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After the duel, after Harrow Nova pins the cavalier of the Third house to the floor and the Princess yells her surrender, Harrow doesn’t realize she’s bleeding.
It’s her adept who notices the bright red blood dripping onto the floor, staining her black shirt impossibly darker. Tern must have grazed her, but there’s so much adrenaline running through her veins that Harrow can’t even feel the pain. All she cares about is that she won. She feels lightheaded, almost giddy.
Gideon reaches for her, but Harrow jerks away. She can feel Gideon’s eyes burning into her along with the watchful gaze of the Sixth and the hungry, open stare of the Third. She doesn’t want to be touched—not here, not now. Not with everyone watching. Not when, for once in her life, she feels like something other than a failure. Harrow takes off her cloak and wraps it around her arm herself.
“Stubborn bitch,” Gideon mutters, but she allows Harrow her pride, and leads them both to their quarters.
Gideon doesn't speak to her the entire walk back—she just chews her lips bare of paint and watches Harrow out of the corner of her eye, and she doesn't relax until they're both back safe behind her bone wards. She’s twitchy, too, her fingers tapping a repeating pattern into her thigh, making her osseous bangles clink together.
The sound grates her ears. Any other time, Harrow would snap at her, but right now she can’t bring herself to care. She won. She won against the cavalier of the Third House—who, for all his blustering bravado, was the strongest swordsman she’s ever fought. She defended the Sixth. She told everyone at Canaan House that the Ninth House was not to be fucked with, and she won.
When Gideon leads her into the bathroom, Harrow goes, but when Gideon tells her to sit on the edge of the shallow basin Harrow folds her legs and sinks onto the floor instead, twisting herself to lean back against the wall. Gideon rolls her eyes but doesn’t protest. She takes a moment to shuck her outer cloak before she’s sitting down on the floor across from Harrow, their knees almost close enough to touch. The position scrapes up an old, long buried memory: Harrow is four years old, and still her parents’ daughter, and Gideon is sitting across from her springing her first tooth from a discarded chip of bone. They were equals then, but now, fourteen years later and almost a solar system away, the mere inches between them may as well be galaxies.
“Can I see?”
Harrow rolls up her sleeve so they can both get a better look at her injury, but the cut extends almost to her shoulder, so she’s forced to pull her shirt off in its entirety. Harrow’s nerves are steel, but her guts feel composed of some lesser material as she strips the shirt off, leaving her only in her bandeau and trousers. The wall behind her is cold, and she pushes back against it. She doesn’t want Gideon to see the mess of old scars that litter her back, a permanent reminder of her second greatest sin.
“Any other injuries?” Gideon asks.
“No,” Harrow mutters.
“Can I—”
“You don’t have to.”
“You’re my cavalier, dipshit,” Gideon grumbles. “It’s my job to heal you after a duel. Give me your arm.”
Harrow holds out her arm. Gideon’s hands are light and gentle as she examines the injury; the cut is long, but not too deep, and doesn’t hurt in a way separate from anything else Harrow is used to. She does wince, though, as Gideon presses the edges of the cut together. Bloodsweat begins to bead on her forehead and this close, Harrow can see the brushstrokes of her paint. The lines may smudged and blurred, but it’s clear Gideon is trying. At first, Harrow thought the Reverend Daughter would want to dispense with any Ninth House ceremony as soon as they landed on the First—she assumed that Gideon would waste no time shedding the title that she had bucked against all her life—but she didn’t. She continues to paint her face in the morning and say her prayers at night, and something deep inside Harrow aches to know that Gideon is maintaining the House’s traditions with such care.
It’s too much. Even intentionally avoiding her eyes, looking in Gideon’s direction at all is too much to bear.
Harrow looks down instead, her focus only drawn higher as Gideon begins her work in earnest. She says nothing to indicate that first push of thalergy, but Harrow finds herself transfixed on Gideon‘s hands as they grow hot, her thin fingers poking lightly at the sides of the wound. Wherever she touches begins to sting, bright pockets of pain zipping up Harrow’s arm as Gideon knits the wound closed, cell by cell and dermal layer by dermal layer. The flesh remembers itself, and Harrow cannot help but stare.
It’s solid work. Harrow has been healed by the nuns of Reconstruction more times than she cares to remember, and never has thalergy been used on her with this kind of efficient care. It makes bile rise in her throat for reasons she doesn't know how to name.
