Octavia didn’t descend the bell tower alone, granted. It wouldn’t have been the first time. Still, there was a comfort in coming down with another acolyte in tow--for once. Her steps down weren't as shaky as she would’ve expected, although she recognized the degree to which she was thoroughly numb on her last foray downwards. There was, to the credit of those who had insisted on it, a comfort that came with knowing she would never again have a reason to scale the bell tower. For once, it wasn’t her top priority. Her heart had already fallen, shattered, and scattered along every last step of the staircase.
She didn’t want to know where Josiah went. It wouldn’t have been the first time the truth of the Ambassador’s privilege burned someone she loved. She wondered if she’d just made the same mistake twice. She wondered if it was what he’d needed to hear. She was thankful, more than anything, that the Velrose Acolyte respected her sorrow. Even quiet as it was, she knew her hitching sobs were echoing somewhat off every wall. It was enough to make her the slightest bit self-conscious.
Octavia--
She physically shook her head, her braids beating against her tear-stained cheeks. Please. Not right now. Please!
Stratos didn’t press her, nor did he offer a reminder of his presence. Octavia didn’t have the strength. She didn’t have the energy. She didn’t know what she needed, nor did she know what she wanted. In that way, perhaps her descent wasn’t so dissimilar to that of last time, after all.
Octavia was hardly lucid for the majority of her return, by which she reached the foot of the staircase with relative calm. "Calm", to be fair, was subjective, given the way she still wanted to vomit for a thousand other reasons. She raised one hand to her throbbing head, biting back another round of sobs that came with the mental image of Selena’s smile.
“Octavia,” she heard a tiny voice offer.
To face Allison, distraught as she was, was a nightmare. It took everything in Octavia’s power to keep herself together as she spoke. “Yes?”
The Velrose Acolyte fidgeted shyly, regardless of what little attention round, inquisitive eyes could offer. “Thank you for letting Valkyria go home. Thank you for helping. I’m…really happy I got to meet him. I’ll be happy about that for the rest of my life.”
For that, too, Octavia wanted to cry. She stumbled over her words. “T-Thank you for…being there for him. And…thank you for helping us with everything. We couldn’t have done any of this without you.”
Allison took her gratitude with little more than a nod. “I’m happy I could do something to help. I don’t…think I understand all of the Ambassador stuff, even if I get most of it. Still, I’m glad I got to be helpful to you. I hope I…did a good job.”
Octavia took the little acolyte’s hand without hesitation, squeezing gently. “You did amazing. You’re wonderful.”
“I don’t know if they’re gonna be happy that Valkyria is gone,” she confessed. “I think they’re gonna be mad at me.”
“We can talk to the clergy, if you want. We can tell them that it was for something important. If they really cared about Valkyria that much, they’d understand.”
That was a lie. Knowing what she knew of Velrose and its origins, Octavia strongly doubted the explanation would suffice--genuine or otherwise. More prominently, the idea of interacting with the clergy of her own volition was nauseating in and of itself. It was an empty promise, although it would be more than possible to pass to someone else. She’d already berated River. She’d already broken Josiah. There weren’t many options left.
“Do you think they’ll still want me to be the acolyte?” Allison asked timidly.
It wasn’t a question Octavia could answer. “I…don’t know. I-I would think so. They love you. The whole city loves you.”
“They love the acolyte that’s a Maestra,” Allison corrected. “They love the acolyte that rings Valkyrie’s Call for them. Without that, will they still want me at all?”
Octavia sighed. “If…they let you leave, you can always come with us, you know. You don’t have to stay in Velrose.”
Allison shook her head. “I want to be the acolyte. This is…the place mommy loved, and Sonata, too. I want to be able to protect it for them, however I can.”
Octavia couldn’t help the way her hand found Allison’s head, an instinctive gesture of comfort that she only noticed well after it happened. “Remember to be Allison. You’re not just the acolyte. You’re more than that.”
Allison didn’t give her a smile in return. The pressure of the girl’s body against her own was more than enough, her embrace as hesitant as it was feeble. For as small as she was, her little face pressing up against Octavia’s torso was briefly startling. “And you’re not just the Ambassador,” Allison murmured. “You’re Octavia.”
Octavia pulled her close, doing what she could to avoid smothering the Strong child. She was content to let silence do the talking. At the foot of the bell tower, with so little for the acolyte to show for her title, it was the Ambassador who was to blame. Even so, not a drop of hostility fell from Allison’s lips.
To be comforted by a child well under half her age was disorienting. It didn’t matter. She was as warm as the bronze she had attended to so lovingly in the sunshine a thousand times over. Of those cursed to play at an age so tender, Allison was one that Octavia wondered if she'd truly saved in the wake of her responsibilities. Theirs were incompatible.
There were, at least, some actions the Ambassador could still take responsibility for in Velrose. She didn’t necessarily need to leave the church.
It wasn’t a long walk, although she felt badly for leaving the little acolyte behind in the process. As to what was left for Allison now, her primary objective quite literally having vanished into thin air, Octavia couldn’t imagine. Her knowledge of the Velrose Church and all that came with its practices left many, many gaps she didn’t wish to fill. It was more so the acolyte’s place than her own to navigate the world in which she’d been raised--for better or worse. Octavia had seen enough of the rules and customs she’d needed to see through three sets of eyes, and only one set that she could truly claim as her own.
