AN - Blame this on my hopeless crush on Orla Brady.
It's quiet at the Totemic commune, quieter than Lydia remembers it being when she was young. After thirty-seven years spent in the fort, she's been conditioned to accept noise as a way of life. From clippers training on the grounds outside the mansion to the bustling of waitstaff within, there was always some sort activity to ensure any respites were brief and never comfortable, just the way Quinn liked it.
During those first months of their marriage, she'd stalked the darkened hallways, unable to sleep after her husband passed out either from the aftermath of drunken carousing with his men or having just finished wearing himself out with her body. She'd loved Quinn then, hadn't minded being used when she got her own pleasure out of their couplings. But when he wasn't awake to distract her, she found no solace in her new environment, cacophonous as it was, and missed the tranquility of nature to lull her into the elusive arms of oblivion. In those days, she'd still clung to her faith, and when her relentless pacing didn't tire her out she would lock herself away in one of the unused rooms and pray until weariness finally set in. Only then would she return to her marriage bed for a few scant hours of sleep before waking to repeat the entire cycle the next day.
Back then, being liberated from home hadn't precluded her from yearning for it. But now that she is home again after so long, she is just as unsettled by the quiet as she'd been with the fort's noise as a naive girl of eighteen summers; she'd not been much younger than Jade when Quinn whisked her away with the promise of a life full of excitement and danger, all of the things she'd been craving since she could remember.
Anger roils in her gut when that name pops into her mind. Such a fool she was to allow that treacherous tramp even an inch of sympathy. She'd had the audacity to believe a bond was forged between them out in the poppy fields beneath that relentless furnace in the sky which scorched all flesh alike. And though Jade proved that retrospectively ludicrous assumption wrong, and with breathtaking haste, at least for Lydia's part it was an honest development.
Being out there with Jade, working until her fingers bled and her back incessantly ached, gave her a new appreciation for the poor souls who slaved away under objectively brutal conditions to provide for the lavish lifestyle she'd lead for so long. Having shared their toil in only the most insignificant of ways, tasted the sweat soaking her skin, and felt the pain of such monotonous and excruciating labor, her innate narcissism could no longer be used as an excuse to remain blissfully oblivious of their plight.
Later that night as she bathed away the grime and stink, she'd allowed herself a moment of clarity to acknowledge her shame at how callously she'd treated her fellow human beings when she'd learned so stark a lesson that day. Beneath the thin veneers of social status and sartorial decadence, everyone was comprised of the same frighteningly delicate flesh, susceptible to the same emotions, and ultimately made equals by way of the grave. Death is the only actor in the production of life who does not play favorites.
In the afterglow of that revelatory experience, had Jade revisited her overture about improving the lives of the cogs as a means to secure their loyalty, she might have been convinced to join forces to sway Quinn's typically unyielding mind to grant it. But it was not to be, for Jade was too busy sharpening the knife with which to stab Lydia in the back.
That day also gave Lydia a new appreciation for the former cog girl whose deceptive wit and pretty face elevated her from serfdom to the betrothed of the Baron and has now presumably, with all other claimants out of the picture, inherited the title of Baroness. An impressive feat for what was once a wisp of a girl a brisk gale could have carried a thousand miles away. Jade's former insignificance stood in stark juxtaposition with her current ascension to power, making Lydia all the more jealous of the girl's meteoric rise, and even more disgusted with herself for falling for the proletarian charm that so dexterously disarmed two notoriously skeptical souls as she and Quinn.
Granted, Lydia would be lying to deny she'd felt something for her young rival as they worked so naturally together. As they labored under the withering sun, their movements were so synchronized as to portray a partnership that mystified the gawking eyes of the clippers helping tend the season's jeopardized crop. For all appearances the two made a team of such graceful fluidity that none outside the fort would believe just hours before they were heatedly vying for influence with the Baron. There was just something about Jade that reeled Lydia in, that coaxed her out from behind her painstakingly manufactured walls, both physical and metaphorical, and made her feel something she'd not been able to identify.
Not one day later as she daubed the sweat from porcelain skin heated with fever induced by a self-administered poison, she found herself dwelling on the Jade-shaped warmth in her chest that didn't seem to want to go away no matter how fervently she tried to banish it. Whatever it was, confusing as all hell as it was, it was real, and it made her crave Jade's presence in a way she'd not experienced since she was a young woman still in love with her husband...which should have told Lydia all she needed to know. But she is stubborn and blind to her own emotions just as thoroughly as she had been to Jade's duplicity, so she remains to the present utterly perplexed at how easily she became wrapped around the girl's pale, delicate finger.
She supposes that ignorance was largely the cause her downfall. She had underestimated Jade, and almost fatally at that. There was a moment after Quinn thundered into the bedroom with murder in his eyes that she'd truly feared her husband would gift her a second smile across her throat for her alleged crime, decades of marriage and partnership be damned. She supposed bearing him a son – however disappointing Ryder turned out to be to a father of such impossible expectations – counted for something after all.
Such a small mercy seems inconsequential, though, when Lydia has lost everything she worked so hard and sacrificed so much for. Her influence, position, and wealth are all gone thanks to a subtly ambitious girl she'd dared open her heart to. In all of her years inside the fort, no one aside from Quinn and Ryder had ever penetrated the thickly layered shell she erected around her heart until Jade decided to simply waltz her way around it pretty as she pleased. And now with that barrier of protection pestled into dust upon the mortar of naive trust, Lydia has come full circle in life, back to the place where it all began so many years ago. Only when she left the commune then it was on her feet with her head held high, but she'd returned on her knees, a broken shell of the proud, spirited girl she used to be. Perhaps she would have been better off had Quinn chosen to add her to his already impressive array of kill tattoos rather than ostracizing her, which seemed at the time a fate worse than death. At least then she wouldn't have to live with knowing she only had herself to blame.
