Work Text:
The chill was an inescapable thing and it followed her closely wherever she went. It burned her face red whenever she emerged from the mining town cabins. When she’d been forced to ride against it in fierce storms, it possessed her hair to lash violently across her cheeks in a blinding fury. And once those storms passed, it continued to insatiably lap at any skin left exposed to its gnawing teeth. Numbness in her fingertips became commonplace, leaving her defenseless as her trigger finger trembled beneath thin leather gloves. Like a starved coyote, the chill searched for any scrap of flesh it could find and devoured it to the bone. It wasn’t forgiving, as nature often isn’t.
She draws her coat closer to her body now, but the little winds continue to hungrily nip at her cheeks and dust them pink. What once ravaged her has become meek since they’ve descended the peaks of the Grizzlies. But it’s still there, and will continue to be until spring thaws the world.
“Can’t believe I’m lookin’ at one of the most wanted outlaws this side of the Dakota.”
She looks up from her feet and sees Karen smiling, holding a cigarette between her fingers. She brings it to her lips and draws out the smoke.
“God, if the Pinkertons knew how big of a baby you really are, maybe they’d have tried their luck in Colter,” she says with a cheeky grin.
“That’s the only way those fuckers could’ve taken me down,” the outlaw says, laughing bitterly into her scarf. “I’ve never done well in the cold. Every day that I wake up and can’t feel my toes, I’m closer to packing up and fleeing to New Austin. Thinking of building myself a house made of cacti.”
She walks through the frost-laden grass to where her friend stands, overlooking the Dakota river.
“You’re fulla shit,” Karen says, rolling her eyes. “The day you leave this bunch will be the day God, himself, shoots you off your horse. Got too much love in your little heart for the lot of us.”
The woman chuckles dryly, a mischievous glint in her eyes.
“Got too much love for you, Karen,” she says in a sickeningly sweet tone and leans in, tilting her head dramatically to the side as if to give her a sloppy kiss.
“Get the hell away from me!” Karen screeches and fumbles to push her away.
The outlaw stumbles backward lazily with her head thrown back in laughter.
“You play around too much, you know that?” Karen says, shaking her head, but the forceful tug on the right side of her lips gives her away.
She smiles down her nose at the blonde woman, “Yeah, that’s what I keep hearin’.”
Once they both settle down, Karen extends the cigarette to her, offering whatever she can manage as it quickly dies out. She takes it between her forefinger and thumb and lets the smoke warm her from the inside.
“You know what I overheard some of the workin’ girls sayin’ when I was in town?” Karen speaks up as the smoke escapes the woman’s throat.
She hums in question. Words out of the mouth of a working girl can hardly ever be taken for truth, but damn if they weren’t entertaining.
“Apparently, the number of clients they get skyrockets in the winter months. Somethin’ about men subconsciously wantin’ to be warmed up so they seek out activities that make ‘em break a sweat.”
She nods, “I guess that makes enough sense.”
Karen shakes her head, “That’s not all. The girls were also sayin’ that as it gets colder, the men are more and more riled up. Almost like it’s something with the moon, but instead of turnin’ into the dogman, they just wanna bury themselves in a woman real bad. But all I’m hearin’ while these girls are sayin’ this is that we got ourselves a bunch of fools too dumb to think clearly down in that little town.”
She stomps the life out of the cigarette with the toe of her boot, her spurs jingling as she drives it into the dirt.
“Ain’t no way that’s true,” she says with a sardonic smile. “That last part, sure, but the moon’s got nothin’ to do with it.”
“Well, somethin’s gotta explain it,” Karen says and crosses her arms defensively across her chest. “I can tell ya, once it gets colder the men start lookin’ at ya different. I never noticed the link ‘till now but it kinda makes sense.”
She has to fight the laugh rising in her chest as she tries to seriously process the idea that men are becoming more aroused due to a giant orb in the sky. It takes everything in her not to but Karen sees right through her.
