Work Text:
what was once still is granted motion / & again i am dark / with my envy as life unfolds / its arms & taunts / death with its favorite song / for now / lover / i am going to ruin you
- “Juxtaposition with seeds”, b ferguson
The escape, again.
After a year, the crackling wrongness of a neck snapping. The inadequate resistance of skin under a blade. Promises fulfilled, blood soaking through contracts. Again. Another. To the next.
And then Treviso, bloodied and bowed but unbroken. Death settling over his shoulders like a shroud.
A hand over his, a worried look. A thread woven through her gaze: the improbable, guilty lure of freedom.
The demon breathed in his ear. “Liar.”
Lucanis jolted awake with an oath. It took a moment longer to register the pain in his hand and lurch back a step, doubling over it with a hiss. He’d fallen asleep while heating oil; his hand had drifted into the pan. Dangerous. Stupid.
“Lucanis?”
He turned. Rook was leaning against the dining table, arms crossed, watching him.
He’d joined her team two days ago, stumbled with her and Harding through the eluvian into the land of dreams. In that time she’d kept him under unsubtle and constant surveillance, dropping in unannounced under flimsy pretenses: formally negotiating his contract, discussing Treviso and the occupation, watching him cook, telling stories about her time in Arlathan Forest. He appreciated her wariness and tried to match it in kind, clothing himself in the tattered remnants of his professionalism. She seemed like someone who knew how best to use her disarming charm to her advantage, but he’d had a lifetime of experience with that type. He knew how to keep an arm’s-length distance.
“I’m fine,” he said, shaking out his hand and going to dunk it in a nearby washbasin. “My hand slipped.”
“That’s not very Crow of you,” Rook said, a laugh in her voice.
“Mocks but. No cruelty.” Spite sounded puzzled. Lucanis ignored him, turning his hand this way and that to assess the damage. Likely a small blister or two. He knew how long burns took to heal, remembered the maddening itching. He’d take Harding some of those appalling sandwiches she favored, trade them for elfroot from her burgeoning garden.
“Not that it’s any of my business, but are you getting enough sleep?”
He turned, schooling his features to a pleasant blandness. Many who’d held his contracts over the years, especially those outside Antiva with less experience of the Crows, had forced their ideas and opinions about how he was to complete their bidding, right down to how he should approach the target, what he should say, how he should dress. He’d become very good at nodding and saying the right things in the moment and completely ignoring the more annoying parts when actually on the job.
That said, he’d never had to share a living space with the holder of his contract, never found himself the subject of such intense monitoring. He dried his hands on a cloth, meeting Rook’s eyes. “A momentary lapse. I am recovering.”
Her gaze darted up and down; he suffered the scrutiny with a raised eyebrow. He knew he’d looked a mess coming out of the Ossuary, half-starved and exhausted, but the intervening days had brought him back to a comfortable routine. He could tell even this early that muscle tone was beginning to recover with adequate nutrition and exercise, and caffeine was serving where restful sleep evaded him.
“All right,” she said at last. “Just let me know if you change your mind and want a bigger room.”
“We’ve talked about this,” he said. “I appreciate the space and find it perfectly suitable.”
“Well, good,” she said, and pointed. “Is the pan supposed to be smoking like that?”
He cursed again, dragging the pan off the heat, then stared for a despairing moment at the burned oil.
“I’m sorry. I distracted you.”
“Not at all,” he said, extinguishing the stove’s flame and wrapping up the unfried arancini he’d prepared. They would keep well in the cold box, being mostly leftover rice anyway. “I was just killing time.” He paused. “How late is it?” And how long were you standing there before you spoke up?
“Hard to say in a place like this,” Rook said, “but I imagine day is breaking somewhere out there as we speak. So... the smarter question would have been ‘how early is it?’ because now I know you’ve been up all night.”
He couldn’t suppress a slow, frustrated sigh. “I’m fine, Rook.”
She pushed away from the table and came a little closer. He noticed she walked slowly, deliberately around him. Predictably, like she was trying not to spook a nervous cat. “Has Spite been hurting you again?”
