all the precious things we surround ourselves

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writing after a long break is like stretching a muscle you haven't used in a long time and BOY is mine sore.
i owe it all to rose! if you're here reading thank you so much! i'll probably pop in from time to time.. <3

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When Brighid enters the master bedroom for the second time, Mòrag has not moved from her perch at the edge of the bed. All is quiet but for the steady ticking of the grandfather clock and the soft swishing of fabric as she rubs her palms back and forth over the tops of her thighs.

"Take care not to furrow your brow so, Lady Mòrag, unless you'd like it to stay that way."

Mòrag looks up, surprised. Surely she'd been too lost in thought to register Brighid's footfalls in the hallway, or the click as she'd closed the door.

"It's too late for that, I fear," she replies, voice tinged with weariness. With two fingers, she lifts the skin in between her eyebrows, traces over the two indentations made deeper over the years by the many varied tribulations of life. "Did you talk to her?"

She's referring to their teenage daughter, who locked herself in the attic about a half hour ago after a particularly heated exchange of words with Mòrag. They'd started to become routine as of late, though she can't quite put her finger on when.

"She's fine. Still angry, but fine."

Mòrag's shoulders relax just the slightest bit, a bend of relief. "I may have been too harsh on her this time."

Gingerly, Brighid takes a seat beside her wife. Unlike Mòrag, her face is untouched by time or emotion, expression difficult to read. "To say the least. Her words and manner are brash, but you often forget she is still a girl."

"It's precisely because she is still a girl that I won't have her roaming about in the streets of Alba Cavanich any time she pleases. A party after dark in some fellow's shack in the Industry Ward, full of ruffians neither of us have never even met? You cannot honestly think I, as her mother, would possibly agree to put her so callously in danger." She's begun to raise her voice again without even realizing it.

"How quickly you forget your own youth," Brighid says with a wry smile. She reaches over, places her hand over Mòrag's. "As I recall it, you were quite the... intrepid explorer in your day. And that's putting it lightly."

Mòrag huffs. "My situation was quite different."

"You're right. You didn't have parents, while our Sena is lucky enough to have two that love her dearly. Surely she shouldn't be punished for that." Brighid's words soothe, and Mòrag cannot ever stay cross for long. She sucks in a deep breath, blows it out.

"I'm not punishing her, Brighid. I'm establishing rules."

"Forbidding her to set foot outside the palace will only encourage her to do so in secret. You of all people should know that."

"So I should just let her do whatever she wants?"

It's Brighid's turn to exhale, a sigh not unlike those uttered when she's dealing with irritable bureaucrats or incompetent infantrymen. "I never said that."

Mòrag, sensing her frustration, laces her fingers together with Brighid's. The squeeze she follows it with could be a Sorry I'm such a handful, or maybe a Thank you for being patient with me. "Then what are you suggesting?"

Brighid looks right at the Special Inquisitor, lifts her chin. "I'm saying this time we should let her go. If security is of concern to you, it will be no trouble to send a detail along. Covertly, of course." Mòrag frowns, purses her lips like she's already thinking of a rebuttal. "We are in a time of relative calm, Lady Mòrag. It may not last for long. If this year of peace were to be her last, would you not wish for her to live it to the fullest?"

Brighid is right, as is often the case. Parenting came as naturally to her as breathing, while Mòrag always feels as if she's saying or doing the wrong thing, like she's poisoning something meant to be pure and good. Even in childhood, whenever Sena would get in trouble for telling a lie or throwing a tantrum, always at the core of her anger would be the dull ache of guilt. That no matter what it was that she'd done, it had to have been Mòrag's own fault. In all other realms of life, she's grown quite adept at keeping her emotions out of her affairs. But when it comes to her daughter, she sometimes finds herself acting like a child in her own right-- lashing out for nothing, haunted by fear and all the foolish things born of it. She's never let herself need anything like she does this family, and it's because of that that she struggles. Brighid knows this, but Sena, of course, does not.

"...All right," Mòrag agrees, against her inclinations. "I suppose she can go."

Brighid untangles her hand from her wife's, reaches up to stroke sleek black hair threaded with grey. The fondness in her touch is unmistakeable. "Thank you."

"Do not forget the security detail, Brighid," comes the quick and petulant reply. "You promised."

**

Outside Sena's bedroom door, Mòrag stands with her hand poised to knock. She's been there for about a minute already gathering her wits. Finally, her knuckles make contact with the wood, three sounds both sharp and hollow.

There's no response from within.

"Sena?" She calls, voice low but still audible. Again, silence.

Against her better judgment, she moves her hand to the doorknob. Incredibly, it turns.

The lamp by Sena's bed is still going, but she appears to have fallen asleep. There's a book lying open on her lap, pages askew. With her back still propped up by pillows, her head is at a strange angle, her mouth slightly ajar.

As Mòrag approaches, she marvels for the millionth time at how it can be that her daughter looks both like her and like Brighid at the same time. Her jet-black hair, Brighid's honeyed skin. Her sharp, straight nose, her Blade's heart-shaped chin. Hesitantly, still assessing sleep, she picks up the book, closes it, places it on the nightstand. She bends over the lamp next, shuts off the gas, filling the room with buttery darkness. The girl's breaths are even and deep.

"Good night, Sena," Mòrag murmurs, smoothing over the wrinkles in the light blue comforter. She leans forward, brushes her lips to the crown of her daughter's head. Breathes in the scent there, something clean like laundry and clover, the same as it's always been.

Sena stirs beneath her, limbs stretching luxuriously. "...Mmmh?" Her voice is thick with sleep.

Mòrag straightens up, tucks a strand of stray hair behind her daughter's ear. "I didn't mean to wake you. Rest now."

There's no reply. Assuming she's slipped back into sleep, Mòrag takes one more moment to admire before turning to take her leave. Then, just as she approaches the door, so soft she's almost sure she imagined it:

"Love you, Mom."