Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

When Rumi goes to sleep, she wakes in violence and peace at the same time—violence because her entire body pulses, aches with injuries that are all but healed, with phantom hurt that should no longer exist but feels solid all the same. Agony runs like lightning through her insides, traveling from her fingertips to deep inside her bones, sharp then dull, sudden then suffocating.

And peace, because she wakes to nothing behind her eyelids. There are no nightmares trapping her in cruel, looping scenarios. No flashbacks chaining her to a past painted in crimson hands and shattered breath. No voices whispering her name with poisoned tenderness, no shadows pressing her back into a blood stained floor.

There is nothing.

Still, Rumi wakes in a jolt—heart painfully thundering inside her chest, lungs heaving as she drags in air too fast, too shallow. She presses her lips together, teeth biting down hard as she tries to keep the pained hisses and broken gasps trapped inside her mouth, anything not to wake her soulmates.

The images that haunted her while she slept fade the second her eyes open, wide and unfocused and searching, the demonic tilt glowing faintly in the dark, exhausted. Pain lingers even when fear doesn’t, clinging to her nerves like an afterimage. She grips the blankets tighter, fingers trembling against the fabric as she desperately bites her lip.

Don’t cry.

Don’t make a sound.

Don’t move.

She’ll hear you.

Her patterns whisper it like a warning, poisoned words carried on a gentle wind against her soul —words of caution, of memory, of hurt learned too young and too deeply. Her skin prickles as if expecting hands that never come.

Rumi curls into herself, barely able to move more than an inch as her entire body locks up in pain, muscles pulling tight around old wounds, breath stuttering with every tiny shift.

Yet, it’s always the same thing. Because no matter how hard she tries to stay silent, to swallow her tears, her gasps, to freeze her body in place so she won’t wake the people she loves, she fails.

They always wake up. Be it Mira first, or Zoey, they always wake up.

The hand wrapped around her waist, usually Zoey’s, eases just a little as the woman reaches over to turn on the small lamplight. Not that they actually need it. Every time the half-demon wakes like this, her patterns are already flaring furiously beneath her skin, glowing in shades of fear and pain before Rumi can even register why, before she can remember the way Celine’s fingers burned her skin away while she watched, helpless.

Every time, Mira’s arms curl around Rumi’s body with such caution, such reverence, that it nearly destroys the barrier Rumi hastily builds to protect herself. She whispers soft words of love and warmth into the half-demon’s hair, grounding syllables pressed into purple strands, while Zoey draws delicate shapes onto her skin. Hesitant at first, because Rumi’s body still can’t always tell the difference between a touch of care and a touch of pain.

Then, slowly, it gets better.

It’s no longer just one finger tracing the markings of her skin, but Zoey’s palm, gently mapping every inch of Rumi’s body as if relearning her, as if reminding her nerves that this touch is safe, that it won’t hurt.

It’s no longer just Mira’s murmured words tucked into her hair, lips brushing against her head, but the steady rise and fall of her chest beneath Rumi’s cheek, arms tightening just enough to say I’ve got you without ever trapping her.

Until Rumi can breathe without feeling like she’ll shatter completely if she lets her guard down for even a single second. 

Until she can breathe without feeling like she’ll disappear into a world made only of pain and anguish if she doesn’t hold herself rigid.

Until she can realize that this is real, that this isn’t just some fleeting mercy her mind is granting her so she doesn’t lose herself to terror.

Not a moment suspended between memories of Celine’s fingers, Celine’s blades, Celine’s quiet fury staring her down with cold, emotionless eyes that catalogued every flinch, every breath, every sound she made.

Until Rumi presses her head against Mira’s chest and counts the woman’s heartbeat like a lifeline  just like Mira taught her the first time this happened, when Rumi couldn’t find her bearings and thought she might vanish if she stopped moving.

They are always there for her.

“Hey, Tigerina, we’ve got you.” Mira whispers against her skin when Rumi can barely speak at all, throat clamped shut with fear, voice drowned in dread and shame.

“You’re here with us, Ruru, it’s okay.” Zoey adds, lips ghosting gently against the back of Rumi’s shoulder as her fingers continue tracing slow, familiar shapes into the half-demon’s skin.

Rumi can barely keep her eyes focused on anything for too long, terrified she’ll see someone standing there—waiting, watching.

And as much as she tries to stop these nights of sleepless waking, she can’t. She can’t blank her thoughts into nothing and wait for a better night to come. Can’t clamp down on her memories and wish herself into at least one night where she doesn’t disturb her soulmates’ rest.

And even when she tries to pull away —tries to sleep alone, to drift off at different times, to take the couch or the floor or the chair or anywhere else so they can get a full night of sleep—they don’t let her.

Mira just stares at her, deadpan, while preparing breakfast like Rumi personally insulted her perfectly made morning eggs. Zoey all but stomps her foot into the ground like an angry rabbit at the idea, immediately launching into at least twenty-three different reasons why they won’t accept it.

“Penguins stick together, Rumi!”

“Yeah, but… we’re not penguins.”

“So?”

It’s always the same with different arguments, and Rumi doesn’t have the energy to keep trying, nor the heart to stay away from them for very long. So when she wakes in the middle of the night, when the fear coiled tight in her chest finally starts to loosen and the tremble in her hands begins to fade—

Rumi lets herself be held.

She shakily curls her fingers around Zoey’s hand and pulls her closer, not saying a word, only humming weakly in contentment as the younger woman presses against her injured back.

She wordlessly snuggles further into Mira’s chest, pressing her face into the woman’s warmth as she melts into the touch, with Mira gently tracing the edge of her earlobe, the curve of her jaw, the thin line of her lips.

Their breaths mingle into one, until Rumi can close her eyes again without fear of being dragged there again.

“I’m sorry.” she whispers, her voice barely audible in the gentle quiet of the room, as Mira’s hand starts softly threading through purple strands.

“You have nothing to apologize for.” Mira always answers, her voice barely louder than Rumi’s —ever since they learned how loud noises make it worse.

How Rumi wakes in pain and confusion and terror, and how a sudden sound can be the difference between grounding and spiraling—between breathing and falling headfirst into a pitless wheel of fear and agony she can’t escape.

Zoey just hums against her back, curling even closer with their legs tangled, bodies flush together (even though it hurts, Rumi doesn't say anything. She prefers pain and feeling them close, than pain and not having them around) and yet, she’s still careful.

Because as fast as Rumi heals, the wounds were just too much, the injuries were just too many.

The places where her skin had been torn apart are healing slowly, but healing nonetheless. Almost closed, but still leaving behind a trail of jagged skin and dark red scars, light white flesh— marks left where a quiet fury was once carved into her body. They are still there, wrapped around almost her entire form, a map she carries even when no one else can see it hidden beneath bandages and clothes.

The places where she had smashed against hard surfaces—as she dragged herself away from Celine, sobbing in her own blood, trying to escape with weak, barely standing legs, slipping and catching herself and falling again and again and again and ag— those places now only hold scarred flesh, still freshly bruised. 

Still, some wounds were deep, deeper than the rest.

If she trails her fingers down her face —down her forehead, her eyebrow, her eye, her cheek— she can trace them perfectly where stone met skin. She knows exactly where the injury started, where the gravel bit in, where the impact fractured something delicate, and where it finally ended.

The places where Celine had carved through with fury made lighting, with ire made thunder, are painful, overwhelmingly so. They heal, yes, but it's as if the honmoon itself dodges the injuries, not capable of healing what it itself did, even if against its will. 

Even her own body does not seem to know how to remedy what's been done to her flesh, as if it can’t understand the origin of the wound, the foreign, alien hurt embedded into her flesh, as though it can still feel that corrupted energy coiled somewhere deep within Rumi’s soul, lashing out in quiet, unseen pulses.

The chaotic, decayed energy that branded her skin in tones of tarnish and threads of impure crimson forced something unholy through jagged cracks of what had once been holy-and none, neither her body nor the Honmoon, knows what to do with it.

An injury that fractured not only her skin, but her patterns too? She's never been through something like this. Rumi has always been fundamentally broken, shattered, inside, but easy smiles and hollow laughter always covered up anything that might have slipped through.

Now, the broken patterns scattered across her skin mirror the fragmented, rotting pieces of her soul, and this—this is something she can no longer hide, no matter how hard she tries, no matter how tightly she holds herself together.

The scarred lightning paths along her skin do heal, but far more slowly than the rest of her body, dragging behind every other wound as if resisting closure, as if refusing to be forgotten. They bleed when her other injuries don’t, reopening without warning, stinging and aching and pulsing, as though something beneath the surface is still alive and pushing back. 

As if something hasn’t finished hurting her yet.

And, worst of all, is the injury at her side.

The place where a hunter’s blade pierced deep, cutting in with deliberate precision and making sure every single movement pulls at it, stretches it, and reminds her of its presence—each breath catching slightly, each shift of her body met with that quiet, persistent pain that never quite fades, no matter how many pills she takes.

It’s the only injury she doesn’t let them help her with—specifically, the only one she won’t let Zoey anywhere near. 

If she can’t handle it on her own, if the pain becomes too much or her hands tremble too badly, then it’s Mira she calls. Mira who helps her dress the wound, who steadies her when she has to clean it, who assists in the smallest, most necessary things—washing her hair, changing her clothes, guiding her through a shower as gently and as briefly as possible.

And this one, Rumi understands why it’s taking longer to heal—why it lingers, why it resists the same quiet recovery the rest of her body clings to. 

It’s because it was made with a hunter’s weapon. 

This, she's known since she was small. This, she’s had ingrained into her long before this moment, something learned through years and years of experience that have never once left her, no matter how much she might have wished they would.

She remembers all of it.

So, even though she's still bruised and hurt, when Zoey embraces her her arms don’t tighten around certain places. They never do. Zoey has mapped her injuries with her eyes closed, learned them without ever needing to be told, knows instinctively what to avoid without Rumi having to ask, to explain or flinch or pull away first.

And when Mira traces her fingers along her ear, her cheek, her lips, she knows too. She knows where the skin hasn’t healed quite right yet, where touch turns uncomfortable, where it makes Rumi’s skin crawl instead of warming beneath it. She adjusts without comment, without hesitation, as if it’s the most natural thing in the world.

They think of her when even she doesn’t think of herself.

They care for her when she can barely remember how to care for herself at all, when pain and exhaustion blur together and self-preservation feels like something meant for other people.

And Rumi is overwhelmingly, achingly grateful for it.

It’s only with their soft, steady words and with those careful, knowing touches that Rumi manages to let her body relax again, her breathing evening out as sleep slowly, finally, pulls her back under.

And even when she can’t go back to sleep, they stay awake with her.

No matter how many times she insists they don’t have to, no matter how often she tells them to go back to bed, that she’s going to be okay, that she’ll manage somehow—they still remain by her side, dragging their sleep-heavy limbs wherever Rumi limps to, whether it’s the couch to watch another episode of Centaurworld, or the kitchen where she fumbles her way through pouring a cup of water with trembling hands.

They make sure she isn’t alone, make sure she is always within reach of one of them, always held in the quiet safety of their presence. As if letting her slip too far (even for a moment) would mean losing something they wouldn’t be able to bear.

It takes her a while to truly understand why they’re doing this.

It isn’t only because she’s injured, and it isn’t only because she’s frail, fragile, or delicate in the way her body seems to betray her—it’s something deeper than that, something heavier that settles into the spaces between their words and their actions.

It’s because they need this too.

Rumi couldn't quite place the silent, determined look she sometimes catches in Mira’s eyes when she thinks Rumi isn’t paying attention, or the strange, almost pained glances Zoey lets linger on her when she believes the half-demon isn’t looking.

There’s no single moment that makes it clear to her, no sharp realization or dramatic shift, just a slow, quiet understanding that settles into place one morning as she limps toward the counter. Her hand gripping tightly onto the crutches as she moves, until her foot comes down wrong, the crutch slipping out of rhythm with her body.

For a split second, everything tilts.

Rumi starts to fall backwards—but Mira is there before she can even register the impact, hands already curled around her in a protective hold, pulling her close with wide eyes and face tight with concern. She checks her over once, then again, and again after that, hands hovering and returning, searching for injuries that aren’t there even as Rumi insists that she’s fine, that nothing happened, that she’s okay.

And that’s when it starts to settle into her. The reason they’re overprotective, the reason they’re always there no matter what, the reason she can barely move out of their sight for too long without one of them following close behind—It’s because they’re afraid.

Her heart whispers it to her, the realization edged in something jagged and tender all at once even though it’s something that should be obvious to her.

They’re scared of letting her go.

What hides behind Mira’s gaze isn’t just care or patience or quiet strength, it’s fear that Rumi can no longer ignore now that she sees it clearly. And Zoey’s glances, fleeting as they are, carry that same fragile weight.

So Rumi lets them care for her, in all their small, careful ways, in the touches that linger just a second longer than necessary and the presence that never quite fades, because she understands now that this isn’t something she can refuse without hurting them too.

They need this as much as she does—maybe even more, it seems.

So when Zoey jumps up from beside her, face gleaming, eyes wide and a goofy smile on her face and yells proudly "I HAVE AN IDEA!" Rumi only smiles, joy bursting through the broken parts of her soul as she hears the younger woman.

Therefore that’s how Rumi finds herself today. 

Face focused, a drop of sweat trailing down her forehead, her tongue caught between her slightly sharper-than-usual teeth, in complete concentration.

She can feel the air tense around her.

Can feel a pair of eyes on her back and the anticipation, the fear, the way her own hands tremble.

She feels the pain traveling up her entire left arm down to her fingers, a dull burn that flares sharper every time she tightens her grip on the bag, as she keeps going anyway.

The tension grows and grows and grows, coiling tight in her chest, until Rumi stops breathing altogether and her lungs start to burn from the lack of air —but she can’t stop now.

Not when she’s come this close. Not when she’s already here, this far.

So as her vision starts to blur even more than usual, the edges of everything softening and slipping just slightly out of focus again, as the ache behind her left eye deepens into something heavier that pulses in time with her heartbeat, as her fingers tremble harder now and the air in her throat turns thin and sour, difficult to swallow—the thought comes.

Give up.

Let it go, let it fall apart, let it be one more thing she couldn’t quite hold together—

But then—she finishes.

Her fingers uncurl from the icing bag almost all at once, her grip giving out as she finally inhales and the air drags into her lungs like something foreign she had forgotten how to feel properly until this exact moment.

Rumi looks down at what she’s done.

At the cupcake currently very badly covered in icing —messy, uneven, drooping a little down the sides, a chaotic swirl of orange and green mixing wildly in the middle.

She blinks, then glances at the other cupcakes she tried to decorate earlier, each one worse than the last.

One where her left hand trembled so badly she missed the cupcake entirely, icing splattering everywhere but where it was supposed to go.

Another where, a few tries later, she actually managed to get it centered, only for the whole thing to slowly collapse to the sides, now looking more like a tiny frosting volcano than anything else.

A few others she almost got right. Almost. She couldn’t quite control how much pressure she used on the bag, her left hand constantly flaring with pain and sharp, biting annoyance, her patterns reacting instinctively beneath her skin—too much icing, then not enough, then too much again.

And a few others… well. They’re best left unexamined.

But now…

“So?” Zoey asks from behind her, a few steps away, leaning against the counter.”How did it go?” 

Even without turning Rumi can tell she’s nervous, hearing it in the careful lightness of her voice, feeling it in the way she’s clearly trying not to hover. She knows Mira is right there too, just behind Zoey, pretending very badly not to stare.

How did it go?

Rumi looks down at her newest cupcake once more. Slowly, she sets the icing bag down on the counter, then swipes her good hand across her forehead, wiping away the sweat trailing down her face.

She gently gathers the cupcake into her bad hand, noticing how it doesn’t tremble as badly as it did before, how she can curl her fingers a little more than she could when they first started hours ago.  It’s not perfect and her hand still aches, but she did it.

She did this. It's hers.

Rumi doesn’t answer, instead, she turns around as quickly as she can. Cupcake balanced carefully in her bad hand, her other hand curling into a thumbs-up. She flashes the biggest smile she can muster, all fangs and soft exhaustion, eyes squeezing shut from how wide it is.

The joy on her chest glowing deep within her smile, mirroring in her patterns.

In front of her, Mira, dressed in a ridiculous kiss the cook outfit, an oversized apron dusted with flour and sugar, sleeves rolled up, hair messier than usual from leaning over bowls and trays, blinks once. Then twice.

Before throwing her hands up, fists clenched, face going dead serious for exactly half a second before she shouts triumphantly:

“LET’S GOOOO!”

Zoey jumps in place, hands clapping excitedly before she immediately starts doing the worst, most enthusiastic robot dance Rumi has ever seen, elbows jerking, shoulders popping, absolutely committing to it like her life depends on it.

The feeling of pride and joy in the half-demon’s chest swells so fast and so violently she almost feels like she’s going to explode, all because of this ugly, horrible cupcake, because it’s hers, because she made this.

Because her own, injured hands did this.

She limps forward excitedly, movement a little uneven with the crutch under her arm but fueled by pure adrenaline. Her soulmates meet her halfway, each wearing a blinding smile, eyes shining like she’s just accomplished something incredible (she did).

She eagerly holds the cupcake up between them, showing it off like a trophy.

And Rumi knows there are bad moments and there are good moments, knows that there are moments in between—somehow feel like both and none at the same time.

Now?

Now is a good moment.

Now she can look past the pain burning at her fingertips and start to see the beginning of skin healing beneath it, not the scar it will surely leave behind. She can see herself healing, inch by inch, instead of drowning in fear and memories.

When she failed to prepare the icing for at least twenty cupcakes, she managed to pull herself back from the edge of a very familiar, very painful cliff, where all she can see is how she fails at everything now.

How she fails at placing the icing because her left hand was left almost mangled by Celine’s cruelty—but now she only sees progress. She sees how her first cupcakes were horrible, and now this one is… less horrible.

How she fails at decorating because her arm and back hurt so much, pain ravaging the insides of her limbs as she bites her tongue hard to keep it trapped in her chest—but she also sees how she got better, how it took a few tries to get it slightly right, yes, but she did it anyway.

How she fails at helping Mira and Zoey with the heavier work (carrying trays, lifting bowls, moving things around) and the burning feeling of shame starts creeping up her spine, whispering that she’s useless now, that she’s broken, that she can’t do anything right— but now she can see how she’s getting better. How, a few days from now, she’ll be able to help them more and more, little by little, as her body catches up to her will.

She sees the good in herself, not just the damage.

So Rumi doesn’t focus on how ugly her cupcake looks or how messy the icing is.

She focuses on how she did it.

On how she managed this one stupid, small thing. On how, even as she failed over and over and over again, she tried again. And again. And again.

She tried.

And it may not be the best-looking cupcake in the world, but it’s hers. And that makes it perfect enough.

So she proudly presents it to her soulmates, a big, silly smile stretching across her face, all fangs and pride, hands curling around the cupcake as if it’s the most precious thing in the world.

(After her soulmates, of course.)

“Look,” she says softly, reaching her hands forward to present the ugly cupcake to Mira and Zoey. They shuffle closer without touching it at first, like it might be fragile or sacred somehow, both already smiling. “It’s so ugly.” Rumi laughs quietly, patterns reacting in a light shimmer almost golden, but not quite there yet. Like the sunlight within her soul is still deciding whether to break through the clouds.

Zoey coos immediately, leaning down to inspect it closer, eyes wide and gleaming as she takes in the messy, trembling icing barely holding its shape.

“Oh my god, it looks so cute!” She tilts her head, leaning in even more, utterly serious about it, while Rumi just stands there smiling awkwardly at her messy creation, pride and joy burning hot in her cheeks. “It’s like if a tiny disaster and a tiny miracle got all mashed together into one!” Zoey giggles, delighted.

“It's like if Frankenstein was a cupcake. It looks sick,” Mira says lowly, eyes fixed on the cupcake with a warmth that makes Rumi’s chest ache in a good way. “In both ways. I love it.” She shifts closer, gently pressing their shoulders together, and Rumi doesn’t flinch. Instead, she leans into it without thinking, without fear.

Now is a very, very good moment.

And there’s... a brief, trembling murmur under her breath, though she hasn’t spoken. It curls through her chest like a secret, instinctive.

For a moment, she feels… held by it. Then it slips away, leaving only the echo of something she can’t name.

Not yet, it says.

“Can I?” Zoey points at the cupcake, looking up at Rumi with a silly, hopeful smile.

Rumi nods eagerly, not trusting her own voice to stay steady with the burning joy bursting in her chest. The thought from before fades away with that sensation.

Zoey carefully lifts the cupcake and moves aside, placing it with the rest of them—a chaotic mix of Rumi’s barely-standing ones and Mira’s and Zoey’s more confident attempts. A bunch of randomly colored, unevenly decorated cupcakes, all different sizes, icing spilling and swirled in every direction, imperfect and ridiculous and very, very comical.

Zoey places the half-demon’s cupcake right at the center.

Its messy icing stands proudly beside Mira’s flawless one and Zoey’s brightly covered, explosively decorated masterpiece. 

Rumi puffs out her chest, right hand settling on her hips, eyes glinting as her patterns reflect the joy blooming inside her—almost all of the patterns, anyway. Not the ones that had been shattered by Celine’s fingers, broken and scarred and still quiet beneath her skin.

No.

Today is a good day.

Rumi can’t help the smile pulling at her lips, even if it tugs at still-healing skin and sends a dull, lingering ache across her face—it doesn’t matter, not right now, not when the feeling in her chest outweighs it so easily.

Zoey suddenly grabs Mira by the shoulders, completely uncaring that her hands are still covered in streaks of icing and powder, smearing color across Mira’s shirt as she shakes her lightly, practically vibrating with energy.

“I’m so excited! Aaaahhh!! It’s been so long since we did this I honestly forgot what it felt like!” she exclaims, bouncing on her toes before dramatically pushing herself off Mira and leaning against the wall like she’s just returned from a life-threatening quest.

“The sheer feeling of adventure burning in my heart as the challenge of making the perfect cupcake arrives!” she continues, throwing a hand over her chest. “The thrill, the danger, the mermaids in the water trying to lure us deep, deep, deep down so we never complete our task—!”

Rumi nods along, completely serious. “Yeah, that was harsh. There was a redhead siren that almost pulled me under, trying to steal my perfectly made cupcake…” Her eyes narrow slightly as she glances at Mira, taking her in with clear suspicion.

“Oh yeah??” Mira shoots back immediately, catching on without hesitation. “I’m pretty sure one of them wrapped their tail around my leg just to make my cupcake fall a few times. A very long purple tail that looked suspiciously like someone’s braid.”

Zoey pauses mid-theatrics, turning to Rumi with wide, betrayed eyes.

“You can do that??”

“What—no. No!” Rumi shakes her head quickly, caught off guard.

“What do you mean you can’t control your braid like a tail? That’d be amazing, oh my god—think of the possibilities—” Zoey doesn't get to finish.