Lucanis felt Spite’s indignation like a passing breeze. “No.”
She paused again, brows drawn down. “But you’re worried he might hurt us.”
Her gaze, he thought, was almost appallingly direct. Honest. Manipulation tactic or not, it was hard not to answer that look in kind. “Of course. It’s my responsibility not to endanger the team. But I can still work.”
“I never suggested you couldn’t.” She shifted, her confidence giving way to something uncomfortable. “I heard you mention going to Treviso today. Do you mind if I tag along?”
“Keeping an eye on your investment?” he said, feeling an unfamiliar sneer curl his lip. Spite surged approval.
Her expression didn’t change, but there was a pang of shame in him, watching her carefully neutral face. “Let’s call it offering support to a colleague. If I wouldn’t be overstepping.”
All through the Ossuary, she’d kept several paces back, letting him walk first through the doors she’d opened. She’d always given him the choice. “Not at all,” he said. The words surprised him even as they came out of his mouth. “I’d be glad for the company.”
Her smile spread across her face like a slow sigh of relief. “Great,” she said. “After breakfast, then?” She nodded to the mess of the kitchen. “We’ll eat leftovers.”
“I’ll make the coffee,” he said, and watched her leave.
“Hmm,” Spite said, swarming up to follow his gaze. “Soft. Sweet.” There was no sneer in his voice, only a mild confusion. Almost as an afterthought, he added, “Makes you strange.”
Lucanis swatted him away and went to boil water.
After donning his armor, jogging swiftly through the courtyard so he didn’t have to linger in the tingling wrongness of the open view of the Fade, he heard Rook’s voice echoing from the eluvian room and slowed, despite himself, to listen.
“I genuinely don’t think he’s dangerous,” she was saying. “I think he’s scared of what all this means, but I don’t think he’s a threat. Not in that way.”
“That’s a bit naive.” That was Harding. “I’m not saying it’s Lucanis we need to be scared of.”
“Spite seems like more of a danger to him than anyone else.”
“Sure. So far. I’m just saying, make sure you have some way to stop him if it comes down to it.” A pause. “I’ve got this enchanted arrow.”
“Lace.”
“What? It’s an effective deterrent.”
A heavy sigh. “I just don’t know how I’m supposed to keep a team together when we don’t trust each other.”
“Rook, he’s got a demon inside him. A demon. They’re the whole reason the Chantry exists.” He could imagine Harding’s gestures from the passion in her voice. “Half of society is built around avoiding them at all costs. Spite isn’t a grumpy toddler throwing a tantrum. He’s a force of pure evil. And mage or not, abominations are bad news.”
“She’s right,” Lucanis said, loud enough for both of them to hear as he came down the stairs. Harding was a little abashed, but her stare was solid when he met it; Rook, on the other hand, looked deeply mortified, staring fixedly at the ground. From this angle, he could see the blush down the back of her neck. “Scout Harding is only taking necessary precautions, Rook. You hold my contract and I will uphold it, but I don’t ask that you defend me. Our relationship is transactional and professional. I will provide you with the promised service and go on my way.”
“Let me talk to her,” Spite said. His eagerness, clashing horribly with Lucanis’s exhaustion, was like the jittery rush of a third cup of coffee late at night. “Let. Me talk.”
“The promised service is killing a god,” Rook said. She’d dragged her gaze up from the ground, but there was a transparent pity in her eyes he didn’t know how to take; this time, he was the one who looked away. “That could take a while. We need to trust each other in the meantime.”
“It’s not a matter of trust,” Harding said. “It’s practicality, Rook.”
“Do not let your guard down,” Lucanis echoed.
“Trusts you,” Spite said, positively gleeful. “Shouldn’t. Does anyway. Need. To talk to her.”
Lucanis huffed irritation. Rook and Harding exchanged a look. “Is Spite getting agitated?” Rook asked, carefully casual, like they were talking about the weather.
“He knows better than to endanger us by throwing a tantrum just as we’re about to leave,” Lucanis said pointedly. “Which I assume is what he’s wanted all along.”
“Leaving? Here?” Spite’s enthusiasm waned to wariness. “But you. Lie.”