At first Lydia wanted to strangle Jade for her betrayal, but found she couldn't hold on to her bitter fury very long when it was ultimately misplaced. As much as she wished she could tally up all of her woes upon Jade's account, it was her own machinations in the past to rid herself of the pest that was Beatrice which inevitably planted the seeds of doubt in her distrustful husband's mind. Damned box of Monk's Hood. She should have destroyed the evidence of her immutably cardinal sin instead of hanging on to it just in case she had need of it again. Not that disposing of it would have mattered in the end. Even without proof, Quinn would have been easily persuaded of her guilt; those headaches of his only made him more paranoid than usual. It really should not have been a great surprise, then, that someone finally came along with the wit to put two and two together and enough craftiness to utilize her transgression to poison the increasingly uneasy well of trust between her and a husband more apt to condemn without substantiation than forgive with an abundance of it.
How could she truly blame Jade when it was as much her own fault – if not more so – that she lost it all – her husband, her son, her privileged life, and her home? And how could she hate Jade when she'd once been Jade? After all, it wasn't simply Quinn's charm or dashing swagger or rugged good looks that lured her away from a life of faith she'd once been devoted to. No, it was her own ambition, her own avarice, her own inner darkness that latched on to the freedom Quinn embodied, a freedom to be who she really wanted to be, powerful and rich and worshiped for both her lofty position and enviable beauty. Ultimately the only difference between her and Jade was that she'd made no secret of how corrupt and selfish she is while Jade played the ingenue with all the finesse of a seasoned actress.
Self-loathing hits Lydia square in the chest, an unfamiliar feeling for a woman who has never had cause to doubt her choices in life. It's a wonder her father had taken her back considering how tainted her soul is. She hadn't been lying when she told him how grateful she was for his generous mercy and compassion. She doesn't deserve it and never will. The only question that remains for her to answer now is whether or not she will squander the second chance she's been given. And while she wants very much to believe she's learned her lesson about the dangers of greed and the toxicity of pride, she has doubts as to whether they will stick. Time, she supposes, will tell.
For the longest, Lydia sits in the darkness, head bowed and posture perfect just like she was taught from her youth. As her father used to say, "Posture and discipline go hand in hand." Although she'd neglected the practice since her son's birth, meditation comes easily, like riding a bicycle, and as she empties her mind of any latent thoughts and emotions, her grasp on the present is relinquished to the unique serenity meditating affords.
Some time later – Lydia doesn't know how much – she's broken out of the peaceful trance by a shrill whinny and the steady beating of hooves against the earth. A rider is approaching the commune, which at this late hour is very unusual. People generally don't even visit during the day, seeing as it is nestled into an obscure valley miles beyond the last vestiges of civilization. Curiosity flaring, Lydia strains her ears to listen as her father approaches the visitor. His voice is faint as he inquires about their purpose for journeying so far out of the way so late in the evening.
"I'm here to see your daughter," the person says, and Lydia's breath catches in her throat. Soft and feminine with the undertones of an intelligence that is easily dismissed, Jade's voice is unmistakable.
"I'll call for her," her father says, his own voice more gruff than usual with suspicion.
Immediately following her re-dedication, he'd taken her to his quarters, away from prying eyes and ears, and demanded to know what happened to her. That she would come to him, of all people, the man she had once sworn never accepted her or understood her, a man from whom she proclaimed visceral glee at being so heroically delivered by her cavalier young clipper. With some great reluctance, she'd told him the truth, if only because she knew that, differences aside, he loved her in spite of her scornful words. He'd only publicly excised himself of her because it hurt too much to admit he would otherwise take her back without hesitation. And when she did come back some three decades and change later, he didn't even allow her grovelling to reach truly pathetic levels befitting a heartless betrayal such as hers. That she has so neglected and abused her father's abiding love is yet another blot on an already horrifically stained conscience that will probably never get scrubbed clean.
Jade's response is a little too quick for Lydia's liking. "No! I would much prefer to speak with her privately. The matter I wish to discuss is...delicate."
Her father hums, but does not question Jade's request. Whether it is out of deference to the newly minted Baroness or trust of his daughter, Lydia doesn't know.
"You'll find her meditating in her quarters just over there," he says a beat later. Lydia assumes he points out the one he'd assigned within the first row of ramshackle shanties on the west end of the compound. "You'll have all the privacy you require there." Lydia hears the rustling of Jade's dress as she begins to move, but her father stops her by adding, "However, the hour is growing late, and I'll not have her distracted from her nightly prayers longer than necessary. Also, our days are long and wearisome with toil, and she will require rest for the morrow. See you don't keep her occupied too long."
"I won't. You have my word," Jade says, and then her skirts are swishing as she resumes her short journey to the tiny one room hut Lydia now calls home. Jade stops outside the entryway covered only by a threadbare curtain. Abodes belonging to devotees are not permitted to have doors. Only her father's cabin has that luxury. A single, tentative knock upon the wooden panels of the hut officially announces Jade's arrival. "Lydia? I know I'm not your favorite person right now, but..." A deep, preparatory breath. "May I please speak with you?"
With her heart thudding painfully in her chest and rage bubbling in her veins, Lydia has half a mind to turn the devious little tart away, if only to avoid bloodshed, as she's itching to claw Jade's pretty blue eyes out. But she can do neither, not when her father knows Jade is here to see her, and not when some treacherous, stupid, masochistic part of her wants to see Jade's face again.
"Come in," she says as she raises up off the floor, throat so tight her words are hardly audible. Jade hears them though, and sweeps the curtains away, then steps into the cramped hut. Dimly lit as the space is with only a small candle, her eyes are still a shade of azure more brilliant than Lydia imagines any sea can faithfully reproduce, and the shadow cast over her features in the soft orange glow pronounces the alluring cleft of her chin. She is impossibly beautiful, and Lydia hates herself for even thinking that.
"Lydia, I..." For a moment, Jade falters, kneading her hands together at her waist. "I came to say I'm sorry," she says after the pause, her expression conflicted and guilt-laden, which only reignites Lydia's fury. How dare she come here and have the audacity to appear remorseful for what she's done! The urge to throttle the disingenuous Jezebel is almost too strong to resist.
