#Harrow covered in her own blood and passed out in Gideon’s arms:

[harrowedsoup]

I still wish we’d gotten Harrow react to the eighth being middle school bully’s to Gideon when they kicked her out of the lunchroom.

Like I know they weren’t getting along great at that point but you just KNOW Harrow would have started a fucking war about it. She’d have such a good mixture of being pissed about the diss about the Ninth House and the disrespect to Gideon (because she’s first cavalier and totally not for any other reason) that I think she’d just straight up kill him.

[ghost-in-the-hella]

If you are still taking prompts, and were so inclined, 47 for Gideon the Ninth!

I am always so inclined. Enjoy this... this thing. Gets a bit rude because, well, Gideon.

47. “You look like hell.”

---

“You look like hell.”

Gideon startles at the sound of Coronabeth Tridentarius actually speaking to her. She sounds more intrigued than judgemental, as if hell were an exotic travel destination she’s not yet been to but is eager to learn more about. Gideon is, not for the first time, grateful for her affected vow of silence as all possibility of coherent thought abandons her tongue. She would surely be a stuttering gay mess if she tried to speak to a woman as beautiful as this particular princess of Ida. With her feigned vow, she can still pull off the “strong but silent” affect and at least somewhat salvage the impression of being a suave badass who’s great with the ladies.

Or she could if she weren’t currently a panting, heaving, sweat drenched, bone dust coated, blood smeared, tattered mess.

It figures that Harrow doesn’t even have to be in the same room with Gideon to have completely ruined her game. Gideon draws herself up to her full height and squares her shoulders - fighting the urge to slump into an exhausted heap on the floor - and straightens her crooked aviators. She hopes that her face paint is still a badass skull and not a runny mess of gray; they’re not big on mirrors down in the facility. Her spine stiffens as Coronabeth steps toward her, smiling like they’re sharing a secret, and brushes one perfect hand lightly at each of Gideon’s shoulders, scattering fine chips of bone onto the floor.

“Poor thing,” Coronabeth purrs, locking Gideon in place with intense eye contact even through her shades. “Your necro’s really running you ragged, isn’t she?”

The last thing Gideon wants to talk about while a beautiful woman is touching her - actually touching her! Okay, touching the shoulders of her robes, but still! - is her screeching ferret of a necromancer. Her distaste must show in her expression even through the caked on layers of sweaty paint because Coronabeth chuckles prettily and squeezes her shoulder - Gideon tenses her sick delts reflexively, desperate to please - and gives her a conspiratorial smirk. “That’s alright. I won’t ask you to divulge any forbidden secrets about the Ninth House or the trials.” She runs clever fingers around the hem of Gideon’s hood - a rumpled heap around her neck, having fallen down as she heaved herself up the ladder from the facility in a hurry to get herself to a sonic - and winks suggestively enough that Gideon swallows hard. “She really must be putting you through the ringer. You know, I feel quite sorry for you cavs sometimes. So much is asked of you, and you get so little in return…”

Gideon has passed out. Surely, this must be what has happened. She’ll wake up in her nest of black blankets with a dirty magazine glued to her face by skull paint and drool, completely covered in sticky notes blackened with Harrowhark’s vitriol. Because it sure as hell feels like Coronabeth - Coronabeth Tridentarius, crown Princess of Ida, hottest necromancer this side of the funny books - is flirting with her. With her. Gideon Nav, indentured servant of the Ninth, perpetually demeaned cavalier primary to her lifelong nemesis, hottest cavalier in history to never touch a boob that wasn’t her own. With her stupid, itchy black robes that still smell faintly of Ortus Nigenad’s flop sweat no matter how many times they’re laundered, with her overgrown and uncombed hair all full of cobwebs and bone dust, with her half-melted face paint of a creepy fucking skull not quite concealing her latest acne outbreak. So there’s no fucking way that this isn’t some delightful dream inspired by too many titty mags before bedtime.

Coronabeth’s hand slides down from Gideon’s shoulder, gliding down the length of her arm - trailing over the firm roundness of her deltoid, the jaw-dropping perfection of her biceps, the corded extensor muscles of her forearms - down to seize her calloused hand with her own surprisingly strong one. “I think you deserve something in return. Don’t you?” 

Okay. New thought. Maybe Gideon hasn’t passed out, but she’s probably going to if Coronabeth keeps touching her like this.

Gideon nods very carefully, trying not to let any drool drop from her mouth.

Coronabeth’s smile is as bright as Dominicus. She tugs Gideon’s hand and leads her down an unfamiliar hallway. Gideon follows obediently despite her necromancer’s warnings ringing in her head, shrieking at her to trust no one. Well, Gideon figures, if she’s a lamb being led to the slaughter, at least she’ll die happy. A girl’s holding her hand! Flirting with her! Smiling at her! Touching her muscles! 