“It ain’t that ridiculous, you know. You can’t tell me you ain’t never noticed Arthur actin’ different.”
The amusement rapidly drains from her face and is replaced by a look of bewilderment.
“What are you talkin’ about Arthur for? Arthur and I are just friends, we ain’t like that,” she sputters out.
“Oh, sorry,” Karen says, putting her hands up, “I forgot you was still on that.”
Her flustered reaction surprises even herself, causing a creeping warmth to crawl its way to her cheeks. A biting retort fumbles dumbly in her mouth.
“I’m not on anything. Don’t know what got in your head but it ain’t never been like that between Arthur and me.”
“It ain’t just in my head, honey. Everyone here knows it. You think folk ain’t seein’ the way you two touch up on each other the way you do? How neither of you goes nowhere without the other? Get real. It’s plain as day to everyone but yourself.”
She tosses a quick glance over her shoulder, hoping no one is near enough to hear their conversation. Instead, she sees that the camp has slowly come to life while she’d been distracted by Karen. Folk have begun their morning chores, migrating from washboards to clothing lines or splitting logs of wood in two. Her eyes flit across their faces until they land on the one she’s searching for. He’s far enough away, speaking with Pearson by the food supplies wagon. The cook waves his hands around animatedly but he’s turned away from her so she can’t tell what they’re speaking about. Arthur looks past the man and meets her eyes. He smiles and nods at her, to which she returns with a forced thin smile of her own.
“You don’t know what you’re talkin’ about, Karen,” she mutters, and without turning to say goodbye, walks away.
And yet, Karen’s words burrow themselves deep within her mind and linger in the spaces between each normal thought as the day continues. Surely she'd been exaggerating and not everyone in camp suspects her and Arthur to be intimate with each other. Karen just thinks she knows more than she does sometimes. It was very much like her to be overly confident about certain things, proclaiming them as fact even past the point she knows she’s wrong. Then again, that also wasn't the first time someone had mistaken their closeness for something more amorous in nature. Dutch, having watched her throw an arm around Arthur and share from his bottle, assumed the pair had made themselves official. This prompted some proud fatherly spiel wherein he clapped Arthur on the back and congratulated him. It was vague enough that neither of them knew what he was referring to until later. Once they both realized, it gave them a good doubled-over, tears-from-the-eyes sort of laugh. But Arthur quickly cleared it up with the man, assuring him that there was nothing of that sort going on. Apparently, Dutch remained unconvinced.
As she sharpens her knife, an interesting thought intrudes past the others. For a moment, she wonders if Arthur might be an exception to this phenomenon the working girls were talking about. He never spoke of women the way that most men did. So, if he’d ever been interested in that sort of way, she wasn’t privy to it in the slightest. But, he’s still a man and he isn’t immune to the desires of men. Could it be possible that Arthur wishes for a woman to warm his bed at night? Or perhaps, on the coldest nights, a woman to warm himself inside?
Her blade slips against the whetstone and nearly slices her hand open as depraved imagery flies behind her eyes. She curses loudly and the knife drops to the dirt with a muffled thud.
A horse gallops and skids next to the hitching post beside her and the rider quickly flies off the mount, hitting the earth with heavy feet. She looks up from her hand and it’s him. There’s a pristine buck carcass flung over the back of his mare from a hunting excursion he must be returning from.
“You alright?” He asks in a raised voice, meeting her with a walk that holds no patience. He looks down at her hands, likely expecting to see them covered in blood. His shoulders drop in relief when he can’t find any.
“I’m fine,” she says, standing up quickly and brushing dust off her pants. She forcefully clears her head of the intrusive thoughts, worried he might be able to see them if he looks too close.
“You nearly gave me a heart attack, woman. Don’t know what I’d do if you went and chopped off your trigger finger,” he says, running a stressed hand through his hair.
“You’d have to find a new riding partner, that’s for sure,” she quips unenthusiastically.