Because Rumi’s cupcake, her own beautiful, very ugly creation, starts to slowly tilt to the side, the icing giving in first, slipping just enough to make it clear it’s about to collapse.

Zoey notices immediately, a  pained grin spreading across her face.

“Okay. We should eat it before it collapses.”

“Hey.” Rumi protests weakly.

The first bite is…questionable.

Rumi’s face scrunches almost instantly, her nose wrinkling as she chews carefully.She’s trying very, very hard to give it a fair chance.

“Uh… I think I’d like to go back to soup.” she says after swallowing, her tone thoughtful in the worst way possible.

And Zoey gasps like she’s been personally attacked, hand flying to her chest, while Mira snorts so suddenly a small piece of cupcake nearly escapes her mouth as she curls forward, barely holding it together.

“Excuse you, this is art.”

“This is sugar having an identity crisis.” Mira shoots back, grabbing a napkin and spitting the rest of the cupcake into it without hesitation, eyeing the remains like it might actually be dangerous before looking back up at the smaller woman.

“Don’t look at me!” Zoey immediately raises her arm and points straight at Rumi’s face. “She’s the one that made this cupcake!”

Rumi almost falls off her chair at the audacity, scrambling to grab her crutch from where it was resting before lightly—lightly—smacking Zoey’s leg with it.

“You— I only decorated it! You made the whole thing! You and your TikTok recipes!”

Zoey lets out a small, breathy giggle as she tries to drag her chair back, just out of reach of the crutch.

“Hey—”

“What did you even put in this?” Mira interrupts, already halfway to the sink as she wipes her tongue with the napkin before immediately rinsing her mouth out, visibly horrified. “God, this is—this is like if a chemical weapon was turned into a cupcake or something.”

Zoey hesitates just long enough to make that statement significantly more concerning.

“…creativity?”

Mira snorts again, shaking her head as she gestures vaguely toward the table, where Zoey’s cupcakes sit in various stages of chaos, each one more aggressively decorated than the last.

“Yeah, I know you put creativity, I can literally see that,” she says, waving a hand at the explosion of color and questionable decisions. “But I’m talking about the actual ingredients, because trust me, I’ve made a lot of bad cupcakes in my life—but this?” she points directly at Rumi’s abandoned cupcake, still slowly collapsing in on itself, “this isn’t bad. This is worse. Like—much, much worse.”

Rumi glances back at Zoey, her expression softening just slightly as she pats her shoulder in something almost sympathetic.

“Ah, Mira, it wasn’t that bad,” she says gently. “Maybe it was just this one cupcake.”

It was, in fact, not just this one cupcake.

Seven cupcakes later, Rumi cannot take it anymore.

She’s standing by the sink, rinsing her mouth over and over again while desperately chasing it with a glass of juice, leaning just a bit too heavily on her crutch as she tries to recover.

“Oh my god,” she groans between rinses, “it was not just that cupcake.”

Mira hums in agreement from where she’s now crouched beside the trash can, spitting out another aggressively colored piece with zero shame.

“You know what?” she mutters, wiping her mouth again. “I think I prefer soup too.”

And the silence that envelops the room feels heavy with…guilt?

Slowly, both of them lift their heads., looking back at Zoey.

“There may have been,” Zoey starts, already taking a step back, “a slight overestimation of how much vanilla is too much vanilla.”

“Zoey.” Mira warns from beside the trash can.

“And possibly some experimental layering.” zoey takes another step back

“Zoey.” Rumi echoes, already reaching for her crutch again and holding it just a little too much like a weapon.

“And maybe—hypothetically—I used salt instead of sugar at one point, but I fixed it, so—”

There's a pause as they take her words in. A beat as the meaning settles. Eyes widening in slow, horrified understanding and—

“SALT?” Mira yelps, throwing her hands in the air. “YOU PUT SALT IN THE CUPCAKES?”

Zoey winces, shoulders hunching slightly as she offers them a very small, very guilty smile.

“In my defense,” she starts, already backing away another step, “they look exactly the same—”

“Zoey.”

“And I was under pressure—”

“Zoey.”

“And—okay, in hindsight, maybe tasting the batter before baking it would’ve been—”

“ZOEY.”

Mira lunges in Zoey’s direction, who yelps and dodges with a laugh, nearly tripping over one of the chairs as she retreats further into the kitchen.

“IT WAS AN HONEST MISTAKE—” Zoey protests between giggles, raising her arms like that will somehow protect her. “A VERY CONFIDENT, VERY COMMITTED HONEST MISTAKE—”

“You poisoned us!” Mira accuses, pointing at her from beside the table Zoey is currently using as defence, still half-laughing despite herself. “You looked at a cupcake and said, ‘you know what this needs? Sodium.’”

“I fixed it!” Zoey insists again, even as she keeps backing away, her grin breaking through her guilt. “I added extra sugar after, for balance! Flavor complexity and all that!”

“That is not how that works!” Rumi shoots back, leaning heavily on her crutch as her stomach rumbles, breathless and laughing despite the lingering horror. “That’s not balance, that’s, I don't know—you confused the cupcake!”

“It’s emotionally layered!” Zoey argues, gesturing wildly.

“It’s emotionally distressing with an explosion of sodium.” Mira corrects.

“Dude, just so you know, there are cupcakes made with salt, okay?” Zoey shoots back immediately, pointing an accusing finger at Mira while dodging away as the other woman lunges at her again, still very much ready to fight for justice.

“Well this is not fucking one of them, I swear to god, if this triggers my IBS I’m—”

Today’s a good day, Rumi thinks amusedly, watching the two of them wrestle each other across the kitchen, bumping into chairs and nearly knocking the table sideways as their movements grow more dramatic and uncoordinated. The remaining forty-seven cupcakes wobbling dangerously with every hit and shove.

There’s something warm in her chest as she watches it, something gentle and stable that settles deeper the longer she stands there, her grip loosening on the crutch as laughter lingers at the edge of her lips, as the chaos unfolds in front of her in the 'safest' way possible.

Once more, their chaos almost turns the table over, taking along the cupcakes with it.

Wait—

“Uh, guys?” Rumi interrupts, her voice cutting through the chaos just enough to make them pause mid-scuffle. “What are we going to do with the remaining forty-seven cupcakes?”

Zoey and Mira both go still, eyes drifting slowly toward the tray like they’re only now realizing the scale of the problem, the aftermath of their very questionable decisions settling in all at once.

"Fuck."

Rumi keeps these memories close to her chest, tucked deep, deep within a fragile soul that has already endured far too much. She keeps it by her heart, holding onto them with something that borders on reverence as if they are delicate and sacred all at once, as if they are the only things she can truly trust not to slip through her fingers when everything else does.

She keeps them in her soul, guarding them carefully because she knows—she knows—the power a memory holds.

How it can lift you up in one second, only to tear you down in the next.

Memories are power.

Rumi knows that, she’s always known.

She spent her whole life haunted by the mere suggestion of cold fingers brushing against her skin, even when the woman herself wasn’t there. And that alone was enough to make every vivid, crimson-soaked memory break through whatever weak defenses she had managed to build at the time, crumbling them like they were never meant to last.

After all, nothing is meant to last beneath Celine’s gaze, not even her.

That’s why she treats moments like these so carefully. Quietly admiring them within herself, turning them over in her mind, holding onto every detail like it might disappear if she loosens her grip even slightly. 

Almost pleading, desperately, for more, for something that can fill the empty spaces where pain carved its way through her when she could barely move.

So when a good moment comes, when a good moment comes—Rumi tries to hold onto it with everything she has.

But not every moment is a good moment.

There are days that the memories she desperately seeks to force out of her mind, to bury, to lock away, to push out of reach—force themselves into her life, and she can't do anything about it

There are bad moments too, in which Rumi can’t really tell the difference between a hand that offers safety and one that forces cruelty —and she tries, she tries with all the remaining might she has left, with the weak grip she still has on herself, to turn those days around before they swallow her whole.

She grips the cold handle of her door just a bit tighter, wishing the cold could seep into her bones and banish the phantom hands away, wishing it could anchor her here, now, instead of there, then.

She holds the chopsticks just a bit stronger until her knuckles whiten, wishing the pressure could push away that phantom feeling on her side that ignites every time she moves—where Celine had—

She looks away from Mira’s concerned gaze, from Zoey’s soft eyes, because she can’t quite understand how they can look at her and see something that resembles love, something beautiful, when she herself hasn’t been able to look in the mirror since Celine.

Since Celine.

Since she ran away from Celine on weak legs and an even weaker body, bloodless, courage-less, desperate—limping away in terror, with Zoey’s bloodied shin-kal almost slipping from her grip as Celine—

And Rumi freezes.

Alone in the kitchen, holding a knife she was doing her best to clean.

A knife that snaps her back to that moment—to running from Celine while thinking this is it, while thinking these were her last moments.

For a split second, Rumi isn’t holding a kitchen knife. She isn’t standing in her kitchen, in her house, wrapped in the quiet safety of her soulmates’ presence.

No.

She’s there.

With a knife that's not a knife at all, but a blade.

A so, so familiar blade.

Sprawled on the ground, unable to move as Celine grips the handle tighter and tighter, pushing the blade down and down and down—and all Rumi can do is scream, choke, gag on her own blood, because this is it, isn’t it? She’s going to die—

The knife blade slips from her hand and clatters into the sink.

And Rumi can’t breathe.

Something burns through her lungs suffocating her every breath, like the air itself has turned against her as she leans over the counter, hands shaking so hard it feels like her bones can’t hold themselves together. Like there’s an earthquake within her soul.

She can’t see—her vision blurring more and more and more until even her own hands disappear in front of her.

She can’t feel her hands against the marble anymore—and this time it has nothing to do with the scars, nothing to do with nerves that never healed right—she just… can’t feel them, can’t feel anything as her knees give out and hit the ground. Her head dropping forward until it rests against the cabinet while her breath comes in broken, uneven pulls, chest heaving as she curls into herself.

She doesn’t hear Zoey approaching, doesn’t register the sound of her voice or the urgency in it as she gets closer to the barely breathing half-demon.

But she feels it when Zoey touches her shoulder—and Rumi pulls away so fast that she ends up falling on her back, her skin flaring in pain as she desperately pushes herself into a corner, trying to get away, trying to get space, trying to make it stop.

Stop, stop, stop stopstop.

Because one bad moment—even on a day that isn’t good or bad, just something in between—can still be enough to bring everything crashing down, to unravel her completely, to become Rumi’s downfall in a way that feels inevitable the second it starts.

Like now.

Zoey stays by her side, gently coaxing her with a voice that’s barely a whisper, soft and threaded with patient—but it still makes Rumi flinch, still sends fear racing up her spine in a violent, devastating rush.

Because her mind twists it into something else, something wrong yet familiar in the worst way. Screaming that that is not Zoey’s voice, that it’s Celine’s, that she’s still there and she never left. That Rumi still there, with Death’s hand loosely wrapped around her wrist as Celine—

The patterns on her neck burst to life, weak as they are, coiling beneath her skin in a sharp, dangerous warning, flickering with a uneven glow that feels more like panic than power. The sheer terror ricocheting through her body drowns everything else out, distorts her senses and forces even her markings to misread what’s in front of her, to believe that the person beside her is not Zoey (her soulmate, her safe place) but Celine, her tormentor her body still hasn’t learned to forget (and never will).

So between pained gasps and breathless winces, Rumi’s words are swallowed before they can exist, pressed down by the brutal, suffocating gentleness of her own patterns.

Don’t speak, they beg. She’ll hear you.

So Rumi doesn’t speak. She lets the silence take her, lets it close in tight and painfully around her neck and the patterns force her into stillness. Into shrinking, into cowering from eyes that will never find her again—and yet feel like they already have.

She doesn’t know how long Zoey stays with her, doesn’t know how long she remains curled into herself in that cold kitchen corner, the floor hard beneath her, the air too thin in her lungs—all because of a fucking knife she was cleaning.

She doesn’t let Zoey touch her even when she opens her eyes and sees wood from her house instead of blood-stained stone. Even when reality tries, gently, to reassemble itself around her.

She doesn’t let Zoey touch her as she sobs into her own arms, shoulders shaking, fingers digging into fabric and skin and patterns flaring weakly along the lingering terror in her chest, along the trembling that won’t leave her muscles. 

Because some part of her is still waiting for everything to turn again, to snap back into something worse. Because some part of her is terrified that if Zoey gets too close, she’ll disappear and be replaced with something else.

Someone else.

Still, Zoey stays by her side—as she chokes down sobs, as she forces down her tears, as she tries, desperately, to hold herself together, to keep herself from splintering apart piece by piece. Zoey stays.

Until the light outside slowly fades and the room dims with it, until the sky turns dark in a quiet, gradual way that Rumi barely notices. Time stretches thin and meaningless around her.

Zoey stays, keeping just enough distance to not overwhelm her, just sitting beside her on the cold floor as she fills the space with soft, steady words. Reciting fact after fact about different kinds of marine animals, her voice is the only constant Rumi can hold onto. 

Rumi will have to ask her to repeat every single word when this is over, when she can actually hear and process them, understand what Zoey is saying—because right now, the words reach her but don’t land, slipping past her like water through open hands.

“I’m sorry.”

She forces the words out of her throat, dragging them painfully through the barrier her own patterns built inside her. Shame starts to burn in her chest, shame of losing control like this, of unraveling in front of Zoey.

Of being seen like this.

And Mira, too—the woman may not be here in the room with them, not anywhere Rumi can see, but she can still smell her nearby, her familiarity threaded into the air. She can smell the concern and fear and the quiet worry clinging to it. Zoey must have told her to stay away, must have kept her at a distance because Rumi was already too overwhelmed, already stretched too thin to handle anything more. And even like this, even through everything, the thought settles somewhere deep in her chest, conflicted.

And of course, Zoey doesn’t miss a beat as she answers.

“Nothing to be ashamed of,” she says softly. A small, almost silly grin blooms across her face “My little starfish.”

And even though Rumi’s hands are still shaking, even though her face is damp with tears and her breathing hasn’t quite steadied and her skin still crawls with the phantom memory of blood that isn’t there anymore and hands that no longer exist—

Rumi smiles.

“I’m taller than you.” she mutters back, her voice quiet and rough but steadier than before. Tilting her head just slightly toward Zoey, her mind echoes the same conversation from days ago, the one she kept tucked carefully inside her chest.

Zoey just shrugs, that same victorious smile settling in, softer and edged with relief, something warm flickering in her eyes as she looks at her.

“My big starfish, then.”

Rumi smiles, a small, uneven thing, wincing as she tries to bring her feet closer to her chest, her body still stiff and slow to obey her (still pained, still aching). Zoey notices, of course she does—and though her face remains wrapped in a softness Rumi once thought she’d never deserve, her words carry that same quiet concern Rumi is still learning how to hold without flinching away from it. She still thinks she’s not worthy of such attention.

“Did something happen to cause this reaction?” Zoey asks gently, settling more comfortably beside her and resting her head against her own knee as she watches the half-demon carefully.

The knife clattered against the sink, barely clean—because when Rumi blinked, it wasn’t a knife at all, but a hunter’s blade, slick with her own blood.

A knife that's not a knife, but a blade.

Zoey’s blade.

“I was cleaning the dishes.” Her gaze drops to her left hand, carefully hidden between her legs and her stomach. Still wrapped in bandages that swallow most of the damage, twitching now and then, refusing to follow even the simplest command. “I—uh, I was trying to clean the dishes. I grabbed the knife and I— it just—”

The words tangle, collapse in on themselves as fear coils tight around her chest again, almost as suffocating as the shame burning through her ribs.

“’twas stupid, really. I shouldn’t have reacted like that.”

Zoey hums quietly beside her, shifting her head as she turns the words over, considering them in a way that feels patient instead of dismissive.

“If I had a panic attack over something ‘small’, would you say it was just me being stupid?”  she asks softly.

Rumi looks away immediately, her eyes refusing to even glance toward her injured—branded, mangled, fragmented—fingers. She squeezes her eyes shut instead, her heart still racing unevenly in her chest.

“No,” she answers, just as small as she feels, the word slipping out before she can stop it. Tears spill over again, and clenching her jaw does nothing to stop the trembling in her lips as she adds, “of course not.”

Zoey hums again, quiet.

“Then this isn’t stupid either, okay?”

Rumi doesn’t answer. She can’t.

She’s too busy trying to force the sobs back down, trying to keep them from breaking through her clenched teeth, from spilling out and taking everything else with them. Her patterns shift beneath her skin, restless and reactive, pulling against still-injured patches, stretching something that isn’t ready to stretch.

It hurts.

She’s so tired of this.

“Rumi?”

Rumi shakes her head sharply, a hiccup slipping past the invisible muzzle she’s forced over her own voice. She brings her good hand up to cover her mouth, pressing hard like she can physically keep the sound in.

She can’t—she can’t force this down.

Why? Why?

She’s always taken care of herself. Alone.

Always alone, completely devoid of help, of anyone stepping in, of anyone seeing—and now she can’t even fucking wash the dishes anymore.

“Do you need anything? Is there… is there anything I can do to help?” Zoey asks, and there’s something tighter in her voice now, a growing urgency she’s trying to keep soft, trying not to let it overwhelm Rumi any further.

Rumi flinches anyway, shrinking deeper into the corner until her shoulder presses harder against the cabinet behind her.

“C-can you— uh, repeat?” she forces through tears, prying her eyes open just enough to look at Zoey, her gaze unsteady and almost afraid to land anywhere for too long. She tries to ignore how her vision refuses to settle, how her left eye won’t properly focus on anything, making everything blur and double and sting, a constant throb building behind it that only makes the tears worse.

“Repeat?” Zoey echoes, uncertain but clearly trying to understand, her own eyes beginning to water at the sight of the trembling half-demon in front of her.

“Th-the, uh… you were— the animals.” The half-demon manages, the words catching and breaking as they come out, embarrassment threading through every sillable.

Fortunately, Zoey understands almost instantly.

“Oh—yeah! Of course!” she perks up, something bright and eager slipping into her voice like she’s been handed something she knows how to do right. “Can I scooch closer?” she asks, gesturing lightly to the empty, cold space beside Rumi.

Shame flares hot in Rumi’s chest, almost suffocating, and she shakes her head.

No.

She can’t—she can’t take that right now.

She knows, God, she knows Zoey would never hurt her, will never hurt her, but right now fear speaks louder than that solid safety shining faintly in her chest, drowning it out completely as it wails and ricochets and coils in shaken, uneven gasps, waiting to lash out at the mere inconvenience of being challenged.

Thankfully, Zoey doesn’t seem the slightest bit upset about Rumi’s denial and instead settles down where she is, easing into the space without hesitation. Dark strands of hair fall onto the floor as Zoey lies down completely, leaning her feet against the counter above them.

“So,” her voice is light and casual, like they’re just picking things up again. “I know I’ve been telling you all about starfish these last few days and all that, but my latest obsession isssss…” she drags it out, lifting both hands above her head and wiggling them dramatically, fingers spreading and curling in exaggerated motions, “octopuses!”

Breathing in through another shaky sob, her hand almost flinches away from her face when one of her fingers brushes against a jagged patch of healing skin on her cheek, the texture unfamiliar and wrong under her touch.

“Tell me, ruru. What do you know about octopuses?”

“N-nothing,” she admits, voice small, a little hoarse.

“Nothing? No, I don’t believe that. C’mon, anything at all, you can tell me,” The smile Zoey gives is bright, like this is the most natural thing in the world. “I swear on my pinky—on both my pinkies—” both fingers are in the air, and the woman smiles brightly at them, “—that I won’t judge.”

Okay. Rumi can do that.

“I— they have e-eight legs?”

“Okay, see? You’re already better than half the population. Most people say they have eight tentacles because, you know, their limbs kinda look like tentacles, right?” Zoey spreads out her limbs on top of herself, moving them so weirdly that the fear in Rumi’s chest pauses for just a second, caught off guard, almost amused.

“Octopuses were named after their eight limbs, and you were thiiissss close to getting it right. They’re not legs—” her legs slump back against the counter, and her arms even more weirdly than before, elbows bending in strange, awkward angles, “—they’re arms! And it’s, like, super normal to confuse those things, you know? Tentacles and arms look alike—”

She pulls her arms back in, a pause shifting in the air.

“Well, not our arms. Their arms look alike. Look like tentacles. Their arms look like tentacles… Anyway! They behave very differently, you know?”

Rumi does not know. But she nods along anyway, silently hearing every word that leaves Zoey’s mouth as if she’s holding onto a lifeline, clinging to it with everything she has left.

Her choked sobs and hiccups have almost disappeared, leaving only uneven breaths. With shaky fingers, she swipes the remaining tears from her face, grounding herself in the motion and focusing all her fragile attention back on Zoey.

To Zoey, not to Zoey’s blade.

To Zoey’s fingers wiggling in a weird way, not to Zoey’s blade.

To Zoey.

“Tentacles usually shoot out to catch prey with those little sucker thingies at the end, but arms? They have suckers aaaall the way through.” Zoey continues, her voice filling the space easily. “And our eight-armed friends use them to sense everything around them, like what I told you about the starfishes, remember?”

“Y-yes,” The words slip out before she can stop it, holding onto Zoey’s soft smile as the other woman looks up at her in surprise at the quick response, her eyes softening even more at how delicate the half-demon looks right now.

“Yeah, it’s basically the same thing. They look for food and walk and, you know, poke things too…” Her wrists almost smack together as she brings them closer, hiding her thumbs and sticking her other fingers out as she shows it to Rumi, completely focused on making each finger move differently—which, of course, doesn’t work at all. “They’re all multipurpose tools. They do have preferred arms, buuuut, well, they all do, uh—everything.”

Zoey staggers a little, wincing in concentration as her fingers stubbornly refuse to move the way she wants them to.

“Wait, hold up. Lemme just— I’m almost—” her fingers almost, aaaalmost reach whatever position Zoey is aiming for (Rumi has absolutely no idea what her soulmate is trying to do), then— “aaand… here we go!”

And her hands… nope, do not look like an octopus at all.

Rumi sniffles, a broken sob slipping out that twists into a small, shaky laugh at the sight, barely even paying attention to the numbing pain in her body as it pulses under her skin.

She really shouldn’t have fallen the way she did. Her side burns relentlessly, the threads of lightning branded into her skin burning in sharp, flickering pulses that make her breath hitch if she focuses too hard on them—

“So, Rumi, my big starfish,” Zoey says, undeterred, her voice warm and steady like an anchor, “tell me. Have you ever heard of the hairy octopus?”

What?

“…no?”

Zoey’s smile widens impossibly more.

“Perfect! So…”

And just like that, she launches into it.

Into a very serious, very detailed explanation about hairy octopuses—where they live, why they’re called that (even if the answer keeps changing halfway through), how they may or may not have tiny little personalities and dramatic lives beneath the ocean, how they absolutely would win in a fight against at least three other sea creatures Zoey is very clearly making up on the spot.

Her voice fills the space easily, naturally, not forcing anything and never asking for anything back—just offering something steady and safe for Rumi to hold onto while her breathing slowly evens out, while the razor edges of panic begin to dull into something manageable.

