Setting: SWTOR
Rating: T
Genre: Adventure & Romance
Pairing: Amos/Cassandra Sa’alle*
Summary: Amos ran his way to freedom, not for himself, but to save another. When the people who took him in are in danger from Lord Sa'alle the Younger, he offers himself as a sacrifice to keep them safe. He wasn't expecting to find the first thing he wanted for himself.
Notes: AU of Lessons. Amos is ported from his DA character. Cass has been returned to her original version, but is the same basic character as Cass-no-not-that-one. Should be understandable without any prior reading. Commissioned by @lyriumyue
Read it on AO3
Olkin II had a single sun that was neither too hot, nor too cold. The weather was always temperate and it was only a combination of agricultural tech and Force abilities that kept the soil from going fallow from the lack of an off-season. The entire colony knew each other and treated each member like family. It was a dream. Amos had forgotten what breathing fresh air felt like, so long he’d been in one of Nar Shaddaa’s many slave pens. Lord Merula’s compound was hardly better, with the acrid incense saturating the air as he performed ritual after ritual.
Sirens interrupted his thoughts and Amos rose from his seat. The PA system crackled and popped as it activated, but it did nothing to reassure the citizens. “Residents are instructed to engage in Contamination Protocol Dorne. Lord Sa’alle the Younger will be on world in two hours. Please proceed to your stations and begin the aforestated actions.”
Feeling cold and sick to his stomach, Amos rushed back to the capitol building. He’d thought Cate would be safe here. The soldier had been so convincing - and Imperial Intelligence - but Amos should have known better. He knew he could only rely on himself. His throat burned as he rode the lift up to his handler’s office. Three holocalls were in-progress when Amos opened the door.
Morathis nodded to Amos without looking away from his calls. He was a chiss that was tall when Amos wasn’t towering over him. His suit was white and tailored, but lacked the glittering adornments of the Ascendency. He’d been the shadow governor of Olkin II for almost twenty years, but he still carried every ounce of military bearing the Ascendency had forced on him. Amos admired him when he wasn’t fearing for Cate’s life and his own.
The last call disconnected and Morathis turned to face Amos. “Go to the hospital and assist Tava.”
Amos’ expression didn’t change, nor did he move from in front of Morathis’ desk. “Sa’alle the Younger is betrothed to Merula.”
Morathis rose a single finger, asking Amos for a moment of silence. The three months on Olkin II hadn’t been enough for him to learn that Amos didn’t need to be silenced. Morathis’ next words were slow and measured, carrying the weight of the sirens. “You are familiar with Lord Sa’alle the Younger?”
Memories danced in front of Amos’ eyes. Ezra’s sharp features twisted in equal parts derision and glee. Sharp voices that cut and burned with the Force despite coming through a holocall. Red tattoos and brighter hair. He blinked to clear the images. “The Elder negotiated the terms. The Younger is here for Cate.”
“Perhaps.” Morathis’ red eyes narrowed, making the lack of clear definition of iris, pupil and lens more uncanny. “She is a fierce loyalist. Our working theory is that she suspects the Sith Overseer of treason.”
“Give her what she wants,” Amos said.
“You’re quick to sacrifice yourself,” Morathis replied.
He didn’t say ‘my life is worth less than others,’ ‘I have nothing to lose’ or ‘there are worse fates than being killed as a traitor.’ Instead, Amos stared into those red eyes and waited for Morathis to choose his own justification. Maybe there was a queue of citizens waiting to fall on the sword he didn’t know about. Maybe it was a lottery system - unlikely - and some poor sap was already saying their goodbyes. It didn’t matter. Cate was his responsibility. Amos would see her kept safe.
The chiss sniffed and activated one of his comm units. “Go to the third floor. They’ll outfit you with a uniform. Then on to the spaceport to meet Sa’alle the Younger. Let us hope your Force resistance is enough to hide the nature of this place.”
Amos nodded at Morathis’ dismissal and followed his orders. The staff on the third floor asked no questions, simply sighing loudly when they saw how large he was. With half an hour to spare before the Sith’s arrival, Amos was in the spaceport. The uniform fit better than any clothes he could remember wearing and perhaps it suited, since it would be the last thing he wore. He wondered what the citizens of Olkin II did with their dead and if there would even be a body after Sa’alle the Younger was done with him.
The gangway lowered with the loud hissing of hydraulics. Preceding the Sith were two Imperial soldiers, though they wore dress uniforms, not armor. Sa’alle the Younger walked with a captain behind her left shoulder, the empty space at her right obvious for the intentional message. No one could ever be useful enough to take that place. Instead of flowing robes and expensive Sith regalia, Sa’alle wore… Some kind of uniform. It was fitted, grey and partially armored. The accents were bronze and she had medals pinned to her lapel. A lightsaber hilt sat at each hip.
Amos’ breath caught in his chest. Her presence in the Force was so strong, he could feel the strength of her press against his skin. Like a bright light, her face was difficult to look at. A silver and black, circular droid floated just over her shoulder. Sharp, Sith tattoos marked the right side of her face before stopping perfectly in the center. A design half-removed. She was as beautiful as she was powerful and some hitherto silent part of Amos howled that Merula would never be worthy of the sight.
She walked up next to him and it took most of Amos’ control not to react. She’d seemed ten feet tall at the airlock of her ship, but now, so close, she didn’t even come up to his shoulder. Sa’alle narrowed her eyes up at him. She didn’t deign to speak to him directly, instead the droid spoke with a rough, mechanical voice. “You are unnecessary.”
Bowing low enough to drop his head below the Sith’s would seem like nothing so much as an insult, but neither would Amos kneel again. He tilted his head down. “I am at your service, nevertheless.”
The edges of her mouth turned down, just the slightest hint of a frown to match the hard look in her eyes. Sa’alle said nothing else to him, turning away and stalking out of the hangar. Despite her height, steps ate nearly as much ground as his own - no doubt a result of clever and precise Force use. The two sabers at her hips implied a martial user, a master of using the Force internally.
It was only when they exited the space port and Amos saw the sun pale in comparison to Sa’alle that he realized she hadn’t recognized him. Either Merula hadn’t bothered including his image or he was beneath her notice. He followed her in the vain hope he could distract her from Olkin II’s true purpose. For hours, he walked behind her captain, offering unnecessary commentary whenever she approached an area normally bustling with Force activity. The contamination efforts were good, but a powerful Sith might be able to Sense traces of old Force use.
Everything felt so vibrant at Sa’alle’s side. Colors were sharper, smells were stronger and every sound grated against Amos’ nerves. Her aura of Force power enveloped and infused him, but perhaps part of it was his senses making a last-ditch attempt to experience as much of life as possible before she killed him. She’d come to find her fiance’s pet victim and bring her back to the murk, Merula estate. Maybe she would raise her own hand to Cate’s torture, though Amos couldn’t imagine it. Not that he doubted Sa’alle’s power. Even with his Force resistance, he felt in her thrall, but she would never lower herself to such shallow torture. She would destroy a person with slow inevitability and despair. Isolate them until they were surrounded by nothing but her control.
