I stiffened immediately, my breath was stolen in an instant.
"I thought you said you'd warn me first," I growled in French, leaning away from Lavi as he chuckled.
There couldn't possibly be another bug. If there had been, he would've told me, wouldn't he have?
"Sometimes you have to strike while the iron is hot," he stated in English, breath tickling my neck as he laughed.
Realization struck me hard in the gut as long fingers turned my stunned face towards his, and a mouth swamped my own with a soft, hungry need. An arm had me in an unbreakable embrace, and I felt panic as he began to walk me backwards, my knees caving as they hit the edge of the bed. Angry, shameful memories resurfaced as I fell, my brain sluggishly pulling itself together.
"Should I ask how old you are?"
I shoved his face and spat, "If this is your idea of a joke, it's not funny. Get off of me before I hurt you."
That was a bit of an empty threat. Lavi was much better at hand to hand than I was. I could last about fifty seconds against Kanda. Lavi could last almost indefinitely. There was no comparison.
"There's only one joke, and that's you hurting me," he chuckled, raising an eyebrow.
And then, I noticed his eyes. Or, rather, eye considering he only had one, as far as I knew. The green was cloaked in purple, a haze around the edges that threatened to overtake the whole. He hesitated for a moment, blinking in confusion as he looked at me, almost as if he wasn't quite sure how he'd moved from point A to point B. My eyes flickered to the wine glass still on the table, and it clicked.
They'd drugged the wine. They weren't trying to poison us. They were trying to… to… I'll be honest, I had no idea what their game was, but I was suddenly very glad that I hadn't decided to drink the wine. At least, Lavi was mostly harmless as a raunchy teenager. I... was a different story altogether.
My distraction must've given the drug an opening to completely overshadow my partner as he pinned me with both hands and kissed me again. I thought I was ready for it this time, but I'd underestimated the power of suppressed feelings and loneliness.
While there was a part of me that was absolutely revolted and angry, another part of me, a small part that I'd thought no longer existed, relished it, the press of skin against skin, lips against lips, teeth to teeth, the hand pressing me against his face, the arm under my back holding me to him. It fed off this feeling of exhilaration and the closeness. That part of me took over and kissed back with equal force.
The feeling didn't last too long. I seemed to shake myself out of my stupor long enough to realize this was not something either of us wanted. One hand was settled against my hair, and the other was at my waist. One of my hands had wandered to the back of his head, fingers wound into his hair, and the other was down the neck of his shirt, fingernails digging into skin. Lips suddenly moved on to my neck, and I took my chance to try and grab for the hammer strapped to his leg, knowing that he was never without it. Maybe I could hold it for ransom and convince -
A very fast set of fingers gripped my own, and Lavi looked at me with an almost pitying look.
"Ah ah, naughty, naughty," he cooed.
I'd been sure that, even like this, he wouldn't hurt me. I'd thought that maybe I could somehow persuade him to get off of me, go outside, and wait it out like a dog in a doghouse. Now, I wasn't so sure.
And you know what, I said 'don't drink the drugged wine', but does anyone listen to Mag? Nope.
"Please get off?" I asked sheepishly.
For a moment, the request floored him. I could see that the purple had pushed back against the green, but now the green was taking over again. I pulled the strap of his eye patch, snapping the elastic against his face. He yelped in pain, clutching his face, as I squirmed away. I dashed from under him, falling to the floor as he scrambled to catch me, and I ran to the bathroom, slamming the door in his face. I locked the door, and I looked around, trying to figure out what I could use as a weapon. I hadn't thought to get my bracelets, which were on the nightstand on the opposite side of the bed. I picked up a good sized bottle, wondering how hard I'd have to hit him to knock him out. Macy had done it just fine –
"And after we'd had a drink…"
The realization dropped on my head with the weight of a department store. Macy's entire story –
The door suddenly swung open, and Lavi raised an eyebrow mischievously, holding up a bobby pin, from my suitcase no less. I deflated, hefting the bottle in hand. He ignored it.
"Maggie, come on, we can have a little fun. Stop being such a wet blanket," he said, walking into the bathroom, and I felt like crawling underneath a rock and crying.
Whoever this was, he was not my friend.
I swung the bottle in my hand at his head, and he caught it easily, snatching it the way a parent would take a toy from a tantrum-ridden two year old. His straight razor was on the counter, but he'd already advanced far enough into the bathroom that I'd have to reach around him. Besides, what was I going to do with a razor? Slit his throat?