Much to Gideon’s surprise, she is not promptly jumped and flesh magicked to death upon entry to the Third’s quarters. In fact, as far as she can tell, she’s alone in them with Coronabeth. Sure, she had to offer up a bit of blood to the gross ward on the door, but she’s already bleeding a little bit from her adventures in the facility anyway so that’s no biggie. 

She’s relieved to note that there are two big, ostentatious beds in addition to the smaller (but no less ostentatious) cavalier bed at the foot of one. If by some miracle she does get laid today, she’d really rather it not be in a bed that Ianthe Tridentarius has also slept or - God forbid - boned in. Coronabeth hustles her past the beds (dang) toward a large and opulent bathroom. “Here, get washed up.”

A fluffy purple towel is thrust into Gideon’s hands, there’s a gentle shove at her shoulders and the click of a door shutting, and suddenly Gideon is alone in the fanciest bathroom she’s ever seen. It’s even more ridiculous than the one in the Ninth’s quarters. She catches her own reflection in the mirror and finds that she looks every inch as confused as she is. “What the fuck?” she mouths to herself.

“I don’t hear washing happening!” comes Coronabeth’s mellifluous voice sing-songing through the door.

Gideon Nav fancies herself a remarkably strong person, the kind of person who could move mountains barehanded if she set her mind to it. Apparently, she has one fatal weakness: a beautiful woman telling her to do, well, literally anything. So Gideon obligingly scours the paint off her face - Harrow’ll be furious, but Harrow’s always furious and her paint’s a mess anyway - and inspects herself once more in the mirror. Sexy. Hot. Gorgeous. Little bit of acne at the hairline and around the left nostril, bit ruddy-cheeked from over-scrubbing, but still a flawless masterpiece of hotness. 

She sniffs her armpits. Pretty sweaty. Are chicks into that? If they’re going to bone (please, please, please) then won’t she get sweaty again anyway?

Wait, are they going to bone? They are, right? They’re alone in Corona’s quarters, her terrifying sister and their insufferable cav have clearly been sent away, and Corona’s super hot and bossing her around and dragging her into her bedroom (well, through her bedroom to her bathroom, but still). If this were one of Gideon’s magazines she'd already be up to her wrist, or at least majorly winning at tonsil hockey. This is literally a textbook scenario for boning.

Okay, then. It’s on. So now what? Should she brush her teeth or something? Her breath’s probably pretty rank after the morning she’s had. Should she, like… shave stuff? 

“You may draw a bath, if you like,” Corona calls through the door again. “Ianthe and Babs will be gone for hours. And something tells me that you have never been pampered.”

And so Gideon ends up taking the first ever bath of her life in the gilded bathtub of the Third. She can’t bring herself to fill the tub more than a couple of inches, even though from her skin mags and her comics she knows a bath is usually filled until the person in it is all but drowning, or at least until the bubbles are tastefully covering the good bits (comics) or just barely not covering them (skin mags). She does throw in several of the weird perfumy things hanging out around the tub at Corona’s urging. By the end of it, she’s pretty sure she’s dirtier than when she stepped in except that now she’s filthy with scented soaps and salts and glittery “bath bombs” (surprisingly not that violent but also surprisingly messy) instead of sweat and blood. She scrapes and scrubs at herself and then gives her body and her clothes a good shake out in the sonic for good measure. She borrows some toothpaste and uses her finger as a toothbrush, then rinses with borrowed mouthwash. 

There’s a fluffy purple and gold robe that smells a bit like Corona’s perfume and seems the right size, so even though it’s a million miles off from her usual aesthetic she consents to shrug it on. It’s impossibly soft and warm and smooth. Stops a bit short on her thighs, but presumably that won’t get any complaints.

When she steps back out into the Third’s quarters, Gideon feels strangely vulnerable without her protective layer of filth. She smells like a stranger, and her fingertips and toes are wrinkled in a weird way that she assumes has to do with the bath bombs or maybe with how hard she was scrubbing. That, or she’s picked up some freaky skin disease from the Third’s bathtub. She hopes she’s not about to die or something.

Corona looks beyond delighted to see her emerge, ruddy and steaming, from the bathing chamber in her ludicrous little bathrobe. It’s a shame that it’s short on the leg coverage and heavy on the arm coverage, since Gideon’s legs are fucking awesome but not nearly as impressive as her guns. She wants to ask what Corona has planned for her now, but her stupid oath to Harrow stays her tongue. If all goes well, Coronabeth might have a better use for her tongue than words, anyway. So instead she stands there trying to look impressive rather than panicky and overstimulated.