Those were the thoughts in Amos’ head when he stood, stock-still, just inside Sa’alle’s appropriated penthouse suite. There were no exterior walls, only floor-to-ceiling windows that showed the verdant fields beyond the city. He knew some of them had to be screens, since there were no signs of the capitol, but the transition between the windows and screens was so seamless he couldn’t see it.
“Your name,” Sa’alle demanded.
Amos’ attention snapped back to her, but years of slavery kept his body from reacting. He lowered his head. “Amos.”
Sa’alle walked up to him and the floor trembled at each step. She prowled a tight circle around him, as if she were a jungle cat sizing up her prey. Her stare warmed his skin like so much sunlight. She stopped in front of him and tossed her head, snapping her long ponytail back over her shoulder. Her droid bobbed in the air as it said the words, but it was more ominous than funny, with a sharp, jerky path. “You are no one’s servant. What is it you think you are hiding?”
There was no Force behind the question, but in that moment Amos could refuse her nothing. Her perception missed little, that was more than clear from the day he’d spent trailing behind her. For her eyes to look at him and not see the servant, the slave they’d tried to make him… His eyes were hot and wet and if he looked into her face he’d be more than lost, so he stared at the ceiling. “I was…” ‘Lord Merula’ didn’t seem appropriate. He couldn’t hold a candle to Sa’alle’s power. The title meant nothing. “Ezra’s slave. I escaped. Made my way here. He’s afraid of the planet’s Sith. Lord Aucht.”
Her eyebrows furrowed to nearly touching. “And I should care about this Ezra, why?”
Amos nearly choked on his tongue. Had he been wrong? She wasn’t there for Cate? Or did she simply care so little for Merula that she didn’t know his given name. His mouth was nearly too dry to speak. He took his time, waited until he was positive he could speak the words without stumbling. “Sith Lord Ezra Merula.” Your betrothed, he couldn’t say.
Her head turned to the side, showing disinterest and disdain both. She sniffed, perhaps the first sound she’d made all day. “Whoever he is, his interests are beneath me.” She stalked away from him, but her droid continued speaking. “Lord Aucht would not have sent you to me like a nerf to the slaughter if there was not something here to be hidden.” Sa’alle rounded on from across the room him and her eyes flashed with visible Force power before he felt the technique crash against his resistance. “Tell me the secret.”
Amos fell against a display case, his feet unable to hold him under the onslaught. It felt as if his entire body was being compressed into a single point in the center of his skull. His cheeks were wet and blood pounded in his ears when she released the failed compulsion. He gasped for breath and his limbs shook too much for him to push back to his feet. The moment his heart rate began to slow, Sa’alle grabbed him by the chin, forcing him to meet her eyes.
For an eternity, she said nothing, simply stared. Then she released him and yanked back her presence in the Force. It felt as if she’d sucked the air out of his lungs and the color out of room. She dropped her hand and turned her back on him. “You were wasted as a slave, Amos. From now on, you are my hostage. Lord Aucht can reveal himself to have you back.”
Setting: SWTOR
Rating: T
Genre: Adventure & Romance
Pairing: Amos/Cassandra Sa’alle
Notes: Mentions of fantasy slavery.
Read it on AO3
Lord Sa’alle the Younger’s Fury class ship was near-silent in flight. Every metal inch was engineered to Imperial perfection. There wasn’t a stain or speck of dirt to be seen as her captain led Amos away from the bridge. With how she’d made Amos sleep on the couch in her suite on Olkin II, it was the furthest he’d been from her side since they met. Hostage or not, he felt a pull toward her. She was a sun, far more ready to burn him to ashes than warm his Life Force, but he needed her. Only years of lessons in blood kept Amos from bumping into the captain’s back when he stopped. He opened a door and gestured Amos inside a cramped, but well-kept office.
The walls were lined with holopaintings and shelves of datacrons. The desk itself was faux wood with a glass top and a neat pile of datapads. It reminded Amos of Morathis and made his stomach hurt. Was this what it felt like to be homesick? He stood until given leave to sit. The chair fit him, which was a positive, but it had been designed to be deliberately uncomfortable. Every chair in the Merula estate, save for the throne-like monstrosity Ezra sat in, was like that. He did not fidget.
The captain took his seat behind the desk, but given how much he needed to adjust the chair down, it was most likely Sa’alle’s. He folded his hands on the glass top. “We’ve not been properly introduced, Amos. I am Captain Lachlan Falk, in service to Her Lordship. Now, you will tell me why it is you believed her to be acting on behalf of Lord Merula.”
Captain Falk had not been in the room when Amos told that to Sa’alle, but the question didn’t surprise him. Undoubtedly, the captain had eyes and ears everywhere she went, though it made Amos worry what else he had learned about Olkin II. Falk’s expression was locked in neutrality as stiff as his pressed uniform. His tone hadn’t been hard because it didn’t need to be. Amos was a former slave and now a prisoner, even if Sa’alle could see who he truly was.
“Ezra is her betrothed. I was present for some of the negotiations.”
Falk didn’t wait for him to finish speaking before flicking on a datapad and quickly entering information. Amos watched his hands and was struck so fiercely by a thought that his mind reeled. The typing motion, the way his fingers moved up and down, always landing on the same plane, he’d seen Sa’alle do it all through the day, but hadn’t been able to place the motion. Typing. But why? It was such a visible tell, he couldn’t fathom why she might do it. To take mental notes to an illogical extreme?
The office didn’t hold the answer, but Amos could see that between the datacrons were strings of crystals and delicate silver hairpins that glittered with jewels. He had no trouble imagining Sa’alle in elegant, Imperial finery, but his thoughts stumbled over her lightsabers and droid. Surely she’d never be without them, but nor was she the type to wear something so garishly out of place.
“It seems there was a misunderstanding,” Falk said.
Amos doubted that, but said nothing. Ezra had spoken in Basic - he couldn’t speak Sith - and Lord Sa’alle the Elder had the same marks on her face as Sa’alle. He frowned. The two were so painfully, viscerally, different in his mind that it irked him that they shared the name.
“It is a different Lord Sa’alle the Younger that is to wed Lord Merula.” Falk lowered the datapad to study Amos.
“Who?”
“Lord Sa’alle the Younger. They are both only ‘Lord Sa’alle the Younger.’” Falk broke eye contact for a moment. His hands twitched and made aborted motions, as if he were trying to straighten the already organized desk. “Lord Sybil Sa’alle, their mother, plans for only one to live. There are… far more than the two of them. They were not given individual names.”
