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i. Beauregard
When she felt almost awake after being slammed into the ground by a giant, Beauregard assumed she’d survived. Blinking hard, she tried to see something other than darkness. A groan escapes her lips as she raises an arm over her head, rubbing her eyes.
“Are we still fighting?” She sits upright, feeling the sting of multiple broken ribs. “Jester, Cad, could use some help… Guys?”
Beau looks around. As far as she can see, there is only murky, shifting darkness. But she can see her hand completely, can see the rest of her for that matter. It’s not a pretty sight- her torso is patterned with black and blue and purple from bruises and burst veins. There’s a slicing feeling in her internal organs as she breathes, like a hot knife ripping through her.
From the distance, she hears something, and she tries to stand, stumbling towards it. The mist swirls around her, clinging to her legs, to her arms as they touch the cold ground. Beau sees a light, and squints to it, trying to make out any detail.
“Jester, can’t you do anything else?” She hears the frantic voice of Fjord ask. “Caduceus, can you do anything?”
“Maybe,” Jester’s voice is wet. She hiccups. “I don’t… I’ve never done something like this before.”
“I can,” Caduceus murmurs. “At least, we can try. It’s been a while since I have done something like this.”
“Guys?” Beau reaches the light. About twice the size of her fist, she peers at it. A dark sanded beach, with murky almost black water lapping at the surface, comes into view. The image grows larger, showing her friends. Yasha, a beautiful badass obelisk towering above the party comes into view first. Jester’s blue hair come in second, followed by Caduceus’ pink head bowed over something, Fjord and Caleb and Nott off to the side. Frumpkin purrs softly on Caleb’s shoulders. “Hey, I’m over here!” She shouts, stopping as she inhales with searing pain. “Shit.” Her hand comes away from her torso not wet with blood like she had expected, but dry.
There’s a very clear possibility that some shit happened, some sort of magic that popped her into a different dimension or into a… something magic or other, Beau doesn’t know.
Jester kneels, opening a book from her pink backpack. Caleb sits next to her, stroking a bluish lump on the ground.
“A diamond,” Caleb says. “You will need a diamond, worth at least three hundred gold, Jester.”
“Shit.” Jester spits. “I don’t have one, and because I almost always have the most money we probably don’t have one. Probably.”
The mess on the ground comes into focus, and Beau finds herself staring at… herself? Same bound dark hair, coming loose from the tie. Jade pendant sliding almost off of her bruised and bloodied neck. Her familiar blue robes puddled around her, moved out of the way to expose her battered chest and stomach. She touches the robe- the robe she was wearing.
“I have one,” Yasha speaks up, dropping to a knee. From underneath her skin tight shirt, she pulls a sparkling gem on a leather thong. “Don’t know if it’s worth three hundred gold, but it’s worth a shot.”
“I would say yes, that is.” Caleb appraises the gem. “We can perform the resurrection.”
“What?” Beau exclaims, hand returning to her ribs with another reminder of pain. “I’M NOT DEAD, I’M HERE! WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON?!”
“Beauregard.” A soft and somehow familiar voice says from behind her. Beau’s hair stands on end, and she drops into as best of a stance she can, spinning slowly to face her foe. Peering from the darkness, Beau notices a black figure in leather armor, graceful black wings trailing the ground.
“Who the fuck…” Beau coughs, unable to finish her question.
“Am I?” The young man finishes for her. “Think of me as a transition. I’m here to watch the outcome of your friends, and then make a choice on your end.”
“Transition to what?” Her heart is pounding in her throat.
“It sounds like you are unsure, Beauregard.” The figure glides past her to the vision. “Let me clarify. You, Beauregard, are no longer living. I am the champion of the goddess of death, and now it is time to see if you will return or come with me.”
“What do you mean, I’m dead?” Beau shouts, voice hoarse. “I don’t accept this, I want to speak to a manager, fuck you.”
“You have no pulse, your soul has departed.” The Champion places his hand on her shoulder. “Now listen- it’s rather rude to ignore your friends when they plead for you back.”
ii. Jester
“Okay, okay.” Jester places one hand on the book, the other on Yasha’s diamond. “Traveller, I really hope you’re there I’ve never done this before even though I have Caduceus to help me I don’t know how this is going to work out and you know it’s so important I’d never do this if it didn’t matter,”
“Breathe, my follower,” The Traveller’s voice whispers in her ear. “I know it’s important.”
“It’s just…” Jester bites her lip, pressing her eyes shut even more. Tears roll down her cheeks. “Beau means sooo much to me even though sometimes she’s an asshole I love her. And I want her back here, with me. I wasn’t able to… I couldn’t save Molly. Please, let me save her. Please. And I promise, Traveller, if you bring her back I will be such a good follower, I’ll get so many people to follow you I promise. I haven’t had too much success so far because most of the people here have sticks up their butts with gods and shit.”