She halfway wished she would’ve paid more attention to the layout of the actual church, for whatever that was worth. Wandering by herself, even for relatively short distances, was unsettling. She knew where she was going, somewhat. Part of her wished she didn’t have to.
The quarters they’d been graciously provided were largely adjacent to one another--both a blessing and a curse, in terms of noise control. It wasn’t as though anyone was particularly loud during the evenings, when the time came, and Octavia was grateful that the vast majority of the Maestros had the common courtesy to practice well outside of their rooms. It still left stragglers, sometimes. She wasn’t immune to the speckled handful of stray notes that slipped beneath at least two different doors on her way to the only room of interest.
Her footsteps echoed down the hallway, unfortunately. Each muffled song was at least a slight offset to her approach. She had that much. It was enough of a distraction that it took her a moment to remember exactly which room, for how excitedly its Maestra had disappeared within on the eve of their perilous descent. Octavia would’ve rather have heard her notes in passing, soft as they’d surely be, versus anyone else’s. She’d be lucky if she heard them again at all anytime soon.
She knocked, praying that her guess sufficed. It was the second time she’d worried about searching for the same girl in the wrong place, and the thought was ironically nostalgic. Octavia held her breath.
“Come in. You don’t have to knock.”
Her voice was weak, heartbreakingly so relative to the spunk Octavia had long since grown used to. The Ambassador didn’t shirk the invitation for a moment, anxious as she was to cross the threshold. Where she could only find the tiniest wave, the Maestra whose temporary shelter she intruded on offered her far too soft a smile.
“Hey there, Heartful. Took you long enough.”
It was all Octavia could do to try to return the same, unstable and wobbly as her own smile was. “H-Hey. How are you…feeling?”
Mina’s grin, feeble yet true, was much more welcome. “Never better.”
Her words were doubtful, given the way she struggled just to sit up in the bed. With her glasses folded neatly atop the nightstand, her hair devoid of the cute clips Octavia had come to appreciate, and devoid of a grin so vibrant, she could’ve passed for a different person. Never since they’d met had she seen Mina so frail and vulnerable, even as her bold words sought to boost what her fragile voice couldn't. Octavia wrung her hands together, resisting the urge to wince at the sight.
“Are you in…any pain?” she asked nervously.
Mina shook her head. “Not really, just tired. It’s annoying. Sick of bein’ stuck in this stupid bed. I wanna get the hell out of here already.”
Octavia’s heart chuckled on her behalf. “You and me both.”
“Tell you what, though, we kicked some ass down there,” Mina continued with far more satisfaction. “It felt real good to get to fight like hell for once. Hate to say it, Heartful, but it was fun. Well, like, some of it. Not all of it, obviously.”
Octavia bit her lip. She hesitated to bring it up. She figured the topic would arise eventually, and she was correct. Of her own accord, Mina mentioned it herself, flopping her head back against the pillows with mild exasperation.
“Never almost died before, so that was new. I…guess I got carried away. That was my fault. Probably deserved it.”
Octavia shook her own head viciously, kneeling down at the girl’s bedside with little hesitation. “Don’t say that! You didn’t deserve anything that happened to you. There was lots of Dissonance, and you did your best. You were amazing. I saw you fight, and to know you were fighting on my behalf was…incredible. You weren’t even the only one who got hurt! There was another--”
“I screwed River over pretty bad, didn’t I?” she mumbled.
Octavia’s eyes widened. “I…”
Mina sighed. “You don’t have to sugarcoat it. I already know what happened. Never thought I’d be on the receiving end. I don’t really remember it that much. I wonder if he regrets that he had to do it.”
Octavia bit her lip. “You know him. He’s stubborn. He really thinks it’s what he was born to do. I don’t think he regrets it at all.”
Whether or not Octavia wished for River to carry at least a sliver of pain over the weight of his decision didn't matter. It wasn't relevant to Mina’s well-being. She opted not to think of it right now, lest her anger compromise her concern. It was an issue for later.
“Yeah, he’s stubborn, alright,” Mina agreed. “He’s one hell of a Spirited, though. I could almost see him being something else. Heartful, maybe. No offense, of course.”
“Why would that offend me?”
Her grin was stronger, somewhat. “You really want a guy like that as a legacy sibling? He can barely pull himself down from the damn clouds, sometimes.”
Octavia couldn’t fight the way the corners of her mouth turned upwards involuntarily. “I wouldn’t mind. River makes choices I don’t agree with sometimes, but he’s…nice. I like being around him.”
Mina scoffed. “My God, does lightning bug know you talk about him like that?”
“What?”
“Geez, Heartful, leave something for the rest of us,” she teased. “If you want River so bad, the least you can do is hand over what you’ve already got. I’ll take good care of him.”
The urge to smack Mina’s arm was a reflex, injuries or not. It was enough to make the Maestra laugh, and Octavia nearly did the same. It was much more like her, and much more like what Octavia had hoped to see upon finding her face again.
When she calmed once more, Mina’s tone was softer. “Don’t tell my dad I almost died, alright? I think it’d kill him instead.”
“I have no reason to tell him.”
“He didn’t want me to be a Maestra in the first place,” she said quietly. “I don’t blame him, after what happened. He probably thought that would be me, someday. I mean, that wasn’t exactly how it went down, but here we are anyway. If he knew that this is what almost did me in, the one thing he didn’t want me to do, I think it would…hurt him more than all of this hurt me.”