The back of my knees hit the bathtub, and I was out of options. I stepped into the tub, backing up towards the faucet with nowhere to go. He knew it, too, because his eye glittered a bit in the light of the bathroom, and I swallowed hard.
"Little girl, you sure do love your family."
A hand brushed my face, leading away strands of straggly, light brown strands. Calloused fingers lifted my face so I could look up at him. I shivered, too scared to move. He'd already shown he was a lot stronger and a lot faster. Kanda had said all he'd taught me were supposed to help in a situation like this, but then again that was against another assailant who didn't know those same techniques.
My back pressed against the knob of the shower as he leaned forwards, chuckling with half-lidded eyes.
"I don't know if you know, but you're a pretty –"
An idea blinked on in my head, and I shoved the water on as cold as it would go. Lavi was suddenly hit with a face full of water, and I ducked underneath his arm, racing out of the bathroom. I grabbed my weapons off the nightstand as I stood there sopping wet, and I activated them, a single thought retracting the blades so that I wouldn't cut anything or, more importantly, anyone, myself included. Lavi scrambled out of the bathroom, and I immediately launched myself at him with a war cry. He looked up, genuinely surprised, as I suddenly smashed a metal, flat ring in his face, sending him backwards into the bathroom again. He stumbled and cracked his head on the bathtub, and he cursed vehemently.
I stood in the bathroom doorway, prepared to do it again, but he put up a hand and croaked, "Wait, Mag, wait a second!"
I started to walk into the bathroom.
"Mag... Maggie, please, I didn't... mean..."
Not convinced, I flicked the blades of both rings out and held one against his throat, shaking as I lifted his head to look at me. This stung, stung me deeper than I wanted to say. I felt like I'd been betrayed and violated in ways I couldn't talk about.
Lavi looked up at me, hands up, not bothering to move. He shivered, sopping wet, as blood dribbled on to the tub from where his head had hit the edge. He swallowed and said, "Maggie, I'm so sorry. I should've – Oh my god, I'm so sorry, just… Magnolia, I…Oh god…"
I held still, so still I thought for a moment I'd locked into place and wouldn't be able to move. His eye flashed at me, a bright green, watery orb, and I realized that something about the water had negated the effect of whatever drug they'd put in the wine. I trembled as he gently pushed the blade away from his throat, and I ran out of the bathroom.
I launched myself out of the cottage towards the cliffs, and I stood outside underneath the fingernail moon feeling like I was going to fall apart. I leaned over, dry heaving, as I heard footsteps behind me, and I turned around.
Lavi stood uncertainly underneath the dim light of the moon, and I wasn't sure what to do. I knew that the drug's effects had worn off, but at the same time my paranoia was so strong that I contemplated threatening to throw myself off the cliff if he so much as took another step towards me. I kept reliving that moment of him touching me, caressing me, kissing me, and feeling both disgusted and guiltily satisfied.
You can take the girl out of the brothel, but you can't take the brothel out of the girl.
"Mag, what do you want me to do?" Lavi asked, his voice cracking, as if someone else had overused it and given it back to him in pieces.
I stared at him, my hair thrown about by the wind. I shivered in the cool breeze, and I realized that I was soaking wet and three buttons of my shirt were undone somehow. I quickly yanked my shirt closed, hugging myself and pacing as I thought.
"I need a minute. Several. Several minutes," I stated honestly.
The cold night air was beginning to clear my head, and the aftershock left me with shaking limbs. We stood there for a while before Lavi said, "We should go inside. We'll catch our death standing out here."
I nodded, picking my way back into the cottage. The air inside felt dirty, somehow, as if the guilt and the fear had seeped its way into the very ambience of the place. I stood in the middle of the one-room cottage trying to get my bearings.
"Maggie, you can put that up now," Lavi said nervously.
I looked down at my weapons. I hadn't deactivated them. I set them down on the coffee table with a massive clunk, and I collapsed in a chair, staring at the floor. I rubbed my wrists, noticing the bright red indentions where my bands usually sat. Lavi pulled up a chair across from me, and I got up and walked over to the bed. I couldn't so much as stomach being within three feet of him.
"Magnolia- ?"
"I think I need some sleep," I stated wearily.
I sat down on the bed, but I couldn't bring myself to put my legs under the sheets. For some reason, it felt tainted, as if the very memory was pressed into the mattress where our bodies had been, waiting to be unlocked the minute I lay down again.
Someone sat down on the other side of the bed from me, and the hair rose on my neck as I seemed to anticipate a hand reach for me.
