Limerence
I cannot continue to sit by and let this happen. I would never forgive myself if something were to happen to her. Not after all she has been through.
In hindsight it was stupid to train this late at night. I couldn’t sleep and I’m starting to suspect that Mary might have some sort of sleep magic. It would be frankly hilarious if her powers were sleep related this whole time.
A total bait and switch.
Because I honestly sleep way better when she uses her powers on me.
Not that I’d ever fucking tell her that.
And as much as they’d said otherwise, traipsing in on Marla and Trish felt like an invasion–especially at this hour.
I should have known my diligent training would ultimately lead to a routine pattern that someone could track and use against me.
Stupid.
But it’s my first time having mortal enemies, so can you really blame me for not considering it?
“When she told us about you, we figured she was going to just outright kill you,” Loki says, sneering as he, Beowulf, and about twenty other goons surround me.
The colosseum’s lights had sputtered back to life in the middle of a ghost wrangling session and the sudden hit to the face had almost knocked me unconscious.
Now my ass hurts from landing on it and my face smarts from where Beowulf had laid into me.
“She actually stopped me from killing myself, if you’ll believe it,” I say, rubbing at my itchy nose as it heals.
“So, you’re a suicidal too, huh?” Loki scoffs. “That’s rich.”
I was suicidal–but he doesn’t get to know that.
“And you brought twenty-four other people with you,” I say gesturing around. “Thought you’d have trouble beating on a defenseless woman?”
“We know the Dark One,” someone says from the crowd and a handful of people murmur various slurs. “Cop bitch and overpowered freak.”
“So, I’ve been properly estimated, then?” I ask, slowly rising. “Anything else you’d like to monologue?”
“Bet she hasn’t even told you about the Prophecy yet,” Loki says, continuing the school yard bullying schtick.
“I don’t know that I really care,” I say, turning in place to mark who exactly is around me. “I really just want to get my hands on those sick fucks who bombed my favorite coffee shop.”
“Oh,” Beowulf howls with laughter. Or maybe just howls since he’s a werewolf. “That was rich. Sobbing over some human.”
Rage spikes quick and hot, flooding my veins with numb adrenaline.
“Lights, please,” I hiss and the entire room falls into darkness.
As expected, several of the Remnants and supernaturals pull out various forms of light. Still, I feel my body take on the smoky texture and feel the way my arms elongate.
“Shit,” someone nearby screams out, but I don’t pay much attention.
I launch myself at Beowulf, but the wolf breaks into a full sprint around his group.
They take the hint and charge at me. Several of them look to be were-creatures but others are magical entities I don’t know the names of.
The spirits take over and they loose from within me like a shattered dam.
Screams of panic interlace with the screams of the damned as semi-corporeal entities rush from the shadows.
Like a conductor of the dead, I wave them towards the various groups and one-by-one they begin to fall.
“Bitch!” Loki screeches and dives at me.
To my surprise, he isn’t a coward. At least not exactly. There’s a dagger in his hand, but it’s in my back before I can really see where he reappears. Evidently, he has some manner of teleportation.
“Fuck,” I hiss, scrabbling at my back to pull out the knife, but either Loki takes it with him, or it’s now somewhere in the shadows. I don’t exactly know how he managed to pierce skin that isn’t there, but it’s a problem for later me.
Whispers break out in the colosseum. I can tell they’re insanely loud if the confused, manic behavior from my assailants is anything to go by. But, to me, it almost sounds like white noise.
The odd sensation of taking lives is even worse when I see their spirits, too. But they don’t seem too excited to piss me off even further and sort of evaporate as each Remnant and supernatural beast falls.
A dragon-kin rushes me and their dagger-like claws actually tear into part of my abdomen. The pain is intensely sickening, like it’s an immediate emetic. And I’d probably puke if I had a gastrointestinal tract in this form.
Alright, I can get hurt in this form–noted.
He gets skewered by several spiked tendrils that launch him somewhere off into the darkness of the colosseum.
The ghosts seem to sense the end of the battle and suffuse into the shadows. Their strength is much less than it had been before, but I don’t feel any anger from them. Just a sense of satisfaction.
Turning, I find the ringleaders.
Beowulf stands beside Loki, both looking worse for wear as they manage to put down several of my remaining ghostly entities.
I dive at them, not yet willing to let them return to banter or monologuing. The last thing I need is for them to manage to get away.
Beowulf sees my movement and dashes forward on all fours. His figure seems to lengthen and grow as he gets nearer. Larger. Almost like an extreme dire wolf almost three times his normal size.
I toss out dark spikes, but Beowulf tanks them like they’re nothing. He reaches me, but instead of colliding with a hard object, he phases through my body’s shadowy form.
The sensation is weird, but the desired effect makes feeling violated worth it.
Loki starts forward, but his face pales when he sees the way Beowulf’s remaining limbs slide off at odd angles. What might have been an intestine drips out of a severed torso that was once only one piece—but now is at least four.
“I would like to hear you apologize to Alice,” I say, voice reverberating with distortion.
Instead, though, Loki dives forward and, this time, I do feel his power.
I’m not even sure what it is, but it hits me like a freight train.
I fall to the sand, my fleshy human body most definitely taking the brunt of the damage.
And whatever they’d had on their weapons feels like the manufactured siphoning tech that some Remnants can create.
It burns in a way that means I need medical attention.
Now.
I get my head up in time to watch his single form split once. Then twice. In the blink of an eye, there are now fourteen Loki’s circling me, each leering with murderous intent.
Fuck.
“I’m the fucking god of tricks, you dumb bitch,” his clones say in unison. “You won’t be able to—”
The one directly in front of me retches as a shadowy spike extends from his abdomen.
