Margaux stepped down the hall at a brisk clip. The heels of her boots clicking down onto the marble floor and echoing throughout the halls as she made her way back towards the Huntress’ rally point. A new night had fallen, and Sol was still not back. Margaux tried to find her mother but Niamh was even more elusive than she normally was, though she couldn’t blame her. Her own heart twisted at Sol’s absence, whatever pain she felt currently could only be magnified by the woman that raised her. Margaux dusted off her duster and grabbed her mask. Affixing it to her face she took a deep breath, fussing with the seals while she got the straps settled over her hair. The filtered air always tasted different, but the herbs at least would keep it from being truly insufferable.
Mask in place she gently picked up her belt and clipped it around her waist. Even hearing the clink of the treated glass made her think of Sol, how much she envied Margaux’s gains. Maybe Sol will be her praises when she returns her to the Church. The liquid inside had a faint glow about them, gently as if they’d trapped the dawnlight within the bottles it swirled about. She gave a twist of her hips to make sure it was secure and once she was satisfied she turned to go. Her crossbow likely wouldn’t do much, but tonight wasn’t about the lycans. She would be bringing Sol home, one way or another.
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Huntresses meeting each other on the streets wasn’t unheard of or uncommon, but when one sees a sister squatting down on the cobbles staring intently at something one just can’t help but be overwhelmed by curiosity. Whatever she is looking at clearly has some importance or she wouldn’t risk giving so much of her attention to some bauble some woman threw out. Margaux turned the broken lantern over again and again. It was Sol’s for certain, and the fact that the flame still burned was a good sign. Her concentration was broken when she looked up at the sound of something approaching. Only to relax when she realized it was only another Huntress.
“Night greet you sister.” Margaux intoned as she turned back to the lantern. “Is the hunt good tonight?”
“You tell me.”
Margaux looked back up at her, noting the spear that the masked woman carried. “So far, this is all I’ve found of one of our sisters.” She held it up with a bolt, careful not to actually touch it. “She’s still alive.”
The Huntress stood quiet for a little while. She shifted only slightly before giving a nod.
“I don’t think she’s been afflicted,” Margaux continued. “The flame still carries only her signature. No curse, no hexes, nothing I can detect.” The spear shifted in the huntress’ grip, but Margaux didn’t seem to mind the woman. “I might be able to use it to find her. So long as the flame burns Huntress Hayward still draws breath, and I intend to bring her home.”
“And if you are wrong?”
“About?”
“The affliction.”
Margaux looked down at the lantern again, she could be wrong of course. Overlooking something because she desperately wants it to be true, that Sol’s just holed up somewhere licking her wounds or deep into some other trouble. The idea of Margaux being Sol’s knight in shining armor had appeal.
“Then I will do what needs to be done, I won’t have the affliction tainting our Sisterhood.”
The Huntress nodded and started off. The night was young and both had many lives to claim under the moon. Margaux watched her go for a moment, but collected Sol’s lantern. She knew that while Sol was alive for now, that didn’t mean that she actually had time. It was something that the Sisters tried to drill into their heads often, how normal women often only had a couple of days before they could be considered lost. Sol was, no, is a huntress. Like herself there required a certain confidence that they were going to be okay a few days outside the Church’s eyes.
It however, didn’t miss Margaux’s notice that there were almost never rescue efforts for her peers. If one went missing, instead of rallying their sisters in arms, everyone quietly started gathering things. Small things, at first. Margaux remembered the first time she was a part of a Huntresses Wake. She didn’t know the woman of course, there were easily thousands just like her, but she was close to her Mother. Despite being in different centuria her mother glided through everything, offering a single gift. A silver dagger. How many lycans could that dagger kill if they had gone to find her instead of gathering for this? How many could they have saved even in the act of looking for her, instead of this? Questions that lead to punishment, but it stops here. It stops with Sol. They won’t be able to brush it off, Sol surely would see the value of this and help her look for others that surely have gone missing.
The flame flickered again and Margaux furrowed her brow, her brooding interrupted by it. She held it up to better be able to inspect it, narrowing her eyes. It was flickering distinctly east. She held the lantern up, moving for the flame’s dance till it was pointing directly ahead of her. At first she thought that she’d gotten lucky and Sol was just inside the townhome, but as she walked away from it just to make sure the flame didn’t move. It continued to point east. With a heavy sigh Margaux continued her walk. She saw the canals and the flame still hadn’t moved. Standing at the very edges of the wards protecting the district from the lycans that prowled through the rest of the city Margaux stared out into the glittering darkness. Sunstone street lamps bathing everything in light and shadow.
“Why are you there?” She mumbled softly, putting the lantern on her hip Margaux crossed her arms. That was Glitterstone. Sometimes the Church would send expeditions out but she’d never been assigned to one. Eden was large enough without the worry of spreading themselves too thin, and there was a reason why they’d abandoned the other districts. Which begged the question: Why was Sol there? If she turned back now then Sol would almost certainly be lost, and all Margaux would have accomplished was finding her lantern and allowing their superiors to have a perfectly accurate time of death on their paperwork. With a heavy sigh Margaux started walking across the bridge. They would know. That much she was certain of. They would know that she left the district and now she either had to return with Sol in tow or not at all. “Don’t make me regret this” She whispered softly, praying that the wind carried her words away.