“How?” Lucanis said, drawn in spite of himself into the conversation. Harding went tense, but Rook just cocked her head to one side, considering him. “How do I lie to you?”
Spite snarled. “Let me. Talk. To. Rook.”
A flare of pain across his temples, like a band tightening. He resisted the push, but he had to take a step back to catch himself. The demon hadn’t bloodied his nose this time, at least.
Harding’s hand moved toward her bow. Rook’s twitched up as though to reach for him. He found himself oddly disappointed that neither of them followed through on their actions. “We good?” Rook asked.
Lucanis straightened, watching Spite stalk off to pace ominously a short distance away. The thought of prolonging that discussion made him want to curl up and fall asleep on the spot. In desperation, he turned to a kind of cockeyed politeness. “Will you be joining us, Scout Harding?”
“Not unless you’d like me to,” Harding said, with a hard stare at Rook. “I was going to Dock Town to pick out some more plants to bring back with me. The soil I brought to my room here is... unreal. It’s like it’s finally remembered how to properly grow something.”
“Treviso’s market has an excellent selection,” Lucanis said. “Or, well, it did before the invasion. I imagine there are still some gems to be found. I’ll bring you back what I can find.” He could sense the frantic edge in his own offer, the need to prove himself kind and thoughtful and human. Spite gave a cackle at that thought.
“Oh,” Harding said. “That would be very nice, Lucanis. Thank you.”
“Well,” Rook said, her perpetual cheerfulness gone brittle, “let’s head out, then. No sense keeping Treviso waiting.”
The city was so close to correct that it felt like a dream.
In his torment, he’d mentally walked the streets of Treviso, darting down familiar alleys, lingering on rooftops, sipping coffee, watching gondolas carve through the inky blackness of the canals. It had been an easy escape, well within the realm of his experience and training, and he’d reveled in it. But as time had passed, as his lacerated mind had been stitched back together with the edges not quite meeting, he’d struggled to fill in gaps. The blocks leading up to Cafe Pietra had become a blur of starry skies and hushed voices, of warm spice and cool walls. The Diamond had seemed smaller and larger all at once: a smear of soft conversation, Teia’s amused smile, Viago’s piercing eyes. His grandmother’s face had wavered, shifting from gentle to stern, and Illario’s laugh had turned hard, mocking, until family had become just another way for Zara to torture him.
Even with all the subtle ways it had been undone in his mind, this Treviso didn’t match what he remembered. It was too big, too bright, and everything was subtly wrong, drifting out of focus. Someone on the street made a comment about the occupation, offhand, like the word fell easily from their lips. A new booth was standing at the market in the place of the one where he’d once bought Illario a fine leather flask as a nameday gift.
“Smells like smoke and blood,” Spite sneered. “And lies.”
“It must be a relief to be home,” Rook said in the same moment, and he had to suppress a guilty start; he’d forgotten she was there, walking silently by his side as he wandered the almost-familiar streets. But the words were gentle, a conversational volley that he felt he could pick up or let rest as he liked. He found silence the less appealing option.
“I wish I hadn’t come back to this,” he said, nodding to an Antaam barricade. “We knew the fighting was moving this way, but for the city to have fallen so quickly...”
“Yeah,” Rook said. “I think Viago’s looking into something on that. We’ll have more on it soon. I’ll make sure you’re in on those discussions.”
“Thank you,” Lucanis said. It took him a moment to realize why Rook cared: if she was angling to get the Crows on board in the larger fight against the gods, helping Treviso would likely serve her well. “I intend to see this occupation fall.”
“You will,” Rook said. The incongruously intense conviction in her voice sent a chill down his spine.
“Promises,” Spite murmured. “Always. Promising. Does she lie as well as you?”
He realized belatedly that he’d stopped walking, rubbing at his temples as he stared out over a canal. Rook came up beside him to lean casually on the railing beside the walkway. “Any particular place you’re looking to visit while we’re here, or just getting the lay of the land?”
Lucanis thought about the empty chair where Caterina had sat. “I’m sure Illario and the Talons will want to speak with me soon, but for now I’d rather be a little more anonymous. Just walking. Thinking. And keeping an eye out for some flowers for Harding.”