“You are doing so well. I’m here, Jester. And I will help you.” The Traveller’s voice seems jovial even for this solemn occasion. “You have what you need.”
“Okay, okay.” Jester opens her eyes, looking at the nervous crowd. “I’m ready. We need three people to help me with the resurrection, who will help?”
iii. Caduceus
“Of course, I need Caduceus to help me cast it,” Jester says.
Caduceus’ big hand pats hers.
“Of course, I’ll help you.” He smiles.
A gentle giant, he had seen deaths. He helped souls pass from one plane to the other. But there was something that felt wrong when he saw someone so young fall before their time.
The Nein had lost so much already when he could not help them. He was not going to stand idly by while they lost yet another member.
Caduceus began the ritual with Jester, guiding her hand.
“Beau,” He says softly, “I’m talking out loud because I know you can still hear me, at least, I think you can. We’d like very much if you came back, but if you decide to go, that’s cool too. I encourage you to not join the cycle of life and death here, now. Okay. I think we’re ready for the next person.”
iv. Caleb
“I’ll help.” His words hang in the air, thick with tension. Caleb’s fingers fidget as he touches Beau’s tattered blue robes, taking a moment to cast Mending. His arm tingles as the magic flows out of him, focusing on fixing the robe. Slowly, the tears stitch back together, and he wishes, gods he wishes he could fix all the cuts on Beau that way.
“Thought you’d like to have your robes the way they should be,” Caleb says, wrapping them back around Beau’s lifeless body. “It just… seems better.”
“Who else will help?” Jester keeps her eyes closed. “And they have to be good, because they have to make up for Caleb’s smell driving Beau’s soul away.”
v. Nott
Most everyone seems to be looking to Yasha, off in the distance. Yasha is kneeling in the sea, facing distant storm clouds.
“Ahem,” Jester says, louder. “I said, WHO else will help, maybe someone with a DIVINE CONNECTION AND I DON’T MEAN ME OR CADUCEUS, WE ALREADY HELPED.”
“I’ll go get her,” Nott says. She can’t blame Yasha, she reflects as she scampers along the top of the water, ring of water walking keeping her from sinking. Dead bodies normally didn’t give her chills, but seeing Beau without a sarcastic comment and smirk felt wrong.
“Yasha,” Nott taps her gently on the shoulder. “Do you want to…” the words freeze on her lips. Yasha’s lips move, but no sound emerges. Locked in prayer to the Stormlord, her cheeks wet from splashing seawater and tears.
Nott takes a seat, not minding the water wetting her clothes.
“Yasha?”
From the coast, Nott hears Fjord speak. “I’ll do it.”
vi. Fjord
“I haven’t had the pleasure of having many close friends,” Fjord folds his arms, standing over Beau. “And it’s been a while since I’ve had a friend make me laugh as hard as you. Hell, come back and I’ll wingman for you with Yasha. We’ll miss your spirit, Beau. And even though we’re some pretty big assholes, I don’t think you want to leave us.”
“That was really good Fjord,” Jester opens her eyes. “What now Caduceus? When do we know if it works?”
“Now?” Caduceus folds his arms. “Now we wait.”
vii. Beauregard
“The spell is complete,” the figure hums. “What say you, Beauregard? Rest, or toil?”
“I want to go back,” Beau wipes a tear from her cheek as she watches her friends wait. The vision has grown, taller and wider than her.
“Not quite yet.” The Champion looks at the group. “There’s another person who needs to speak.”
“Who?” Beau narrows her eyes. “Don’t say my father or some bullshit like that. That’s my family, their say is the only one that counts.”
“Didn’t think you’d forgotten me so quickly, asshole.”
viii. Mollymauk
“Molly?” Beau’s voice seems small.
“Yeah.” He comes closer to her. “Been a while. I’ve been keeping an eye on you, and the rest of them. You’re doing good, for a band of thieves and criminals and assholes.”
“Thought you were going to get me to stay,” Beau mutters.
“No, just going to talk with you.” Molly smiles, leaning in. “I saw that tattoo, Beau.”
“OH?”
“Jester did a good job with it.”
“Mhmm.” She nods. “She did.”
“They’re good people, the lot of them.”
Behind her, the Champion talks with another figure, masked and tall, in the background, examining the diamond and muttering.
“Beauregard,” they call her attention.
