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Yasha has traveled all over the continent by now, within and without the Empire, but there’s something special about doing it on the wheels of a caravan. They’re currently camped a few days out from their next stop, loosely scattered across the field in wagons or at the campfire. The sun is slowly approaching the horizon, and the wide grassland ripples under the breeze.
She still breaks away sometimes, following the bellow of the Storm Lord, but she never realized how aching loneliness was until she joined the circus. Traveling in a big group like this, it almost reminds her of… home. Her heart squeezes tightly. Fuck.
There’s a feather light touch on her bicep. Her mouth instinctively twitches up as she glances down to meet Mollymauk’s eyes. As always, his red eyes are squinted in secretive pleasure, a little smirk tugging at his lips that reveals the barest hint of fangs.
“What is it, Molly?”
He pouts, theatrically throwing his very little weight into her side and sighing. Her smile warms, fond. “You’re not tired, you just had lunch.”
He lazily rolls his head to meet her eyes from where it’s digging into her ribs. Yasha groans. It’s not like he weighs much anyway. And secretly, it’s become a kind of comforting routine, Molly dragging her out of her grief with his pestering playfulness. She shoves his cheek away with a hand and crouches to one knee. “Get on before I change my mind.”
Molly immediately perks up with a devilish grin, tail swishing in one long arc behind him. He pats his heart twice in an unspoken thank you as he jumps straight onto her back and clambers up onto her shoulders. He’s annoying, her Mollymauk, but for whatever reason he actually likes her. (She’s not sure if he would if he knew what happened to Zuala. The grief never fades, even now, even with him. But then, he’s only known her grief, and he still clings.)
He roughly pats her cheek and points imperiously to the wagons. She rolls her eyes and marches over. Bo is sat upright on the back of one, snoring, and little Toya is leaning against him, eyes flickering shut drowsily. She quickly rubs an eye when they approach, blinking quickly to wake up. She beams up at Molly, who Yasha knows has also taken a shine to her, and whispers in her creaky high-pitched voice, “Molly!”
Yasha slows to a stop, but he kicks her like his boots had spurs. “I could throw you,” she snaps half-heartedly and starts to pass with a slight wave to the girl.
As she does she hears the door-hinge screech of Toya’s giggle, and a wispy reproach of his name, and Yasha sighs. She leans back and sends him falling back an inch above the ground, gripping his shoes. “Did you actually want to go somewhere or am I just your bodyguard?” she says amusedly.
“Charm,” he rasps in correction, and wiggles in her grip. She can’t help but grin, hearing his voice. He’s been talking more and more lately, and it’s so Molly, the way he talks, the timbre of his voice. He’s going to be impossible when he can speak more than a few words at a time.
She reaches the campfire and drops him on the grass. She laughs, quiet, as he squawks in outrage. With a thump, she drops down in front of the fire, curling an arm around her bent knee. She doesn’t even realize she’s still smiling until she feels him lightly tap at the corner of her mouth, and her eyes flick over to his.
For once, his face is serious, searching, and he tilts his head in question. Are you feeling better? she knows he’s asking. Her throat swells with a rush of care, but she breathes slowly through it and then, after a moment's pause, reaches for her waist. Molly doesn’t react, just furrows his brow a little and watches as she pulls out the book.
It’s pages are brittle and yellowed, and there are water stains on the cover. She gently flips back the cover to show an old pressed flower, and then flips through page after page, Molly watching silently all the while. Right before the most recent page, she closes her eyes and takes a steadying breath. She’s not going to doom him by loving him, she tells herself.
She flips the page.
It’s still green, the clover flower. She only picked it a few days ago. Molly's eyes flick from hers to the flower, and despite the guillotine she feels rising higher and higher above her (his) neck, she says, “This one’s for you.”
She doesn’t explain who the rest are for; she doesn’t need to. Molly grins toothily, throwing his hands to his chest as if to say who, me? But his eyes sparkle with pleased surprise. She gently closes the book, and leans into his side. She can have this- this- togetherness, at least for now, at least for him. As long as it’s fleeting, tucked between her missions for the Storm Lord, maybe it can be allowed to stay. Maybe she won’t ruin it.
He eagerly wraps his arm around her, butting his horns into her shoulder and humming against her skin. For a moment, she almost feels her wings, soft and downy, curling around them just like they once did with Zuala.
“I’m glad you found me,” she says, voice thick.
He smiles mischievously. He twines two fingers together like string. Fate, he mouths.
No, she thinks, tucking a strand of hair behind his ear: looks at Mollymauk, this little mute tiefling who hangs on her arms and picks her buttercups and calls her ‘charm.’ Choice.