A vague fear churned in Amos’ gut. He might have been horrified that Sa’alle’s mother planned to slaughter all of her sisters - that any of the others might survive was impossible - but his own parents had sold him to slavers for below market value, a fact he’d been whipped with for years. This Sa’alle, his Sa’alle, with her droid and her two lightsabers, would live, but not easily.
He swallowed and asked, “What do you call her, then?”
“Her Lordship?” It was a question and answer both. He shook his head and sighed. “The men call her Lord Silence. I advise you not to speak of the others to Her Lordship. There are many fates worse than death.”
“She hates them?” Amos asked, but even as he said the words, he knew he was wrong. No, his sun did not hate them. If inquiries resulted in worse than death, she loved them. Loved them and didn’t want the reminder that they would all have to die so she could live. His heart clenched in his chest. Amos wasn’t stupid. Uneducated, certainly, but he wasn’t stupid. He shouldn’t have such empathetic conviction about a stranger - much less a Sith that had taken him prisoner.
“Her Lordship’s feelings are never so simple. Should you change your mind about this suicide mission you’ve assigned yourself to, best you keep that in mind.” Falk stood. “Come then. I’ll show you your accommodations. It will be interesting to see if Lord Aucht takes any steps to retrieve you.”
“She’s a loyalist,” Amos said. He followed Falk into the shining, metal hallway and through the ship. “Why target Aucht? His colony is peaceful and sends the Empire a fortune in taxes every term.”
Falk did not reply until he had ushered Amos into his… cell? It was little more than a cupboard with a bunk bed built into the wall and storage on the other side. A soldier’s bunk, not a prisoner’s cell. Amos chose not to question it, still waiting on an answer to his previous question, if one was coming. They didn’t treat him much like a prisoner and the information was, perhaps, not too sensitive to share.
“I would not claim to know Her Lordship’s mind,” Falk said. He glanced down at his hands and the edges of his mouth pulled down before he got control of himself.
He argued against it, is what he means.
“But we will return to more immediately beneficial endeavours in the interim. The droid will be in with further instructions.” Beneficial for whom went unsaid. The captain nodded once before shutting Amos in the room.
The conversation had left him with far more questions than answers. Others, like Morathis, considered Sa’alle a loyalist, but did she see herself that way? If so, why target Aucht? Did she have reason to believe he was a traitor? Were people whispering the truth about Olkin II? If they were, did Captain Falk not know, or not consider them credible, or was he not a loyalist? Amos couldn’t imagine her tolerating a left hand that wouldn’t support her ideology, so why were they in disagreement?
They burned more fiercely in Amos’ mind because he knew she was right. By Imperial Law, Lord Aucht was a traitor, harboring a thousand or more Force users. It would be worse than death for him and execution for everyone on-world, complicit or not. If she had proof, would Sa’alle turn fifty-thousand people over to the slaughter? Yes. Or not. Or would she?
Amos closed his eyes to banish the thoughts and then set his focus on the room. He would have to fold himself nearly in half to fit on the bed. It was low enough to the ground he might be able to pull the mattress off of the top bunk and arrange it next to the bottom one. Amos hadn’t owned anything more than a few changes of clothes on Olkin II and he wasn’t sad to see them left behind. Lord Aucht he knew nothing about, but he trusted Morathis would do whatever he could to retrieve him… If it wouldn’t bring undue attention back to Olkin II, which was unlikely.
But Cate was safe.
She was safe and he would be able to bask in the sun until he died.
---
Lord Silence’s ship made no sound as it flew. He knew that her name came from the fact that she never spoke, but it suited the muffled engines and disciplined men. Narrow carpets ran through the halls and rooms had either thick standing mats or spotless, circular rugs. At least, all of the areas Amos had explored. When the droid had brought him his first meal and instructions, it hadn’t said anything about remaining in his bunk. Amos would never consider himself curious, he had no interest in eavesdropping or sneaking, but he had such a drive to learn that he ventured out of his bunk on the second day.
One of her soldiers saw him, and there was no mistaking Amos for anyone else with his height and his lack of Imperial uniform, but had simply nodded a brisk acknowledgement before continuing on their way. As much as Amos had wanted to inspect the shelves in Lord Silence’s office and examine the hair pins and datacrons, he wasn’t surprised to find the door locked. He couldn’t find any personal touches or adornments. No pictures to break up the walls, no decorations that weren’t Imperial Military Standard. They would have been a weakness, showing her true heart so openly, but he still wanted to know. The inexorable pull he felt to her was unnatural, but why fight it when he had so little time left? She stirred the life in him; it didn’t matter if it was fabricated.
His steps slowed and his breath shuddered in his chest as he looked out of a window. He’d found a lounge, his last hope for glimpse of some personal effects, but hadn’t expected great, big window staring out into the vast emptiness of space. His throat felt tight and even though the sight unnerved him, Amos couldn’t look away. Some dark compulsion made him walk closer. The only thing that stopped him from touching the glass was the railing holding him too far back. It was foolish, the emptiness couldn’t swallow him up, couldn’t steal his thoughts, but he felt them pulled away regardless.
Amos.
He felt the name in his soul, his Life Force, more than he heard it. Amos barely managed to hold in his gasp as he turned away from the window. Sa’alle was standing next to him, her hair tied back in a severe ponytail and every line of her uniform perfect. Special Operations, the droid had said when he asked, the coats and regalia were Spec Ops, not some fanciful division created by Sith to give themselves a fancy title. It couldn’t, or wasn’t authorized, to tell him her background, but identifying the coat had been something.
She didn’t look at him, her eyes trained on the nothingness that had held him captive. If it bothered her, it didn’t show on her face. “You do not like it.”
It wasn’t even a question, but still it ripped honesty from his bones. “I feel like I’m insignificant, next to it.”
Sa’alle said nothing, though her fingers moved, tapping against a datapad that wasn’t there. She tilted her head slightly towards him; she understood, but did not agree. Whatever ths sight gave her, it wasn’t insignificance. She raised a hand as if to touch the glass herself, but didn’t stretch her arm to try, only enough to make the desire clear. The want didn’t crease her face, but it didn’t need to. Amos could see it.
Words churned in his head and fought to escape his mouth and Amos didn’t want to speak them, they could lead only to disaster, but he needed. What he didn’t know, but only Sa’alle could give it to him. “Lord Aucht won’t give you anything for me.”
“He will not.” Sa’alle turned to him then. For an instant he saw only the half of her face without the Sith marks. She looked delicate and precariously balanced, like a vase on an uneven stool. Then she faced him directly and her hand may as well have been wrapped around his heart.
“Then what?” His question was a plea. He wasn’t sure what he wanted. To live was only an afterthought. He knew she could give him things he didn’t know existed. Amos reached out and she neither punished him nor moved away from the touch of his hand on her shoulder. Holding her should have reinforced how small she was, how delicate, but instead he just felt her ethereal power crash against his senses again. Everything came into sharp focus and Amos noticed that one of her lightsabers didn’t quite suit her, not really. Too large for her hand and with edges too rounded and soft.
