The tears should have been expected. After all, Redana is very prone to being overwhelmed by emotion, isn’t she? She can never hide anything. You even knew, back then, that something was troubling her, that she was going to say something, that she was going to act out—

But you never could have expected the [i]how,[/i] could you?

In the same way, oh Bella, oh most loyal of cats, oh most yearning of maids, perhaps the smile and the way she daintily baps at those tears comes as, if not a surprise, then a treasure long yearned for, absent for such a long time, for leagues upon thousands of leagues, and now it’s here. The princess— the girl that you risked it all for.

“Sorry,” she squeaks, and giggles a little. “I’m trying my best!” She shuffles backwards in the seat, as close to her Bella as she can, her eyes wet with dew and her smile defenseless. Her cheeks are still warm. (Did you hear her intake of breath, when you gave that order? Body and heart, love and worship. An invitation. No, more than an invitation, a command.)

“It’s just— I missed you. And I missed the person I thought you were. And I don’t want to miss the person you [i]are.[/i]” Her mismatched eyes shine in the mirror, refracted through wet joy. “And—“

Is it just a finger on her lips? Perhaps. Her eyes widen, and she sits up straighter, and she crackles with the energy of a thunderbolt. Jingle jingle goes the bell! How brave the both are! To dare this, to give, to insist, to demand.

It’s the slowness that reminds her that she’s supposed to be watching. Supposed to be learning. And she does try! Through the occasional sniffle, the occasional happy squeak, she pays attention for as long as she can. Which isn’t as long as she really needs to, but there’s only so long that she actually can focus on the work, and then she’s getting distracted by the softness of Bella’s fingers, and the expression of focus on her— on Bella’s face. Her Bella. Her Bella! Her Bella.

She bounds up out of the chair as soon as Bella opens her mouth to say that it’s finished. But she’s not doing it so that she can race off, to go chase something else, and she’s not dragging Bella along behind her. Her fingers interlace with those strong battle-terrors; her palms press against those nail-pocked twins. She even stands on tiptoe, so that she can sneak in a kiss against Bella’s throat.

“Thank you,” she says, and then she says it again, and then she says it again, and then she’s nuzzling against Bella, holding her monster-killing hands close, a bubbling spring of sweet water, drink her deep, and the sway back and forth, the step by step, that’s dancing, isn’t it? Like on Salib.

“I’ve been waiting my whole life for you to say that,” she admits to everyone in the room, a grand revelation that comes as a surprise to only herself. “For permission to [i]want[/i] you.” Her grip tightens. “And I do. I do want you. I want you to be free to be who you want to be and go where you want to go and love who you want to love, and I want you to choose me, I want you to [i]choose[/i] me, I wanted you to choose me back there, and I want you to, to get anything you wanted, anything you never got out of your bones, every time you said [i]well if I was the princess she’d be doing this,[/i] because it’s fair, it’s got to be fair, and you were—“

She fumbles, rallies, squeezes her eyes up, tries to hide behind their hands together.

“You were so hot on Salib. Are so hot. But especially there, when I was Skotos, and you didn’t know me, and you could want me without princesses and maids getting in the way, and I could be wanted by you, and I wish you’d [i]ruined[/i] him.”

She rubs her face against a pair of hands and looks up like one of Artemis’s attendant nymphs, you remember, in that giant frieze in the north wing? A delicate warrior, a dragon caught by a ribbon, a— well, a Dany in a maid outfit.

“And I [i]really[/i] want you to do things. To me. In this. To make up for lost time. Body and heart. I’ll be [i]such[/i] a good maid. I promise. Everything you want.” And if you asked her to turn this ship around, you’d shatter her like glass. She’s fragile, but tumbling into your hands because she trusts you not to drop her, and because she wants to climb you like a tree.

Going places will probably have to wait.