TOUCHED BY THE BACK HAND OF GOD

     ‘ --- please,’ she says, voice thin and rasping. ‘I have nowhere else to go. Refuge, food, only a day or two. Please.’

     The question scrapes out before she can consider it, properly, test the weight of any answers. “Are you protection?”

     Freedom. Silence. Peace. “Protection.” The touch is like something spiked sliding against slate; she can almost hear the screaming noise it makes, just above the sound of comfort. A swallow to unstick her words from the inside of her throat. “You shouldn’t be here.”

     “ --- Mr Deschain?” She’s barely been here five minutes but already the heavy perfume of flowers has done its job: first, an overwhelming constant, almost pungent; then softer, sweeter, more yielding; and finally a barely noticeable buzz. She inhales, nonetheless, smiles with a little more wideness, a little more tenacity. “Vanessa Ives. Apologies for the scent. It’s rather overwhelming, today, isn’t it?”

like for a smol starter!!

     There’s an odd urge to laugh, but her face won’t let a smile press through, sour or otherwise. She’s glad of it. Holding in a breath, she throws a look over her other shoulder. “I didn’t summon you here.” A pause, to think, words bristling at the edges of her skin, pressing gooseflesh up her arms. “Who commands you?”

     Vanessa doesn’t have to look to know. The Nightcomers occupy a certain place on the spectrum of fear: this man, if he is a man, sits somewhere else on that line. She can’t place him, and isn’t sure she’d rest easy if she could. On a moment of brashness, eyeing the door and her little scorpion, “Leave me.”