. 02

Chapter Two

For a moment, Cordelia considers kissing the very cobblestones beneath her foot, moved beyond all measure to finally have the noble solidity of ground against her soles. But, upon a cursory scan of the area, noting the muddy pools of brackish water intermixing with the hardened-yet-gooey piles of Seagull excrement, she decides restraint is the order of the day.

Seabrook. Medium-sized town upon the central coast of Kereland. Full of sailors, fish, crates of goods, and an abundant and brooding community of gulls.

It smells of fish.

This is obvious of course, so obligatory a sensation that even uttering it aloud would be rife with opportunity for conversation scrutiny.

Unless, of course, this is one of those moments when the everyday peoples of the world require the obligatory mention. Just as one is supposed to bid someone a good day before daring to initiate conversation, perhaps the custom of a harbor is to acknowledge the olfactory existence of the sea?

A heated debate rages within her mind.

"Something the matter?" Annette steps forward, depositing her luggage onto the ground beside her. Unlike Cordelia, she seems to not pay much mind to the bacterial orgy splashing underfoot.

"Relieved to be on land once more," Cordelia drops her shoulders, fingers gripping the handle of her suitcase with no desire to follow Annette's lead. She swallows and coughs out, "It...

erm

... smells of fish?"

Annette's lips shift into a polite acknowledgement of the fact.

Success? Failure? Cordelia decides it must be impossible to know the expected script of arriving firsthand at a harbor.

"Welcome home, Miss Baker, as it were."

She tries not to think about the letter in her pocket, the color leaving Annette's face as she uncovers the deception which keeps it from her, the fear that might overtake her if ever it came to pass that its author-

"It feels simply as another island under my feet," Annette shrugs. She hoists her luggage once more, not particularly noticing, as far as Cordelia can tell, the septic drops of water dribbling off of its bottom edge. "Shall we make our train, seeing as it is a mode of travel you deem acceptable?"

Clean dress, happy smile, nervous hands - the woman across the gangplank is meeting a lover.

Stern cloak, heavy pocket. Pistol? Ex-soldier, most-likely. Returning home? Mixed Kerish and Emrish features, impossible to decide phenotypical primacy to suggest either homecoming or departure-

Annette is staring at you.

"Pardon?"

"Train, my dear," her redheaded companion nudges.

"Right. Of course."

- - -

Just as an afternoon in the waves leaves a phantom sensation of bobbing in water for the remainder of the day, so too does the jostling rumble of a locomotive. Cordelia can already feel it even as night falls to find her still in the train car, back against a less-than-luxury wooden bench in a cramped private room.

And it's only been an hour.

A shiver goes down Cordelia, her body slowly rebelling against the lot she has assigned it for the day. Each passing moment in such condition finds her constitution delving deeper and deeper into a fury which she can only describe as primeval.

"You're uncharacteristically quiet," Annette shatters the silence, maintained by the white noise of the moving engine. "I'm eager to hear what has preoccupied your mind all day."

Cordelia makes a rumbling noise deep in her throat and folds her arms across her chest. "My body would like to cease moving."

Peléroso's Symphony No. 2. That particularly lovely bit with the viola.

Annette tilts her head, eyebrow cocked. "You're never at rest."

This comment unfortunately provokes a twinge of ire. "There's a difference between me moving my body, and my body being moved for me," she huffs out. Then releases a displeased grunt for good measure. "Humans are not meant to travel so far in a single day."

Crescendo... vvphmn hmmmmmmmmm, bip-bip-bip-hmmmm. Decrescendo.

"Another casualty of modernity," Annette teases. "I fear you might not make it this time."

Might not make it.

What would her life be without you? You could die anyday.

What would happen to Annette?

Would she replace you?

"Do you think you would get a dog?" Cordelia queries.

Recovering quickly from the brief bit of confusion which interrupts her usually neutral expression, Annette cocks her head. "Are you considering plans for how I would replace you if modernity took you from me?"

And then the trumpets interrupt the viola, bursting in to end the-

"I hear greyhounds are exceptionally loyal."

Annette furrows her brow. "I cannot lie with a greyhound."

