TIME BREAKER.

—

The librarian’s arms hook beneath his own as they fold to the floor as one. Iseult aware of how everything bled into each another— aware of how the bottom of every breath shuddered from the letting. Hand tucked beneath the bicep, pressed to the saturated spot, he takes stock of the newest mortal wounding. The late assassin’s dagger had plunged up beneath his left arm and severed the artery there. He has minutes at most. Already, the mere notion of speech is insurmountable at best.

The sensations of his own flesh as it fails him are familiar. When he thinks of it, it isn’t unlike the blunting of a blade, the pass of the whetstone: a certain sharpness for a moment in time until the dulling comes. Until the repeat. Iseult expects to be left to the turn and toil of it. Left to that fleeting blink of nothing before the flashpoint of consciousness once more. Of all things, Savatier’s arms around him are what strikes the freelancer as strange. Of all things to possess the mind as it loosens its hold once again, it’s the realization that this is a first. A rare and wretched first. Through every unceremonious end, the only other witness has been them who held the hilt, wrenched the neck, twisted the blade— that is to say, Iseult has never known himself grieved. Has never had such considerate company for the difficult work of dying. Aware, now, of a hand brushing the upper edge of his mask, bloody fingers of his own grip the offending wrist, pressing in. It’s nothing more than reflex, for in the next moment, the guard unmasks himself in a last great labor. A bid to communicate, wagered in vain. A rasp of speech.

“None.” Were this really an end, he may have humored the request. For an absurd moment, Iseult even thinks how he’d answer if it were. He thinks of the brothel become semblance of home; of the working women who’d salvaged him from the sea those years ago and sheltered him since. Iseult thinks of them, but would never reveal such. Not even as some hypothetical closing act. His path is his own; he will not have its missteps lead back to them. And so it stands: None. And so, he simply manages “I won't—” and that’s the last of it. There are many turns the phrase might’ve followed: I won’t fall here, by way of forewarning and comfort. I won’t tell you a thing, By way of spite. Or simply, I won’t, Defiance the only instinct of the dying. 

It all goes the way of speculation. The encircling fingers slacken on Savatier’s wrist and slip aside. A strange calm floods the waning focus in his eyes as the guard stares past him. Seeing the rows of books. Seeing the highest shelves of a library that cares little for the disturbance. Seeing a vaulted ceiling, soaring high enough to fall into. And then, seeing nothing. Of all the places to tick off his roster, his last choice would be death in a fucking library.

he expects the hand grasping his wrist, the reflex of a mercenary always with too much to lose--he does not expect iseult to unmask himself the next moment. savatier stutters on his own breath, his own face bare, but not ignorant to val faim’s customs to not recognize the significance of laying one’s face exposed. of shedding one’s face, effectively shedding their safeguard, their armor, their last and most dire line of defense. the assassin’s face, sweat and blood-slicked and possessing a growing pallor, is still lovely in spite of his encroaching end, and savatier smooths his palm over iseult’s forehead, offers a pained, crooked grin by way of recognition. there you are.

it disappears, crumples, as soon as iseult answers. no one. 

no one to receive his last wishes, nor his love. no one but him to witness his death, to know he’s died at all. how lonely. how exceedingly lonely. 

the breath is throttled out of him by the time iseult tries to speak again, and it’s pitiful that he can’t manage any words even as the guard dies. you won’t? you won’t what? tell me, if it’s all you can do. but even as his lips part and wordlessly move in some pale imitation, nothing comes out. not even, ‘i’ve come to admire our repartee, however maddening.’ not even, ‘i’m glad someone knows my habits, even if it’s by pattern and not by your will. it is a comfort.’ 

Many who have called Patrice by his title in Val Faim use it to mock him. They see it as a trivial thing, a lesser name to call a man than Lord. And yet, Patrice chose this title as his own, because Lord tied one to a land, but Captain tied one to nothing but one’s will and chosen path. Savatier is perhaps the first person to repeat the title and sound genuine, as if he were admiring it. It certainly helped Patrice as he continued to relax under the other man’s gentle touch. 

There’s something about Savatier that makes Patrice wonder what he’s seen. Those who are inexperienced with travel are prone to do one of two things: mock him for his travels, for their minds are so narrowed to their own experiences that they shun him for his, or ask incessantly about the world they’ve yet to uncover. Perhaps as a librarian, Savatier has simply uncovered so much of this world in books already that he does not need to ask so eagerly. Perhaps he is simply hiding it well. Or perhaps he’s traveled himself, and the weathered wisdom to his eye that Patrice simply cannot look away from tells him it may be the latter. 

“And yet just enough of a healer to be exactly what was needed tonight,” Patrice comments with a raised brow of his own. Of course, healing may not be the only necessity, and though Savatier claims to be thanking Patrice for his good deeds, Patrice may just have to thank the librarian for his own. But the reminder of Val Faim stings worse than any treatment one could place upon his wound, and it even sounds so in Patrice’s voice as he replies through gritted teeth, “I will never be warmed to this place. Thankfully, there are enough escapes around here.” His ship. The bar. Maybe even Savatier. 

