( it's amusing--or would be, in any other circumstance, because her eyes go from the tankard which, to some disappointment, is nearly drained, peering down into its depths, to the movement in front of her, the wide-eyed way that julian stares at her and how his feathers go, not all at once, but in patches, ruffling and spreading and rounding him up into a large black mess. it reminds her, again, of chandra, of the way she might get irritated with some perceived inconvenience and puff herself into something more menacing as though it might help her get her way; and her lips pull before she can stop herself, something rueful and sad and wiped off her face as quickly as it appears.
leave her out of this, julian is demanding, and part of her wants to slam her hand into the table--granted, it would most likely go all the way through, now, splinter the wood into pieces, and the urge to do it is there, that simmering anger that seems to spark up from somewhere in her chest like it's worming its way through all the good fairness in her heart and turning it into something else. like an apple that's got a worm at its core, eating away slowly but steadily. she doesn't blame him for thinking it's a trap. and yet-- )
Could the Devil really replicate my beauty so easily?
( it's another amusement, though it's mostly hollow. )
You said you'd stay, I know. He told me this. And now it's my realm where you will stay, if that's your choice.
( he won't believe that either, will he? she glances back into the tankard again--it's full, somehow, despite knowing it wasn't just moments earlier. she lets it rest on the table, props her gold-tipped fingers around it, drums her claws into the edge. it makes a rhythmic, rattling sound against the tin, and her lips press together against the pain that still threatens to sear through her head at trying so earnestly to remember things that are lost. )
Do you remember, before all this? Those years before he died? There was a night you were buried so heavily in your research, even Asra gave up on prying you away. You hadn't slept for at least a day, maybe more, and it was the middle of the night and you... had your hands in your hair, like you were likely to pull it out, and I didn't want you to shed all of that awful red hair all over my clean library floor.
( the memory swims, jolts--then goes stable, her red gaze focused on some knot of the wood of the table as she recounts it, or maybe it's that she can't look julian in the face as she speaks. )
And we went outside, to the garden, and the fountain, and then... You remember, don't you? How would the Devil know all this? Look at me.
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leave her out of this, julian is demanding, and part of her wants to slam her hand into the table--granted, it would most likely go all the way through, now, splinter the wood into pieces, and the urge to do it is there, that simmering anger that seems to spark up from somewhere in her chest like it's worming its way through all the good fairness in her heart and turning it into something else. like an apple that's got a worm at its core, eating away slowly but steadily. she doesn't blame him for thinking it's a trap. and yet-- )
Could the Devil really replicate my beauty so easily?
( it's another amusement, though it's mostly hollow. )
You said you'd stay, I know. He told me this. And now it's my realm where you will stay, if that's your choice.
( he won't believe that either, will he? she glances back into the tankard again--it's full, somehow, despite knowing it wasn't just moments earlier. she lets it rest on the table, props her gold-tipped fingers around it, drums her claws into the edge. it makes a rhythmic, rattling sound against the tin, and her lips press together against the pain that still threatens to sear through her head at trying so earnestly to remember things that are lost. )
Do you remember, before all this? Those years before he died? There was a night you were buried so heavily in your research, even Asra gave up on prying you away. You hadn't slept for at least a day, maybe more, and it was the middle of the night and you... had your hands in your hair, like you were likely to pull it out, and I didn't want you to shed all of that awful red hair all over my clean library floor.
( the memory swims, jolts--then goes stable, her red gaze focused on some knot of the wood of the table as she recounts it, or maybe it's that she can't look julian in the face as she speaks. )
And we went outside, to the garden, and the fountain, and then... You remember, don't you? How would the Devil know all this? Look at me.