Thankfully Lydia has a lifetime of training to master her emotions. Rather than lash out with a fist or an open hand as she wants, she raises a dark eyebrow. "Are you? Seems to me you got exactly what you wanted. I'm gone, and though Quinn was all yours – as was Ryder – for only a short time, now you have the whole of the Barony as well." Jade gapes at the last part, which makes Lydia chuckle darkly. "Did you think I didn't immediately figure out why you eliminated me from the board? Quinn might be Baron, little girl, but I'm the one who taught him chess, who encouraged him to think before drawing his sword at the first provocation, who kept him and his interests safe whenever he was away on business, and did so in the shadows even when he was present. I'm not as big an idiot as you thought me to be."
"Yet you had no clue what I was about to do," Jade says, eyes flaring in offense at being mocked.
"To my eternal shame, I didn't," Lydia says. She deliberately folds her hands neatly in front of her, a picture of false composure meant to contrast herself from the nervousness Jade displayed at first. "A mistake I'll not make again. Believe me, I see you for who you are now, albeit too late to make any difference. Like so many others, I was blinded by that innocent facade of yours. Though to be fair, I must admit that I had actually started to trust you after..." she trails off before admitting to the moment of weakness that had ultimately lead to her current ignominious exile.
"After what?"
There is a gentleness to the query Lydia hadn't expected. She shifts her weight from one foot to the other. "The poppy fields. I...I'd thought we'd come to an understanding that day, that we'd learned enough about each other to realize co-existence was not so out of the realm of possibility as I'd once thought. I meant what I said that I didn't want us to be enemies. But as you so accurately pointed out, I had no clue you were just playing me for the fool. It was a master stroke of deception. Well done. I bought the act hook, line, and sinker."
Confronted with her chicanery, Jade ducks her head demurely and gazes up through her lashes. A long withheld secret shines in her eyes. "What if I told you that it wasn't?"
Lydia reels back as if struck by the implication. "I beg your pardon?"
"That day in the fields...it wasn't an act, not for me," Jade says, her words spilling out as if having been restrained to the point of pain. "I need you to know that. As for what came after? I had to remove you from the picture in order to get what I wanted, and framing you was the only way I could think of. I knew Quinn wouldn't kill you, that he would banish you rather than spill the blood of the woman who bore his son and had earned his trust a thousand times over through the years. I had hoped in the aftermath you would return to your father for protection – which you did, to my great relief. You were spared the ugliness that happened when the Widow's alliance attacked the fort. But I swear to you, I wasn't playing a game with you that day." Jade reaches out to grasp Lydia's forearm, imploring her for understanding. "I really do admire you...more than you'll ever know."
Lydia shrugs the hand off as if it burns, lips curling up into an angry snarl. "After what you did to me, you expect me to believe a word you say?"
"No, I don't," Jade says, eyes so big and beseeching that Lydia is losing her tenuous grip on righteous indignation. "I know words are meaningless after what I did. That's why I put myself at risk riding here alone in the evening instead of writing to you. And I know this will seem ridiculous all things considered, but I came here in person, willing to take whatever you want to dish out, for a simple chance to explain why I did what I did."
Lydia snarls. "I've already told you, Jade, I know why you did it!"
"But you're wrong! I didn't do this for power, Lydia! I did it for lo..." Jade takes a trembling breath, gaze averting as she cuts off whatever she was about to reveal. She lingers in silence for a heartbeat, but when she turns back to Lydia, her eyes are pleading for understanding with such keen ferocity that Lydia swallows down the bitter rejoinder she'd been set to serve up. "I spent the entire ride here figuring out what to say to convince you of my sincerity. But it's all going so sideways, and I realize that you're not going to hear me out unless I prove it. So while I've got enough courage, that's exactly what I'm going to do."
Lydia arches a brow dubiously. "And just how do you plan to accomplish that?"
Back straightening, shoulders squaring, face settling into an expression of absolute resolve, Jade says, "Like this..."
There isn't enough time for Lydia to brace herself before Jade is crashing into her, one hand grasping her waist while the other finds purchase around her ear and is pulling her into a kiss that is all supple lips and earnest passion that momentarily steals away Lydia's ability to formulate a coherent response.
For a first kiss, it is tentative and awkward, but also pleasing in a way Quinn's haven't been in nigh on a decade. She has never kissed a woman before, and it is alien to her, but she finds that's not such a bad thing. There is no rough stubble chafing her cheeks and chin, no violence behind the act, no physically communicated assertions of dominance, just raw need and primal desire and tender affection all rolled up into one soft embrace. It feels so good that Lydia loses herself in the sensations produced by full lips trapped between her own and a feminine body pressed intimately against her. Warmth unexpectedly gathers in her loins, and she almost succumbs to the impulse to deepen the kiss before she remembers who she is kissing.
She tears away from Jade with a cry, knocking them both off balance. "What the hell was that?" she says as she recovers her composure. She wipes her mouth with her sleeve as if disgusted, which she is, just not at having been kissed by a woman who happens to be her enemy. Rather she is upset with herself because she'd liked it far more than she should have considering said woman has had both her husband and her son between her legs. Through that distorting lens, the wrongness of the desire cannot be understated, but she feels it all the same.
Jade bites her lip, cheeks flushed with embarrassment. "I-I'm sorry. I thought...I thought I felt something from you that day. That you felt...I guess I was wrong." Lydia just stares, dumbstruck, which seems to make Jade even more uncomfortable. She scratches at her neck for a few seconds, and when Lydia remains unresponsive, she ducks her head to hide her reaction. But Lydia hadn't missed how crushed she looked. "I'm sorry, I'll go. I just...I'm sorry. Truly." And then Jade is turning to leave.
But Lydia can't have that. Something in her is screaming, begging her to stop Jade before she's gone and likely out of her life forever. It makes her feel panicky and a little crazy, and she nearly makes a fool of herself rushing after the fleeing girl to pull her back inside before she is fully through the curtained doorway.
Those arresting blue eyes grow huge again at Lydia's abrupt action, though this time they are full of hurt and confusion. Jade stares at Lydia with a million questions and a half-quenched hope, and Lydia doesn't know what to say in the face of having put that expression there. How can she when she hardly knows what she's feeling? All she knows is that the idea of Jade walking away from her right now is unacceptable.