 And yet, Savatier’s excitement seems to bring him down from the frustration building in him, a strong swig of something that feels almost intoxicating already. “Then you’re in for a treat,” Patrice answers, already beginning to grin at the thought of bringing him aboard. That grin spreads at the mention of the crow’s nest, and Patrice is sure there is more to Savatier than meets the eye. He’s certainly eager to discover it. “I’m sure they’ll find their way up there if that’s what you wish.” That is, if they ever made it there. Patrice was ever aware of the sensation of Savatier’s hand upon his arm, though reluctantly, he pulled it away from the cloth, certain the bleeding has stopped. Abruptly, Patrice stands, looking at Savatier and nodding his head towards the door. “I think we may need them sooner than expected.”

-

“ah. what i lack in salves, i boast in luck and timing, is that it?” he chuckles. patrice’s sudden vehemence towards the city draws a second sideways glance from savatier. he’s known others to be similarly embittered towards the city, namely the lion’s mane own proprietor, and he is equally curious as to why the captain would echo a similar sentiment, how much he was hurt and in what manner to possess such reflexive venom. wants to ask as much, but is sure now, the air rife with tension, is hardly the time. perhaps there will be opportunities later to unfold the man before him. he hopes there will be. 

“i’m sure you’re not alone in that sentiment,” savatier offers instead, hoping it is to be of some solace. “some things and places and people are ill-suited to us. it’s hardly ever our fault for the way of our natures.” he too, feels like a native species of flora that has grown to reject what his environment has become. dug up from his roots and replanted, but everything is all different, the soil, the salinity, his bloom. all wrong. 

patrice stands, offers a leave for them both, and for half a moment savatier is speechless, chest light with thrill. he hasn’t been touched since--since odeline, hasn’t allowed himself the respite from his penance (penance for what, even? that even he couldn’t change the course of fate?), never thought he would ever again. and yet, he stands, just as abruptly, swallows hard as he fumbles a dor or two for his drinks and follows patrice, hot on his heels. “yes,” he stutters, “yes, i think so. the bleeding looks dire.” an outright lie, and his lips curve around his words as he says them. he thinks he’s nervous, sure that he’s rusty in--this. but he wants it, knows this to be true. wants to be known, to be held, wants it like an impulse, like a dormant craving come to life. 

the air and the sky outside are clear, despite this, he inhales deeply, smiles faintly. “this one of those escapes you were speaking of, captain?”

—

it doesn’t make sense, agrippine knows, but the thought comes to them anyways. they hope that, in the memories lost to them, savatier is tucked between a handful of moments, and that — should their memories slip away from them again — savatier will be this for them always. an anchor to their present, he gravity that brings their terror back to the earth and lets the dust settle. with a gentle pull of their hand and a subtle motion to refocus their gaze, savatier wraps agrippine in a world where they are unharmed and untouchable. he becomes the tether to their peace. their hopes.

agrippine’s hand squeezes back — once, twice, three times… their breath evens out as they count the times they tighten their grip on savatier. when they reach seven, agrippine’s heart has calmed and a relieved smile comes to their lips with ease. “thank you,” they say reverently. will they ever understand it? will they ever thank him enough for it?

perhaps val faim worships a girl-made-prophet, but there is something holy in this, too: someone to hold your hand and wait for the dark to recede. in kindness without question, even when you are horrified by your own shadow. they try to tell savatier this. they try to pool the words together and fish it out of their throat: you are so good to me, how are you so good to me, how will i ever give to you what you give to me?

they choke on the enormity of it, their gratitude, their affection for him. instead, agrippine steps closer and gently touches their forehead to his chest. “thank you,” they repeat, knowing he will understand.

before he can react, agrippine is lightly stepping away and dwelling on every word from his lips like it’s gospel. “without my past, i am…” their mouth twists as they try to describe the chasm that plagues them, that lives inside them and does not let them forget it, “… not whole. i am a question with no answer.” they search his gaze for recognition of the sickness they describe: of not knowing or recognizing the self. “remembrance will not break me. it will… complete me. i believe it.”

they are a force, even when they are in want of memories, even when the echo of one regained leaves them trembling. their past a tenuous umbra, and yet they are determined to meet it with resolve, no matter the weight of the burden. no matter the shadow of terror. that they are courageous, even in the face of their own peculiar oblivion, leaves savatier heavy with admiration, and regret. 

in some ways, he’d been a coward. 

escaping instead of grieving, instead of pulling the blade out of his gut and demanding reason from jaster. but, he supposes, the former was his grieving--it still is. and the latter wouldn’t have changed anything, even if he stayed. perhaps he would have been kicked into odeline’s grave with her as he lay dying. years ago, he might have found it preferable if that was the summation of his fate, but this, he knows, is greater than dying at the edge of darkness. this small measure of comfort he can offer, and all that he receives in return--gratitude undeserving, and someone pulling him from his rumination, reinforcing the breaching of a distance, of a fold--this laying of a bridge.

if they look for a mirror in him, they will find just the opposite. his is an oversaturation of the self, too aware of what he’s lived through and lost. where they look inward and face fog, he sees memories of monolithic heights looming, demanding his sight, his entire conscious. despite this, he could not imagine what would be left if they collectively vanished--what would be left of him. he sees agrippine, sees someone already so very generous and actualized and good and whole. 

i am a question with no answer.

