The Silver Queen [AU]

[Coquette Blacquin]

She's silent for a while, mouth working as she filters through her excuses. Eventually, her shoulders slump, and it's clear the truthing has already cost her something: some small bit of pride, some bit of self-delusion she's too clever not to see through when forced to say it plain. "It was an arranged marriage. I attempted to get out of it, and I failed."

[Tethras Clan]

"..." Something about the phrasing, her inflection... Almost despite himself, Zevran asks, "attempted... how?"

[Coquette Blacquin]

Again, the pithy lie goes unvoiced. "Violently. But I am no match for my husband."

[Tethras Clan]

"...how did he... how did he react?" Zevran swallows. "What was he to you? More than anything else, what was he to you?"

[Coquette Blacquin]

"I.. I don't know. There isn't a more than anything else. He was..."

Tears spring to her eyes, and she wipes them away, her hand trembling. "He was my husband, my lover. My jailer. My enemy. He beat me, he raped me, but he was gentle sometimes, and I liked what he did, Ciren help me."

[Tethras Clan]

"That is not sin or failure in you," Zevran says instantly, the words as natural and true as Ciren's very existence. "Lust, arousal, pleasure... none of those are the same as consent or the soul's desire for a touch. Mortals cannot help but to react to certain things- it is simply how the gods made us. It is on him, the monster that used you, used your nature as a mortal to hurt you, that the fault and crime lies."

[Coquette Blacquin]

"As you like," she says after a long moment, the pleasantry nearly meaningless and thus allowed. She wipes at her tears, taking a deep breath, composing herself. "Have you more questions?"

[Tethras Clan]

"Many," Zevran says after a short but heavy pause. "Why... why did you hurt the one you know as Belladonna?"

[Coquette Blacquin]

"Master told me to," she says, her voice soft, her response automatic. Judging by the slight wince afterward, she didn't mean to answer so readily. 

[Tethras Clan]

"Master told me to," Zevran murmurs, eyes closing in remembered pain. How many lives did I take for that very reason? "Would you... do that again? To anyone? Now that Ozy is dead and more than dead, what will you make of yourself?"

[Coquette Blacquin]

"I.. I don't know. It has been... it feels like some time since I was... free," she whispers. "I was a good person once, I think. Perhaps I was not. Perhaps I was selfish and cruel. But I thought I was a good person. I...  I freed slaves. Surely that made me good? Surely that wasn't..." 

She rakes a hand through her hair, struggling to keep her composure. "It doesn't matter. I am not what I was then. I am not what I was yesterday, either. I am... something else. I will become something else. What... what purpose would you have me attain? Only, I seem to be in your power now, and I would not like to disappoint."

[Tethras Clan]

Slave skin. There's no mistaking that, however she tries to hide it behind fancy airs and polite gilding. "For now, rest. He... he clearly prized the... value of your body, but your mind and heart are deeply wounded. We have books a plenty, if you care to read. You can walk the deck during the day or go to the mess hall. Just take Vigile with you. Or myself. We've a good crew and none shall touch you as our guest, but a ship- particularly an airship- has dangers of its own." He pauses. "I would... take it as a kindness if you avoid Captain Isabela- Belladonna as you knew her."

[Coquette Blacquin]

She flinches, ever so slightly. "I see. I have-- oh. I suppose I do not have money to offer her, nor... nor much of anything, really. I... it seems I am..."

Trembling, seems to be an appropriate end of that statement. Coquette struggles not to think words like ruined or destitute, but it's hard, when she's yet again finding herself along among strangers, friendless, abandoned. I killed him. I finally killed him.

"If... if it's not too much trouble... may I request to be taken to Glaley? I have family there, a home, that I would very much like to return to."

[Tethras Clan]

"Glaley?" Zevran frowns a little. "That... we're heading to Raplin's Oak, a village protected by a local deity, but that's not far from Glaley. There are healers and sages there," he explains. "Glaley is..." He purses his lips. "In a bit of turmoil, last I heard. Some riots, I think, though it's been a few months since the last word I'd gotten."

[Coquette Blacquin]

"R-riots?" she asks, looking frightened. "That's-- please, you have to take me there. I have to make sure my family is alright."