the motion.

In essence, they want her to lure Quinn to her doom. Them, the individuals that a night ago has claimed that Quinn held no feelings for her but ill, desires nothing but her undoing; an assertion that has caused her some distress, for reasons mysterious even to her.

Only King and General Adder have enough dignity to apologize to her, yet even then: she can’t help but despise them for what they’re asking her to do. The lies, the trickery, the conspiracy they’re going to perform just to kill a young woman.

However, Ana knew it was more than that. The young woman was no stranger to her, almost the exact opposite, in fact. She can recognize her blind and deaf by the deft touch of her hand alone, through the way her body curves and the myriad of scars that covers them, each with a unique story Quinn are always so eager to tell.

Ana doesn’t wish to be the one that delivers a killing blow to such a delicate yet resilient body. But she must. Because it was Ana’s duty, and she was her charge.

Yes, she convinces herself. We’re only an obligation to each other. As she walks towards Quinn, following the plan of assuring her that Ana still trusts her. Nothing more.

“Do you mind sharing the table with me again this afternoon?” she asked, voice lower than she intended due to overcorrection.

And it hurts her when Quinn smiles at her open and sincere. When she answers. “But, of course!” Ana can only nod in reply and begin strolling away before Quinn takes her hand in hers. “Let us!”

An action that would’ve softened Ana’s down in any other situation but this. At the kind touch of her calloused hand, Ana’s mind is burning bright ablaze with questions, the most important one being: will she still hold me so gently knowing what I’ve planned for her in the background?

When the answer came quickly to the obvious negative, she stiffens as hurt travels from her chest to the rest of her body. The kind of torment that worsens when she catches Quinn’s gaze, forcing her head away in the hope that the ache will subside when they finally eat.

It doesn’t.

In fact. “Ana!” It only intensifies the moment Quinn begin their conversation with a pained hitch in her voice carefully hidden for most people that aren’t Ana.

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

A tone that softens Ana’s own as she answers. “Yes?”

Something that seems to help with Quinn nervous energy. “Have I... done something to antagonize you? Is this about me leaving the bed?” For her sentences are surer, as if she has taken a step forwards Ana in a show of trust.

Something that Ana can only respond in one way.

With the aid of winter. “No,” she speaks in stone, finality upon her tongue.

By word alone. “I see. Alright, then!” She has compelled Quinn to stop, quenched all mirth from her heart as she tries to start, beginning their usual small talk; and Ana ruined further by allowing herself to be smothered by guilt, stifling her replies.

The penitence soared as she continues to interact with the woman, dousing whatever feeling there are in all of their activities together in remorse she can’t even confess or apologize for.

Each time it roots down, she repeats her mantra to herself. That it was a job, that this is a task performed for the sake of the temple and everyone she cares about and nothing else.

Yet, when the regret deepened enough to punch holes in their intimacy, when Quinn grew colder alongside her, when the woman’s touch became distant and false; a mere facsimile of the real thing: Ana can’t help but suffer, her heart filled to the brim with a desire to do something, anything.

Such a wish even begin haunting her dream, with an image of them coiling together in a way Ana’s unable to ignore, the affection causing their faces to glow with such a bliss that it makes Ana wonder, is that really how they look together before?

“Ana.” The Quinn of her fantasy whispers, prematurely silencing her train of thought with a dazzling smile. The voice sounds so real in her ears that she almost believed it to be—“Quinn.” She stops herself, awaken to find the woman kneeling in front of her, her visage cradled handsomely by the winter moon.

It makes her looks angelic, nearly innocent if not for the shine of fear and hesitance in her verdant green eye. “Yes.” As she answers with an easy smile.

“Is there something you need?” she asked. Are you having a bad dream? Swallowing her follow-up question whole.

“A quick talk, if you don't mind.”

Sensing the urgency in her voice. “I don’t.” Ana shakes of the drowsiness as she swiftly rises and sits, pulling herself back to give Quinn room to climb up again, should she wish to do so.

“Thank you!” She does, Ana nods.

And after another round of doubt, she summons a dagger. “Now! Do you trust me, Ana?” And delivers a question that Ana almost instinctively answers in the affirmative before she catches a hold of herself.

Quinn’s body language makes her look smaller than she is. However, the expression that dances on her lips, the way she grasps the blade playfully in front of Ana. It points only to one truth.

“… Quinn?” A fact that causes fear to seeps deep into every crevice of her body, seizing control of all corners of her heart. Not for herself, but for Quinn’s feelings of her.

After all, she knew of her plan, and now shall take her life for it as payment for the betrayal. A trade Ana would gladly accept, a fair penitence for her crime. If only she has no job to do, no obligation to others.

But she does. So, she cast the spell. “Ana? What’s—” Cutting off Quinn with a powerful blast of divine energy as she sounds the silent alarm they have painstakingly sets up exactly for this situation.

A three-week preparation is the perfect amount of time, a fortnight should be more than enough to subdue Quinn, now sitting on the floor with a gaze directed downwards, trying to hide the sad smirk carved into her lips by a streak of hurt.

“I see,” she whispers, disappointed.