Amos ripped his attention away and back to Sa’alle’s face. He didn’t expect her to give him a vocal answer, but she could speak in other ways. She met his eyes and turned her face away to the side, not down. There was an answer there, something she was already considering, already planning. There were no creases in her forehead, no down turn to her mouth, but Amos knew that she didn’t like it. Didn’t like it, but would follow through regardless. The back of his hand brushed against her hair when he removed it and he ached to spin his hand and feel it properly.
Sa’alle stepped back from the railing and from him. “In the meantime, you will be properly outfitted and trained. I trust you will not disappoint me.”
Setting: SWTOR
Rating: T
Genre: Adventure & Romance
Pairing: Amos/Cassandra Sa’alle
Notes: read it on ao3
Thanks for reading, folks! I’m available for commissions. Check out the details here.
Color returned by inches, like walking through the tapered end of a fog bank. Cassandra’s men tried to speak with him, but they were so much wall dressing as Amos walked past. He should have been nervous, should have braced himself for rejection. He was a barely-educated former slave without a credit to his name. He was broken in a thousand ways and still he went to her.
Medical machines were beeping and chirping when Amos entered the medical ward. Cables spider-webbed between them and Cass. A plaster covered her left cheek and an oxygen mask hid her mouth and nose, but Amos had never seen anything as beautiful as the light in her eyes as they met his. Carefully dodging the wires, he stepped up next to her. He held out his hand she pressed her cheek into it without breaking eye contact. I missed you, the motion said. It felt like a dream to finally bend over and hold her in his arms.
The plasteel oxygen mask bit into his cheek and caught his falling tears. Her body was chilled, but still set him on fire. He wept into her hair and held her as tightly as he could with the wires holding her back. Her grip on him was weak and her hands trembled, which served only to tear his heart more. He kissed her hair and then pulled back to do the same to her temple. He pressed their cheeks together, as if he could pull her exhaustion into himself. Amos closed his eyes and breathed her in.
Cass tapped his arm, the tick, the habit from when she spoke, but nothing came from her droid. She didn’t pull away, but she moved her arms. A clatter and thump sounded when she used the Force to levitate something to her hands. She fiddled with it a moment, then… “Welcome home.”
The words stole the air out of his lungs and burned his already wet eyes. It was too much on his heart to look at her face, but he couldn’t stop himself. Her expression was gentle, the look in her eyes soft without any of her strict tension. He traced the plaster, remember the feel of her skin tearing. “How?”
“A throwing knife, of all things,” Cass said. And then she laughed.
She laughed.
She realized that she had, that she could, at the same moment Amos did and they clung to each other through the tears. Cass laughed through the tears and held him like she’d never let go. “The curse is gone. I am finally free.”
Amos didn’t ask for details. They would have time for that later. Instead, he kicked off his shoes and climb onto the medical cot with her. It was much larger than the cramped bunk he’d had before, but he still had to hold her close for them both to fit. Not that he could have done anything different. She laughed again, weaker, tired, and then pressed her face, breathing mask and all, into his shoulder. Her armored bracer was between them, broken and hanging off of her wrist. It had to be what she moved with the Force, but why?
A quick prod of the loose armor plate explained everything. Beneath it was a keypad, well worn by fingers and Force use. He’d assumed the droid was connected to cybernetics in her head, but this made far more sense. Cass wouldn’t open her mind up to technological vulnerabilities. He pulled the blanket up over her and the bracer, hiding the secret a little longer. Perhaps it wasn’t just laughter she had back. Maybe she would be able to speak normally.
It didn’t matter, he realized. They rarely needed words and would need them less and less as time progressed. Amos kissed her forehead. He never wanted the moment to end, never wanted to lose the feeling of her happiness, but his own exhaustion betrayed him. He fell asleep just as her breathing slowed and the last bits of tension in her body faded away.
---
“You should rest,” Amos said as soon as the dream solidified around them. He brushed the loose hair out of Cass’s face and then let his hand linger. She was real and next to him, awake and sleeping and his heart felt full to bursting. He pulled on her arm until their bodies were touching.
“I will be more rested with you here,” she answered without her droid. Her mouth was still scarred, still touched by the tattoos that proclaimed her bloodline, but the voice was hers. Finally.
They stood in silence, the setting shifting through locations because it made no difference. His dream still dressed her in her spec ops coat, but clothing hardly mattered. More than he desired her, he… Amos cupped her cheek. “I love you.”
Cass put her hand over his and nodded. Even here, the words would not come easily to her, if they ever did. He had no need of them. He felt it in every inch of his Life Force. She pulled on him, even as he was already leaning down, and kissed him. A gentle touch, then harder, longer between breaths that came out in gasps.
Amos felt himself burning up from the inside out and never wanted it to end. He would hold and kiss her for eternity, stroking her hair, caressing her face. He’d kiss every scar on her hands and hold her through the tremors. Showing her vulnerabilities meant more than words of love ever would. Oh, his heart would stop and tears would scald his cheeks when she said them, but the touch of her mouth did the same. It could wait. They had time. Later could last forever.
He had no skills and fewer credits, but he it was not nothing he gave her. She was the sun and he was what she spent hours staring out into space looking for. Peace.
Hello I'd like an order of agony, please. ‘ wake up! wake up! ’ for the Power Couple, or ‘ i don’t feel sorry for you. ’ for corrupted Amos AU Cassmos :')
Corrupted Amos AU. WARNING: BAD FEELINGS. BAD PEOPLE DOING BAD THINGS. BAD FEELINGS. BAD IMPLICATIONS. (difficult) Pregnancy mentions. THIS IS NO GOOD, VERY BAD, NOT FUN.
They didn’t need words. Hyal could take one look at him and hear his thoughts in her head as if they were her own. He’d seen the cage in the underground levels. He knew the how of the understanding and had known the truth of it between them since they met.
But after so many years of enforced silence, he would use the power words held whenever he could.
“I don’t feel sorry for you,” Amos said.
He’d seen her fall to her knees in the hall. She was in pain’s grasp before she left her bedroom, but the arrogant magister had thought she was above it. With one arm clutching her abdomen, she’d clawed at the wall with the other, magic digging her nails in deep, but not enough to keep her on her feet. The pain choked and gagged her.
“You brought this on yourself.” Amos walked past her. He was hungry. No person would make him stay hungry a moment longer than he decided he would be.
She knew better than to watch him walk away.
At least the brat was silent. Astraea was her name. Hyal had forced the red hair on her, but he’d expected as much. It didn’t matter, in the long run. Astra wouldn’t be the runt her mother was. She would be his power and ambition personified. For now, she laid silently in her cradle, watching everything.