"Don't touch me," I snapped, harsher than I'd intended, though it felt good to let loose some of that pent up frustration.
I felt myself tense as the hand drew back, and I rubbed my face, the silence pregnant and heavy.
All he had to do was leave me alone, and I'd sort it out myself. A lot of it didn't even have to do with him. As selfish as it sounded, most of the problem lie within me. That part of me that had taken advantage of him… I hadn't thought that it was still alive. Go figure.
It struck me that perhaps I was not the only one suffering as I glanced behind me at my partner. Lavi was the one who'd had his body hijacked. I wasn't even sure if he remembered any of it. For all I knew, one minute he'd downed a drink, and the next his student was holding a blade to his throat while he was trying to hold his head together. I hadn't even asked him if he had a concussion.
"Lavi…? Are you alright?" I asked cautiously.
I turned around, only able to see his back. His head was hung low, and his shoulders slumped. He looked over his shoulder at me, and he gave a weak excuse for a smile.
"I guess. I don't know what to make of myself right now," he stated, and I slowly began to crawl over to him.
His head was still bleeding. I got up and grabbed the nearest shirt.
"Hang on, let me help you. I'm not doing too well as a partner seeing as I'm letting you bleed to death," I joked in a brittle tone, trying to hold up a fragile smile.
Lavi looked up unexpectedly as I forced my paranoia to settle down and my stomach to quit protesting. I began to dab the back of his head with the shirt, clearing away most of the blood. It didn't look very deep, luckily. It would make for a heck of a goose egg, but it wasn't life threatening. I'd always been told head wounds often looked worse than they were.
"Here, let me do this," Lavi said, and he held the shirt to the back of his head.
He continued to stare at the floor, and I opened my mouth to say something. He looked up expectantly, and I shut my mouth, realizing there wasn't really anything to say.
"I was scared," he suddenly said.
He looked up at the ceiling, as if it held the words he was supposed to read off.
"I felt like someone had dug out someone from inside of me that I didn't know was there and put it in control. It wasn't like somebody else was using me. It was like… I was controlling me, but it wasn't any part of me that I was familiar with," Lavi explained, and I shivered.
I walked around and dug through his clothes for something dry, and I handed the set to him. His head was mostly cleaned up now.
"You frightened me," I admitted, and he barked a laugh.
"Trust me, you frightened me, too. I was aware the entire time, and I just about wet myself when I saw you grab that bottle," he said, and I rolled my eyes.
"You handled it pretty well," I said sardonically, and he sobered.
"I suppose… Ugh, and I remember it all. That's the worst part. I remember-" He halted there, and I finished for him.
"Snogging me?"
He winced, from pain or chagrin, I didn't know. Probably chagrin. I was fairly certain that it was against Order rules to french one's students.
"Yeah. I also remember you snogging back," he stated, and I coughed and rubbed my arms.
That did little to ease my mind.
He looked up at me, and he asked, "There's that part of you, too, huh? That you didn't think existed."
"Yes, there is, but that's from something different entirely," I admitted, playing with a piece of hair. I looked up at him, and I said in playfully miffed tones, "But you already know all about that, don't you?"
He gave me a guilty smile.
"I was curious." He fell quiet again before continuing, "I saw it in passing, and I just thought, you know, you weren't the type, but… it seemed you were under duress."
I scoffed with a note of hysteria, muttering, "Duress. Yeah, you could say that."
"How did you manage? To… let go?" he asked.
I bit my bottom lip, chewing pensively before answering, "You stuff yourself in this… box. A mental box. And every time you use it, stuffing yourself in gets a little easier. And that part of you that wants out grows a little stronger. Pretty soon, you're not sure which one you are – the one in the box or the one doing the things that need doing."
I looked sidelong at Lavi, suddenly wondering something.
"Was that the only reason it scared you?" I asked, and he looked sheepish.
He pulled on an ear, the three earring holes glaring as the skin stretched. We'd decided it'd be best if he left them out, seeing as no self-respecting son of a merchant would wear pirate rings in his ears. In a way, I missed them. They were practically an extension of him.
"Um, well, I've never…" He grimaced and moved his hands about in a 'well…' gesture. I blinked.
"Oh."
Lavi blushed. It was the first time I'd seen anything like embarrassment get to him. I laughed.
"Have you so much as kissed a girl?"
He crossed his arms and looked off.
"Hey, don't let anyone else know, okay? It would ruin my credibility," he muttered.