“You do that a lot,” Rook said, turning away from the canal to face him.
“Do what?”
“What you’re trying to do with the flowers. You’re always apologizing for things that haven’t happened yet. Things that may never happen.”
He’d avoided her eyes since they’d stepped through the eluvian; now, he found himself captured by her searching gaze. In the evening twilight, her eyes were an interesting shade of gold. His reflexive denial died on his lips, and he said, instead, “I can’t risk it.”
“It’s all right,” Rook said. “It was an observation, not an accusation.” She touched his arm, a brush of fingertips against his armor. “I’m just saying you don’t have to worry. We’re not your enemies. A little scared, maybe, but we’re on your side.”
Spite relentlessly drove his perception to the touch, as though through layers of leather and cloth he could feel her warmth radiate. “Strange,” he said. “Soft. A hand that doesn’t shred us. Doesn’t hurt us.”
Lucanis took a step back, inhaling sharply, and she glanced down at her half-raised hand as though only becoming aware of it for the first time. “Sorry,” she said.
“It’s fine,” he said, forcing a smile. “I am a little jumpy.”
She narrowed her eyes. “Not sleeping for two days will do that to someone.”
Two days was a laughably optimistic tally, but he appreciated the mundane excuse for his behavior. “I’m sure I’ll catch up on my sleep back at the Lighthouse. It’s eerily quiet there.”
“Really? I’m always hearing things. Gusts of wind. Branches clacking in trees. Distant thunder. Birdsong.” Rook shook her head. “I could’ve sworn I once heard a whole-ass halla galloping through the courtyard, but I turned and there was nothing there.”
He blinked. “I’m surprised. It’s completely silent to me.”
“Because. You lie. Never leave. Never left.”
“Maybe it comes with time,” Rook said, and smiled. “Don’t worry. Your standard-issue auditory hallucinations have been delayed, but they will arrive shortly.”
Seeing her smile, he couldn’t help smiling back. He was so tired that he felt a little drunk, spinning in the familiar strangeness of their surroundings, breathing the city’s air under the sky, the stars.
“Oh,” said Rook, watching him, as though something had just occurred to her, but she only shook her head and nodded to a bridge. “Shall we?”
He waved her on with a little flourish, then followed, buoyed by the unaccustomed lightness in his chest.
“Soft,” Spite said again. “Strange.”
“Papers.”
The word was uttered with the same snarl as an oath, and like an oath barked in public, the reactions were varied. Most lowered their eyes and kept walking. A few stopped to observe from a safe distance. Rook was one of them, slowing her pace until she came to a halt entirely, half a block away from the discussion; Lucanis obligingly waited and watched beside her. Their meanderings had taken them to the Drowned District, a less wealthy part of the city that Lucanis had expected to have remained largely untouched. Instead, the place was swarming with Antaam. People walked with their heads down.
There were six Antaam looming around a young man in the neat-yet-modest dress of a merchant. The sweat was visible on his brow, even from this distance. “I... I don’t have papers. Lived here all my life.”
“We understand,” one of the Antaam said, leaning closer; the man backed up, shoulders banging into the wall behind him. “But you understand that we need proof that you belong here. That you’re not some sort of miscreant who would dare harm this beautiful city.”
“I don’t have—” The man gulped audibly. There were already sweat stains on his shirt. “I don’t have anything on me. I can go get my merchant’s license for the Grande Markets.”
“Oh,” another Antaam said. “He doesn’t have it.” With shocking suddenness, he drove his fist into the man’s gut; he doubled over with a cry, retching. “Seems plenty suspicious to me.”
Moving slowly, as though in a dream, Lucanis strode up to the Antaam and slammed a dagger through his lung.
