Running

[Cherny]

The boy holds his tongue as the girls argue, his hand tensing in the wildling's grip just enough to keep his bones from grinding together. Instead he divides his attention between the trees around them, the seamstress behind, and the slowly-brightening lights of the tavern windows ahead.

It's only as the wildling explains her expectations, how she anticipates matters will go should she unleash her devil, that the boy shakes his head, frowning, not believing it for a moment.

"So what'll it d-do after? If, if you l-let it out, and it k-kills the wolves like you w-want. It's n-not going to, to go b-back in its bottle." He's not sure how it had been imprisoned in the first place, but cannot imagine that it was voluntary; something of great power in the Pit, perhaps; maybe a devious trick, a trap. "If you let it out it m-might kill th-the wolves. Or it m-might leave them to, to eat p-people it doesn't need. Maybe it'd l-let them eat everyone you c-care about, to, to punish you for leaving it in its b-bottle."

A pause to let her consider that for a time, given her own experiences with the creature.

"Maybe it'll k-kill the wolves if th-they try to eat you, but it d-doesn't care about what you w-want. You're j-just a, a body f-for it to wear. It cared m-more about Giuseppe than, than you. Your d-devil didn't rush to save you w-when, when you were in the s-stocks - not like it w-went to find out what h-happened to him. It c-could have, but it d-didn't."

It had left her, abandoned her as it walked around in Niall's flesh; left her to be flogged, abused, humiliated and tormented; it had fallen to Son to attempt her rescue, and Solena to finally spirit her away.

"B-but Gloria's not quite right. It, it d-doesn't want us. It's just c-cruel and s-selfish. You, you d-don't get to see it w-when it's in your eyes, b-but it is. It'll h-hurt people." The wolves, from what he's seen of them, have cunning - a brutish thirst for revenge, yes, but not the cold, dispassionate malice displayed by Noura's devil. "Especially if it l-looks like you, you might c-care about them, or listen t-to them rather than, than it. It w-wants you as a, a p-puppet. But if it c-could get back in Niall, that'd b-be just as good. Better, m-maybe. Niall's as, as s-selfish as your d-devil, so they're a g-good match."

Let me fight my own battles. Noura's hand tightens upon his own, and he squeezes back in kind, thin fingers rough from his work.

"They're n-not just your battles. You, you're our f-friend, and we care about you - even if you d-don't believe it - so, so that m-makes them our battles too. Wolves or, or w-whatever else."

A glance for her features then as she slumps, as her tone softens slightly; a moment to lift his wrist to his mouth, tugging back the cuff with his teeth until the deep furrows in his skin are exposed to the moonlight, scars held out for the wildling to see. His own voice drops to match hers, quiet but emphatic.

"You k-killed the mother-w-wolf and saved m-my life. That's n-not a crime. It's not a, a s-sin you have to atone for. You saved a f-friend - I'd've d-died if you hadn't. Like you m-might've died if, if Gloria h-hadn't fought the other one."

At last they reach the edge of the lawn, a moment for expansive gestures and dramatic farewells. One last squeeze and he releases her hand, glancing aside to reach for the seamstress' elbow, anxious for that contact, that anchor.

"It w-won't share you. It'll h-hurt everyone you c-care about until they can't b-be near you, or you c-can't be near them. You'll end up alone, j-just you and it." He shrugs helplessly, resigned to having done his best, to having made his best case; whatever decision the wildling makes, it will be hers alone.

"You kn-know what that's like."

[Rance]

Her tongue was a loose flap of leather. It had a talent for words in controlled circumstances, where she could mitigate the values and deficiencies of a verbal opponent; that was what Duquesne had taught her, that where she must unleash them, her rhetorical abilities could be barbs, gauches, blades. But when faced with situations of emotion, where her accent too-often tripped her voice, she underperformed, offered flaccid arguments, approached with too much bluster like some clumsy fool swinging a maul in a glass chapel.