“Come here,” Corona beckons with an elegant finger, her eyes glittering like shards of polished amethyst. Gideon’s pretty sure that Corona’s not using any necromantic tricks on her - she knows what that shit feels like by now, and it’s vastly unpleasant - but she follows her gesture as inexorably as if Corona were looping a leash of thanergy around her throat and dragging her closer. 

And then Coronabeth Tridentarius is touching her. Like, pretty much everywhere. “Hmmm, let’s see,” she murmurs thoughtfully as she palpates what feels like every trembling inch of Gideon’s being (apart from the good bits, but maybe this is what foreplay is? she’s heard of it, but her magazines usually skip straight to the main event). Instead of trying to think, Gideon focuses on feeling, which is much more in her wheelhouse.

Corona’s nimble fingers carding through her damp red locks (they could stand a trim), fingernails sending tingles through her scalp as they scratch gently against skin that’s never been touched in kindness before. Fingertips trailing down the strong line of her jaw, gently seizing her square chin and turning her face to every possible angle, her gaze as palpable as her fingers. Strong hands (how does the Princess of Ida have actual calluses on her fingers?) testing her muscles, examining her hands and paying particular attention to her fingernails (they could also stand a trim).

“You look good in my robe,” Corona announces, taking a step back and allowing Gideon to breathe for what feels like the first time since she set foot in her quarters. “Gold suits you.” She locks eyes with Gideon and quirks her lips into a subtle smirk. “Gold suits you very well.”

Gideon swallows hard, trying not to gulp audibly and concentrating on not sweating through her borrowed robe.

“Much better than black. Not that you look bad in black, mind you, but there are other colors that would be much more flattering for your lovely complexion.”

She takes Gideon by the hand and leads her over to an over-decorated table that Gideon observes is overflowing with cosmetics. “For example… Hmmm… Plum?” Corona holds up a tube of something that’s a deep, bruised purple, examining its contrast with Gideon’s skin. “Or perhaps mauve…”

Coronabeth is insatiable. Gideon is left exhausted. When she finally emerges from the Third House’s quarters (very much not laid), hours have passed and she feels as if she has run a marathon. Not from any outward exertion, but from the effort of holding still and keeping silent throughout the whole ordeal.

She is perhaps the most sexually frustrated she has ever been in her life, having never been touched by a woman (and what a woman!) so much before, or really at all before unless she counts herself or the shriveled crones of the Ninth.

She is also… well. Made over. Her hair has been combed and styled, and it reeks of hair gel almost as badly as Naberius Tern’s does on an average day. Her nails have been trimmed, filed, and buffed smooth before being painted a soft lilac and accented with shimmering gold. Her face has been rendered utterly unrecognizable; Harrowhark would likely envy the sheer amount of makeup on it if only it were in the design of a skull rather than whatever peacocky nonsense Coronabeth’s done to it. She is, at least, in her own black robes despite Coronabeth’s best efforts to get her to borrow some of Babs’s gaudy frippery.

She suspects she has, in fact, been fucked by the Third after all.

She slinks down the hall as stealthily as she can manage, thanking her lucky stars that her necro is probably half-dead in a bone or buried up to her pointy little goblin ears in ancient books or possibly both rather than being a normal, decent human being who might give a fuck where her cavalier has vanished off to for hours on end with one of her greatest rivals. She’s hoping that everyone else in Canaan House will be equally preoccupied and that she’ll be able to return to the safety of her chambers with her dignity at least partially intact when she rounds a corner and nearly faceplants directly into the solid mass of Camilla the Sixth.

Gideon draws herself up to her fullest and most imposing posture and tries to mask her humiliation as best she can. Camilla observes her cooly, but Gideon swears her fellow cav is just barely holding back a laugh. 

After a small but excruciating eternity in limbo, Camilla steps aside to let Gideon dart gratefully past. Camilla casts a few words over her shoulder as Gideon passes, and they follow her burning ears all the way down the hall and back to her quarters: “You look like hell, Nav.”

[quatredraws]

Classes reversed au

Because I can’t get this idea out of mind

Where Gideon is a necromancer.

Her yellow eyes are open and laser focused, even at few days old. She follows spots of light no one else can see in the skeletons of the ninth. She screams longer than any other child in the nursery, eats double, and shits for three. She has a fierce head of red hair and only shuts up when held up.

This, being the fucking ninth, where emotions are a faux pas, never happens if anyone can help it.

Hence why the bloody aunts wake up the whole nursery one cold and frigid morning, because Gideon Nav is cooing in the arms of a skeleton. This skeleton obeys no one else’s will. Gideon is dripping blood from her tiny, sweet, button nose, and her stained skin unnerves even the lady of the house.

