Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

When Sona woke, it was to the press of a gentle kiss to her brow and the smell of coffee. Sona hummed, pouting, and lifted her chin stubbornly without opening her eyes.

Quinn laughed softly, the affection warming through the sleep-rough burr of her voice, but she acquiesced nonetheless, leaning down further to give her a proper kiss good morning, her lips warm and willing and a little chapped as ever.

Sona cracked open an eye to grin sleepily up at Quinn, admiring the way slats of early-morning sunlight filtered through her blinds and played over the pale, subtle swell of her chest. She'd had many a pleasant wakeup call before in her life, but she had to admit she was particularly fond of waking to kisses and coffee—particularly when delivered by one Ser Quinn, stripped comfortably down to her smalls and little else.

The sign Sona managed was lazy and half-awake, and Quinn grinned to see it. "Morning to you too, princess." Quinn swung her legs up over the side of the bed to curl against her. One hand came up, gently brushing loose curls from her cheek, very nearly lulling Sona back into a contented sleep just that easily. "I brought coffee," she added, smiling fondly down at her. "And put way too much sugar in yours like you like."

You spoil me was closer to what Sona wanted to say, but dozing back to sleep as she was, the best she could manage was a clumsy <Thank you.>

She wasn't expecting Quinn to snort almost instantly. She opened an eye again, bemused at the pretty blush that touched Quinn's cheeks. "You uh. You wanna try that again?"

Sona blinked, thinking.

The realization came unbidden, her ears flushing pink even in the low light: she'd missed her mouth with that sign, flicking it haphazardly from her chin instead.

<Thank you,> she repeated with emphasis, lips pursed as her face burned. <Not 'fuck.' It's early.>

Quinn chuckled, leaning down to kiss the pout from her lips. "Is that you explaining your freudian slip, or are you just saying it's too early to—?"

<Yes.> Sona reached out for one of the many stray decorative pillows on her bed and, finding purchase in one, gave Ser Quinn a good-natured wallop to the head. <Don't be rude,> she pretended to scold as Quinn laughed at her half-hearted attack. <What happened to chivalry?>

Quinn burrowed more comfortably into the tangle of sheets and blankets with her, ghosting a hand fondly over Sona's cheek as she struggled to stifle her giggles. "Hey, you propositioned me here," she teased. "I'm being perfectly genteel, I'll have you know." She ducked a second swat with the pillow and cackled, stealing a quick kiss as Sona's shoulders shook with her own silent laughter.

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"Okay, so this goes around, and then the front bit does... some zigzag bullshit." Vi squinted down at the crumpled paper diagram that came in the box with her new bowtie, frowning. "Wait, it's supposed to be the back part? ...It wraps around—?" She huffed and went to pull the tie loose for the tenth time in as many minutes. The flimsy scrap of fabric knotted and pulled taut and refused to budge further.

Vi harrumphed aloud, putting her hands on her hips to glare at her reflection in Caitlyn's vanity mirror. A hot mess in a tailored suit glowered back, the flared ends of the tie pointing in random directions, the knot jabbed uncomfortably up into the hollow of her throat.

"Cait I changed my mind, I can't go," she hollered over her shoulder, baring her teeth in a sneer at the mirror. "I'm too stupid to be seen in public with you."

Caitlyn laughed so suddenly that she snorted. Vi's expression softened to see her come up behind her, brilliant eyes crinkling with mirth at her piss-poor attempt at tying a bowtie.

Sheesh, Cait hadn't even finished primping yet and Vi already felt too rough and clumsy and unpolished to even be using the same mirror as her. The sleeveless dress she'd opted for and the way she'd swept her hair up off her pretty neck left those fucking incredible shoulders exposed and ugh Vi just knew that absolutely nobody from the lanes would've ever believed her if she'd said this was the girl she got to be on the arm of.

"Don't be ridiculous," Caitlyn chided, grinning as she tugged Vi around to face her. "Bowties aren't so much an expression of intelligence as just..." She plucked the hopelessly knotted fabric free again with a single motion. "A test of one's ability to comprehend utterly incomprehensible explanations."

Vi laughed as Caitlyn deftly began to work at her collar. "And what's your excuse, hot-shot?"

