"Good morning, Cinder!"

Ruby set her chair down and sat cross-legged on it. She looked at Cinder, hoping for a response, but the other woman, lying on her bed, only offered her a glance before she returned her gaze to her own fingernails.

"The silent treatment again, huh?" Ruby sighed. "'s okay. My feelings aren't hurt or anything."

Cinder turned her hand over and traced the lines of her palm. This routine had become the norm between them, so it wasn't like Ruby didn't expect it. That didn't make it any less frustrating, though not enough to stop her from visiting.

"You know I know what you're doing, right? And it's not gonna work," Ruby said. "I know I'm not an evil mastermind like you, but I'm not dumb either."

Cinder smirked, still not looking at her.

"Not working, Cinder. I'm not gonna stop showing up here 'cause you're giving me the cold shoulder," Ruby said. "I don't care if it takes one or two or ten years. You're gonna open up to me eventually."

Cinder put her hand down. She stared at the ceiling, her expression undecipherable. After a minute, she sat up, and when she looked at Ruby, her eyes were cold and sharp like daggers.

"I will tell you one thing," she said, "since you're so desperate."

Ruby uncrossed her legs and leaned forward, listening eagerly.

"I was wrong about you," Cinder said.

Ruby frowned. "Wrong how?"

"When we first started these talks, I said I did not think you were naïve," Cinder said. "I thought you were an idealist, which is only marginally better. I was wrong on both accounts. I've come to believe, with no doubt in my mind, that you are nothing more than a fool."

She stood up and walked over to the glass, looking down at Ruby from the other side.

"Look at you. Throwing yourself into a war you don't even comprehend, day after day, counting down the seconds to your death. You know you're going to die, and yet you keep fighting like that's nothing. Like the fighting means anything."

She raised her hands and laughed – she laughed, a natural, involuntary noise Ruby would have thought was beautiful, if it were any other circumstance.

"And you keep coming back to me." Cinder sneered. "Expecting me to share. To change. To help in some way. But we agreed in the beginning, Ruby, we were going to play our parts. The hero and the villain. But you don't seem to understand that the parts are real. We're not friends. And one day, when I get out of this cage, I will kill you, and I won't think twice about it."

She touched her hand to the glass, her eyes cold and scorching like suns, and Ruby felt herself falling down, down, down a bottomless abyss-

"You can fight it all you want, Ruby Rose - but when you come to talk with the devil," Cinder said, "that's exactly what you get."

Cinder stepped back and sat on her bed again, and in the silent wake of her words, Ruby felt herself trembling all over. She pushed her wrist against her thigh to stop her hand from shaking, and bowed her head, eyelids fluttering as she fought down the tears with everything she had.

Ruby looked up and met eyes with Cinder.

"I'm not gonna stop."

For a split second, Cinder's face contorted with frustration and despair – a split second that gave Ruby all the hope in the world – and then it was gone, and she lied down and closed her eyes.

"Be my guest."