Cherny spoke better when he must. Cherny, tiny and frail, undergrown, was a brain; he was a force of logic and he was softer, kinder, more considerate. His fingers framed themselves around the cup of her elbow and reminded her that even if she hadn't fingers, she could touch and be touched. With the Broken Dagger so near, she thought she could feel the warmth of the hearth filtering through her bones and loosening her resolve to be a gargoyle, sand-and-stone. The rock thudded to the mossy earth.

"They're our battles, too," she reiterated, preferring to wield her brother's more cogent statement. "That cannot be changed; we fight these little wars together, whether or not you want us at your flanks. Uncorking that bottle and swallowing that creature may give you the advantage you need to overcome the wolves, but you add another monster to replace those you're so intent to kill.

"And where will you be while that new battle rages? Asleep in your body, incarcerated inside your brain while a Passenger does with you what It so desires. Safe and sound," she said, her voice fading, discouraged. "Still running."

She turned her head to look toward the Rememdium, its length a stern shadow against the opposing treeline. Her remaining fingers clutched like a vice along the crest of her belly, its miniature occupant yet invisible, undeveloped, a blot of capillaries and nerves growing within her, a Horn, a Soodsy--

"All I ask is that when you drink down that Creature, Noura, you do it in my presence. You let me look into your eyes as it takes them from you. I will be there," she said, "that I might understand why It means so much to you."

Because she understood already there was no arguing for or against; together, she and Cherny spoke into the wind of an inevitability. Bottles only stayed corked for so long. Impulse had a finite measure, a gradual limit.

Gloria Wynsee knew this better than most. Her neck tightened as she turned, glanced to her brother, and produced a meager smile for his sake. She knew he wanted nothing more than to go back. So did she, so did she, to crawl into a bed that was not hers. Yet, the thin distance between where they stood now and the safety of the tavern, of the infirmary, was as large as a sea; she couldn't stand the idea of walking a hundred steps in one direction while Noura walked a hundred in the other.

"If you go back into those woods tonight, Noura," she said to the other girl's spine, "so do I. We do this all over again; we repeat, repeat, repeat."

[Guppy]

"No, It will not be convinced to go back in the bottle-prison that Niall crafted," she admitted. Matter of fact.

She was not foolish enough to think otherwise. "But I am not certain that I would want her to," she added, no trace of shame in her eyes. "Before you, either of you, came around, there was just the two of us. She kept me safe. She gave me life as mine ebbed away. I owe her much." She did not think that they could begin to understand the bond between them, but she could not help but try. "She may be monster, but she is mine."

His warnings about the demon were taken into consideration. She paused and she watched him with wary, thoughtful gaze. Petulantly ignoring the problem did seem like something the creature would do. "Hence my attempts to goad the wolves into action. When I travel the forest, I keep one thumb on the cork to the bottle. I will release it only when danger rears its ugly head." Her tone revealed how much thought had been put into this scheme of hers.

Brows furrowed, bothered by his scorn for the creature's character. "That is not wholly true," she corrected, ducking under a low-hanging branch and pausing to lift it so that he might duck under as well. "As soon as the creature heard of my plight, she searched for me. She burned the stocks to the ground." Mention of Son made her go a little quiet.

The recognition of hunter's boy seemed to get through to her finally. For a moment, she was silent as she examined her inner thoughts. Gathered her resolve. "... I do worry for him." If not herself. "The creature has not made her admiration secret and he is wary." She swallowed thickly. "Do you think it would strain whatever affection we hold for one another?" Her voice was quiet and plaintive, a mere whisper that they would have to strain to hear.

saved m-my life

Despite her cantankerous nature when it came to Cherny and his friendship, his words did seem to soften her mood. The moon crawled across her guilt-ridden features and shifting eyes as her gaze roamed over his jagged scars that would never fade. "I feel as if I am the one to have turned their attentions to those I treasure. Those I love. I feel ... as I was the one to take your hand," she admitted softly as her chin fell to rest upon her chest, finding herself unable to meet either of their eyes lest she see her fears mirrored there.

His hand slipped from hers and he reached for the seamstress. She was left quiet in its wake.

Finally, grudgingly, she followed them towards the lit windows.