“no,” savatier says, “you are an answer, agrippine.” he squeezes their hand. “i believe it. and when... when it happens, even if it feels like breaking, you are not. it is simply the person making way for a new paradigm. reforming, putting together this new piece to their puzzle. do not be afraid. and if you are afraid, know that i will be here, as i was tonight.”

it’s not their second, nor their third, nor their fourth time making their way to the azure quarter, he and iseult, and the initial inelegance of all but asking his guard to wait as he finishes his visitation with a certain captain smoothing its way into a rather regular routine. but it is their first time returning to the ship after the attempt in the library, secrets uncovered and given willingly, and even the steps leading to the docks and up the ship feel shifted, tenuous, the briny air heavier.

it is some relief, he thinks to resume a sense of some normalcy, a carnal call, even if he is to also brief patrice on the ordeal, relive it again in a way. but it’s as much for safety as it is for comfort. if they’re to continue this with the added, sure element of danger, then surely the captain ought to know what kind of danger to which he’s exposing himself, if--if he should choose to continue. and, perhaps what sort of exposure to which iseult is opening himself up. what should happen, then, if there was another attempt, and iseult had to perish and resurrect again should patrice see?

a sidelong glance, perhaps a bit nervous, before they’re weaving through patrice’s crew to knock on the door of the captain’s quarters. the door opens, and he sags with relief he does not realize he’d been waiting for, smile faint. “patrice.” imagines the solemnity of the situation is written clear across his face, and he makes an attempt at brevity, voice light as if he speaks of the weather. “you might have heard there’s been an attempt on my life.”

…

Sainte thinks of the fight at the Mane, and bites her tongue. It was nothing, something that if she said out loud might not sound as sincere as she means it to be. But really, things like that encounter, she thinks, are perhaps the reason she has been called to Val Faim. Not the reasons that Calandre hired her, perhaps, but larger reasons. The sort of thing that make her feel she has some kind of purpose. 

The answer to his question is both simple and complicated at the same time. Nothing drove me, she thinks. Odeline called to me, and she would have done it no matter my circumstances. The answer she gives, however, is different. 

“My father, he always impressed the importance of prayer. He was very devoted.” It’s not a lie - the sword, and Odeline, those were perhaps the most important things to Gaspard, and in turn, the most important things to Sainte. She turns her gaze from the statue to the man. “It’s not just that, though. I don’t-” She pauses, though only for a moment.  “I don’t think I found her. She found me.” Her gaze is fixed sharply on the man now, hoping he will know what she means. “Do you understand?” Or maybe not. She turns back to the statue. “And yourself?”

-

she found me. do you understand?

i do, savatier thinks, i think i do. it’s these moments of tremendous irony that he wishes he can give up his secret, throw away his cover as if it’s a jester’s mask and reveal himself with great flourish. but no one knows of savatier, the prophet odeline’s lover, odeline’s most devout follower; they know only of where her magic has touched, and if it can touch them now. though he’s never minded being forgotten, he only resents it when he wishes to outstretch his hand, and breach a divide. you would not believe how she changed me. 

“perhaps i do. sometimes things might have a tendency to appear before us when we need them most.” he swallows a wince. if only she would make herself known to him, as her droves of followers believe she does to them. it’s how he knows she’s no lingering spirit living as a goddess; if she was, he would know. somehow. he would not have given up searching for her image in mirrors, pond reflections, in her own damn ‘tomb’, if she had made herself known to him at all in all the years since he’s been displaced. “and so i’ve read in my accounts. while the prophet herself is a fascinating figure in our history, i cannot say my prayers have been answered in a way that would illicit unconditional belief.” and, as a reconciliation, he offers, “perhaps when i need her most. perhaps she will find me, as she had you.”

THE SIXTH OF MACCIUS AT THE SUMMER PALACE. closed for @savaticr​

It’s not concern that fuels Rosalind’s hurried step through the Summer Palace, she tells herself. The crease in her brow is merely from the burden of having to find the library at all — a place Rosalind has never cared for in the first place, and even less so now that Savatier haunts it. Tombs of ancient wisdom and stories belong to Rochelle; she would have liked Savatier, Rosalind thinks. Ah, well that’s all the more reason to find him annoying. She hates the gentle melody of his voice, the soothing rhythm with which he speaks; she detests the soft flicker of his eyes when Rosalind curls her lip and spits on his advice.

Even so, she feels the muscles in her back loosen when she finds him. “Oh, so the assassin I sent after you didn’t do much after all.” She tries her hand at the jest, as if she has the heart (or even the know-how) to hire a hitman. Rosalind focuses her gaze on the volumes that surround them, rows and rows of books that go on endlessly. She runs a hand across their spines, scans their titles; anything to hide the relief in her eyes. “It’s a joke,” Rosalind scoffs, anticipating a scolding from Savatier before he has the chance to deliver it. “Please. If I wanted to be rid of you, I would distract Iseult long enough for you to trip and fall to your death, old man.”

“I suppose it’s a good thing you’re still around.” The bemused tone of her voice sounds suspiciously affectionate. “Who knows what the Empress would do to Iseult if he failed as your bodyguard? I don’t like it when other people take away my playthings.”

-

rosalind arrives like hound hot on his heels, with all its bark but none of its bite--or, perhaps some, but nothing that breaks skin. perhaps she intends it that way. the fact is, he’s sure she does. as easy to spit on his word as she is, as disgraced as she surely expects others perceives herself to be in the face of calandre’s slight, he’s never thought she was without abundant cleverness, and ambition. shame that she spends it trying to play catch-up in a race that is ill-suited to her talents. 