Hyal thought she could keep him away from what was his, but it was just another foolish idea in her head. Like that she could dictate what beds he slept in. Like he cared about her disapproval.
No.
Hyal might still yet die from having birthed the girl. She didn’t have the strength to keep him away from his child.
The letter was sealed with magic. Amos had to feed it a drop of his blood for the seal to release the contents. He frowned at the contents. It was angry and full of splotches, cross-outs and smears. He shoved it in front of Hyal’s face.
She pulled her hands back and refused to look at it.
Amos grabbed for her hair to force her, but her magic stopped him. So she wasn’t dying anymore, then.
“Do not think to touch me,” she said.
“Read it.”
She gave in. She always did. She was weak. “You have a son.”
Amos scoffed and threw the letter in Hyal’s fireplace. What a stupid thing. It never warmed him. “She’s lying.”
“Only one eye turned brown.”
“I don’t care.”
Astraea was surely a mage. He’d acquired two identical toys. One enchanted, one not. She refused the cheap one. She could feel the Fade in the proper one. The one she deserved. Good. No one would dare give her anything less than she deserved.
Hyal entered the nursery. She no longer bothered attempting to keep him out. Her head was unbowed, but it needn’t be. She had learned her place. “I have been invited to your son’s birthday party. I will attend. I care not what you do.”
She was lying. She cared. She cared a lot. She didn’t want him there. Didn’t want him to change his mind and switch to a better heir. Didn’t want him to see her face the shame of everyone knowing ‘her’ lover had betrayed her.
He had no interest in the boy, in the party, but it was best that Hyal not forget who she was.
The attempted assassination of the boy hadn’t surprised Amos.
Hyal saving him and subsequently claiming the child as her ward hadn’t, either. She would scrabble at any chance to get power over him.
She touched the boy’s face. His cheeks, his nose. Some kind of magical conditioning technique.
“I won’t allow you to use him against me, Magister.”
She paused, her hand hovering over the cradle. She didn’t turn to him, didn’t have the will to deny him to his face anymore. “If that is what you think this is, you are welcome to take the boy and leave.”
He gave her no words for that.
Astraea would be fine. Children fell ill all of the time. The healer was confident in the girl’s recovery and even if they hadn’t been, Hyal was ready to slit her wrist to make it certain. He knew that look in her eye, the way Pride’s scars seemed to glow.
It had never occurred to him Pride should take exception to how she bowed to him. Not until he saw those scars glow for his child.
Hyal was still proud. Still had been years ago when he asked why she replaced the bedding in her room. She’d given him a single word and nothing more. Refused to show weakness, but unable to lie.
“Blood.”
He ripped the half-rotted door to her room open, the magical locks unable to overcome structural weakness. He tore the bedding off her mattress and threw it on the floor.
Blood.
The mattress was too expensive to replace.
Blood.
Not one large stain. Several.
He remembered her, curled in that spot. Body shaking silently in pain, all of her magic unable to stop it, unable to still herself while she suffered with child.
So much blood.
She should have died.
He should have lost her.
For the first time since he tore his way to freedom with his own bare hands he felt. And he felt cold. So terribly cold.
“Yes,” she said hours later. She didn’t look away from the stains. “Now leave me.”
Setting: SWTOR
Rating: T
Genre: Adventure & Romance
Pairing: Amos/Cassandra Sa’alle
Notes: read it on ao3
Cassandra the Mandalorian had called her. The name rattled around in his lungs and fought to be spoken aloud. Amos had some understanding from the exchange. Lord Silence, Sa’alle, Cassandra had loved that Mandalorian’s brother, he died, and Lord Sa’alle the Elder had promise to revive him. He knew well enough already that woman would never give her something she wanted so dearly, even if it were possible, but he understood her desperation at his core. Untrained as he was, he’d been more than ready to jump to Cassandra’s defense if her sister had attacked in the hangar.
His heart hurt to see the naked grief on her face as she leaned over the railing in her ship’s lounge. Her hands shook and her shoulders were bent. Her hair was loose, but not obscuring the pain pulling on her mouth or the tears in her eyes. Unable to keep his distance this time, perhaps never again, Amos stepped up to her and touched her back.
Her entire chest shuddered as she took a deep breath and straightened. She shook her head and turned to him. As if some foreign spirit had entered her body, she started and her expression morphed into confusion, though the pain was still there on the edges. Cassandra pressed against his hand even as she looked down at herself. She closed her her hands, running her fingers over the scars on her palms. She met his eyes.
“I did not expect… This,” Cassandra said with her own mouth and own voice.
“I… You can speak?” Amos asked. It was wrong, wrong. She couldn’t. He knew that. Was she a doppelganger? A vision?
She swallowed and the droid bobbed up over her shoulder. “No. I cannot. Do not think on it,” it said for her. She pushed a lock of hair behind her hair and stared at her hand when it shook.
Amos took her hand when she lowered it and it felt as cold as ice. “You’re hurting. Tell me what to do.”
Cassandra huffed, something close to a chuckle, and tears fell from her eyes. She wiped them away with her free hand and curled her fingers around him. She looked down at her clothing again and shook her head. “What is this?”
“I don’t know,” Amos whispered. He took her other hand and held them together. He wanted to embrace her, hold her until her tears dried and everything was right again. “When I look at you, I just… I want.” He didn’t know what he wanted, probably wouldn’t have words for it if he did.
Again, she looked down at herself, as if she expected to find someone else’s body. She shook her head as she tilted it up, her hair swishing impossibly loud in the still lounge. More still spilled from her eyes as she stared into his. “I can see that, but I do not understand.”
“I just want to make it better. For you.” For us. The words stuck in his mouth like thorns, but she nodded as if she’d heard them. Amos bowed his head until it touched hers. It shouldn’t have, she was so short, but he couldn’t bring himself to question it when she wasn’t pulling away from him. “Tell me what to do.”
“There are no orders for this, Amos. There cannot be.” Cassandra pulled away then, but just enough to lift her hand and cup his cheek. She was speaking without her droid again and the long lines of her Sith robe tried to draw his attention, but couldn’t keep it. “But we may have time for this. Rest now. I will endure, as ever.”
Blackness overwhelmed Amos. He gasped and cracked his head against the cramped wall his bunk was built into. He blinked the stars out of his eyes and clutched the lump. A dream. It had been a dream. No, no, it had been real. But he’d been asleep. He squeezed his eyes shut and fought back the pain in his head. She’d spoken without the droid. At the beginning and the end. It had to have been a dream.
He rolled out of the cramped space and staggered around, trying to dress himself properly. His clothes were wrinkled, but hers had changed in the dream. But he couldn’t believe his own imagination could recreate her so truly, so genuinely. Heart aching, Amos staggered through the ship until he found her, again in the lounge.