Octavia watched as Mina’s hand slipped carefully into the lining of her cardigan, weaving between blankets for the sake of something so small. She managed to capture both pieces carefully with only five fingers to work with, sparkling as they were in the soft natural light. Up above, the sunshine that streamed through Mina’s window did much more justice to the little curves than the dim candlelight below. For once, Octavia was appreciative of at least some aspect of Velrose. The rod and the iron itself dangled delicately from Mina’s fingers, swaying gently in the open air as she held them aloft.
When she extended her hand towards the Ambassador in the slightest, the gesture came with a half-hearted smile. “I’ve had my fun. I did what I wanted to do. I paid the price for it, yeah, but at least now I know what this world is really like. I hope I got you somewhere you needed to be, Heartful.”
Octavia only stared at the glistening triangle. “Are you…sure?”
Mina averted her eyes. “I…think so. I’m pretty sure. You've gotta do it eventually, right? There’s some days I think it’d be fun to be a Maestra forever, and there’s some days I think I’d rather be anything but. I want to be proud of what I’ve got, and it’s gonna be trickier to take pride in something that I’ve got nothing to show for. Even so, I…think this is what’s best. I think Raisare deserves a break, anyway. She kicked ass just as hard.”
Octavia patiently awaited the return of Mina’s gaze, stilling her words until she had the chance. “You can…still be proud of being Essenced, even if you’re not a Maestra anymore. It doesn’t just go away. Josiah’s still Essenced, you know, and he hasn’t been a Maestro for awhile. That’ll never change. You’ll always have a part of Raisare with you.”
Mina rolled her eyes playfully. “Oh, my sweet little Heartful, what am I going to do with you? And lightning bug owes me lunch for leading me on like that, anyway. Guess we’re gonna match. It’ll be a good conversation topic.”
Octavia giggled, at least briefly. “As long as you’re…sure that this is what you want.”
Mina nodded, extending her arm the slightest bit further. “Yeah. Rai, what do you think?”
It was crowded, somewhat, with a relatively small space for the Muse in question to greet Octavia’s eyes. Nonetheless, her full splendor was every bit as strikingly beautiful and illustrious as always. Her golden glow, overpowering as it was, put the sunshine to shame. Every sparkle that graced Savior’s Resplendence as it dangled quietly was a silent spark that tickled Mina’s fingers in turn. If Raisare’s luminous presence was enough to sting Mina’s eyes, she gave absolutely no indication. Instead, she opted only to offer a grin that warmed Octavia’s heart.
Raisare bowed to the Ambassador once more, despite their prior meeting. “If you would have me, Ambassador, I would be most grateful for your assistance.”
Octavia smiled as best as she could. “You two were--are--amazing partners for one another. I know you’ll always be together, somehow.”
Raisare cast her gaze down to the girl below her. “I do not disagree,” she affirmed, her tone laced with warmth.
Mina waved her free hand dismissively. “Ah, knock it off, both of you. Don’t go gettin’ me emotional.”
“I speak what I mean,” Raisare said.
Again did Mina roll her eyes. “You were one hell of a troublemaker, you know that? Still, I…appreciate you stickin’ it out with me. Thanks for giving me a chance, for whatever it was worth. It was good to have you.”
“And to you, my child, it is as the Ambassador says. Take pride in your blood, with or without such power in your hands,” Raisare offered gently.
Mina chuckled. “Whatever you say, Rai.”
When Mina’s eyes drifted to Octavia’s, her fragile smile served as permission. “Take it away, Heartful.”
Octavia nodded, although not without a soft smile of her own. She relished the occasional ting of Savior’s Resplendence clinking as it dangled, a sweet sound she regretted halting. Her bandaged fingers did an injustice to the little triangle, soaking up the sparkle she hoped to savor until the end. Instead, ever so gently, she cupped her hands around the metal, cradling both precious fragments with caution.
“I have borne witness to your pain,” she murmured, “and my light guides your passage from the depths of my heart.”
Mina watched along, and so did she. There were no tears to be shed, as Octavia had almost expected to find. Instead, in the wake of Raisare’s gorgeous departure, challenging the sun’s rays with every flickering shimmer, the speckled stars she left in her wake were met only with a grin. Mina was silent, drinking in a spectacle she’d seen Octavia bless her eyes with several times over by now. Surely, at least, to bid farewell to her own partner was a different experience entirely. For as fatigued as she was, content or otherwise, she took it with grace. Octavia could feel her palms closing inwards as the cool iron escaped her skin, a somewhat unwelcome departure of its own.
“Not half bad, Heartful, not half bad,” Mina teased as she saw the deed through to the end. “You’ve got this down, at this point. And look, now you got rid of three of ‘em while you were here. You got a bonus one, so you’re welcome for the compensation prize. Thank me later.”
Octavia giggled once more. It wasn’t in the slightest that she’d taken any satisfaction in sending Seraphe or Valkyria home, for what trials their guidance had necessitated. It was by the same difficulties that Mina was even bedbound in the first place, and the thought still made her feel ill. Her heart raced when she thought of the Muses that had awaited her both so high above and so far below, the strength of sound shaking her to her core without the need for so much as a single note. Instead, with her feet on the ground, she could take comfort in the essence of lightning as it flashed its vibrance before her.
Even without Raisare, even without fingers that could dispel agony itself with the most relentless of bolts and sparks, Mina sparkled just as much. Her grin was just as electric. That smile was the one and only sliver of happiness Octavia found in Velrose that day, and she prayed for it to strike her heart again and again.