“Good,” Gideon murmurs, finally breaking her silence, and Harrow shivers, pushing down the thing that rises in her unbidden at her adept’s words. She chides herself—Gideon is praising her own necromancy, not Harrow. Ever the narcissist, ever obsessed with how she looks in the mirror. But Gideon is good—she’s meticulous. Long after Harrow thinks she’s done, Gideon’s hands are still warm on her skin, and she hums a bit as she runs her thumb along the seam, up and down, slowly, working out each knot and bump until the only thing left is a clean, thin scar.
When finally Gideon deems her work finished, she leans back, her hands falling into her lap, finally disappearing from Harrow’s sightline. Her arm tingles, and she feels… empty, somehow. Like as if when Gideon withdrew her touch, she took something else with her.
Harrow’s arm doesn’t hurt at all anymore; if not for the scar, Harrow would think her duel with Tern was nothing but a dream. Slowly, she flexes her fingers. She rotates the wrist, bends her elbow, rolls her shoulder.
Harrow still can’t look at Gideon, but she manages to mumble a quiet, “Thank you.”
Gideon sighs, and Harrow hears the back of her head thunk against the wall behind her. “Don’t worry about it,” she says. Harrow can hear the shuffle of fabric as Gideon repositions herself, shifting to lean her back against the tile wall. “Just… don’t do that again. I didn’t want to take that duel. I didn’t want you to put your body on the fucking line.”
The words sting, sudden and harsh, and Harrow feels anger rise within her. Her head snaps up. “I won,” she retorts.
"I don't care, you should have waited. You should have let me refuse."
"I couldn't let the Sixth—"
"Me neither, which is why I would have figured something out if you had let me ." Gideon says, and her whole body sags. Harrow sees, suddenly, how tired she is. Bloodsweat is crusted at her temples and in rivulets down the sides of her face, and her chest rises and falls like she’s just run a sprint. Her eyes have that distant, faraway look of necromantic exhaustion.
"I—" Harrow starts, then stops. Bites her tongue as the phrase I’m sorry dies in her throat, because Gideon didn't have to heal her. She could have gotten stitches from the Sixth, or bandaged it on her own. It's not her fault that Gideon overexerted herself for something that Harrow doesn't even deserve. "I'm not sorry," Harrow grinds out, instead. "The Third House was out of line. Death first to vultures and scavengers."
"You sound like Crux."
Harrow sniffs, crossing her arms. Her palm brushes against the new scar. She’s still only wearing her bandeau, and without the warmth of Gideon’s hands she can feel the gooseflesh rising on her arms. She shivers. Being here, so close to Gideon with her bloodshot eyes and exhausted sigh, so exposed, is suddenly too much for Harrow. She turns her face and shoulders, twisting her torso away from Gideon to stare instead at the adjacent wall. Her legs are cramped from sitting down for so long, and this new position relieves it somewhat.
It's only when Gideon's breath catches that Harrow realizes her mistake.
"Don't," Harrow says quickly, even though she knows it's futile. She stands suddenly, her vision swimming black as then she bends down to grab her discarded shirt. It's still wet with blood, and cold, but she shoves it on anyway. The fabric sticks to her skin and feels awful, but she can’t bear the idea of Gideon seeing any more of her scars. “Don’t. Please .”
"I'm sorry," Gideon says anyway, those terrible words, because her bleeding heart wouldn’t know when to leave something alone if it tried. “If I knew what I know now, back then, I swear, I would have done better. I would have healed you better than the fucking nuns. I’d have stopped them before you got hurt, Harrow—"
Harrow turns away, resting her cheek on the cool tile of the wall. All she wants to do is run away, but she feels bolted to the floor. Frozen. Her shirt, that she had put on in such a blind panic, now feels suffocating. The scars on her back burn, and despite now being clothed she feels just as exposed as before. “You were a child."
"So were you! And they hurt you.”
“It’s not your fault, Reverend Daughter,” Harrow snaps, pushing her way out of the bathroom. “I stole the chain. I paid the price. It’s not on you. Stop carrying my guilt.”
“I should have stopped them sooner. I was—fuck . I shouldn’t have waited as long as I did.”
Harrow sags. All the fire that possessed her just a moment ago has gone, and in its place she just feels empty. Hollow. She slumps down onto the edge of the mattress. “You tried. That’s more than I was owed.”