“you don’t want to be rid of me, rosalind,” savatier says simply, smile faint, knowing but not arrogant. easy enough to avoid her nettle, and he evades it without acknowledgement as he does the courtiers within the palace. ah, she tries with her venom, but it never quite lands; even when he deigns not to move. he suspects that it’s a reflex in spite of kinder sentiments--spitfire creatures with long-held grief seldom know what to do with opportunities to relieve their aching. he would know this best. “i’m glad you felt compelled to visit. it’s been quiet in the library without the rapport you offer. well, relatively.”

strangely, her irreverence is a welcome distraction from past recollection--the attempt, harrowing enough on its own, was nothing compared to the aftermath. iseult’s blood spilling, stark as ink, watching the life fade from the guard’s eyes.... and watching it return. and his own secret, offered, its own promise. 

“your plaything? is that what he is?” he asks, bemused. not that he’s ignorant of it. “then should i apologize for the fact that the entire ordeal’s left him with even less time than before? have you been lonely, rosalind?”

—

(tw: blood, violence, strangulation, death)

More than the dagger that deals the blow, routine is a king killer. Predictability. Baring one’s movements to watchful eyes like clockwork, such that a trap can be sprung on the very next foot’s fall. Iseult knows this as instinct. Knows this as the blade knows its hilt. And yet. The more of his routine the librarian shares ( or rather, the more the guard shares in it ) the more it dulls his sharpened edges. The longer they spend in this vast library where time’s march slows to molasses, the less he remembers the whetstone. Iseult’s never taken a job that’s lasted long enough for habit. So when habit finally comes shambling in beneath his nose, its shell has already hardened.

Savatier is predictable, and Rayne has left the room too long. When they return, a parcel of sweets tucked away into their layers, it’s to a leaden silence. A texture to it they know so intimately they’re on edge the moment it greets them— expecting a familiar chorus: the soft rustle of pages, the creaking of wood as Savatier’s weight shifts against the desk, mumbled notes spoken before stored to memory. This silence bears none of it. It smacks of strangulation as he ghosts through the threshold and steps lightly, hand snapping to one of the hilts at his belt.

Ah, he so rarely takes pleasure in being right. The sight of a silhouette boxing the librarian in ices Iseult’s blood. These several strained heartbeats after entry, secrecy is on his side. With none to waste, there’s no time for the artful approach he is used to.

Iseult surges forward, bearing down upon the assassin as he unsheathes the blade on his hip. As the gap rushes to a close he bends a knee, dropping into a slide to strike low. Body weight brought to bear and aim true, he severs the assassin’s achilles in one clean pass. Blood splatters the marbled floor. Iseult reclaims his footing as they crumple. He permits them no room to recover, turning the blade to drive it through their throat. The assassin rolls aside. The guard’s blade clangs off of the mosaic beneath and his opponent exploits the momentum that follows—  twisting it from his grasp. As he makes to draw another, the glint of steel in his periphery claims he isn’t fast enough. His bare hands will have to do. Iseult hooks his bicep beneath the assassin’s throat and locks their head in the crook of his arm. Drags them both up together— up and crashing into the bookend of a shelf. There, he digs in his heels, bodies tangled in silent fury. Tightens the grapple. Tightens to squeeze truth from their lips, leaving just enough space for their answer: “—who the fuck sent you.”

Desperation breeds further bloodshed. The assassin sports a trained hand of their own. In the last moments of it, the lucky dor turns again. Two finalities occur at once: the dagger flips in the assassin’s hand and sheaths swiftly backward. The guards arms wrench left. A grunt, a gurgle, a wretched sigh. Silence. Iseult bows his head to the deed, as he always does. Breaks the circle of his arms and lets the body slip to the floor so gently it belies the act before it. But his head— his head has grown too heavy to lift. Rayne sways once, twice, before the shelf catches his back and he slides down against it, streaking the wood with a smear of scarlet.

-

he spots iseult approaching, swallows the pit in his throat in favor of burgeoning, unbridled relief that he schools his face from betraying, if only for the moment it takes for his guard to overtake the assassin and for savatier to leap away from the fray, throwing himself against his desk and watching the scrimmage, feeling every bit the fly trapped in amber. 

it’s a wretched thing, this helplessness that paralyzes him at the root. iseult moves faster than he can even search for moments where he might slow time to a crawl, just an instant, so that he might stick a quill through the eye or force a letter-opener through his throat. there’s no chance, no opening left by iseult, all brutal swiftness, as elegant as he’s ever seen someone systematically dispatched with practiced ease. realizes, it’s been all too easy to underestimate iseult and remember he’d been hired for his abilities beyond finding a comfortable perch from which to watch him do his readings. it looks far too easy for iseult to twist the ebb and flow of the skirmish, and his primal heartbeat thrums wild with elation when it seems apparent that his guard has the upper hand. 

but just as quickly as the tides changed, they shift yet again. a silent, strangled yell lodges itself in his throat at the flash of silver, at the sight of a blossoming wound beneath it. he launches himself past the deceased assassin, slipping on blood coating the floor, and wraps his arms around iseult’s shoulders as he descends, balking at the trail of red he leaves behind. 

“you’re alright,” savatier grounds out through gritted teeth, grip tight around slackening flesh. bellows, “guards!” there’s too much blood lost already, spills over his fingers as if he’s upended a bottle of wine over his hands. odeline, help him. the only time he’s prayed to her, and it’s less a prayer and more a conversation long overdue. 

she doesn’t answer. and when he tries to will time into reversing, it doesn’t answer him either, only continues its excruciating march. here, it says. have this. his blood on your hands. his life for yours.