I shook my head and patted his shoulder.
"Don't worry. There are a lot of guys who haven't, more so than you'd think. They just talk big," I assured him.
Lavi laughed, and I smiled.
He took a deep breath, and he admitted, "Just… this is kind of sentimental, but I'd rather start off the right way and not be deflowered because of some funky aphrodisiac cooked up by little old ladies."
I rolled my eyes.
"That's not sentimentality. That's common sense. And I told you not to drink it, but you didn't listen," I said, feeling smug.
"Hey now! The only reason why you didn't drink it is because you don't touch alcohol!"
"Well, obviously it's a good policy because you nearly-," I declared, and Lavi's face suddenly fell before I could finish. I stopped, letting the implication die.
It was awkwardly quiet as the full weight of what might've happened hit us both. If I hadn't had training and resourcefulness on my side… if Lavi hadn't fought the drug… if, if, if…
"You were right. I was… cocky," he muttered, rubbing the back of his neck, and it hit me just how hard he must be taking this.
"You said to Kanda that you and I… kind of had a kinship-," I said, and I stopped myself as I realized I was pushing too far. I wasn't willing to talk about my problems. Who was to say he would talk about his?
He fidgeted and stated, "Well, I had a near miss, except it was a very fat countess in an old castle, and there were chains involved. I was fifteen, and she, um… drugged me." I gave him an incredulous look.
"You have this thing for being drugged by unappealing women, don't you?" I stated, and he threw his hands up.
"This is why I don't tell people about this sort of thing! It was just a little traumatic, and Bookman only managed to get me down off the ceiling after she'd run off with my shirt," he muttered, and I couldn't help laughing. I know that this was supposed to be a heartfelt confession of a horrible event, but if it wasn't hilarious to think about. Who would've thought?
"Don't worry. Your secret is safe with me," I assured him, patting his shoulder, and he put a hand over mine.
I resisted the urge to jerk away, my paranoia flaring up so badly that I almost smacked him.
He must've noted the flinch because he let go of my hand, and he said, "I think that's enough for one night. I'm about dry now, actually."
I was almost dry, too, but we both opted to change before heading to bed. I crawled under the sheets, still slightly apprehensive. The angry memories I'd had before still sprang to mind, but I managed to push them aside for the sake of sleep. Lavi walked over to the wicker chairs and couch, and I sat up.
"What are you doing?" I asked, perplexed.
Lavi lifted his eyebrows and said, "I'm… going to bed."
It hit me like a truck full of pennies. Of course – I'd made him sleep in the chairs for the past couple of days.
"Um… why don't you sleep here, and I'll sleep in the chairs. You need more rest than I do," I stated.
He slowly got up, and I got out of the bed, and he suddenly stated, "We could… both share."
I stared at him and then scoffed a laugh.
"Consider this karma," I muttered, scratching the back of my head as I glanced at the wicker chairs.
The lights had dimmed down seeing as we hadn't put any more oil in the lamps, but I could hear Lavi walking across the wood floor. There was a rustle of sheets, and Lavi climbed into bed as I stood up. I thought about the wicker chairs and their scratchy coverings, and I suddenly started to reconsider Lavi's initial offer. Had I really made him sleep on those…?
I climbed back into bed with a sigh. I had better face my paranoia and fear now. If I didn't, it'd fester like an old wound, and cleaning it out would be just as ugly. I settled under the sheets, feeling oddly safe despite the picking my brain was doing at all those memories of the last few hours, going over them like a tongue around a rotten tooth. I could hear Lavi's breathing begin to slow as he fell asleep, and I rolled over to face him. He was on his side, facing me, and again I noticed how tired he looked, more now than ever.
I pressed my lips together into a line, concerned. He was like any of my other siblings; I wanted to take care of him the way I did my own brothers, but I wasn't sure how. My brothers, I could touch. He probably wouldn't appreciate that, though usually he wouldn't have such problems seeing as he practically stood on top of the people he liked. Poor Allen just about suffocated when Lavi was around.
"Maggie?" he breathed, and I suddenly felt panic again.
I stilled and asked, "Yes?"
"Just wanted to know if it was you," he muttered.
I resisted the urge to snort. Who else was there in this room? Santa Claus? The Tooth Fairy? The Easter Bunny?
"How's your head?" I asked.
"Been better."
I chuckled, and he smiled, eye still closed. Hesitantly, experimentally, I reached out and touched a hand, and he sighed. Just as tentatively, he grasped my hand, squeezing it tight for a second before letting go and turning over.
