but the moon is low and I can't say no

[forthsofar]

There's so much less she can do, in comparison, and Rosie knows that all too well. No magical shattering of bone, no cold and swirling wind, no holding him resolutely in place with the clench of a fist or a murmured string of Latin. All she really has is her anger and shock that it had happened at all, that Nick had been--could ever be--so vile about it.

It's not much, not at all. But maybe it's enough. She owes it to Sabrina to try, at the very least.

She doesn't really have a plan, either, something she only thinks about once she's stormed into the lobby of Nick's building and stabbed her finger viciously at the call button for the elevator. Maybe she doesn't need one. Maybe all she needs is her fury, her love for Sabrina...and the key she still has, silver and shining, on the keyring in her purse. Once the elevator comes and she gets inside, she works the key off the ring; if nothing else, she'll just throw it at him. It's not like she'll need it ever again.

Rosie arrives at the tenth floor, charging out and down the hallway. She doesn't even hesitate, just unlocks Nick's door and flings it wide. The lights are on, dim and golden in the living room and bedroom, signs that he has to be here--not that she wouldn't have waited, seething and furious, until he arrived back home again.

"Nicholas," she snaps, in a voice that for a minute sounds far too commanding to be her own. In any other circumstance, it might have made her smile. "Get out here and explain yourself immediately."

[[tw for gaslighting & dubious consent in the thread]]

Comments

[awickedtime]

He loosens his control just enough then, just enough to let her come back to herself enough to realise what she'd just said to him.

"I didn't catch that," he says. "Again."

[forthsofar]

Rosie blinks once, twice, as the sense of something stifled in her head recedes. Her eyes refocus, then go wide as she realizes where she is, how she's sitting, what she'd meant to do and--clearly--hadn't.

What she'd said instead, too.

Rather than repeat herself, she gasps, sharp and frightened. Everything in her wants to move, to run, but the threads of his control are still strong enough to keep her exactly where she is. "What did you do to me?" she asks, looking terrified over at Nick. "Why can't I...what is this?"

[awickedtime]

"Interesting," he says, tapping his chin with one finger. "I knew what Scratch thought, obviously, but I don't imagine he thinks his sweet little feelings, his secret feelings, are so coyly reciprocated."

[forthsofar]

"Why are you talking about yourself in the third person?" It's a stupid, ludicrous question given the situation, given the sharp, nasty way he's looking at her, given the fact she still can't move, but it's the first thing she seizes on in her panic. "I don't know what you...how you made me say those things, but you need to stop."

Rosie strains against the invisible something keeping her immobile at the foot of Nick's bed, pulling so hard that she's distantly aware of a twinge in her shoulder, something painful that she may well feel for a long time afterwards. "How dare you make me say them. They aren't even true, now I know how awful you are. Sabrina's heartbroken, do you know that?"

[awickedtime]

"I really don't know what he sees in you," he sneers. "Pretty face, yes, but mortal women are just so drab." He rolls his eyes. "Sabrina will get over it when she realises what exactly it is she's missing." He makes a dismissive gesture. "Go on. Get out of my sight. And you don't need to remember this, not really. Do you?" He makes a gesture. "Go on. Go. Before I change my mind."

[forthsofar]

"If this is what you're really like, she's n--" Once more, her retort gets cut off midway. Her eyes roll as he shoves his way into her head again, blanks her memory of the last few minutes, leaving behind only the deep sense of something unidentifiable but wrong.

Rosie whimpers, high and frightened, and then she's running. She has only enough sense to grab her purse--how it got on the chair, how she got to his room, she doesn't know, can't think, doesn't want to ask--before she's gone. It's only when she's halfway home that she realizes she's barefoot.

How it happened, she's not even sure.