He falls to his knees, revealing–
“Aw, fuck me,” I groan, losing the war with my nausea and falling forward on my hands and knees. “I’m so sorry.”
“Don’t be,” Alice says, voice kind and gentle. “You did nothing wrong. I don’t blame you for anything.”
I nod, accepting it as it is. “Thanks for the assist.”
“That was all you,” she says, slowly beginning to dematerialize. “You’re figuring out how this works. So many of us want to see you succeed.”
I hear footsteps on the soft sand and regather the darkness around me. My wraith-like form reappears, and the sharp pains fade to dull throbs. I launch a handful of spikes at the next attacker, wondering who manages to show up late to an ambush, but then everything sort of just breaks.
“Fuck!” I screech out, hitting the sand again. Whatever, whoever, it is absolutely decimates my incorporeal form.
“Oh my God,” I hear the familiar voice and then see her face over me as the lights in the colosseum brighten.
I roll to my side and get to my knees, the exhaustion and weight of pain beginning to really do a number on my spine.
Or maybe it’s the knife that I think might still be in my back.
With a grunt, I manage to get both feet under me, staggering forward a step.
“They—” I hack up something gooey and coppery, spitting it at the ground between us. “They fucking came after me. Are you here to finish the job?”
Bloody Mary looks horrified as she studies me. Though, for a second, I would almost think there’s terror there, too.
“I’m not some rabid dog,” I hiss, reaching behind me and feeling at the handle that is most definitely there. “If you’re going to put me down, just fucking go for it.”
I can’t reach the damned thing, and brushing the hilt only sparks a new wave of nausea.
Mary doesn’t look at the bodies. She doesn’t look at the sinew and gore. She just keeps staring at me.
“What the fuck is your problem?” I almost feel like crying as I stare at her.
Adrenaline gives way to debilitating pain and I crumple, my knees hitting the sand roughly. I manage to stay upright, though, and sit back on my heels.
Everything fucking hurts.
Mary moves faster than I can see, and I wonder if I’ll even feel it. Maybe she’ll be merciful and–
She’s in front of me, now, both knees planted in the sand, her hands steadying my shoulders.
“God fucking damnit, Mary,” I spit into her face, she doesn’t even flinch. “If you’re going to kill me, then just do it. I’m sick of whatever game you’re playing–”
Mary’s mouth is on mine before I even get the final word out. I groan as I lean into her, letting her tongue in without a single bit of resistance.
She huffs what sounds like a sob as she leans back, arms now around my torso.
“They would have used you against me,” her voice is watery as I watch tears brim at the corner of perfect orange rises.
“Who?” I ask, breathless from a kiss that just shattered my world.
“Them,” she says gesturing at the carnage. “Not just them, either. Tempest is no longer united, and we have enemies within our walls.”
I blink stupidly as I watch turmoil mar her beautiful face.
“Use me how?”
She splutters something in a language I don’t understand before gripping the back of my head. Her teeth clack against mine as she presses another searing kiss to my lips. Something sharp cuts at my gum, but I barely notice as she pulls back again.
“A weakness. An exploit,” she huffs.
“You don’t have any weaknesses,” I stammer out, pain beginning to return despite whatever magic is in her lips.
The one, unfailing certainty that I’ve learned in the Citadel is that Bloody Mary cannot be beaten. Cannot be manipulated.
She sobs out again as she presses her forehead to mine.
”You are my weakness,” she pulls at the knife at my back, and it releases with an awful sound. I howl out, but she holds me tight as either her magic or my healing factor kicks in.
“Surely you–” I start, wondering where this could all be coming from. “You’ve ignored me for the last two weeks. I felt so goddamned alone until I met Marla and her wife.”
Pain flashes across her face as she nods.
“I know I have a lot to explain. And you probably think I am some obsessive, power hungry psychopath. But I took over the investigation into you expecting to find someone powerful but menial.”
Mary heaves out a breath, sounding flustered.
“Except you are remarkable, Arya. And I hated the way everyone treated you. I hated the way she treated you.”
Anger flashes through what had been undiluted suffering as she pins me with gorgeous orange irises.
“I know she was your friend. I know you had feelings for her. But, by the old gods, I will never forgive her for how she treated you. I almost—”
She lets out a cry, wrapping hands around the back of my neck.
“I almost lost you that night and it had been the one night where I was not watching. I was almost too late.”
I imagine normal people might feel violated or creeped out that Mary had been watching me during those moments. During the times when I felt so alone.
Except I don’t.
She shakes her head like she knows she’s rambling—and it’s fucking adorable.
“I don’t know what to say,” I say softly, feeling my body begin to knit itself together. “But I don’t think you’re an obsessive psychopath. I guess I don’t get why I’m so important to you. And I don’t get why you treated me like I was dirt.”
Mary only nods, looking relieved that I hadn’t yet passed judgement. Though, I wouldn’t be surprised if this is some half-cocked hallucination my brain conjured after the battle. Because, of course, I would choose to die thinking Bloody Mary had actually been infatuated with me this entire time.
“I want to tell you everything, but we should get you patched up,” she says, patting me down as if looking for other weapons in my body.
“I’m going to need a nap,” I whisper, feeling chills track down my spine. Sweat had turned icy within the last few minutes.
“I will have someone down here to clean these up,” she says, glancing around at the room.
“I’m sorry,” I say, dropping my head. “I was just so angry.”
She wraps delicate fingers around my chin and tilts my head to meet her eyes.
“Never apologize for slaughtering the enemy, Arya,” she studies me for a moment before smiling thinly, “and my name is Cassandra.”
“Cassandra?” I ask, a stupid fog forming in my mind at the drained adrenaline.
“Cassandra Alta,” she says, pressing a kiss to my forehead.