And maybe—maybe that’s how it works.

Just like good moments can turn into something somber without warning,folding in on themselves before she can even realize what’s happening, and not-so-good moments can spiral into something disastrous, all-consuming… Maybe not-good moments can turn into something light, after all.

“TODAY IS A MOTHERFUCKING GOOD DAY!”

Zoey screams, money flying in the air like confetti, bills fluttering down around her while Mira drops to the ground with an exasperated groan, throwing her arms over her face like she’s been personally victimized.

“Oh my God, can you stop showing off? I am in fucking debt over here!” Mira glares at the ceiling like it personally offended her existence, while Zoey just keeps dancing a very bad imitation of the robot, over and over again, completely unbothered. “I have four kids to feed, and two of them are going to college, and I HAVE NO MONEY, and you’re there! Being the worst possible girlfriend and letting me drown in debt!” she yells, fist clenching in the air, hands shaking with dramatic fury.

Zoey just shrugs.

“Not my fault you don’t know financial education—”

“You little shi—”

“ALSO! Here, I am not your girlfriend.” Zoey cuts in, pointing at herself like she’s making a formal announcement, “I’m just a neighbor that’s very competitive about, well, life.”

Mira sits back up so fast all her hair falls over her face, completely obscuring her expression except for the faint, terrifying glint of eyes that know no peace—only debt.

“Are you breaking up with me to stay with this piece of shit??” she snarls.

Zoey, completely unfazed, just sits back and starts counting the money in her hands like it’s just another normal day in rich-ass Zoey’s life.

“He’s not a piece of shit.”

Mira grabs the small blue car from the board and shoves it into Zoey’s face, aggressively pointing at the tiny plastic man sitting comfortably in the passenger seat.

“You’re right. He’s not a piece of shit. He’s a piece of plastic. A piece of plastic that’s making not only one of my girlfriends break up with me, but also leave me buried in debt!”

Zoey just blinks, calmly collecting the money from the floor as if there isn’t a very dangerous Mira right next to her and one wrong move could collapse the entire situation.

“Well,” she says, casual as ever, “it’s not my fault you decided to have four children with no financial plan on how to take care of them.”

Mira blinks slowly.

“You—” she starts, then hastily slams the little car back onto the board, making it tremble under the force of her fury.

“‘Congratulations! You’re a grandpa.’ I’m a grandpa,” Rumi suddenly announces from her nest of pillows, completely out of nowhere.

She’s perched in the pile Mira had carefully prepared for her, buried almost head to toe in blankets and holding the card way too close to her face as her eyes furrow in concentration—her left eye aching, blurring the letters just enough to make her squint as she reads out loud.

“Well, I think I’ve beat you, Mi. Not only am I in debt because of my three children going to college, but I’ve also become a grandpa.”

“Oh my God, you girls suck at this game,” Zoey laughs, spinning her turn and walking the required steps across the board. She stops, grinning. “Aha! Paycheck day!! Mimi, give me my money right nowwww, I order you!”

Mira groans, aggressively gathering fake bills from the plastic bank and practically throwing them at Zoey’s face.

“Fuck you and all your money. And just so you know, we don’t suck at this game, we just fucking have horrible luck.”

“Yeah, yeah, sure,” Zoey says, waving her hand dismissively as she gathers her winnings. “You’re just jealous I’m getting richer by the second while you’re still, well, super poor and in a heavy load of debt.”

Mira throws a pillow at her.

Zoey laughs manically and dodges, nearly launching herself straight into Mira’s lap as she scrambles closer.

“Hey, hey, hey, don’t be like that! I can be something for you I’m pretty sure you’ve always dreamed about.”

Mira wraps an arm loosely around Zoey’s body while spinning her turn, unimpressed, even as Zoey nudges into her shoulder.

“Oh yeah? And what’s that?”

A delvish grin appears on Zoey's face.

“Your sugar mommy.”

Rumi chokes, immediately spluttering out the water she was drinking, coughing as Mira freezes mid-motion, her head snapping toward Zoey.

“You— you—” Her words barely comes out, face flaring red as she looks down at the smaller woman. “You’re playing with fire.”

“Aw, but am I, though?” Zoey muses, already pushing herself away just as Mira suddenly lunges for her. “Hey—hey—hey, what’s that about? It’s not my fault your fire looks like a tiny, itty-bitty ember, like Calcifer.”

Mira points a finger straight at Zoey’s face.

“You rich bitch, how dare you—”

“‘Congratulations, you’re a grandpa.’ Oh, come on, again?” Rumi groans, letting her head fall back into the mountain of blankets. “Now I’m a grandpa twice. I’m a two-times grandpa. Grandpa squared. God, I don’t have money for this! My children are barely out of college, they can’t support themselves yet! I’m gonna have to do it for their kids too?”

“Rums, babe, you should’ve had the talk with them before letting them out into the wild.”

Mira immediately shoves Zoey, sending her tumbling sideways into another pile of blankets.

“Rumi, don’t listen to a single word this rich-ass hag has to say—”

“Hag?? Damn, that’s low.” Zoey says, propping herself up on her elbows and spinning her turn again with her foot.

“I’m sure you were a great dad to your kids and had the talk with them, responsibly. It’s not your fault they didn’t want to listen.” Mira leans over the board, over Zoey’s foot as it messily drags her piece closer to success, and gently cups Rumi’s jaw, looking straight into her mismatched eyes with full, unwavering seriousness. “You were a great dad, Rumi.”

Rumi nods, just as serious.

“And you’ll be a great grandpa too!”

“Mimi, your turn.” Zoey says, poking Mira’s side with her foot.

“Argh—leave me alone, you rich-ass worm!” Mira groans, spinning her turn and immediately grabbing her hair when she lands on another 'pay to live' spot. “Fuck! More debt?? Who the fuck made this game? Who the fuck made us play this game??”

“Zoey did.” Rumi mumbles, spinning her turn as Mira launches herself at the smaller woman again, the sound of Zoey’s laughter as she tries to dodge filling the room.

Rumi smiles softly, gathering her car and moving it along the path, picking up another card.

Her face falls the second she reads it.

“‘Congratulations, you’ve become a grandpa.’ Oh, come on, again? I’m grandpa three times now??”

Both Zoey and Mira freeze mid-chaos, turning to look at her with wide, disbelieving eyes. And if Zoey wasn’t laughing before, she definitely is now.

She bursts into laughter, curling into herself, one hand clutching her stomach while the other wipes tears from her face, completely losing it.

Rumi stares down at the card like it personally betrayed her, shoulders slumping deeper into the blankets.

“God, why cant my kids just stop having sex? Or, at least, use protection?? so irresponsible...”

Zoey is still laughing, fully gone now, half-curled on the floor with her legs kicking lightly against the ground.

“Damn girl” Mira blinks, voice breaking between laughs. “At this rate you’re gonna unlock great-grandpa by the next round—”

“Don’t,” Rumi says flatly, pointing a weak finger at her. “Don’t even put that into the universe. I don't even have enough space in the car for all of them, dammit.”

Zoey can barely lift herself up, swiping away the tears as she still giggles here and there. Mira, meanwhile, has gone eerily quiet, which is never a good sign.

Zoey doesn’t notice at first, reaching for the wheel to spin it again when-

“Hey, Zoey.” Mira says sweetly.

Zoey pauses mid-laugh, immediately suspicious, squinting up at her. “...yeah?”

Mira smiles.

“So,” she starts casually, spinning a card between her fingers like she’s not about to commit something morally questionable, “about that whole sugar mommy thing…”

Zoey snorts. “Oh, are you finally accepting your fate? Took you long enough.”

Mira hums, tilting her head. “Oh no, no, I’ve been thinking.”

That’s worse.

“That’s never good,” Zoey mutters, slowly pushing herself away from Mira.

Rumi, from her blanket fortress, leans forward just a little, eyes narrowing with quiet interest, already knowing where Mira is going with this. The card is placed down on the board with exaggerated care.

“Well, if you’re the sugar mommy… that means you’re financially responsible for me, right?”

Zoey blinks. “What? No—”

“And,” Mira keeps going, talking over her like she didn’t even hear the interruption, “as your dependent—emotionally, spiritually, and now financially—I think it’s only fair that you start covering my expenses.”

Zoey sits up fully now. “Absolutely not.”

Mira grabs a handful of fake money from Zoey’s pile.

“—HEY.”

“This,” Mira says, holding the bills up like evidence in court, “is for groceries.”

“That is NOT for groceries, that is MY HARD-EARNED—”

Mira grabs more.

“—this is rent.”

“YOU LIVE IN A PLASTIC CAR—”

“And this,” Mira adds, taking even more money and tucking it into her hands with zero shame, “is emotional compensation for the distress you caused me earlier.”

Zoey lunges and Mira immediately scrambles back, cackling as she shields her stolen money with her body.

“Rumi, tell her!” Zoey yells, pointing accusingly. “Tell her that’s not how sugar mommies work!”

Rumi, who is now fully invested, slowly pulls her blanket up like she’s settling in for a show, wincing slightly as the skin on her back pulls tight in protest before she relaxes into the pillows again.

“I don’t know,” she says thoughtfully, watching them with quiet interest. “Sounds right to me.”

“TRAITOR.”

Mira beams. “See? Even Rumi agrees.”

Rumi nods, completely serious. “Yeah. If you say you’re a sugar mommy, you have to commit to the bit.”

“I was JOKING,” Zoey protests, already crawling forward again like a feral animal ready to reclaim her stolen wealth. “You can’t just weaponize my jokes like that!”

“Oh, I absolutely can,” Mira shoots back, barely dodging as Zoey grabs for her hands. “That’s, like, my main skill set.”

Zoey manages to catch Mira’s wrist, almost forcing them to the floor.

“You— you devil, fiendish woman! Let go of my money! Wh—what—are you biting me??” Mira looks down, eyes widening in genuine shock as she sees Zoey actually biting down on her shoulder. “Rumi, help! Money is making her go crazy!”

“Mm’noh krezeh!” Zoey protests against Mira’s shoulder, words muffled as she clings to her like a feral creature, one arm hooked stubbornly around her while the other tries (unsuccessfully) to gather her money back.

“Zozo?” Rumi calls softly from the other side.

Zoey freezes immediately, blinking at Rumi.

“Yeh?”

“Come give me a kiss.”  Rumi tilts her head slightly, offering her uninjured cheek.

The reaction is instant.

Zoey immediately unwraps herself from Mira, abandoning the fight without a second thought as she scrambles up and practically launches herself across the space toward Rumi with quick, eager movements. She slows just enough to lean in and press a gentle kiss to her cheek, eyes going impossibly soft as something quiet and fond settles into them.

Then she pauses, expression shifting. Zoey blinks, eyes narrowing slightly as she looks between Rumi—and Mira, who is very much taking advantage of the distraction to safely stash the stolen money away.

Zoey looks back at Rumi, accusatory.

“You…” she starts slowly. “You did that on purpose.”

Rumi smiles, and Zoey can’t help herself—her eyes immediately trace the lines of scarred flesh along her cheek, watching how they shift and curl with the movement. Her eyes glance up to the scar above the half-demons eyebrow, and she can’t help but linger there for a second too long, thinking, still incredibly hot.

“Of course I did. Sorry about that.” Rumi says easily, completely unaware of Zoey’s inner turmoil.

Zoey leans back, crossing her arms over her chest in a poor attempt at looking unimpressed.

Leaning back and crossing her arms over her chest , Zoey gives a poor attempt at looking unimpressed.

“This half-ass apology is not enough.”

“Yeah? Then what about this one?”

There's a shift in the blankets as Rumi's good hand is freed from the maze of blankets she’s buried under, reaches out and gently cupping Zoey’s jaw, giving her more than enough time to pull away if she wants to.

Zoey really, really doesn’t want to pull away.

Smiling softly, Rumi leans in and captures her lips with her own, tilting her head just slightly to deepen the kiss. Zoey immediately melts into the half-demon's hand, leaning into the touch, into the warmth, letting Rumi take the lead without hesitation.

Rumi pulls back after only a few seconds—and Zoey nearly chases after her, like she’s about to flip the entire board game into the air just to get her lips back.

“A `thank you` and an ‘I’m sorry’ for Mira’s sugar mommy.” Rumi says, letting her hand fall away from Zoey’s jaw.

Zoey lets herself drop back completely boneless into the pile of blankets with a soft, dreamy sigh, her face flushed red as she sinks into the fabric.

“What—hey, c’mon. You kiss that rich-ass hag??” Mira says indignantly, though she’s very much failing to hide the flush creeping up her own cheeks.

Rumi's eyes follows as, once more that afternoon, Mira's hands rise to press firmly against her side, and a quick furrows of her eyebrows—barely noticeable to anyone who doesn't share a soul with the woman— gives Rumi enough information.

Mira is in pain, or, at least, in some level of discomfort.

Rumi just shrugs casually, pretending not to notice and deciding to call it out in a moment.

“I owed her an apology.”

“Oh yeah? Well, you owe me an apology too.” Mira shoots back, crossing her arms over her chest and pointedly looking away.

She’s pouting, Rumi realizes, a flicker of amusement warming her expression.

“Yeah? What for?”

“Well, for not kissing me, obviously.”

Rumi hums, her gaze dragging over Mira like she’s actually considering it.

“I feel like this is just an excuse so I kiss you, Mi... C’mon, come here already, you drama queen.” Rumi adds, extending her arm toward her, palm open in invitation.

Mira drops all her very, very important money to the floor without a second thought. Completely hypnotized by Rumi’s eyes, she all but drags herself forward through the board, through the pieces, through all of Zoey’s fake money, until she reaches her, until she can finally take that trembling hand into her own.

She settles on the floor sitting back on her legs, cupping Rumi’s hand between both of hers. Fingers feather-light in a way that feels almost reverent, she slowly brings it closer to her lips and presses a gentle, lingering kiss against Rumi’s knuckles.

Rumi smiles softly, leaning her head back into the pile of blankets as she watches Mira. She takes in the quiet, the way everything feels wrapped up in this small, cozy bubble they’ve built around her, softness spilling into every crack of her still-healing soul.

“Is that the kiss you wanted?” her fingers curl slightly more against Mira’s.

Mira, still holding Rumi’s hand close to her chest, just shakes her head and moves closer, drawn in without resistance. One of her hands lets go, rising slowly (gently, so gently) to cup Rumi’s cheek, her thumb brushing just beneath her eye and Rumi can’t help but lean into it, chasing the warmth.

“Can I?” Mira asks with a small, almost shy smile pulling at her lips.

A few days ago, the mere thought of touch would’ve made Rumi’s skin burn unbearably, like she’d never truly left that godforsaken place behind.

Now?

Now Rumi just closes the distance herself, catching Mira’s lips with her own before the question can linger any longer.

Mira softly sighs into the kiss, her hand twitching slightly against Rumi’s cheek before pulling her just a little closer, just enough to deepen it, to make it last a heartbeat longer. Her other hand tightens faintly around Rumi’s fingers like she needs something to anchor herself.

Rumi hums softly against her lips, her free hand resting lightly against the woman's shoulder.

A slight brush of fingers pushing against her chest and Mira pulls back, her eyes lingering on Rumi like she’s seeing her for the first time. Completely and utterly mesmerized by the woman in front of her, drunken in her kiss.

“Is that enough of an apology for you?” Rumi asks, licking her lips absentmindedly.

Mira’s gaze follows the movement immediately, her expression going a little blank as she nods, dumbfounded.

“Yeah.” she breathes.

Rumi’s smile sharpens, just a little.

“I’m glad, now pay up.”

Mira blinks once, twice, watching as Rumi's smirk grows.

“Wait—no, hold on,” Mira says, narrowing her eyes as she leans in again, pointing a finger at Rumi like she’s uncovering a conspiracy. “You can’t just seduce me and then demand money, that’s—there has to be laws against that.”

“I don’t see you complaining.” Rumi shoots back, entirely too calm.

“I’m thinking about complaining.” Mira mutters, though she doesn’t move away in the slightest.

From her side, still collapsed against piles of pillows, Zoey raises a single finger like she’s about to make a very important point.

“I don’t know why you’re thinking about complaining, Mira. I’d give that kiss all my money in the world and more.” she says, pushing herself up onto her elbows, smiling all silly and soft, eyes still a little dreamy as they linger on Rumi.

Arms crossed over her chest, Mira leans back on her feet with a huff.

“You say that because you have all the money in the world. You rigged the game against me, I don’t have money for shit.”

Zoey just shrugs, entirely unbothered, gaze drifting back to Rumi like gravity itself is pulling her there.

“That’s life, Mira. That’s literally life. The name of the game is Life.”

“You both are dorks.” Rumi says, looking between them, though there’s a faint smile tugging at her lips. Mira’s eyes snap back to hers immediately, still carrying that playful accusation as Rumi continues, shifting slightly in her nest of blankets. “Well, since you won’t pay me for my incredible kiss, there’s something else you can do for me.”

Mira raises an eyebrow, suspicion still there, but she leans into it anyway.

“Oh? And what would that be?”

But the shift is immediate. Subtle and small enough that anyone else might’ve missed it—but Mira doesn’t. Her instincts flare the moment she catches that flicker of hesitation in Rumi’s eyes, the way her fingers tighten just slightly into the blanket and her gaze starts to drift away.

“I, uh…” Rumi starts, voice dipping, softer now. “Could you grab my meds?”

Her voice is quiet, so quiet Mira has to lean in just a little to catch it. And just like that, the weight in the room changes.

The playful, teasing Rumi from seconds ago, with smirking eyes and easy smiles slips away, replaced by something smaller, more guarded. She pulls the blanket a little higher, the fabric dotted red and bunched around her like a shield, her gaze fixed somewhere that isn’t Mira.

Mira’s chest tightens. Her eyes linger, just for a moment, on the scarred, still-angry skin along Rumi’s cheek, the faint redness that hasn’t quite faded yet, the way it contrasts with how carefully she’s trying to make herself disappear.

She softens immediately.

Gently, she gathers Rumi’s free hand back into her own, her thumb brushing lightly over her knuckles as she studies her, searching for any sign she might’ve missed. A loose bandage? A scab that accidentally opened up? Something else? She feels more than sees Zoey’s attention shift toward them, eyes looking for the same things.

“Of course, babe,” Mira says softly, tilting her head just a bit. “Which one do you want us to get? What are you feeling?”

Zoey is already moving before Rumi can even answer, pushing herself up properly this time, her usual chaos dialed down into something quieter.

“Yeah, Ruru. The pain ones? The ones for the dizziness? Stomach ache?”

Rumi hesitates for just a second, her fingers curling faintly around Mira’s. The taller woman can see it clearly—the way she’s fighting against herself, against those instincts that tell her to hide, to downplay, to pretend everything is fine so no one ever has to worry.

Mira almost steps in.

She sees Rumi’s eyes grow more distant, sees that sharp flicker of guilt, like she already regrets bringing it up at all—but then it’s gone, so fast Mira almost thinks she imagined it.

And instead, Rumi stays, pushes through it.

Pride blooms in Mira’s chest as she watches her do it—watches her choose to reach out anyway, to ask for help, to trust them with it—and Mira can’t help the small smile that tugs at her lips.

“The pain ones.” Rumi murmurs.

“Got it.” Zoey is on her feet in an instant, already heading off.

Mira stays, her thumb keeps tracing slow, absent patterns over Rumi’s skin.

“How bad is it?” she asks softly once Zoey is out of hearing range.

Rumi shrugs, looking away.

Mira tilts her head slightly, trying to catch her eyes again. “Rumi?”

“I— uh. It’s not that bad.” Guilt coats each trembling word that leaves the half-demon lips.

Mira hums quietly, gaze dropping to their intertwined hands.

“It’s bad enough that you had to ask for help.” she murmurs, lifting Rumi’s hand and pressing a gentle kiss to her knuckles, letting her lips linger there for a second longer than necessary. “Don’t undersell your pain, Tigerina.”

Rumi looks back at her then, eyes still faintly shining with that same guilt, that same hesitation. Her hand shifts where it rests against Mira’s jaw, thumb brushing lightly over lips, and Mira leans into it without thinking, turning just enough to press a soft kiss into her palm.

“We were having so much fun,” Rumi admits quietly, voice almost fragile. “I didn’t want to ruin it.”

Mira’s expression softens immediately.

“You didn’t ruin anything.” she says gently, trying to make sure Rumi hears the firmness in her voice, her thumb brushing a slow line across Rumi’s knuckles again. 

Rumi exhales slowly, shoulders sinking just a little deeper into the pillows.

Rumi' shoulders sink just a little deeper into the pillows as she exhales, hand shifting beneath fabric. Mira’s eyes follow the movement—and she can’t stop the wave of emotions that rises in her chest: guilt, sorrow, anger, all tangled together—as she realizes what Rumi is protecting beneath the blankets.

The injury.

The place where Mira had watched helplessly as Celine used Zoey’s blade to pierce through Rumi’s skin, through muscle, through bone.

Understanding dwells deep into her bones as she connects the dots. It’s not just the marred path carved into her by corrupted energy and cruel hands that’s hurting her half-demon.

Rumi looks away from Mira’s eyes, unable to hold that gaze for long and face the tenderness there, the fragile understanding and painful knowledge  that burns too close to something she isn’t ready to name—even if she knows it, deep down.

Mira stays quiet for a few seconds.

Then slowly, carefully, she reaches for the blankets covering Rumi and begins to push them aside.

A instinctive fear, spike of nervousness shoots through Rumi immediately, her head lifting just enough to glance toward where Zoey went. And relief settling faintly in her chest when she realizes she’s still not back.

Because she can't let Zoey see.

Her attention drops again—to the faintest, feather-light touch against the back of her hand, eyes finding Mira's fingers on her skin. Waiting, patiently, for permission

To move Rumi’s hand—the one bravely, stubbornly covering the injury beneath it.

An injury that pulses with her uneven heartbeat, that aches with echoes of pain that never fully leave, that flares in waves of lava beneath her skin, following the path of destruction carved there by dark lightning and merciless, barbaric hands.

Rumi nods once. Carefully, slowly, she moves her hand away, forcing her thoughts to scatter and go anywhere but there, anywhere but toward the damaged skin hidden beneath fabric and bandages.

She won't think about it now, not when her soulmates are laughing and smiling and giggling in joy.

Mira gently lifts the fabric of Rumi’s shirt, just enough to see beneath and expose the bandages covering the wound.

Rumi looks away immediately. She doesn’t see the way Mira’s expression shifts, softening into something heavy with guilt. Doesn’t see the way her eyes take in the bandage, no longer clean white but stained in uneven shades of red, some spots darker, deeper, fresh with bits of crimson.

Though the wound itself had been mostly forced shut, branded—by stitches that were long forgotten, by searing, scorching lighting—Rumi had still managed to tear parts of it open again, then. And, even now, it hasn`t trully healed yet.

Maybe it happened when she tried to crawl away.

Maybe when her body convulsed on the floor under Celine’s watch.

Maybe when she forced herself up for one last attempt.