Sa’alle, Cassandra, was standing at the railing, but not leaning as she had been in the dream. She was waiting for him and nodded when they made eye contact. She was as small as she should have been and her pain was hidden in only the twitch at the corner of her mouth and the slight tilting of her hands. She waited until he was next to her to have her droid say, “It is my father’s talent to enter dreams as such.”
“Then it was real?”
Cassandra turned to look out the windows, but her hand out for him to take. Her meaning was clear to him, if no one else. It is all real. Always real. Between us.
“What do you see?” Amos asked, though he immediately knew it was the wrong question. He pulled her hand to his chest, stepping up to her to avoid pulling her to him. “What are you looking for?”
She leaned against him, just the slightest press, not even enough to share warmth. “Peace.” Cassandra nodded at the window and then pulled away. With no further signs of her pain, of her heart, she disappeared back to her command.
The feel of her lingered on Amos’ skin like a sunburn just settling in. He cherished the feel of it, tried to keep the smell of her in his mind, tried to remember the sound of her real voice, the one stolen from him in the waking world. Something had passed between them, something had changed, like her clothes had in the dream, though he couldn’t think of-
She’d known it was a dream. Known it was his dream and she’d kept looking at herself expecting to see… what? What did she think he wanted to see her wear? An image of her in a formal gown flashed behind his eyes, but it didn’t feel right. He didn’t desire that as much as… Oh. Oh.
His breath caught in his throat and the tingle on his skin turned into a blazing fire. He couldn’t swallow for the dryness in his mouth. She hadn’t expected to be wearing anything.
And the image would never leave his mind again.
---
After she touched his dream with the Force, Amos was unable to wonder where Cassandra was. He could feel her. It was no longer just that his senses functioned better. He wondered if this is what she felt like to other Force Sensitives. This beacon of power and warmth that called to him through the cold metal walls. It had taken him days of agonizing thought, trying to come up with something he could do for her, something he could offer her, before he’d realized that he did have something. He knocked on her office door. Without waiting for a verbal cue, he stepped in as soon as the door unlocked. He took his time closing it, just letting the feel of her so close wash over him.
She glanced up at him, but her eyes didn’t linger. Cassandra had two datapad in front of her and a news report was playing in the background. It was in Huttese, so Amos could only make out “dead” and then several numbers without context. He sat across from her in the purposefully uncomfortable chair. After so many lessons, he was as used to it as a person could be, so he waited for a pause in the rhythm of her work.
When she shifted between the datapads, her fingers typing into empty air, Amos said, “Cassandra.”
The datapad did not fall from her hand, but there was shock in her tight grip on it and the muscles around her mouth couldn’t decide how she felt about his use of her name. She set the datapad on the glass surface and stared into his very soul. “That name is my father’s doing, as well.” The back of her hand brushed against the glass, sweeping away debris that wasn’t there.
He knew her meaning well enough without words. I do not like my feelings on him, but they are what they are.
“I have proof of Lord Aucht’s treachery.”
She froze then, breathing in hard and loud. Her hand clenched into a fist before withdrawing under the desk. “As do I. It was not for the name or the Dream Walking that I refused to turn him to the slaughter.”
Aucht is your father? He wanted to ask.
She answered him with the same silent gestures. She turned her head, leaving her chin at a sharp, accusatory angle. You did not know? Cassandra let out a quick breath from her nose and tilted her head again. Her hands came back to rest on the desktop. Of course not. It is because… “Even if that woman could,” she huffed a rough breath, the ghost of a derisive laugh, “even if she would have returned Aaron to me, I would not sacrifice so many for him. For any one person.” She looked at her hands, still with her Force to stop the tremor. Nor would you. You trusted I would refuse.
Amos reached out and his palm hovered over her hands, completely hiding them from view. He held it there, agonizingly close, but not touching. I had to give you something. Everything.
She tried to pull her hands away - I need nothing - but Amos closed his hand over hers - Let me. She allowed him to hold her still. There was no doubt in his mind she could resist him, remove him from her ship, her life, her aura, but she remained under his touch.
As if she was just as ensorceled by him as he was by her.
“Let me help,” Amos said. He wouldn’t leave room for confusion, wouldn’t let her purposefully miss his meaning or pretend a vague touch meant something else. “I’m no more your hostage than I ever was a servant.”
“That was the purpose of your lessons.” She couldn’t hold his gaze and looked several times at his hand over hers. “But it is not so simple as staying when offered the chance to leave.”
The words hung in the air, bricks in a wall Amos had felt but not truly realized was there. “Because you kidnapped me.” He didn’t need her to say anything, he knew, he understood. “You are no one’s servant” had meant more than words because it was more than words. He could make excuses for her, but if she were swayed by them, she would not be his sun. He swallowed, though his parched throat protested. “Was the purpose.”
“Yes,” Cassandra said. “That woman is a foe you cannot fight. I cannot afford the resources required to keep you safe.” She stacked her second datapad on top of the first. “I have already contacted the governor of Olkin II. He has produced the purchase documents of one former slave with your bioscan. You are to be released at the earliest opportunity. He believed you would wish to return to Olkin II, but it is at your own discretion.”
“That would be best,” Amos said. He knew he couldn’t convince her to let him stay and there was nowhere else to go. She wouldn’t have left him empty-handed, but he needed a purpose, a task and Morathis could give him that. He didn’t want it. He wanted the one he’d chosen, wanted to stay and bask in Cassandra’s sunlight, even if it was going to burn him. “I-”
“No, Amos. Not now.”
Not now. But later. He could have her later. She would leave him on Olkin II and he would find his way back. He would check on Cate, ensure she was healing properly. He would repay Morathis for everything. He would make himself useful enough that Cassandra couldn’t afford to leave him behind.
Setting: SWTOR
Rating: T
Genre: Adventure & Romance
Pairing: Amos/Cassandra Sa’alle
Notes: This section references a lot of stuff that happens in Legacies, but as the POV character is also unaware, it should not inhibit enjoyment of the story overmuch.
Read it on AO3
A vast majority of Imperial settlements were legally considered colonies or protectorates. Falk commented that it was partially so that individual Sith Governors could have more control, but that it was also a xenophobic practice to keep other races from being citizens while still benefiting from their labor. Even when they weren’t forced into slavery, the taxes were hardly better. Amos knew those things, mostly. Before Merula purchased him, he’d worked next to people forced into indentured servitude just to feed their children. It seemed odd that Sa’alle’s training would be… lessons in Imperial economics. Especially considering that both the droid and her captain editorialized, explaining how prejudicial most of the practices were.
Amos didn’t ask what the Sith intended. He wore Imperial livery with a delicate silver crest he assumed was Sa’alle heraldry and sat through his lessons without unsolicited comment. Falk seemed to want more engagement from him, which, when combined with the clothing and the lessons, suggested that it wasn’t death that awaited him.
But he knew full well not to make assumptions about what a Sith would or wouldn’t do.