----------------------------------------
Octavia had dreaded sleeping. She’d had absolutely every reason to. Every suspicion she carried with her that would follow the path of her head to the pillow was correct.
She’d procrastinated, largely. Octavia wondered if she’d driven anyone insane with the sound of her boots echoing up and down the hallway so late in the evening. She was driving herself insane, at least, and the fear that ate away at her heart over the simple idea of surrendering to the darkness only made it worse.
She feared confiding in another, just the same, for how they would surely try to coax her into accepting unconsciousness regardless. She’d expressed to them her struggles with toll nightmares before, sporadic and interspersed with her more regular plague of bells and broken light. Octavia longed for a good night’s rest, if not just once more in her life. She was aware that it was wishful thinking, given what more still awaited her in the future.
Are you alright?
And when she ended up in her bed, it was Octavia who was confided in first. She resisted the urge to groan, casting her eyes aimlessly at the ceiling rather than at his case across the room.
Not especially, no, she admitted. It was her first acknowledgement of his words in some time. Still, she didn’t apologize.
What ails you?
Octavia rolled her eyes. He was almost being insensitive. What doesn’t?
If there is something on your mind, you are always free to confide in me.
Stratos sounded identical to her companions. It wasn’t exactly endearing, in his case. I don’t really want to talk about it.
I see. Know that I am here, nonetheless.
I know.
Even unspoken, it came out sharper than she meant for it to. Octavia almost regretted it. A part of her hoped it would make him uncomfortable. As to why, she had no idea.
You have…done remarkably.
Octavia sighed heavily. “Please stop saying that,” she begged aloud.
I only speak what is true.
“I don’t want to keep hearing about it!” she snapped. “Stop reminding me that it happened and just…let me forget about it already!”
If…that is what you wish, then I will not dwell upon it. We may simply look to the future instead.
Octavia squeezed her eyes shut. Volume control was getting difficult. She did everything in her power to inhale and exhale at least once, shaky as her breaths were. I just want to go back to Tacell. I don’t want to think about anything else for the rest of the time I’m here. I don’t want to do anything. I’m tired. Please, just…let me have this. Haven’t I done enough for now?
Of course. I…did not mean to pressure you.
She resisted the urge to admit that his words were doing so, regardless. I’ll deal with…whatever comes next when we get back. I can’t do anything else right now. I have nothing else to give. I don’t want to be here, so just let me get that over with. Please.
Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.
Stratos paused. I understand, he offered at last.
Octavia didn’t particularly believe him.
As to when she fell asleep, she had no idea. She wouldn’t have known that she was asleep, anyway. It was a roll of the dice, when she left the waking world, as to whether she kept her own eyes. At the onset of her task, her pool of potential masks to wear and shoes to don once more in her dreams was relatively small. She’d relived several specific tolls multiple times over in the past, particularly prior to her voyage to Tacell. Steadily, the little settlement had sent a steady stream of fresh material trickling into the pond from which she fished for her next nightmare.
Sometimes, she played them straight, a clean shot from start to finish of a life fully lived. Sometimes, they were twisted and repackaged, with elements added or removed like the sickest of puzzles. Already, before, had she imagined her mother in place of Mina’s. At least once, Octavia had found her father where Harper’s had fallen. There was a time, disgusted as she was to remember, where Drey’s tear-stained blade had pierced her own heart rather than Priscilla’s. It was material she hated to work with, a storybook she couldn’t close. Try as she might to tear out the pages, every toll was yet another written in its place.
Where Tacell had offered her a stream, then, Velpyre now flooded her with the sea.
Even in the depths of a different Hell, up and down as she’d gone, she was well aware of the way every face that met an untimely demise would follow her long after. It was impossible to memorize over 14,000 lives lived in one sitting, and yet there were more than enough that stood out. There were those that, as she feared, found her fingers coated in the blood and pain of another. There were many, many hands that were laid upon the innocent, a single sacrifice that now screamed vividly in her dreams. Her collection of the acolyte’s agonized cries paid off in the worst way, and she had her pick. It was a recipe she couldn’t stand to cook. The way by which she was forced to devour the sights and sounds of the Cursed City’s suffering for eternity left her cursed just the same.
Octavia couldn’t prove that she wasn’t dead. She wondered if it would matter. In silence, in the regretful peace that was the privacy of the church quarters, there were none of the comforting sounds she associated with the places she’d come to call home. Between herself and the Velrose Church, perhaps a bell wasn’t the only sound that could tear her apart. No sound at all but those she could string together was equally as torturous.
Click.
When something had the chance to wake her, it usually did.
She’d ended up as somewhat of a light sleeper over time, something Octavia could count her blessings for in the face of what panic haunted her routinely. Any opportunity to escape the crushing silence that kept her bound to an unconscious Hell was seized, no matter how small. Even so, in this place specifically, the sound that awoke her with a jolt was more akin to a curse that led her mind down a path far too dark. Any threats in the waking world, within the walls of the church, were perhaps almost equally as severe as those she endured in her nightmares.
Octavia actually needed to catch her breath for several seconds the moment her eyes popped open, struggling to adjust to the dark. Her attempts to scan the room frantically with such low lighting were feeble, and her first reaction was fear. Stradivaria was too far to reach from the confines of her covers. If something was in the room with her, she’d be defenseless, briefly.
It took an unfathomable amount of willpower for her to crawl out of bed, still hardly able to stand in the wake of her exhaustion. Her only option for inspection was feeble candlelight, which she nursed to life at her bedside quickly and desperately. A precursory glance around the small expanse of her quarters was, at least, momentarily comforting--isolation, still intact as ever, was hers to claim. The paper on the table was new.