A breath of laughter leaves his lips to tell her she’s being ridiculous.
“Naw… There ain’t no replacin’ you. Ain’t a single person here has what it takes to put up with half the shit you and I do. We’d just have to teach ya to shoot with four fingers.”
His tone is lighthearted but there’s a hint of sincerity to his words that makes her cock her head in intrigue. He notices the change in her expression and quickly backpedals.
“Ah, don’t let that get to your head, now! I can barely tolerate ya most days. There’s just… no denyin’ you’re one of the best shots here,” he says, avoiding her eyes.
She smiles smugly and pats his chest.
“Tell me something I don’t know, cowboy.”
“Like I said, I can barely tolerate ya,” he says, swatting her hand off him. “Anyways, you mind takin’ that buck to Pearson? I need to have a word with Dutch about tomorrow.”
“Sure thing,” she says and slips past him to retrieve the fresh game.
She hoists the buck over her shoulder and nearly gasps from the unexpected weight. The animal is nowhere near light and it’s a wonder he managed to cleanly take down the thing. He looks over his shoulder at the sound of her boot scuffling in the dirt as she steadies herself.
She stumbles over to Pearson’s wagon and throws the carcass down on the ground. The cook is nowhere to be found so she figures she’ll save him the trouble and put her sharpened blade to good use. The knife cuts cleanly through the skin like warm butter, separating the hide from tender pink insides. As she’s making the final incisions, she looks up from the gruesome sight and sees Arthur talking to Dutch outside his tent. He seems relaxed enough, his hands resting on the buckle of his gun belt while he talks. It’s something he does often, just like someone might stuff their hands in their pockets for the sake of keeping them occupied. An endearing little action. And yet, for some reason, the common and utterly insignificant act of him doing this makes her forget herself.
Maybe it’s the suggestion of him holding a different object hidden beneath the confines of denim, right below his loose grip. Because the longer she looks, a vision of him taking himself into a fisted hand begins to overshadow her mind. He’s lying in his cot, and while everyone else huddles together for warmth in their makeshift beds, he’s fucking his hand in the darkness of his tent. His eyes are screwed shut and his mouth is parted slightly, but no noise escapes his lips to save himself the mortification of someone walking past and overhearing. He quickens the pace of his pumping hand and breathes out a quiet, ragged moan as he coats his stomach with ropes of sticky seed. His chest heaves, then slows to normal before he wipes the evidence away with a worn shirt.
Arthur looks at her with a confused look on his face. He waves a hand slowly in mock greeting to rouse her from her dazed state. Dutch, mid-sentence, turns to look over his shoulder, but she averts her eyes before they can meet his.
“Holy shit,” she whispers. She frantically finishes skinning the deer with her chin to her chest to hide the furious blush tormenting her cheeks.
Once she’s finished, she practically sprints back to her tent before Arthur can ask her what her deal is. She closes the flaps hastily and goes to sit on the edge of her bed to collect herself.
It’s not like she’s never fantasized about a person before, and she’s taken people to her bed more times than she can remember. This flustered feeling isn’t rooted in some virgin-like innocence, and yet she might as well be a pastor’s daughter with the way she’s blushing over it.
It’s because it’s him. He’s her partner. Her friend. Someone who’s grown to understand her better than she understands herself. She’s been the same person for him ever since they crossed paths in Montana all those months ago. Many feelings, albeit platonic, have come and gone since that fateful encounter, but lust? Lusting after a friend may be the most foreign feeling she’s stumbled upon in all her years of living.
A griminess so thick and so palpable enshrouds her, weighing heavily, filthily, on her skin. And there’s only one solution that comes to mind.
She straddles the firmness between her thighs as it bounces rhythmically beneath her. A moan unintentionally escapes her lips in response to the merciless feeling down below. Her blouse sticks to damp skin and plasters itself lewdly against the curves of her stomach and chest as her hips rock back and forth. Another moan. This one more pained than the last.
