you will burn and you will burn out.

             ‘ do you think you could handle it? ’ a quill skirts quickly across old parchment – her handwriting is so sharp it’s nearly indecipherable. and though her features are just as sharp, her voice holds something almost akin to softness. caleb always seemed to draw out that curiosity in her better than anyone. ‘ a room full of students. ’

@irresurrection​ liked for a starter!

     though he continues to stare at his book, he pictures it. it does not take much. a room filled with desks and lined with chalkboards. spellbooks rustling open. young people, some sleepy, some bored, some eager, some serious — waiting for him to clear his throat. and perhaps a cat, lolling on his papers.

     ( he thinks, too, of how good it felt when nott began to devise her own spells, based on tips he gave her. the way her boy’s face lights up whenever caleb draws a sigil. )

     it’s a beautiful picture. one he does not know how to deserve.

     “you don’t — have to.” it’s a small, bright thing. very optimistic. julie hesitates, a beat, and then says: “i know — caleb really likes you. and i think everybody else does too… and… like.. i guess. i do, or whatever. it’s like. the things that bug you should. also bug us, or whatever, i guess? — i just, like, don’t think. i guess, if you… wanted to rush toward what you want. i think. you would be supported?”

     what she really wants has nothing to do with checking for traps or cooking up acids, and suddenly seems so big as to be absurd, hysterical. they all know she’s cursed. they know she wants caleb to set her free. and, according to julie, they like her. but do they understand?

she sees him from her periphery, ears perking in response, but can’t break her focus on the chemicals in front of her, less she spill something and make the table start dissolving. 

he walks past without saying anything, which isn’t entirely unusual, but she can feel the difference. she’d be lying if she pretended she didn’t. and she’s a liar, yes, she’s a terrible liar, but she can’t lie when it comes to caleb. she keeps trying, and keeps failing. 

he speaks, and she nods, putting the final touches on the mixture of acid so she can turn to look at him when she replies. 

“nope,” she says, immediately clearing her throat after when the word comes out as a croak. “not tired, i guess.” 

it sounds false to her ears. the truth, in its entirety, is she doesn’t know how to sleep next to yeza anymore. she’s used to sleeping with caleb, curled in the crook of his knee with her head resting on his calf, her back and legs warm with his body heat. yeza sleeps like someone used to being alone at night, laying on his side with his arms tucked under him, and she feels a gnawing guilt at being the reason for it. 

and she keeps comparing him to caleb. she never compared caleb to yeza, before. she had no reason to; her wizard’s vastly different to the halfling that she’s known most of her life. but caleb has become the standard in her life, the one constant she’s had, her only companion other than the self hatred nestled in her heart. 

she clears her throat again, trying to banish her thoughts. “what about you? can’t sleep?”

     “nott, komma, tired,”   he murmurs, then offers a weak smile. a bad joke.   “bet you’ve never heard that one before.”

     he has no great fondness for small talk, but he wishes for a moment that he knew a little less of her habits, so that he could ask oh, what are you working on? and then offer ja, that will come in handy when we... whatever they decide to do in the wastes of xhorhas. but he knows her too well. he asked to put her laboratory here to that purpose.

     in short, he’s laid a very pretty trap for himself.

     “ah... yes.” carefully, so as not to make it bump and squeak, he pulls a chair out from the table, his book laid in front of him, and takes a seat.

shit. they can’t imagine derogna’s end goal is the same as the tomb taker’s, but that still makes anything she finds incredibly dangerous. and she has the book. lucien’s memories promise that the lady’s too paranoid and selfish to show the book to the nein, but it still needs to be out of her hands, in case. while they didn’t spy nott with the group, molly has no doubt that they would be able to find a way to steal the book from her. 

they can’t let any of the nein get pulled in with the somnovum. then everything molly’s done — all of this time with the tomb takers — would be worth nothing. 

“hm. i suppose that’ll do,” they agree, bracing their hands on their knees to stand. but pause when caleb speaks again. it’s too dangerous to get them involved, molly thinks. they’re already involved, lucien’s voice purrs meanly, pull them under. 

“i don’t know,” they say instead, mask firmly in place. “do you care? about the fragment?” about me?

     he was hoping lucien wouldn’t press him hard for more information, because it seems ill-advised to give it, and caleb isn’t at all sure he’s up to being a convincing liar without spells to back him up if it should go south. but then they don’t, and that makes caleb, somehow, more anxious.

     “What the fuck.”  Her voice is low, nearly as flat to the ground as Nott but not as willing to dive underneath the cart for it, instead choosing to stare at her and make sure that blade doesn’t leave her sight. With her elbows hitting the dirt, she waves one incredulous hand, squinting. “Do you think gives you the right to go through someone’s fucking shit? Nott?”

     “there was a time i thought... you might not make it without me.”   in more than one sense. she’d been afraid for him, but she had held onto it — because it meant she had something to give.

     knowing that time is over makes her happy, but sad, too. there’s pride on her face, which has nothing to do with her role as a mother, and resentment that has everything to do with once having lived too long and too close with someone you love, and saying goodbye because you had to, before you were ready. and there’s love.

     she leans forward, so their faces are as close as her halfling height and his stooping allow, and her brown hand rests on his pale cheek. above all, there’s love.

they would try to make themselves as unthreatening as possible, but think it might be better for caleb to see them as he did before: a tiefling he barely knew with unnerving eyes. it’ll allow for the quickest assessment for how caleb feels about them, at the very least. 

except his pension for reacting incorrectly to danger seems to have stuck, and he does exactly what mollymauk doesn’t want him to do: nothing. 

it is, however, entirely in character, if molly’s memory serves, so they don’t put too much stress on that. it’s still very unhelpful, and only leads to make them more apprehensive about the whole thing. 

“hello, mr. caleb,” they intone, voice lacking the mirth it once held in heaps. time has been unkind to mollymauk tealeaf. they’ve learned, as lucien, how to make their hesitance seem purposeful, letting silence stretch instead of wracking their brain in panic. “i don’t suppose you can tell me what you’re doing with lady derogna?”

     “it’s no secret. she hired us.”

     there it is, such unadorned truth that it sounds like evasion.

     “we are to accompany her to eiselcross. use our.. skillset... to guard her on this arcane endeavor.”   but after that, for the woman who once threatened veth’s son — who knows? the best way to gather intel on the cerberus assembly, as much as it makes his throat dry even to think it, is to keep their enemies close. but caleb cannot share that here, with this stranger wearing a familiar face.

     caleb finds himself, as he does more and more often these days, hesitating outside her bedroom door. he fiddles with his copper wire, winding it around two fingers and unwinding it again. if he cannot bring himself to knock, he could send a message. and then her... her husband, he need not know of the interruption. 

     that makes caleb’s lurking sound like something other than it is. but it is true that he has avoided yeza brenatto — speaking to him, or even speaking his name.

     because you are a useless piece of shit. she deserves better than you for a friend, and you know it.

     after a while, caleb gives it up. he tucks the wire back into the pocket of his new coat and slinks off in shame to the library. if nothing else, he can make himself useful. force himself to be good for something. anything.

     he intends to return to his studies. ( transmutation magic is the way to break his friend’s curse; he is sure of it. caleb set out on this path for a reason. ) but when he opens the door, who should be there, in the alchemical laboratory attached to the study, but nott the brave.

     caleb stares blankly at her, wavering between holding his planned course and giving in to the need to be near her. he walks past her. pulls a book from the shelf. walks back to her, carrying it.