One entire edge was semi-serrated, as though torn with great caution and care. The rest was well-intact, small as it was. It fit comfortably in her hand. Beneath the oppressive flicker of candlelight, the fresh, wet ink that she struggled not to smudge with her thumb was bleeding through the paper somewhat. She recognized the handwriting, vaguely. She couldn’t quite place it.
Octavia, her mystery letter began. She took it back to the bed, setting the candle delicately atop her nightstand.
There aren’t enough words in the world to thank you for all that you’ve done for me. The lengths you’ve gone to for people you’ve never known are nothing short of extraordinary. If you weren’t the Ambassador, you’d be an angel. Maybe you can be both. You’re surrounded by people who love you and will fight with everything they’ve got to support you. I’ve seen the things you’ve overcome, both obvious and inside your heart. You’re stronger than you know, and you should be proud of every step that you’ve taken. I know how hard it can be to move forward when the world is ripped out from under you.
Octavia couldn’t help the way she gripped the paper just the slightest bit tighter, her fingernails digging into the flimsy material. She strived to be gentle.
Everyone has somewhere they’re meant to be. For me, it was with you, and with all of the people you introduced me to. It was a family I didn’t deserve, but I loved all the same, even if I didn’t show it well. There are times when I’ve wondered what would’ve happened if you’d refused to accept me after everything fell to pieces that day. I wouldn’t have blamed you. I spent a very long time trying to figure out where I was supposed to belong after that. I found my answer, and I thank you for that from the bottom of my heart.
Her eyes widened. She was starting to recognize the way each S curled ever so subtly, the gentle tilt that each letter carried along every stroke of black. The handwriting was finally starting to click. Octavia was on her feet once more, largely out of confusion.
Recently, there’s somewhere else I’ve realized I’m supposed to be. It’s somewhere I should’ve been for quite some time, and it’s somewhere I’ve thought of going before. Just like you refused to leave me behind, there’s someone I’m not meant to leave behind anymore, either. This isn’t a choice I make lightly, and this isn’t an impulse. I’ve thought about this long and hard, and decided this is what needs to be done. You didn’t do anything wrong. None of you did anything wrong. To you, most of all, be kind to yourself. Forgive yourself for things that were beyond your control. Please know that this is what I want, and please believe me when I say that this is entirely my own decision. I’m not afraid. I wish you the best of luck with everything, and I know you’ll see all of this mess through to this end with great success. You’ll always be my Ambassador. I’ll see you again someday, hopefully not anytime soon. I’ll wait patiently. I love all of you.
Stradivaria was on her shoulders before she even made it to the last lines.
I’m sorry.
She couldn’t think. She couldn’t breathe. All she could do was run, the door to her bedroom slamming behind her so loudly that it echoed down the hallway. She didn’t care who heard. She didn’t care if she woke anyone up. Already, Octavia could hardly see through the ocean that besieged her eyesight. Every step was staggered. She wanted to scream.
With love, now and forever.
This place had stolen everything. This horrible, horrible city and the one that lay beneath it had taken far too much from the world. Even salvaged, even freed of otherworldly agony, the mortal agony that it still harbored was inexplicable. It couldn’t steal anything else away from her.
Josiah.
It absolutely could not steal one more precious piece of her heart away from her.
There was no way to pinpoint with 100% certainty where he’d gone. She had an extremely predictable idea, if a prior sentiment he’d offered so recently was anything to go by. It would break her to do it alone. Octavia didn’t have a choice. There was no time to call for help, and hardly any time even to call his name--rather, to scream and scream for him until her throat was raw. She’d need every ounce of breath she could conserve, and she’d need every bit of luck that could bless her guess. If she was wrong, it was over. Even now, if she was incorrect in her assumption of his methodology, it could very well already be over, somewhere unseen and shadowed. Octavia knew him better than that.
The stairwell in the depths of night was one thousand times more intimidating than in the daytime, the scattered windows at every landing nearly useless in guiding her path. With only splinters of moonlight spared to lead her frantic flight, the musty stone walls that caged her on every side threatened to suffocate her at a moment’s notice. It wasn't a quick climb by any means, and one she loathed making each and every time.
It didn’t matter that there was no bell left to ring. It didn’t matter that there was no Maestra left to ring it, the title revoked--for once--with peace and grace. The sound was absolutely devastating. Octavia could hear nothing else with each and every step. Running was making it far, far worse.
Where Josiah’s gentle touch and soft words had led her to the very place that had ruined her inside with such patience, she found no such reprieve alone. She yearned for it more than anything, begging and pleading with screams she couldn’t emit for his comfort. Octavia needed his reassurance. She again needed someone to tell her they weren’t real, her own Hell had long since passed, and her own mistakes had long since been made.
Octavia needed him to say, with explicit certainty, that there wouldn't be two dead acolytes crumpled on the pavement secondary to her incompetence when she reached the top. She needed anyone to tell her she wouldn’t find much the same of the forsaken boy she’d grown to treasure with all of her heart.
Every toll of every invisible bell made her unbelievably dizzy, and her fingernails scraped along the stone walls in a desperate attempt to reclaim her balance. Her rapid ascent was staggered, somewhat, the echo of her boots pounding against every stair drowned out in excess by the noises that tortured her head. Any second now, she would slip, surely bashing her skull against some facet of the stairwell and spilling yet more blood upon the gem of the Blessed City.