Her thighs have always burned something fierce whenever she’d mount her horse directly after a bath. Soft, herbal-scented skin would grate against thick cotton of riding trousers, eliciting the pained gritting of teeth. But this time, the minor uncomfortable sensation is preferable, simple, compared to the complexities of her consuming thoughts from earlier. A hot bath was her saving grace as it turned out. It cleared her head and made her feel like her normal self again. Whatever thoughts she’d been having of her partner had been washed away and left behind at the bottom of the steel tub like some tainted baptism.
She rides through the trees that fringe the perimeter of camp and calls out to Javier, who stands guarding the entrance. He gives her a short wave, and nothing else. The two of them haven’t talked much, despite having ridden together for over a year now. Most of the men in camp tend to keep to themselves, she’s noticed. It’s a shame the talkative Irish man went and got himself killed in Blackwater. He knew how to have a good time. He always claimed the two of them were kindred spirits, but she heavily denied it each time since it read like an insult.
She swings herself off the saddle and, like a moth to a lantern, migrates toward the fire to warm herself. The sun has sunk beneath the horizon and with it any amount of heat it provided, leaving her a shivering mess. Dinner bubbles inside the stew pot, prompting her to grab a portion before taking a seat on one of the logs.
The fire is reduced to glowing embers that do little to warm her bones. She nudges the logs with her boot but they just shift and plume ash. Sighing, she tugs closed the lapels of her coat and brings a spoonful of venison stew to her lips. The steaming broth slides down her throat and settles in her belly, making a furnace of her stomach. It’s a nice feeling, one that quiets her mind.
Suddenly, the log shifts as someone sits beside her.
“Where’d you disappear off to?” He asks. “I couldn’t find ya anywhere.”
Arthur settles to sit hunched over with his elbows resting on his knees, a bowl of stew in his hands. He’s wearing a dark long-sleeve shirt and a light jacket, but not much else to protect him from the cold. In fact, when she looks around, no one else seems to mind the chill as much as she does. Maybe Karen was right in calling her a baby.
“Nowhere special. I just had to go into town for a bit,” she says, taking another sip of the stew.
He nods his head, “Had to go into town and get yerself a bath, huh?”
She turns sharply to look at him, her brows drawn together in confusion.
“I could smell the lavender oil the minute ya hitched yer horse,” he explains. “What’s that about? Are ya plannin’ on finally actin’ like a lady or somethin’?”
She shoves his shoulder with her free hand.
“Shut up Arthur. You act more like a lady than I do,” she accuses. “Also, it might do ya good to take a bath for once.”
That last part she says a little lower than the first. Sometimes, when they’d be out on extended errands they’d bathe in the river together. But no matter how much he scrubbed his skin, when she lay beside him in her bedroll at night, the stench of cigarette smoke and sweat would linger in the closed tent. She always put up with it though because it likely meant she didn’t smell much better.
“The hell’s that s’posed to mean?” He asks, looking visibly taken aback.
“It means you smell like—”
“Naw, not that. Whatchu mean I act like a lady?”
“Oh. It means you’re goin’ all soft, big guy. Take it as a compliment,” she says, trying to suppress a smile.
“Great. First Dutch, now you. I ain’t goin’ soft, girl. And I sure as hell ain’t turnin’ into a woman,” he says, looking away from her and shaking his head. “As if you even knew what it meant to be one. Look at yerself!” He adds with an indignant wave of his hand that gestures from the top of her head to her feet.
She doesn’t need to look. Her coat is crafted from bear and bison pelts, made to fit a man larger than herself because the trapper lacked the expertise to tailor one for a woman. It keeps her warm enough, which is all that should matter. Wearing clothes that flatter her figure ranks relatively low on her list of priorities when every day is a fight to not freeze to death. On top of that, folk have always been mighty eager to remind her of her femininity whenever she dared step outside the docile role of her fairer sex. Which, in her line of work, was often.