Gideon is one, and she’s powerful and bored. But also kind. She will hug anyone with arms (fellow children, nursery teenagers, even the lord and the lady if they don’t move fast enough), but skeletons follow her everywhere - they teach her how to walk, and get her changed - and the more time passes the more the skeletons unnervingly move like people she observes.

The lord and the lady are plotting a war crime.

The aunts are doing maths.

Gideon is screaming bloody murder from the nursery.

and not even all doors of the ninth can muffle it. Not even all skeletons of the ninth can prevent this. Not even all ancestors of the ninth can stop a toddler from barreling inside of the lady’s private chambers.

Gideon nav is sweating blood and pointing a soft, chubby finger against the lady of the locked tomb, lady of our memories unforgivable, mistress of the thousand keys.

And she speaks, for the first time in her (short) life:

‘Hark! For I have seen the tomb open. Hark! For I have seen the stone rolled. Hark! For she will live, and you will weep, and the universe will be torn asunder.’

She takes a brief breath, the hiccup of a child with the power of ten thousands suns in her amber eyes:

‘And I command you not to.’

and then, under the horrified gaze of the lady nonagesimus, the hacks a glob of blood and mucus and smeared across her robe, across the lady’s stomach.

No one dies that night. No mysterious fever spreads through the nursery. Gideon Nav spends 24 hours in prenatal unit, fighting against coma. A random steroid on the belt of the ninth goes off, in an explosion of colour no one notices because, hello, the locked tomb is stuck in the middle of a fucking frozen planet.

Nine months afterwards, a small, premature child is born to the lady. Her head is fully covered by a mane of shocking black hair, but no one rejoices - there is a distinct lack, that maybe only adepts can detect, that makes the birth a sad occasion - a lost hope.

Until a skeleton walks a cooing Gideon all the way to the cradle. Both parents eye the dismal child with the hatred and terror reserved to a terrifying little shit that didn’t even have the grace to be of your own blood. But Gideon gives even less of a fuck at 2 yo than she will when in full possession of a) her necromantic powers and b) awareness of what ladies and lords do (‘no, plotting war crimes is not an average in the houses’)

Anyhow, here is how Harrowhark the ninth opens her eyes (‘hark!’ Giggles gideon) to a smiling redhead. How she’s held and walked by even more skeletons that Gideon ever created for herself. How she takes her first tottering steps to collapse in Gideon’s arms - not her parents.

I mean, don’t get me wrong, they fucking hate each other still.

Except maybe they don’t.

‘I will rip your spine off from your eyes if you don’t stand still’ mutters a peeved Gideon, trying to brush Harrow’s hair free of knots.

‘I will drag you face-first across all the steps to the locked tomb’ threatens Harrow, while trying to shove a raw leek down Gideon’s throat (she heard they were good for blood-making, and Gideon hemorrages all the fucking time)

‘I hate you’ they say to each other, smiling with bloodstained teeth, when they face each other in a circle made of children heckling them off.

The ninth is a dying house, but somehow a toddler staunched the loss.

It’s only natural that the lady and the lord hate everything about this. They can’t deal with the outrage - they can’t conceal their hatred - they will not be freed of their small mindedness.

This is how Gideon is told to act like a cav, and Harrow is told to act like an adept.

Which is extremely comical, as Harrow has been swinging around femurs since she was three and has the muscle to show for it. Gideon will not open a book unless there are figures, and she already read all anatomies ever. So Harrow reads theory and trains with a sword and Gideon trains with a sword and with skeletons and together they develop a language made of signs and twitches and snapping fingers to cover all bases and blur the limits between a rather short and swole cav covered in bones and with bone hearings, and a tall and mildly less swole adept who can summon bones from her cav’s outfit. Harrow calls strategy while tanking. Gideon casts will dealing some serious damage.

They still open the locked tomb.

Gideon’s steps hecho with a familiar power. Harrow’s blood thrums with possibilities never realised. Together they figure it out.

Together they scream themselves hoarse when the lady and the lord and the goddamn first chavarlier lock them outside of their room, and do the unthinkable.

Gideon screams herself hoarse and bloody some more after that because it never should have come to pass. Harrow is the iceberg over which the blood soak in. It’s no one’s fault, so obviously it’s theirs.

It will take palamedes sextus to maybe make them understand that’s not the case.

Gideon wants to run and join a different house.

Harrow doesn’t.

Everyone in the ninth is as lost as them, if by everyone you mean Aiglamene and Crux.

No one will know. So they all cover it up.

So Gideon and Harrow still grown entwined like two deadly blossoms. So Gideon’s will still try to run and her cav will try to make her stay and all the children of the ninth (now teenagers) will look at them like the worst adept cav combo ever known to the ninth house.