The Antaam collapsed with a little gasp as Spite, rousing from a sulk, surged to the forefront of his attention; Lucanis spun, took a leap that felt higher than it had any right to be, and speared the next Antaam through his eardrum, then wrenched his knife free as that one fell without a sound. Another made a confused grab at Spite’s skeletal glowing wings, a meaningless interruption that Lucanis felt as a buzzing at the nape of his neck, and he spun to meet the hammer-blow of the fourth. The speed of his turn meant the hammer only cracked down on his shoulder and collarbone instead of his skull, but the shattering pain of the hit sent him stumbling to his knees. The dagger in his off-hand scattered to the ground as his arm went numb. Four Antaam left standing. That wasn’t ideal.
Lucanis drove his blade up, diverting a killing hammer-blow with a sword through the nearest Antaam’s wrists, pinning them together. With a snarl, Lucanis pushed the blade farther, up through his throat. When that Antaam fell back, Lucanis’s rapier went with it; he drew a throwing knife and whirled around.
Rook was there, carving through the fourth Antaam; he had a brief impression of her shielding the merchant on the ground, who seemed to have done the reasonable thing and gone fetal at her feet, but in a moment the man was up again and sprinting for the safety of the crowd that was starting to build around them at a respectable distance. Lucanis whipped his knife at the Antaam who attempted to hurl a spear at the merchant, fouling his shot with a blade to the forearm, but the motion drew fire from his collarbone along with a grinding crunch of bone that threatened to send him back to his knees.
Then Spite’s frustration pulsed along his spine, stealing his breath, and Lucanis had to close his eyes as his gorge rose. The pain dragged him back to the Ossuary, to Zara’s smile, to Caliban’s sneer. But no. This was real. This was fighting on the streets of Treviso. This was—
He opened his eyes in time to clumsily dodge another hammer-blow, staggering back into the wall of a building behind him. He reached for the hilt of the rapier he’d lost earlier in the scuffle, feeling nothing at his side. The Antaam looming over him didn’t grin, didn’t gloat, merely wound up for another blow he knew he wouldn’t be able to dodge.
With a yell, Rook launched herself onto the Antaam’s back, plunging both weapons into his shoulders. The Antaam jolted back immediately as Lucanis stared, stunned, and then he rammed Rook into a wall behind him. Lucanis heard the crack of her head against the stonework, but he was already moving, plunging another throwing knife into the Antaam’s chest. The Antaam collapsed with a gurgling sound, leaving Rook to wrench her weapons free and stumble off of his corpse.
She’d finished off the other Antaam during his lapse, Lucanis realized, looking around. “Weak,” Spite sneered at him, and for a moment all he could do was focus on the even rhythm of his breathing.
“Hm,” Rook said. She was looking up at the wall the Antaam had slammed her into. Beyond the spray of the Antaam’s blood, there was a patch of blood that smeared down the wall. Reaching out a hand to steady herself, Rook touched the back of her head. Her hand came away bloody. “Why do I seem to be collecting head wounds lately?” she muttered, then turned an alarmingly bright smile his way. “You all right?”
“Fine,” Lucanis said, and an unfamiliar prickle of shame at his uselessness in the fight compelled him to add, “Broken collarbone.”
“Ouch,” Rook said. “I think we need to get out of here. They’re not going to look kindly on all of this.”
“Back to the eluvian,” Lucanis agreed. “We should—”
Rook held up a hand to interrupt him, then turned away and vomited against the wall. She swayed, breathing hard, before straightening. “Well,” she said, and spat. “I might need your help with the fleeing part of this.”
“Of course,” Lucanis said, and moved forward to steady her as her knees buckled. She gripped his proffered forearm like a lifeline, and after a moment’s hesitation he slung her arm around his shoulders, wincing as her weight settled against him and drew a wave of pain from his collarbone.
A shout drew their gazes across the bridge to where a larger contingent of Antaam was charging their way. “Now, I think,” Rook said. Her tone was bright, but he heard her words slurring, and she leaned a little more weight against him.
Dragging her with him, he ran.
This, at least, was familiar. He had worked in Treviso for ages before the string of Vint contracts, and while Rook’s unsteady gait precluded the rooftop getaways he favored—nobody ever thought to look up—he was still able to dodge through alleys and double back between market stalls. With each new turn, with each touch of a wall, the city was crystallizing around him, taking tangible form once more.