Footsteps. Then the bed shifts, and she feels a weight settle in next to her. Silence, only broken by Gideon’s breathing. Harrow stares at her palms. She can imagine what Gideon is doing—the sad puppy dog tilt of her face, the way she wrings her hands when she doesn’t know what to say. Harrow waits for her to keep talking, to keep apologizing, but she doesn’t. Gideon just sits there, almost close enough to touch. Silent.
Then: “You fought well.”
The compliment is so sudden that Harrow starts, and makes the extreme mistake of turning towards Gideon. Gideon is… closer, than Harrow had assumed, and she finds herself staring at Gideon’s eyelashes, heavy with paint, just a hint of red peeking through. Her lips are almost entirely bare of paint, chapped from the air and her constant chewing. There’s a scab at the corner of her mouth.
“Uh,” Gideon says. She shifts. “Um…”
Suddenly, Harrow is all too aware of their position. She flushes, pushing herself off the bed.
“I’m sorry, my Lady,” Harrow says. She does not say: This is improper for a necromancer and cavalier . She does not say: I wish I were not your cavalier.
She’s almost out of reach when Gideon grabs her wrist. Her grip is pitifully weak, but Harrow stills under her touch anyway. Her fingers are long and thin and can wrap entirely around Harrow’s wrist.
“Or you could stay,” Gideon says. Her eyes are wide, bright in the dim of the room. Harrow makes the mistake of holding her gaze; she feels pinned down, drawn in. Like those winged insects on the Ninth who would always flutter too close to lanterns; scrambling for the light even as it killed them.
She blinks.
“I just—” Gideon’s brow furrows, a crease forming between her eyebrows. She scowls, then, like she’s thinking very hard. It’s a facial expression Harrow is normally used to her wearing only when she is working on some particularly troubling theorem. She hates how she knows Gideon. Hates that despite her jealous rage, she has come to memorize all the quirks of the hailed savior of the Ninth House.
“We’re probably going to die here,” Gideon says. “Sorry. Harsh but true—so it doesn’t really matter, right? Like, maybe Lyctorhood doesn’t even exist. Or it costs some terrible price that I won’t pay. And you heard what Teacher and the others have said, we’re stuck here, and the Fifth are dead, and I don’t think what killed them is done.” Her hand squeezes Harrow’s wrist, and then she pulls. Harrow goes with her, as if in a dream, and allows herself to fall onto the blankets. “But anyway, we’re not really a necromancer and her cavalier, you know that right? You never took the vow.”
“I want to be,” Harrow says. She says it before she finds the will to stop it, and hates herself for the betrayal. It’s terrible, really, because it is both the truth and the greatest lie she has ever told. What she has always wanted was never to be a cavalier.
“What’s even good about being a real cavalier? We’re off the Ninth, and it’s not like Mortus sets a shining example for a future full of promise. Cam’s cool, sure, but that weirdo Protesilaus? Or fucking Tern, or that Second bitch who’s clearly shoved the entire dueling handbook up her ass—what I’m saying is it doesn’t matter now. You’re here. You won. That’s enough, right?”
Harrow opens her mouth to respond but she realizes, quite terribly, that she can’t. It’s like there’s a rock in her throat, a sob curled right behind her soft palate, threatening to escape. She doesn't know how to explain why it’s important to her, and she’s scared that if she starts, she will never be able to stop. Of course it isn’t enough; it will never be enough. But being a cavalier—a proper cavalier—is as close as she’s ever going to get. As close as she has ever dared to dream.
Harrow tries to breathe, tries to count seconds, but it’s all too much. Gideon is so close, and she knows if Gideon reaches out to touch her, Harrow will shatter.
Gideon moves and Harrow freezes. It’s like she’s outside of herself, watching, as Gideon reaches out towards her, like a curling lick of flame come to claim its ashes. Like a beam of light pulling her in to die. Gideon’s embrace is like nothing she has ever felt before. So different from the rough scrapes of their childhood, before Gideon became adept enough at summoning skeletons that Harrow could no longer get close enough to touch her. It feels electric, every part of her that touches Harrow sends pins and needles through her. They’re so close, and it has been so long since anyone has touched Harrow this way. Not in violence, or utilitarian care, but something else that Harrow does not even know how to name. Her arms envelop her, robes smelling like incense and preservation salts. Like home. Gideon’s lips press into Harrow’s forehead.