Until there is a summon. An interstellar trip. A few murders. A terrible solution.

Gideon will frustratingly wait in the sidelines while Harrow wipes the floor with Magnus and Babs

If that ever happens, bacause they will likely be joined at the hip and cam and pal will recognise them as kindred spirits (the devotion is there under that hathred)

Until Gideon is facing Cytherea, and her cav (maddening Harrow, and her forehead under her lips when they exchanged a vow years in the making) is bleeding and stumbling and they were all gonna beat it

‘Flower of the ninth’

So

Gideon grabs harrow’s arm.

‘I’m going to give you something. But you’re not going to like it it.’

Harrow doesn’t like where this is going already,

‘Shitty timing for a gift, nav’

Gideon uses her blood to scribble something on Harrow’s face, her hands, her throat. Cam adverts her eyes, maybe suspecting.

Then she hooks her conscience in her friend her flower her bonded spirit twin her cav’s eyes, and she lets her body collapse in one last breath.

Harrow can’t hear herself screaming.

Their spirits ricochet against each other like oil and and water shaken by a dog with the rabies. A low noise (like a cathedral bell ringing for the dead) echoes across the stars - or it would if the noise propagated in a vacuum.

They writhe and froth and contort until they settle in a smaller frame, with tight muscles and calluses from years of training, crying tears of blood from the cranial pressure, seeing starburst of necromantic magic where Cytherea and her construct are kicking Ianthe’s ass.

Harrow is still crying in this one. Gideon still dies (for now) in this one. But, in this one, a lying cav and her adept have just fooled the emperor.

For! They have seen the tomb open. For! they have seen the stone rolled. For! they will live, and the emperor will weep, and the universe will be torn asunder.

[summerhuntresses]

no grave (can hold my body down)

[ao3]

After Harrow passes out in a bone cocoon, Gideon takes care of her while studiously avoiding any inconvenient revelations.

Gideon could say, with great certainty, that she had never once been concerned about the wellbeing of Harrowhark Nonagesimus. She had been concerned about the actions of Harrowhark Nonagesimus in the past, and how said actions would impact her own life in new and unpleasant ways, but the actual physical wellbeing of the Reverend Daughter of the Ninth was not something she lost sleep fretting over.

 That being said, it was extremely disconcerting to find herself fretting over Harrow now. Gideon had initially laid her down and simply wiped the blood and dirt off her face, worried about the other woman waking up in a fury over her ‘gross overstep’, but now…

 Well, Harrow had been unconscious for hours and Gideon was starting to worry about her necromancer.

She had already cleaned Harrow up as much as she could without undressing her - worried or not, that was a boundary that she was not willing to cross - and now she was just… waiting. Waiting for the woman to wake up.

 It was difficult to keep her eyes away from Harrow, honestly. Gideon knew that she wasn’t going to just stop breathing in her sleep, but the image of her lying there covered in dirt and blood and bone wouldn’t leave her alone.

 Honestly, Gideon had never really noticed just how small the woman was. True, Gideon wasn’t exactly small herself, but she had to have a good foot on Harrow and at least a hundred pounds. Looking closer, Gideon realized that she could see the individual bones in Harrow’s wrist jutting out against her skin.

 “Well, fuck.” She sighed and sat back, arguing with herself even as she knew that she was going to do something stupid. “I mean, I know I wouldn’t want to lay around for Ninth knows how long marinating in my own filth. It would be too much of a temptation for the Eighth, at the very least.” Gideon nodded decisively, smacking a palm on the bed in emphasis and nearly jostling Harrow onto the floor. “Whoops. I’m doing my duty, Nonagesimus. That’s what you’ve wanted me to do for ages.”

 Harrow, still unconscious, did not respond.

 Gideon sighed and stood. “Look, I know this is weird, but… You’re tiny, Nonagesimus. Your name is bigger than you are, for Necrolord’s sake!” She narrowed her eyes. “I don’t care what you have to say about it, I am getting you in clean clothes if it kills the both of us.”

 Mind made up, Gideon moved quickly to avoid pussying out. Hauling Harrow into a sitting position with one hand, she stripped her out of her heavy outer robe with the other, immediately encountering a dilemma when she realized that she needed a third hand to keep Harrow upright. 

 “Aw, fuck.”

 Never once in her life had Gideon ever even considered the possibility of hugging Harrow. It would have been like hugging a spiked mace, if the mace was malevolent and actively trying to remove Gideon’s ribcage with its teeth. Six year old Gideon would have run away from anyone suggesting the idea to her. Twelve year old Gideon would have done her level best to break their kneecap. The Gideon from a week ago would have laughed until she cried.

 The Gideon of the here and now had Harrow in what could only be described as an embrace as she struggled to pull Harrow’s damp and disgusting undershirt over her head.