"Hm? Simple. My mother—" she neatly finished the bow with a flourish, tugging gently to straighten it out "—works in politics." She tried to punctuate the statement with a quick kiss, but it caught Vi by surprise, and she sputtered back into laughter against Caitlyn's lips. Cait offered her that rare, mischievous grin that seemed to be reserved just for her. "Shall we?"

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"Ma'am? You can't be back here."

The woman scarcely glanced up from her phone—did a double-take when she saw that Shyvana was indeed speaking to her. She gave a short, bemused little laugh, standing up straight from where she'd been leaning against a nearby bass stack.

"Am I supposed to be somewhere else?" she asked, lifting her chin to maintain eye contact as Shyvana approached. She was a pretty thing to be sure—all freckles and scarlet mane, to say nothing of her figure—but that still didn't permit her to be in the green room. Not on Shyvana's shift, anyway.

"The front of house, preferably," Shyvana answered, somewhat impressed with the woman's unbothered demeanor. Most patrons tended to run off in a hurry when confronted with a stern dragon employee well over a foot taller than they. "But, really, nearly anywhere else besides back here. It's a liability for our performers."

Her pretty mouth formed an equally pretty grin. "Oh, I see. By the way, not related but—I don't think I caught your name? You work here?"

Shyvana lifted a brow at the segue. "It's Shyvana, and yes, I do. Now—please, this way? The Syren group for tonight is due in..." She glanced at her watch. "Really, any moment now."

Perplexing enough, she laughed again, resuming her relaxed lean against the amplifier, pale blue eyes crinkled with mirth. "Oh... Shyvana. Honey. They have really got you fucked up around here."

"Excuse me?"

That grin didn't even falter as she reached for her belt, tugging at the laminated badge that was clipped there that... oh. That read there across the front, in bright scarlet letters, "SARAH FORTUNE (SYREN)" across the center.

"I got in like fifteen minutes ago," Sarah said, apologetic, as Shyvana stared in mortified horror at her access pass. "Traffic went faster than expected. I guess they didn't actually tell everyone after I got in..?"

Shyvana sucked her teeth, already feeling a headache coming on. "I'm not convinced they told anyone, given that I'm the gods-damned stage manager." Someone was getting ripped a new asshole later. "I'm sorry about the mix-up. Please, do make yourself comfortable, I'll... get back to it myself."

Sarah's shoulders shook with incredulous laughter. "I'm sorry, they didn't tell you I got in?" Her smile really was distractingly pretty. "What exactly do they suppose a stage manager does if not manage the stage?"

Her easygoing attitude beguiled a little smile onto Shyvana's face in turn. "In my case? Pyrotechnics, I assume."

"Pyrotech—you are aware I'm a singer/songwriter solo act, right? They did tell you that much?"

Shyvana cracked a small grin, snorting out a thin wisp of smoke to clarify her point of heritage. "Joking. I wouldn't even be very good at it, really."

A flicker in Sarah's expression—contemplative—before settling on mischief. "You don't think so?"

Shyvana's lips parted to answer—

and were met with the sweet brush of Sarah's against her own, warm and soft and wait—

Shyvana stumbled back with a bewildered chirrup. Sarah smirked up at her with more confidence than she probably felt, if that blush settling in her cheeks said anything.

"Um," Shyvana managed eloquently.

Sarah grinned, thumbing a smudge of lipstick away from the corner of her mouth. "Maybe you're right about the pyrotechnics. No flame there, just sparks, eh?"

Shyvana's face burned. Sarah's grin broadened even as her own flush crept into her ears.

"So what time does your shift end, again?"

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Katarina cracked open an eye as the bedcovers pulled back, cracking a languid smile up at Fortune in the dark. "Was wondering when you'd get in," she drawled, rolling over to let her slide in next to her.

"Some of us have real jobs," Fortune shot back with a weary smile. Her hand found Kat's waist—twitched in surprise to find it bare. "Went ahead and made yourself right comfortable in my bed, huh?"

Katarina chuckled, tugging her closer across the sheets. "You always tell me to make myself at home. Figured I'd save you the trouble of telling me this time. Besides, I'm still wearing my smalls."