"Night, Maggie," he mumbled, and I tried to sort out what all of this meant.
Finally I gave up. We were teacher and student, as well as friends. Nothing had changed that. At least, I hoped. The memory still remained, fresh and frightening, of just how close we'd come to crossing the boundary.
I still trusted him, though. A nugget of faith persisted, much to my surprise.
"Night."
"How the heck are we supposed to confront two old ladies about feeding their customers to sea monsters?" I hissed into the golem, and Violet's tinny voice said, "Hey, this is your mission, not mine. I just got out of jail. You really think I want to think about how to get back in to jail?"
I rolled my eyes.
I was up early this time around. I had learned something very valuable about Lavi last night – he kicked in his sleep. He kicked like a mule. I was never, ever going to sleep in the same bed with him, if I could possibly help it. I would rather sleep in a slimy puddle full of cave fish than sleep next to him, and it is very apparent how I feel about both slime and cave fish. I probably had bruises the size of goose eggs all over my legs.
Okay, so I was exaggerating a little. He wasn't that bad. That didn't, however, make me any less reluctant to share a bed with him again.
I groaned as I shifted in my wicker chair, and Violet asked, "What's the matter? Training got you sore?"
I sighed.
"I wish it were just training. I could at least run and make the soreness go away. Nah, I slept with Lavi last night, and I'm sore in places I didn't even know existed," I admitted, examining a bruise I somehow ended up getting under my arm.
I'd woken up to find the sheets twisted and Lavi's foot in my face.
"Maggie, I thought you were over the whore stage of your life? Besides, aren't brunettes your thing?"
I stopped, confused, before I realized what I'd just said, and I smacked my forehead.
"Get your head out of the gutter! There's only one bed around here, and he kicks like he's in a city league! He somehow managed to get me in the ribs," I muttered, inspecting my new assortment of bruises.
Explaining these away was not going to be easy. I had a ton of bruises in some odd, out of the way places, and seeing as I was "training," I could just say that I'd had a rough day and be done with it.
"Yeah, that's exactly what happened. Whatever, I guess I'll find out in nine months' time if you're telling the truth. So, when will you be back?" she asked, and I leaned back into the wicker chair, resisting the urge to grumble a bit more about decency and respect for one's elders.
It creaked, and for a moment I was afraid it'd break. It held, though, and I sighed contentedly. At the least, I'd had a nice long shower. The events of last night were far behind me after a short rest. Of course, it'd come back to haunt me later like a surprise party with guns, but for now I'd enjoy my peace of mind.
"I should be back by tomorrow. We just have to ride to Boston, unless the plan changes," I said, and Violet tittered, "Alright. The twins have been wondering how you've been sleeping? Did you enjoy their little gift? They said they made sure that your first mission with him was veeery special."
I glared through the golem, not that that would've done any good had I actually been there. Violet had the uncanny knack of ignoring glares, stares, and the like. I doubted my glare would do much through the phone line.
"You tell them that I'll shove all that lingerie down their throats after I beat them to a pulp and send them swimming down the Thames," I grumbled.
"Alrighty, then! I'll be sure to say. Love you, Mag! They say they love you, too. They're too afraid to come over because they think you'll fry them through the air waves."
I pursed my lips and raised an eyebrow.
"I love you, too. Don't get into too much trouble," I stated, and I clicked off.
A pair of arms suddenly wrapped around my neck in a hug, a chin resting on my head, and I just about screamed in surprise.
"Good morning!" Lavi said, cheery as a ray of sunshine.
I sighed, slumping.
"Hello to you, too," I breathed out as he bounced off to make something or other. If there's anything I knew about the man, besides the fact he became a dervish in his sleep, it was that he didn't know how to stay still.
"Got a plan for tonight?" he asked, and I shook my head.
"I've got no idea. I was hoping you'd been dreaming up one over there in your nest," I said, gesturing to the swirl of sheets on the bed.
He somehow made his grin a grimace, scrunching his shoulders sheepishly.
"Sorry about that. I guess I was more energetic than I'd meant to be," he stated.
I was already dressed and packed, and it took him moments to have everything ready. We needed to check out by noon, and then come back later to confront the old ladies about their schemes and take them into Order custody. The Vatican would try them on charges of sorcery, witchcraft, tax evasion, and body theft (though the last one was tentative, considering the both of us would have to testify), and hopefully they'd be thrown into a special jail for wayward magic users like themselves.
