Belladonna

DISCLAIMER: The Deepgate books and everything associated with them, including Dill, Rachel, and the lovely Ms. Carnival, belong to Alan Campbell. But if he decides in book three that he really doesn't want to keep Carnival (the jerk!), I'll happily take care of her in his stead…

Maybe it was all just the giddiness of survival—maybe the idea was completely stupid and borderline insane, as Carnival's narrow-eyed glares clearly accused. Rachel still thought it had at least a little bit of merit, so she'd talked Dill into doing the requisite shopping before approaching Carnival about it. And in the pause when the scarred angel had just stared at her, confounded, she'd just shrugged and said, "Humor me." And steered Carnival towards the abandoned house's bath chamber before she could work up a protest.

Well, alright, it was fairly crazy. If someone had told her last month—or, hell, last week—that she was going to have her Church-decreed nemesis sitting naked in a tub for a badly-needed bath, Rachel would have laughed herself sick.

The difference a few days could make…

"I don't see the point of this," Carnival said irritably.

Rachel shrugged, grabbed a bucket, and scooped up some water, and overturned it above Carnival's shoulders.

"Fucking son of a fucking bitch!" Rachel had to lean back to avoid getting slapped in the face with a sodden wing as Carnival nearly jumped out of the tub. "That's fucking freezing!"

"You'll get used to it," Rachel told her, and did it again. Carnival continued to swear, but hunched down this time, mantling her wings down and straining to look over her shoulder with suspicious eyes.

"Crazy Spine bitch," she muttered at last, and settled still, her knees locked in front of her and her arms crossed firmly and protectively over her breasts.

Of course, Carnival would probably have laughed herself just as sick if someone'd told her that she'd be letting a "Spine bitch" get her into a bathtub a month ago. But something had passed between them in the depths of Ulcis' lair, something that had bound the assassin and the angel together in ways neither one of them could fight.

Rachel could remember that back when she'd been a little girl, dreaming of adventures like those she'd thought her father had, she'd had friends with whom she'd stayed the night. They'd done things like this, taken long baths and played dress-up and made each other pretty. And hadn't this all resulted from the stray thought that Carnival should try to do something with her hair?

Maybe she had gone crazy, choosing to display her new feelings of friendship like this.

Still, the strongest protests Carnival was giving were halfhearted curses as Rachel vigorously scrubbed dirt and crusted blood from her back and wings. A couple of days ago, the scarred angel would've sooner taken the assassin's head off than allow herself to be touched—so Rachel knew that the kinship or insanity or whatever it was she was experiencing wasn't one-sided.

Beneath all the built-up dirt and grime, Carnival's skin was lily-pale between the crisscrossing marks of old and half-healed scars. According to the Church's records, she rarely ventured out into the sunlight; that and her resulting photophobia were probably why. Even Rachel, with the traditionally waxy Spine complexion, had darker skin.

Well, there weren't many opportunities to get tanned while continually on the run from the society you lived in, after all.

Likewise, once the mess had been rinsed out of her hair, Rachel could tell that it was the shiny blue-black that most women would kill to have.

Ulcis had said that Carnival's mother had been very beautiful—luckily, it seemed that aside from her wings, the scarred angel had inherited her mother's looks.

"I was right," Rachel murmured as she ran her fingers through one of the snarls in Carnival's hair, trying to undo it without yanking. "You are pretty underneath all this."

Carnival didn't reply, except for a "Fucking OW!" and an elbow in Rachel's chest when she couldn't avoid pulling.

At that moment, there was a soft knock on the door. "Um… I have all the things you asked for," Dill's slightly muffled voice announced.

"Great timing," Rachel called back. "Leave the bags right there outside the door, I'll get them in a minute or so."

"…Just what are you playing at?" Carnival asked warily.

"You'll see," was Rachel's only reply. She ran her fingers through Carnival's hair experimentally, then fluffed it. "I think we've gotten rid of all the tangles, at least. Towel off, and we'll see about getting this dry. …I sure hope you like what we've got for you."

--

Dill sat against the wall with his knees drawn up to his chest and listened to the sounds of scuffle that came from the other room.

All of Deepgate was in ruins now, and most of the surrounding villages had evacuated to bigger towns when the chains had been cut. Distantly, Dill was glad of that fact—he didn't want to think of what might have happened to the villagers who might have been too close to the city when that happened. Besides, it meant that it had taken Rachel only an hour or so to find them shelter in an abandoned house—they'd been here before the sun rose. Carnival had retreated to the darkest part of the building and stayed there—Dill remembered that she wasn't supposed to be able to take direct sunlight.

He'd stayed inside, too, except for when Rachel had sent him out with his wings bundled under a cloak to buy things in town. He was tired—exhausted—but every time he dozed off he dreamed of the Maze, and it was harder and harder to remember who he was and why he was here whenever that happened.

The loss of his sense of "self" was frightening, but Rachel and Carnival were here, and they took the situation in hand when it happened. Rachel gave him gentle reminders, and Carnival brusquely ordered him to get hold of himself. Both their methods helped.

He didn't know what he'd have done if they'd still been fighting. He was more useless now than he'd ever been—he relied on them, trusted them for everything. It made him smile. The priests would have been worried about that, about his having so much faith in an untempered Spine and a supposedly unstable murderess.

For all that, though, Rachel and Carnival were the best friends he'd ever had.

"What the—what the FUCK is that thing?! No way in hell you're getting me into that!"

