fragments

Imogen didn’t miss the way Laudna inched away from her in bed once the lanterns had been snuffed out.

She let her, at first, even though it made her hands shake. Even thought it made her chest ache like she’d been kicked by a horse. She knew Laudna needed space to process sometimes. Sometimes needed the quiet to untangle her thoughts like she would a tangle of red thread. 

But the drone of Laudna’s thoughts didn’t settle, didn’t quiet. It only wound tighter and tighter, fear and grief in equal measure, and Imogen couldn’t stand it any longer. 

Laudna? Imogen asked softly, reaching out with her mind. 

Laudna’s breath hitched, her shoulders twitching as she startled, and Imogen felt the grief burn in her gut. 

I—I’m sorry, am I keeping you awake? Laudna asked, her voice strained even in Imogen’s head as she began to sit up. I can go, I’ll go, I’m sorry—

No! No, please, Imogen gasped, a scarred hand landing on Laudna’s arm, and Imogen wanted to scream at the way Laudna flinched at the touch. Please, don’t go, she begged. 

A-alright, Laudna said quietly. She lay down again, her shoulders still hunched, knees still drawn up to her chest, her back still to Imogen, and Imogen couldn’t bear to pull her hand away unless Laudna asked. 

She desperately hoped Laudna wouldn’t ask. 

Do you need something? Laudna asked quietly after a beat of silence, would you—should I get Fearne?

No, I… Imogen began, the lump in her throat choking her words even though she hadn’t spoken aloud. Can I…I want—can I hold you? she finally said, tripping over her words. please?

Imogen felt salt sting her eyes at the tendrils of confusion that crept along their tether. 

Why? Laudna finally asked, her voice in Imogen’s head no more than a choked whisper. 

Because I love you, honey, Imogen said, trying desperately to keep her breathing steady as matching love and grief met at the center of their tether. Silence stretched between them for a long moment, and Imogen brushed her thumb back and forth along Laudna’s arm before withdrawing her hand. I-I won’t, I won’t force you, Laudna, never, but if you want, I would really love to hold you, baby.

Imogen heard a shuddering, rattling breath escape Laudna, and then the shifting of the covers as Laudna scooted back towards her and before she could even consciously think to do so, her arms were curling around Laudna, tugging her against her chest as she let out a shaky breath. 

I love you too, Laudna said, her voice small and quiet, like even in Imogen’s mind she was trying to take up as little space as possible. 

If only Laudna knew how much space she truly occupied in Imogen’s mind. 

They lay there in the quiet dark, Imogen holding Laudna to her chest as she breathed her in, nose buried in her dark hair that always seemed to smell of decaying leaves and frost. Felt the way Laudna’s slow heartbeat thudded with her own quick pulse. Laudna’s hands were wrapped around Imogen’s wrist, Imogen’s other hand pressed to Laudna’s chest as she slowly trailed her fingers back and forth along Laudna’s collarbone. Imogen’s lips found Laudna’s neck like mottled marble and she felt Laudna gasp as she left a kiss at her nape. 

Can I show you something? Imogen asked quietly, breaking their mental silence, and when she felt Laudna nod, she nudged at their tether, asking for Laudna to open the door just a little wider. 

Laudna did. 

Imogen took a deep breath as she buried her face into Laudna’s neck, holding her just a little tighter, and she let her heart bleed over their tether. 

The monotonous, numbing misery she’d felt in Gelvaan, desperate to be alone but desperate for someone, still, even though she knew it would hurt. The way she’d wander the fields with Flora whenever she could get away from home. The way she’d ride her down to the river miles from the farmhouse. 

The way she used to look at the rocks on the riverbank and think of filling her pockets. How she’d stand there and wonder how many it would take. 

The utter incandescence of hearing Laudna’s thoughts for the first time, how her music had pulled Imogen’s world into focus, had made her feel like she’d been able to breathe for the first time in ten years, the sudden, desperate need to find the source. 

Seeing Laudna for the first time and being struck still by her lopsided too-wide smile and her owlish eyes and the delicate grace of her movements. The tug in her chest at the note of fear trilling in Laudna’s thoughts until Imogen had extended her hand. 

