And in the end of it all, of all the elegance of courts and prized positions, it didn't mean anything, at all. A boring monotony in the course of decades. And he's right - his hat had likely seen far more shit than the gilded dresses of nobility.

She shifts, teeth gritted and head tipped back to look at the bleak ceiling when his hands graze her skin. They’re cold, or maybe her skin a touch too warm around the cut.

“Is there any herbs here? Marigold, calendine, rhwydwaith carthion? Roots? Oils? There can’t be nothing. There’s never nothing.” She huffs, having not had any time to look before running into him.

Stitches. Not good he says, and that almost gets a laugh out of her. It’ll hold her skin together but he doesn’t know her determinations, either. She has only one set of scars, silvered on her wrists. She has spent decades nurturing the vanity crafted in Aretuza’s walls. The price paid was a great one, a choice lost, burned into ash, and maybe at this point, vanity was habit. And it isn't about what anyone else can do, it's about what she can do.

There is power, too, in appearing as though nothing can touch you. Even if it's far from the truth. But what was the point of magic if not to get you what you want.

“Mm. Would have been cleaner, at least," is the dry remark. "Do what you must then,” she’s been through worse than a few needle prods, after all.