st_onecoldfox | Ghosts of Winter: Kolkhis (for Corbie)

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Ghosts of Winter: Kolkhis (for Corbie)

Another coughing spell hit, clenching and jerking Mildmay's body so strong the headboard rattled against the brick wall of his room.

Fuck me sideways. I got the winter fever. Again.

His whole body ached, and he was shivering, but it hadn't been a septad-minute since he was drenched in sweat, pushing feebly at the covers trying to kick them off. He'd known it was Winter Fever, but forgot. It did him that way sometimes. The idea hitting all the sudden like a epifa-whatsit, and knowing he'd knowed it only fading in after.

But he knew he was sick. And worse, others knew it too. Emma'd kicked him outta the kitchen with a thermos of soup, assuring him she and Kenny'd manage without him, and insisting he get some rest and take care of himself. What'd happened to that soup? He couldn't remember eating it or nothing. He thought maybe Corbie'd bullied him into bed, but that mighta been the fever, 'cause there'd been two Corbies, and how the blazes could he withstand the both of 'em when they put their minds to something?

Couldn'ta been Corbie though, neither of 'em, 'cause she'd never been to Mélusine, and he knew this bed. Too big for any bed of his. Felix's bed at the Mirador'd been this big, but Mildmay's was little more than a cot. He knew this bed. This was... This was Keeper's bed.

Kethe. He hadta get outta here. He wasn't going back. Not to her. And he couldn't let her get Corbie neither. Fuck.

He took a deep breath to work up to pushing out of bed. Or he tried to. It set off more coughing, and he just wound up more tangled in the bed linens, already clingy damp with his sweat.

"Just where do you think you're going, Milly-Fox?" The voice was almost a purr that slithered down his spine like the Snake Littleman had called her. Keeper put her hand flat on his chest, and she barely had to push to keep him right where he was.

"You go where I tell you. When I tell you. Always so good at doing just what you're told. Except for when you didn't, and look where that got you. Although perhaps you've forgotten. Should I show you then? Remind you of what you are?"

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Corbie had all but moved into Mildmay's room since that visit from her other self. They'd managed to bully him into bed, which was half the battle, but the other half was still exhausting. Getting him to eat or drink anything. Getting his fever down. The fever was showing no sign of breaking yet, and that worried her to no end, but she went no further than just to the other bed unless she needed something, and even then she could call and ask someone. She should perhaps have feared getting sick herself, but he was too ill to be left alone for any significant length of time. Even when he was sleeping. His nightmares had been fucked up, even though she couldn't really make out what they were.

"Mildmay?" she called softly from the bathroom where she'd gone to wash her face. The room felt so hot and close, even though she knew that was her imagination. Mostly calling out was to remind him that she was there at all, before she went to go check on him. His voice was way too raw to carry even that far. "D'you need anything?"

"Oh, I believe you will find I take care of what Mildmay needs," came a voice that was very much not Mildmay's. For one, the voice was obviously that of a woman, and the the grammar and phrasing sounded, as Mildmay would say, 'flash' despite the Lower City accent shaping the vowels.

"Better than whatever plaything he happens to have found for the moment."

Edited 2018-12-29 22:04 (UTC)

She'd started to wet a washcloth for his forehead--she had an idea of how to keep it cool--when she heard exactly the wrong thing. And then Corbie was out of the bathroom like a shot. She stopped and stared at the woman hovering over Mildmay--tall, very pale, grey eyes that reminded her of the mist over Bernatha.

Corbie didn't notice the room straight off, and when she did she ignored it. She'd already been thrown off enough. "I'm sorry, who the fuck are you?"

Kolkhis shook her head, all but tutting. "Such language. Although it shouldn't surprise me, Mildmay taking up with someone no better than any Pharaohlight whore."

Hearing both those voices, Mildmay struggled to sit up in the bed, and it was an effort. His eyes were wide with something like – go on and admit it, Milly-Fox – fear, darting from one woman to the other, still glassy and too bright with fever.

"You gotta...," he started, looking toward Corbie, before swinging around to Kolkhis. "She don't got nothing to do with this," he insisted, but it coming out more pleading than he woulda liked.

"Doesn't have anything," she corrected sharply, the will you never learn, you stupid boy dripping from her tone and the look she gave him.