“I’m sorry,” Gideon says, and every word cuts Harrow like a knife. “I’m sorry for—for taking everything from you. I always thought you would have been the better necromancer.”
There it is. The weight Harrow has carried her whole life, laid bare before them both.
“Don’t say that,” Harrow whispers.
“It’s true though. I try, but I never gave a shit about any of it. And you care so much—you were right, back then. You would have been better.”
When she was still very young, before her parents' fears about her lack of aptitude solidified into disgusted resignation, Harrow would spend all day trailing Gideon’s studies. She insulted her bonework and stole her books and taunted her that no matter how hard Gideon worked she would never be a true daughter of Drearburgh.
Time had made a fool of her, though, and now Harrow can only bury her face into Gideon’s robes and shake.
“Do you know?” Harrow asks, finally, when her breath has slowed enough for words to come.
“Know what?” Gideon’s voice is slow, measured, like she’s approaching a frightened animal.
“The price of my birth.” The words flow easily now. Harrow breathes in deep, and tries to remember the salt, and the water, and the cold. She tries to remember how, before she was revealed to be a failure—when her existence was not a terrible tragedy but a necessary sacrifice—Harrow’s Mother had taken her to the saltwater pool. Here, there is no salt. There is just a mess of black cloth and Gideon. Harrow breathes. “My parents—the Reverend Mother and Reverend Father—they don’t hate me only because I am not an adept. They hate me for the price they paid. My parents killed an entire generation of our house to make sure that I could be born, and be necromantic, and I am a failure.”
At first, Gideon says nothing. Her arms just tighten around Harrow’s shoulders with a strength that Harrow didn’t think her frame was capable of. It almost hurts, and Harrow thinks that maybe this is the end. That Gideon is disgusted, betrayed. Angry, as she has every right to be. She hopes Gideon will make her death quick, even though that is a mercy that Harrow knows she does not deserve.
Harrow waits, but her death does not come. There is only the tight press of arms around her and the echo of Gideon’s thudding heart.
Perhaps Gideon does not mean to kill her after all. Harrow begins to thrash, eventually extricating herself from Gideon’s arms. Her vision is blurred, but she can see the way Gideon’s mouth is pressed into a tight line. Can see the tear tracks in her face paint. Sees her mouth move to say, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.
“Don’t,” Harrow hisses. She reaches out to seize Gideon, claw at her, push her away and hold her fast. “Don’t you apologize to me. You saved me. When I stole the chain, they would have killed me for it, and you—did you know? Did they tell you? When you stepped in front of the whip for me?” she laughs, high and terrible. “You should never have saved me.”
Gideon’s palm burns where it is still pressing into Harrow’s back, still holding her tight. The scars on Harrow’s back seem to writhe.
Then: “I knew.” Gideon’s voice catches, but her words are firm. “Harrow… I always knew.”
“You knew? ”
“Yes.”
“You knew my parents—”
“Yes.”
“They murdered our House.”
“Yes.”
“They killed them for me, and I am a failure.”
“Harrow…” Gideon’s voice is so sorrowful. “They told me the day you were confirmed to… to lack aptitude. I’ve known since I was six years old.”
Harrow presses into Gideon’s chest, and lets herself burn.
Harrow doesn’t know how much time passes before her breathing finally slows. It’s still dark, by the time her puffy eyes are ready to gaze about the room, and her head pounds. When she tries to get up, Gideon rests a hand on her shoulder. She flicks her wrist, and a construct claws its way out of her discarded robe and into the bathroom. It returns with a cup filled to the brim with water, and Harrow drinks, grateful.
When she’s had her fill, Gideon sets the cup on the nightstand and hands her a clean, dry shirt, somehow rustled up from the depths of her trunk. Gideon’s eyes are downcast, and remain fixed on her lap as Harrow changes. The image fills her with a peculiar sort of grief.
“Thank you,” Harrow says. Her throat feels red and raw, and her eyes feel puffy. She’s sure her facepaint is ruined—though Gideon doesn’t look much better. Gideon only shrugs in reply, throwing herself back to lie face up on the mattress. After a moment of hesitation Harrow follows her, staring up at the canopy above her. Gideon is only a hand’s width away, but the empty space between them feels like a canyon. Harrow wishes she could reach across that gap, but her body feels frozen.