Even without the Antaam that were obligingly falling farther behind, though, they were starting to draw some worried looks from civilians as Rook’s casual jog with an arm slung over his shoulder turned into a drunken stumble and a death-grip cling. She was muttering under her breath, and when he realized she was stringing together nonsense words he ducked them into a more secluded alley.
“Rook,” he said, and bit down on a yelp as he wrenched his aching collarbone trying to lower her carefully to the ground, letting her back rest against the wall. Her head lolled forward, and he could see that blood had run down the back of her neck to soak into the collar of her shirt. “Rook, can you hear me?”
She squinted at him like she was struggling to focus. “Hit my head harder than I thought,” she said, but the words ran together into a blur. “Don’t feel good. Need to go back through elu— elb— the mirror.”
“Right,” Lucanis said, and dug into a pouch for one of the phials Viago had pressed into his hand as they’d left the Diamond two days earlier. Of course he’d only thought to bring one today. “First, I need you to try drinking this. Can you keep it down?”
“Got hurt because you. Were. Weak,” Spite sneered, and Lucanis felt his face heat with some emotion he couldn’t name.
“Sure,” Rook said, waving a hand blithely, but it took her a couple of attempts to grab hold of the phial, and another moment to work out how to uncork it. She paused just before downing it. “Wait. What is this?”
“One of Viago’s concoctions.” Lucanis shrugged. “I don’t know the specifics, but it knocks out most injuries pretty effectively. I think embrium is involved somewhere.”
“Smells like it,” Rook mumbled, then squinted at him again. “Do you need one?”
“I’m fine, Rook. Take the potion.”
She drank it down and winced, slamming her eyes shut and leaning back. “Embrium always makes me sleepy.”
He blinked. “I’ve never heard of that.”
“I react oddly to most herbal things,” she said with a sigh. “Now I’m just trying not to throw it straight back up.”
The words brought back, unbidden, the memory of being force-fed in the Ossuary, his desperation to survive warring with the knowledge that something else was being driven into his body, something terrible. To distract himself, Lucanis shrugged out of his greatcoat and draped it awkwardly over Rook; she opened her eyes to stare at him as he settled it around her shoulders. “You were shivering,” he said. “With Spite, I don’t feel the cold the same way.”
“Oh,” she said. “Thank you.”
“We’ll rest here for an hour or so. Just to let the potion take effect and make sure you’re all right to go the rest of the way.”
She was still staring at him, so he made his way over to the mouth of the alley, peering out. No signs of commotion, either from Antaam invaders or well-intentioned snoopers. He glanced over his shoulder and said, before he could think better of it, “I’m sorry, Rook.”
She closed her eyes with a sigh. “About what?”
He drew back to pace in front of her. “I shouldn’t have started that attack unprompted. We weren’t equipped properly, and I was just... I was looking for an excuse to pick a fight.”
“Understandable,” she said. “Lucanis, you saved that merchant from getting seriously hurt or... or disappeared.”
“That wasn’t why I did it,” he said, feeling Spite’s waves of approval at the bitterness in his tone.
“I know. But it’s what happened.” Her eyes cracked open. Some of the pallor in her face seemed to be fading already, he thought. “You don’t think much of me, do you?”
“What?” He stopped in his tracks. “Why would you think that?”
“Because you’re assuming the worst of me. Constantly. This—” She waved at her face, putting on a blindingly bright smile. “This is a choice I make. But it’s also who I am. I’m not a complicated person, Lucanis. Chances are, in any given interaction, that I don’t have ulterior motives. I see you tensing up anytime I try to do something nice. I promise, sometimes I just... want to try to do the right thing. I’m a terrible liar, so I’ve had to make do with being genuine to a fault. Does that make sense?”
He felt his lips twitching into a crooked smile. “It isn’t something I find easy to believe as a general rule. A Crow who takes things at face value is a very dead Crow.” Something compelled him to add, “But I’d like to believe it from you.”
Rook smiled back at him sleepily. “I can work with that,” she said, and added, “You have nothing to apologize for. I’m on board. For all of this. I can’t ask you all to risk your lives on this objectively ridiculous mission without being willing to help you out along the way. So don’t be a fool for the sake of being foolish. Let me help.”