Corbie had seen Mildmay contemplative, wary, worried, alarmed even, but she had never once seen him afraid. Had never heard him plead with anybody, not even Felix.

She had never hated anyone like she hated this bitch right now.

Marching over to the bed, Corbie sat herself down and took Mildmay's hand. His fever was still so high... "I do now," she said softly.

Then she turned her gaze on the woman. "You must be Kolkhis." Mildmay had been talking to her, sometimes in his dreams, sometimes awake, but he'd been so ill that she hadn't considered...

Well. Fine. She'd fucked up. She was here now.

He wanted to tell Corbie to get away, that she didn't want to be here. He sure as fuck knew he couldn't protect her right now, especially not from Kolkhis. And he didn't want her to see him how he really was, just some clockwork bear for Keeper to wind up and set loose.

"I am," Kolkhis agreed, her tone smooth as glass. She didn't bother to ask the girl's name. It hardly mattered. "Shall your little friend join us, Milly-Fox? This is no social call. We have business, you and I, things to see, and I'm afraid the time table is rather tight."

Mildmay wanted to shake his head, tell her no, tell her to fuck fucking off. But he didn't do none of those things. He watched her, same as you'd watch a snake waiting to strike, 'cause she was gonna, he just didn't know how or when, and he didn't want Corbie to be the one hurt.

Neither did Corbie try to introduce herself. Even if she'd been asked, this woman didn't deserve her name. Because she had never gotten much in the way of details, but she knew who Kolkhis was. And she knew Felix absolutely loathed her.

But because Mildmay wasn't up to answering and she sure as shit wasn't leaving him alone with his keeper, she only said, "I'll come."

"Very well. Time to go home." Kolkhis took Mildmay's other hand. Between one breath and the next, they left the inn behind and appeared on the roof of a cathedral looking out over the poverty-riddled warren that was the Lower City.

Keeper didn't do nothing outta the goodness of her heart. Mildmay wasn't convinced any more she had one, no matter how much he'd wanted her love and approval growing up. If she'd brought 'em here, on top of Min-Terris, there wasn't nothing good to come of it.

He knew that, but the real bitchkitty was, winter fever or not, he almost felt like he could breathe easy for the first time in indictions.

Corbie was almost grateful that she had experienced this with her own ghost so she didn't disgrace herself by panicking when reality shifted around them. There was one thing Mildmay was probably thinking that she agreed with--if she were quiet this would probably end faster. And her only real concern was to get Mildmay back to the inn so he could get some rest.

She reached up and rubbed his arm briefly with her free hand. She knew what it would mean to her to see home again.

All that aside, though, she couldn't fully contain her curiosity about this city she'd heard so much about and never seen.

Could stand most anywhere in Mélusine without the Mirador and its towers looming large in your view, unless you turned your back on it completely, and Mildmay figured Corbie'd heard enough about the city to know what she was looking at there. And the view was so familiar, it took him a moment – or maybe that was the fever fogging his head – to realize what was wrong with it. It was the Mirador intact, no sign of Malkar's fire or the repairs that dragged on and on after.

What came out wasn't about the Mirador, though. "Always liked the view from Min-Terris," was so mushy and mealy Mildmay could barely make it out himself and he knew what he said. No fault of Corbie's if she didn't. And Keeper... if she didn't understand, he was just fine with that, never mind she probably picked this spot knowing he'd liked it.

"Missing home?" Kolkhis asked, following Mildmay's gaze to the wizards' stronghold, and deliberately twisting the knife. She might have lost him when he left, and then again to his hocus brother, but the Mirador would never be home to someone like Mildmay. "I taught you better than that. But you used to know that."

She stretched out one arm, one long, lean finger extended. Not northwest toward the Mirador, but closer to the west and Breadoven.

Mildmay's breath caught at the sight, and it was Kethe's own luck it triggered a coughing fit. Because what he saw, darting across rooftops and leaping from one to the next as nimble and sly as his namesake fox, was a black haired man in a jacket he knew from here, with its hidden pockets and careful stitching that could carry far more than it appeared.

From this distance it was hard to make out distinguishing features, and even the red hair she would have looked for wasn't there, but she knew without asking that that was Mildmay. Before his leg had gotten all fucked up. Even with his leg the way it was, on good days he could move almost soundlessly.

