#drabble request for eimksr & ribbons!!

[ei-banana]

pairing: eimikosara (sfw)

wc: 800

A moment of reprieve, just the three of them.

———

“Not too tight, Miko,” Sara chastised quietly from her seated position, hand shooting from her lap to wrap tightly around one of Yae’s bracketing ankles. She leaned against the foot of the sofa, three pages into a long-forgotten fable, between legs that squeezed, under hands that roved.

Roved and tugged.

“If you would be so kind as to put that book down and engage conversation with me—” She tugged again and Sara hissed. “Ribbon please, darling.” Yae dangled her hand expectantly and the general acquiesced with a huff.

Pink chiffon, soft and smooth between her fingers and wholly out of place in her dark, frayed hair. Yae tied off the attempted braid and leaned back, hand at her chin, judging with a caustic eye. Sara squirmed with unease— the near stagnant air of the room strange against the newly exposed planes of her face— and the kitsune sighed, making to untie the evidence of her failed toil.

“Your hair is much too short.”

“I like it this way,” Sara grumbled, flipping to the next page, not a single word registering.

“And why wouldn’t you? It certainly frames your face handsomely.” The words were pressed warmly to the flush of her cheek, and so too was Yae’s sudden smirk. “But you would grow it out for me, wouldn’t you?”

“Her hair is fine, Miko,” Ei spoke up from the adjacent desk, exasperation falling airy from her lips, face hidden behind endless, age-worn scrolls. Her posture remained impeccable despite the way she swayed with the subconscious desire to recline, to collapse completely and rest. “Now I beg for your silence while I set about deciphering the ceaseless drivel before me.”

Ei threw herself into work with all the force the new resolution lining her shoulders called for, but even a god of immeasurable might grew weary. Sara frowned at the Archon’s exhaustion-addled tone, slamming her book shut and standing despite Yae’s responding noise of inconvenience. She bypassed other precarious stacks of unnamed effects— the dust covered office in utter disarray, the likes of which Sara abhorred, though Ei seemed to prefer it this way— and settled heavy hands atop rigid shoulders.

“Why don’t you come relax?” She kept her words low and consoling, all too understanding of Ei’s oft purist nature. Sara kneaded at the tensest strip of muscle, ushering in the other woman’s resolve with each roll of her fingers.

Ei relaxed her brow though she sighed most defeatedly. “I wish this ever uncertain world permitted such frivol—”

“Just take a moment, Ei, humor the brevity of our presence would you.” Yae had snuck up somewhere behind them, settling with a hum in the Archon’s lap. Ei grunted minutely, hands settling at her waist on instinct, face pinched with consternation. “Sara’s insistent on doing up your hair, after all.”

“I am?” The general balked at the claim, head cocked in confusion, frowning when Yae rolled her eyes and shook the ribbon with a look of command. Sara gripped it loosely, nodding with renewed direction. “We do this every morning, why not lean back and enjoy it a little longer?”

“If I may take up the quill in tandem—”

“You may not,” the kitsune snapped mulishly, forehead already pressed to the slope of Ei’s neck, arms binding. “You will sit here and accept our beneficence.”

Ei slumped back with a low note of disapproval, though her head lolled and her hand had long since begun rubbing circles into the lower notches of Yae’s spine. Sara smiled, if imperceptible, at the sight, twining effulgent tresses around her own deft fingers, weaving and working with meticulous focus. The wall clock above their disorderly entwinement ticked soothingly, counting away the seconds they shared in the man-made pocket of reprieve.

Sara bound thick strands with the proffered strip of pink, knotting the bow nice and perfectly neat before tugging lightly at the base of the braid. Ei’s eyes opened a most startling lilac, beckoning, beseeching the warm sort of love that flowed boundless at their very feet; Sara bent down and pressed the seal of their mouths together, laughing softly at how splendidly they collided despite the horrid angle.

“That was… nice.” The words were breathed with tentativeness against her teeth, and Yae looked up at the sound, chin tilting with silent request. A few short pecks to the faux pout, and the kitsune was appeased— to have them both so tempered was truly a feat.

Ei remained silent, almost meditative where she reclined between such loving deterrents. She had once told Sara— oceanside, deep in the swell of night, loneliness still haloing each of their downturned heads— that nothing had ever challenged her albatross quite like their insistent affections.

Such grandiose words must have rung true, for the Archon grew lax, and she smiled.