[P] but be nobody's darling

[Florentine]

i'm a pretty flower girl
check out my pretty flower curls

Florentine eyes Seraphina as she brings the broth to her lips. The gaze is wide and nervous - she has never been a good cook. It was almost a relief when she was queen and others cooked for her. As a mother Florentine had needed to learn fast, but it always remained a challenge. It was, in all honesty, a miracle she and her family were all still alive after years of her cooking. Flora liked to think she was attuned to the subtle politeness that people smoothed across their faces when they consumed something that was less than edible from her kitchen. Lysander had refined the art, yet she could still detect it, it was there in the slight pucker of his brow. That small wrinkle of anxiety. 


She was not sure what Seraphina’s tell is, but she looks for it and hopes she has not missed it and that her broth is at least okay. She thinks it is. But only the cold light of morning will bring the truth. 


It is a simple fact that Florentine is not as self-aware as others might be. It is also a fact that likely comes as no surprise to those who know her well - or maybe even just a little. So it is entirely normal when Flora continues oblivious to the way Seraphina carefully pulls the cobwebs from her tangled hair. In that moment, never have two queens been more different and yet shared so many things; Like coming so close to death they could feel the cool dark of its breath across their lips.


“Enjoy your retirement?” The Dusk woman suggests with a small smile. Despite that smile she knows retirement is only the start for them. Being a Novus monarch changed you. She saw it in her brother, in Ipomoea, in Somnus, in Seraphina, in Reichenbach, in so many of them. She had loved all of them and watched as they changed. Her breath is a small thing within her lungs, it escapes, barely a sigh.


“Thank you.” She says, after so long. Their bowls are empty, the broth cooled upon the side, the fire in the hearth has burned down and glows, now only suggesting warmth. It feels like the end, the culmination of the time before. When she sleeps, she will shed the grief of the last few months and awaken and begin her search for her children. She is grateful Seraphina would help - where she could. Yes, Sera, Novus is dark and so terribly dangerous. But first, before the morning, she will give Seraphina a place to rest and sleep and Florentine will sleep too. When they part at the dawn, Florentine will be ready to find her babies.


@Seraphina  - Fin <3 I am wrapping it up here. I hope that is okay? They amuse me a lot - i should like to thread them together again at some point <3

florentine
rocking your pretty flower world