Reaching up to rub Mildmay's back when he coughed was almost a reflex, her hand moving in slow circles before she'd entirely registered what she'd done. Her eyes, though, followed the black-haired figure. They never look up, he'd told her once, and while she'd always understood what he meant, something clicked about that bit of information that never had before. It became more real somehow.

There was a particular kinda calm Keeper got, when she wasn't fucking calm at all, but wanted to let on she was. All the kids learned the difference soon enough, 'cause the longer you made her wait in that kinda mood, the worse it was gonna be for you in the end. And Mildmay'd be damned but if it didn't work, his own body fighting itself to get his coughing to stop without him even thinking to. He took a breath, slow and careful, testing it wasn't gonna start up again.

"What. The fuck. Do. You. Want?" he asked, voice rough but the words careful and clear. Don't give her no reason to make him say it again.

"I shouldn't have to tell you a second time. I'm here to remind you of who you are, Milly-Fox. Perhaps I haven't made the lesson clear enough yet. You weren't any kept-thief. It was not even as a cat burglar you made your mark.

"No, Mildmay the Fox was more than that, once upon a time. We wouldn't want you to forget, or for your little friend to miss out on the show."

That sounded an awful lot like I want to be a dramatic cunt to Corbie, but she kept her mouth shut. Mouthing off to this bitch was only going to end with Mildmay being more upset than he already was. Let her think she had the power here. But ultimately, she was a ghost.

And Corbie knew a few things about how to handle ghosts worse than her.

And a few things about catty women who thought they could get one over on her.

She lowered her hand from Mildmay's back to give his hand a squeeze. She wasn't going anywhere. It was going to be okay.

Even if the cold feeling in the pit of her stomach told her she was about to see something really bad.

White wrapped around 'em like thickest fog or wind catching at the Trials cloth maze, and when it faded, it was night, and the three were standing in an alley in... Lyonnesse, Mildmay realized. And in the next fever-thick breath, he knew what it was Keeper wanted to show him.

"Don't look," he warned Corbie, praying without much hope to Kethe and anybody who'd listen that she keep her eyes closed and miss the whole thing.

"Don't be silly, Milly-Fox. She should know just who it is she's fucking. Think of poor, poor Ginerva. Things might have ended differently if you had ever bothered to explain. But no. You let her have her fun with a Britomart thief, and no idea the sort of danger she could be in simply from entangling with you."

She turned her steely gaze to Corbie. "I've always found it better to be fully informed, haven't you? And Mildmay does get these romantic notions sometimes."

Who the fuck is Ginevra?

Corbie could not keep the question off her face, and she knew it, but she made the choice to lean into that rather than try to smother it or hide her expression. With the focus turned on her, however momentary and incidental, Corbie knew that keeping quiet would only make her more noteworthy. So she gave the easy, fade into the background answer. "Yes, ma'am, I have."

She shifted from foot to foot, eyes darting from Kolkhis to Mildmay to the scene as though unsure where to look. It was not a lie, exactly. Mildmay didn't want her to see... but she was curious.

But seriously, fuck this bitch.

Keeper's instructions had been crystal fucking clear. Whoever was paying for this job didn't just want Griselda Kilkenny dead, they wanted her damn scared first, and an example after, and if Mildmay wondered what a smalltime madam had done to earn that kind of feeling, he sure as anything knew better than to ask. It wasn't none of his business. He was just Keeper's clockwork bear: wind him up and make him dance. 'Cept his 'dancing' meant somebody wound up dead.

He couldn't look at Corbie. Or at Keeper. And that only left watching as the scene played out same as it did in his memory and dreams. He watched as his younger self stepped outta the shadows silent as the death he was bringing when Griselda crossed the mouth of the alley, one strong, scarred hand wrapping 'round her throat to cut off any scream, the other pulling her back by her hair. He hadn't been worried about her fighting back, not even with her arms and legs still free. She was at least a couple septads into her second Great Septad, and struggling to breathe was taking up most of her focus.

He backed her into the nearest wall, using his body to pin her in place, and leaned in close to tell her exactly what he was gonna do to – how he was gonna bleed her slow, and then, once she was dead, how he was gonna leave her to be found – his voice low and harsh as he forced the words past his scar and the tiny voice in his head wondering why he was doing this. 'Sides, he knew why. 'Cause Keeper'd told him to, and maybe, if he did it, she would... she would... She would what? Love him? He couldn't even believe that, but he did it anyway.