-movement and replicating the sounds of-

Cordelia releases an amused breath, prepared to sportingly thrash the counterpoint her companion has raised. "Many hounds are quite eager to cuddle with their masters, it shouldn't b-,"

She doesn't mean sex

.

"-Oh," She completes smartly. "I understand. Point to Baker, as it were."

Annette accepts her conversational victory - whether or not she also perceives the act of conversation as something of a sport is at present, unknowable - graciously, speaking once more to the character which Cordelia finds so admirable in her. She herself is not nearly the same gracious victor, nor deferential loser, as this lovely woman.

"My love, you are irreplaceable," Annette says softly, reaching across the narrow cabin to take Cordelia's hand into her own. "Should you perish, I would carry that grief unto my grave."

You would never recover from losing Annette, she is far better than you could ever deserve, and in fact, are you sure that she doesn't wish to abandon you in this very momen-

"Do you like Kereland thus far?" Cordelia shuffles on, deciding not to allow that line-of-thinking to carry on in the foregrounds of her mind. It'll rage with a gull force in the background nonetheless, but distraction from it is necessary. She turns her head to gaze at the inky blackness of the countryside at night.

New moon.

"The view is to die for," Annette says in a tone that initially reads as enthusiasm, but is actually sardonic. She makes a vague gesture at the shadowed landscape to their left - her right.

You would have to find a way to move on - to return to drinking and fighting would dishonor all that Annette has unveiled in you.

Perhaps you should get a dog.

Cordelia must not have been hiding -

You're hiding the letter from Annette.

- her angst too efficiently from Annette, for she sits forward and gives her hand another reassuring squeeze. Her soft brown eyes flick their lashes sympathetically-

You're assuming they're sympathetic-

- as she considers the detective before her. "It's just a little while longer, Cordelia," she soothes. "In an hour, we'll be set up comfortably in an inn, a warm hearth at our backs." Another soft squeeze. "Keep strong."

Cordelia notices the shadow of a tree passing by out the window and informs Annette that: "I read that the Yew is a sacred tree in Kereland. I've not seen any thus far."

The fourth movement of the Symphony No. 2 is rather underwhelming compared to the overarching themes established in earlier-

"I return your attention to the remarkable view."

A dog would be able to tell that you are a monster. Better not.

"Ah, yes," Cordelia mutters, losing the battle to add any affect to her voice. It comes out static, neutral, void of any real emotion. "Difficult to see in the night."

You

are

a monster. In fact-

"Unfortunately, Miss Jones, I was being far more crass," says Annette.

"Crass?"

The innuendo lands on Cordelia in a surprised and false-starting wave, initially breaking through the bickering chatter within to spark confusion for having missed Annette's meaning, and then resolving into a satisfying bark of laughter once understood.

Annette sits with her legs spread wide, skirt pulled tightly against her thighs to demonstrate a notable bulge in her undergarments. She's smirking, evidently proud of herself for such wordplay.

She ought to think up some witty banter to make reply, but all Cordelia manages to vocalize is an atonal:

"

Oh

."

"Sacred Kerish tree? Get it?" Annette giggles roguishly to herself, shuffling in place to provide even more of a view. "Not my finest joke, but at least I have your undivided attention now."

"I see." Cordelia clears her throat; pulls back the stiff collar of her shirt to uninhibit her now labored breathing. Like a loose string being pulled taut, Cordelia feels the fraying lines of her psyche focus into a single strand. "Your latest efforts to rehabilitate my feelings on transit?"

"A private car. Just come over and kiss me."

Cordelia brings a thoughtful finger to her chin, considering Annette carefully. "Have you been hoping for that this whole time?"

Have I missed a signal?

"Is the vibration of the train's movement not stirring something within you?" She bites her lip and raises her shoulders. "I've been going mad since the last stop."

"Miss Baker..." Cordelia mutters proudly. She crosses the aisle between them, fingers gently tugging the curtain on the door of the cabin shut. A quick peek down the hall to ensure all is quiet and well.

"You get this intense expression on your face when lost in thought," Annette tells her. "It's adorable." And then her lips are accepting Cordelia's, sweet and familiar. An instigating entreaty, slowly bringing them back and back and back into one another. "But, how much more precious when that focus is turned upon me."

