[P] Linger

[Marisol]

there will be singing
about the dark times.

Marisol takes pleasure in the simple things, mostly because she hardly has time for anything else. She is careful to keep her satisfactions close to the chest, out of the light, where they are neither too obvious nor too suffocated, always stretching and grasping for things they cannot have. Normally, when they are satisfied, it is impossible to tell; nothing in Marisol’s stance changes but, maybe, the shifting of weight, the curl of a lip. It is a secret thing. A thing she does not want to name. Of all the things to love, why should this be one of them?

But here and now her gratification is obvious. It’s too intense to bother hiding. Besides, they are alone. Blissfully alone. Who is she pretending for? They are one and  the same, or close enough to it that the little differences don’t matter. The soft purr of Anandi’s voice makes Marisol shiver, half threatened and half satisfied; the sound the kelpie makes when her breath catches in her throat, a sound like dying, makes Mari gluttonous for something more, everything else the Emissary could offer her. What she would be willing to offer, if lightly pressed. Mari is ready, ready, ready. Ready to run. Ready to bite. Ready to press until she feels a pop, pulls a tendon, beats Andi into the ground the way she knows Andi was planning to tame her—with a fluttering of lashes, with a noose around the pounding heartbeat, with the heat that sloughs off her skin in waves.

The submissive cast of Andi’s eyes toward the floor, the softness of her voice: it fills Marisol with a satisfaction so potent she feels it in her teeth, a lick of salt, a buzzing smugness in the chest. A throbbing heartbeat twice its normal size.

She is finally, finally learning, there are ways to win that don’t require blood.

Marisol doesn’t bother responding to the quip about their Warden. She only smiles, a subtle twist of the lips. But something in it has changed, tightened, become colder: the gold has finally turned to iron, and the thread of it sits between her teeth and wires her jaw together so the points of her teeth don’t quite show. Something between a smile and a smirk. Something between sincere and deadly. The lazy coolness in her eyes implies that mention of the Warden might be just off-limits. But it is only an implication, not yet a real warning.

Then, suddenly, she is startled and distracted by the movement of water on Anandi’s stomach. Mari’s grey eyes don’t quite widen in surprise, but they do follow Anouk’s path with surprisingly innocent curiosity. She is fascinated by it (him?): the trail of dampness he leaves on Andi’s gray skin, the easiness with which he slides up her shoulder, then unsticks himself from her neck, floating in a perfect, pearlescent orb at her side. For all Novus’ magic, Mari still finds herself amazed and far too interested in the way he bobs in the air like a bird without wings.

She flicks her ear, turns back to look at the Emissary directly. Her immediate reaction is to say yes; she even opens her mouth to say so. But then it closes again. Her dark lips purse. She understands the longing in Anandi’s tone, but her life has followed it in a completely opposite direction: Dusk’s queen has always been alone. Her father is dead, her mother lives, directionless and without memory, in the slums, and the only siblings she’s ever had were the cadets she grew up with, who, like her, were not the type to show affection. You have no idea, she thinks, how lucky you are. Something ugly rears its head: jealousy.

But her face is still relaxed, unbothered. In a voice more sincere than she has ever used with the Emissary, Mari says, “Of course. They deserve safety regardless of their… usefulness.” A beat of silence. A dark-grey gaze softened just slightly, the way water beats down stone. 

Something has changed.

“Speaking.”

credits