The watcher's face remained as stony as ever, but the fever-flushed grey of illness lost even those bits of color, as he remembered the feel of the first cut, and the second, of Griselda's blood on his hands. "Stop it," he forced out, barely a rasp.

This was the single worst thing Corbie had ever seen.

She had never seen someone being killed before. People had told her about it before. Soldier boys who needed to tell someone without then being told to stop being such a pussy about it. But she had never seen it. And she had never seen Mildmay so...

The color drained from her face, but she kept watching. But more than the blood and the screams, she was watching the boy.

Boy.

Because more than the hair, that was the difference. A boy's physique was different from a man's. Lighter. Slimmer. He had none of the coltish awkwardness one would usually expect of a teenager, but it still showed. And while she knew that voice, while she hadn't heard it go cold like that... Lady, how young was he? "Oh, Mildmay..."

"It took only a few kills for my little Milly-Fox to make a name for himself," Kolkhis explained, reaching up to run a hand through the loose hair around his face. "And they still tell stories about him. Just the threat of Mildmay the Fox was enough to get many people to fall into line. And others would come to me especially to hire him, because they wanted the job done right. But then he lost his stomach for the work, thought he could get by on his own, without me."

Her grip on his hair tightened. "You forgot I made you. You were nothing without me. Hiding behind-"

"Stop it," Mildmay said again, louder and sharper this time as he jerked away from Keeper. "Just fucking stop."

And that moment when Kolkhis turned her full attention to Mildmay and Corbie became invisible was the moment Corbie struck. Muttering words under her breath to subdue a ghost, she brought up her hand and slammed her flat palm against Kolkhis's breastbone, above where her heart was at least supposed to be.

"Okay. Now you're gonna listen to me a fucking minute." Not that she'd have much choice in the matter. Corbie wasn't about to let her speak again, now that she'd touched this ghost with her power. She didn't know if what came out of her was really for Kolkhis or if it was for herself or if it was for Mildmay, but the words would be said all the same.

"Yeah. You made him into that. Good for you, he was a child. And even then, big scary boss bitch you are, he was too strong for you to break. You don't know a fucking thing about who he is. And I ain't about to give you the time to learn, because he needs his rest, I was done with you yesterday, and he's been done a fuck of a lot longer than that. Get. Out."

Only then did she speak the final words of the spell, dispelling the ghost.

Just like that, two little fucking words and a not so little wizard's power behind him, and Kolkhis was gone. Griselda's corpse and the younger Mildmay too, and the rest of Mélusine. Just Corbie and Mildmay, alone in his room, and good thing his bed was right beside 'em, 'cause his legs went and gave out, the both of 'em, and he only just managed to land in a exhausted slump on the edge of it, 'steada the floor.

"Fuck me," barely more than a whisper, and Mildmay ran shaky hands over his face. He couldn't look at Corbie. Not after... that.

Instinct made Corbie rush to his side, but when Mildmay managed the edge of the bed, for a moment she didn't know what to do. Or say.

She'd never felt shame like this from him before.

Okay. She could handle this. "Come on," she said gently, reaching out to touch his shoulder. "Let's get you back in bed."

Mildmay didn't have it in him to argue with her, worn down to nothing by Kolkhis' "visit" and the fever that was gonna run roughshod over him never mind what else life had in mind for him.

"Don't gotta," he tried as he let her steer him back into bed. 'Cause why she'd want anything to do with him after all she saw, he didn't know. Why would anybody give a damn about him after seeing that? 'Specially Corbie, who was a good person with a soft heart. "Know you can't wanna now. Not for me."

"Shut up," Corbie said gently, tucking Mildmay back into bed. Her hand moved to his forehead. If only this fever would break. But maybe now that the ghost was gone, he'd be able to actually rest and heal.

She slipped into the bathroom to do what she'd intended before this all started, wetting a washcloth with cold water and wringing it out.

She came back a moment later and sat on the edge of the bed, folding up the washcloth and laying it on his brow.

It would be a lie to say that she felt nothing about what had just happened. She thought and felt a lot of things. But even if Mildmay was well enough to talk to her about it, she knew she wasn't ready. So she left it at, "I'm here. I don't hate you. We'll talk about it when you're better."

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Ghosts of Winter: Kolkhis (for Corbie)

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