 “How did you even manage to get this gross, Nonagesimus? I thought you were all about dignity and shit, this is just nasty.” Gideon took an experimental sniff of the shirt, recoiling and chucking it across the room nearly immediately. “If we didn’t pack so light I would burn that, Harrow. Burn it.”

 Sitting back, Gideon looked at the girl in her lap, Harrow’s absolute stillness highlighting just how small she really was. Gideon frowned, running a gentle finger over the ribs visible on her side. “Damn, Harrow, what’s wrong with you?” She pulled a new shirt over the other woman’s head with none of the haste she had felt earlier, taking care not to jostle the necromancer. “Eat a sandwich, witch bitch.”

 Her hands betrayed her, though, smoothing the shirt down Harrow’s side with care and sliding back up to carefully extricate a few straggly curls from the collar. She stroked the woman’s hair absentmindedly, lost in thought and ignoring the weirdly damp feel.

 A shiver under her hand made her frown. “I guess all your energy goes to being a prick and not to keeping yourself warm.” She stood and grabbed her spare cloak from her blanket nest, wrapping it around Harrow. “That seems kind of stupid, Harrow. Just sayin’.” She pulled the other woman back into her arms as she tied the cord around Harrow’s neck.

 Harrow shifted slightly in her arms, brows furrowing and a soft grumble rolling from her throat. Gideon looked down at her in surprise. “What? Not used to people touching you, Reverend Daughter?” She stroked a hand down the side of Harrow’s head firmly, the nearly rough touch seeming to calm the woman. Gideon snorted. “It can never be easy with you, huh?”

 A knock on the door startled Gideon badly, arms tightening around her necromancer and eyes darting toward the chest at the foot of the bed with the hidden longsword.

 “Gideon? Gideon, it’s me. Palamedes Sextus. Of the Sixth. And Camila as well.”

 Rolling her eyes, Gideon gently laid Harrow back against the cushions before getting up to throw the door open. “Sorry, I’m not sure I know who you are. Do you have some ID or something to make it clearer?”

 The door swung open to reveal Palamedes frowning at her. “Ninth, I’m positive you should be able to recognize who I am from my name and House. Are you feeling all right? Did you take a blow to the head down there?”

 He put a hand up, seeming to try and check her forehead for a fever before Camila smacked his wrist down, glaring exasperatedly at Gideon. “I honestly preferred it when you didn’t talk, Ninth.”

 Gideon gasped dramatically, clutching her hands to her chest. “Are you saying you don’t love my wit, charm, and dashing good looks, Cam?” She dropped her hands and grinned her most obnoxious grin, the one that made Harrow froth at the mouth and bleed from the eyes in rage. “Bullshit.”

 Palamedes swung his gaze between the women, uncertainty written across his features. “I… don’t know what’s happening right now. But! I wanted to come by and check on the Reverend Daughter. She overexerted herself badly when she did whatever she did, but she should be fine. Cam and I checked her over briefly and she showed no signs of shock or physical trauma beyond the exertion. Try and keep her warm just in case.” He smiled reassuringly at Gideon. “She needs rest, and a lot of it, but she’ll be on her feet terrorizing the Fourth before you have time to enjoy the quiet.”

 Cam sighed from her place at his side. “Somehow I get the feeling that the rest of us will never get to enjoy peace and quiet. Ever again.”

 Throwing her a wink, Gideon said, “Admit it, you like my braggadocious tenacity.”

 Cam blinked. “Nav, do you even know what that means?”

 Shrugging, Gideon told her, “No, but it sounds awesome.”

 “How did you even hear that phrase, Nav?” Cam looked perplexed, which increased the range of facial expressions Gideon had seen her wear by a factor of two.

 Gideon shrugged again. “Nonagesimus yelled it at me when we were like twelve. No idea what it means or where she picked it up, but it sounds cooler than anything I got from Necrotits Prime, volumes three through eleven, so I stole it for my own use.” She grinned. “Good, huh?”

 Camila and Palamedes shared a look that Gideon couldn’t interpret before turning back to her. “You know what, Ninth?” Palamedes sounded more uncomfortable than anything else as he addressed her. “I think you’ve got this handled on your own. Just… just keep her warm and comfortable and don’t let her get out of bed for the next twelve hours at least.” He was in motion before the words finished leaving his mouth.

 Cam watched him go with a raised eyebrow before turning to Gideon. “Good luck, Nav. She seems like she’ll be a fun patient.” She left immediately, missing Gideon’s one-finger salute as she went.

 Gideon slammed the door childishly, muttering curses under her breath as she did so. When her eyes landed on Harrow again she deflated, the irritation draining from her at the sight of Harrow practically swimming in Gideon’s spare cloak. 

