On a request of LunaEquus, I went and did this chapter on Ann in.
Originally it was going to be Ann with her homely reflection starting somberly back through a mirror ( and I was going to throw in the Narcissus myth in it too) but that ended up becoming something bigger and I found the concept in this chapter a little too similar to the first one of this fic.
I decided to rebel a bit, and focus in on Ann's singing. I'd think that while being plain is a main link to her pain, Ann probably feels bad toward herself in other ways, if she's pretty, I'd say she can find something else to hate about herself and feel worthless of it.
Hopefully, y'all will like this and I cross my fingers you do.
Read. Review. Critique ALWAYS encouraged.
Chapter 3- Silence
If I were to ever not sing ever again, if I were to ever be silent, I would kill myself. Silence makes me nothing, and nothingness cannot exist in life or death.
We have arrived from the Realms tonight, the same way as every other night; the magic coursing though our veins as if it were our own blood, even when Gemma was the one truly born with the magic blood. Certainly not I, Pippa, or even Felicity.
We make it out in the hallway. Empty and dark, it is chillingly lifeless here. It's so cold it hurts to just breathe. It makes me realize in this pitch-dark hallway that I've read far too many Gothic novels than I should have read ---I suddenly think of a dark castles, demons, madness cutting holes through a man's mind, ruining it and his sense of morals, curses, dank decay... I swallow thickly. Maybe we should sneak into the Realms some other time of the day. The late afternoon perhaps?
Midnight is the time of wolf howls and animated skeletons after all. The curtain billows abruptly, with the moaning of harsh winds outside. I shudder and chide myself, less of the Gothics, and more of dear Lucy going past her perils, I tell myself sternly.
Pippa suddenly unleashes a fit of giddy giggling and Felicity angrily shushes for, but it's Gemma is the one who's able to really quiet her down---and with only a fierce glare. Sometimes I suspect Gemma knows the effect her sea-glass eyes can have on someone, she certainly knows how to use it well, I'll say that.
Pippa looks down, guiltily compliant, and I don't even think before I rest my hand on her arm. She stiffens in surprise, but smiles at me as she realizes who it is. My breath hitches.
Only Pippa and Gemma can do that - cause so much reaction whilst hardly doing anything for it. Gemma with her eyes, and Pippa with her eyes as well as everything else, her lips, her hair, just everything...It can hurt just looking at how pretty she is.
The four of us sneak our way into the room which Gemma and I share. Felicity opens the door with us following behind her, pauses, then closes it. I frown in puzzlement, and I imagine Gemma and Pippa mirror the same expression on their own faces.
Felicity smirks over her shoulder at us, tightens her grip on the knob, and opens the door again. We find ourselves in awe in what Felicity has done to our poor plain room.
She's made it into the room of a palace!
It's far bigger than before, high-ceilinged, and holding such sleek and clean-cut elegance. The floor is shining black marble, the walls bone-white and smoothly polished, made of a precious material I can't identify. At one corner of the room there is a large vanity which we immediately head to. There's a bench which can seat all four of us easily and so we line up in front of the mirror — right to left, Felicity, Gemma, Pippa and I.
Happily, the other three undo their corset laces and hooks, tilting their heads back with wide, toothy grins as they shut their eyes, deeply exhaling in relief as well as looking practically aroused in doings so. I remain where I am. I don't need to see the mirror to already know what I look like-- my face has already haunted me enough, thank you.
Suddenly, I feel someone tug my arm. It's Pippa. I let her grab my hand and follow after her when she tugs at me to hurry up.
I open my mouth to ask where we're going and why, but my mouth promptly closes when, at the corner of my eye, I see Felicity press her mouth where Gemma's long neck meets her very freckled shoulder. Oh...
Pippa (surprisingly) quietly leads me to the Great Hall and we hide ourselves in Felicity's tent. "I think we ought to leave them alone." She says to me. "Methinks Fee wants to lecture more on the Sapphists with Gemmy." She giggles again, and hastily I shush her.
Is she drunk?!
Just to be sure, I lean over to smell her breath. She stares at me looks over to and I swallow thickly, sitting back nervously as she sends me a raised brow as well as a coy smirk. "Me thinks YOU want to know more about the Sapphists," She says, in barely more than a whisper. Pippa pauses for a moment, studying me, and then she starts snickering, sputtering like a horse.
I gesture for her to lower her voice, and she grins, biting down on her bottom lip. I realize something then. Pippa is drunk. Drunk on magic. Is that even possible ?
Before I say anything, her hands suddenly reach for the sides of my body, beneath my breasts, and my breath stills. I imagine her unhooking and unlacing what I am wearing right now, and I'm not sure if I'm either repulsed or hoping for it. I shut my eyes tightly, banishing thoughts of us rolling together across the floor before one us pins the other down.
"Annie, Annie," Pippa croons. I look up in surprise. What did she just call me?
Her tongue slips between her pouting lips, running it around her whole mouth. Pippa's long, white hands trail up from HER sides to frame my face, and she says quietly, her eyes darkening to aubergine as brown-black hair fell over them: "Well, we certainly can't leave you ignorant of the Sapphists then, shall we...?" And then she kisses me full on the lips.
It was intense. It was almost burning hot. I wanted to pull away. I wanted to lean into it.
It was an eternity but it was also far too short a kiss when Pippa finally fell back on the support of her palms to the floor with a ripe grin across her face.
"Pippa," I say breathlessly, "We need to go back to the room."
She lets loose a small giggle after I say that.
"What ?"
"It's just... those are the first words you've said all night since we came back." She says, as she leans forward, and her soft hand curves along the side of my face. I lean into it with a delirious smile I can't control. Maybe silence won't be the end of my life after all. Maybe I can go on with it.
I wonder if Pippa will tell me more on the Sapphists. It really is an interesting subject to me after all.
Seriously, raise your hands if you think Pip and Ann would make hot-ass lesbians. Anyone?