“It’s not worth enough,” the Raven Queen drops the diamond, voice chilling Beau to the bone. “You cannot return.”
ix. Yasha
The memory of Zuala was rushing through her, like it had so many times before. Now, it was a mix, of Zuala and Molly and Beau. The three of them, it seems, were wrapped up in her mind, associating it all with death.
“Why isn’t she back yet?” Jester shouts as Yasha wades back to shore. “Caduceus, it’s been too long, and we don’t have another diamond and we don’t have another chance she’s gone.”
“Why didn’t you help, you big dumb idiot?” Jester hisses at Yasha, fanged teeth bared. “She would have come back for you.”
“The diamond wasn’t worth enough,” Caleb shakes his head.
“I know.” Yasha takes a deep breath. “But it was the only chance we had. I hoped it would be enough.”
“But you. Didn’t. Help.” Jester snarls, adding a few choice words in infernal.
“Blaming Yasha won’t help anyone,” Fjord steps between the two, his hand on Jester’s shoulder.
Yasha pulls away from Jester, letting herself fall at Beau’s side. Caleb walks away from the body, leaving the two of them alone.
“Hey Beau,” Yasha pulls Beau’s broken body onto her lap, holding her and not letting go. “I know, I said this would cost you five gold. You can pay me back later.”
Silence comes from Beau, as Yasha runs her hands through her hair.
“I really like you, you know.” Yasha clears her throat. “Like a lot, in a super weird way. I think… Beau, I love you.”
Yasha waits for something, anything. But like most of what she does, it seems to be too little, too late.
“Why don’t you take me too, Stormlord?” She murmurs. “You gave me something good, and I let her slip away. Again. All of them, all of them just die and leave me behind.”
Like she had for Molly, Yasha cries out, her call almost shaking the earth. Her skeletal wings burst out from her back, another reminder of everything she’s lost and those she’s been unable to protect.
Gently, she kisses Beau, everything she wanted to do since she met her in that tavern, since she carried her to her seat in the tent, since countless fights and shared meals, hot bathhouses and cold stormy nights. For a moment, she pretended that Beau was here, thought of the sarcastic reply to the kiss- or even better, just shy blushing and more kisses.
x. Beauregard
“No,” she shakes her head furiously. Her limbs feel numb, and breath grows more shallow. “No, you can’t do this to me, not after this. Not after Yasha…” Beau’s voice breaks.
“You’re dead, Beauregard.” The Raven Queen sounds removed, unmoved. “You need to move on.”
Beau looks at her hands, feeling so lost. She could solve so many problems with her fists, so many fights. Not this one.
“Come, Beauregard.” The Raven Queen hums. “We shall see your future.”
“Fuck that,” Beau says to herself. With a blind swing, she strikes the Raven Queen in her porcelain mask, catching her off guard. With another roundhouse, the Raven Queen turns, and Beau sprints for the shrinking vision. “Yasha, I’m coming.”
xi. Yasha
It happens slowly, so slowly she isn’t sure when it happens. Hot breath meets hers, and Beau’s lips start to move against hers, mouth opening and tongue pressing against hers, warm and living and alive. God, she feels so alive. Yasha pulls away, watching as Beau blinks open her eyes.
“Hey,” Beau says, wincing.
“Are you okay?” Yasha helps her sit.
“Well, I just died, and I don’t think the answer to that is often yes.” Beau cracks her neck. “But I’m alive, Yasha. I’M ALIVE, ASSHOLES.”
Nott looks up from Caleb and Jester, who stops crying and wipes her tears.
“Beau!” Jester runs to her. “How?”
Beau looks to her fist, unwrapping the cloth around it. Her knuckles are a deep black, with purple and blue bruises down her arm.
“The Raven Queen said the gem wasn’t worth enough,” she grins, spitting some blood onto the ground. “But I said fuck that, punched her twice, and came back.”
“Holy shit.” Yasha mutters, feeling a flush come up to her face. She coughs, turning her head to hide the blush.
“By the way,” Beau leans in to whisper to Yasha. “If you want me to pay you five gold for every time I want you to hold me, I’m going to run out of coin fast.”
“I’ll consider a discount,” Yasha smiles.
“That must have really really hurt,” Jester smiles. “I’ll help you. Take a seat.” Jester pats Yasha’s thigh. Beau shifts onto her lap, and Yasha runs her hand through Beau’s hair. Jester’s healing helps, though she’ll undoubtedly be quite sore for some time.
“That was a close one, Beauregard.” She hears the voice of the Raven Queen. “Don’t expect to evade death so easily next time.”
Bean knows she’s right- she’s ridiculously, insanely lucky. But for now, she’s satisfied with lying her head on Yasha’s muscular chest, and falling asleep to her heartbeat.