Or maybe—maybe when Mira held her, as she shook with sobs so violent they tore through what little healing had begun.

No.

Stop.

“Do you want me to help you change the bandages?”

“No—no, I… I can handle it,” Rumi swallows, her throat dry as she gently pulls her shirt back down, the weight of Mira’s gaze lingering just a little too heavy against her skin.

“Rumi…” A quiet warning threads through her voice as she leans back slightly, not pushing, but not letting it pass so easily either.

“Don’t ‘Rumi’ me. You know I’ll let you know if I need an extra set of hands,” Rumi says lightly, trying to push the anxiety away from her chest as she looks back up at Mira.

And, true enough—Mira does know that. At least with this, Mira knows Rumi will call for help when she needs it, like she has before, even if it takes her a while to get there. So she  nods, accepting the answer, even if the concern doesn’t fully leave her, lingering quietly beneath the surface.

“But will you?” Rumi asks suddenly, her eyes narrowing just slightly, suspicion slipping in where softness had been.

Mira blinks, caught off guard by the shift.

“What?”

“Let me know if you need an extra set of hands.”

Still, the taller woman just stares for a few seconds, utterly confused.

“Well—yeah? Of course?”

And the moment Rumi tilts her head, completely unconvinced, Mira knows that answer didn’t land the way she hoped it would.

“Sure about that?”

Mira gulps, the hesitation flickering across her face before she can stop it.

“…Yes?”

“Okay, then why haven’t you told us about the pain in your side?”

The question is so quiet, so casually placed, that it takes Mira a second to even process it.

Her eyes drift for a moment instead, following a few loose strands of Rumi’s purple hair as they fall softly against the blankets, watching the faint glow of her patterns shift beneath her cheek as the light catches them just right. A sigh escaping the lips she loves so much and—

Wait

Mira looks up at knowing eyes, before huffing out an incredulous laugh and dragging a hand down her face.

“What? Don’t think I don’t see you reaching for your side every five minutes,” Rumi protests, shrugging weakly as Mira shakes her head, already leaning forward to pull the blankets back up around her and tucking her in again.

“Don’t know what you’re talking 'bout.” Mira snorts, shrugging with a kind of playful stubbornness that doesn’t quite hide the truth underneath.

“Oh, yeah? So if I just— I don’t know—poke you or something, right there—” she gestures with her head toward Mira’s side, “—you’d be fine? Nothing would happen?”

“Yeah, of course. Go ahead, punch me.” Opening her arms out, Mira offers her side to Rumi. Then she pauses, her expression shifting into something far more mischievous. “Oh, wait—you can’t. You’re stuck in burrito blankets.”

“Sure, I’m not stuck—” Rumi starts, already trying to pull her arms free from the blankets, only to pause when they, in fact, do not come out. She tries again, shifting her weight and attempting to wriggle one arm out with more effort this time, nearly tipping herself sideways in the process.

“You were saying?” Mira lifts one perfectly shaped eyebrow, suddenly very interested in inspecting her nails.

“You—how? I was just—”

“Just being too preoccupied with my health to notice that you’ve been wrapped into a full-on blanket cage.” Mira cuts in smoothly, completely unapologetic. “A poorly made burrito prison. Honestly, you look like a glowing sack of potatoes. My Burritumi.”

“M-Mira!” Rumi gasps, scandalized but laughing, falling back into the pile of pillows behind her when she once again fails to free her arms. Completely defeated by the blankets wrapped around her.

Mira opens her mouth, clearly ready with another snarky comment—but stops almost immediately, her expression shifting as something more serious flickers through it.

“Wait,” she cuts herself off, leaning in slightly, her eyes scanning Rumi quickly, “before I start making fun of you… is that making the pain worse?” Her voice softens without her even trying, concern slipping in naturally as her gaze lingers on the way Rumi is pinned beneath the blankets. “I wrapped it like that so it wouldn’t pull too much on your side, but if it’s pressing wrong, I can fix it—just tell me, okay?”

Rumi stills for just a moment beneath the blankets, the laughter in her chest softening as she looks up at Mira, catching that shift, that quiet flicker of concern that always settles in so quickly, so naturally.

Mira watches her for a second longer, like she’s weighing the words and trying to read everything Rumi isn’t saying just as much as what she is, before finally exhaling and letting some of that tension slip from her shoulders.

“Good.” she mutters, though there’s still a hint of something protective in the way her gaze lingers for just a second more before she pulls back.

“Now...C’mon,”  A grin bursts back onto her face as she leans away again, opening her arms dramatically “hit me, I dare you.”

A beat.

“Oh? Not gonna hit me? Well then, your loss, grandpa.”

“I’m not a grandpa!”

“Life says otherwise. Three times.”

“‘Life’ is just a stupid board game!” Rumi groans, trying to push Mira away with her feet, only managing to shove her off balance enough that Mira flops right into the pillows beside her instead, landing with a soft oof.

Rumi turns her head, blowing a few loose strands of hair out of her face as she stares at Mira, who’s already smirking like she planned that.

“Mira.” she warns.

Mira shifts onto her side, reaching out to gently tuck one of those stray strands behind Rumi’s ear. She opens her mouth, clearly ready to deny everything again—but stops.

Because Rumi’s eyes harden. The teasing doesn’t quite land the same under that look.

Mira exhales, the tension slipping into her shoulders as she rolls onto her back, staring up at the ceiling instead.

“I got hit when we found you,” she says finally, her voice quieter now, stripped of the playfulness from before. “It was no big deal.”

But those words—They tell Rumi more than enough.

Because there are only two ways Mira could’ve gotten hurt that night: the chaos unraveling at the end… or Celine herself.

And Rumi—God, she really hopes it was the first.

“Mira…”

“I’m not hiding it from you” Mira adds quickly, like she already knows where this is going, one hand coming up to rest loosely over her side without thinking. “When it hurts, I take something for it, or I rest, or whatever. It’s handled. This isn’t… I don’t know, I’m not doing some weird hero bravado thing,” she huffs softly. “I just forgot to take my pills this morning, really.”

She looks back down—straight into Rumi’s still slightly suspicious eyes, narrowed just enough to say I don’t fully believe you, but I’ll let you talk.

From the other room—

“OKAY BUT SERIOUSLY WHY DO YOU HAVE THREE DIFFERENT BOTTLES THAT ALL LOOK THE SAME—”

Mira huffs out a quiet laugh, shaking her head.

“You were worried about ruining it?” she murmurs, glancing briefly toward the doorway before looking back at Rumi. “Chaos is still very much alive.”

Rumi lets out a small, tired huff of laughter. “Good.” 

“FOUND IT—WAIT, NO, THIS ONE SAYS ‘DO NOT TAKE WITH—’ HOLD ON—”

Mira groans, already starting to get up.

“I’m going before she accidentally poisons you.”

“Wait, don’t forget to take your pills then—they’re next to your toothbrush, the blue bottle.”

There’s the briefest pause, and then Mira leans in without hesitation, pressing a quick kiss against Rumi’s cheek—pulling a small, surprised squeak out of her that she absolutely did not mean to make.

Rumi’s nose scrunches immediately, trying her best to push her away in a half-hearted attempt as heat creeps up her face.

“Come back, or I’m stealing the money you stole from Zoey.”

Mira snorts softly, leaning in just enough to press a quick, warm kiss to her forehead.

“Ha, no you won’t,” she murmurs, amusement clear in her voice. “You’re just a wrapped burrito of a half-demon now.” She pulls away, already turning toward the doorway. “A wrapped burrito that’s a three-times grandpa.”

Rumi squints at her, deeply offended.

“I’m not—”

But Mira is already gone, her laughter trailing behind her as she disappears into the other room, where Zoey is still very audibly arguing with all the labeled medication they have.

And Rumi—Rumi sinks back into the pillows, still wrapped up and utterly defeated by the blankets, her lips twitching despite herself, warmth lingering where Mira kissed her.

Again, somehting shifts inside her chest.

A... rumbling, almost like a quiet vibration, as if her body has brushed against a hidden rhythm. It’s gentle, almost comforting, and that’s what unsettles her most. She lingers on it for a second too long, brow knitting.

…Weird. Still, the feeling passes just as quickly as it came, and so does the thought, and she carries on.

Must have been her imagination.

She can almost ignore the pain. She can't.

Good moments, she reminds herself. This is a good moment, they’re having a good moment. one that she will carefully wrap in safety just like mira did with her-a memory guarded in burrito wraps of fortress

Because memories are power.

Even wrapped in burritos.

Her gaze drifts without fully focusing, following the sound of Zoey’s voice bleeding in from the other room, Mira’s laughter cutting through it in between. She holds onto it a little tighter, letting it anchor her where she is instead of letting her mind wander too far.

But it does anyway.

It always does.

Because, once more, memories are power—From the faint brush of Mira’s fingers against her patterns, from the way Zoey always melts against her lips when they kiss.

From the way Mira holds her when she cries, steady and grounding even when Rumi feels like she’s slipping out of herself, and the way Zoey keeps talking through the worst of it, filling the silence so it doesn’t swallow her whole—

From the way Rumi cannot look at herself in the mirror, to the way she sees her silhouette herself no matter where she looks.

A silhouette drowning in memories. A spectre made of trauma, feeding of the misery from the eyes that avoids it.

“You owe me your life. You owe me everything.”

The feeling of it staring at her from the corner of the room, patient and unmoving, no matter what she does—she looks, and there is nothing, always nothing,, only trauma wearing one of its many, shifting forms.

An empty weight draped over her shoulders, overwhelming, even as she tries to bask in the sound of her soulmates’ laughter when their cupcakes go wrong.

A present being, breathing softly against the back of her throat, too close, too intimate, as Zoey tells her all over again everything she knows about hairy octopuses

A penumbra beneath her shadow, something darker stitched into her outline, taking its place with hollow eyes made of nothingness. Staring unblinking while Mira wraps her in the safety of blankets and pillows.

“You’re still alive.”

It observes as Rumi does her best to ignore the outside world—what were the outlets saying, what were the fans thinking, what new rumors were spreading now, what kind of fake gossip were the magazines feeding people this time?

It watches as Rumi picks up her phone just to see for herself, her fingers trembling, and throws it away in the very same second, breath catching in her throat, terrified of what she might find staring back at her.

It breathes her pain in when she tries to move her left hand, basking in the tears that spill down her face when realization hits all over again—she can’t, she can’t move it like she used to, she can’t feel it the way she used to, like something essential has been cut away.

And it drinks in the fear when it realizes that Rumi doesn’t go into Mira’s or Zoey’s room anymore, doesn’t even stand at the doorway, because there’s something—  

It breathes in corrosive uncertainty that spreads through her soul when she hears that sound again-the flash of a camera, the snap of a picture.

It sucks in the image of a bloodied spiral, branded against the deepes parts of the half-demon's soul.

Rumi wakes in violence and in peace at the same time.

“Huh… I thought you would have died by now.”

Because memories are power.

“You tried to kill Rumi, but you killed Miyeong instead.”

Rumi wakes with a jolt.

She pushes herself up, away from Mira’s chest beneath her cheek, away from Zoey’s arms around her waist until she’s sitting, hands grasping blindly for anything solid as her chest heaves. Her lungs burn in desperate, uneven pulls of air; and her heart races, wild and completely panicked and slamming against her ribs.

Terror.

Terror from hands she knows were in her dreams —

Reaching for her, aggressively dragging her back when she tried to run.

Violently tearing her skin apart with corrupted energy, the burn of it spreading too fast and too deep and her body splitting under power that didn’t belong to this world.

Coated in her own blood, sliding down her side as if it were trying to leave her too.

She knows what she dreamt about. Still, once more as she wakes, there isn’t a single memory left behind of the nightmare that ravaged her brain, of that moment, that place… just whispers of pain and murmurs of agony sliding through her soul like it already knows every corner of it, the memory was carved somewhere deeper than thought that doesn’t need images to hurt.

She can’t breathe.

And though she can’t feel her soulmates, she knows they are awake now. She knows it in the shift of the air, in the shift of the weight beside her. But she can’t feel anything. 

Not them. Not comfort. Not warmth.

She can’t feel anything except her own fingers, trembling against the sheets, against her skin, unsteady. 

Except her own lungs, scorching and aching without air she’s too afraid to take, breaths breaking apart before they’re even finished. 

Except her own heart, racing wildly against her chest, against her ribs, against her ears, as if it could outrun those hands if it beat hard enough. It can’t.

And except her own pain, traveling through every fiber of her left side as if it remembers and wants to recreate exactly what happened, precise in a way that makes her stomach twist. 

The way her skin tore apart, the way blood gushed down her body, the way her flesh split open, exposing muscle and bone beneath a cold, indifferent stare, as Rumi all but screamed and collapsed to the ground, unable to do anything but wait —helpless.

She can’t breathe.

And there’s someone calling her name, but Rumi can’t hear anything but the sound of her own blood rushing through her ears—and the sound of her own choked screams, broken and wet because she was choking on her own blood as Celine’s fingers dug deeper into her flesh, merciless. The Honmoon’s corrupted energy flaring like lightning, burning into her skin, branding her for life. 

She can’t hear anything but the sound of her own cries as Celine gripped the blade, still lodged deep into her side, tightened her hold and moved it, twisting it just enough to make raw agony tear through the entirety of the half-demon’s as she cried out in pain and— 

“-mi-”

There’s an ache curling around her every fiber as if she were still there—barely breathing, ribs aching with every shallow pull of air, as Celine towered over her and—

“Rumi—”

She can’t breathe.

And her patterns react—finally, after staying silent for too long, after all but abandoning Rumi after Celine—glowing a furious, uneven dark purple mixed with pinks and magentas. Colors of pain, of fear, of terror bleeding through her markings like open battle wounds, pulsing beneath her skin as if they’re trying to scream for her when she can’t.

“-an you hea—”

And there’s a hand on her shoulder that she knows. She knows it’s Mira’s. She knows it is. She recognizes the scent, the familiarity wrapped in the touch, the warmth of her palm.

Still, Rumi pulls away.

Because it’s not Mira she feels.

It’s her.

It’s Celine.

Celine.

A single whisper of the woman’s name is enough to make Rumi freeze all over again.

Obedience branded into her soul by iron-forged fingers, claws, of Celine’s hands. The mark corroded so deep into her mind that even the ghost of that scent—smoke, burnt sugar, antisceptics, and blood— is enough to undo her completely.

Dead as she is (is she?) Celine’s lava-hot grip lingers, a brand burned into the back of her neck, scars etched across her body: a testament to everything Celine did to her.

All the days she screamed herself raw and bled until her eyes refused to open and clawed at the ground until her nails snapped—

Rumi tears herself away from Mira, curling into her burning body as her heart skyrockets again, a sharp, broken gasp tearing from her mouth—drowned apologies tangled with a hiss of pain, “I’m sorry”s caught and shredded in her throat before they can fully form.

Beneath all the agony inside her body —the phantom pain of Celine’s fingers, something burning beneath her skin as her patterns flare in terror, her barely healed injuries screaming as if they’ve been torn open again and again and again and again —she barely registers it as her hand comes up, clawing blindly at her chest, at her neck, at her shoulders, grasping at nothing, trying to hold onto anything that might make this stop.

She can’t breathe.

There’s a sound in the background, something distant, warped, so very different from everything else she’s hearing —from Celine’s cold words, from Zoey’s hushed voice heavy with concern, trying to pull her back, trying to anchor her here.

Please.

Please, make this stop.

But she can’t.

There’s a huffling sound to her right as a light is turned on, but Rumi doesn’t focus on that, doesn’t even register it as real as she chokes own her own panic

There’s a sound in the background, and, different from all the others so far, it stays. It doesn’t fade away the moment it reaches her ears, doesn’t drown beneath the weight of fear and pain—it stays.

Instead, her mind fixates on the way Celine’s fingers are closing in on her again, tightening, claiming.

Rumi is twelve and learns what it feels like to see bone pushing through her flesh, pale and slick beneath torn skin.

Rumi tries to focus on that single sound, her mind too tired yet too wired at the same time to do anything else, clinging to it because it’s the only thing not trying to hurt her.

Rumi is thirteen and learns what it means to choke on her own blood through a punctured lung, each breath a violent, rattling struggle, vision trembling and darkening as Celine doesn't even look at her.

Rumi tries to focus on that… melody? 

Rumi is seven and learns her teeth aren’t normal. They’re too sharp, too fierce. She learns the looks, the fear, the quiet distance that follows.

She focuses on the melody that reaches her ears and somehow manages to burst through every breath of darkness it finds, threading itself between memories that were never meant to be survived.

And Rumi is twenty-five, gripping her chest uselessly, fingers digging into fabric as if she could pull air into herself by force, gasping and shaking—hearing a soft melody play against her ear, impossibly gentle.

It covers her body in safety, draping over her like a shield she forgot existed. It covers her mind in warmth and familiarity, dulling the edges of terror just enough to breathe and remember that she is here—not there— And that for this moment, the hands are gone.

There’s a melody playing that Rumi latches onto with every bit of energy she has left, with every fragile scrap of sanity her sleep-deprived brain can still gather.

And now, with this melody, it’s not just pain she feels— it’s not just the phantom claws of Celine’s hands burning into her skin, lingering where they no longer are.

It’s the blankets beneath one of her hands. Soft texture, still warm from Zoey's body, grounding in a way that makes her fingers curl instinctively into the fabric.

It’s her legs tangled in a mess of sheets, the light pressure resting against her healing scars.

It’s the air around her, the light of the room —no longer cold and dry and burning her lungs, but carrying familiar scents and quiet movement. No longer darkness dressed in pain and cold stares, but a faint yellow light spilling into the room, illuminating just enough for her to recognize it.

Her room.

And it’s the presence of her soulmates by her side, not Celine.

There’s Mira on her left, right where she had been sleeping against the woman’s chest, hand curled near her heart. There are a few strands of messy, loose pink hair sprawled across the bed and brushing lightly against Rumi’s thighs —she latches onto that contact immediately, to how impossibly light it feels on her skin, almost ticklish.

And there’s Zoey, who Rumi only notices now, sitting in front of her. Close enough that Rumi could reach her if she wanted to, yet far enough not to cage her the way her memories do. Her eyes are heavy with sleep and wide with concern all at once, glancing from Rumi to Mira, watching carefully as Rumi slowly comes back to herself.

The half-demon can see Zoey’s mouth moving, can tell she’s speaking, but she can’t hear anything beneath the ringing in her head as her chest heaves, beneath the pressure behind her eyes, the echoes of past screams and cries still rattling through her skull.

But she can hear the melody.

The one that somehow pulled her out of that dark pit of nightmares when even her soulmates’ hands and words and touches couldn’t. She turns her head weakly as she searches for it, neck stiff and heavy like it doesn’t quite belong to her yet.

Her mind is still too under, too pained, but less. Less now that the melody is slowly taking over, seeping into the cracks the nightmare left behind, threading itself through the ache in her skull and the tightness in her chest, steady where everything else had been chaos.

Her eyes search the room— no longer seeing that place, no longer seeing stone and blood and shadows, but her own room, familiar and uneven and the shapes of it finally holding instead of collapsing into fear. And as her eyes begin to focus properly—on her drawers, her curtain, the corner of the room, the clutter she never bothered to clean, the soft mess of her life still intact— the half-demon starts to notice how sharp her sight is. 

Sharper than it should be, sharper than it ever was. Edges too clear, colors too defined, details snapping into place with unsettling precision.

Still, she doesn’t dwell on it.

Because she’s desperately trying to find the source of that melody— a melody that keeps wrapping her tighter in safety, in warmth, in something achingly familiar, something she wants to pull to her chest and never let go of. 

“Rumi?”

Her eyes snap up to Zoey for a brief moment, catching the concern there, the relief, the quiet, pained care sitting deep in those brown eyes —before she looks away again, restless, searching. Searching for the melody as her patterns flare once more, purple swimming beneath her skin and along her scars

Until her eyes finally— finally —find it.

A soft sound playing on loop.

Mira’s cellphone, placed beside Rumi’s legs with the screen still turned on, glowing faintly in the dim light. Written across it:

“Demo-3.pianoThisTime-maybe”

The melody drifts from the speakers in quiet waves with slow, simple notes. Uneven in a way that makes them more human than anything Rumi’s ever heard. Wrapping around her ribs, her spine, her every breath, pulling her gently back into herself as the ringing in her head dulls and the tight coil of panic loosens, one fragile moment at a time.

Rumi stares at the phone, unmoving, letting the sound hold her together while the last remnants of terror finally begin to fade.

She just... breathes.

She doesn’t know how long she stays like this— fingers trembling, less and less, against her skin, against the blankets; breaths heaving, less and less, until she finally manages to rip herself away from the darkness that almost swallowed her whole. And her patterns flare beneath her skin, less and less, then slowly ease. The dangerous magenta threaded with panicked purple dims, inch by inch.

“Are you back with us, Rumi?” Mira's voice is almost a whisper as she asks.

Rumi lets herself breathe in the melody in front of her for a little while longer before looking at Mira tiredly, letting her sharper-than-usual sight drink the woman in.

Messy hair, fingers nervously twisting fabric. Concern written openly across her face with attentive, soft eyes refusing to leave Rumi’s. Her pajamas are wrinkled and mismatched, clearly thrown on without thought, glasses hastily placed on her face and tilted slightly to one side.

She looks like a mess.

Rumi loves her.

The half-demon nods weakly, jaw tightening as she grits her teeth together, her patterns barely flaring beneath her skin in restless waves.

Mira notices. Of course she notices. Her eyes flick down to Rumi’s patterns immediately, concern flashing bright behind them before she forces herself to look back up.

“Is it okay if we touch you?” she asks gently, not moving any closer, not assuming anything.

No, it isn’t. Rumi shakes her head instinct screaming, body recoiling even as nothing is touching her yet.

Yes, it is. She stops herself, hesitating, then nods instead—

But she’s scared. The thought comes sharp and animal and Rumi almost growls in frustration. A low, instinctive sound tearing out of her chest before she can stop it, the conflict inside her rising suddenly and painfully.

The only thing that stops it —stops her —is the fact that the melody is still playing softly in the background and that Rumi is utterly exhausted, bones heavy and mind frayed.

“Okay, babe,” Mira says softly yet very much confused “you gotta help me out here cause I'm receiving mixed signals. Was that a yes or a no?”

Rumi looks down, still breathing deeply, still aching, eyes still catching flashes of before at the edges of her vision. She doesn’t trust herself to speak. She doesn’t even trust herself to decide.

So she nods again.

Mira breathes a sigh of relief before leaning in slowly, and Rumi holds her breath as she watches the woman shift closer, every muscle in her body tightening, until Mira gently places a hand on her shoulder.

Rumi braces for impact, for pain, eyes widening briefly as she doesn’t see Mira anymore, only Celine, towering, reaching—

But nothing happens.

No claws. No heat. No corrupted energy.

Of course nothing happens.

And Mira looks at her with so much softness, so much careful tenderness, that Rumi almost wants to throw herself at the other woman, instinct pulling her forward before fear can catch up.