Octavia couldn’t breathe. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d taken a breath, her vision blurred by tears and yet more. Every muscle burned as she pushed harder, her knees rising high and adrenaline threatening to poison her blood.
She could see them--both of them, so clear in her eyes each time she blinked. Given the way she’d stolen their own eyes one after another, their pain was clearer now than ever before. There were two smiles that would never have the chance to shine again. There was a sweet laugh, undeterred by suffering unmatched, that could never greet her ears once more. There was a bright gaze, proud and honest as it embraced a city meant to be protected, that would never more look upon anything with love. There was a girl born of budding blossoms and a girl forged in raging flames, both betrayed by a world that should’ve shown them nothing but kindness and love.
In her ears, one screamed and fought against a destiny that deemed her fire worthless. Surely her wrath had been twofold, born of love and hatred alike. One pleaded for her life, feigning acceptance of her death with a grace not hers to keep. Surely her hands were in agony again, just as Octavia had seen both from afar and up close. It didn’t stop every last toll of the bell from shaking her very soul.
She needed someone. She needed anyone. She needed anything, anything that would take her brain out of her head and tear the memories apart one by one. They were supposed to be gone. It was supposed to be over. Two cities, freed from the embrace of their captive angels, should have taken with them every burning flash that seared Octavia’s heart.
It didn’t matter that she was still running--although for how long, she was unsure. Her lungs were on fire, her body in general not faring much better. She openly sobbed.
It should’ve been her.
It should’ve been her.
Don’t think about it.
She couldn’t help it. There was nothing but. To retrace these exact steps alone with identical urgency, there absolutely could be nothing but. It was just as she’d feared.
It should’ve been her.
It couldn’t be him.
His face flickered in her head, so briefly and yet so strongly. Octavia found precisely one scream at last. It held his name, and it echoed all the way up what little was left of her desperate climb.
The breeze she found atop the stairwell was useless against her superheated skin. Even now, even with her feet firmly upon the limestone that crowned the highest point of the church, the bell that was nowhere to be seen still tormented her within. She’d never scaled the tower at night before, the moon cresting high overhead a gorgeous sight above the Blessed City. It was a far cry from the splotchy pinks and oranges of sunrise that had watched over the acolytes’ final moments with calm.
Octavia wondered if he cared, if it was perhaps too different from the world the flame’s broken eyes had seen as she'd succumbed to a fate she didn’t deserve. There was a difference, then, in the way he chose to face the earth below rather than shy away from its view. Selena had fallen face-up, her last agonizing moments of life full of pure sky overhead.
With his arms spread in just the slightest, Josiah, instead, had long since settled on the alternative. The railing held the weight of his careful balance well, perched so precariously atop the metal that it seemed one strong gust of the evening breeze would spell his end. Octavia knew he wouldn’t care, save for the dissatisfaction of choosing his own terms. She could imagine the way he would roll his eyes all the way down. She couldn’t imagine the sight of him once his body touched the ground again. The image burned the inside of her head. It was enough.
Stradivaria crashed to the limestone, hastily discarded as she broke into the most desperate sprint she’d ever made in her life. Octavia had gotten lucky before, in times of peril. Others had intervened. Circumstances had shifted. Up here, atop the very place that had twisted and broken her long after her struggle had ended, she would get no such reprieve. Even now, the bell tower of the Velrose Church fought to steal from her yet again.
Her boots pounding against the stone were still softer than the beating of her own heart. If he knew she was there, never once did he acknowledge her. Octavia watched as the boy tilted his head upwards, drinking in the sky for a moment.
One foot left the railing. Josiah didn't fall with a cry, nor with words upon his lips at all. He departed the tower peacefully, silently, leaving the very world in his wake as Octavia saw his eyes close.
She, too, jumped.
The top of her boots hooked the bottom rung of the railing from beneath as she struggled with his weight, both hands trembling with a combination of effort and sheer terror. Her breath was uncontrollable, and Octavia was outright gasping for air as her tears splashed against his sleeve. It took everything she had to keep still, battling to stay grounded to the opposite side of the barrier from the boy dangling in her frantic grip. In the process of clambering for his wrist, he’d swung inwards, his forearm surely pained by the sudden impact of rough granite against his bones.
Josiah didn’t struggle. For a moment, he didn’t speak, either. All that filled the void was the sound of Octavia’s own labored breaths, the unassuming autumn breeze grazing them peacefully, and the stifled sobs that she fought to restrain. There were no bells. Even now, even like this, his face was enough to scare them away.
Octavia watched as his head drifted downwards, calm eyes taking in the city so, so far below. When they raised ever higher, they met her own, half-lidded and hollow as they were.
“You can let go now,” Josiah murmured. “It’s okay.”
She shook her head desperately, readjusting her grip out of sheer panic. He was nowhere close to slipping. Still, the paranoia was absolute torture. Josiah watched her pain quietly.
“It really is okay. Don’t worry. Close your eyes and look the other way.”
Again, Octavia shook her head. Her best attempts at suppressing her sobs were in vain. He sighed, still relatively motionless as he hung perilously over the rim of the tower.
“I didn’t want you to see this,” Josiah admitted.
“You’re not supposed to be doing this!” she cried, her voice cracking.
“Maybe I shouldn’t have said anything. I should’ve known better. I’m sorry for making you worry about me. Go back to bed. It’ll be over quick.”