"I cannot help but-,"

"No talking," Annette silences her with another kiss, wrapping her hands onto the back of Cordelia's neck and skull, fingers pulling against her hair and skin.

Cordelia's hands, meanwhile, begin the encroaching process of exploring Annette's hips and waist. A little pressure here, a little pull there, letting herself settle into the homely feeling of her form. She pauses briefly to admire once more the beauty of Annette's face, then guides her mouth to her neck.

"I didn't realize you were so eager at present," Cordelia teases, almost apologetically. Her companion writhes and sighs at each new touch, folding further and further into the need for her.

As for the chaos of Cordelia's mind - it is replaced with a singular focus.

Annette.

Cordelia likes to think of herself as attent to detail, able to pick up and investigate the tiny aspects that comprise a person, but it has been some time since she's been allowed as close of a look at someone as she has with Annette.

She's not a particularly large woman, far less broad and a handful of inches shorter than Cordelia, yet she carries with her a presence that could, at one time, loom massively over her. At the same time, she can make herself tiny, frail, and so precious that Cordelia can only wish to scoop her up into her arms and caress her forever.

Her strong brow, so often furrowed into a knowing and amused scowl. The slight asymmetry of her nose, ever-so-slightly pointed to the right as it curves upwards. Her lips which form a downturned, almost pouting expression when held neutrally - yet may split into a massive grin, full of a slightly over-bitten set of teeth. Freckles, splattered across her nose and cheeks and body so perfectly they must have been painted on.

The curves of her figure - legs as slender and soft as a dancer's; breasts that are scooped and supple; the gorgeous curve of stomach just under her navel; arms which so frequently invite Cordelia to press them back against a wall and have the woman to herself.

And then there are the tiny things Cordelia noticed over time which she loves. The protruding spikes of her spine running along her back. The little stretch marks creasing in her arms, waist, and thighs. The way her blue-green veins color her wrists and inner thighs. The slight discoloration of skin from sun spots and scars past and present. Boney ankles and fingers. Little moles dotting her shoulders and chest. A smell of olive bark and rose - one which rises from her natural odor and one from chosen soap.

Cordelia fancies herself as a person who can appreciate Annette in a way that no one else ever could. If her life was devoted to nothing but the study of Annette's body and mind, how could that be an unsatisfying passage of years?

The study of nothing but Annette, and of mystery.

"Those are still words," Annette chastises. She places a kiss on Cordelia's cheek and uses the hand on her neck to guide the detective down further on her body. "I have a better use for that tongue."

Cordelia can hardly complain, readjusting so that she may kneel on the floor and bringing her head down to her companion's skirt. Her fingers flick through the fabric, appreciating the slight ruggedness of the heavy, wintery material while her lips find the smoothness of her legs.

She allows her mouth to take its time upon Annette's legs, teasing their way up her. Annette loves a nibble here and there across her skin, and so Cordelia brings her teeth to it, tugging it and making her gasp out into the room.

At the edge of her undergarments, Cordelia slides her fingers along the seamlines, making Annette wait for her to go further, taunting the woman into begging her for more. It doesn't take long to bring her to such a point, yet Cordelia makes her wait even longer.

When her fingers do begin to graze the shaft of Annette's clit her fists ball up Cordelia's hair and pull her in deeper. She runs the pads of her thumb over the tip, teasing the little wet spot around and around - slowly and methodically. Annette loves the metric way Cordelia works her body, practically mathematical in the intentionality of her motions.

It is here that the usual juncture briefly troubles Cordelia: to retread paths which she

knows

will work for Annette, or to brave a new direction and uncover a new route? Her mouth touches the space underneath Annette's shaft as her palm presses against it.

The vibration of the train is a new experience for her, and thus, presents a novel experience. Best to lean into such novelty and craft something new.

Unless, of course, it presents too many new sensations and requires the structure of familiarity to ground it.

But is such structure even possible in this new environment?

Will she be bored of the trodden path?

Is she bored of you-

Cordelia raises her head to meet Annette's eyes, which are shut tightly and scrunched up into an irresistible expression of need. Annette's lips puff out hasty breaths, a splash of red coloring her cheeks. One hand presses firmly into the bench to steady herself whilst the other remains in its desperate grip of Cordelia's hair.

Novelty.

Security.