Beside her, Gideon shifts, somehow unable to lie still. She’s clearly agitated, and it’s… bothersome. Harrow is just about to snap and ask her if she feels unwell when Gideon sits up. She turns towards Harrow, and the expression on her face is something Harrow cannot name. She licks her lips.
“There’s a benefit, you know. To not being my real cavalier.”
“What do you mean?” Harrow scowls.
“It means I can do this.” Gideon says, and kisses her.
Gideon kisses Harrow like nothing she could have ever imagined, when she allowed herself the fantasy of indulgence. She’s never seen anyone kiss. Not the Reverend Father or the Reverend Mother. Not any of the brothers or sisters or penitents of the Locked Tomb, none of which ever saw fit to engage in affection around Harrow. Not even in the magazines that the Daughter ordered and kept secret, and hid poorly, and that Harrow threw into the trash without ever looking at.
Harrow wishes now that she had not been so pious. When she had let herself wish-hope-pray for that kind of touch, it was always with someone faceless; only a glow of gold and the magnetic pull of light. Antiseptic. To imagine more would have been to ruin herself
Gideon doesn’t kiss like any kind of fantasy. She kisses like she’s hungry, and wanting, and doesn’t know what to do with her hands.
Gideon’s nose presses almost bruising into the skin next to Harrow’s own. Teeth nip her bottom lip and quick apologies follow, breathless, Gideon’s words swallowed as Harrow devours her in turn. She kisses Gideon like kissing her could save the Ninth. Like kissing her could erase all the wrong Harrow had ever done. Like maybe this, sacred devotion, this heretical sin, is the last way she can kneel to the Tomb and have it matter.
Gideon’s hands fumble on the hem of her shirt, but Harrow shakes her head. There may be a time, later, for Gideon to truly gaze upon the mess of scars that litter her back—but Harrow isn’t ready. Not now. She doesn’t want to think about anything but the heat of Gideon’s hands on her skin and the bruising softness of Gideon’s lips. She just wants Gideon.
Gideon nods, and doesn’t push. Her hands find the button of Harrow’s trousers and pull them down to her knees, helping Harrow kick the rest of them off. Then, Gideon rests her hands on Harrow’s hips, waiting. Her fingers tap against the curve of her hip, a silent question. Her eyebrows furrow.
Harrow considers, briefly, letting everything stop here. She thinks about folding her hand over Gideon’s to still her nervous fingers. She thinks about pulling on her trousers and cloak and returning to the cavalier cot at the foot of the bed. She thinks about cleaning her face and repainting the sacrament with sharp, even lines.
Then Harrow rolls her eyes and shoves her underwear down her legs, casting them off somewhere into the depths of their room.
She allows Gideon to rotate them, so Harrow’s back is pressed against the bedsheets. Gideon presses kisses down Harrow’s abdomen. Harrow watches her like Harrow has always watched her. Through all the times they had fought Harrow has learned to read Gideon’s movements clearer than any tome, and it astounds her that she can read Gideon here, too: the way her shoulder twitches right before her arm moves. The way she can never hide her target, always exposed by her wandering eyes.
When she finally reaches Harrow’s core, she stops, and Harrow freezes. Maybe it is too much to ask. Maybe Gideon only engaged her long enough to give her hope, only to pull it away at the last second, a final, painful con. It would be what Harrow deserves, probably. But when she meets Gideon’s eyes, she just looks nervous. Sheepish.
“Sorry. I—uh, I’ve always wanted to do this.” Her ears and cheeks are flushed dark, her pupils wide. “I’m just… savoring the moment.”
Harrow scowls, but Gideon’s weight is heavy on her thighs. It pulls her, grounds her, softens the retort she has building behind her teeth. “Don’t take too long,” Harrow mutters. “Or I might decide I want to be your proper cavalier after all.”
“Oh, my noble sword-hand. Never that.”
Harrow can’t help the whimper that bubbles up from her throat. Gideon’s eyebrows quirk, but Harrow can’t pay attention to the rest of Gideon’s reaction because suddenly Gideon’s mouth is on her, hot and wet and wonderful.
Just like Gideon’s kiss, this isn't anything like what Harrow had ever imagined—this isn’t anything like Harrow could have even begun to allow herself to imagine. Gideon’s mouth is clumsy but unyielding; she licks a broad stripe up the center of Harrow’s cunt before pressing sloppy kisses onto the insides of her thighs.
