high on a hill there's a sweet bird calling

[forthsofar]

When Rosie came to, her head still aching and the memory of Nick's lost and desperate shouts ringing in her ears, it had been within the hot, filthy confines of the kitchen dungeons, the other prisoners--including Charlie, frantic at his own capture and how Sabrina had suffered during it--caged around her. It had been terrifying; foul, small creatures traipsing in and out, tormenting them with blows and threats alike, the ceaseless heat of the oven. Some people had even been taken away and brought back again, shaken and shaking, while others never seemed to return at all.

That had been bad, but what followed was somehow worse.

Through magic or mischief or some dark and fell knowing, their captor had learned of her. Or perhaps just of her voice, pure and sweet and clean. Master wants you, pretty bird, the goblin had rasped, leering at her as it unlocked the door, as it and two others dragged her out with sharp-nailed hands tight on her wrists. Lucky little black-haired bird, freed from the pie. She'd fought and screamed and wound up beaten for her trouble, their swinging fists and heavy clubs landing everywhere but her face until they dragged her away sobbing to place her in the throne room in another cage, more opulent than the last. When she'd seen the figure sitting on the throne, she'd screamed again, loud and terrified. Then, after another blow and a booming command, begun to sing.

Rosie doesn't know how long it's been going on, how long she's been here, one performance bleeding into the next, small creatures passing by when her captor is gone to pinch and poke at her or tell her the vilest and most frightening things. Long enough that her voice is nearly broken. Long enough that she doesn't cry as much as she had before, when it was all new and frightening.

She's alone now, one of those rare moments, sitting slumped at the floor of the cage and just waiting. When she hears the sound of footsteps coming closer, she turns her head towards them, staring listlessly for a moment before she grips the bars of her cage and pulls herself up again, readying herself for another song or something worse.

Comments

[awickedtime]

He nods in the dark, knowing that she'll feel it with how he's leaned against her. "He's downstairs. Beat up, but okay. Better once I told him that Sabrina's okay. They hurt her when they took him." He draws in a shivering breath. "Rosie...I'm sorry."

[forthsofar]

It's not good news by any stretch, but neither is it a confirmation of what she'd most feared after they'd been parted, after all she'd overheard about pies and feasts from the goblins and others as they passed by her cage or caroused in the throne room. Once again, such a small thing means so much, easing her frantic heart a little more. "He told me," she says, remembering how she'd held him as he cried in the pitch-black of their cell. "They stabbed her, and...and took him."

Hearing the shudder of his breath behind her and the whisper of his apology, Rosie pulls away just enough to turn around and face him, her hands reaching through the bars for his. "Don't," she whispers, fierce and sorrowful and firm. "You tried. If it had been just me out there..." She sniffles. "Things would've turned out much worse."

[awickedtime]

"We fixed it," he says, staying close to her, even as she's reaching for him. "I just...wish that I could have done more, Rosie. I wish...I wish I'd been able to fight more."

[forthsofar]

"You're fighting now, or helping to," she insists. Her thumb finds the pulse point on one of his wrists, starts circling slowly, soothingly. If it's odd that she's now the one comforting him, their roles at least shared if not reversed, she doesn't think about it. "Charlie and I...we wouldn't be able to get out of here on our own."

Saying that feels like a betrayal of sorts, some concession to an inherent weakness that she'd ordinarily fight against. But it's true, proven by their time in the dungeons and the bruises mottling her body, and she lets any thoughts of protest pass.

"We need you. And Sabrina. Both of you."

[awickedtime]

"We'll figure it out," he says, gently, leaning into the comforting touch on his skin, mirroring it with his hands on her. "It's not like we haven't taken on worse before. And Sabrina, she's..." One eyebrow twitches slightly. "You haven't ever seen...what she's like. When she's furious. When she's pushed too far. She's like...nothing I've ever seen."

[forthsofar]

The first time they met, Rosie played her almost-obligatory role as one of Sabrina's closest friends, testing and questioning Nick, maintaining a slight facade of judgement as though she'd yet to make up her mind about him. In truth, it had barely taken five minutes. Love--and respect, and trust, all the things Rosie had hoped for so long someone might feel for her one day--had poured out of him then, the same way it does now.

All over again, she's so glad Sabrina's regained the boy she'd so feared was lost to her forever.

"I'll see it soon, I'm sure," she says, the corner of her mouth lifting in a faint half-smile. "All these...creatures, goblins, I don't even know what to call them, they won't know what to do when Sabrina comes for them."