“Hi there.” Mira whispers, her thumb softly tracing small circles where her hand rests against the half-demon’s skin, watching closely as the pattern nearest her touch begins to shift— the violent magenta and panicked purple slowly bleeding back into silvery rainbow hues, as if listening to the wordless thoughts of Mira’s touch.

And then Mira’s eyes move.

They drift elsewhere— to Rumi’s hands, to Rumi’s face, to Rumi’s… ears? Her gaze sharpens slightly as she catalogues, searching for injuries, for signs of something wrong that Rumi herself might not even feel yet. 

Why is Mira looking at her ears?

Mira looks back up, catching the pained confusion written plainly across Rumi’s face, and she smiles softly, eyes closing just for a second as if to steady herself.

“You gave us quite a scare there,” she whispers. “We couldn’t reach you. Are you feeling better now?”

Are you feeling better now?, not are you okay?

Because they already know she isn’t okay— and Rumi is painfully, overwhelmingly grateful for that question. Grateful they don’t ask her to name the obvious truth because she doesn’t think she could say it out loud. That no, she isn’t okay. Not really.

But she is feeling better.

She can almost breathe without the fear of Celine’s hands closing around her throat, without the certainty that she’ll be crushed into nothingness again.

So she nods weakly, still not trusting her own voice.

Mira softens at that, her shoulders relaxing as the tension all but bleeds out of her posture.

“Okay,” she says gently. “Can I move closer?”

She gestures to the space between them, the music still playing softly in the background like a held breath. Rumi turns her attention back toward the sound, tilting her head slightly as she listens.

Now that her mind is… less crowded, less painful, now that the ringing in her ears has faded and the pressure behind her eyes has eased, Rumi realizes she doesn’t recognize this melody. She realizes she’s never heard it before.

It isn’t complex. Quite the opposite, really.

It’s simple. A soft piano melody, unadorned, with no dramatic rises or falls, no heavy emotional buildup, just a calm, steady tune. Something Rumi wishes could swallow her whole, wrap around her heart and never let go.

A single, simple melody that somehow pulled her away from the agony of Celine’s fingers against her skin.

“—Rumi?”

She looks up to find Zoey sitting a little closer now, directly in front of her, careful to avoid her legs. Zoey smiles when their eyes meet, and it’s different from Mira’s smile— where Mira’s is soft and cautious, Zoey’s is bigger, a little sillier.

“Can we come closer?”

Oh.

Yeah, that.

She nods once more, trying to ignore how her limbs still shake in the aftermath of whatever it was she had just been dragged through— trying to ignore it and, at the same time, trying to understand why Zoey is looking at her the same way Mira is. Similar concern mirrored there but more open, threaded with curiosity and almost quizzical in the way her gaze lingers.

Still, Rumi doesn’t dwell on it for long.

She feels a gentle hand on her shoulder and, this time, she doesn’t flinch away aggressively from the touch. She still jumps a little, muscles tightening instinctively as they  brace for the worst, but it lasts less than a second. Her eyes drop to the hand resting there, Mira’s hand, and almost immediately her body gives in, tension bleeding out of her shoulders as she exhales.

The hand slips lower, deliberately avoiding the recently raised flesh on her skin—the new scars, still raw and tender, not the old ones already woven into her soul, already closed and lived with.

Gentle fingers trace down the lines of patterns along her back almost reverently, before settling at the small of her back, sending a shiver straight up her spine as Rumi unconsciously leans into the touch, muscles nearly relaxing completely.

Mira shifts closer, slowly pressing Rumi against her chest, resting her head against the half-demon’s shoulder. And this time —though Rumi can’t help but still tense as Mira moves, though she can’t help but still wait for fingers that will never come—she leans into her too, letting out a trembling breath she hadn’t even realized she was holding.

The moment she does, Mira all but curls around her, hands coming up to wrap Rumi gently, legs settling softly on either side of her as the taller woman folds protectively into her.

Her hands trace down again, finding Rumi’s elbow, then following the patterns on her skin with careful devotion —avoiding the still-healing injuries, extra careful along her left arm as her fingers barely graze the surface —until they reach Rumi’s hands, tightly curled, still trembling, knuckles white with the strength she’s been using to grip the sheets and her own skin, holding on to keep herself from slipping back there (even though her left hand barely twitches).

Her breath hitches, a sob stuck in her throat.

Mira’s fingers gently caress Rumi’s hands, and only then does the half-demon realize just how tightly she’s been clenching them, how they still shake from the aftermath, from the force she poured into keeping herself grounded.

There’s a hand on her leg. Rumi looks up to see that Zoey has moved closer too — not as close as Mira, but close enough to be felt, to be present.

Slowly, to the rhythm of the melody still playing softly in the background, Rumi’s hands begin to unclench, fingers loosening inch by inch and finally releasing the deadly tension that had locked them in fear—enough for Mira to slip her fingers through Rumi’s, lacing them together and holding her there.

The half-demon feels the patterns beneath her skin almost stop flaring in pain. She can still see the faint glow of purple and magenta beneath her scars, but dimmer now. Quieter.

She feels Mira’s warm, steady breath against her skin, and Rumi can’t help but melt into her.

“Hey,” Mira whispers against her skin, lips brushing softly against Rumi’s cheek. “We keep meeting like this.”

They do.

Memories flicker —of the first time she woke after, disoriented, terrified, unable to tell the difference between Celine’s hands and her soulmates’.

Rumi almost huffs out a laugh at that, because truly, they keep finding each other like this.

But at the same time she almost cries, because truly, they keep finding each other like this.

Mira hums and Rumi desperately holds on to that vibration as it runs through her body, fingers twitching in Mira’s hands like she’s afraid the sound itself might slip away.

“That was a bad one.” she says, and at that Rumi does huff out a broken, hoarse laugh, scraping her throat on the way out.

She opens her mouth to apologize, the word already forming out of habit, but she knows now, after a long time of insistence from both her soulmates, ever since the idol awards, that she doesn’t have to apologize for things like this. So she doesn’t, even as every instinct in her body urges her to.

She looks up when Zoey moves, head tilting as the woman tries to catch Rumi’s eyes.

“You want to talk about it?” Zoey asks softly, hair a mess from sleep.

Rumi wants to talk about it. She wants to lay down her defenses and tell them what happened—to keep them from building a nightmare in their own heads based on the story her scars tell. She knows how painful their imaginations can be, how vividly they fill in the blanks.

But she can’t. Not yet.

She can’t talk about it without the memory of Celine’s fingers against her throat without the ghost of Celine’s breath against her cheek, of Celine’s eyes on her skin like heat, branding her for eternity.

So she just shakes her head.

Zoey nods, not disappointed at all, hand drawing small, grounding circles on Rumi’s legs, right above a larger pattern traveling beneath her skin. Rumi weakly watches as that pattern and the ones around it begin to glow a pale silver instead of purple and magenta and red, the mix of fear and pain that had been flaring under her skin slowly dimming.

She relaxes even further without even noticing it, sinking deeper into Mira’s arms as that unknown melody continues to soothe her restless soul, wrapping around her thoughts like something warm and steady, something safe.

“Do you think you can go back to sleep?” Mira whispers against her skin, her voice gently brushing over the most bruised parts of Rumi’s soul.

The half-demon doesn’t even need to think about it.

“No.” she whispers back, hating how broken it sounds, hating even more how she already knows they’ll force themselves to stay awake with her no matter how many times she insists that it’s okay, really, they can go back to sleep.

Because they won’t.

And she loves them for it.

And she hates it, too.

You’re too much.

“It’s okay. Is there anything you want to do right now?” Mira presses a light, lingering kiss against the back of Rumi’s neck, and the half-demon melts impossibly further into her, a quiet, trembling sigh slipping past her lips before she can stop it.

She wants to cry.

The only thing Rumi wants is for it all to stop —the memories, the pain, the flashes of terror that cling to her even after she wakes —she wants it to stop, please, just stop, but no matter what she does, no matter how tightly she closes her eyes or how deep she buries herself into Mira’s warmth, she can’t make it stop.

She can’t.

“We could watch a movie, if you wish,” Mira murmurs against her skin, lips trailing featherlight kisses along the sensitive patterns there, fingers pressing gently against Rumi’s hands (still mindful of the left one, still careful). “Or maybe cook one of Zoey’s crazy recipes. Whatever you want.”

“I don’t know.” Rumi admits quietly as she forces tears down her throat, because even the thought of doing anything at all— even here, even wrapped safely in her soulmates’ embrace— is enough to make her anxiety rise again and again, tightening around her ribs for no real reason. “I can’t…”

There’s no threat, there’s no danger.

She just… can’t.

With shaky hands and trembling lips, Rumi's voice barely comes out as she continues, feeling as small and fragile as she's ever been.

“Can we… can we just stay like this for a little longer?” she pauses, her breath hitching as her voice falters, a painful, curling shame settling deep under her skin at how small she sounds, how needy.

She’s tired— she's so, so tired.

“Please… just a little longer.”

The melody that wraps around her soul can barely quiet the raging storm in her chest, waves and waves of overwhelming everythings crashing into her all at once, too loud, too much, too fast for her to keep up with.

She can’t.

Whatever it is-sleep, wash the dishes, practice, playing board games, whatever-she can't

She can't.

Please, make it stop

She feels it when Mira and Zoey seem to exchange one of those silent conversations above her head, wordless and loaded with meaning, but Rumi is too tired to follow it, too foggy to care, so she lowers her head instead, her eyes drifting to Mira’s hands tangled with hers—

“Of course, sweetie. Of course. It’s okay, take your time.” Zoey whispers from in front of her, her voice so soft it almost hurts, and the moment Rumi looks up she regrets it instantly—because Zoey is looking at her with so much gentleness, so much open, unfiltered care that it makes something in her chest twist painfully.

She doesn’t deserve it.

She does deserve it.

She doesn't know.

Please, just make it stop.

Rumi drops her gaze again just as quickly, her throat tightening as she tries not to choke on everything building up inside her, on the memories that keep pressing too close, too loud, as she clings desperately to the melody in the background like it’s the only thing keeping her from slipping under again.

Make it stop, she begs silently, her teeth gritting together as Mira’s arms wrap around her in quiet, unwavering safety, and she tries—she tries—to force herself to believe that she deserves it, that she’s allowed to stay here like this without ruining it.

Make it stop, she begs again, barely breathing through parted lips as Zoey continues to support her without hesitation, without question, like there’s nowhere else she would rather be.

Still, those are not the words that leave her lips.

“Mira.” Is all she says, all she begs. She doesn't even know what she's begging for, but mira seems to understand the masked words behind her breathless plea.

She gently tightens her arms around Rumi's trembling body and presses her chest against the half-demon’s back, leaning impossibly closer yet still as gently and as mindful as she can be— because there’s a healing path of rotten destruction carved on Rumi’s back, on Rumi's chest, where Celine's fingers had forced themselves, pushing corrupted violence through her very soul as she couldn't do anything but scream and scream and scream—

“-ry to match my breathing, yeah?” Mira whispers against her hair, breathing in way more than she actually needs and Rumi tries to follow the movement blindly, desperation starting to spread through her soul like burning spiderwebs.

Rumi tries.

God, she tries.

She shuts her eyes tightly, teeth clenched as she forces herself to follow Mira’s rhythm—still, she fails over and over again. Her breath stuttering too fast, then catching, then breaking apart again into uneven, rasping pulls that scrape against her throat, never quite syncing with Mira’s steady inhale, exhale, inhale. 

Make it stop, please.

And it's as she holds on to Mira as strong as she can, fingers curling tighter where they clutch at Mira and her entire body trembling as each breath feels like it has to be dragged out of her chest, that Rumi notices that something is different.

She doesn't quite know what it is that this small nudge is telling her, but she just knows that yes, something is different.

Rumi doesn’t know how long she stays like that—trying to gather her bearings through uneven, desperate breaths, focusing on the rhythm of the melody, on the warmth surrounding her, on anything that isn’t the chaos in her own head, forcing herself to come back piece by piece, inch by inch.

But eventually she moves, though the fear hasn’t truly vanished—and then she freezes.

Because she looks down at her hands, and sees that they aren’t really hands right now.

They’re elongated and sharp and oh, so deadly.

Oh, something is different.

Claws extend from where her fingertips should be, as if the tips of her fingers are no longer made of skin but carved from polished marble. Her flesh is no longer the sickly pale she’s been these past few days but something vaster— purplish at the tips, a dark, rich violet that slowly blends back into her natural tone the closer it gets to her elbow.

Deadly claws, entangled gently with Mira’s soft, delicate fingers.

Rumi’s hand twitch instinctively, a startled, almost panicked movement as awareness crashes into her all at once. 

Breathe, you’re okay, just breathe.

Her mind catches up too late and too slow because it’s sharp, too sharp, you’re going to hurt her. For a brief, terrifying second she almost jerks back, almost rips her hands away like she’s been burned (like she's burning Mira).

But she doesn’t. Because Mira hasn’t pulled away, and Rumi knows it's impossible for the woman not to have noticed the claws yet.

And there’s no flinch, no recoil, not even a tension in her grip. There’s just the same steady warmth from before, when they were lying on the ground playing board games. The same quiet certainty that Rumi would be able to make her own cupcake without their help as her fingers remain curled around something that could so easily cut through skin.

And that… makes her hesitate. Hesitate, not accept.

“Rumi?” Zoey calls her, trying to get her attention. But all Rumi looks at are her fingers that are no longer fingers.

Breathe.

Focus on the melody.

Maybe at another time Rumi would have panicked fully, would have torn herself away in horror at what she’s become, at what she looks like, at what she could do.

But she’s so, so tired, her thoughts still sluggish and heavy from whatever dragged her under earlier.

And Mira is so, so warm behind her—and she knows, without a shadow of a doubt, that they love her no matter what shape she takes.

Even like this. 

So, with immense effort, she forces her fingers to still, forces the panic back down before it can take hold, before it can spiral into something worse.

She doesn’t pull away. She doesn’t shut off this part of herself that her soulmates embrace so freely.

Still, a thought crawls slowly to the edges of her mind: 

The last time she had her claws out, she—

No. Breathe.

Focus on the melody.

Rumi does nothing, just lets Mira and Zoey have their silent conversation, letting herself be held despite her claws, despite the purple staining her skin, despite everything. Even though the light contact makes the still-healing shredded skin on her back pulse with a consistent ache. 

Breathe. Just… breathe.

“Did I hurt any of you?” she asks slowly after a long time (It feels like two minutes. It feels like two hours), the fog in her mind still clinging stubbornly to her thoughts.

She remembers pushing someone —Mira?—away. Remembers curling into herself as a gentle hand reached for her. She doesn’t smell blood and neither does she sense injury, but she needs to be sure.

Zoey’s hand pats her leg lightly.

"Nah babe, no one got hurt. There's a few light scratches on your arms, maybe hands—but nothing too bad. I'm pretty sure a few kisses can heal them in no time." She winks completely unbothered. Even now Rumi’s patterns react, though slower and tired, flushing faint traces of pink ink beneath the fading purples and magentas along her skin.

Rumi nods, relief settling quietly in her chest, glad she didn’t hurt them in her blind panic.

“So… I was going to break it to you, the claws thingy, but you kinda saw them first. And… well, that’s kinda not the only thing that changed?” Zoey continues, a nervous smile tugging at her lips as her eyes drift, once more, to Rumi’s ears, lingering there just a second too long.

Rumi tilts her head slightly, confusion and fear flickering across her face as her brows pull together, not quite understanding what Zoey means, not quite catching up.

“What do you—”

She doesn’t even get to finish the question before Mira shifts behind her, one hand slipping gently from Rumi’s as her fingers move upward instead. Mira’s touch is light when it brushes against the side of Rumi’s head, barely grazing her ear, and Rumi stills at the contact, her breath catching for half a second as something instinctive curls tight in her chest before softening just as quickly.

“They’re a little different,” Mira murmurs thoughtfully, her thumb tracing the outer edge of Rumi’s ear with featherlight curiosity. “More… pointy?”

Rumi blinks.

“…what?”

Her hand moves almost automatically, carefully lifting her claws to touch her ear, the sharp edges hesitating for a fraction of a second before making contact like she’s bracing herself for something unfamiliar. It feels strange at first, trying to navigate her own body with fingers that aren’t quite the same as before, but she manages—and then she feels it.

The subtle change.

Her ear is slightly elongated, the tip sharper than it should be. Her fingers trace down its side, and she finds more —slight ridges along the edge. Small, uneven bumps that feel different from the usual warmth of her skin, something closer to the hardened texture of her demonic features.

When she presses a finger lightly against the tip—she flinches back when it actually pricks her skin, just enough to sting.

Rumi freezes.

“Oh.”

The word comes out quiet, more realization than reaction, her mind struggling to catch up with the fact that it’s not only her hands that are different. Distantly, she wonders if there’s anything else.

Distantly—because she doesn’t think she can hold onto that thought for much longer.

So she doesn’t.

She doesn’t think about how the skin on her back also feels different, stretched in places it shouldn’t be. Like something underneath it has shifted just slightly out of place yet to the spot it was always meant to be at the same time.

She doesn’t think about the pressure sitting low on her spine, aching with a painful familiarity like something trying to settle there again.

She doesn’t think about the way her chest feels tighter and heavier, not quite wrong but not entirely right either. 

Like her body is slowly rearranging itself into something she hasn’t fully understood yet.

She can’t. Not now.

There’s only so much she can handle at a time.

So Rumi says nothing, and keeps those fragile realizations to herself, tucking them into the far corners of her mind the same way she’s done with so many other things, stacking them carefully where they won’t fall apart all at once.

“You tried to kill Rumi… but you killed Miyeong instead."

Rumi forces this thought down with so much violence it almost breaks her whole.

“It’s cute.” Mira adds, humming against her skin, and before Rumi can even begin to form a response, the woman presses a soft kiss right against the tip of her ear.

The contact is warm and impossibly gentle, chasing away almost every negative thought in the half-demon’s mind as a soft shiver runs down her spine. 

She doesn’t know what to say to that. She doesn’t know what to do with that.

It doesn’t feel bad, nor does it feel wrong.

It just feels—new.

But as much as these changes feel natural, like something her body has always known how to do, they don’t feel familiar, and that difference sits somewhere deep in her chest.

Zoey watches the entire exchange with a grin that she’s very clearly trying (and failing) to hold back, her earlier nervousness melting into something brighter, something playful now that the tension has eased. 

The last time she had her claws out, she—

“Tigerina?” Mira murmurs against the half-demon’s hair, their heads almost bumping together.

Don’t cry, don’t cry.

“Uh, sorry. Just— I'm a bit overwhelmed? Trying not to freak out.” Rumi’s words stumble as they leave her mouth, honest in a way she's not used to allowing herself to be. “I— give me a second.”

For a moment, neither of them says anything. Rumi asked for a second, and they give her more than that, respecting her space without question. Mira doesn’t move away, maintaining her steady warmth against Rumi’s back and breathing slow and strong enough for Rumi to follow, and Zoey doesn’t interrupt, her hand still resting lightly against the half-demon’s leg.

You’re okay.

Even now, they always make sure Rumi is comfortable and safe and so much more in this quiet space they give her, neither of them rushing her to understand or to react or to be okay faster than she actually is. It settles over her like safety made solid, wrapping around her like a comfortable blanket.

Her shoulders drop just a little more,her  breathing evens out.

“…does it feel bad?” Zoey asks, quieter than before.

Rumi hesitates. She’s… not sure. She doesn’t know if the anxiety curling tight in her chest has anything to do with the fact that she’s fundamentally changed, or if it’s just the lingering grip of the nightmare still wrapped around her ribs, still pressing into her lungs, refusing to let go even now.

Stop.

“I… I don’t know. I don’t think so.”

The words come out slow, heavy, like her mouth is filled with lead, her tongue thick as she forces them out. A thin layer of cold sweat runs down her back, her skin prickling as her gaze drops to her hands — to the sharp edges that weren’t there before —while she feels Mira’s breath warm and steady against her ear.

“Do they hurt?” Mira asks, watching their joined hands with quiet curiosity.

The last time she had her claws out, she—

Please, stop.

“…No, not really?” Rumi answers honestly, her voice still trembling slightly. “They don’t hurt. They’re just… a bit sensitive, I guess.”

She looks down at them —at the deep violet bleeding into her natural skin tone, at the sharp, marble-like edges that catch the light differently now, reflecting something that doesn’t quite feel like it belongs to her yet, something foreign even as it moves when she does.

Stop, stop, please, just stop..

“I—” The word catches, and she swallows. Rumi blinks and-

The last time she had them out, she had been trying, desperately, to keep her own blood in, to force the scream back down her throat as Celine—

A dizzy spell slowly barges through her body, like cold water being poured over the crown of her head and trailing down her spine, seeping into every nerve. “I don’t—” Her voice falters, her stomach twisting.

She feels like crying.

It’s too many questions. Too many sensations pressing in all at once.  Too much her, all at the same time, in ways she hasn’t learned how to hold yet.

“I just…wait—”

Mira shifts immediately behind her, one hand steady where it rests against Rumi’s side, anchoring her without trapping her there.

“You’re okay.” she murmurs softly, the words warm against her skin.

Rumi exhales shakily, her eyes squeezing shut for a second.

It's a mistake. The half-demons closes her eyes and—

The last time she had her claws out, she was dragging herself forward through sheer will and barely-there strength— 

Her chest tightens violently—

—her blood smeared across the floor and splattered against the walls, her body burning and screaming in a way she had never known it could—

 —while her breath stutters, then stumbles, then refuses to come properly—

—claws piercing deep into cold stone and scraping painfully as she forced herself forward, toward Celine, toward the woman’s exposed back, ready to try one last desperate thing before death finally claimed her—

—like her lungs forgot how to work for a second too long. Her grip tightens without her meaning to, claws curling more sharply around Mira’s hands.

“—mi, Rumi, sweetie?”

Rumi blinks, the present crashing back in all at once, almost disorienting, like she's pulled violently to the surface after drowning for too long and her lungs burn as air rushes back into them.

She’s staring at glowing red and purple patterns flaring violently across her skin. Her claws are curled desperately around Mira’s hands —and somehow, impossibly, not harming her at all despite the blind panic surging through her.

Rumi quickly looks away from them, that memory still burning hot and fresh behind her eyes.

“I—” her voice cracks, breath hitching as she tries to pull it together,forcing her thought away from those poisonous recollections. “I’m okay— I’m—”

She swallows hard, refusing to look up at them, because this is all stupid. So, so stupid.

It's been long enough already (it's barely been a few days), she shouldn't have been having these… these flashbacks, these memories of touches that come back to hunt her no matter how surrounded in safety she is.

God, her chest still aches, her lungs still struggling to settle into something that resembles a rhythm, and that's just because of a single glimpse of that.

Two almost panic attacks in a row?

Stupid.

“I’m— it’s just—Just a memory.” she finishes weakly, though even she cannot convince herself of that.

It's not just a memory.

