Work Text:
The woman before her bites on her glove, yanking it off so hard that it drew blood from her index. Her hand reaches for the feathers on her head; it’s scalding, not unlike her breath that smells like a sickening mixture of mints and alcohol.
She could feel the liquid dripping off her ears, no doubt painting her hair an even brighter red. Strange how the colour of their blood don’t change.
“I’m glad you’re Liberi,” Mostima laughs, “I would’ve dragged you down the path of the fallen otherwise.” A bloodied finger on her lips, tracing and waiting.
“And I hate that you’re not.”
Fiammetta leans into the kiss anyway.
Time rewinds for Mostima whenever they visit, Fiammetta knows, as her guardian and overseer. They go back to the aftermath of loss, she could tell by the way the stave is absent, hidden away by Yith. It would be all too tempting otherwise, to break things with it to the likeness of her heart.
She knows, when Mostima heads out for her errand with her hoodie all zipped up, as if another layer of added restraint would even do anything.
Clouds above them roar gently in agreeance, a downpour is imminent.
“Just got to do this real quick.” Mostima says, clutching her bag of documents. She is halfway out of the door. “Hand it off to the Emperor and we leave.”
“You’re not going to see her?”
A sickening smile fit for a psycho.
“Who?”
Fiammetta shakes her head and turns back to her own pile of documents.
“I’ll pick you up in the evening.”
The door slams shut before she could get a reply.
Her boots are soaked, their feet squelching unevenly as she struggles to get them through the alley. Rain is still pouring, sticking her feathers together, and she clutches Mostima’s hood with increasing ire.
“Get the fuck home at least.”
Fiammetta grabs her collar, and gives her the hardest shake she could manage without exploding. “An adult like you is surely capable of doing that.”
There is a moment of clarity in those beautiful eyes that she once thought was lost, and Mostima fumbles, while trying to get her legs working again.
“Fia-”
“Not a word.”
Her feathers are burning, her insides twisting with so much discomfort she wishes she could be violent. But all she does is to hold Mostima closer, lest one of them goes berserk. It was their promise after all.
They somehow get through clean towels, and her feathers are now finally dry. That is, until Mostima paints them wet again. She tastes her blood on her tongue, iron that smells like the armory, and reminds her of the hospital.
She doesn’t ask questions to things she already know, for she is the guardian to her guardian.
Fiammetta sinks into the kiss, the halo shines on them, however dim it is. She wants to laugh, but Mostima does it first, a giggle that makes her chest constrict.
“It makes you look gloomier than usual.” Mostima says, smiling. “The light from my halo, and the blood on your lips.”
“You know I always find that annoying.” Fiammetta scowls. A rotten rotten reminder of things that should not be.
“Me too. But it really makes you… look like you’re Suffering.” Mostima finishes, laughing so hard she falls back on the bed, blue hair splayed across the covers the same way they were laughing years ago at the fields back in Laterano.
“Shut it. I’m sick of your shit.”
If she was a Sankta-
“Fia-”
Oh, if she was a Sankta-
“Kiss me.”
She would’ve fallen twice as fast.
The difference between the halos are glaringly obvious, but Fiammetta has grown to playing with Mostima’s horns over time. First she did it out of hatred, of guilt so vehement she rubbed a layer of skin off them.
And now she does it because Mostima feels it; it gives her a sickening pleasure to see Mostima breathing heavily, sensitive to her touches.
She wants to tell her she doesn’t mind, if she is a Fallen or not, she’ll always be Mostima to her. And everyday she wishes she could’ve been faster, to be the one pushing the trigger, to be the one to do it.
“You taste like shit.” Fiammetta says, “What do they serve you at the bar?”
She doesn’t taste like Lemuen, she tastes like sin and forgiveness all in one. She doesn’t feel like Lemuen, she feels wrong, yet so right.
“Absinthe.”
“Fitting.”
When she bites down on Mostima’s collarbone there is a moan, almost sounding fake, but then there are hands on her coat, down her shirt and inside her pants and Fiammetta decides she’s not going to care anymore.
It is always pouring when they do it, rain so reminiscent of the day of their Mission.
She screams to drown her out.