"Hm." Sarah met her in a soft, sweet kiss, lips still curved in a small smile when they met. Katarina brought a hand up, cupping her jaw—stroking a lazy thumb over her cheek. The kiss lingered for a long moment. Even when they parted, it wasn't very far: Sarah gently butted her forehead against Katarina's, breath warm and shallow, smile still tugging at her lips for all her eyes remained closed for a long moment.

She was so damn pretty, Katarina thought, idly tracing her thumb over her favorite line of freckles across Sarah's cheekbone. She'd always been damn pretty, of course, but now, at this closeness, after... after... well. It was all she found she could think about.

Sarah's eyes finally opened, smile fading into a guarded look. "Wasn't sure I'd ever see you back here again," she admitted in a hoarse whisper, squeezing Katarina's hip. "Figured our deal was up."

No feelings. No expectations. No strings attached. That had been the deal they struck years ago. A pair of killers armed to the teeth with a target on their backs as striking as their blood-colored manes. Anyone who got too close stepped into range of that target. So they just wouldn't. That was their rule. That was their only rule.

Sarah had broken it.

"Safe travels," she'd murmured against the caress of Katarina's mouth on the docks that day, Kat's ship nearly past due to leave. "Please stay safe for me, kitten. I love you."

It seem to have come as a shock to them both: Katarina had frozen so suddenly she'd dropped her bag entirely. Sarah just paled... and bolted.

The way Sarah touched her now, so tentative and wary, Kat suspected Sarah still wasn't wholly convinced she was really here, in her bed, in her arms again.

Katarina kissed her this time, pressing harder into her, licking into the soft of her mouth. Sarah made a soft noise but gladly allowed the contact, tilting her head a little to improve the angle. Sarah always just fit against her, Kat thought: her lips; her body; her life; her heart. She just slotted into the spaces of herself Kat had long since neglected and let the light in and didn't flinch away from anything she found there.

"I don't think you were the one who broke our rule," Katarina found herself whispering against Sarah's mouth before she could stop herself, stunned at her own revelation.

Sarah didn't even seem to have the mental faculties at first to register her words. "You—?"

"I think you were just the first one to say it."

The next kiss was like gossamer, tremulous and faint, and even that whisper of contact left Kat's breath shuddering.

"Kat?"

"I love you too," she whispered—and kissed her again, swallowing Sarah's sharp inhale. A soft laugh, joyful and incredulous, bubbled up from Katarina's throat and she broke away for only a moment to gulp in a breath before kissing Sarah again, reveling in the returned embrace. "I love you," Katarina said again, breathless and wondering. They kissed again—"I love you"—again, longer now, and Katarina's voice cracked in disbelieving reverence: "Fuck, angel, I—I love you."

And Sarah, laughing, crying, pulling her closer into their tangled sheets, kissed her back: "I love you too."

Chapter Text

Evelynn was never truly silent when she swept into a room, no matter how she insisted none ever heard her coming. (Unless, of course, they plead politely, she often added in afterthought, her chuckle dark and velvety.)

But in Morgana's opinion, if men truly were ignorant of the heat of her magic gliding in on silent feathers—of the prickle of her allure sinking through their ribs like a key in a lock—of the scarcest brush of a fleeting claw against the soft vellus hairs of the jaw—well. Then perhaps it was just as kind that her Sovereign would soon put mankind to rest.

Scarcely a sigh at her left. Morgana did not so much deign to open her eyes from her meditations, simply lifting a hand to halt Evelynn's advance even a breath further. Her laugh was hot against Morgana's palm as Evelynn sank to human shape, turning her cheek in to Morgana's hand, as though her Queen intended to caress her.

"Such contempt, my Queen!" Evelynn complained lightly, kissing the heel of Morgana's palm—her wrist. "Art thou displeased with my service?"

"I am communing with the Old Ones," Morgana said icily. "You are making a nuisance of yourself. Again."

Evelynn cried out as if fatally wounded by the formality, draping herself despondently over Morgana's forearm. "'You?' Oh, thou'rt a cruel mistress indeed!" This close, the scent of her was impossible to ignore: dragon's blood and cedar, clove and—...and that break in focus was enough, Evelynn's lips soft and hot and full at the corner of her mouth, sin and temptation all at once. Morgana could feel her smile against her cheek. "In truth, it is intoxicating on you, my Queen."