Strange looks off. Stiff, teeth grit for rigor. He sees it from above himself. Later, maybe, someone will chase that. Ask the stupid question. Are you —
Someone else. Cedric has the knife.
Heart's got more dignity. It's slower, too, and she's tore up enough that he might not find it true. So it's this: A hand slipped under curl, the echo of a summer afternoon. Gentle. Familiar. When he tips her skull forward, to expose the base of her spine, that's familiar, too.
Takes a moment to place it right, to find the narrow space between tendon and vertebrae. This isn't neurosurgery. Thedas doesn't own a rarified understanding of the body's most complex organ, but it doesn't take that to drive a knife through brain. Only force. Only practice.
Rina jerks, one great final spasm. Breath cuts, eyes still, and she's gone. Something dribbles over his knuckles. If there's a mercy in the sound Eloise makes, it's that it covers the grinding squelch of the blade's remove.
Across the hall, wind through a door. Soft. Beckoning. It wraps over Eloise's hands, to be swallowed by the light.
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Someone else. Cedric has the knife.
Heart's got more dignity. It's slower, too, and she's tore up enough that he might not find it true. So it's this: A hand slipped under curl, the echo of a summer afternoon. Gentle. Familiar. When he tips her skull forward, to expose the base of her spine, that's familiar, too.
Takes a moment to place it right, to find the narrow space between tendon and vertebrae. This isn't neurosurgery. Thedas doesn't own a rarified understanding of the body's most complex organ, but it doesn't take that to drive a knife through brain. Only force. Only practice.
Rina jerks, one great final spasm. Breath cuts, eyes still, and she's gone. Something dribbles over his knuckles. If there's a mercy in the sound Eloise makes, it's that it covers the grinding squelch of the blade's remove.
Across the hall, wind through a door. Soft. Beckoning. It wraps over Eloise's hands, to be swallowed by the light.