“All right,” Lucanis said. The ease with which he spoke the words didn’t feel possible, taking on the fuzzy quality of a pleasant dream. “I’ll let you know when I hear anything from the Talons or Illario. Thank you.”
Rook tipped her head back. “Andraste’s pyre,” she grumbled. “This stuff is strong.”
“It’s... it’s safe to give to small children for broken bones,” Lucanis said, unable to resist a gentle teasing tone. “Specifically because it has no side effects.”
“Well, the world’s spinning for me,” Rook said. “I feel a little drunk. Call me a lightweight, but—”
“You’re a lightweight.”
She opened her eyes with a delighted chuckle. “Fine, I admit it. It really is making me sleepy, too.”
“Rest a bit,” Lucanis said. “I’ll keep watch.”
She exhaled heavily. “You can’t stay awake forever. Lemme talk to Spite sometime.”
“YES. Let. Me. Talk. She can be freedom. Can eat our nightmares!”
“No,” Lucanis said. “That’s not a good idea.”
He expected more pushback, but heard only soft, even breathing, and when he looked over again she was asleep. He bent beside her to readjust the greatcoat, pulling it up to her chin, and paused, casting an appraising eye over her features: her color looked much improved already, and the flow of blood from the back of her head seemed stanched entirely.
“The coat,” Spite murmured. “Will smell like her, after. Blood and flowers. Sweet.”
He paused in the act of brushing down the collar of the coat, and for a moment let himself listen to her quiet breathing. Even stumbling through the nightmares of this city, even making mistakes and putting others in danger, nothing had been irreparably broken today. For the first time in a year, he let himself wonder whether tomorrow might just bring the same inexplicable good fortune.
“Rook. Opens. Doors,” Spite said, thoughtfully. Lucanis didn’t have the faintest idea what he meant by that, but it had the ring of truth to it.
He pushed to his feet with a wince and padded over to the mouth of the alley to keep watch.
“Harding forgave you for not bringing her a plant?”
Lucanis jolted from a half-doze, surrounded by waiting and whispering horrors, into full wakefulness. He’d been slumping against the wall of his storeroom, his empty coffee cup moments from slipping out of his hand. Rook was standing in the doorway, one hand raised as though to knock, with a sheepish look on her face. “Sorry,” she said. “I saw the door was open. Didn’t mean to startle you.”
“Not at all,” Lucanis said. “I think she was just relieved we came back in one piece. Not even a single threat.”
“Good,” Rook said. “We’ll be recruiting some more team members soon. I’d rather the current ones not tear each other to shreds before then.” She paused. “Lucanis, I wanted to apologize if I was a little overly direct yesterday. I wasn’t filtering things the way I normally try to. The way a leader—even an interim leader—probably should.”
He crossed his arms, staring down into his empty cup. “I don’t think you said anything worth apologizing for. I was the one who got you hurt.”
“Ah yes,” she said. “I distinctly remember you saying, ‘Hey, Rook, jump up on that Antaam’s back and hit your head really, really hard on a wall.’ Very cruel of you.”
He laughed. “You’re not going to let me feel guilty about this.”
She grinned. “Nope. And likewise?”
He mimicked her bubbly tone. “Nope.”
That got her to laugh outright. He thought he might be able to drift away on the lightness that filled his chest at the sound. “All right,” she said. “Let’s try this again. Hi, I’m Rook. I’m going to be leading this team and I need an assassin for a truly impossible task. I also need someone I can rely on.”
“Well,” Lucanis said. “Hello. I’m Lucanis. I can certainly offer the former and... at least attempt to provide the latter.”
“Good enough for me,” Rook said, and extended her hand. He clasped it, and the lingering chill of the nightmares crowding his mind dissipated against the warmth of her touch.
As she left the room, humming something tuneless under her breath, Spite murmured, “Still makes you strange.”
If he closed his eyes, Lucanis thought, he could almost hear the gallop of a halla through the courtyard outside. He shook his head. “Perhaps I could stand to be a little stranger.”