The Devil Doesn't Bargain (MatD part 2)

Chapter THIRTY SEVEN - Just Perfect

(I can't thank you enough for your patience - my deepest apologies for the break between these last two chapter drops. Life has a funny way of crushing us when we least expect it. Here's an extra long one for you that has a special spot in my heart! Here's hoping you like it too.)

As much as I wanted to appease Sebastian's wishes right that moment, my body had an entirely different set of ideas and nearly collapsed into his arms the moment we stood up. Sebastian, naturally, anticipated my crumbling bones at the first sway and tugged me to his chest. 

"Ok sweetheart. Easy now."

Using his free hand, he leaned over and collected our wands then heaved my legs up under one arm and another just below my shoulders, warm at my back.

I wanted to protest, feeling entirely embarrassed by the heaviness of my body being fully supported by him. It seemed a silly time to become self conscious of my weight, but my fuzzy brain was being anything but reasonable at the moment.

"Just... let me... sleep here." They were more of a mumble than real words but Sebastian understood them all the same.

He scrunched his nose, a natural theatrical tease threaded through his lips. "Among all the soot and splinters? I may be a crummy boyfriend sometimes but you ought to expect better of me than that my cabbage."

I hummed into his shirt, nuzzling my nose to his warmth. The world was all a bit heavier now and my eyelids felt substantially more burdensome. I allowed them to flutter closed but not before catching a fractured glimpse of a single tear that threatened Sebastian's freckles.

The crackling disdain of the room curled around us as he shifted me just so to accommodate for the extra weight. My consciousness wound itself to the threads of his shirt and I floated in and out of alertness. I was vaguely aware of his stretch to cast disillusionment around our bodies and the way my muscles relaxed around the gentle up and down motion as he carried me through the halls and down the stairs, pausing a moment or two presumably to catch his breath.

A metallic tang still curled around my tongue though its gravitas was severely outweighed by the comfort of cedar wood and a strikingly strong smell of quill ink.

My mind hummed into his scent and I drifted off after it. A rest but not quite a sleep.

The clinking and thunking of the Undercroft clock door roused me momentarily but Sebastian's silent string of curses and a quick heel-turned spin back towards the wall snapped my tired eyes open. 

Peeking from around his arm, I caught sight of the palest marble-like slit of skin before it was promptly concealed under a thick green fabric. I pulled my forehead back to Sebastian's chest, worried what more I might see if I allowed my eyes to wander.

A second familiar bickering tone nipped the air.

"That's it! I am permanently locking The Undercroft the moment you leave. I have had it-"

"-Ominis." Anne's voice was soothing and cold concomitantly, a slight rasp crested under it all.

A few moments more seemed enough of a barrier and I dipped my head back again, though the effort felt far heavier this time.

Relief breathed over my lips. 

The slip of marble I'd seen only moments before had been nothing more than the bare skin of an arm. Though that in itself felt an invasion of an intimate moment shared only in private. Thankfully the rest of them had been properly clothed and concealed. 

Anne's white laced sleeve of her nightgown had been pulled up, bunched in a wrinkled heap a few inches above her elbow. Pink veins slithered across the marble, the faint heat of a receding warmth painted over her skin where something had lingered only moments ago.