It turns out that slipping into a mildly lit room in the middle of a storm, soaked in water after an attack on the city, shone the limelight on my actions. And like in any theatre, the limelight emphasized things you wouldn't think they would.

Like how perhaps I was not a monster or an undead, or some ghoul that wanted to maul the living. That led to quite a freight indeed, at least for the poor [Maid].

I had barely slipped into the room before people started shouting in a cacophonous assortment of three voices. I dropped on the lustrously oiled floor and stepped over to a faded rug so my dripping didn’t ruin the finish, but even that set everyone more off.

I suppose invading someone's room was uncouth in noble society, considering how frightened they were, but I didn't care much at the moment.

The [Maid], who had never seen me before and was in the middle of tending to Anna's arm, was very much not ready for me to fling myself into the room, soaking wet, dirty, coated with blood, which ran like it was fresh, with my eyes glowing like I was a monster out of her childhood nightmares.

She, to put it kindly, freaked the fuck out, letting out a cry and moving back from Anna, her hands pulling into her chest like she was going to clutch a holy symbol and recite a hymn.

That stung a bit and brought a toothy wince from me as my ears moved, which apparently made it worse.

Anna and her Mother also shouted, though Anna regained composure, her shout short in the way that would be followed by a ‘you startled me.’ Her Mother sounded more like she was trying to alert others, her voice less shrill and more shouting, an effeminate, maidenly bellow.

Note to self: when invading a noble woman’s room at night, avoid flashing one's teeth at the [Maids] when you look like the living dead.

Second note to self: Learn to dodge because she wasn’t going for a holy symbol; she was going for a dagger, and getting hit by the handle and groaning did not help either.

Letting out a hiss of pain, I snapped out an “Ow, watch where you're throwing stuff.”

“Dear Gods, it talks,” she cried.

“She does seem to have a habit of that, and interrupting,” Anna’s Mother said before muttering more to herself, “It’s always the window it fails on,” and letting out a tisk of disapproval.

Anna, who’s fist was clutching at her own heart with her un-bandaged arm, proclaimed, “By the trees,” followed by a, “Nearly stopped my heart,” followed by a, “You’re going to be the death of me,” with little sips of breath between each.

“Everyone needs some spice in their life, I suppose,” Anna’s Mother, who I did not know the name of but probably should, said calmly. “Though your spice could use some work. Home invasion, rudeness, and wet dog smell are somewhat bitter flavors.”

Flavour? Spice? Rudeness? What on earth is she talking about?

Not wanting to fumble myself like a limp noodle and also not wanting to look like the spineless buffoon I was, I decided to take a jab back. It wasn’t a great idea to piss off Annas' Mother, not if I intended to stay around Anna, but I was confused, stressed from the night, and I was worried about and guilty for what had happened to Anna. I was short of the ability to care about her wordplay or chiding. She was not my mom.

“While I do have a history of entering homes through windows and smell like a wet fox, those come with bonuses. I’m a bit short on some niceties, but I always have the decency to be straightforward and introduce myself for one. Hello, my name is Saphine. I also saved each of your children’s lives once tonight, that’s a good second. For a third, I make sure the people around me are ok,” I told her, gesturing to Anna.

Anna flushed, but I ignored that. Her mother and I were fighting at the moment, and as she would point out, it would be rude to ignore her. Rude, and stupid.

“Oh? You’re her apprentice? I knew you were a stray, but I didn’t expect how accurate that would be. My name is Arabelle Bethania Von Mynes. Though since you seem to have an issue pronouncing big words and enjoy spending time with My daughter so greatly, you feel entitled to her personal quarters, disregarding her state of Dress,” she said, emphasizing My and Dress with a gesture to Anna, and a raising of a thin bedsheet to cover her fully if lightly clothed body. “You may call me [Lady] Arabelle.”

Anna, her face taking on a deeper flush, mumbled, “Mother,” but so quietly it was hard to hear.

I looked at her momentarily, my mind whirling through her words.

Did she know? Did she know about me and Anna? What did she mean about closeness? Was the comment about her state of dress about her wearing a dress, about being clothed, a jab at me for breaking in, or a comment about our ‘closeness.’ It was hard to tell. The woman, the [Lady], was saying more than she was saying, layering her words. Undoubtedly, she had far more charisma than I thought I could handle at the moment. I could feel it.

I had started an argument with her and entered it like every other fight I had gotten into: Half baked, zero information on what I was fighting, unarmed or armoured and short of enough skill or skills to make an impact.

Think Saphine, think. Is she letting me know she knows, or is this something else? Is she trying to get me to slip up and tell her something?