Still, she is too perplexed to even formulate words, so she merely stares as if willing Jade to understand the intolerable surge of emotions roiling within her head and heart.
"Lydia?" Jade's voice is gently probing for an answer as to why she was detained that Lydia isn't sure she has.
Scrambling to make sense of the disconcerting jumble of feelings currently assaulting her, Lydia releases Jade's forearm and brushes at her forehead with her own as she steps away from the danger this girl represents. "I...you...what was that Jade?"
Jade's eyes sparkle as a smile forms upon lips that have proven to be even softer than they look. "It was a kiss. An inadvisable one it seems."
Lydia scoffs with frustration. "I know that! Why did you kiss me?"
"Oh, Lydia." Jade takes a forbearing breath, then begins chasing after Lydia, one step forward to every step back until Lydia's back is pressed against the unforgiving wall that prevents her from fleeing the hungry lioness who has singled her out as prey. "I kissed you because I have wanted to for a very long time. I was going to explain everything right after, but the way you reacted...it just looked like you hated it. That you still hated me."
Lydia sighs, suddenly exhausted from battling her own mind and heart over this incredibly confusing girl. "I don't hate you, Jade. I can't." The honesty comes pouring out whether she wants it to or not. She's too overwrought to hold it in now. Or maybe it's because she's wedged between Jade's piercing cerulean irises and a very solid object she lacks the mystical ability to remove so as to escape. By all rights she should feel panicked to buy herself some space, but as she spills her guts about her most contemptible deed, she doesn't feel any at all. Not even a hint. "It would be hypocritical of me to say the least," she goes on. "What you did to me...hurt. But it's not as if I haven't done worse. I killed Beatrice because she threatened my position with Quinn, of which you are obviously aware given how cleverly you leveraged that sin against me. So no, I don't hate you. And that's part of the problem."
Jade cocks her head to the side, brows furrowing in an enticing way. "How so?"
"Because I should!" Lydia's eyes flash, hating the how trapped she feels, hating how drawn she is to a girl should rightfully despise. Hating how weak she is. "You destroyed in less than a day what took me thirty-seven years to build! For that, I should want to wrap my fingers around that pale neck and squeeze until your eyes pop out of your skull. I most certainly should not want you to kiss me again!"
None of the rant has any effect on Jade, save for the last sentence. At hearing that admission, her entire visage lights up. "You do?"
Lydia fumbles through for possible reasons why Jade would be happy to hear someone should hate her enough to murder her. It hasn't sunk in yet as to the truth she accidentally let slip. "What?"
Jade nibbles at her lower lip, and her eyes grow hooded as her pupils dilate. Lydia feels heat pool in places she's not felt it in a very long time.
"You want me to kiss you again?" Jade asks, and it suddenly hits Lydia what she'd said. She gasps.
"I-I..that's not what I meant, I was merely making a point, not inviting you to...oomph!" Lydia was about to insist that admission was not an invitation for another unsolicited advance, but that declaration is swallowed up by Jade's eager mouth.
This time the kiss is not in any way gentle. This time Jade throws herself into it, bringing their bodies flush until their breasts are pressing together and her leg is wedged between Lydia's, pushing up into her most sensitive area, causing her to flush with such desire that her entire frame shudders. The reaction encourages Jade, who tilts her head and swipes at Lydia's lips with her tongue, probing for permission to enter. Unable to articulate her approval, Lydia moans as she grants access to a velvet invader that plunders her mouth with stunning speed and dexterity. Their tongues tangle deliciously together as Jade's delicate looking hands roam brazenly over Lydia's curves.
And then without warning Jade is pushing Lydia against the rough wall of the shack. That Lydia is taller than her counterpart does not deter the shorter woman from gaining leverage. Jade is good at that – gaining leverage and then utilizing it to deadly effect. Hands that were once tightly grasping her hips over the plain white fabric of her shift are suddenly moving southward to find purchase on her rear. The action is aggressive without being dangerous like Quinn's groping always was, feeling rather more reverent, as if Jade is possessed by an insatiable urgency to touch Lydia everywhere she shouldn't be considering where they are and who they were to each other less than an hour ago. It is entirely too intoxicating, and Lydia shudders again as Jade squeezes the muscles beneath her fingers, then begins to knead them as they trade lingering, open mouthed kisses.
With Jade's breasts sliding tortuously over Lydia's painfully erect nipples and her thigh pressed as it is against Lydia's overheated and now-sopping core, the onslaught of stimulation is simply too much, too fast for her stave off critical overload. Years have passed since Quinn had her to bed, and Lydia has always been far too proud to pleasure herself. She'd been raised to be stoic and in complete mastery of herself at all times. But all of that diligent schooling and all of those years denying herself the luxury of release is obliterated in seconds by the fervent attention of a woman who knows exactly where to apply pressure to all the right places at the same time.
Lydia wrenches her mouth away from Jade's, yelping as an orgasm rips through her body of such acute intensity that her vision tints white. Where it not for Jade literally supporting her weight, she would surely be in a panting, moaning heap on the floor.
When she glances up a few seconds later, legs a bit more steady, Jade is staring at her with saucer-like eyes. "Did you just…?"
Still trembling with the aftershocks, Lydia lowers her gaze to the ground and nods, utterly mortified at her lack of control.
"Hey."
Jade's kind tone isn't enough to chase away her shame. Not only has she broken her recently renewed vows to remain disentangled from unbelievers, she's done it in the most perverse way possible.
"Hey, look at me."
This time, Jade tenderly tips Lydia's chin up with her index finger so that their eyes meet. Jade's are warm with affection while Lydia's swim with bitter tears. Her humiliation is impossible to conceal from Jade's discerning gaze.
"Don't do this to yourself, Lydia. What just happened wasn't wrong. It was beautiful," Jade says, full of conviction that somehow cuts through all of that self-derision to reach a place of hope Lydia had thought she'd lost forever.
