The silence of the night often made Sersi uncomfortable. It was as if the world around her had completely frozen. Neither music, footsteps or voices, nor the laughter of children playing echoed through the old Indian streets. Nightfall forced her to be alone with herself and her thoughts. And the fact that she and Ikaris would be married in the coming days did not calm her mind even in the slightest. Ikaris was on guard duty, Sersi could not sleep. That's why she was loitering around the place where she would soon say "I do."
The people of this city took great pleasure in helping to plan the wedding ceremony of their idols, their gods. But Sersi's thoughts did not let her rest, so she started again and again to change something at the place of her wedding ceremony. First it was the flowers, which underwent a permanent change of shape and color. She even worried about the food, although she trusted Gilgamesh completely.
Lost in thought, she changed the color and pattern of some cloth hanging from the ceiling of the temple. Sersi didn't notice that her sister had been standing in the middle of the room for several minutes, watching her. "Doubts?" she asked in a monotone voice. "What-!" Sersi startled and accidentally turned one of the fabric panels into the petals of a canna liberte.
"T-Thena!" After a few seconds, Sersi was up to her knees in orange petals. "Y-You totally scared me." She held her left hand to her chest to feel the speed of her heartbeat. Thena was visibly unimpressed. "I wouldn't marry him either." She said as she let her cold gaze roam the room. Sersi seemed a bit overwhelmed at first, fiddling with her sari nervously. Thena wasn't exactly an eager conversationalist.
"He's an idiot." Thena's footsteps didn't make any sound as she walked through the festively decorated area. Just one of the many things that made her so dangerous. "Who?" Sersi followed her sister with her eyes, confused, until finally it "clicked." "Ikaris?" All she got to hear was a blunt "Hm." Unsure of what to say next, she slowly shuffled towards Thena, who subsequently stared at her without blinking and with her head tilted.
"I love him." she finally said. "And he loves me." "Are you sure?" Her voice was so icy, you could have frozen entire oceans with it. "He's oppressing you, Sersi." Thena turned away from her sister and reached for one of the pomegranates, piled up on one of the tables. "He's protecting me. That's completely different." Sersi swallowed nervously as Thena manifested a dagger to open the pomegranate. "Is that so?"
Despite her incomparable beauty, Thena scared most people (and sometimes her family) with her mere presence. Thena never shied away from really giving someone a piece of her mind. It was hard to read her emotions unless you were Gilgamesh himself. Sersi knew that Thena meant well. But it didn't mean she was right this time.
"He underestimates you. Pretends you're a helpless, wounded deer." Thena's bony fingers fumbled the sweet sour seeds from the pomegranate. "Haven't you ever wondered why he keeps you out of even the easiest fights? Why he never takes his eyes off you even in quiet moments?" She gleefully ate one seed after another. Sersi knew the answers, that she was firmly convinced of. But before a word could fall from her lips, Thena said, "He thinks you're weak, Sersi." The Goddess of War turned her head slightly to get a better look at her sister in the corner of her eye. The pomegranate seeds disappeared between her full lips.
"Thena, I know that you and Ikaris don't have the best relationship. But can't you just be happy for me? As my sister?" The platinum blonde beauty seemed visibly unimpressed by her sister's words. "Do you really want to share a bed with someone who has no faith in you?" Sersi tilted her head and fixed her gaze on the pomegranate dripping with juice. "He... Ikaris just shows his feelings differently. He just wants me to feel safe." She looks up, into her sister's eyes. "I'm sure between you and Gil-"
"Gilgamesh knows what I'm capable of." Thena pressed the rest of the fruit into Sersi's hand. "He doesn't mother me. Doesn't treat me like-" "Thena!" The two women turned jerkily to look at the unexpected guest. Gilgamesh braced his large hands on his hips and looked at Thena with a raised brow. The Goddess of War just rolled her eyes and then put a hand on Sersi's shoulder. "If it makes you happy. But don't complain in the end when that idiot-" "Thena."
Sersi's thoughts circled in her head like a vulture circling its prey. Unable to say anything, she watched as Gilgamesh rebuked Thena with just a glance. He nodded apologetically to Sersi before escorting Thena to bed. "If he hurts her, I'm going to kill him." she whispered, receiving a giggle and a kiss on the temple in return.
Sersi took a deep breath and absorbed the beauty of the room in which she would soon be married. Hopeful, confident and full of love, she looked to the future. If only she had known that he had broken her heart.