 She sat on the edge of the bed, pulling the edges of the cloak tighter around Harrow’s throat. “I can see you shivering, Nonagesimus. That’s honestly pathetic, it’s practically tropical here compared to the Ninth.” Sighing, Gideon stood up once more and picked Harrow up in a bridal carry. Several minutes of cursing and jostling and nearly dropping her necromancer later, Gideon had managed to tuck the other woman under both the blankets and her spare cloak.

 Harrow twitched, brow furrowing again and head rolling from side to side. “No… construct….. how...” She muttered random words in her sleep, anger and fear written on her face as she did so. 

 “Hey. Hey, Nonagesimus.” Gideon shook her gently, not wanting to harm her further after the unpleasant bone incident from earlier. Harrow didn’t respond beyond tossing her head away from Gideon, muttering continuing unabated. Gideon shook her harder. “Nonagesimus. Hey. Harrow.”

 The other woman shot straight up in bed, eyes suddenly wide open and blazing. “No grave can hold my body down, Nav.” 

 Gideon yelped and fell backwards, tumbling straight off the bed. “What the fuck, Harrow!”

 Harrow glared at her. “It’s freezing in here.”

 Sitting up, Gideon stared incredulously. “It’s cold? You wake up from a fucking coma spouting that creepy bullshit and your concern is that it’s cold?” 

 Harrow hunched in on herself, frowning as she snapped, “What are you talking about, Nav?” She drew the cloak further around herself, not seeming to recognize who it actually belonged to. 

 “Ugh.” Gideon pointed at her accusingly. “You are weird, Nonagesimus. Weird and lucky.” 

 Her finger, righteously jabbing toward Harrow, faltered somewhat when Gideon noticed the shivers wracking Harrow’s frame. She looked around helplessly, but there were no more blankets to be seen in the room and no other people either. Gideon sighed. “If you bite me I’m letting you fend for yourself, you gremlin.”

 “What-”

 Harrow’s question was cut off by Gideon flinging herself over Harrow to crash land next to her. She immediately grabbed Harrow around the waist and bodily hauled the smaller woman into her arms, wrapping her in her own cloak and drawing the blankets up around them both. Harrow spluttered, arms flailing pathetically.

 The sight of Harrow in the throes of speechless bafflement was somehow endearing, a thought that Gideon shoved into the deepest recesses of her brain to never, ever revisit.

 “What are you doing Nav.” 

 Gideon shrugged. “Sex Pal said you had to rest and you had to stay warm. You generate zero body heat on your own because you took ‘bone necromancer’ too literally, so really this is your own fault.” She relaxed back into the pillows, dragging Harrow halfway onto her chest and pointedly not making eye contact as she desperately tried to maintain her chill.

 Harrow continued to flail. “This is utterly inappropriate get your hands off me I am fine this is unnecessary what kind of cavalier do you think you are.” Despite her words, Gideon could feel the shivers receding, her own body heat making its way past the shell of ice that Harrow kept wrapped around herself.

 She tucked Harrow’s arms into the blanket. “If you sleep for twelve hours without being a prissy bitch I promise I won’t make fun of you about this for the next twelve to fourteen years.”

 Grumbling, Harrow let herself be manhandled. “Fine.”

 “Fine.”

 (Neither of them ever mentioned how they woke up - with Harrow’s head nestled under Gideon’s chin and Gideon’s hands up Harrow’s shirt. Except that Gideon totally did and Harrow absolutely tried to murder her for it.)

[rambleverse]

Call to Arms

Gideon wakes to a dark room. There will be hours yet until the sun rises again, and the task of the night before robs him of a rested ride. But this is not about a full night’s sleep, or the sun rising on familiar fields: this is not about what aught to be. 

Gideon rises from his bunk, and with a bit of fumbling, lights the last stub of candle at his desk. Flickering below the beeswax lies his only guide: a map stuck together by weeks of Hawks flying--bloodied and tired--to give their home a fighting chance.

Their home.

He gives himself a final turn in a washbasin, rinsing the sleep from his eyes in day old water. He washes in silence, turning thought over thought as he passes the last of the soap over himself:

Fairbreeze and Falconwing may already be gone.

Know now that this path is stained with blood and sacrifice.

A hundred cannot be enough.

Remember that you are of the Light. No more do you trod the path of the normal man.

Am I being sent to help, or sent to die?

But others do not see the sacrifice you make and the burdens you carry.

They will be hungry.

When you are wounded and broken in soul, when your heart bleeds and your strength is fading then remember this: Your path is never easy.

I will not see home again.

Gideon rises, dabbing a rag on his face and corners. He wears his shirt and pants, he goes to the stables. On the horizon torches of the dwarf camp burn just beyond the city. Soup nickers, puts a muzzle to his hand.

