#boralus

@daily-writing-challenge A story based on our mains from BFA! You'll be seeing them a lot soon <3 Small TW for implied / referenced abuse ________________________________________ The rain came sudden over Boralus that day, heavy and relentless. The kind that clogged gutters and churned filth down cobbled alleys in thick rivulets, black as rot and cold as plucked teeth. A thousand rooftops hissed above as Ridley drew his coat tighter, boots scuffing through puddles the color of ale gone flat. He had gone out on an errand for Merrick. Something small. A message. A package, it didn’t matter now. He’d turned the corner toward the crooked loft and spotted her. Sybil was slumped against the alley wall behind the butcher’s, soaked to the bone, and shivering like a plucked bird. “Oi,” Ridley snapped, already striding toward her. “What’n th'fuck are you doin’ out here?”

She didn’t answer, she just blinked at him with those eyes, one lavender, one brown, and tilted her head slow, like she was listening to something only she could hear. “…’m fine,” she mumbled. “‘M just waitin’. Waitin’ for th'street t’swallow me.”

“Bullshite,” he grunted, crouching. “You ain’t fine. Yer lips’re blue.”

She made a noise. Not quite a laugh, but not quite a sob either. “He said I talked too much. So I stopped.” Her voice was thin, breaking at the edges. “Now he says I look too sad. So I came out t’bleed it into the rain.”

Ridley’s fists clenched.

Fucking Merrick.

He looked her over. No bruises today, at least none he could see, but her feet were bare, red with cold, and her fingers were locked stiff around the frayed hem of her shawl. “C’mere,” he muttered, sliding an arm behind her back. “We ain’t doin’ this out 'ere.”

Sybil didn’t resist as he gathered her up, nor did she protest when he hooked his other arm beneath her knees and lifted her like she weighed less than a fawn. She just breathed—shallow, and hitching. “Y’reek of pipe smoke,” she murmured against his collarbone.

“And y'smell like a drowned rat,” he shot back, teeth grit. “S’pose we make a good match.”

She was quiet for a beat, then whispered: “Sweet, that.”

Ridley froze for just a blink. “…Whot?”

“Carrying me. All rough an’ ugly an’ angry about it. It’s sweet.”

He scoffed, but it came out thin. “Ain’t nothin’ sweet 'bout me.”

“Still is,” she said softly. “Even sugar tastes bitter if you burn it.”

The streets blurred around them, Boralus groaning under the weight of rain and rot, but Ridley didn’t stop walking until he reached the loft. The old stairs creaked under his boots, and the door squealed open with a push of his shoulder before slamming shut with a kick of his heel. He laid her down in front of the hearth which was just ash and cold stone now, but it’d do—and stripped off his coat to wrap around her. She didn’t move. “…You hungry?” he asked.

“No,” she whispered.

“You hurt?”

“No.”

He paused, then knelt beside her. “…Want somethin’ sweet?”

She turned her head. “Aye.”

And that night, Ridley stood over the brazier stirring a pilfered tin of condensed milk and stale oats into something clumsy and hot and laced with honey he'd pinched off a stand in the market a week back.

Sybil watched from the floor. Still quiet, but shivering less now. When he brought her the mug, she didn’t say a word. She just sipped from it, then blinked. “…Burned it.”

“Yeah,” Ridley muttered.