“I’ll have you know I consider myself an expert on the matter… ma’am.”
She starts to snicker but when she looks over at him his jaw is set and he’s giving her a side-eye that makes the noise die in her throat.
“Keep callin’ me a lady and see where it gets ya, woman. Y’ain’t gonna be laughin’ when I’m forced to prove myself to ya.”
If there was ever any heat being produced in her body, it's all gone and rushed to her face just now. She stares at him, unblinking.
“What?”
“Mm, s’what I thought,” he says, bringing a spoon of potatoes and broth to his lips. “Now, if you’re done foolin’ around, are you comin’ with us tomorrow or not? Dutch said you might but I know you’ve got a lot on your plate as is.”
He said he’d prove himself to her. Prove that he’s a man. There’s hardly any innocent way to interpret that.
“Tomorrow?” She asks. “What’s happening tomorrow?”
He looks at her all funny-like, slightly annoyed even.
“Did you drink the bathwater or somethin’? The O’Driscoll told us they was all holed up in some cabin not far from here. Mentioned Colm is with’em. I only told ya about it a handful of times.”
She hears him but isn’t really listening. The phrase repeats on a loop in her head. She wants to ask him what he meant by it but the moment’s passed and she knows there’s no real answer. If asked, he’d just say he was teasing her and there’s nothing more to it.
He calls her name, bringing her out of her stupor. She opens her mouth to say something but the wind picks up. A bone-rattling shiver possesses her, making her shrink inside herself. He stares at her, unphased by the chill but with concern etched into his handsome features.
“Sorry, Arthur. I- I don’t know where my head’s at,” she says through clenched teeth.
“S’Alright,” he says, looking her over. “I forget how sensitive you are to the cold.”
He sets his bowl on the ground and brings his hands to cup around his mouth, heating them with hot breath. He then takes her hands into his and clamps around them, transferring warmth to numb fingers.
“Jesus, you’re freezin’,” he says.
He brings her hands close to his mouth and repeats the same action, trying to warm them back to life with his breath. He presses into her palms, massaging heat from the pads of his fingers into hers.
Had he done this simple gesture for her yesterday, she likely would’ve just felt grateful to feel her fingers again. But today isn’t like yesterday. Yesterday, she wasn’t acutely aware of the ever-present moisture nearly dripping down her thighs or the dull, aching pain at her core as it practically begs to be filled by a man. Yesterday, she didn’t envision that man to be Arthur. She didn’t envision herself blissed out and bouncing on his cock, being guided by his hands gripping her ass and forcing her all the way down on him every time. She also didn’t visualize their sweating naked bodies pressed against one another as he hoists her legs around his waist and fucks her relentlessly against the side of his wagon. Yesterday was, without a doubt, much easier than today. Today she’d thought of all these things and more.
She watches attentively how he holds her slender fingers in the thickness of his own. Those hands have snuffed out the lives of many, brutally at that. She’d seen them wrapped around the necks of men, crushing their windpipes and severing their spines when he’d been provoked on the wrong sort of day. Lots of blood on those hands. But there’s just as much on hers and in this moment, those blooded hands are so tender towards her.
If these same hands could kill without remorse, yet be so gentle when the time came for it, then by God, what else were they capable of?
She slips her hands out of his faster than she intended to.
“Thank you, Arthur,” she whispers, looking away.
“Sure. Maybe that’ll help ya to start actin’ normal again. Get the blood flowin’ to yer brain and such.”
If only he knew it was doing the opposite. Blood is flowing elsewhere and she’s the furthest from normal she’s been in a long while.
She stands up, leaving the bowl of stew unfinished on the ground.
“Here’s hoping,” she says, her hands clasped together to preserve his heat.
Her boots crunch ice-bitten dirt loudly beneath their heels as she makes her way through the quiet camp and to her tent. She doesn’t realize she’s holding her breath until the flaps close shut behind her.