“I’m not going anywhere!” Octavia wailed. “I won’t let you!”
Josiah’s soft voice was viciously unsettling, as though he was already dead. “I’m not supposed to be here.”
“Of course you’re supposed to be here!”
He shook his head. “I survived that day by a complete stroke of luck and an absolute coincidence. This isn't what was meant for me. I wasn’t meant to get this far.”
“But that means something!” Octavia sobbed, her tears practically splattering against his face below. “There’s a reason you’re still here! There’s a reason you’re with us!”
“It’s like I said. I’m not ungrateful. I really did cherish everything we did together, all of us. I don’t regret that, Octavia. I don’t regret any of it one bit. I’ll miss you guys, all of you.”
“So why, then? Stay!” she shouted.
“She needs me.”
Octavia could barely breathe, readjusting her grip once more. She was steady, her anchoring firm. He wasn’t light, and yet he wasn’t heavy, either. She couldn’t hold him forever, and yet she’d die before she let him go. She so desired to have him atop the tower with her, to see his feet touch something solid and his body escape the gaping grasp of open air. In Josiah's gaze, she still found no fear. Never had Octavia wanted him to be afraid so badly.
“She’s alone. She’s been alone for too long. I can’t leave her alone again. I won’t let her down anymore.”
“She wouldn’t want this!”
“She would.”
“How can you say that?”
Again, Josiah closed his eyes. “I know her. No offense, but I know her better than anyone ever will.”
Octavia gritted her teeth through her tears. “I’ve lived through her eyes! I’ve been her! She only ever wanted for you to be happy!”
“She wanted us to be happy together. This is how we end up together again.”
“Why does it have to be now? You’ll see her again someday, when you’re meant to! I’m sure of it!”
“I’m meant to right now.”
“Josiah, please!” she wept.
“I can’t…wait anymore. I’ve made her wait for so long. I’ve been hurting Selena for so, so long, and all this time, I had no idea. I can’t go on knowing that. I can’t do that to her.”
“You’re her most important person! She doesn’t feel that way, I know it!”
“I shouldn’t get to live my life when she can’t do the same.”
“Your life is precious!”
Octavia screamed her words with such ferocity that she’d shaken the city below. Josiah’s dead eyes widened somewhat, taken aback by her volume. Her voice shook fiercely with every word.
“Maybe I shouldn’t be alive if she’s not, but I am! Maybe I shouldn’t be alive if I couldn’t help Sonata, but I am! Maybe I shouldn’t be alive if Priscilla isn’t here with me, but damn it, I am! Maybe I don’t want to be! There’s people I want to be with again, too, but there’s people I love here just as much! If I’m still standing here after everything, if I’m still alive after every single time I could’ve lost my life, shouldn’t that mean something?”
Josiah was quiet. Octavia’s voice battled her own sobs.
“You’re going to see her again, someday. I’m going to see the people I love again, someday, too. Until then, there are people who love you right now, both of us, that we can spend just as much time giving our hearts to. You have people who love you more than you could ever know. Make lots of memories and take them with you to her when the time really does come. You deserve to be happy just as much as she does.”
“This is what would make--”
“This would kill me,” Octavia whispered. “This would kill us all.”
“You’re gonna guilt-trip me?” he said coolly.
“I’m going to do whatever I have to to show you that your life means the world to me.”
“Please don’t make this difficult. Don’t make yourself more upset,” he pleaded.
“If this is really and truly what would make you happy, then I’m not letting you go alone.”
Josiah’s eyes widened in full, his body jolting beneath her grip. “What?”
The glare she fixed him with was as sorrowful as it was resolute. He flinched.
“Don’t say things like that.”
“I mean it,” Octavia growled through her tears.
“You have a lot more to live for than I do. You just said it yourself. You don’t really want to die,” he reasoned.
“I don’t, but I will if it’s for you.”
Josiah narrowed his eyes, his voice sharp. “Don’t you have regrets? Aren’t you afraid to die?”
“I’m terrified,” she admitted, sobbing.
Little by little, his voice was rising. “You’re the Ambassador. If you die, they all have to start over. Everything falls apart. You leave behind all the people who were counting on you, and you throw that away over someone who threw away the one thing that could help you out. You wouldn’t do that. I know you. You’re not that stupid.”
Octavia dared him with her eyes wordlessly, tears or not. “It doesn’t matter. You matter.”
“Don’t just…throw around sentiments like that!” Josiah snapped at last.
“I’m serious!” she shouted back.
“Knock it off!”
“I won’t let you be alone!”
Josiah paused. He inhaled sharply, twisting the wrist she clung to so pleadingly in just the slightest. He didn’t yank or flail, only adjusting himself enough that the act of grasping him grew ever more difficult. When Octavia continued to hold fast, he twisted further, and yet further still. He balled his fingers into a fist, tugging downwards slowly in a subtle attempt to break her grip. It nearly worked, even with two hands firmly upon him. All the while, his narrow eyes, tinted with pain, stung her with a piercing gaze she’d grown to hate.
Octavia compensated for his resistance in the form of surrender. She relaxed the hold one of her boots had around the railing, her body rapidly jerking forward with such force that her stomach lurched. Her life wasn’t quite flashing before her eyes. Still, she was absolutely nearing the threshold as her entire torso dangled precariously over the rim of the rail. She knew exactly what would happen if she moved her other foot.