And while the calculating part of her wants nothing more than to rail against the weakness of her flesh and the devilish temptress who took advantage of it, the recently enlightened part realizes she can't be a participant in any more lies. She's spent too many years wrapped up in them, lying to Quinn about Beatrice, to Ryder about the monstrosity his father was slowly becoming, but mostly to herself. She'd convinced herself she still loved Quinn after he stopped looking at her like he used to when they first met. She'd convinced herself it was best for Ryder that he become a strong man like his father in order to inherit the Barony without losing it the very next day to some greedy challenger waiting in the wings to take advantage of the slightest shift in power. She'd convinced herself she was happy with her life, that she didn't regret the choices she made that brought her so much wealth and influence. But they were all lies. Damnable lies that only kept her ignorant of the fire Jade ignited inside her, a flame thirsty to devour life for all it's worth and love with every last fiber of her being. It is a flame that she knows will one day consume her whole, but she can't seem to care about that now in the light of such fathomless adoration shining within Jade's otherworldly blue eyes.
So instead of rejecting Jade as her old self would have done, instead of casting all the blame upon her seductress, she decides to own her choice and to accept her weakness. For once, her life is her own, and she's going to live it for herself. There will be no fawning over the object of her affections, no allowing her agency to be conquered because someone, however gorgeous and desirable they were, made her cum like she hasn't in ages. She'd enslaved herself to Quinn because he made her feel things she didn't think were possible. She won't make that mistake again.
In spite of her soiled undergarments, Lydia musters up enough dignity to stand tall. "Why?"
"Why what?"
Jade's confusion is understandable. She'd obviously been expecting gratitude for the affectionate encouragement she just offered, and to be sure, Lydia did feel grateful. Knowing Jade thought their tryst, abrupt as it was, was beautiful did much to soothe her smarting ego at such a premature climax.
There was a time when Lydia could make it last as long as she wanted, could ride Quinn with composed abandon and then back off, teasing him until he was begging her with tears in his eyes to let him finish. Even during their most heated couplings, Quinn took more time to get her off using all of his considerable prowess than Jade had with two kisses and a little bit of friction. She hadn't thought she was so pent up that the slightest provocation would have her bursting apart at the seams. But then again, maybe that was all Jade. Maybe whatever...this...is between them is just that much more combustible than what she had with her husband. And that is a truly terrifying thought. Terrifying and thrilling.
"You never answered me before. Not really, anyway," Lydia says, brushing away all other considerations besides getting some real answers. "Why did you kiss me that first time, Jade?"
Jade takes a moment to study Lydia, as if assessing her ability to handle the truth. When Lydia arches an eyebrow in challenge, Jade gives her a little smile.
"Like I said, I wanted to. I have since I was a sixteen year old girl who secretly worshiped at your altar." Jade dares to reach up and tuck a stray strand of hair behind Lydia's ear. Her expression is painfully sincere, and it makes Lydia's stomach flutter as if butterflies have taken up residence inside. "I was so infatuated that on a near monthly basis I requested to be assigned to serve you."
Lydia is naturally shocked by the admission. She'd got no such sense out a sixteen year old Jade, not that she'd put much effort into searching for it. Perhaps her callous disregard for those of lesser social status had prevented her from noticing any detectable affections. Or maybe she'd just been blind to the attention because it was from someone of her own gender. Lydia likes to think she's a progressive woman, but she can't dismiss the possibility.
"You did?" she asks, not bothering to mask her surprise at Jade's youthful interest.
"God, yes," says Jade, lips curving sentimentally upward. "You were my first crush."
"I was?" Lydia is pretty sure she's never asked so many question using so few words. And yet her astonishment is so great and her curiosity so piqued that she can't be bothered to chastise herself for such a gross absence of eloquence.
Jade chuckles lightly. "Don't sound so surprised. Surely I'm not the only cog or servant who lusted after you. There is, after all, so much to appreciate." Jade's tone shifts then from amusement to extravagant exaltation. "Of all the women in the Badlands, there is none more beautiful, more impressive, more brilliant than you. Contrary to your belief, I've never been ignorant of the role you played in Quinn's affairs. I've always been aware of your intelligence, and it only made you infinitely more attractive to me."
Jade pauses, gazing down at Lydia with such open adoration that Lydia can hardly believe she hadn't noticed how Jade felt. How could anyone have successfully camouflaged such devotion without once allowing the mask to slip? Not to mention a sixteen year old former cog who, according to Lydia's limited memory, daily appeared so out of her element after leaving the fields to take the up the position of a housemaid. Then again, Jade has proven adept at concealing a great many things, things which had they been revealed would have invariably resulted in her death. How, then, can any of this be trusted? Lydia wonders.
"Oh, how I yearned for just a sliver of your attention," Jade then says as she gingerly trails a work-roughened fingertip down the length of Lydia's jaw, over her lips, down her nose. "I used to fantasize about using the guise of serving you dinner in your chambers to seduce you whenever Quinn was gone on one of his trips. I had my first kiss with a girl I grew up with just because she looked a little bit like you, and it was you I thought of while I was kissing her. It was your name I cried out when I touched myself at night. It was you I pictured holding in my arms until I fell asleep. And it was you I so oft dreamed of, and they were such beautiful dreams that I couldn't let go of them even when Ryder started to fancy me.
"And before you go all mother bear on me, I really did care for Ryder. I loved him, just not like I should have. And I'm sorry for that, but he was as close as I could get to having you without...actually having you." The only reason Lydia doesn't throttle Jade for using her son so contemptibly is because of how guilty she looks. That, and the next words that depart those lovely, indisputably talented lips. "It was Quinn choosing me as his second wife that opened the door for me to get what I truly wanted. Everything I did after that was to that end...was ultimately for you."
Lydia jerks back at that. "Jade...what, exactly, does that mean?"
"It means that I didn't become Baroness just because I care for Ryder and wanted to protect him, and I certainly didn't do it because I had feelings for Quinn. I didn't even do it because I really had no choice in the matter."