“What… What is wrong with you?” she asks no one. Her tent is empty, and even though she wants to be alone, this is no comfort.
Her palms dig into the concave of her eye sockets, rubbing them furiously to wake herself up. She groans and shrugs off her coat, letting it collapse onto the floor. Her boots are kicked off her feet and her shirt is made quick work of before it’s thrown violently across the room. Her pants meet the same fate, being unbuttoned and kicked off, then kicked again so they lie atop the other garments. She collides with her mattress in a huff and lies there to stare at the ceiling of her tent, chest rising and falling rapidly.
She’s not going to be laughing when he’s forced to prove himself to her.
Why is that phrase repeating over and over in her head? More importantly, why is she closing her eyes and slipping her hand beneath the waistband of her combinations?
She pauses. It’s wrong to do this. So wrong. To touch herself with visions of him in her head is sick. But she needs it so badly, so desperately she needs this to be taken care of. The throbbing at her core ultimately wins over her conscience, and forcefully pushes guilt to the side.
Her fingers slide between the delicate folds down below, the slick moisture coating her digits easily. She imagines it’s his hand. Large and warm, playing with her and teasing out moans by dancing around her clit. He asks her if it feels good, but only incoherent noises leave her lips.
He chuckles and the breath of his laughter hits her center as he dips his head between her thighs. Lips replace fingers, sucking and leaving open-mouthed kisses heavy with tongue, ravishing her like a starved man. Her thighs clench around him and her calves tremble against his bare back. She whispers praises to him when she can find the words.
Please keep going. You’re doing so good. So good.
Both of her hands tangle themselves in his hair. She can’t help but pull on the strands the minute he slides his thumb inside her all the way to the knuckle. Her back arches off the cot at the sudden sensation but he pulls her back down, locking her in with a hand wrapped around her thigh. She can feel him smile against her, momentarily letting up the relentless forces of his mouth. He’s loving watching her squirm beneath him, because of him.
But the combined sensation of his thumb fucking her and the concentrated movements of his tongue at her clit nearly drive her to the edge. She squirms and brings her knees up around him, causing him to pull away and leave her empty.
Ya have to keep still, darlin’.
He coaxes her legs back open, spreading them apart with firm hands. But before he can return, she whispers desperate words that fall sweetly on his ears. He changes direction and begins to kiss his way north, traces of her still on his lips as they press wetly to her stomach, then her breasts, and then her neck. While he trails up her jaw, she tugs down his union suit from where it gathers at his hips. He assists her clumsily by shaking it off his legs and kicking it to the floor, where it now lies atop her own discarded clothing.
Before he takes her, he hovers on rested elbows and searches her face for any sign of reluctance. Only half of his features she can see clearly as warm oranges and yellows flicker across it from the lantern at her bedside. The fringe of his hair tickles her forehead, teasing her into closing the distance between them. With a hand on the back of his neck, she brings him down to her level and connects their lips. Their mouths move roughly against one another, their noses squishing and bending against the pressure of their touch.
He’s warm, so warm. His mouth is hot against her tongue and the points on her body where the two of them meet are ablaze with a fire that spreads down, and down, until it rests in a sweltering mess at the apex of her thighs. She needs him, were the words she’d whispered. And she needs him now. She reaches down between their two bodies to where his cock grazes against her legs and with a sure hand, takes hold of it and guides it to her entrance. She can’t see it but it feels thick in her grasp; her hold not permitting thumb and forefinger to meet.
The head slips gently inside and opens her up to him with a slow, shallow movement of his hips. He removes his lips from hers and rests his forehead against her own, looking down and indulgently watching himself disappear inside of her inch by inch. It fills her deliciously, stretching her open until he eventually bottoms out and their pelvises lie flush with one another. She lets out a sharp exhale at the contact, knowing he’s sheathed fully inside of her. Before he moves again, she brings her legs around his waist and crosses her ankles so his movements are limited to being shallow and forceful.