I could see why the siblings called her Mother, and not mom. She was intense as if she were sitting on a throne instead of next to Anna’s bed in a chair. I could imagine it leaving an impression on most people, but I was not like most people. Instead of feeling less than, I just felt pissed off. It didn’t help that Ann- Arabelle reminded me of Anna the longer I stood near her. Discounting her green eyes and brown hair, she had some of Anna in the rest of her. They shared shapes, eyes, and cheeks, and some more than that: the shape of her head, the hair, and the way they held themselves.

She also talked like Anna, or I suppose Anna talked like her, at least when she was annoyed. She was paying close attention, and I could tell that because her eyes were slightly narrow. I could see her, literally see, with my own two eyes as she thought because she thought like Anna, too. But unlike Anna, whose soft features made it feel like she was paying attention to you, like you were the only one in the room, her eyes had none of the softness. Instead, in the place of that soft mouse lay a cat who watched you, scrutinizing and dissecting you like you were the mouse. She must have married in, it wouldn’t surprise me. She looked like she was the type that would catch a man, not the other way around. Taking time to think and feeling the rain spitting through the window, I made to shut the shutters, leaning over to the window. I caught sight of Clause face down in the courtyard. I checked quickly, but Selly was gone from her nap location, even though it was hard to see, the beding was empty.

Perhaps she was picking a fight with the Mynes family’s [guards], given it was cooling down quite quickly. I bet she would be all energized. Thank gods for Clause. He could deal with her. And he could be a scape goat to stay out of saying whatever she was trying to get me to say.

Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

“Speaking of taking care of people, your eldest is passed out, face down in the courtyard right now. Must have been the healing potion. I suppose regenerating blood, fixing his organs and setting a ribcage can take a lot out of a guy,” I said to no one in particular.

It was a bit crass and absolutely a low blow, but she pissed me off.

Anna muttered, “Saphine.”

Her mind whirred behind her eyes. Her face gave away nothing, totally blissful as if I had told her a quaint little story.

“Oh? I thought you somehow saved him just earlier. Was it your potion?” she asked, waving at the fearful [Maid], who quickly walked to the door like she was escaping.

“No, but he would have been a dead man if I didn’t step in and drag him back. Did you know he got it in his head to go fight and managed to be hit so hard it shattered his breastplate? Kind of crazy.” I asked her.

“Oh? I suppose you think I should thank you for aiding your fellow man? How noble of you.” She said, a tone of mocking in her voice.

“Well, I can’t take all the credit, Anna suggested I follow after him. It’s her who deserves that praise. She’s the hero of the day. Though I suppose saving your fellow man must be rather literal, with Anna being so low in priority despite saving thousands. The man gets a healing potion, and she gets a salve for her arm,” I told her acidly.

She glared then; it was a minor thing, but there was nothing else it could be.

She opened her mouth, presumably to give me the verbal equivalent of a blow to my head, but the other stationary member of the room spoke up.

Anna, face red, shouted, “Will the both of you shut up?”

We, and I do me we, both turned to her as if we had been slapped and the [Maid], moving faster than humanly possible, excused herself. I hadn’t noticed Anna’s red face because I had figured she was embarrassed.

I had been wrong. Anna was not embarrassed about me doing my best to argue myself into a hole with her mother or being argued over; she was angry at it.

Genuinely angry, and not from being annoyed at the situation either. I had seen her in pain and discomort before, and she had been a bit more snappy, up from non-existent and patient beyond belief to pre mourning Selly. This was not a pained Anna, nor an uncomfortable or inconvenienced Anna, or even all of those combined. This was just flat-out angry Anna. And she was angry, at us. At me and her mother.

Her genuine anger stunned me. It genuinely stunned me. I had stepped somewhere I hadn't stepped before, and just realized I shouldn't have because the ice had cracked underfoot.

Anna had raised her voice, and so, I stopped, as did her mother.

She started with her, which made everything worse because I knew my turn was coming.

“Mother, you have no right to punch down and pick fights with her. She is my apprentice. MINE! And so help me if you say one more demeaning thing about her the next time one of you is in trouble, I will not help. I would sooner put this whole fucking valley out of its collective misery, which considering everything is this family's fault, would be a fucking favor,” she told her.

Then she turned to me, and I felt a pit open in my stomach as I fell into the frozen lake.

“Now, as for you… Where do I even begin? Don’t use me against my family? Don’t use me as an excuse to see me? We’re in someone else's home, and you decided to break into a room because I existed there? Are you out of your fucking mind? What happened to the you that asked for a boon of hospitality? Because I know she didn’t disappear! So where is she right now?” she asked.

“I- I-” I tried to start, only for her to cut me off.