[awickedtime]

"I wasn't there when she did it," he says, quietly, happy to spend these few minutes distracting her any way that he can. "But she killed two angels who were trying to wipe out the Church of Night. I have no idea how much power that takes..."

[forthsofar]

"She killed two angels?" Rosie repeats, looking wide-eyed at him as yet another part of her preconceptions about the world--and her friend--shifts to something far more incredible than she'd ever thought possible back home. "Goodness."

There's a noise then, the sound of a door shutting and the tread of feet along the corridor, moving closer. Rosie looks up, tense and watchful, waiting to see if they'll simply pass by.

[awickedtime]

"They were witch-hunters," says Nick. "And they'd killed some of our people. They would have killed all of us, if they had the chance. Sabrina stopped that from happening, but...it wasn't easy. She was hurt doing it." He still, sometimes, has dreams about the way she'd looked, crowned in thorns, pierced with arrows. Nick goes quiet at the noise, settling back into the shadows. The incantations he's managed to weave are simple, weak things, but they make him all but invisible if he doesn't want to be seen, as long as nobody's looking straight at him. He keeps his hand in Rosie's.

[forthsofar]

"I'm glad they didn't kill you," she says, and if it feels like a sacrilege, to cheer the death of angels, Rosie only spares it a passing thought. "I'm sorry they killed anyone, but I'm glad she stopped them."

There's a slowly brightening glow in the corridor as the footsteps get closer. One of the goblins passes into the throne room carrying a torch, and Rosie's hand tightens on Nick's. "His Lordship's coming back soon, birdie," it rasps, looking over at the cage, its vision sliding without pause over where Nick's crouching beside her. "You know what that means."

Rosie swallows hard and nods. "He'll want a song. I'll sing for him, I promise."

"Else what, pretty bird?"

She dares only the briefest glance down at Nick, drawing strength from the weight of his hand in hers. "Or I'll pay for it."

[awickedtime]

Nick's jaw tightens at the way the Goblin speaks to her, at the implied threat. He squeezes her hand back and stays as still as he can, barely breathing.

[forthsofar]

The goblin lets out a pleased, gravelly laugh at her answer. "Knew we'd tame you, birdie," it says, continuing to make its way around the room, setting out platters and goblets and re-lighting some of the wall sconces with the torch in its hand. "Took no time at all, did it? Sad little songbird, knows who her master is."

Rosie lets out the quietest of whimpers, then nods, tears pooling in her eyes but not spilling over yet. She can almost sense Nick's tension, the way it shifts the way his hand grips hers; she prays they'll be left alone before it snaps, or the goblin notices he's there.

It takes a blessedly short time after that for the goblin to finish its work, and with another grinning leer, it leaves the two of them alone once more. Rosie waits for a minute, trembling, making sure the creature's truly gone before she lets out a gasping sob. "They're so horrible, Nick," she says, the words coming out choked and stuttering as she cries. "The things they say...it's almost worse than when they'd just hit me."

[awickedtime]

Rosie all but collapses and Nick presses himself as close as he can, both arms wrapped around her, up against the bars to get closer to her. He presses a kiss into her dark curls.

"It's okay, Rosie," he says, softly. "You just have to be brave a little while longer." He remembers something that Sabrina said to him, when things were getting really bad. "Braver than you've ever been. Can you do that for me?"

[forthsofar]

His hand lets go of hers and the loss is so sudden and sharp, Rosie might have wept all the harder if she'd been capable of it, if there'd even been time before his arms are around her, solid and strong despite the bars between them. There's no magic in it this time, no murmured incantation in the accidental brush of his lips against her hair, but it eases something in her all the same.

"I will, Nick," she promises, her face almost pressed against the side of the cage as she moves as close as she can to him, letting herself just be held. "For you. And Sabrina, and Charlie, until we can all escape, whenever that is."

[awickedtime]

They get as close as they can. He cradles her close to him, ignoring the press of the bars between them, keeping her close to him, keeping her warm and close and safe.

"We'll get you out," he promises, meaning it with every fibre of himself. "We're not leaving you here."

[forthsofar]

Rosie doesn't say anything, just nods, relaxing as much as she dares into the circle of his arms, letting the slow, regular rise and fall of his breathing calm her own. If the goblin had been telling the truth, this moment will end soon enough; the throne room filling again with the terrible, horned lord of the castle and his fawning minions, increasing the danger that someone might detect Nick's presence and spoil the plans he and Sabrina have begun to lay out.

She won't let that happen, no matter how much--how desperately, even after knowing him only a short time--she wants to keep drawing comfort and strength from simply having him here.