The two of us headed towards the main reception house, and I suddenly wondered out loud, "Why would the two old ladies drug us both with an aphrodisiac? I mean, there's really no use. You just need two healthy, strong people to sacrifice to the sea monsters, and there you go. Why get them all worked up? I mean, Macy had the same sort of story, and the ladies have been talking about how eager their men have become in the last week. It's kind of giving me the heebies."
Lavi thought about it.
"You know, I have absolutely no idea," he stated brightly, and I shook my head. At least he was honest.
I was suddenly aware that there was a strange fog as we neared the house.
"This is… oddly coincidental," I said, and Lavi abruptly covered my mouth.
"Don't breathe," he ordered, and I obliged. He pulled out a handkerchief from his pocket and I tied it around my face while he dug around for another in his pocket.
"What's going on?" I asked as he put it on, and he said, "This is some sort of sleeping gas. I recognize it from another war. You'll drop like a fly before you even get to the house unless you've got some sort of barrier. This isn't perfect, but it'll get us out."
He started to lead me off back the way we'd come, but we noticed that no matter how far we walked, we always ended up in the same place over and over again next to a stump.
"No, no, no… They've put a dimension ward around the road. We'll keep wandering around and around without getting anywhere," Lavi said, suddenly getting worried. I looked up at him and asked, "Do you have any idea how to get out of here?"
He winced.
"I don't know too much magic. Bookman was supposed to teach me this year, but we got side-tracked by you and your family's teaching problem," he admitted, and I groaned. While I had always professed my family would be the death of me, I hadn't thought that would be a literal thing.
I was suddenly getting very, very sleepy. No matter how hard I tried to keep my eyes open, they always seemed to drift closed. Suddenly I fell over, my legs refusing to lift me. Lavi picked me up by the arm, hoisting it over his shoulders, but he himself was about to topple from the weight of the sleeping gas.
"Gotta be… some way out…" he muttered.
"Click our heels three times," I laughed, tearing off the mask.
I couldn't sleep comfortably with it on. Why was it on my face again? I was getting so hot, and I just wanted to take a nap.
"Maggie… Maggie, stay with me. Maggie… Ma…"
I closed my eyes, his voice the last thing I heard before I felt a starburst of panic. Something bad was going to happen if I fell asleep. I had to stay awake. I had to get home. Why did I need to go home though?
I'd promised to get Sebastian a pirate costume. That was it! I couldn't just sleep now! I had to go get that costume for him, or else he'd be so sad… I forced my eyes open, and I realized that I was lying on the ground. Lavi was next to me, his head resting in crook of my shoulder, breath fluttering my hair. Half out of my mind, my entire thinking fuzzy, I started to stroke his face with a single thumb and say, "Lavi… hey, Lavi, time to wake up. It's time to wake up, hon, or we'll be late. We've got to go… go to… go…."
I couldn't remember where we were supposed to go.
Maybe it was school. I remember I had to send Erastus and Sebastian and Violet to school before walking Lily and me to work. Yeah… Lavi had to go to work with me. We worked together, that was it. We were going to be late.
"Hey there… hey…"
I looked up suddenly, my eyelids drooping again, and a black haze began to fill my vision. Above me, there were two figures in the mist, and I squinted.
"Can you get us to work? Hehe, if we don't… we're gonna get fired," I giggled, feeling slightly manic by now.
And I had to do something else, too. Something about a… a costume. Looking at Lavi, that eye patch, I realized why. I had to get him a pirate costume. No, I had to get someone else the cost…ume…
"Now, now, love, just go to sleep. There's a good dear. It won't be long now, just head on off to beddy-bye land and-"
"Agatha, they're tributes, not pets. You don't need to coo at them."
"But she's still awake, sister. And you don't yell at someone to go to sleep. You croon. Like this. Now there's a good girl, yes, go to beddie-by slumberland with the fairies and the teddy bears."
"Oh, you're so hopeless. Here, just take that rock and bash her over the head. The Sea Lords like them fresh, but not that fresh."
Wait… what…?
"But… Sea Lord Crickadutus loves his to still be squirming, especially the lady. He says the wriggling is the best part."
"I don't care what Sea Lord Crickadutus said about his meal. We're running a salvage business, not a restaurant."
But… what's this? I worked in… in weapons, not salvage. I had to get to work. But I was so tired. I looked at Lavi, and I laughed again, letting my head fall against the gravel. He kicked in his sleep, I remembered that. And he'd kick me. That'd wake me up. And then we'd go to work. Just… just a short nap and…