“iseult,” savatier murmurs, smooths hair from his face, presses his hand to the wound harder. it sounds like the name was a bubble welling in his mouth, then bursting. “it wasn’t worth it. you should have kept to your pastries.” the guilt feels like another attempt on him, like poison corroding him inside out. “tell me your last wishes, who i should send your love.”

Where: The Summer Palace’s Library. When: The Night of the Masquerade, During The Fireworks. Who: @savaticr

There should not be a light behind the window, and yet there is. 

If Gisele is forced to suffer through the grand finale of this terrible night, everyone else should have to endure the same agony, without the singular mercy of retreating to a now empty palace. This thought has occurred to her multiple separate times in the past few minutes as she stands alone in the gardens, apart from the others, watching the sky flash endlessly with violent light. Her thoughts are moving cyclically, along the same tracks to the same diversions, as though scripted; Her feelings too are fraught and mutating from moment to moment, leaving her dispossessed of herself, scrambling for purchase in any kind of constancy she can get. 

Some believe there is constancy in the finality of grief, but the notion is misguided– finality comes when the grief is sourced from circumstances beyond your control. Gisele’s grief is a suffocating shark on a fisherman’s boat, slippery and sharp-toothed and either thrashing so violently it could shatter bone or lying so still you could not meaningfully tell if it was still clinging to life. Now is one of the more severe struggles: her own arrogance is wedged in her throat, stifling her breathing until it is so slow she almost isn’t breathing at all. How could Gisele dare, to sit across from Vivienne as she swallowed poison, to look Yvon in the eye as she lusted after her demise? How could she? 

And yet how could she not? It needed to be done, and so it would be. Best to cut these lines of thinking short before they hooked her inexorably, but that meant finding something else to feed the ravenous, churning thoughts and, ah, that light is still there, mocking her. 

A light is aglow behind the window; If Gisele is to tolerate this night, everyone else should have to as well; She feels awfully detached from herself; She’s a monster who murdered a sister; She’s a monster who’ll do it again; A light is aglow behind the window. 

The urge to investigate is one she will deny herself no further, if only to break the chain. 

Gisele arrives at the darkened library without a light of her own, subtle as sin, intending to ambush the trespasser, transmute her own distress into theirs and thus exorcise it. Soundlessly, she passes through the door and aisles of shelves, honed on the suggestions of shadows like a prowling beast. As soon as she rounds the final corner to reveal the stranger, she does so with a theatrical clearing of her throat, a straightened posture, puffed up like a park pigeon facing down a predator. “Well, well, what have we here? You know it’s terribly impolite to sneak off during a party, so you should consider it a blessing that I-”

And then her eyes adjust, revealing none other than the librarian himself. Her monologue withers and dies on her lips, her expression and demeanor going empty, as though all momentum has drained directly out. So she alone was the trespasser, just her luck. “Er, pardon me, Monsieur, I hadn't…" The words come uneasy and faltering, tone drifting upwards, phrased like unintentional questions. “I didn’t realize you’d be here at such an hour or I wouldn’t have… I trust I’m not troubling you?”

-

to be anywhere beyond his own solitude is to walk on a knife’s edge. 

he was never made for this; the gold sheen of this capital, weaving through politics if not staying out of it completely, standing shoulder to shoulder with courtiers and nobles and pretending as if he belongs when silk and blood mix. the spectacle of a masquerade was alien enough, but an execution as calandre’s finale was neither the tedium he expected nor the noise to cut through the doldrums he’d wanted. it’s with crashing relief that he slips away in between fireworks, and to the respite of a familiar space, the soft glow of candlelight creating enough of a lilting waltz that he wouldn’t want for another masquerade the rest of his life. 

at his desk, he pauses. every paper and scroll  is as he left it, and his fingers hover over his quill, tempted to pick it up and write of all that has transpired, to create order in the night’s disarray, if only for his own peace of mind--behind it, for posterity. should hippolyte turn out to be innocent, does he trust calandre’s biographers to transcribe this evening’s events? oddly, no one seems to remember jaster stuck a sword through a man’s gut.

before he can begin, a voice startles him out of his musing, though he doesn’t stand from his seat. knowing iseult is somewhere in the shadows, loathed as he is to admit after their vague little row, offers a sense of ease he wouldn’t have otherwise. 

his brow lifts when the woman he’s come to know as gisele duval begins with chastisement and ends with amends. it’s a shock to see how either duval sister can muster the strength and will to attend a damned masquerade, though he’s come to understand both boast their own peculiar resilience. while yvon seemed to cope with questionable habits, of which he tries to coax her from when she does find her way to the library, gisele in particular strikes savatier as less shaken, faster to grieve and recover. 

—

At the table now, he looks over the spread of tomes. They spill across the table in rows so rich he thinks soil before he thinks syntax. Thinks of tilling before taxonomy. Thinks of roots and leaves and the vexing patience of their strange, meticulous gardener. It would be easy, he thinks, to wrap gloved hands around these curious fruits the Librarian imparts to him and wring the meaning from their rinds. Deliver the seeds to Alain Gauthier and bury it all once the job is through.

It would be easy. So why, pray tell, does his hand drift for the nearest open book? It’s theater, he swears. It’s all bets and wagers. It’s putting the chips down now to reap them again later twofold, from the man who seems able to solve this. Solve him, and his maddening question: what am I? Why am I something death eludes?