She drags in another breath,rasping through her throat, trying to force it to remind her body that it’s over. That she’s not there anymore, that there’s no blood on the floor, no stone beneath her claws.

Not here.

Not now.

It’s been long enough (it hasn't). It should have been long enough.

She shouldn’t still be like this, shouldn’t still be dragged under so easily, so helplessly, by something as small as a thought or a sensation or a wrong movement of her own body.

She’s too much. Can’t even go two minutes without falling apart.

“I’m sorry.” the words leave her lips before she can stop herself, slipping out automatically as instinct speaks louder than the knowledge that she shouldn't be apologising for things like this. “I didn’t mean to— I’m fine, really, I just— You can go back to sleep.” Her voice falters again, because she’s not fine and they can see it, and that—more than anything else—makes something twist painfully inside her chest.

Because she's going back to lying and pretending.

There’s a small shift behind her before Mira settles just a little closer, her chin resting lightly against Rumi’s shoulder.

“Hey,” Mira murmurs against her sharper ear, fingers curling around Rumi’s even more. “None of that.”

From the front, Zoey lets out a soft click of her tongue, her hand returning to Rumi’s leg with a gentle, absent-minded touch that feels more like reassurance than anything else. 

“Yeah, no, we’re not doing the ‘I’m sorry for existing’ thing tonight. Hard pass. I’m 146% sure that you wouldn't go back to sleep either if it was one of us.”

Still, the half-demon wants to shake her head, unconvinced in the middle of her own shame.

She doesn't. Instead, she swallows it.

The instinct to argue, to insist and list every single reason why they’re wrong rises almost scorching in her chest—you’re the reason they’re losing their sleep, you’re wasting their time, you’re too much, again, always again—but she forces it down before it can reach her tongue, muzzles the thought before it leaves her lips.

Because she already knows how that would go. They would deny it, gently, patiently, like they always do, and she would still feel it sitting there, screaming poisonous thoughts inside her chest, unchanged.

So what’s the point?

Her fingers curl just slightly against Mira’s, her shoulders held still through sheer will as she focuses on breathing. Pushing it all down.

It’s easier this way. Safer.

To just… let it sit.

So she stays still and lets them be kind to her, because they need this too, she reminds herself. She won’t ruin this too.

“You didn’t do anything wrong.” Zoey adds more quietly, her fingers brushing slow, grounding patterns against her skin, watching the faint, tired response of color beneath them without making a big deal out of it.

The room falls quiet for a few seconds too long, then Mira speaks again, her voice low and careful in the stillness.

“Did your claws trigger that?”

Always attentive. Always so careful with her.

Communication is good, her mantra whispers through her mind again.

Don't make a sound, her patterns scream through her mind again.

Rumi nods slowly.

“Do you want me to stop touching them?” Mira asks quietly against Rumi’s skin, her lips brushing faintly along the curve of her shoulder as if even the question itself needs to be handled gently.

“No.” Rumi answers without even thinking twice about it. She would much rather feel Mira’s soft, careful fingers tracing along her claws than feel that phantom cold stone beneath them again, than remember her own blood dripping thick and warm down to her wrists.

And Mira doesn’t press.

She doesn’t ask what Rumi saw, doesn’t ask what memory dragged her back under so suddenly, doesn’t try to gently pry open something that is still raw and bleeding —she just nods against her skin and keeps tracing slow, grounding lines over her claws, still very mindful of her left hand, still careful in that quiet, instinctive way of hers, knowing that Rumi will come to them when, and if, she wants to share.

“I— I think I just—” she swallows again, shaking her head faintly, trying to push everything back down, trying to gather herself before it spills over again “—can we not… think about it right now? I can’t…”

There’s no hesitation.

“Yeah.” Zoey says immediately, just as soft.

The shift is instant.

Light. Easy.

She's still a little bit overwhelmed, still a bit on edge, as if the slightest pull or push from either side is enough to make her tip over the eternal drop inside the darkness of her soul-she breathes knowing Mira and Zoey would jump in after her and she would not, ever again, be alone. Doesn't matter if her ears are a little more pointed now, or if her fingers are a little sharper than before.

Rumi looks back up, a shy confidence shining brightly in her eyes that reclaimed that fear and doubt from before.

Zoey perks up almost instantly, her fingers already moving again where they rest against Rumi’s leg and tapping lightly against the patterns there, watching them react with quiet fascination.

“So, you can’t go back to sleep and there’s nothing you want to do right now, but I have an idea.”

You’re wasting their time.

Rumi raises one eyebrow.

“You won’t even have to move,” Zoey grins. “You just gotta sit there and be beautiful and all that—which, honestly? Very easy for you.”

That… doesn’t sound that bad. Even though the smallest change still makes dread pool low in her stomach, she finds herself nodding, and the way Zoey’s face lights up — eyes glowing despite the heavy sleep still clinging to them— makes it worth it.

“Okay! Okay, I just gotta grab my stuff and I’ll be right back.”

She pats Rumi’s leg quickly before launching herself out of bed, stumbling over sleep-heavy limbs as she rushes out of the room.

A loud clank echoes through the penthouse, followed by the unmistakable sound of several things crashing to the floor.

Then, distantly, “I’m okay!”

And in the middle of the flashing memories and phantom pain and that fear that never seems to fully loosen its grip on her —its claws pierced just as deeply into her mind as Celine’s name is carved into her brain—Rumi still can’t help the small smile that curves at her lips at Zoey’s antics, breathing the room in slowly, grounding herself in the scent of her soulmates instead of blood and smoke.

“It’s okay if you don’t wanna do this, you know? We can just stay here and do nothing. Pretend we don’t see Zoey falling asleep sitting up and drooling on herself.” Mira murmurs with a soft laugh, resting her chin gently on the half-demon’s shoulder.

Rumi hums quietly, leaning her head back against Mira’s.

“She seemed excited. It’s okay,” she says softly. “Besides, I don’t… I need a distraction.”

She needs a distraction from the burning flashes of Celine’s freezing eyes against her torn skin, blood flowing down from places she swearS she sees her own bone, her own fat and muscle as Celine reaches out and—

The unspoken words never make it past her lips, but Mira hears them anyway. She always does.

“And I think she needs this too.” Rumi continues, quietly.

Zoey’s been a bit… different, since everything happened.

Not strange, exactly. Rumi expected this, they’re all traumatized. More than traumatized. None of them walked away from that night untouched, and she never expected them to just be okay, to pretend normalcy like nothing had shattered.

They’re all a little broken right now.

She sees it in the way Mira’s eyes barely leave her, in the way Mira is already offering what Rumi needs before Rumi even understands it herself, in the way she holds her just a little tighter whenever silence lingers too long.

And with Zoey, too, she’s there just as much, just as fiercely, but there’s… something.

Something Rumi still can’t quite name.

She doesn’t push Zoey for answers, doesn’t corner her with questions. Rumi just makes sure Zoey knows she’s here, that she’s safe, that Rumi isn’t leaving again, and that seems to calm Zoey more than anything else.

Still… there’s something off, and it’s making Rumi’s skin crawl with a sharp, acidic anxiety, like a storm building quietly beneath her flesh, waiting for the right moment to split open.

The same thing she feels when she passes by both their rooms, still unopened by hands that are too scared to face the imaginary threat that her trauma created.

With the old scent of her own blood coming from behind Zoey’s door, with the feeling of something corrupted from behind Mira’s door.

There's something wrong with Zoey.

“Yeah,” Mira agrees softly. “I think she needs it too. Though don’t blame me if her idea actually involves glitter or something equally dangerous.”

Rumi smiles faintly, tightening her fingers, claws, around Mira’s hand. She almost melts right there and then when Mira begins slowly massaging her right hand, fingers careful as they trace the length of the purple claws and explore without fear.

“Do you want me to get your meds?” Mira asks after a moment, her voice barely a whisper against Rumi’s shoulder. “Are you in any unnatural pain right now?”

Something warm settles in Rumi’s chest at that —at the softness threaded through Mira’s worry, at the way the question carries no impatience nor exhaustion, only steady concern.

She's one very lucky half-demon.

“I’m okay. I’ll let you know if it gets worse,” she says, shifting slightly, trying her best not to let the pain show too clearly in her voice.

It hurts.

She turns her head, finding Mira’s eyes over her shoulder. “Though I’m pretty sure a kiss would make it better.” she whispers, tilting her head just enough, fully aware of what her golden, slitted eye does to Mira when it catches the light.

Mira blinks, cheeks flushing almost instantly.

“Are you seriously flirting with me after having a panic attack?”

Rumi hums softly like she’s actually considering the question, her expression turning just a little more amused as she lets her gaze linger.

“Well, I do know you have a thing for claws…” she shifts her hand against Mira’s, enough for the light to catch on the sharpened edges. “And I’m pretty sure Zoey’s even worse about it.” 

Mira goes completely still.

The flush on her cheeks deepens instantly, spreading down her neck as her brain very visibly short-circuits for a second, eyes flickering between Rumi’s face, her ears, her hands—

“I— that’s not—” she starts, then stops, because there is absolutely no way to deny that without sounding even more guilty.

From the front, Zoey makes a very suspicious noise that sounds a lot like a choked laugh she’s trying to pass off as something else entirely.

Rumi only smiles, sagging a little more against her as she glances toward the door, hearing hurried footsteps approaching the room.

“Hey, hey! What about my kiss?” Mira tries to look at her properly over her shoulder, but Rumi turns away on purpose, her smile growing when Mira lets out a small, betrayed giggle at the antic. “Oh, I see how it is. We’ll come back to this, just you wait. I’m getting my kiss.”

A threat Rumi likes very, very much.

Closing her eyes, Rumi forces herself to focus on the details of the room around her — grounding herself in what she can feel instead of what she remembers.

The soft tickle of Mira’s hair against her skin.

The steady warmth pressed along her back.

The distant, muffled hum of city life drifting in from beyond their balcony.

And then, once more, the melody.

The melody she had almost pushed aside, still playing softly in the background as she leans into Mira, her fingers loosely laced, her breathing slowly falling back into rhythm with it.

The same melody her chest follows so blindly, breathing in time with its quiet symphony the same way Rumi’s fear had been chased away by its very first notes, dissolving under the weight of something impossibly tender. Rumi breathes in slowly, the air filling her lungs as she opens one heavy eye and looks toward the source of the sound— Mira’s phone resting beside them.

“Demo-3.pianoThisTime-maybe.mp3.”

“Mi?”

The woman hums in response, yawning against Rumi's cheek.

“Yeah?”

“What is this demo on your phone? I don’t remember working on that before.” Rumi asks, eyeing the device as if it might somehow give her the answers she wants.

Though Rumi is the one who creates the melodies for their songs, sometimes Mira and Zoey step in with ideas of their own. Just like Zoey is their main lyricist, weaving words into their melodies, but Rumi and Mira always add their own verses, their own touches. The same thing with Mira and her choreographies and visuals. 

Still, Rumi makes sure to work on every melody they have, even the dozens they’ve never used and the others that have been reshaped and remixed so many times they barely resemble the original anymore. She remembers every single one of them, but this one...This one she doesn’t recognize at all.

Which means—

“Oh,” Mira says, perking up just a little, lifting her head enough to look at the screen again, her voice suddenly hopeful “You like it?”

If Rumi likes it?

God. It was this melody that carried her out of the hell she’d been slowly dragged into, that dark place where not even Mira and Zoey could reach her, no matter how tightly they held on.

She likes it very, very much.

“I do, a lot.” The half-demon isn’t even sure how to put the depth of that feeling into simple, human words, but the patterns on her body seem to manifest it for her, blooming into colors no language could ever properly describe. And Mira understands them all the same.

“I’m glad.” Rumi can feel her smile against her skin, can feel her fingers flex softly against her own. “I’ll tell you about it soon.”

Soon.

A word Rumi once thought had been taken from her entirely, lost somewhere between the moment Celine’s hands wrapped around the blade and the moment everything else fell apart.

“Promise?”

The question comes out quieter than she expects, smaller—fragile in a way that makes even Mira hesitate for just a second.

“Promise.”

And that hesitation, that softness, that care—it settles deep in Rumi’s chest, heavier than the word itself. So does the shame, the guilt, because she’s the reason they’re losing sleep.

The door flies open and Zoey barges into the room, arms overflowing with nail polish bottles, cotton pads, tiny brushes, glitter pots, nail stickers shaped like stars and moons, and at least three small bottles of acetone and a bunch more stuff clutched precariously against her chest.

“Tcharam! I have arrived!” she announces loudly, hair getting stuck in her mouth as she starts spreading everything across the bed with dramatic flair. A few bottles roll off immediately, clinking against the floor, and neither Mira nor Rumi move to stop them.

Mira just watches the smaller woman organizing everything, the taller woman’s head resting against the half-demon’s shoulder once more.

‘Organize’ is a very strong word for what Zoey is doing, actually.

“We’re going to paint our nails?” Mira muses, eyeing the chaos.

“Nope! I’m going to paint your nails.” Zoey corrects proudly, hands on her hips for half a second before she crouches to grab a runaway bottle. “Which means I’m choosing the colors, the combinations, the decorations… everything. Full creative control.”

Mira huffs out a soft breath, tilting her head back to look at Rumi. “You okay with this?”

Is she?

Rumi looks up at Zoey’s expectant face, eyes gleaming with careful anticipation.

So different from the way Celine looked at her, as Rumi dragged herself away in a pool of her own blood, nails tearing uselessly against the floor, skin splitting at her fingertips, slipping through her fingers as she tried to crawl—

She needs a distraction. Anything at all.

And Mira’s arms wrapped protectively around her waist, and Zoey’s excited little glances toward her nail polish bottles like they’re precious treasures, feel like more than enough— more than she deserves, really.

She nods quietly, attempting a smile back at Zoey that she’s fairly sure it looks more like a pained grimace than anything else, but Zoey seems to understand anyway, her expression softening before she beams brightly again and starts preparing her “organized” mess that she swears makes perfect sense.

“Okay! So, as I said, I’m gonna choose everything! Colors, patterns, shapes aaaand themes. Maybe matching sets, some chaotic contrast, maybe something symbolic? I don’t know, we’ll see as it goes…” Zoey continues, already lining up bottles in crooked rows. “Trust the process.”

She keeps rambling, words tumbling over each other as she debates between metallic silver and deep emerald. Meanwhile, Mira simply settles more comfortably against Rumi, her body curving over hers, their breathing slowly syncing as they listen to Zoey’s endless, passionate monologue about nail art trends and aesthetic balance.

It’s almost peaceful.

Almost.

That is, until Rumi glances down at her hand intertwined with Mira’s and realizes something.

“I don’t have nails.” she mumbles quietly, because truly —she doesn’t.

Looking down at her transformed hands, she notices something she never really paid attention to before —it isn’t her nails that grow, it’s her fingertips.

Elongated and sharpened and carved into deadly, curved claws that are part of her bone, not something that can simply be trimmed or painted over. She flexes them slightly, watching the faint gleam of their edges catch the light.

“I don’t think polish is going to stick to these.” she adds under her breath.

Zoey pauses mid-ramble, mouth still half-open around whatever chaotic metaphor she was building and looks down at Rumi’s hands. She notices it instantly, and then just shrugs.

“Dude, do you really think that’s going to stop me? Please. You know me better than that,” she giggles, winking at the half-demon. “Your claws are still going to look like they went on a rodeo with a glitter-covered bull and lost multiple times, then rode a unicorn or two, and somehow ended up playing with frogs on top of turtles. Or however that saying goes.”

“Zo, babe, I don’t think that’s even remotely how it goes.” Mira mumbles, yawning softly, her voice warm against Rumi’s ear. “But I support the imagination. Go for it.”

“Yas! Now—” Zoey points dramatically at Rumi with a bright neon-orange bottle, her face suddenly serious. “Give me your claws or suffer the consequences.”

Rumi offers her right hand immediately. She does not, under any circumstances, want to suffer glitter-related consequences.

Still, it takes more than she’s willing to admit.

Not only is she exhausted down to the bone, not only is she still trembling from memories she doesn’t fully remember (yet feel as something solid and dangerous pressed against her throat) but her muscles are weak and shaky, unreliable.

When she lifts her hand toward Zoey, it’s with visible effort, tendons pulling tight, fingers twitching against her will.

And shame coils around her soul almost instantly. It snaps and hisses against her ears, bares its teeth at her neck, wraps tight and suffocating.

How can she still be like this, even after it’s over?

Isn’t this enough?

Isn’t she suffering enough already?

Her fingers falter and she almost pulls her hand back. Almost gives up before even truly trying.

Instead, Mira’s hand slides beneath hers so steady and warm and solid that Rumi almost cries. Supporting her palm from underneath and guiding her forward, lending her strength without a word, until her trembling claws reach Zoey’s outstretched hands.

Rumi blinks in surprise.

Mira’s fingers lace with hers as if there’s no danger at all, as if those claws have never drawn blood and the rotten purple of her skin —streaked with faint patterns of lingering shame— is simply another beautiful thing to hold.

Her hand still trembles. Her fingers still twitch now and then. But they are steadier over Mira’s, stronger with the help of her soulmate.

It makes her want to cry.

Her left hand, however, remains curled protectively against her stomach, trembling in its own private pain not wanting either of them to see, even though she knows they already have.

Rumi blinks her tears away, swallowing the thick lump in her throat as she looks back up at Zoey and nods.

“Thank you very much, milady.” Zoey says with exaggerated politeness, bowing lightly, though her eyes shine with unshed tears she refuses to acknowledge. Then she gently gathers Rumi’s hand in hers and begins carefully painting the sharp tips of her claws.

Rumi tenses immediately, staring down at her own hand and bracing herself to be dragged under again—to lose herself in the memories that always threaten to swallow her whole. She can feel Mira tense behind her too, waiting for the same thing, breath hitching almost imperceptibly.

But once more that evening, she’s proven wrong.

Because when Rumi looks down, she doesn’t see a demonic hand soaked in ruin and shame and pain.

She sees white polish layered beneath neon-bright orange, glitter packed so densely it almost hurts her eyes when it catches the light, shimmering boldly against her deep purple skin.

It’s loud.

It’s ridiculous.

It makes her want to cry in relief.

...Once more, there's a rumbling in her chest. It's small, barely a vibration, but just the brush of it against her soul is enough for Rumi's instincts.

There's a rumbling that feels unfamiliar yet not at the same time.

Still, it goes away. Barely even a few seconds it lived in her chest, before fading. 

Rumi snaps back to the present as they continue.

“This… this is definitely a bold choice” Mira hums thoughtfully, tilting her head as she examines the result. “Not my go-to, but I can see how the orange complements the purple.” She nods as if she’s critiquing high fashion.

“Right?? I’ve been wanting to do this for soooo long!” Zoey bounces slightly on the bed, still carefully holding both Mira’s and Rumi’s hands despite her clear excitement (and the deep yawn she tries to swallow).

And even Rumi can’t help it. A small, cracked giggle slips out of her before she can stop it, fragile and raspy because it’s something that hasn’t been used in a long time, surprising her more than anyone else as it vibrates awkwardly in her chest.

As Zoey is about to move on to the next claw, Mira suddenly stops her with a soft tsk, gently intercepting her before the brush can touch Rumi again and, without a word, she shifts their hands so Rumi’s palm rests over the back of her own; Mira’s fingers spread slowly, until they weave together—one of Rumi’s claws resting between two of Mira’s fingers, then one of Mira’s fingers sliding carefully between two curved, sharpened tips, back and forth, flesh and bone and polish and purple skin fitting together in a way that shouldn’t feel this natural and yet does.

Rumi's hand on top of Mira’s, fingers overlapping each other, spread out so hers fit between Rumi’s.

“Paint mine too,” is all Mira says as she continues leaning against Rumi’s shoulder.

“Oh? Definitely not on my plans, but I’m more than happy to oblige!” Zoey yaps, delighted by the sudden expansion of her artistic vision, before immediately returning to work, brush dipping, tapping, sweeping, now painting Mira’s nails in matching defiance.

And that’s how most of Rumi’s night is spent—

On soft touches that don’t ask for anything in return, on honest glances that don’t flinch at the sight of her claws, on concerned caresses that linger just a second longer than necessary as she leans more and more into her soulmates, physically and not, her weight gradually surrendering until she is almost folded into them.

On letting herself be held.

On letting them breathe her in, feel the rise and fall of her chest, the tremor in her muscles, the steady proof that she is here, that she survived, that she is, somehow, alright.

On letting Zoey carefully, reverently, yet still giggling under her breath, paint her claws in shades of neon that clash and shimmer and sparkle obscenely under the light, covering sharp bone in layers of glitter as her bright laughter fills the room and refuses to let the air grow heavy.

On letting the delicacy of Mira’s touch anchor her back into this moment of carefulness and gentleness she is certain she does not deserve, and then slowly, stubbornly, convince her that yes, she does.

On basking in their presence as she manages, little by little, to separate herself from the nightmare-induced panic that dragged her awake in terror and agony, untangling her mind from phantom hands and remembered blood and replacing it instead with warmth, with soft fabric beneath her, with Mira’s steady breathing against her neck and Zoey’s excited commentary about marine biology and why starfish are actually terrifyingly fascinating.

This is too much.

Too much softness.

Too much care.

So much so that she cries.

She looks down at her hands, so carefully cradled between Mira’s and Zoey’s, their support disguised as something casual —as Zoey painting her own nails to make it less obvious that she’s steadying Rumi’s trembling claws, as Mira’s fingers intertwined with hers as if it’s simply affectionate and not an anchor keeping her from drifting somewhere dark. 

A tear slips down her cheek, traveling down uneven patches of skin.

The brush glides delicately over deadly tips, coating something that has always, always brought Rumi shame in colors so bright they almost hurt to look at —neon, glitter, white beneath orange and pink and green and blue— transforming weapons into something soft, something chosen and wrapped in care, dipped in hues of kindness.

A mercy she never thought she deserved. At least not until these past few months.

Not until now.

She bites her cheeks with teeth more sharper than usual, trying to keep the sobs in.

Rumi looks down at her hands again, vision blurring as silent tears slip down her face. Her left hand, hidden by more bandages than actually needed trembles where it grips the blanket beneath her legs. The skin that had once been torn apart so violently is almost stitched together, whether by the brutal branding of Celine’s fury or by the careful, patient hands of the doctors who pieced her back into something functional, she’s not entirely sure. The wounds are almost closed.

The scars are not.

Her bandaged fingers curl into the fabric anyway, as if protecting something that is no longer there, while her other godforsaken hand continues to shake beneath Zoey’s touch, even with Mira’s steadying warmth beneath it.

She likes to pretend they don’t notice she’s crying.

She really does.

But she knows that’s not true —not when the air shifts and their movements grow softer, slower, as if the entire world has narrowed down to the fragile thing unfolding between their joined hands. Not when she feels something wet drip down on her shoulder, a breath hitching faintly as Mira’s breath hitches.

Another tear slips down her cheek.