“A good brush, wear it well ol’ girl.” he says as he tends her coat with the bristles, and with heavy tack and little complaint they make their way back to the barracks. Tying her to post he catches a glimpse at the sky--a blue-and-black bruise so cloudy it smudges out the last of the straggling stars.

Inside the barracks the elves bustle. A few look at him, maybe one nods. The decision to break the news yesterday was not his, could never have been his, but tying his own armor about himself he notices his clamor sounds similar enough. He takes his sword, his shield, and-

He stares at the foot locker.

But when the burden you carry causes you to stumble do not forget you are never alone. In your allies seek out their strength.

Reverently taking the bundle inside, he feels the glow beneath the shawl wrapped and double-wrapped in silk and canvas.

Together they gather in the field before the barracks, alone for the morning brief. Gideon closes his eyes, taking in a deep gulp of air before nudging Soup at her sides. His soldiers are impeccable. As immaculate as any of the Sunguard’s finest. They stand ready, rigid, and perfect. The thought makes him shift in his seat. Beneath those visors are thoughts unsaid since the rest of the battalion marched days ago. Like those passed between bunks the night before--passed his own mind as he glances to the gilded helm tied behind him.

For it is when you are weakened that others will try to tempt you off the righteous path.

“I know this is not what you expected” his own voice surprises him. Too soft, maybe-definitely too soft-

Alone in a field-miles from home. 

“We will not be joining the rest of the van. Instead, on orders from the Knight-Commander, we are to-” the word fails to come to mind.

Rally. Rally. Why couldn’t the word just be rally, why couldn’t it just-why can’t it just be Common. 

He feels the air catch in his chest. Gideon Greatmantle sits silently on his horse, the hundred elves before him locked like statues as his hand flexes on the reins. His eyes dart to his helmet. He could hide his face, his humanity. He could pretend all he like to be like them--perfect and ready--maybe in an impossible hundred, three-hundred years he might fit the part.But not now not here not for them, he can’t-he can’t-and off the helmet

A glimmer. Like fine silver ink:it traces the edge of the metal. He turns.

On the horizon beneath a wreath of purple and orange the keenest edge of sunlight rises over the trees to the east. 

He rises a fist to his chest. Routine, drilled, practiced pretending to be something perfect: all this and more brings hand to heart. The Sunguard salute the rising sun-and there below the line of white gold stand his perfect elves.

They do not turn, they do not see the sun behind them; yet they salute. As one stiff sweep they bring their hands to their chest. Whatever brings them to do so, it is not the sun-not Belore. But then...?

Then he finds the words.

“I am not an elf.”

“If I could say it better I would-if I could say it clearer, if so many things were different--I would still be south with the friends I buried there.”

“I would be with family and you with yours, your land--it might breathe again after what the Legion’s done. I could grieve, and you-you would have time for wheat, for houses, for parties and babies.”

“And if I must I would be here only after years of practice, patience, and study. I would lead you after years of wisdom cut from battle. I would give you every edge and do so with gray hair, clear heart and mind.”

”But I cannot be an elf, or wise, or honored--” 

“But I want to help.”

The word comes to him: Conviction.

And as the sun rises behind his perfect elves in gold and red, Gideon feels the task rise up from the ground. 

“Sunspear!”

The hundred call, “Ho!”

“Today from every shore the Alliance rides the many roads to Silvermoon. I know as well as you what lies along the way--who and what they will find--your farms, your homes, your mothers and your fathers. They will cover every inch they can to sharpen their blades, against the grain of your own blood, for their final push against your heart.

But we ride to make sure the roads are not so easy! While the Serdar and his legion march against the Alliance van, we will go to every little nook and hamlet, so that when the Alliance knocks, they do so at an arm’s length. We will harrow lines, train, dig, and scheme to ensure that when the sun rises again your kingdom will still be yours.

The Alliance thinks to make their edge sharp against us, but we will show them what happens when the grain is pressed too hard! We will send them back nicked, chipped, and brittle-so that when the Serdar’s shield meets them in battle they will snap like wicker!

So will you ride with me alone? Will you ride just beyond the edge, to save your kith and kin? Will you give your people what may be their only chance to see this war through, to breathe, to live? Or will you stay here, complaining that you would have had to follow a human who dared do what you would not?

If so, I could tell you of what it means to have no home instead.”

Gideon sits atop his horse, taking his helmet and hoisting it to the sky.

“Will you ride?” he shouts. The elves, raising swords before the rising sun, cheer back, “Ho!”

“For home!” 

“For home!”

“For hearth!”

For hearth!”

FOR QUEL’THALAS!

prayer source from Tyleril Silversword