Grave Bites
There’s a cuddliness between Hanna and Lucia, something softer than anything else I’ve seen from Lucia.
Hanna grabs my hand. “Ghoul bite. Partially infected. Damn, I would’ve taken care of you last night if you told me.”
“You looked busy.”
“I had room to get a little busier.” She winks. “Lucia, be a dear and pick a butt off the ground.”
“Preparing me to be your apprentice?” Lucia hums while handing over a whole ash tray.
“I’m considering it…” Hanna unwraps a cigarette of opium, mixing it with the burnt tobacco and some water to create a salve which she applies to my hand with a bandage. “That’s the folk remedy. Your mistress should be able to heal it fully with her magic when you get back.”
Instead of correcting her, I just say, “thanks.”
Such dangerous plants, but they seem so loving and gentle like this.
I try to smile. “You’re a nice friend.”
“I enjoy you more than I should.” She blinks and pats my hand, tongue swirling in her mouth. “I’ll stay on call for whenever you’re finally ready, but even if that call never comes, you’re not bad as a friend.”
Lucia signs from behind, ‘she’s coming to our next hunt.‘
I snort in laughter nearly strong enough to lift my spirit. “You two are cute together.”
Without me.
“I know,” Hanna replies. “I’m thinking my girlfriend might also want a look at her. An innocent peak.”
I’ve never seen Lucia get so flustered.
They’re happy.
It’s unfair that I’m not.
It’s unfair that love can be so easy. That some people are born Ringborns with all the choice in the world. That the Ring won’t even think to grant its gift to anyone who won’t—
“I’m sorry, Great Ring, for doubting you. For a moment. I didn’t mean it. I was emotional. I’m sorry,” I quickly whisper in hopeful penance. “I just wish that you put me on a thread to find the love that’ll bring me to you.”
My mouth quivers. Love is optional; it always has been. I can’t access the Ring because I rejected it. I could at any point choose to take its blessing. I’m just a terrible worshipper. Unfaithful in my heart of hearts.
I throw open the doors to the parlour, seeing Mistress Vincenza talking with Piero, both smiling. A brand new radio on the counter plays a Lawrinian audio drama I can’t understand.
“Oh, did your apprentice go ghoul hunting!” Piero leans back, bellowing with deep laughter.
Mistress Vincenza turns around, curiosity turning to soft, warm giggles. “Stella’s going to be proud of how well your dress held up.”
I grab the side of the dress and pull it into the air, pushing out all the warmth she put in my lungs to say, “it was a great gift.”
“Only when you’re wearing it.” She steps closer, bending down towards my height. “I thought you could use a radio, in case you ever bring… Did it go well?”
“The—the… the—“ I toss my head aside and swallow. “The hunting?”
“Your date,” she clarifies in a hushed tone.
“It went… It…” Please, Great Ring, give me the air to say something. “I—No.”
The first huff fills my lungs back up. The next one overfills them. By the third, I’m hyperventilating. I don’t need to avert my eyes; I can’t see my mistress as they turn blurry and wet.
“I f-fail—I failed.”
Like a violent hiccup. Not even two words are worthy of passing through my lips without embarrassing me.
“No, it’s fine. Come…” Mistress Vincenza yells at Piero, “you’re on the desk.”
“What?” his voice asks in the distance.
“Get on it,” she spits, grabbing my arm and gracefully pulling me into the back.
I’m not graceful. I think I spotted at least two other patrons in here who could’ve seen my display.
She takes up the stairs, unlocking the room to the right.
Shame and curiosity fight, and my shame wins. I barely pay attention to the room we enter, other than the fact that it’s decently spacious, as she escorts me onto some sort of couch.
I burrow my head in my hands. Why can’t I just stand the prick? Take the bite of someone else’s lips if it means I won’t be in tears?
All I wanted was to see Mistress Vincenza smile at me with pride. I wanted to earn it. I wanted to live up to the impossible expectations that I could be a necromancer. I guess… I thought I could be something. More than a rounding error on some factory’s salary cards.
Fuck, I wanted my parents to know that I could live well-off without them. I wanted to impress them by being so independent that I barely even said goodbye.
Deep breathes. The hitching is slowing down.
I wipe my eyes and lift my head. My jaw is shaking, but I feel like I could maybe talk if I tried.
Photographs. Pictures. All framed and placed everywhere. In the kitchenette where Mistress Vincenza boils something that smells truly awful. On the table in front of me. Above the mantle for a fireplace.
All of the same two women. Mistress Vincenza, smiling and holding onto someone I do not recognize, the pink of her eyes aglow.