Mira turns slightly without breaking the rhythm of her breathing, pressing a feather-light kiss against Rumi’s skin, careful to barely brush over the scarred area along her cheekbone, lips warm and lingering. Rumi feels it—the way Mira kisses her tears away without making a show of it, humming faintly against her cheek as her gaze remains lowered to their intertwined fingers, as if loving her through it is second nature.

Her claws twitch in Zoey’s hold, a sharp, involuntary jerk that smears a streak of orange across the edge of white.

Zoey looks up for just a second. She doesn’t comment on the tears, doesn’t make a joke about it. Not when her own face has tears falling down her freckles.

She just smiles gently, something quiet and knowing passing between her and Mira in a brief shared glance, before she dips the brush again and continues with exaggerated care, voice bright but softer around the edges.

“Did you know a starfish’s closest relatives are sand dollars, sea cucumbers, and sea urchins?” she begins conversationally, as if they are not holding a half-demon together with glitter and patience. “They’re all echinoderms. Which is a terrible name, honestly, but it basically means ‘spiny skin.’ Very on brand.”

The brush strokes slow as Zoey laughs quietly, her giggles bright in the quiet of the room as she changes to yet another color, another explosion of loud neon mixed with glitter and star shaped decorations while Rumi just blinks.

Mira's free hand pushes a few strands of purple hair away as Zoey continues talking, voice wobbly.

“And, really, have you ever seen a starfish bleed? Well, no, of course not, because they don’t bleed! They don’t have blood, did you know that? They just, like, pump seawater through their vascular system and, dude, how do they even know that?” Zoey sniffles, shaking her head slightly as she looks up at Rumi, still somewhat painting Mira’s nails, the brush gliding carefully even while her words tumble over each other.

Rumi knows Zoey sees the tears on her face. She knows.

And, once more, she is deeply, quietly grateful that Zoey doesn’t comment on it, doesn’t tilt her head with pity or soften her voice in the way people do when they think you’re about to shatter.

“I mean, can you even imagine that? Can you—babe, can you even imagine if we just, I don’t know, had the air around us pumped through our very body like blood? Dude, that’s— honestly that feels like a nightmare. I bet it would sound like a nightmare too, like, what if we just became moving wind pipes or something? Dude, would our farts be the same? So many mysteries, oh my God—”

And Zoey continues, shaking her head at every word as if her body needs to physically agree with whatever insanity leaves her mouth, eyes crinkling with a small, bright smile, giggles slipping out between facts and absurd questions as she keeps telling Rumi more and more things she has never known— things she probably never would have known if not for Zoey deciding that right now, in this exact moment, starfish anatomy is the most urgent subject in the world.

Rumi doesn’t even know what she’s nodding to anymore. She just nods.

Her vision still swims a little from tears, lashes heavy and damp, but the tears that were falling so relentlessly begin to slow—that growing, almost overwhelming everything inside her chest starting to loosen, to unclench, releasing its tight grip around her ribs.

The storm within her chest is no longer a violent tempest tearing through memory and bone; it is something softer now. Something like the quiet after destruction, when the sky is still bruised but the sun begins to press through thinning clouds.

And still, among the darkest of clouds in her soul, Rumi still feels that remaining doubt, as thin and breakable as it is now. That small, whispering voice against her ear, hissing like a snake is still ever present in between gentle touches and the softness that fills the space between them now.

you’re the reason they’re losing their sleep, it whispers, trying to force its way up again. Because truly, zoey looks a second away from falling asleep while sitting, and the weight of Mira's head against her shoulder is getting heavier with each passing minute, as the woman leans more and more into the half-demon

She grits her teeth, focusing on Zoey's words

you’re wasting their time, it murmurs, corrosive phantom words trying to grasp the broken edges of her soul. Because truly, they could be resting right now. They could have gone back to sleep and left Rumi to mend for herself because she's fine, she is.

Rumi closes her eyes, leaning her head against Mira’s.

you’re too much, again, always again-

“You think too loudly, babe” Mira's voice breaks through the fog in her mind. Rumi doesn't open her eyes, doesn't dare to see the way Zoey is looking at her right now.

“M’sorry” she says instead, sniffling. Mira hums in response and the vibrations of her chest rumble through Rumi's body, her patterns blossoming lazily where they touch. 

“What is it that you’re torturing yourself with now?” the taller woman asks softly, and there's a glint of playfulness in her voice that Rumi can't help but smile at, despite her own thoughts.

“Nothing”

“Hum… nothing?” Mira muses outloud, clicking her tongue while she thinks “the thoughts I heard coming off that pretty brain of yours don't sound like nothing to me. So either you’re lying or you’re saying I have bad hearing.”

“You have bad hearing”

Mira removes her head from Rumi’s shoulder, making the half-demon groan as she dips her head to the side, now without support.

“Hum, no, no. I heard what I heard. And I'm pretty sure Zoey heard it too, didn't you Zo?”

Zoey peaks up at her name, pointing the brush up and nodding, face serious

“Yup. I heard it too”

“What, my thoughts?” Rumi whispers, cracking one golden eye open to stare at zoey

“Yup,” Zoey replies without hesitation, entirely certain. “You think very, very loudly.”

Mira rests her free hand against the half-demon’s leg, her fingers warm and grounding as she nods in agreement with Zoey, her expression far too pleased with this conclusion.

“Loud enough to be a public broadcast, honestly.”

“And we’re very attentive listeners.” Zoey adds, tilting her head slightly, like she’s proud of that fact.

Rumi huffs under her breath, something soft and reluctant slipping through her expression despite herself. But it fades just as quickly as it came, the weight behind her eyes settling back in.

The teasing lingers for a moment longer, before it slowly dissolves into something quieter.

They’re waiting for her.

“I keep waking you up.” 

She shrugs guiltily, looking away as the words come out quieter than she intends, heavy with something that settles deep in her chest and feels too much like the shame she carries. Her gaze still fixed somewhere below, anywhere but their faces.

And even without looking, she can feel it—the confusion first, almost immediate, followed by that subtle shift in the room as understanding begins to settle.

“You can’t—you can barely get one good night’s sleep because of me.”

She feels Mira inhale behind her with that small, familiar breath that always comes right before she argues, trying to gently dismantle whatever Rumi is saying—

Rumi shakes her head immediately.

“Don’t even try telling me that’s not true, don't. You think I don't notice how you keep trying to hide it from me? You're kinda obvious. Yesterday Zoey fell asleep brushing her teeth"

Zoey leans back slightly at that, caught. 

Rumi has to bite down on the inside of her cheek to keep more tears from spilling over, the sting grounding and useless all at once. Mira’s hand falls to the sheets beneath them, Rumi’s hand follows because, even now, she doesn't think she's strong enough to let it rise on its own, without help.

"I cant.... I can't help but feel this way. It’s always something. The nightmares, or the… this, or—” she gestures vaguely with her free hand, eyes burning with tears as she forces the words out. “I just— And I just keep— I keep waking you up and-”

God, she can barely say it right, with how much her voice trembles.

She exhales sharply through her nose as frustration threads through the sound, her shoulders pulling in just a little more. Tightening her jaw while her eyes burn, the rest of the sentence dissolving before it can fully form because there are too many endings to it and none of them are good. 

Ruining it. 

Interrupting. 

Being too much.

Rumi swallows again, harder this time, thoughts moving faster and picking at every possible angle like they won’t stop until they find something that sticks.

“And it’s not just that,” she keeps going even though her voice shakes so hard it feels like there's an earthquake inside her chest. 

Because now that she’s started, it’s hard to stop, the thoughts spilling out in uneven pieces. 

“I almost—I can’t do anything without remembering an…I don’t even know what happened just now. I could’ve—”

Hurt you.

The words don’t come out, but they hang there anyway, unspoken.

“I’m supposed to be better than this, I’m supposed to—”

To be better.

To be their leader.

To be someone they can rely on.

She can’t even sleep.

What a joke.

“I should be able to handle this by now,” she adds, softer still, the words barely holding together. “It’s not even—it wasn’t—God, it’s over.”

It’s over.

And yet here she is, like nothing ever changed, like Celine never really left.

Even dead, the woman still has her claws buried deep in Rumi’s soul. Still dragging through her thoughts and leaving damage in places no one else can see—hurting her, hurting Mira, hurting Zoey.

Even gone, she’s not gone.

If anything, she feels more present than ever.

It’s over—and still Rumi is here, trying not to fall apart again.

She lowers her head, leaning away from Mira’s shoulder while her shoulders shake with barely contained tears, because—

“You’ll never be something, you’ll always be nothing” 

Celine's voice echoes through the melody from the back, almost deafening in its corrosive care, in its quiet cruelty.

And isn't that just what she ever was and all she ever will be? Not just nothing, though, but a bother.

God, she can't even sleep.

She’s tired.

Mira breathes in shakily behind her, 

“It's over. It's over.” Rumi whispers, curling her brightly colored claws against Mira's fingers, subconsciously looking for support even though her mind screams that no, she doesn't deserve it, because—

“And still… here I am.” She shrugs, weakly gesturing to herself, to them. "Here we are. I’m so sorry”

Zoey doesn’t respond right away.

Instead, she quietly places the nail polish bottle down on the bed, her gaze lingering on it for a few seconds as she takes in everything Rumi has just said.

“You can't even have a full night's sleep because of me…” And then, softer—almost hesitant, like she already knows the answer but asks anyway—

“…doesn’t it get tiring? "

Rumi is exhausted.

For a second, just a second, there’s silence.

And it’s Rumi, once more, alone.

Alone in her own tears. 

Alone in the suffocating weight of her own thoughts. 

Swallowed whole by a dark, rising wave of nothingness that curls around her ribs and drags her under, deeper and deeper, somewhere not even the melody can reach—

“No.”

Zoey’s answer comes out immediately, her voice cracking in the middle of it like the word itself hurt on the way out. 

Rumi doesn’t want to look up, she doesn’t, because she knows what she’s going to see—pain, exhaustion, something she put there by being like this, by not being better and needing too much for too long.

Pain that she carved into them just by existing like this, by not knowing how to stop.

Still—still, she looks up.

And it’s not pain she finds.

It’s something softer. Something warmer. 

A small, fond look on Zoey’s face that Rumi can’t quite translate, like she’s being seen in a way that doesn’t match anything her mind has been telling her.

“Do you know why this will never get tiring?”

Rumi shakes her head, quick, helpless, because she doesn’t know—she doesn’t fucking know—and she needs to, because this thing in her chest, this anxiety that steals her breath and ruins her appetite and makes her fingers tremble worse than the nerve damage ever did? She wants it gone, she needs something to make it make sense.

She looks up at Zoey and can’t hide the broken hope in her eyes.

Zoey nods, gently disentangling Rumi’s hand from Mira’s, cupping it between both of hers.

“This will never get tiring because it means we didn’t lose you.”

Oh.

“So having to wake up another night because of another nightmare, or sitting here while you’re shaking and trying to remember how to breathe again,” Zoey continues, her thumbs tracing a larger pattern down Rumi’s finger—the one she chose, a long time ago, that is her favorite, “all of this we’re doing? It just means we didn’t lose you.”

Rumi’s heart aches in her chest with how much delicacy Zoey holds her hand, at the raw, unfiltered care in her eyes as she looks at something Rumi can’t quite recognize in herself anymore—

Something worthy of love. 

Because she looks at a half-demon she knows with all her heart, is meant to be loved.

Because she looks at her soulmate, who looks back with just as much emotion on her face.

“—this? this right here? Me completely destroying your claws with ridiculous color choices?” Zoey smiles, glancing down at her own work like she’s proud of it despite everything, and slowly brings Rumi’s hand up, pressing a light, lingering kiss against her knuckles. “This means I still have a hand to hold, to kiss, to paint however I want. Means I still have you here, right next to me.”

Rumi's breath hitches. 

She knows she's starting to lose the overwhelming, terrifying urge to fall apart on her soulmates’ arms, to collapse into them and not come back up.

Again.

Because that’s all she’s done these past few days. It’s all she knows how to do right now, and God, why won’t it stop—

Zoey presses another kiss to her hand and it almost undoes her completely, her fingers twitching faintly under the weight of everything building in her chest.

“Us ‘not being able to sleep’ means I get to wipe your tears when you cry. Means I get to hold your hand when it gets bad, I get to brush your hair back and talk your ear off about marine biology and all the completely useless things I know,” she lets out a small, wobbly laugh that breaks halfway through.

Her gaze flickers to Mira for a second, something unspoken passing between them, before she looks back at Rumi—

And this time, her eyes tell a different story than her smile does.

“Means I don’t have to spend another second wondering if that day—if that day was the last time I would ever see you smile, or hold your hand, or kiss your lips.”

God.

Rumi can’t even begin to imagine that, she can’t.

Pain is all she’s ever known. 

Her whole life, long before she even understood what the word meant, it had already been branded into her, carved into her body like torment made known, like agony made…familiar.

Friendly, even.

Her whole life, long before she knew what it could do, there wasn’t a single day where it didn’t exist, where it didn’t follow her, sit under her skin, breathe with her.

Held her hand as she cried herself to sleep, bit it off when she tried to ask for help.

The pain of having herself stitched back together in cold fury, in detached brutality. 

Of broken bones, of white tearing through her skin in sharp, blinding bursts; of her own flesh burning as she chokes on the smell of it, suffocating in her lungs; of nails being ripped from her hands one by one, of her teeth being pried, cracked, torn from her mouth; of her own weapon piercing through skin, fat, muscle, bone—again and again and again and again, because Celine wanted to, because she could.

Rumi knows pain.

But this pain—

The one that shines in Zoey’s face, that makes her voice tremble and her hands tighten and her heart break in ways Rumi has never felt before—

The one that makes Mira’s breath hitch behind her, her arms tightening just a little more as her fingers trembling faintly where they rest against Rumi’s waist, like she’s holding on just as much—

This kind of pain Rumi has never known.

And she hopes, desperately, that she never will.

Because Rumi had accepted her death.

When Celine… when Rumi had been nothing but a puddle of drying and fresh blood, trembling muscles and weak, broken bones, when everything inside her was screaming and failing at the same time—

Rumi had taken Death’s hand without fighting it. Had waited for it to be gentle, to finally make it stop.

Had waited for its mercy as a dog waits for its owner. Because taking its hand would hurt less than simply…not.

But this?

No.

No.

She can't handle the possibility of losing a soulmate.

“—if that day was the last time I would ever see you smile, or hold your hand, or kiss your lips.”

“Zoey…” she whispers.

Hands settle more firmly against her waist as Mira shifts behind her, breathing in shakily

“This isn’t a waste of time, Rumi.” she murmurs, fingers moving in slow, careful circles over uneven skin, over scars that haven’t fully settled yet.

Rumi squeezes her eyes shut, teeth gritting as that familiar, unwanted voice curls back into place.

It is.

“No, Rumi,” Mira insists even as her voice wavers, her words threading through the noise as steady as the shame in Rumi’s heart “this isn’t a waste of time. I would much rather wake up every single night for the rest of my life to help you through whatever you need than ever have to live in a world where you’re not here at all.”

Oh.

"And I know, God, I know it's not perfect. I know it's messy and unfair and it doesn't really feel like progress. But you're healing, Ru." Rumi’s chest tightens impossibly more, a broken sound catching somewhere between a sob and a breath as Mira repeats, softer, almost like a promise—

“You’re healing.”

She is.

She’s healing—she’s alive.

She’s not trapped under Celine’s gaze anymore, not suffocating under something cold and distant and merciless, not waiting for the end to come.

She’s here.

In the arms or her soulmates, not Death’s.

With people who—

—who chose her, who keep choosing her, even now, even like this.

She’s here.

And she can't help the teary sob that leaves her lips as emotion explodes in her heart.

Before she can think twice, before she can stop herself or even fully realize what she’s doing, Rumi moves.

Her right hand remains safely cradled between Zoey’s, but her left—Her left hand hesitates for the smallest fraction of a second, it always does.

Because that hand is wrong in a way the other isn’t. 

Marked not just by the same violet hues and sharpened edges, but by memory—by pain carved into her skin that never left; by nerves that still misfire and sting and burn under the surface; by the quiet, lingering shame that makes her tuck it away, hide it, pretend it’s not there unless she absolutely has to acknowledge it.

That hand is the one she avoids, a mirror of what was done to her by cruelty made human.

That hand is the one she doesn’t show, the one she keeps under bandages she's not even sure she still needs. A hand that reminds her of too much, of please, please, make it stop, please.

But right now—

Right now she needs something to hold onto more than she needs to protect herself from it.

And that hand becomes the one she uses to reach for her soulmate.

Blindly, clumsily, her breath catching as her fingers twitch mid-motion and the sensitivity flaring sharply as she stretches them out—

Her hand finds Mira’s.

And she grabs it.

It's not gentle and soft like Zoey’s holding her other hand. 

No, this—this is desperate, following the sheer emotion from her soulmates’ words.

Means I don’t have to spend another second wondering if that day—if that day was the last time I would ever see you smile, or hold your hand, or kiss your lips

Her fingers curl with uneven pressure. 

Mangled claws pressing where they shouldn’t. Her grip trembling with the effort of it, with the strain of using something that still hurts, still feels wrong, sending flickers of discomfort up her arm—But she doesn’t let go.

Because Mira’s hand is there.

 I would much rather wake up every single night for the rest of my life to help you through whatever this is than ever have to live in a world where you’re not here at all

And that matters more.

“I’m so sorry.” Rumi breaks.

Sorry for making them go through this. 

Sorry for not being able to ask for help sooner. 

Sorry for pushing them away for all these years. 

Sorry for all she did and all she didn't do and so much more.

Her breath stutters as the sensation settles in, pain and relief tangling together in a way she doesn’t know how to separate. 

Shaking, she clings to both of them now, anchored on either hand, held and holding in return in a way that feels almost overwhelming in its intensity.

Mira stills for half a second behind her as the feeling of a marred hand against hers hits her—and then, just as desperate, her fingers shift, adjusting without pulling away, without loosening Rumi’s grip. 

Mira holds her hand just as desperate, just as unwilling to let go.

Zoey’s thumb presses a little more firmly against her other hand.

And Rumi stays there.

Holding on.

“A thousand sleepless nights over not having you at all?” Zoey says, shrugging lightly even as her voice wavers and a small, teary smile pulls at her lips, “yeah, that’s a pretty easy choice to make.”

God.

Rumi can’t help it—the small, fragile smile that breaks through her tears.

Can't help the way her branded fingers curl tighter around Mira’s, desperate for contact she spent way too long fearing.

And she can’t help the way she looks up at Zoey with mismatched eyes that shine with too much—too much desperate hope, too much trembling fear, too much of everything she’s been trying so hard to keep buried, now spilling out in quiet, uncontrollable ways.

She can't hide it anymore, she can’t. 

As much as she tries, as much as she forces the sobs down they tear through anyway, silent in its devastation. As much as she forces the tears back up, yet they fall down anyway, whispering hopes of what ifs—

She can't hide the pain in her heart, in her soul, from them.

She’s tired.

She’s so, so tired.

Stil…

“What if it's forever?” she asks, trying to fight the rising anxiety in her chest that this will never stop. “What if this never stops?”

The anxiety that tells her she will always be like this—a broken shell of what she once was: a perfect mask branded into her soul before she even knew what pain was. 

Pieced back together by loyalty and order, stitched into something functional because she was such an obedient little thing, because she learned early that survival meant compliance, meant silence.

A precious treasure in the eyes of someone who never saw her as a person at all, only a collection of parts—blood, bones, muscle—something to shape, to use, to control.

What if she never recovers?

What if she—

She’s healing… but what if that’s as far as it goes?

… what if?

Zoey exhales softly, looking down at Rumi's hand cupped between hers with a thoughtful expression.

“Then I guess I’m going to have to invest in a lot more nail polish.”

Rumi blinks.

“What?”

Zoey looks down, tilting her head slightly as she gently lifts Rumi’s hand between both of hers and inspects it with exaggerated seriousness. 

“Do you really think I have enough for forever? Girl, I don’t” she snorts, shaking her head as she laughs quietly “Like, I’m talking full collection. Seasonal themes, holiday specials, limited editions—oh my god, we can do matching sets,” she adds, lightly shaking Rumi’s hand with her quiet excitement. “You’re telling me I get a forever excuse to turn your badass demon claws into tiny works of art? Babe, that’s not a tragedy, that’s a career opportunity.”

A sound escapes Rumi before she can stop it. 

It’s ragged and hoarse and completely unexpected, catching in her throat like it doesn’t quite belong there—but it’s there, and a second later she realizes, distantly, that…she’s laughing.

Actually laughing.

Zoey’s eyes light up immediately, like she’s been waiting for that exact sound.

“There it is. Knew I could get one out of you.”

Mira huffs out a breath behind Rumi, a failed attempt to hide her laugh

“You’re unbelievable.” she mutters, though there’s no real complaint in it, only affection threaded through every word.

“I prefer the term emotionally strategic,” With a quick wink, Zoey gently places Rumi’s hand to the side before shifting forward, crawling between the half-demon’s legs.

“You—” she pokes Rumi’s nose, making it scrunch as a quiet, involuntary reaction slips through her, “have nothing to worry about. You have us forever anyway.”

And—ah.

Are there any words more beautiful than those?

Forever.

With the way Mira is holding her as she nods faintly against Rumi’s hair—

With the way Zoey is looking down at her like she sees all of her, not just the damage, not just the scars marring her skin and memory, but her, whole and worth loving—

Rumi can’t quite hide the way something bright blooms in her chest anymore, like there’s sunlight pushing through storm clouds that refuse to fully clear.

Beneath her skin, her patterns shift. The sunlight shining through heavy clouds of darkness is no longer only in her heart.

She has them forever.

“I do.” she says, smiling.

“Well then—” Zoey hums, tilting her head as her fingers slide up to cup Rumi’s jaw, gently guiding her chin up just enough to meet her gaze, “I think that’s almost settled.”

Rumi raises one eyebrow, sniffling as a quiet laugh slipping out before she can stop it.

“Almost?”

Delicate fingers slowly swipe away the remaining tears in Rumi's cheek.

“Well, yeah, I am going to need to invest a lot of money if I’m going to be painting your nails forever, you know? And we definitely don’t have enough for that, so I’m going to need some kind of payment.”

“We don’t?” Mira muses from behind Rumi, lifting her head slightly to look at Zoey over the top of hers, her tone dripping with dry sarcasm.

“Nah, we don’t.”

“I’m pretty sure we do—”

“Nope. All gone.”

“Well, we are pretty famous and have sold out concerts—”

“Nope, that’s completely irrelevant. I truly am financially devastated because of eternal nail polish. It’s tragic, really.”

Mira lets out a soft laugh, her arms tightening just a little around Rumi as she leans in again, her breath warm against her ear.

“I see,” she murmurs. “And what exactly is this ‘payment’ you’re demanding?”

Zoey hums like she’s giving it very serious thought, her thumb brushing idly along Rumi’s cheek as her eyes narrow in exaggerated concentration.

“Well,” she starts slowly, “I was thinking something along the lines of—”

And then she leans in.