There is no mistaking the somewhat bitter and wholly hard-to-swallow authenticity in Jade's response. Sometimes it's easy for Lydia to forget saying no to Quinn once he fixated was not an option for any girl who wished to walk away unscathed. For Jade, it was either marry Quinn or return to the fields...or worse. That she'd chosen the path of least resistance was to be expected.
"The truth is that I saw an opportunity to finally get close to you," Jade continues. "But instead of working out how I thought it would, you shunned me, despised me because you felt threatened, and rightly so. Quinn played us against each other from the start. I knew then that I would never win your heart with us set in direct competition. To borrow a reference from your favorite game, I needed to remove you from the board so I could achieve checkmate without putting you at unnecessary risk."
Lydia hums thoughtfully. She is intrigued by Jade's mention of chess and her love for it, which serves as tacit confirmation that Jade really has been paying attention to her all these years. Outside of Quinn and Ryder, none in the fort are allowed to know of her proclivity for the highly complex game. Can't have the Baroness looking like the true strategist of the family.
Eyes sharp, she says, "And what constitutes checkmate for you, Jade?"
Not since Quinn came charging into the bedroom with a head of steam, a mouthful of accusations, and a handful of circumstantially damning proof has Lydia seen that calculating tint in Jade's mesmerizing eyes.
"Simple." Jade allows her hand to wander from roaming Lydia's face in order to slip it down the length of her neck. Lydia might have read the move as threatening had Jade not soon slid that hand over her shoulder and down her arm until it was wrapping around her own and their fingers were threading together. "My goal was to remove any and all obstacles keeping you from what you deserve...what you've earned: the Barony. And me with it hopefully."
Never one to miss subtext, Lydia springs on the unspoken peripherals to Jade's 'simple' plan. "You mean to say you turned my son against me on purpose? Because he certainly would have been an obstacle to such a plan!"
Jade shakes her head furiously, eyes widening at being confronted with the ramifications of her actions. "No! I never intended on turning Ryder against you. I just wanted to break his loyalty to his father. I didn't think he would take such drastic, indirect actions to eliminate Quinn. I didn't think he would stoop so low as to ally himself with the Widow or with Jacoby's regent!"
Accurate as it is, Lydia bristles at the smear against Ryder. "Watch it! Misguided as he is, that's my son you're talking about."
"I know he is," Jade says, clearly caught between sympathy for Lydia's maternal loyalty and her own conviction that she'd done what she thought was necessary to achieve her own happy ending. That said happy ending was ostensibly centered around Lydia isn't that much of an ameliorating factor when biological imperative is driving her to defend her son at all costs, even when he has so horribly disappointed her time and time again. No matter what he's done, Ryder will always be her boy, and Jade seems to understand that, which is why she looks so stricken, so conflicted. "And I know how much you love him," Jade goes on. "I care about him, too, but I would be lying if I said I did so with pure motives. I've told you that being close to him made me feel close to you. And I know how sick that sounds..."
"Do you?" The question doesn't come out as acerbically as Lydia had intended, not that it would matter when she is still allowing Jade to hold her hand, to hover with such proximity that Lydia can smell her breath.
Jade actually looks offended at the slight. "How can I not? I'm not proud of...of...of..."
Jade's floundering is almost adorable, so Lydia decides to rescue her by supply the apt terminology. "Using him like a piece of disposable trash?"
"Yes, that..." Jades spits that last word out as if it's venom, which is a little satisfying for Lydia, if only because Jade should feel bad for taking advantage of the sweet boy Ryder used to be before he was abducted and tortured for seventy-two days by those heathen nomads. "I hated the way it made me feel at first." Lydia wants to say, 'I'm glad,' but refrains. "But he was so gentle, so loving, and he made me forget for a while about what I could never have."
Jade's eyes are so big and imploring that Lydia doesn't have the heart to stay mad. She will have time to rectify Jade's treatment of Ryder later, and she will make quite certain that it gets done. She's failed her son too many times and too many ways to deprive him of at least that much.
But the part of that explanation Jade had left unspoken hangs heavy in the air along with the fading tang reminding her of what had happened just minutes ago. Of what Jade had done to her. Of what she'd so willingly and wantonly permitted. Of what she wants to happen again.
Feeling unbidden desire pool low in her abdomen, Lydia peers at Jade cautiously. "And now that you've had it – had me – what do you intend to do?"
Jade breathes a sigh of relief, clearly glad to have changed the subject. Lydia won't let her new lover skirt responsibility that easily, but for the moment, she's content to indulge the part of her that's not a heartbroken mother or an inadequate daughter or a spurned wife, a part of her that's independent of all obligations and just wants to keep feeling the way Jade makes her feel for as long as she feasibly can.
"Well," Jade says, smiling hopefully now, "what happened tonight aside, I was hoping I could visit more often until you're able to fully trust me again. Would your father object to that? Would he object to us? I'm not certain how Totemics view relationships."
If Lydia were feeling responsible, she would have used the opportunity to diffuse the lingering magnetic attraction by explaining how relationships among adherents with outsiders are permitted so long as the believer spends one week per month at the commune. Quinn had refused outright for her to observe this tenet, thus the reason for her total abandonment of her upbringing. But Lydia is not feeling responsible. In fact, she is so shocked by a small portion of what was said that she can't stop herself from gasping.
Her hand involuntarily tightens around Jade's. "You want there to be an us?"
Jade shuffles closer, though it shouldn't be possible since there is not enough room to pass a piece of parchment between their bodies. "Of course I do!" she says, letting go of Lydia's hand to wrap her arms around Lydia's waist and pull them flush. Rather than fight the hold, Lydia relaxes into it, suddenly wanting nothing more than to be as close to Jade as humanly possible. "Didn't you hear what I said earlier? Since the moment I first realized what love was all about, you're all I've wanted. This was never about scratching an itch, Lydia. That's why I said that day in the poppy fields was real. It was for me."
Taking a deep breath, Jade leans forward to rest their foreheads together. Blue eyes meet hazel, and the air stills. Everything goes quiet. Even the crickets stop their chirping as if nature itself were a captive audience to bear witness. To what, exactly, Lydia isn't certain, but she does know that it's momentous, life-changing, reality altering even and that she is just as ensnared by whatever mystical, spiritual, and physical cords are binding her so inextricably to Jade. She imagines it feels a lot like destiny if she had any frame of reference for what destiny actually felt like.