I am simply cultivating something of my own, Iseult tells himself in the nights he stands watch outside the door. When the time comes, I will harvest what I need. His time in the underworld has made him a patient gardener, too.

“Hm,” he hums in reply, mulling over what his ward has let on. He posits, rhetorical as the librarian allows it to be, “and for what do you hunger? To know this country to its root?” he cranes his neck heavenward, to eye the soaring ceilings, “this palace? Or something further, still,” like the things that shift and slouch beneath its gilded veneer. The inevitable question left unanswered circles back in his mind. And to what root for what leaf are you trying to fathom?

Iseult’s hesitation rears its head once more. His hand has stopped just shy of turning a page he hasn’t read. The expectation here, the give and take, is self evident. He permits it (a thing of strategy alone, he’ll argue). Stubborn willed as he is, his investment is phrased as a question.

“Do you believe in his innocence, still?” Not is he, not was he, not why did you make his case. Something deeper, rather. A question of faith.

-

he’s still unused it to, his guard going further than merely observing, asking these questions that plunge past the surface and deep into the unseen dark. feels like treading through unclaimed territory and wild earth, and he’s never been one to evade the unfamiliar, but wonders from where exactly this curiosity is borne. when, rather. when he’d asked iseult why he didn’t speak to hippolyte’s fate, perhaps? come to think of it, had they ever discussed anything beyond the perfunctory grunts of greeting at the start of every day in the library and farewells, beyond the idle chat and observations that had come to pervade their dynamic up until then?

it is with no small measure of guilt that savatier realizes he’s not asked iseult anything of worth. never offered anything worth keeping, either.

(he has his defenses, his excuses. too preoccupied with wondering why he’s worth being given a keeper at all, unless he’s under suspicion, unless he’s been discovered, and his mercenary is less a guard and more a nanny--more of a spy.)

regardless of his paranoia, it is hardly iseult’s burden to bear, whether savatier is right about his concerns or not. 

“to know this country, i suppose. but deeper still, for questions i have, for questions i’ve yet to have. finding corollaries between the birth of a land, the birth of man, what history can tell of us of our own futures.” it’s no lie, not this summation of it. he’d been ravenous to learn what had happened in the centuries between his displacement, to odeline and jaster, and after that instance of closure, he was hungrier yet to see if he can understand what’s happened to agrippine. as long as it feels like a pursuit, it’s easy to numb himself to the loss that never seems to subside, only undulates. its retreat, the wait, is the worst of it. “much can change through a land’s history, its churn of kingdoms and rulers, but it is its people who give it meaning. the markers of their lives, birth and laughter and grief, swept over in favor or war and ills.”

starts to say, it’s not whether he is innocent or not, hippolyte wasn’t given a fair trial. his death was made a spectacle. but iseult isn’t asking about that. he sees it in his expression, the inquisition mired by what feels like genuine curiosity. the mercenary asks not of facts, but of faith. 

—

The last couple of days at Cyril’s shop had been calmer compared to the influx of clientele that came rushing as the celebrations grew closer. For weeks, all Cyril had done was surround herself with flowy gowns and gilded suits, each one more intricate than the one before and all of them etched onto her mind — just like every design before them. All done, however, in the same way, an attempt to outshine those around them, a way of showing just what the noble that ordered them was about and how much of themselves they wanted to put under the spotlight.

It’s the noise coming from the front of her store that brings her out of her workshop, parting the curtains that separated it from the rest and footsteps coming to a halt at the sight of a barely-familiar face; one that she’d seen around somewhere but couldn’t quite place it and that feeling only grew as she walked towards him, a smile on her uncovered features. 

Everything about the interaction had nothing that ought to create worry inside of Cyril’s mind — the man is just a costumer and nothing about his demeanour spoke louder than the quietness that seems to surround him. There is nothing about the man that tells Cyril that she ought to become nervous about exchanging words with him. Not until the rest of the words got to her ears.

Immediately, her eyes widen slightly and Cyril swears her heart stopped for only half a moment. Part of her tells her that perhaps the man is speaking about something completely unrelated to her failed attempt at teaching a courtier a lesson, but the other part of her screams that it’s exactly that that the company she held was talking about. 

Maybe she can just pretend to be completely clueless about what the man is talking about. That could potentially work, right? “Oh,” she breathes out, shaking her head and waving her hand in a dismissive motion, “not at all. It’s been quite calm, compared to before the festivities. And I, erm — I’m not sure I follow what you’re talking about but I would never hurt a courtier, no matter what.” It’s then that she realises she probably should not have said the word ‘hurt’ but she stands tall, hoping he hadn’t noticed. “So…” She allows her voice to fade out between them.

Cyril clears her throat, bringing back a smile (though a far more nervous one) before she looks over the outfit he wore. “Are you looking to buy something? Your robes look like they need to retire.”

-

the tailor seems committed to her false ignorance; savatier isn’t surprised. such an allegation would surely not reflect kindly upon calandre nor her favored tailor should her courtiers hear word about it. such consequences prove irritating at best, ruinous at worst, and it’s a damned shame knowing cyril is subject to them at all, with all the potential resting within her fingertips--the drawbacks of being chosen by the empress herself. he knows what he’d caught a glimpse of in the summer court was just that--a mere glimpse. even if she isn’t aware of it herself. 

the method here, it seems, is shaping out to be reassurance. to reassure her he is not threat, that what he’d seen is safe with him, and will reach no one else. grateful that he is that even a non-mage can spot feats of magic, it is with a certain measure of remorse that he cannot reveal any of his own, a secret for a secret, as he would like to. 