Rumi barely has time to register the shift before Zoey presses a quick kiss to her cheek.

Then another.

And another—

Faster now, playful in the way Zoey leans into it like she’s fully committed to breaking through whatever fragile composure Rumi had been clinging to. Her lips brushing against her cheek in quick, warm presses that leave no room to retreat, no space to spiral back into her own head.

Beneath her skin, her patterns wave, dancing along the feeling of lips against the half-demon’s skin, of the notes from the melody playing in the background. 

Rainbow sunlight slowly starting to blossom through darkened marks.

“Zo—” Rumi starts, but it dissolves immediately into a breathy, startled giggle as Zoey doesn’t stop, her nose scrunching again and again as she tries (very weakly and unsuccessfully) to turn her face away, only for Zoey to follow without hesitation.

When Rumi’s good hand grasps the front of Zoey’s shirt, fingers curling into the fabric, she doesn’t even know if she’s trying to push her away or pull her closer.

“Nope,” Zoey murmurs between kisses, her voice teasing against her skin, “you don’t get to escape this—" 

Another kiss, and Rumi giggles again as she tries to turn her body away only to be gently held in place by Mira’s steady hands 

"-I’m collecting my payment in full—”

An extra kiss, and the patterns beneath giggling lips bloom in that distinct, luminous silver. Spreading softly across Rumi’s skin in a way that feels almost holy, like her pain is being rewritten in real time by the shape of Zoey's lips against her skin.

“And with interest—”

“Zoey—” Rumi tries again, but it breaks into laughter halfway through as the smaller woman leans in again. Her shoulders shaking as she leans back only to end up pressing right into Mira instead, caught between them with nowhere to go and—somewhere along the way—no longer wanting to.

Zoey hums, satisfied.

One hand comes up to steady Rumi’s jaw as she angles her face back toward her, her touch gentle against marred skin even in the middle of the chaos she’s creating.

“Payment,” she insists again, softer now but no less determined, “non-refundable, non-negotiable, and very, very overdue—” And Zoey attacks again.

Another kiss.

This time a quick peck at the tip of Rumi’s nose, forcing a startled giggle out of the half-demon as the silver patterns bloom again, brighter now and no longer painted in the dull, aching hues of pain, no longer echoing the shadows the nightmare left behind.

She barely has time to catch her breath before Zoey shifts in front of her and dives back in, relentless in the softest way, earning another burst of laughter that spills out of Rumi’s chest before she can even think to stop it.

"Z-Zoey!" 

Her fingers tighten instinctively around Mira’s as if to hold onto something while everything else softens, loosens, lets go and unravels in the best way.

And all this time, as Rumi gets lost in it—lost in the laughter, in the warmth, in the overwhelming lightness of it—Mira is right there with them, giggling under her breath as she goes along with Zoey’s plan, her arms steady around Rumi, shifting subtly whenever she feels her move and adjusting her hold with quiet care to keep her from slipping into anything that might hurt.

“Okay—okay—” she breathes out, barely managing the words through her laughter, her head tipping back just slightly as she gives in, her eyes squeezing shut—

—and that’s when Mira joins.

“Told you I’m getting my kiss.”

Before Rumi can understand what's happening, Mira leans in, pressing her lips just behind her ear, right where her hair falls away from her skin, joining in Zoey's little game and making the half-demon let out a small yelp in surprise

"Y-You too??"

Rumi’s breath catches as Mira dives in again, still carefully holding the half-demon safely in her arms.

A little more certain this time, a second kiss along the curve of her cheek from behind—steady where Zoey is playful, gentle where Zoey is relentless, but still making every inch of her skin tickle and blossom with a rainbow haze.

“Hey—” Rumi tries, but it comes out breathless, breaking into another laugh as she realizes she’s completely surrounded now, Zoey in front of her, Mira behind her, both of them absolutely taking advantage of the situation.

“Don’t ‘hey’ me,” Zoey shoots back immediately, delighted while she points a neon-stained finger at Rumi's nose, still gently holding her jaw, “you started this by being adorable and emotionally vulnerable, this is the consequence.”

She leans in faster than Rumi can shy away, and presses another round of kisses on the uninjured side of the half-demons cheek.

“That is not how consequences work.” Mira murmurs against her skin, though she doesn’t stop, pressing another soft kiss just below Rumi’s cheekbone.

“It is tonight,” Zoey insists, leaning in again to steal another quick kiss, grinning when Rumi tries to turn away and fails. "and all the forever nights, with eternal nail polishers to come."

Rumi laughs again, brighter now, her shoulders shaking as she instinctively tries to curl in on herself only to be held in place by Mira’s arms and Zoey’s hands. Her head tipping slightly to the side as she gives up any attempt to escape, fingers still curled tightly around both of them.

“Okay! okay— I get it—” she manages between breaths, though she’s still smiling, still laughing, her voice soft and light in a way it hadn’t been before.

Zoey pauses just long enough to look at her, like she’s checking something and making sure that the laughter is real and not forced, that it’s landing where she wanted it to.

It is.

“Mm.” she hums, satisfied.

Mira lingers for a second longer, pressing one last, softer kiss to Rumi’s temple.

“Payment received.” Zoey declares with a small nod, like this was all very official and very necessary, before leaning over Rumi’s shoulder—

And pressing a quick, affectionate kiss to Mira’s cheek too.

Mira blinks, caught off guard for just a second before a quiet laugh escapes her.

“Hey—”

“Shared expenses, it’s only right. I’m not the sugar mommy tonight, so…” Zoey replies easily, like that explains everything, before she shifts back down and settles once more between Rumi’s legs, already reaching for the nail polish like nothing happened.

“Now, hold still, or I’m charging extra for emotional damages.”

Rumi exhales softly, the last traces of laughter still lingering in her chest as she lets her hand relax in Zoey’s hold, her body sinking back into Mira’s warmth without resistance this time, without that same edge of panic clawing at her ribs.

The shape of Zoey’s small kisses against her skin turns you’re too much into something softer, something that barely even resembles the same thought anymore.

The sound of her bright little giggles, right there in front of her, reshapes they’re wasting their time with you into something that doesn’t corrode, something that slips and dissolves before it can root itself into her open wounds properly.

And Mira’s quiet presence behind her, steady and impossibly patient, turns you don’t deserve this into something fragile and uncertain, something Rumi can almost—almost—disagree with.

The pain in her body means nothing with the smile of her soulmates glowing just as much as her patterns do.

Through her tear-soaked face, Rumi smiles.

Rumi smiles as Zoey keeps talking. Rumi smiles as they touch her demonic skin with no disgust nor recoil, no careful avoidance she learned to expect.

Because the shame and fear that lived beneath demonic skin was all but swiped away by the lips of her soulmates.

She smiles when Mira’s small, barely contained laugh at whatever Zoey said puffs a warm burst of air against her cheek, tickling just enough to make her shoulders relax and remind her she is here—not somewhere else, not back there.

Because the lingering, corrosive claws of a nightmare that bears no face but drags itself under the weight of a name—Celine—no longer has the same hold over her. Not when she’s here like this, held and protected in the arms of her soulmates.

She smiles when she looks down and realizes Zoey isn’t even following the imaginary outline of a nail on her clawed hands anymore —she has completely abandoned the idea and decided to paint the whole, entire sharpened tip at once, coating bone and edge and curve in unapologetic neon and thick glitter and tiny star-shaped decorations that cling to the wet polish.

Because Rumi could barely look at her claws without remembering where she was before—with Death’s hand by her shoulder,mourning a soul taken by cruelty even it could not mirror. 

Now, it's Mira's head gently resting on her shoulder, reminding Rumi that what she once believed was the only truth left to her—acceptance— was never the truth at all.

She has them forever, her patterns sing beneath healing skin just as her soul sings along with the melody in the background, still softly playing.

And at that, Rumi’s smile grows wider. 

She feels the faint pull of her elongated fangs against her lower lip, the subtle stretch of skin as something bright and almost shy pushes its way up from her chest and reaches her mouth.

The storm inside her keeps fading. And in its place, something warm begins to settle.

Something that shines through her cracks like sunlight instead of deepening them. That moves outward from her heart toward her soulmates, pressing into the space between their souls, wrapping around them the way they wrap around her.

Basking her in safety.

Letting her stay.

Because she has them forever.

And even then, forever doesn’t feel like enough time to love them the way they deserve to be loved, to give back even a fraction of their forevers they’ve placed so carefully into her hands.

Still—Rumi will make every forever in their eternity of forevers count.

“I love you.” she whispers in the quiet of the room, her head resting against Mira’s, her hand gently cupped between Zoey’s.

There’s a breath, a pause.

And Rumi doesn’t have to look up to understand.

Doesn’t have to see the way Zoey’s hand stills just above hers, the brush forgotten for a second as her breath hitches softly in her throat. Her eyes softening impossibly more, shining with something tender and overwhelming.

Doesn’t have to look at Mira to know how her arms tighten just a little more around her, how she leans in closer, breathing her in. How the quiet tear that slips down her cheek falls gently against Rumi’s shoulder.

Holding on to the moment as much as they're holding on to her

“We love you too, silly.” 

Zoey answers, her voice soft, fond, something tender wrapping around every word as she looks at her.

Mira nuzzles into her neck, breathing her in

“Love’you”

And truly—now, she knows for certain.

Rumi can’t think of words more beautiful than those.

Rumi doesn’t know how long she stays there in her soulmates’ arms.

Long enough for the darkened sky outside to begin to lighten, inch by inch, shadows giving way to soft blues and warm golds, the hues of the sunrise stretching slowly across the horizon, mirroring the colors of her patterns beneath her skin.

Long enough for the world to feel still, suspended in something gentle and safe.

Long enough for Zoey to completely abandon any attempt at restraint and stop caring entirely that she’s no longer just painting their nails—or claws, in Rumi’s case—but their knuckles too, their fingers, their entire hands.

A messy, slowly built piece of art across demonic skin, covered in neon streaks and glittering hues, each careless, enthusiastic stroke shaping something ridiculous and bright and unmistakably Zoey, stars and colors layered without pattern or plan, and yet somehow perfect anyway.

And, for the third time, Rumi feels it again.

The beginning of a vibration rolls through her chest, brushing against something deeply rooted—instinctual. It isn’t her heartbeat, isn’t her breathing. This is… different. Familiar, in a way she shouldn’t recognize.

Still, it rumbles in her chest like it’s trying to take shape.

For a moment, it almost does. A soft, forming vibration stirs beneath her ribs—then falters, thinning out before it can become anything at all, slipping back into silence.

It's confusing.

The feeling doesn’t vanish so much as… retreat. Like it had been reaching for something it couldn’t quite manage—held back by the dull exhaustion in her bones, by the ache threaded through her body. It sinks deeper into her chest, as if waiting for the strength to try again.

When it fades, she tilts her head slightly, as if she’s missed something important.

But she pays no mind to it, not when she's between her soulmates' arms.

Rumi sleeps.

And when she wakes, still lightly tangled in her soulmates’ arms, she lets herself stay there for a little while longer. 

Lets herself rest against Mira’s chest, listening to the steady rhythm of her heartbeat, while Zoey’s warmth presses carefully against her back, an arm draped loosely over her waist like she never quite let go.

When they finally get up, Zoey gently helping her steady herself with the crutch while Mira moves ahead to start breakfast, Rumi glances down at her right hand—and laughs.

A soft, surprised sound that blends easily with Zoey’s immediate, guilty laughter beside her.

Because her now human fingers are covered in nail polish.

Not just her nails.

Her fingers are a complete mess of bright colors and neon shades and glitter and tiny decorations and whatever else Zoey decided to add the night before, the polish creeping almost all the way to her knuckles in uneven, enthusiastic streaks.

“You dork.” Rumi smiles, nudging Zoey lightly as she starts walking, her overly decorated fingers gripping the crutch carefully.

Some days are good.

Some days are bad.

But every day is better with them by her side.

And a forever made of days with them?

Yeah.

Rumi can do that.

Rumi's silhouette, her trauma made phantom, only watches as it slowly starts to fade away for now.

Memories are power.

Rumi is not the only one with a silhouette.

One night, Rumi doesn’t wake in pain, doesn’t wake in terror, doesn’t wake with phantom hands forcing her skin apart.

She wakes with nothing.

There’s no commotion, no alarm going off that she has to struggle to reach, no Mira snoring softly against her ear, no Zoey shifting beside her, no invisible nightmare pulling at her soul— 

There’s nothing.

Just the cold spot on the bed where Zoey usually lays, their door slightly open. 

Just the faint scent of Zoey mixed with something else. 

Something sour, something bitter. Following a phantom trail out of the room.

Something is wrong.

Without even knowing why, something in Rumi’s chest turns cold, and suddenly every noise sharpens into unbearable clarity as her demonic hearing surges forward, stretching through the silence in search of where Zoey could possibly be.

Her sight sharpens without her command. She feels her ears slightly shift, accommodating to the sudden overwhelm of senses. 

Instinct flares beneath bruised patterns.

She hears the soft breeze slipping in from the balcony, the distant chirp of an owl —since when are owls this close to the tower?—and the gentle hum of bugs crawling around Mira’s plants. 

The faint ticking of pipes inside the walls, the subtle shift of fabric as Mira breathes behind her. Her soulmates serene heartbeat.

And beneath all of that, under the layers of ordinary night sounds, there’s the rush of running water somewhere down the hallway, and something else beneath it —something she can’t quite place, can’t quite identify, but that makes her skin crawl all the same.

Something’s off.

Carefully, slowly, she pushes herself up from Mira’s chest, deliberate in every movement because this could be nothing— just Zoey grabbing a midnight snack, just insomnia, just—

It’s not, something in her soul whispers.

Mira mumbles and turns onto her side, her arm instinctively wrapping around Rumi’s waist as her hair spills over her shoulder, humming something incoherent that even Rumi’s sharpened hearing can’t fully make out. Rumi hums back anyway, a small sleepy smile tugging at her lips as she leans down to press a soft kiss to Mira’s cheek.

“Be right back.” she whispers.

Untangling their legs —somehow twisted together in the middle of the night — she reaches the edge of the bed, instinctively moving for her crutch before stopping midway. 

Not only would its squeak definitely wake Mira, but she’s fairly certain she doesn’t need it all the time anymore. Her injuries still ache, maybe more than they should, but they’re healed enough that she won’t accidentally tear something open and bleed across the floor.

And her left leg, though still flaring in agony here and now, is now dulled to something much more manageable, thanks to the pain pills (and their kisses).

She rises carefully and limps towards the door, pausing when her half-asleep muscles protest too sharply and the deep ache where her skin once split apart flares brighter than she’d like. She braces herself against the wall, breathes through it with a quiet hiss, then keeps moving, following the not so faint scent of something… sour. 

Something bitter, salty—like tears?

Her stomach lurches.

She opens the door slowly, silently thanking Mira for oiling the hinges when it doesn’t betray her with a squeak, and steps into the dark corridor of the penthouse. 

Her vision sharpens instantly, adjusting far too well to the low light. She can see the grain in the wood panels, the subtle variations in shadow along the walls, the outline of furniture at the far end of the hall— more than she should be able to see in this darkness, considering how bad her left eye was.

Unease curls in her chest at the awareness that her demonic traits are surfacing again, sharpening her senses whether she wants them to or not. But she pushes the discomfort aside, clinging instead to the memory of her soulmates’ voices wrapping around her.

We think you’re beautiful, Mira had whispered.

We love you no matter what, Zoey had promised.

Rumi looks first toward the living room, hoping maybe Zoey is watching something, but it’s empty and dark. There’s no flicker of a screen, no movement, no sign of life other than the faint indentation of yesterday’s cuddle pile on the couch —and the scent doesn’t lead that way.

It doesn’t lead to the kitchen either, and the small fragile hope that Zoey might just be having a midnight snack dies quietly when she sees untouched counters and dark appliances, no fresh trace of her there.

Shutting her eyes, Rumi lets a more instinctual part of herself take charge for a few seconds, just enough to try and follow what her insides are trying to scream at her.

Something is wrong.

The half-demon follows the phantom trail with her head, turning away from the living room. The scent pulls her further down the hallway instead, toward… Zoey’s room. 

Where the door stands slightly ajar and a faint, low light spills out from inside.

That same feeling presses against her again, insistent and knocking against her ribs. Like there’s something solid at her side, nudging her forward while whispering in her ear that something’s wrong.

Rumi limps closer, letting instinct guide her, and the scent grows stronger with every step, thickening in the air until her heartbeat starts racing in her chest.

Because mixed with Zoey’s scent—

There’s blood.

Metallic and sharp, coppery and raw, burning her nose and settling at the back of her throat.

And in any other moment, she would have rushed in, would have kicked the door open just to make sure Zoey is safe and breathing and okay.

But she doesn’t.

She doesn't move, frozen.

Because the blood she smells isn’t Zoey’s.

It’s hers.

It’s Rumi’s.

It’s the scent of the very same blood that runs inside her body. 

The scent of crimson that once ran freely from her wounds onto a cold, unforgiving floor as she lay there collapsed and alone.

But…

It isn't just her blood that she smells.

The real reason she stops completely frozen in the middle of the corridor, eyes wide, breath trapped in her lungs, hands beginning to shake —

—is because there’s another scent tangled with it.

Celine’s blood.

A scent Rumi will remember until the day she dies. 

One that haunts her in her sleep and in the dark, threading itself between Celine’s phantom whispers at the back of her neck. 

A scent she had never known before that day— the day Rumi fought back, the day she proved that Celine is not, and never was, untouchable.

Her blood.

Celine’s blood.

What is happening?

She stares at Zoey’s door, slightly ajar, light spilling from inside, and the unmistakable scent— is coming from there.

Rumi can’t move.

She can’t-

Celine… Celine is here?

And suddenly the world moves too much.

The room seems to tilt around her as every single sound slams into her awareness at once, her demonic senses surging violently to the surface.

Her heart races in her chest.

The wind outside turns into a hurricane against her ears.

A hand rises up, clutching her head in a painful grip.

The hoot of an owl from buildings away becomes a roar.

Stop.

The distant hum of pipes in the walls vibrates like a drill against her skull.

Stop, pleas—

The faint creak of settling wood sounds like bones snapping.

Please—

And beneath it all—

Zoey’s watery sniffles cut through the noise like blades.

…what?

Soft breaths, muffed. Shaky sniffles, barely hidden beneath all the other noise. 

Zoey, trying to be quiet.

Everything around her stops all at once as her instincts lock into those sounds.

Zoey’s crying.

That’s what breaks whatever haunted spell had wrapped itself around Rumi’s limbs, her muscles unclenching all at once as her eyes sharpen. 

Her senses narrow into something precise, something dangerous, and she marches forward with an uneven limp before fear can root her to the floor again.

Deep down, she thinks of how she's been all but avoiding the room since she came back. Rumi thinks on how, whenever she passes in front of the door, she feels the terrifying claws of fear trying to drag her, feeding off the sheer uncertainty of what lies behind the wood.

She pulls Zoey’s bedroom door open without hesitation, barging inside with an urgency she hasn’t felt in a long time as her gaze sweeps across the room in quick, ruthless assessment, searching for movement, for a shadow, for anything that might have caused this.

There’s only Zoey’s room —weirdly organized but still cluttered in that distinctly Zoey way — clothes folded in uneven stacks, books half-piled on the desk, jewelry glinting faintly under the low light. 

No sign of struggle. No visible threat.

No Zoey, either.

And, for a second, Rumi freezes.

The feeling that had her avoiding this room at all costs, that made her evade every reason to come inside and linger even for a moment longer than necessary— 

The feeling that there was something behind Zoey’s door—something waiting, watching, patiently craving for Rumi to be the one to open it.

Comes back.

There’s something here, her mind whispers, too afraid to let the thought form any louder.

Rumi looks where her instincts force her to—toward a pile of clothes scattered carelessly across the floor, toward notebooks thrown around the room, half-open like they had been abandoned mid-thought, pages slightly curled, edges catching shadows in the dim light toward corners that feel just a little too dark, just a little too deep.

Nothing catches her attention enough to justify the growing, raw fear clawing against her ribs, nothing moves, nothing breathes, nothing exists in a way she can point to.

There’s something here.

And yet—she sees nothing.

Another sniffle cuts through the air, and Rumi’s eyes snap toward the bathroom, where the door is, once again, slightly open.

Light spilling from inside in a thin golden strip.

That’s where the watery breaths are coming from.

That’s where the scent of her own blood and Celine’s blood is strongest.

Her heartbeat drums violently against her ribs as she steps forward, each movement slow. The world around her growing louder and louder until everything blurs into background noise and all she can hear is Zoey.

Something is wrong.

She pushes the bathroom door open.

And Rumi’s eyes don’t register anything else.

Not the marble walls.

Not the marble floor.

Not the marble sink gleaming under the light.

Not the messy towels scattered across the tiles.

Not the bottles and jars lining the shelves in chaotic rows of different shapes and colors.

She sees only Zoey.

Kneeling on the floor, head resting weakly against the toilet seat as she heaves into her arm. 

Breaths breaking apart into choking gasps, one hand clawing at her own chest like she’s trying to hold herself together, the other gripping the edge of the porcelain so tightly her knuckles have gone pale.

Even though her face is half-hidden, Rumi can smell the tears, can see the dampness soaking into Zoey’s sleeve. 

Can hear the small, wounded sounds she’s trying and failing to swallow down.

Rumi’s chest twists painfully, patterns flaring beneath her skin in restless, agitated pulses as she takes Zoey in, drinking in her pain like it’s something tangible.

And then her eyes fall to the object lying beside Zoey’s knee—

And her heart stops.

Something is wrong.

That’s where the scent of her blood is coming from.

That’s where the scent of Celine’s blood lingers.

Zoey’s shin-kal lies on the floor next to her.

Completely covered in blood —old, dried blood, cracked and layered over itself from different moments, different bodies, different injuries. Darkened stains coating the metal in uneven textures.

And carved into the mystic blade, staring back at Rumi like a curse that never loosened its grip— 

—Is that same spiral.

The one she tried so hard to forget.

The one she shoved deep into that fractured cage inside her soul.

Right there.

The same blade that pierced her side when she was taken.

The same blade Celine dragged down her body as Rumi choked on her own blood, her scream tearing her throat raw.

The same blade Rumi grabbed and used to push Celine away as she ran toward a safety she now knows was never real.

The same blade she sent away with shaking hands, terror running through her bones like lightning, marking it with a symbol carved in her own blood — hope and horror intertwined.

The same blade that saved her when Celine raised her hand, ready to strike her down.

And now it lies there.

By Zoey’s side.

The same blade—

Rumi doesn’t even notice when her hand slips from the door handle, knocking lightly against the metal. The sharp sound echoes through the marble bathroom, small but impossibly loud in the silence.

It reaches Zoey.

And Rumi watches, heart racing so hard it almost hurts, as Zoey slowly lifts her head, confused and dazed, her face streaked with tears and flushed from crying, eyes red and glassy and rimmed with something darker —

—and locks eyes with Rumi.