Harrow whines. It's all so much. Gideon's hair is tickling between her thighs, the gentle rattle of Gideon’s bone wards wound all around the bed frame. The sheets are hot underneath her back and Gideon's hands are on her hips, smearing paint all over the soft insides of her thighs.
Harrow doesn't realize she's crying until she is. First silent tears, and then her chest shakes. The ceiling above her blurs.
"Hey—fuck, hey," suddenly everything stops. The pressure between her legs lets up and then Gideon is cradling her face, thumb wiping away the tears. It's smearing her paint. She knows it's smearing her paint, knows it’s all ruined, knows the insides of her thighs are streaked with the same.
“Don’t stop.” Harrow grits out.
“I—does it hurt? Fuck, Harrow—”
“No!" Harrow snaps. Gideon can’t stop. Not now. Not when Harrow is finally allowing herself to want. “It’s. A lot. But don’t stop. Please.”.
“Sure,” Gideon says, and then her mouth is back, but slower this time. She licks Harrow with wide, flat strokes, the pressure firm and grounding and almost too much.
Harrow keens, high and needy, and Gideon’s tongue stops.
“Don’t stop you idiot—” and there’s the tongue, again. Teasing. Gideon licks into Harrow with maddening slowness, and if Harrow had any words left she would snap at her. Instead, Harrow’s hands find Gideon’s har, winding thick chunks of it around her fingers before she gives it a tug. Gideon lets out a soft, pleased noise that vibrates all the way down to Harrow’s clit, and Harrow winds her hands tighter.
“More,” Gideon grunts, and Harrow yanks so hard that Gideon whines . When she was younger, Gideon’s hair had both fascinated and reviled Harrow. It was like no other color found on the Ninth, growing thick and wild even through the Reverend Father and Reverend Mother’s attempts to shave her to the scalp. Harrow used to denigrate her for it, as evidence that Gideon was no true heir—but now, she is thankful that Gideon was never one to follow that particular sacrament of the Locked Tomb.
Harrow pulls her hair again, and Gideon says: “ Good .”
Her hips buck on instinct.
“Harrow Nova,” Gideon says, slowly, carefully, the movement of her lips maddening around Harrow’s clit. “You’re good.”
Harrow can’t help it. She moans again, a great gasp as she bucks up into Gideon’s mouth. Gideon obliges her happily, nosing against her clit before moving up to pepper kisses all over her mound.
“Reverend Daughter—” Harrow’s voice cuts out as Gideon rolls her labia between her teeth. Her touch is light, just the barest hint of teeth, and suddenly Harrow wishes she would bite. Not for the pain of it, but because Gideon’s touch feels good. Harrow wants Gideon to bite her, mark her, shape her; wishes her body had scars from something other than pain .”I need you—inside,” Harrow manages. “ Please. ”
Gideon grins, her mouth curving sharp against Harrow as she obliges. She takes her time gathering up Harrow’s slick as she fucks her first with one finger, then two, digits curling as Harrow clenches down hard. She feels full, her breath coming in short gasps as Gideon murmurs praise into her cunt.
When Harrow comes, it feels like an exhalation. Her body rocks up into Gideon’s mouth, her back arching, hands still tangled in Gideon’s hair before she collapses back onto the bed. She feels boneless as Gideon licks her through her orgasm, pulling her fingers out slowly, letting Harrow get used to the loss.
“Um, mind letting me go?” Gideon says, voice muffled—her mouth is still pressed up against Harrow’s cunt, held in place by Harrow’s hands.
Harrow starts. She lets go quickly, feeling her face flush as Gideon laughs, shaking her head to allow her sweat-damped hair to fall freely over her eyes. She pushes herself up on her forearms and takes an exaggerated breath.
Harrow throws a pillow at her.
Gideon dodges the aimed projectile, ducking her head as she crawls up Harrow’s torso. A ridiculous grin is plastered to her face, and with her paint all but gone, Gideon looks nothing like the Reverend Daughter of the Ninth House. Her weight settles on Harrow’s chest, eyes like twin sparks of Dominicus as her lips find Harrow’s mouth, all teeth and tongue and clumsy sincerity
Harrow kisses her back, and it tastes like salvation.