The cot squeaks beneath them as he pulls out and thrusts back in, slow at first. He quickly picks up the pace, pistoling his hips to give short thrusts that fill her to the hilt each time with a near-bruising force. One hand wraps around the meat of her thigh and another hand starts rubbing furious circles at her clit. She throws her head back with a wide-opened gasp at the explosive euphoric sensation of being filled by him and the simultaneous attention given to the sensitive nub. He goes even faster when he sees how close she is, and within seconds she unravels beneath him.
She notices through her clouded gaze his brows screwing together and lips parting as her soft muscles throb around the swell of his cock. It’s too much for him. He hurriedly pulls out and releases himself on her belly, coating it with spurts of his seed. He looks at her breathlessly through hooded eyes.
The two of them lie panting, him still stationed between her legs with a heaving chest and weary gaze. He leans down and places a chaste kiss on the inside of her thigh before slumping beside her and laying there in his nakedness.
She cums hard against diligent fingers. Hot and tingly ecstacy spreads from her core throughout her limbs, fluttering her eyes to the back of her skull and leaving her a panting mess. Once that passes and the drowsiness that always follows a dumbing climax sets in, she realizes she’d conjured a strange ending to her fantasy. It was one of genuine intimacy, not driven by the carnal desires of her body.
Thankfully, sleep takes over before she can begin trying to process whatever that means. She drifts off as remnants of pleasure buzz beneath her skin and warm her beneath ticking sheets.
Morning comes quickly, and the accompanying chill of a new day forces her off the cot in search of heavier clothing. She pulls fleece-lined chaps over jeans and buttons them at the waist before throwing on the bear coat she’s worn every day since Colter. As she slips her arms into the clothing, she thinks back on last night. There’s no reason to make a big deal of it. Surely men get off with much worse ideas in their heads about the people they know. She hopes all of that is behind her now that it’s been forced out of her system.
But this is not the case.
This hope is massacred in vain shortly after being conceived. For the day is ablaze with yearning, shame, and raging inferno.
Accompanying Arthur to the hideout was soon realized as a mistake. Every small, inconsequential thing he did served to stoke the fire blistering her loins. Every word whispered atop the secluded hillock, every incidental brushing of skin, and every intentional one too. It all fanned incessantly at consuming flames.
She rides back to camp alone with heavy pockets and a heavier conscience. And as she approaches the grounds, she sees her friend, the blonde woman, standing guard outside. Without thought, she throws her reins and swings herself off the horse, hitting the earth hard and swift. A blustering storm brews inside her, fighting against fire and losing. She approaches Karen, treading heavily over branch and stone, a wild look in her eyes.
“Karen!” She calls out.
The woman turns to face her, her rifle lowering just as quickly as it’s raised.
“Oh, it’s just you. You here to tell me I don’t know what I’m talkin’ about again? If so, you can keep on walkin’, bigshot.”
She sighs and runs a frustrated hand through her wind-tangled hair.
“No! No, I- I didn’t mean it,” she says, with an unmistakable sound of desperation in her voice. “Karen, you were right.”
Karen’s tensed shoulders sink beneath her coat and her features soften. She doesn’t seem to understand, but she’s no longer angry. It’s difficult to be when her friend stands before her, uncharacteristically vulnerable and fumbling with words.
Whatever forces are at work here, be it the chill, the moon, or an unknown third thing, it can be certain she is out of her depth, adrift in deep ice waters. And he is calling to her like a siren’s song but she knows it is an illusion she has conjured up and there is no solace allowed to be found there. He cannot take her like she needs so deeply to be taken by him. It would ruin them, for certain. Because they are not a wholesome people, and despite that, their bond has been forged by goodness. Something like that is uncommon for folk like themselves. It should be held closely, protected from whatever may destroy it, even if it is from herself. It’s for that reason she withdraws her hand, rides alone, averts wandering eyes, and tries her utmost best to quench the flames.
And yet, it has been only a day.
“You were right.”