“it’s alright, cyril.” his lips quirk. her attempts at saving face are, admittedly, bemusing, having seen what he saw. “no one else will be hearing of what transpired.” he thinks to leave it at that, to let her decide to accept it. “shame you’re forced to retribute in secret, no?”

"my robes?” savatier glances down. “they’re customary of the imperial librarian.” pilfered off the previous one, to be pedantic. “everything collects dust in that library, i suppose.” a faintly endeared smile curves his lips. “are you offering me an elevation to distract me from the matter at hand?”

— 

blood, he says, and they wince at the sound of it. hand still in his, their grip tightens. when did savatier become the anchor that tethers agrippine to themselves, to their body which still lives, to the fragments of memory that survived, the bravest parts of them as well as the weakest? the world spins on its axis when all agrippine wants is a moment of pure stillness, a beat to recover their balance and catch their breath. they lurch forward, they are tossed to and fro by the horrible waves of recollection, and savatier catches them. savatier promises reason to the rhyme, and if not an answer to the question, then at least a method to the madness. to their madness.

they close their eyes, not to shut savatier out but to respond to him. “no, there is no pain,” agrippine says, lying as much as they are speaking the truth. there is no bleeding or bruising, no injury to stitch or swelling to cool; but agrippine is a walking and open wound wherever they go, not of body but of heart. there is pain everywhere, and it shows in their wide-drawn eyes when agrippine looks at savatier, brows knit together and lip trembling. “i felt nothing for them, savatier. i feel nothing for them now.”

“it may have been the execution,” agrippine agrees, shuddering at the mention of it. “i don’t understand whether it was just or cruel. i just know the sight of it horrified me, and i wish i had not seen it. because, savatier,” agrippine looks away from him, ashamed as they confess, “if all my memories are like this, i would not like to remember them at all.” 

—

relief washes over him in a balming current. good, that they are not in pain, that they don’t remember pain during these bursts of memories that already engulf them in wildfire burning. if agrippine were to be overcome with physical agony during these moments, his helplessness heightened and no answer for respite, he thinks--he would be ruined. 

already, it is a small tragedy that all he can do is listen and offer a familiar touch to tether them with all the might and meaning he can muster--with all that he has left that couldn’t save odeline--and, somehow, he’s only wondered only once why he’s so insistent on giving agrippine everything and taking nothing. no, this isn’t properly true; he is taking something. purpose, perhaps, if he wanted to be grand about it. but to be needed feels smaller, selfish, a great deal more human and less noble. 

says nothing as they speak, but pulls them closer, shields their line of sight from the rest of the celebration, the remnants of the execution, with the broad of his silhouette. damn the fucking empress, boasting an execution as a spectacle, no regard for who she was harming by doing so. and for what? to send a warning to her detractors? mind, he’s seen brutality at every stage. the world nearly a thousand years ago was a far more merciless place with no one to tame it, and now in this age, now that the beasts of yore have been eradicated, now that calandre’s legacy boasts of bringing in a reign of peace and prosperity decorated with shining wealth while evoking old world severity leaves a vile taste on his tongue.

“you shouldn’t have seen it. none of us should have.” brows creased in sympathy for them, in fury towards calandre, he squeezes their palm. their memories are bloody and cruel--perhaps they were too, once. but it’s clear their memories torture them now, that who they once were and who they’ve become are not conflicted, but separate. “do not put yourself through anguish, agrippine. even if you regain anything from it.” he breathes in deeply. “i’d rather you be whole and without recollection than broken in remembrance. i wouldn’t be able to stand it.”

Patrice doesn’t expect the sting as Savatier presses the cloth upon his wound. Perhaps it was more serious than he’d imagined, or perhaps there was just enough residual alcohol sloughed upon his skin to have come in contact with the injury. He doesn’t flinch, however. He’d seen far worse, and patched himself up after far worse, as well. And yet, he allows this stranger to tend to a wound that does not require that urgent of attention. It may be the way in which Savatier’s hands work, carefully, curiously. Such curiosity is a trait Patrice has always admired, and something he feared was far too rare in Val Faim. He finds himself drawn in.

The man identifies himself as a librarian, with hands more suited to pages than lesions. It explains the way in which his hands work, Patrice thinks, and yet there is something more experienced within them. Perhaps he’s done this before. Perhaps he’s simply giving Patrice more attention than this injury is actually worth. He doesn’t mind it.

He watches the man when the other’s gaze drops to his work, follows the sharp lines of his face to the softening of his expression. Can a face hold mystery, or only an expression? Savatier’s expression doesn’t seem to be projecting anything mysterious, simply humble and helpful, and yet there is something that Patrice wishes to crack open, a marrow he wishes to discover. It could simply be the way in which he works, if those hands are meant for more than just wound dressing, or if that face is meant for more than just being kind to strangers the rest of this city has seemed to avoid. For now, Patrice does not question it, not too hard.

“You call him Captain,” he replies, a slight grin growing on his features. “Patrice,” he adds a moment later. His surname is absent upon this night. Something tells him he does not need to make his noble blood known to impress the man before him. “What am I to call this librarian who moonlights as a healer of ails?”