"I want us to have a life together," Jade then says, bringing Lydia back into the moment. "I want us to work together to make a better life not just for us, but for the people of the Armadillo Territory. Quinn is dead." This isn't news to Lydia. She has already mourned her husband. "Ryder is on the run." This also is no surprise. For whatever reason, Ryder was spared in the carnage of the Widow's grand master stroke. Lydia is grateful for that, hopes he runs far away from the Badlands and seeks solace in a place he can heal the same we she did. Maybe then she'll get her boy back. "Our people need leadership. They need you. But I know this is where you need to be for now, so I won't ask you to leave. What I will ask is that you consider all I've said. I want very much for you to come back with me to the fort so that we can rule the Territory side-by-side. But it needs to be on your terms. I realize now how big a mistake it was for me to take your agency away before, and I won't do it again."
Lydia doesn't say anything for a long time. She just stares into those pools of glimmering crystalline azure that have enchanted her, ensorcelled her under some sort of spell that renders her mute yet leaves her fully cognizant of how amazed she is to be the inspiration behind their lively dancing. Jade's very soul is being laid out before her, is being served up to her on a silver platter and in no uncertain terms that are all in her favor, leaving so much room for her to utterly destroy the beauty she sees before her. And at that very second, she knows beyond a shadow of a doubt that there is nothing false about this visit, that there are no ulterior motives, that this is real, so achingly real, and all she has to do is take what is being so freely given. Lydia has never been in such a position before, and it fills her with such a sense of awe that tears well up in her eyes.
"You really mean that, don't you?" she asks, barely above a whisper. "You're really willing to wait for me?"
Jade presses her lips to Lydia's forehead and makes a pained noise, as if it suddenly is made very clear how foreign it is for Lydia to be the one put first. It is the visible fallout of a lifetime with Quinn. And though there is surely some part of Jade that realizes she could have eventually wound up so...well, jaded, mostly Lydia thinks it's just hurt on her behalf, which is a whole new experience that has those tears she'd been bravely holding back breaking free of her lids and lashes. They stream down her cheeks in fat rivulets, bitter with how much of her life has been wasted up to this point and yet sweet with the promise of a more fulfilling tomorrow she's being offered.
"Yes, I do and yes, I will," Jade says, murmuring the words against Lydia's skin before pulling back to kiss away her tears. She then resumes their earlier position, foreheads touching, eyes fixed, hearts talking at the same time as their lips, just in a different language. "I love you, Lydia," she says plainly so that even Lydia cannot misconstrue the confession as anything but a truth from the heart. "I have since I was sixteen, so I'm not going to stop any time soon. And if what I've just tasted is any indication of what it's like to be loved by you, I'd wait for the rest of my life to have it properly."
Never has Lydia been more emotionally sensitive as she is right now, and Jade's declaration only stirs up more turmoil that she barely begin to process. "Jade..."
A slender finger interrupts her, delicately touching her lips. Jade looks positively radiant. "Shh. You don't have to say or feel anything you don't want to. I'm just happy I got this chance, that you heard me out. That you let me kiss you at least once. I can die a happy woman now."
"Well, we can't have that, can we?" Lydia cracks a smile that Jade returns with full force. "You know, I never would have wished you dead, even when I thought you'd betrayed me for power."
"Yeah?"
"Mmhmm." Feeling emboldened, Lydia reaches up to bury her fingers in Jade's straw-spun curls. She smiles in earnest when Jade's eyes drift shut at the attention. "Even as I walked away from the fort to an uncertain fate, a part of me kept clinging to what you made me feel that day in the fields. You made me feel alive again, made me feel like I was still worth something, that I could still contribute beyond being a token wife and mostly discarded advisor, that I was still desirable in spite of my age and declining beauty. I imagine that's why Quinn wanted to marry you. You made him feel the same."
Jade's eyes open, and the glare she gives Lydia would be intimidating if it weren't for the way her head is tilted to the side like a puppy getting it's ear scratched. "I don't care why Quinn married me," she says crossly. "And don't talk about yourself that way."
Dropping her hand from Jade's hair to toy with the top buttons of her partially open blouse, Lydia arches an obstinate brow. "In what way? Is it wrong to admit I'm getting old? There's no use denying it when the proof slaps me in the face every time I look in the mirror."
"Just because you're aging doesn't mean you're not still beautiful. Because you are," Jade says, frustration evident. It bothers her that Lydia isn't in denial about her rapidly advancing age, which is precious if not naive. Just the same, she let's Jade say her peace. "You are the most beautiful woman I've ever laid eyes on, and to me, age has not diminished you in the slightest." When Lydia gives her a skeptical look, Jade sighs. "I wish you could see yourself through my eyes, then you'd know it like I do."
"That's sweet," Lydia says. "But what's going to happen in ten years when you're still in the flower of your youth and I'm a decrepit old hag with silver in her hair and a face full of wrinkles?"
Jade stamps her foot and harrumphs in a puerile manner that is altogether adorable. "I'll still love you. That's what will happen."
"That's easy to say now."
"Yes, it is. But what do you have to lose giving me a chance to prove it?"
Lydia pushes Jade away, eyes flickering dangerously. All of the assurance from moments ago drains out of her at the thought of settling into a happy life only to have it cruelly torn away just as it had been not a month ago, and all by the same woman.
She practically spits out her answer. "Everything! I have everything to lose! If you cast me away in my dotage, I'll have no one to turn to! My father will have died and my son is not likely to stomach my presence any time soon. But you? You will have your choice of suitors to replace me in warming your bed."
Jade shrinks back as if cruelly struck. "If that's what you think this is, you're wrong. First of all, I won't cast you away. Not ever. And secondly, I don't just want you to warm my bed. I need you to warm my heart as well and to stand by my side, to be my advisor, my friend, my ally, my lover. I'm not Quinn, Lydia. I don't want to put you up on a pedestal to look at whenever the mood strikes or to only ever seek your counsel when I have no other choice. I want an equal partner in life, someone to share my every joy and despair with, someone who is willing to stand with me in the valley just the same as on the mountaintop. I believe with all of my heart we can be that for each other. I wouldn't be here otherwise."