The rage when villagers had come with pitchforks, the relief of running, Laudna’s hand clasped tightly in her own. 

The first time she hadn’t woken up alone from her red storms, the way Laudna had spoken softly to her and stroked her hair and offered her waterskin. How she’d stayed up with her for the rest of the night, making Pâté dance in the firelight. 

Falling in love with Laudna on the road to Jrusar, because Imogen knew now, truly, that she’d been in love with Laudna long before Bassuras. 

Bassuras. 

The roiling shame and guilt she carried still, the resonating  regret at ever letting a rock get between them, the sick feeling she’d had to sit with watching Dusk hold Laudna’s hand, the way she’d hated herself for it. 

Seeing two snakes cradle a ruby and being gripped with the sudden, desperate need to see it on Laudna’s finger, the gold leaving her hand before she could think too hard about buying a ring for her best friend.

The mind-numbing grief as she stared down at Laudna’s body in the rubble and knew it was her own fault. 

Lying awake in the hole beside a body shrouded in yellow as she wept and thought of those river rocks for the first time in two years. 

Incandescent rage as she’d ripped the shadowed Sun Tree in two. 

The way she’d thought her chest might just split open, her heart surely unable to be contained as she watched Laudna’s eyes flutter open on the floor of Pike Trickfoot’s home. 

Relief and love mixing with a new kind of fear, the fear of losing Laudna in a different way if she let her wretched heart be seen. 

Being so close to saying it on the airship. 

The way her heart had all but stopped when she’d landed in the deep snow, Laudna nowhere to be found. 

Not caring that trying to Send to her felt like driving an ice pick into her brain, not caring that it had made her nose bleed once or twice. Laudna, Laudna, Laudna, running in a desperate loop in her head until she’d watched her walk through the door to the Spire by Fire. 

The worry at the haunted look in Laudna’s eyes, the strange tension of not being able to hear her thoughts anymore.

The radiance of kissing her for the first time. 

Memories turning to daydreams. 

A little cottage in the Heartmoor. 

A cottage with a vegetable garden and overflowing flower boxes and a gnarled old tree shading a corner of it, a cottage with a billowing chimney, a cottage full of little knickknacks and trinkets and soft things and cups rim side up in the cabinets. 

The two of them baking in the kitchen. 

Moving the snake ring to Laudna’s ring finger as they kissed in the dark, naked and tangled in their sheets. 

Imogen opened her eyes as she felt more than heard the broken sob that escaped Laudna’s lips. 

I love you, Imogen whispered, the back of Laudna’s sleep shirt soaked with Imogen’s own tears as she held her close. I love you, she said again, pressing another kiss to the back of her neck. I can’t force you to love yourself, baby, she said, her voice cracking as she spoke into Laudna’s mind, I can’t force you to understand that you're worth lovin’ or that you don’t need Delilah to be powerful or, or useful, she sniffled, but gods, Laudna, it breaks my heart that you can’t see it because—because, honey, you’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me, she gasped, I would be layin’ at the bottom of a river by now if I’d  never met you. I think I fell in love with you before I even saw you.

“Imogen—” Laudna whimpered out loud, her body trembling in Imogen’s arms as she squeezed Imogen’s hand with all her meager strength, her other hand coming up to press her palm to her mouth to muffle her sobs. 

Imogen pressed her face to Laudna’s shoulder, squeezing her eyes shut as she felt Laudna’s hand, wet with tears, curl around her own and tug it up, Laudna’s thumb caressing her palm before cool lips pressed a kiss to her fingertips, her palm. 

Imogen couldn’t hold back her own cries as Laudna nuzzled into her hand, gasping in the dark as Laudna’s love like icy vines curled around their tether, taking root in Imogen’s mind and blooming in Imogen’s chest, curling around her heart with a determination Imogen hadn’t felt from Laudna in weeks. 

She pressed her mouth to the base of Laudna’s neck, trying to muffle her own sobs. 

“You saved me,” Imogen whispered against the shell of her ear once she’d regained her own voice, once they’d both slowly stopped trembling. “Please, let me help you save yourself.”