[AW] Strangers in the night

[Marisol]

who are you
when it's all over?

Matters he must attend to. His cushy bed? His rotation of lovers? Marisoi watches him leave with cool, dark eyes and does not know if the smile on her face is one of affection or disappointment. Oh, she loves him, not for his power but his vulnerability - the way he can pretend the world is still soft, like there is still good to be found. It is admirable. And stupid. And something that she has never been able to do, not even as a child (if she ever really was one). She says nothing as he departs, only offers him a somber, knowing nod and then turns her dark hooves back toward the barracks, the path to which she knows as well as the back of her hand. 

It is strange to have someone at her side, even someone she is not tooth-achingly suspicious of. She feels Mephisto trailing her shoulder and does not know whether to speak, what to offer, how to address the silence that hangs between them like velvet curtain - but she has never been one to speak much, and cannot change something so deeply engraved in her. Instead she lets the quiet of the night wash over them until Mephisto speaks, and even then waits, ears flickering, for a moment to pass before she responds. 

Of course. The roads are darker now, and narrower, and their hooves sing a song over the cobblestone as they move toward the barracks, rising stolid and wooden in the foreground. Despite its relative squalor, it stirs up something like pride deep in her chest. Tomorrow, she agrees, and opens the front door with a gently shove of her narrow shoulder; it creaks inward on rusty hinges, surprisingly quiet relative to its old age. Inside, the hallways are dim and the walls postered with Terrastellan flags. It is late enough that the majority of cadets have already gone to sleep, exhausted from their day’s training, and the few that are roaming the hallways duck and skitter away when Marisol glares at them.

Here, she says, coming to a stop, and nudges open another door further down. The beds inside are narrow but soft, and a lantern shimmer softly from a sconce - piles of swords, spears and arrows stand against the nearest wall, and Marisol clicks her tongue in soft disappointment. Take a bed. The other cadets should be back soon. I will collect you tomorrow so that we can begin.

Goodnight, finishes Marisol, with the barest of smiles, and then ducks out of the doorway and back into the hall.

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