Her eyes swam with fresh tears to the point that her vision was clouded. Even so, she stared him down just as hard. To have died so many times over as the Ambassador wasn’t enough to numb her fear of succumbing to the same fate as the acolytes who haunted her. It was at least a comfort, in a sick way, knowing she wouldn’t go alone. Her heart threatened to burst.
Josiah’s eyes softened, widened, flooded with hurt and shimmered with sorrow. He stilled in her grip, unmoving as she struggled to maintain her own balance with him in tow. His fist uncurled, his fingers trembling in its place.
“You’re serious,” he murmured shakily.
Octavia opened her mouth to answer, be it with sharp chiding or reassurance. All she choked out was a sob. Josiah could only stare.
With a slight lurch of his body in the open air, he managed to swing his way close enough for his extended fingertips to just barely grasp the top of the railing. He didn’t resist Octavia’s grip, trembling with mild effort as he pulled. Octavia, too, grunted laboriously as she did the same, fighting to regain her balance and a solid foundation with which to support him. It took everything she had, every muscle in her body screaming and aching from holding him in place for so long. He contributed the most as he climbed back up the railing, turning his back on the welcoming void of the city below.
Even when he threw his legs up and over the metal, even when his feet touched the limestone with an unimaginable calmness and quietness, Octavia couldn’t fight the way her heart still threatened to burst. She couldn’t bring herself to let go of his wrist, lest she blink and find him on the ground so far below.
He wrapped his arms around her. It took effort to steal one of those arms from her relentless grasp, but he managed to do it anyway. Josiah was motionless, wordless even now. With his face well over her shoulder, his hair softly brushing against her cheeks, Octavia couldn’t capture his eyes. Her own eyes were once more threatened by an ocean she couldn’t fight, relieved and overcome with grief for what she’d yet to lose all at once. He beat her to it.
Josiah’s breath rattled on each deep exhale, his embrace stiff and tense. It was tight, somewhat uncomfortable as he held onto her for dear life. What started as unsteady breathing turned into soft distress, cries Octavia could hardly make out. His fingernails dug into the fabric of her dress, curling inwards against her shoulders as they trembled fiercely.
He buried his face close to the crook of her neck, so near that Octavia could feel his sorrow against her. When he began to sob, it was the worst sound she’d ever heard leave his throat. It was the loudest sound she’d ever heard leave his throat.
“I miss her,” Josiah wept. “I miss her so much.”
There was little Octavia could do but return his embrace, her own shaky grasp of feeble reassurance useless as she fell into step with his suffering. Once more, she couldn’t support his body weight as he slumped against her, his own knees giving out under the pressure of his agony. This time, she really did follow him down. Upon the limestone, she let him sob his heart out in her arms. She refused to let him go.
“I can’t take it anymore, I miss her, I miss her,” Josiah cried again and again. “I can’t do this. She was everything for me.”
“I know,” Octavia cried in turn, his tears much her own.
“She was the most important person in the world to me.”
“I know.”
“She didn’t deserve it. She didn’t deserve any of it. She suffered, right up until the end, and I couldn’t be there for her.”
“I know, I know,” Octavia sobbed.
“I had no idea that she…I didn’t know. I’m so sorry. I’m so, so sorry. I can’t…I don’t know what to do.”
“She never told you,” Octavia mumbled through her pain, holding him tighter. “It wasn’t your fault.”
“I should’ve known better!” Josiah shouted, his voice cracking. “I knew her! I knew her better than anyone!”
There was nothing to say. Octavia buried her face in his shoulder as well, staining his flannel shirt with the echoes of her sorrow.
“I didn’t see it that way,” he wept softly. “Maybe I should have. Maybe I…should’ve tried to. What would that have been like? Would it have made her happy?”
“She was happy just to be with you.”
“I could’ve made her even happier,” he whispered. “And that hurts so, so badly to know.”
“You did…everything you could,” Octavia offered, nearly choking on her words. “We both did everything we could.”
“It wasn’t enough.”
“I know.”
“She was my best friend.”
“She still is.”
“We spent our whole lives together. I don’t know who I am without her.”
“You’re Josiah,” Octavia murmured. “You’re precious to me. You’re precious to all of us. We love you so much, no matter why you’re here or what hurts you.”
“That’s not enough,” Josiah sobbed.
“It’s everything.”
“You don’t need to lie to me to make me feel better.”
She pulled him closer, as close as he could come into her arms. “I’m not lying,” she breathed.
Octavia could feel the way his entire body was shaking against her own, his sobs outright uncontrollable as Josiah shattered to pieces in front of her. She closed her eyes, rested her head against him, and let him do what he needed to do most. The tower that once gave a home to a bell instead gave refuge to the sound of sorrow, tethered to the grasp of the very same city. It was a place that had torn not only her own heart to shreds, but the boy who’d outrun a fate worse than death.
So high up, so distant from the sleeping streets below and those unaware of his want for eternal silence, it was a quiet Hell to be shared by those who mourned the same loss. Every tear Octavia shed burned as it rolled down her cheeks, settling into Josiah's flannel sleeves in wet patches.
For all the things she’d lost to Velrose, for all the bell tower had cursed her with, her reclamation of its twin meant nothing. Her dual blessings of guidance had meant nothing. There was no victory to be found in such hurdles to be conquered. For once, in the face of the very place she’d stood and lost her mind, she’d finally managed to protect a piece of her heart. Octavia wept bitterly, holding fast to that piece as Josiah entrusted her with his pain. His life was the greatest blessing the blossom or the flame could ever bestow upon her.