Acton was surprised by how talkative, how forthcoming she was being with him – she hadn’t struck him as the type, and certainly not to him, who by all accounts should be her enemy. But he shouldn’t have been: in a way, he was a perfect confessional. He had no room to judge (nor was he the type), and he was inarguably inebriated.
You are no more home than I.
Well, there was nothing he was going to say to that; he only smiled tightly at her, close-lipped. It wasn’t until she continued that his expression faded into neutrality – but it turned curious at her talk of the attack. Acton hadn’t heard much of it, but the mention of Maxence made his heart flutter with a familiar thrill. He knew it was an awful impulse he should feel guilty for, but the buckskin couldn’t help but be a little sorry the pegasus had been eaten by the very type of beast he’d bragged of slaying. He had been an excellent foil, a terrific enemy to have.
Everything had been far less complicated, then.
But it is her talk of revenge that had him grinning, however briefly. Fire and blood – what was it she had said, so long ago? The desert breeds quick tempers. “I wouldn’t know anything about that impulse,” he said, and tipped her a wink, too drunk to think better of it.
The night was gathering around them as they continued to walk, the firelight making everyone’s features long and dramatic. Acton kept an ear keyed on her as they walked, but his gaze roved the crowd. Everything was achingly familiar but just a step wrong; he knew none of the faces, none of the laughs. He didn’t know which way the path would twist ahead.
It felt a little like being an orphan again, alone and fearful in a way he’d always hated admitting, even to himself.
So there was some measure of schadenfreude to hear her talk of her own problems. Still, her talk of putting her faith in the wrong people made his gaze narrow and his mouth twist as he thought of Denocte and the new regime. “You’re not the first to misplace your trust.”
And Raum…
Acton noticeably faltered, but smoothed his gait without a word. It was not a matter of confessing his and his friends’ sins; he would own up to those just as boldly as he would have at home. It was the reason said sins had been committed – motivations that seemed so pointless now. His loyalty was a broken compass, and the spinning was enough to make him dizzy.
He did not want to talk about Raum, or about Bexley. They were subjects too close to him to want corrupt his thought with a haze of cannabis and booze, and so he side-stepped them neatly when he answered.
“And yet here you stand, whole and still in charge.” He flashed her a grin. “I hope you realize nothing that happened was your fault. You inherited every problem that came to pass. Wheels that were already turning. But now…” the buckskin trailed off, licked his lips. When his eyes slipped to hers, they were slyly appraising, and his lips were curled.
“Now you’re free to choose what comes next for Seraphina.”
Some part of him, of course, knew that he was wrong; the black irony glinted somewhere in his flint-and-tinder gaze. But Acton had never had the sort of responsibilities she carried on her gunsmoke shoulders. His decisions had ever been his own to make, the disastrous as much as the successful (maybe more of the former, lately). He was not ruled by people or the gods – only by his own heart.
Of course, he was the one wallowing in chemicals and self-pity.
Of course, they were both unaware that the gods were soon to come.
@
just a match begging for fire
