Chapter Text
One year before the Alliance took Castrum Oriens
She pushed herself up from the bed roll well before dawn, the desert night chill sending a shudder down her spine as the blankets slipped down and pooled around her waist. Some dim indulgent part of her longed to sink back down into the warmth she was leaving, perhaps drape herself across the toned, muscular body beside her, drink in the heat of his form and the heat of his lips. She propped herself up and looked down at him for a moment, admiring him in the soft, pale light of tiny crystals strung along the inside of the tent.
He’d been a good lover, she thought, not clingy or demanding, only as near as she wanted–and what passed for romance out here in a war zone suited her. She wondered briefly, if they’d met in another time or place, if she might’ve tried to make something more of this.
She shook her head, smiling, and some of her long dark hair slipped over one shoulder as she sat up properly and carefully pulled her sword belt out of the pile of her effects. He was wild as the storm winds she’d seen him command. She pulled one dagger and opened a vial, slicking the blade. This was a waste, though, and a shame–but a necessary one. She pulled a second dagger and repeated the process with a different vial.
She shifted to straddle him without putting any weight down, easy in the spacious tents these Ala Mhigans were so fond of. And then on a whim she leaned down, pressed her lips to his. It earned her a sleepy mumble, and a sweet kiss back–she smiled against his lips, and even wider at the grunt of pain that suddenly cut off as the first dagger sunk into his side. As she drew back his lips moved with no sound, motions she recognized as a spell, and she reveled as the look of surprise on his face turned to one of rage. The second dagger slipped in, and he lunged–only to collapse back, body arcing in a brief second of seizure as it fought against the paralytic poison that followed the silence poison.
“In the name of the Emperor,” she whispered, not for patriotism, but for the look his face contorted into before he went rigid and unable to move. She slipped off, carefully wiped the blood from her daggers on one of the blankets, then sheathed them and began dressing.
His eyes were still open when she finished strapping on her gauntlets and finally slung her sword belt, so she carefully stepped back over and stooped down, mindful of the blood soaking the bed roll now. “If it’s any consolation,” she said, pressing one hand to his chest, “you were the best lay I’ve had in years. I could’ve closed this mission months ago but for that. Goodbye, Merrick.”
She left him there and made her way out of the tent. She had an insurgent cell to kill.
Her partner arrived at dawn with a small contingent of troops to help transport the cell’s leader and to sweep the camp. She’d been thorough, so of course they’d find no one else alive. Which was why, “We’ve got one!” drew an about face and a sharp glare, hands on her daggers.
The tent she’d left this morning.
“Impossible.” She stalked back and ducked in to find her partner reluctantly pushing aside the bloody mess of blankets with the barrel of his gun. “That’s him,” she said.
Her partner looked up, a grimace twisting his sharp features. “Looks like your paralytic might’ve kept him from bleeding out.”
“Of course it would, the bastard.” He was unconscious, at least, no longer locked in that position of perfect agony. “Should we see if they want him?”
Her partner nodded. “If he makes it to the forward camp. If not, we’ll dump him along the way.”
“Agreed.”