kinda wanna write kinda wanna take a nap

Hours passed before finally the storm broke, a bloody wash draining from her vision as the night passed sick and sweating, but bloodlessly. Her whole body was weighed down by its own exhaustion, her bones and muscles ached as though she had walked for miles and her skin was clammy with sweat which left the inside of her mouth painfully dry and her throat aching. But her breathing was finally evening out as the corkscrew pains finally began to subside bit by bit.

Her mind was her own again at last.

From the wall-chained cot, Logan sat watching over her, eagle-eyed and sleepless with his arms folded over his knees. The dark circles around his eyes seemed to have deepened and a familiar ache soaked through her chest as she rolled to sit up with her head bowed.

The silence was achingly painful as she tried to summon up something to say. Anything.

"Thank you," she murmured finally. "For stopping me."

He didn't reply, just rose to his feet, left the cell and vanished through the nearby door. Barely a moment later, he returned looking no more pleased than he ever did.

"I've sent for the Queen. Whatever you have to say will be to her," he said tersely as he resumed his seat.

She nodded and tried to turn her attention inwards, self-assessing the damage she had done to herself. The previous night was a blur from behind the crimson veil, though there were moments that retained some clarity and sharpness; moments where she had been closer to control than enthralled to the horror inside her, though they had been brief and swung between tooth-extractingly painful explanations and sobs of abject misery.

Her wrists and ankles itched from chaffing where she had strained against the manacles, the base of her tail ached as if it had been pulled, and her headache was throbbing explicitly behind the front of her skull, which was different from the usual pain. Had she tried to bash her head open against the wall at one point? That might explain it.

Otherwise she seemed largely unharmed, though that was hardly the point. She hadn't been the one in danger. Not until now.

She shuffled to put her back to the far wall and dared to glance up at Logan. He glowered back at her.

"Did I hurt anyone?" she asked tentatively.

For a moment it seemed he might not answer, before he rubbed his face.

"You cut a guard across the face with your tail, whipped me across the back multiple times, and managed to rip chunks out of a balustrade, but otherwise no," he replied exhaustedly. "You did try to bite me on several occasions though."

Ah. Her faced flushed purple.

"I'm sorry. You were just the first person I found, and-"

"Whatever you have to say, it will be to the Queen," he repeated bluntly. "I trust you will not threaten to hollow out her chest cavity to serve as your castle and to wear her bones as your crown?"

Light, had she really said that? Her flush deepened and she hung her head.

"I'm sorry."

The wait for Lorna to arrive was agonising, and when she did, Nobody was verging on asking Logan what else she'd said if only so she could apologise for the feral madness that had run her mouth rampant. Fortunately, her Majesty managed to save them from that conversation as she entered the cell and frowned.

She didn't look to have slept any more than the rest of them and there was a whiff of coffee on her breath as she addressed Logan with a tone of needling accusation.

"Why hasn't she been unchained?"

"A safety precaution," he replied as he got to his feet. "Just in case she reacted when you arrived."

As always, Lorna didn't seem impressed with her brother even as he unlocked the manacles around Nobody's ankles. When she made no leap to run or lunge, he unfastened her wrists. The warmed iron fell away and her flesh cried out in relief at their freedom regained.

Pathetic. Look at you. The Butler gave you another chance. Kill the Child Queen and save face. But you didn't—you spent the night chained and shackled, playing out a farce as a wriggling, squirming slug. Humiliating. You can be so much more than that screaming heap. Come back to yourself.

Even now her headache refused to abate and she rubbed her wrists carefully. The skin was worn thin from thrashing. It verged on splitting under the slighest pressure. Under the tip of her claw, she could draw forth such beautiful rubies…