#fucku

“‘tis the work of the Devil.”

“Mm. He tempts the best of us.”

“You don’t say, Sister…”

The Sister raised an eyebrow that crested the lace of her cornette. She clasped her hands, looking down upon her Sister in God with incredulous disapproval. 

“Sarcasm is uncouth, Sister. Uncouth.”

“My apologies, Sister,” the shorter one cooed. “I am altogether out of sorts.”

She bowed her head, turning away with a show of assent, but this did not last. She straightened a moment later, gazing at the stone wall but also at nothing, a contemplative frown on her soft features. Rather pleasant to look at, Sister Cirrus had always thought; more pleasant by far than the beard and tonsure of a monk. The tunic that draped her supple frame did not disguise its allure. Graceful, petite—more shapely too than a monk’s usual physique, even with sack-like garb unaccounted for.

Sister Aurora’s sing-song voice broke her from her musings. 

“Are you not, Sister Cirrus? All out of sorts?” Her breast rose and fell with a sigh. “I feel I should pray for our Brother… though he is no such thing in the eyes of the Lord.”

“We are all the Lord’s children,” Sister Cirrus replied.

She stepped close. Her gentle hand came to rest on Sister Aurora’s shoulder. She was met with widened eyes, prettier than this Sister’s namesake in the sky. Prettier than a good many things the Lord God had created. 

“Matthew five-four. He hears our grief.”

Sister Aurora bit her lower lip. She was so young, may the Lord bless her—she had so much yet to learn—but her gaze softened with recognition after a beat of the heart.

“I confess,” she spoke, at barely a whisper, “that I feel far from comforted.”

Sister Cirrus brought her hand up her shoulder, stroking along it until her fingers reached the high collar. Soft as she dared, she touched Sister Aurora’s chin. Her fingers cupped it; her thumb stroked the skin at the corner of her mouth. Such pretty little lips—still damp from her studious moment of remembrance. 

“It is not I who should hear your confession.”

“Oh, Sister.” Her voice did not disturb even the dust. “Every night it is you.” 

Sister Cirrus’ thumb met that plump lower lip, and she drew from it the sweetest gasp. Sweeter perhaps than the hymns with which such a small woman could command the nave.

“It is a comfort, is it not?” she asked, matching Aurora’s hush. 

A shuffling step, the brush of linen. “And every night I thank our Father for it.”

“Allow Him to act through me.”

“Do you believe,” she asked, her eyes like those of an orphan at the steps, “that He—in much the same way—acts through me, for you?”

Cirrus took the face of her Sister in both of her palms. “You are as much a comfort to me as you are a delight. As such, Sister—yes. I see the gifts of my faith in you.”

Such a small distance to cross, now that they stood breast-to-breast. Slight hands were laid upon Cirrus’ hip; a short breath warmed her neck. They leaned in such a way that their cornettes would not crush, the two as adept at this as they were practiced with their hymns. The press of their lips was as familiar as a kneel to prayer, and in it, Sister Cirrus felt deliverance.