Sa’alle took no part in his training and paid him no mind if they crossed paths. He didn’t find her in the lounge again; she spent her time in her office or at the ship’s helm. He watched her when he could, basking in her thinly veiled power. He saw his own preposterous sycophancy in the sharp salutes from her soldiers and vigor with which they followed her orders. She was something more than a Sith, meant something more, even if Amos couldn’t put a name to it.
The ship rocked so hard that the datapad flew out of Falk’s hands, though he caught it before it could crash against the floor. He was on his feet before the alarms sounded and Amos was already at the door. Sa’alle’s soldiers moved quickly, but without panic through the ship and into position. Amos’ thoughts wheeled through his mind as he tried to make sense of the attack. A fury could barely hold more than a strike team and given that he had his own room, it clearly wasn’t at capacity. And to attack without warning tripping the sensors? Who warped in to attack twenty fighters and a Sith?
Sa’alle swept into the helm with her coattails trailing behind her. She nodded to the pilot. “Lieutenant.”
“No response to our hail, My Lord. Initial scans read it as a Hutt vessel, but our slicer is already working on it,” the pilot said without looking up from is consoles. The ship rocked again as another blast hit the energy shields.
Lord Silence clasped her hands behind her back. “Announce me.”
Amos stood silently behind Sa’alle as her pilot announced her. She lifted her hand toward the viewport while waiting for the response.
“We know who you are, dar’jetii bit-” The curse cut off with a strangled choke, timed exactly when Sa’alle clenched her raised hand into a fist.
She lowered her hand when the call disconnected. She took several deep breaths, her emotions showing only in how much her nostrils flared on the inhales. Her droid said, “Board their ship and find which clan they are pretending to be. Then destroy it.”
Amos followed her as she swept out; he was useless in a ship battle and even more so in physical combat. He had always been too large, too strong for his owners to risk him learning how to fight back. He hadn’t even been assigned to physical labor most of the time, lest he build the musculature to resist.
She lead him into the ship’s galley, where she slashed her right arm, striking out at the kettle to start water boiling. Tea. Of course. The earthy scent that clung to her was tea. Another swipe through the air threw open the cooler and jerked the cream out of its place. Though her arms moved rough and sharp, the cream hovered softly through the air. Her precision belied by her anger.
“Silence,” Amos said, though the moniker felt wrong. It was the best of his options, unwilling as he was to address her as My Lord.
She turned her head, but didn’t look at him. “Mandalorians. I need to know if it is that woman they are trying to fool or Xalonie.”
That woman was undoubtedly Lord Sa’alle the Elder, which should have made Xalonie her sister. Why should she have a name? Had it already been decided she would be the the one to live? Amos walked past Sa’alle and finished preparing her tea. He heard the chair move behind him and the soft swish of fabric and clink of metal on plasteel. Piece by piece, he moved the tea setting onto the dining table, trying to ignore the ship’s rattling with as much calm as she did. He asked, “Xalonie?”
She met his eyes for a moment before moving them to the tea setting. Only then did he notice she wasn’t wearing her gloves. Her skin was pale and her lithe fingers were covered with sharp, jagged scars. Force lightning scars. He had enough of his own to recognize them. Her droid floated down to rest on the table, where it rolled near the cream. “It means ‘merciless’ in the Sith language. This is a Jedi plot against one of them. No true Mandalorian with a grudge would make this kind of mistake.”
Her hands held him captive. The scars spider-webbed even over her palms and stood out under the callouses on her fingers. Like everything about her, it was a wonder she could move them with such dexterity. And the scarring was just as dense on her wrist and arm before it disappeared under her coat. Amos didn’t need to be told the source. That woman.
“What did she do?”
“Made allies of Clan Cerar. She should know better.” Sa’alle touched the breast of her coat and then poured her tea. She let him see how her hands shook, just for an instant, as she stirred in the cream. She may as well have ripped his heart out and dropped it on the table between them.
“Will this change anything?” His words hung in the air, the second meaning clearer between them than the first one. He didn’t know enough about her plans for a change to be meaningful, but the shake of her hands, the weakness revealed… It meant everything.
She met his eyes and then stood, straightening her coat before stepping away from the table. When she reached the door, her droid rolled off the edge of the table and floated through the air to hover near her shoulder. “Nothing.”
Her cup sat there, prepared, but untouched, long after she left and the ship stopped shaking. Amos dumped it out in the sink, then the teapot and left the rest for the droids to handle. The scars around her mouth had been so light, so insignificant compared to the ones on her hands, but the abandoned cup made them burn in the back of Amos’ mind.
---
Amos had never doubted his perception. He was confident in his ability to understand the things Sa’alle left unsaid. The angle of her hand, the tilt of her chin, her voice was silenced, but she didn’t speak any less for it. He did not doubt himself, but it was rare that he had confirmation shoved into his face until he couldn’t stand the sight of it.
Nothing had changed between him and Sa’alle, but her plans had.
She stood on her fury’s gangway and waiting in the hangar was a Sith that could only be her half-sister. Lord Xalonie, for it had to be her with the Mandalorian at her right hand, stood in an identical coat, though he breast was decorated with far more medals and accolades and there was a chevron of rank on her arm. A black and silver rebreather mask covered her nose and mouth, but left most of their shared marks displayed. They were close to identical, but just far enough off that the resemblance was uncanny and uncomfortable.
Xalonie didn’t call to him the way his Sa’alle did. She was powerful, yes, but lacked something. Amos had laid so much of his interest on her air of command, but neither was her sister someone that could be refused. If he hadn’t already been tense from the meeting, he would have been from confusion. Whatever hold Sa’alle had on him, it wasn’t as simple as he’d thought.
“I told you not to bring him,” Lord Silence’s droid said.
“You would not agree with me, otherwise,” Xalonie returned. Her voice was equally mechanical and she shared her sister’s finger twitch.
“Get rid of him,” she said. Sa’alle was on the verge of trembling with emotion, Amos could feel it radiate through her Force and he had to clasp his hands together to still them. He had thought her upset was on seeing her sister, destined to die, so for it to be the Mandalorian… He didn’t understand. He knew so little about her.
The Mandalorian tilted his head down, speaking to Xalonie through some communication only they could hear. The skin around her eyes tightened, but she didn’t relent. “He stays.”
“Then we are done here,” Sa’alle said, but she didn’t move. She knew Xalonie would have something else, some other card to play, some last word to make her stop if she’d turned to leave. She would refuse her the pleasure of surprising her with it.
“The Jedi are making their move against that woman. You ran out of time. You knew she would never have let you have a halfblood. Stop pretending.”
Sa’alle closed her eyes against the words and so strong were her emotions that she lost control of the Force keeping her hands still. With his heart in his throat and confusion in its place, Amos touched the back of her hand and felt it still under his fingers.
Captain Falk cleared his throat and stepped in front of Sa’alle. “What do you propose?”