“Don’t! Just don’t. That’s that out of the way, so next up, you’ve picked a fight against my mother and broken into my room, both are colossally stupid, but you did it to check on me. You immediately assumed that it was her, but did it even cross your mind for a moment… For one second. That she was acting on my wishes? That I may have asked her to keep you out?” She asked, bewildered.

I blinked.

“It…” It hadn’t. It hadn’t occurred to me, but she hadn’t told me if she had asked it. I felt, for a terrible moment, that if I asked it, it would lead me down a far, far worse road. I didn’t want to push that way.

“Did you? Did you ask her to…” I said, despite my terrible feelings on the question.

“I did. And you pushed on through anyway. And before you say anything, remember that we are not in private.” She told me, turning to glare, eyes so bright with fury that I half expected her to fire beams from them.

“Don’t look at me like that, Annabeth. I’m your mo-” Arabelle tried only for Anna to practically hiss at her.

“Don’t give me that. You have things you wouldn’t tell anyone, as does everyone. This is not private, not with you. I haven’t forgotten what you did, and I haven't forgotten what you're like. I have not forgiven you,” she spat, every word a picked scab, a weeping wound.

There were no tears, not from Anna, though I was losing it on my front. If a person's mind was a room where you watched the world from a window, I had a hyperactive fox freaking out, tearing up furniture and pissing in the corner. It did so because Anna was showing dominance and displeasure, and it was built to hunt prey and die of smallpox, not to take an emotionally charged complex social conversation. It knew that its mate was hurt, and the mate was angry at it and wanted nothing to do with it, and it couldn’t understand why. To it, breaking into a den to save your injured mate was the kind of thing that lets you keep the mate, not something that got the mate angry at you. The social stuff beyond the four f’s was all me, and I was failing at it just as much as it was, just with less animal screaming.

Splitting my focus to try and get it to shut up while paying attention to Anna was hard enough. Adding in talking was harder still. Harder still was Anna turning back towards me with a look that spoke of betrayal.

“I understand that you think your helping me. I do. But if you think I’m so incapable, that I can’t even take care of myself, I would prefer you just tell me honestly,” she said. "Don't look down on me like this."

I stopped, staring at her, blinking in confusion.

What the fuck is she talking about?

“Anna, I can promi-” I tried to tell her.

“Don’t! Don’t promise me things. Less than an hour ago you got yourself killed. We both know what a promise is worth right now,” she said.

That.

That made my face flush in embarrassment, confusion, and not a small amount of lividity.

Despite understanding where she came from, this one-sided conversating was starting to fray my nerves, and her stating things during it really pissed me off. Deep, deep down, it made me a little angry. Anna had proclaimed me an oath breaker without me even being able to push back. I had promised not to get myself hurt and to scare Anna, but as far as I cared, Anna needed to be alive for that to mean a single goddamned thing, and oaths had just as much to do with intent as they did the word of them.

I wanted to open my big fat mouth and say something. I really, really did. But I also recognized that a part of me wanted to spit something self-destructive, something to gain immediate vindication. That part of me wanted nothing more than to say something stupid, something that was just vitriol, something that would hurt her and myself.

It was a meaningless thing.

I licked my mental fingers and snuffed it.

I bit my tongue. I spoke, but not out of pointless anger, and took a little responsibility.

This could be very bad, I could keep pushing, and yelling, and she could yell back, or it could only feel bad, and be short enough to not be a disaster, and I would rather it hurt like hell, but be clean instead of making it worse. Both of us could do it, but Anna hadn't, so I would.

“You know, Anna, some of what you’ve said is true. I can’t say that breaking into your room was the best move, but I can’t say I wouldn’t do it again. So, right back at you. If you want me to not make sure you’re ok, tell me. Because I’m not going to leave you be if you don’t tell me to, not when the opposite could be disastrous. As for not geting myslef killed? Well, if letting you get yourself killed is the price, I would break that promise in a moment. If you want me to do that, you can go pound sand, Annabeth Mynes.”

I turned towards the door and walking away.

“Saphine-” Anna started, only for me to make a gesture.

“No. You wanted space, I’ll respect your wishes. Neither of us are thinking straight, so I'll the bigger person. You can have your space. I’ll fuck off and pretend your alright, and you can pretend that whatever you think I’m thinking is what I’m thinking. Good night, Annabeth,” and I left without saying another word.

I left, heading to my room before asking the guard outside my door to please leave.

It took four seconds after I got into the room for the all-encompassing need to scream to overcome me. I screamed and shouted and let it all out before hurling myself onto the bed and closing my eyes.

I didn’t feel the need to sleep, but I let myself fall into unconsciousness anyway because I couldn’t take any more of today.

Then I woke up, my back to the black pool and sighed, gritting my teeth as I held back a scream because I couldn’t escape it, not even in my dreams.