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Sol leaned heavily against the wall, holding onto the railing with a white knuckled grip.
“I can do it myself.” She said through gritted teeth, shuffling only inches forward before needing to stop. Gripping the railing so tight that her knuckles began to pop.
“Miss Haywood,” Came a voice that was both gentle and resigned. “You shouldn’t push yourself. You’re only going to make the recovery process take longer.”
“They already think me dead,” Sol spat. “The sooner I get back the sooner I can correct that error.”
Hands gently rested on Sol’s shoulder and she looked at the woman sharply. Venom built up just behind her teeth, longing to bite, to rip, to wrench that horrid blasphemous touch away from her. The longer she stayed here, would they even allow her back? There’s only so much that incense and purifying baths can do. No, she shouldn’t fool herself in what was going to be waiting for her when Sol did manage to return. She’d seen how distant her mother was to her and all the other huntresses that hadn’t gone on an expedition, how they were suddenly on the other side of how all huntresses treated the Daughters of Eden. She remembered longing for even the barest hints of affection from Niamh. The only upside to that, was that it led her to the arms of Margaux. Who likewise found herself in that same limbo of wanting when they were both but girls.
But it was different here. The waiting gentle hands of the women here were wrong. Some were the small, delicate hands that she grew up with. Others were primal, animalistic. Even when doing the most delicate of tasks Sol watched their hands, their mouths for the protruding teeth, for the coarse fur to abruptly grow into a proper pelt. Every moment she was here she was in danger, Sol knew it in her bones. The nurse was right to try to slow her, to try to get some amount of care in for her healing, but she couldn’t wait here.
She needed to leave. She needed to escape. She needed to be purified. She needed to be blessed by the same fires that she had used to argue Averie’s innocence. Only then could she rest, could she even begin to heal. Sol’s strength gave out and the nurse caught her, speaking gentle nothings as she guided her back to the chair and brought her back to her room. She couldn’t argue, it was enough for the day. Even with as hard as she was pushing she couldn’t lift her sword right now let alone swing it.
“Alright, now rest. Dinner will be in a few hours. Would you like the curtains open before I go?”
She thought about it for a moment or two, and nodded. “Please.” Sol said weakly.
The nurse nodded and Sol was bathed in the brilliant, radiant light of the evening sun. This part, at least, wasn’t so bad. She would miss it. Returning to the depths of night and her mind only soothed by the gardens. As the nurse was turning to leave she paused, pulling out a golden frame from her pocket and began to gesture at it. A few seconds later she turned back to look at Sol.
“Byres was just letting me know that he’s on his way up with some books and puzzles. I swear, that man can make a pilgrimage out of a simple trip to the library.” She said as she shook her head in disappointment.
“It is hard to pick out books for someone you do not know,” Sol said in her, no his, defense.
“Especially when the only things you’ve read are hymns and psalms.” She chuckled, offering a wave to Sol as she left.
“The hymns are good.” Sol muttered a touch defensively.
Though now as she sat in silence in her room, she wished that she did take the time to learn a instrument. If it were small enough it might not even be that much effort for them to make or find one for her to borrow. Though even if she had, at the moment she didn’t have the energy to play. Sleep tugged at the edges of her mind, and without any hesitation Sol followed that siren song to that familiar abyss.
She expected to open her eyes to blackness, that everlasting Nothing that had grown so familiar to her. Seeing instead a golden shining face inches away from her own Sol screamed and flailed to get away from it. It also screamed and scrambled away from her. Neither had anywhere to hide from the other, but Sol still turned away from it. Curling into a ball to avoid looking at it.
Silence drug on. Neither willing to disturb the otherwise perfect darkness any more than their sheer presence already was.
“I’m sorry I scared you.” It said, “I was just curious.”
“About what.” Sol pulled her legs tighter, willing her body to sleep faster so that she didn’t have to be around this thing.
“You.” It said.
She could feel it getting closer. It wasn’t even just the way that the radiance flowed over her like a wave, or how their gentle oblivion had disturbance in its current. Sol could feel the need to bear her teeth, to use her nails like claws. She needed the purifying flames, if she had thought, if she had listened she wouldn’t have been in this mess.
“I just wanted to see.” It said, its voice small and fragile. It couldn’t escape Sol’s notice that it reminded her of Dr. Ashur’s voice.
“Begone,” Sol growled. “I do not wish for your company.”
She felt its hand on her shoulder and she whipped around her fist already flying towards its face. Sol heard the crack as its head whipped back and they pushed away from each other in the void. Its cry more one of shock than actual pain.
“But, where should I go?” It asked, fear coating its voice. She resented the way it sounded golden like her namesake.
“I don’t care. Because if you don’t leave, I will do everything in my power to ensure that you will be purged.”
Sol didn’t face the entity that held that mockery of her face. She couldn’t stand to look at it, the way her heart twisted and pain bloomed throughout her chest. There was nothing here to break the light in the restful oblivion, and in time all was cold darkness once again.