The response is spoken with such conviction that all of the air goes out of Lydia's sails. She stumbles back into Jade's waiting arms and tucks her head into the crook of a shapely neck. It fits as if it's made to rest there.
"I want to believe that," she says, forlorn and hopeful all at once. "But how can I when I am still plagued by doubts as to whether I can fully trust you?"
Jade hums as she nuzzles the top of Lydia's head. "I guess that's where faith comes in. I know you're not just here because you have nowhere else to go. You're a true believer. All of those years in the fort, you held on to your totems because you never really lost your faith. It was always there, you just hid it for a while. Now you need to shine the light on it so it'll start to grow again. And if that means me giving you time to do that, I'm more than willing so long as you promise to let me see you again. And soon."
Lydia trembles at the ramifications of that being true. Old habits die hard, though, so she pulls away just enough to look Jade in the face. "You have no idea how much I want to say no, Jade. Logically, I should do just that."
"But?"
"But my heart is saying something altogether different."
The admission doesn't come easily, but Lydia forces it out, not only for her own sake but for the tender patience with which Jade is dealing with her insecurities. Justifiable as they are, most people wouldn't have stuck around to be doubted and questioned at every turn. And yet Jade is still here, still holding on to her, still openly broadcasting what seems to be an undying devotion for Lydia to feed upon for strength.
Heart in her eyes, Jade places a hand on Lydia's cheek. "What's it saying?"
"It's saying that I've been offered something I'd thought to never have again," Lydia says, "a chance at love and happiness. It's saying I'd be a damned fool not to take hold of it."
Jade smiles at Lydia with such tenderness that she feels her uncertainty float away as if on feathered wings the color of burnished gold. "Then maybe, just this once, you should listen."
So that's exactly what Lydia does. She takes hold of Jade with every ounce of her strength, grips her with both hands and clings for dear life, just like she'll have to whenever they leave the commune six months later with her father's blessing secured due to Jade's deft negotiation of a new place of acceptance for the faith within the walls of the fort. Just like she'll have to when every eye is on her as she stands hand-in-hand with Jade upon the grand balcony of the mansion as the Baroness officially welcomes Lydia home and proudly announces their pending marriage. Just like she will whenever Jade comes home from a hard afternoon in the poppy fields with that insatiable desire burning in her eyes and is hardly able to contain her surprisingly inexhaustible supply of enthusiasm within the sacred confines of their bedroom. And like she'll have to when they're giving a joint speech to their clippers, who are assembled on the courtyard below the mansion balcony, regarding their new mandate: to bring peace throughout the length and breadth of the Badlands by exercising restraint when warranted and projecting power through force when necessary.
Too many days in a row laboring too long under the sun and then loving just as long and fiercely through the night only to wake and do it all over again finally catch up to Jade that afternoon. Before Lydia can even blink, Jade swoons, pitches forward, and is nearly halfway over the wrought iron railing. Instinct kicks in before Jade is completely out of reach, and with her heart hammering madly inside her chest, Lydia screams for help and hangs on to her wife's slack body like her very life depends on it.
And in a way it does, because although Ryder does eventually return home, it's just long enough to attempt murdering his mother in her sleep for stealing what he believed belonged to him. Had it not been for Jade's shrill scream that woke her, Lydia would be dead. As it is, the knife only barely misses severing her jugular, leaving a nasty cut along the length of her neck that bleeds so profusely Veil visibly pales later on upon seeing her crimson stained skin and soaked sheets. While Lydia scrambles to staunch the bleeding, Jade goes into a frenzy, wildly rebuffing Ryder's attacks like a possessed creature until two clippers arrive, prompting him to abscond the fort for the last time.
As if her words to Jade that night at the commune were prophetic, her son swears in the midst of fighting off the clippers in his flight that she is dead to him, while a week later her father dies peacefully in his sleep. Lydia, left all alone of family in the world, has no one to turn to should something happen to Jade.
And so when Jade is about to plummet to a certain death, desperation swallows her up. Heedless of her own safety, she nearly topples over the banister to join her beloved in death before staving off disaster. Her fingers and arms protest loudly at the strain of holding on to one hundred and nine pounds of dead weight as she waits for assistance to arrive. Thankfully, Lydia has always been stronger than she looks.
After that, she doesn't let Jade out of her sight for three whole days. She hovers and dotes like a frantic mother hen all messily conglomerated with a lover whose heart stopped beating and whose entire world stopped turning for a split second, and who needs constant reassurance that the person she loves is still alive, still breathing, still whole because she didn't break her body upon the unforgiving ground below. Why Jade puts up with her incessant nagging is a mystery. And a miracle. But she does, and Lydia falls even more in love with her for it.
Sure as she is of Jade's love, though, Lydia still holds on too tight sometimes, afraid of losing the best thing that's ever happened to her. But Jade is ever patient and admirably successful at proving her promises were not temporary. Through tender touches, loving words of reassurance, passionate kisses, and diligent ministrations, Jade reassures her that she'll be there in the morning and the next and the next after that and ten years down the road. Even so, Lydia cannot wholly banish that little sliver of insecurity that seems determined to remain forever a thorn in her side, so she clings a little, worries a lot, and overcompensates even more when they make love. Something about the futility of teaching old dogs new tricks.
There are some new tricks Jade teaches her though, and those she thoroughly enjoys. Who knew that only another woman would be the most effortlessly adept at making her toes curl and her voice go hoarse from screaming out a pleasure that all of the words in every dictionary known to man could not hope to adequately define? As smart as she is, Lydia is quite abashed it took her over fifty years to figure that little secret out, but now that she has, she submerses herself into the revelation like a sailor deprived far too long of the sea. Nobody ever made her feel like Jade does and nobody ever will.
So Lydia holds on tight. She knows Jade won't mind.