Which will win the -

A shiver descends down Cordelia's spine. Goosebumps dot her skin and the hairs upon her neck stand at attention.

She jolts upright, feeling a sudden urgency overcome her focus on Annette and win the battle for her attention.

She bends her neck to gaze out the window, staring off into the endless blackness of the countryside under a new moon. It ought to be dark, unchanging, interrupted only by the occasional farmhouse along the route, the infrequent small down where their train might stop.

But something else disrupts the night.

A solitary campfire, dotting the rolling hills. A plume of smoke rising up from its flickering flames, somewhere in the range of a half-mile away from their tracks.

Annette finally notices her new predicament. "Something the matter?"

"There's a fire," Cordelia informs.

"Objecting to camping as well as transit. How notable."

"It's..."

The detective returns to silence, feeling an inexplicable sense of import to the flames. Even after they disappear behind a nearer set of hills barricading the tracks, she cannot pull her eyes away from the window.

"Might I return your attention to my lips once more?"

And therein Cordelia finds her body reach its final straw. She turns back to Annette, opens and closes her mouth, and cannot force the words out. No sound leaves her lips or throat, and for a moment, she feels as though suffocating.

"Ah," Annette sighs. She rests a palm on Cordelia's cheek and looks as though she is trying not to be disappointed. She releases a forcibly patient breath. "One of those moments, yes?"

Cordelia nods, feeling pitiful and frustrated.

"I understand," she continues empathetically, if a little sadly. "And before you worry yourself - no, I am not displeased with you for it. We should be arriving soon. We'll get you someplace comfortable when you arrive."

Cordelia mouths a weak,

"Thank you

."

"Of course, love."

- - -

Spring is a wet season in Kereland, just as in Emril, and Bellchester. Cordelia simply wishes it would be a wet season everywhere but where she is presently standing.

She pulls her coat tightly around her shoulder and hides underneath the measly cover that the train station outside Fieldston can offer. It's not a particularly large stop, professing to the relative unimportance of their present destination. Cordelia grumbles that they ought to have at least expanded the cover. She stands in front of her suitcase, resolved that at least

that

would remain dry, using her body as an unfortunate and less-than-pleased shield.

And as they wait, Cordelia having finally regained her ability to speak, if only a little bit, frustratedly glares at the collar around Annette's throat and declares, "I hate it."

"It hardly bothers me," Annette shrugs, less disturbed by the rain, at least in appearance. "I'm used to it."

"You risked a great deal to never don it again."

"And now it protects me once more. Need I remind you our victory over it was only in Bellchester?"

Cordelia makes a displeased noise in place of a response. It had been Annette's decision, and while she ought to respect it, the reality of it weighs heavily on the detective. Her partner had felt that in an unfamiliar country, having a woman detective would already raise enough questions for people. That detective being unmarried, traveling with a partner who was also unmarried - she felt that would turn unnecessary suspicion upon them. Better to simply be a detective and her collar in public, and a woman and her lover in private.

"I can still hate it," Cordelia grumbles.

"And so you can. And will."

And returning her focus to the wretched rain and dim light of the train stop, she makes another exasperated noise. "Can she take any

longer

-,"

Which, of course, is interrupted by the sound of sloshing footsteps. Approaching the train station is an old woman in a heavy coat far more suited to the rain than Cordelia's. She wears her white hair in an unhappy braid, complimented by a grim, gray umbrella.

"Detective Jones, Miss Baker," she greets, her voice hoarse and possessing a quality which Cordelia dislikes immediately. She sounds perpetually in need of clearing her throat, which she never does. "Welcome to Fieldston."

Annette astutely perceives Cordelia's generally abysmal attitude and takes the lead in greeting the woman. "Thank you, ma'am."

"Drayburh," she supplies, lifting a hand and gesturing for them to follow her out into the rain. It's a muddy and rough dirt path down into the small valley which the town sits in. "Come along. Gerald has brought the carriage."

Inside the carriage, Cordelia simply glowers at the woman, mostly unintentionally. Annette would likely insist she is simply in a sour mood and that that is biasing her opinion at present, but Cordelia resolves that this is a problem to be solved by a future version of herself - one who is dry, comfortable, and has not been traveling the entirety of the day.