Dark skin, bright eyes, sharp features and hair black enough to make any necromancer jealous.
Mistress Vincenza holds the woman like she’s the most beautiful thing in the world, and I can see why.
I blink and stare up at the one on the mantle, oil painted. The woman she’s holding onto seems to be leaning on her shoulder. The wilting carnation is laid right under the unknown woman. “Who—“
Fucking jittering jaw. Dammit.
I try again. “Who’s that in the painting?”
Mistress Vincenza’s body tenses. She silently finishes pouring noodles into two dishes, moving to place them on the coffee table in front of me. “My wife. This was her favorite meal.”
Everything in my body stops. The jittering. The tears. The subtle shaking of my hands. Just so I can focus on her—her wife. That’s who died. That was her last apprentice, wasn’t it?
My eyes blink to the picture on the table. There they are, cuddling together in their steam car just next to the waterfront, the cigarettes caught between their lips glowing like dim stars. So happy.
The couch shifts as Mistress Vincenza sits with me—not quite to my side, but close.
She mumbles, quietly—unprofessionally, “one of the first things you will learn as you pursue necromancy is the lack of feeling. You will lose your appetite, your hunger pangs… Your lust for food will disappear as your tongue becomes less sensitive. For some, they indulge to feel what they once did.” Her lips struggle to open again, eyes glancing back to the framed picture on the table.
“When it was hard for me to eat, she would always cook me her whore pasta. The same recipe she always loved, and then made me love, minus the anchovies.”
She slowly takes a bite, chewing like the world will wait for her. “I know this is my comfort food, but I will cook yours if you ask. Or buy it. When your chest empties, having these comforts is sometimes the only way to give yourself… a feeling.”
Mistress Vincenza Nasciowa. I’m familiar enough with Lawrinian naming traditions to guess that her wife’s name was probably Nascia. Just putting a name to her gives me shivers.
Necromancers are supposed to live forever. They could’ve had all of time together.
“I can sometimes hear it.”
Mistress Vincenza looks at me, eyes barely holding themselves back as they flicker.
“I can hear thoughts that aren’t my own. They obsess over death. They make it sound like a song. They—I summoned a horde of ghouls after listening to them.” I hold up my injured hand. “My skin goes cold, my heart goes numb, and I barely even feel able to cry.”
“Catarina—Kate, I didn’t realize.”
“Kate?”
“I don’t want to be overly professional. This isn’t part of the parlour; I’m not your mistress while we’re here. Would you prefer… It was Catie, wasn’t it?” She snickers gently, soft like she’s testing me.
“Kate’s fine,” I assure. It feels nice.
“...I should say that I’m proud of how focused you must be on necromancy, Kate.
It takes until the first necromancy spell for most to feel it hollow them.
” She squeezes and unsqueezes her hand into the side of the couch.
“You’ll feel again. It ebbs and flows. Casting necromancy spells, especially new ones, tends to settle the dread. ”
“But, I can’t always learn a new spell. Will I—Is this something I’ll always fall back into?”
“It’s the price of our dream. But you don’t have to pursue this one. I won’t make you stay.”
“No! I w-want to stay. I-I-I have… I have to. I need to be here.” I grab my collar.
“I won’t find a way to access the Ring outside of here.
I’ll work degrading manual labor fit for a corpse until after I turn into one.
I-I can’t get a partner when you pay them to want me; I won’t ever have anyone else if I’m just me.
I’ll only have my occupation. Please, I have to stay here. ”
She exhales. “I don’t want to get personal, but I have to be sure that it’s fine to help you continue… Do you want a partner?”
“I do. It’s…” There’s the briefest moment of joy, imagining someone who finds me deeply interesting, who studies me. And I could study them back. Interrogate their day to day, their life history, like it’s the most interesting thing in the world. Because it would be.
But, who would settle for me? When I give so little and have standards so vexing that I can’t even tell what they are.
“You can find a partner. I’ve seen people beautiful and intelligent fall for the blandest idiots.” She smiles. A distant memory? “I’m sure you’ll find your idiot”
I actually laugh. “I think I’m the idiot in your allegory.”
“Nonsense. Your math assessment was passable; you’re easily smarter than most Roversellans… Now, finish eating, and I can show you something quick. A small spell, one you can do even without a patron.”
“Okay. Thank you.”
“The Great Ring clearly wants you to be here. You deserve your chance.”
I pick up the fork and start bundling noodles. “Should I pray?”
“This isn’t the type of meal you want to attribute to the Ring.” She picks up her bowl and downs some more.
So this is her comfort meal.