"Don't be such a baby about it, it's just a—"

"I'm not being a baby! I don't want to wear something like—"

"It's just this once, so calm down! You don't have to throw a tantrum over it!"

"I am not throwing a fucking tantrum! You—you stupid Spine bitch, don't talk about me like that! Who the hell saved your ass all those times back there, huh?!"

Dill's smile grew. He was glad they were getting along.

--

"You can open the door now, Dill," Rachel called, carefully arranging the last few errant strands of Carnival's hair as the scarred angel fumed. "Get the mirror out, okay?"

He didn't answer, but the door creaked open a few moments later.

Rachel straightened up and shook her head, pushing her pale gold hair back. Looking Carnival up and down, she nodded, smiling at her handiwork. "Stop sulking and come on," she cajoled, giving Carnival a light push in the small of her back. "We need to show Dill, after he went to all the trouble—besides, you should take a good look at yourself. You might be surprised."

Carnival's eyes were flat black as she glared at Rachel. "Just shut up."

Rachel gave her one more light push, propelling her in the direction of the door. Looking like she would like nothing more than another army of undead angels to slaughter, Carnival tromped through it, her hands balled tightly.

Following close behind her, Rachel glimpsed Dill's reaction over the angel's shoulder. Whereas Dill's eyes had alternated between murky hazel and pale pink since Rachel had forced angelwine into him, upon seeing Carnival, they widened, first turning deep pinkish scarlet, then pure emerald, then bright blue.

"You look… really great," he said at last, smiling.

Carnival took a few more steps into the room, then turned and caught sight of herself in the full-length mirror. Rachel, still following, watched as her eyes went huge, paling from black to a gray that was more than half blue.

Her eyes have never been that color before, Rachel realized. Church records had it that Carnival's eyes had constantly been either killing-rage black or intense steel gray ever since she'd first appeared in Deepgate.

Slowly, Carnival stepped closer to the mirror, reaching out to place a hand on the silvery glass. She didn't seem to believe that she was really looking at her reflection.

Rachel just smiled. She'd told Dill specifically to look for a dress that was pale blue—a good pastel shade would flatter Carnival's complexion without overemphasizing the latticework of her scars. And although he'd spent all his time cloistered up in the abbeys with scant opportunity to learn about fashion, his choice had been a good one.

The dress was a little old-fashioned, with its full belled skirt and slightly puffed shoulders, but it dipped in the back to give Carnival's wings room and the full ruffles of the sleeves fleshed out the angles of her thin wrists and hands. Her blue-black hair had dried soft and somewhat wispy, and with it pulled back over her shoulders, she looked like the austere daughter of some rich noble family—aside from the shocked expression on her face.

The flowers seemed to have been Dill's idea, although Rachel had no idea where he'd managed to dredge up a bouquet of anemones in a town that bordered the empty deserts. Remembering the things Ulcis had said and wondering if some kind of hair ornaments would bring more color to Carnival's face, Rachel had taken one of the pinkish-red blossoms and tucked it behind her left ear.

"I really think it flatters you," Rachel said, feeling a bit smug, then fell silent as she realized Carnival was mumbling something as she ran her hand across the glass, then touched her face.

"…make… all that is ugly about you… beautiful," she muttered, frowning.

"What's that?"

"Someone… said that to me once." Her frown deepened. "I don't remember who."

Over the years, Carnival's progressive amnesia had left her with huge holes in her memory—the Spine had always tried taking advantage of that to set the same traps for her over and over. Although Carnival's condition had gotten better as time passed—and Ulcis' revelations appeared to have filled in some of those holes—there still seemed to be a lot of blank spots. Rachel didn't know whether to be grateful for that or not. It surely frustrated Carnival a great deal, but Rachel dearly hoped that she would never be able to remember how badly her father and his undead servants had abused her.

"There's nothing ugly about you, Carnival," Dill said softly before Rachel could think of a suitable reply.

Carnival just looked at him.

"He's right," Rachel told her.

Carnival turned back towards her, wearing an expression that plainly said she didn't know who Rachel thought she was kidding.

"We're serious," Rachel insisted. "Scars or no, you're a pretty girl, and your scars mean something. They're part of you. You don't drain people's blood because you like it, you do it because you have to. Don't you? Hurting yourself's the only way you've been able to pay for it so far." Carefully placing her hand on Carnival's shoulder, Rachel gave her a gentle shake. "You didn't cut yourself when you drank your father."

"The bastard deserved it," Carnival muttered, narrowing her eyes.

"There, you see?" Looking around the scarred angel's wings, Rachel met Dill's gaze; he nodded. Carnival was her mother's daughter in every way; even if she didn't display remorse the same way other people did, the fact that she felt it in the first place was proof enough that deep down, her soul was still human. "Dill and I know that you're beautiful where it counts, because we're looking in the right place to tell. Don't think about yourself like you're ugly; you've got people who know better telling you different now."

"…" Carnival closed her eyes and leaned lightly towards Rachel so that for the briefest moment, her forehead rested on Rachel's cheek.

"We picked up some other new clothes for you, too," Rachel said softly. "Ones you'll like more than the dress. Your old ones won't stand much more wear, after all. Come on and let's try them on."

Carnival straightened up, the mask of toughness back in place. "Fine, fine—since there's not much else to do in this damn boring little hut anyway." Turning her back on the mirror, she swept back towards the bathroom.

Dill and Rachel exchanged knowing smiles.

(owari.)