Xalonie turned away from them, frowning so deeply under her mask that the sides of her face visibly pulled down.
The Mandalorian sighed with his entire body, his shoulders rising before falling in defeat. Sa’alle turned away, unwilling or unable to watch as he removed his helmet. Amos saw nothing extraordinary in the man. Dark skin, too pink to be purely human, but otherwise as plain as a Mandalorian could be. He sighed again, loud enough for the sound to carry across the hangar. “We ally with the jetii. We have reason to believe Xal’s father is one of their generals. He’ll make the others agree, or at least try. We don’t have a choice. Either we make it clear we want her gone, or they'll destroy her entire legacy while muttering about the greater good.”
Later, in the quiet hours of the night, Amos’ mind would reel with information. It would turn over every word said until he’d extracted every possible meaning and understood the exchange. But in the moment he couldn’t spare a single thought for anything other than Sa’alle. The air had begun crackling around her with barely-contained Force. Her chest heaved, even though she didn’t need breath to speak. “Turn traitor on your own.”
The Mandalorian took a step forward and jabbed a finger at her. “Aaron is dead, Cassandra. Killing her enemies won’t bring him back. Letting her kill me won’t bring him back. She killed him, not Rencarn. Join with us, get your revenge and let my brother rest.”
Sa’alle grabbed her droid out of the air, spun in place and threw it at the Mandalorian’s head in the blink of an eye. He had no time to dodge and it broke his nose with a crack that echoed unnaturally in the hangar. She stared him in the eye and trembled. Her Force hissed and spit with Force lightning, burning part of her sleeve and tearing a jagged line across her cheek. “Fine.” Her droid shook and rattled as it tried to float back to her. “Fine, but if I see your face again, I will remove it.”
The droid exploded in a shower of metal and circuits before it made it back to her. Sa’alle turned her back on them without another word, stalking back up the gangway even as the Force cut a line across her forehead. On the edges of his perception, Amos heard Falk speaking with the Mandalorian as he followed her, but the words weren’t important enough to get past his distress.
15, 43, 20 for the drabbles.wither combines or not, and any pairing as I have no idea what your OC's or pairings are just yet :D
20. “You need to wake up because I can’t do this without you.”
Cassmos. bc of tumblr redirect issues, which others have reported with my blog, no cut; I apologize. Additionally: cw: pregnancy, cw: miscarriage mention, cw: blood magic
Deals with demons always came to fruition. Only rarely how the mortal who made them expected them to. Cassandra had been a child when Pride approached her and broke her out of the cage. Demons usually had no interest in children, but Pride had once been Compassion and Compassion always heard tears silenced in the mortal world.
When Amos first listened to Cassandra’s account of her deal, he felt a chill in his heart. One day, when the situation was most dire, Pride would take his... his everything. She was all the warmth in his life and let him be more truly himself than he had never had the chance to be. He could talk of philosophy and history with her. She saw him for what he was and wanted to be, not for what other people made him.
She had married him to give him prestige and make his life easier in Tevinter. She was carrying their child.
And she was dying from it.
Amos never commented on the way red light glowed from under her eyelids when she slept. She knew Pride was courting her in her dreams well enough; she didn’t need his reminder. He felt every pained twitch in her body, held tight against him as she was.
He barely rested himself, anymore. He couldn’t get more than an hour before waking up and checking she was still breathing. When dawn’s light diffused through the curtains, Amos pressed his face into what was left of her hair. His hand felt almost cold against her belly, hot as it was with barely-effective healing magic. “You need to wake up, Carissima.” He felt their child kick and then her wince. “I can’t do this without you.”
She didn’t wake. Wouldn’t, not for some time, but still he begged her. Pride would ensure their child made it to life. He would have to ensure she did.
D3 AU, post-game, grimdark, character death, necromancy, angst, weird.
Pilbridge was a town between Westmarch and Bramwell. The townsfolk didn’t quite believe the stories out of Westmarch: about angels and demons and spirits of death cutting people down in the streets. They accepted the ‘refugees’, but were happy when they went home after the ruckus. One man moved in properly, though.
His name was Amos. He was tall and broad and learned in a way that didn’t make sense with his scarred hands and strong muscles, but no one asked too many questions. Not of him, anyway. He brought with him his little, cursed wife. She was a small thing with white hair, bones on her jewelry and a belly huge and round with child. She didn’t leave their house, which the townsfolk were more than happy with. Her cold expression and voice unsettled the adults and frightened the children. She refused the midwife when her time came and everyone was sure she’d birthed a demon.
In those first months, no one saw the little, cursed wife. Amos spent time in town, writing letters for people, fixing furniture and hunting the wolves that harassed the livestock. Eventually, he brought his new son with him. Gavriil had dark hair and two of his father’s blue eye. He was a quiet baby and smiled at everyone once he could.
When he was a toddler, spending all day running around in the sun, Gavriil’s hair lightened to show the red undertones. He was no longer quiet, saying every word he knew and plenty he didn’t. Pilbridge was charmed. If he seemed to take a long time to grow up, no one minded. He was sweet and if he was tiny, well, his mother had been that cursed woman and no one had seen her for years.
Actually, one day Amos came into the town center with a short, red-haired woman. No one said anything, but everyone was delighted that he’d finally found a proper mother for Gav. She was a mage, but quiet about it. The only oddness in her was the little bird skeleton she enchanted as a toy for Gav. It was strange, but no stranger than how slowly he seemed to grow up. He was buying his own bread from the baker when Christine was born, but he’d only just developed an interest in romance when she became an adult herself.
She was charmed by the tiny bird skeleton that hopped and danced, even if she found Gav’s mother to be strange and detached. Maybe she was nobility ousted in the Westmarch rebellion - that would explain how particular she was about things and how her skin looked as if it’d never seen the sun.
Christine was just discussing with her parents what they could offer as a dowry when the rotted wood supports in their house gave out. All of Pilbridge flooded the street at the crashing. Amos was tearing through the wreckage before the shock wore off even the closest neighbors. Gav nearly carried his mother to the destroyed house in his desperate haste. She could heal some, as a mage, perhaps, but the light in Christine’s eyes went out just as Amos sets her in the street.
Gav sobbed, pleaded, begged for forgiveness, but not from his love, no, from his mother. It was strange, but grief was never simple. One of the townsfolk stepped forward, hand outstretched to offer condolences.
They froze in their steps when Gav’s mother started her magic anyway. It was cold, the magic. The ground was suddenly stiff with frost and the sky itself seemed to darken. Her red hair bleached at the roots as she lifted her arms and wisps of something swirled around her. She chanted in an arcane tongue and the wisps caressed Christine’s cold cheek like a lover before seeping into her body.
The dead girl startled with a gasp and a shiver.
Gav’s little bird skeleton always had acted ever so much like a live bird.