He only glances away from Savatier for a moment, to survey what remains following the fight. Glass is being swept off the floor that will likely carry a sticky film for days. Those patrons who were mere collateral damage assess one another’s injuries. Patrice cannot find Degaré, but he can imagine the owner has his hands full. “And I’m certain Degaré’s stock may very well be depleted from tonight’s antics. I have fresh supply on my ship we can use, instead.”

-

”ah, captain. a man well traveled, then,” savatier says, a brow shooting up. he thought as much. this patrice strikes with a different air than most who inhabit val faim. it’s the air of a man without regard for traditional decorum, yet by virtue and action alone carries greater dignity and benevolence than most who call themselves courtiers. 

and a man of the sea to boot. he thinks he can smell it on patrice, the salt of the ocean, the timbers of his ship, the implacable wild current of adventure and a body used to throwing itself into the middle of it. he’s reminded of his own travels long ago, so far separated from his muted existence now. in possession of all the time in the world left him much time and space to travel wherever and whenever he wanted, and before he’d ever ran across odeline, he’d ventured atop ships with nothing but his name, chased horizons across the ocean, memorized his markers in clifftops and gull nests. 

he’s hardly thought of it now, seldom allowing himself to get caught up in remembrance beyond keeping the memory of odeline--the woman, not her myth--alive. the abruptness of it whips him across the face. 

“savatier,” he says, after a moment’s struggle, and exhaling a short chuckle. “hardly a healer, if that wasn’t obvious enough.” again, his fingers skirt over the bandages and taut muscle, examining his own shoddy work. a moment, and he lifts his gaze back up at patrice through fanned lashes. “i know a good man when i see one. wanted to make sure you weren’t bleeding too heavily for your fine deeds; what a way to be welcome to port, hm? you must be well warmed to val faim after this evening.” 

he does not expect to receive an invitation, and he feels his skin flush, unsure if he ought to read between the lines as brazenly as the captain had offered them, or take it for what it is--an innocent offer to follow the man back to his ship for more bandages for a wound that has likely already stopped bleeding. “i haven’t been on a ship in ages,” he admits, and the prospect, not just of company for the evening, but atop a vessel, atop the sea, and far from the cloying air of the summer palace, thrills him. “don’t suppose you keep any bandages up in the crow’s nest?”

"don’t suppose you’ll be going on one of your supply runs soon?” he doesn’t look up from his scrolls, doesn’t stop in his writing. doesn’t attempt to be more forthright in his peckishness, because it isn’t needed. iseult has spoiled him with his regular, illicit kitchen routes, pilfering pastries and wordlessly laying them upon his desk with his return, such that his own belly notices the absence in routine. ‘what kind of hound are you trying to train?’ he asked, once.

"don't suppose you'll make quick work of a cannelés should i happen to?" as always, pleasantly whip-quick. savatier stops writing after a beat, turns to face the mercenary, bare face to mask.

“suppose i would.”

rain hits the glass panes of the windows in its torrential downpour like pebbles across the surface of a lake; a tepid droning quiet following the raucous events of the week. it seems val faim’s long reign of uneventful peace has come to an end. if it’s not a beheading in the afternoon, it’s a magicked explosion in the evening, every threat sending the empress and her retinue scurrying into frenzied investigation. it’d certainly be something to spectate, this privileged position of his, enough on the periphery to play witness, if it didn’t threaten the summer palace - and his own safety, by proxy. 

though, the concern with the latter is negligible. what is left to fear when you’ve seen the dregs of creation and the beasts damned by the earth? when your lover’s bones mingles with dirt? what is left for him? 

iseult often finds him lost in thought, and when he feels a breeze brush behind him, he doesn’t think much of it - until he realizes he didn’t hear the doors open, and sees the dagger speared through his desk, narrowly missing where his hand rested upon his scrolls. 

Savatier, to his credit, takes the drink. Michel watches, briefly, before turning his eyes up towards the sky. Light, color, and sound all cut their way across the stars, only to fade away into a glorious display that leaves the taste of metal in his mouth. He swallows it down in favor of champagne. 

A wild, young world is often violence, and it is only this world that Michel has known. It might be better that he inhabits it in the way that he does, both participant and observer. He is allowed to keep one leg waist-deep in the water, and the other out. He had killed Hippolyte, yes, but he is coming to terms with the fact there is little consequence for him. All around him, he is watching in real time as the waves he had made when prompted by Calandre ripple their way through each and every person who’d witnessed the act.

“Not really,” he says to Savatier, because he isn’t, and he doesn’t have the power in him to muster up the energy for lying. He doesn’t know how to express it outside of saying he’s not having a good time, but after his conversation with Helene, he’s feeling a little raw, like someone scraped him up from the dredges of a jar. He tilts his head towards Savatier, brow arched. Overhead, there is a collective gasp of shock and awe as several more bolts are sent up to shatter and disappear. “Are you?”

he pauses as he tips his glass, perhaps taken aback that the queen’s prized executioner, the inevitable star of her own stage, confesses to melancholy--or, at the very least, apathy. does he not relish in ridding the empress of her dogged assassin? or does he rue his duty? 

does he believe hippolyte to be innocent? 

a frenzy of questions he swallows down with his swirl of champagne, but still they ring stubborn, threatening to bubble past his tongue. despite all that’s happened, he summarily attributes hippolyte’s death to calandre’s will, rightfully, but he’d not thought to think of what her sword thinks of its own killing.