[ What does one do when faced with an enemy made weak? Answer: you make them weaker.
That is what Mutius had hoped to do on the afternoon he'd found Philomela in the garden. He'd smiled at her that other-brother smile and stood with both of his hands hid behind his back and he'd asked her if she knew the story of the first Philomela. And when she'd answered no, he'd just smiled more and told it had to do with teeth and tongue and would you like a lesson, sister. (And Philomela had asked, would you like a lesson of your own and that's when Valentine come and scooped her up.)
She thinks about that day often, whenever she feels unhappy or sullen or whenever Valentine is away on something called business. (Philomela knows it's not business, it's blood and it's eating, but Valentine promises one day soon, she can come with him and be on business too.) It makes her feel nice and maybe, yes, a little strange too. But it's a good kind of strange, like she's going to burst, like she loves her brother so much it'll kill her and she'll die smiling. ]
I know so, [ she says and crinkles her nose at him, like a kitten whose whiskers have been touched. ] Cause I'm the boss, right?
That's right, [ he tells her, mimicking that expression. ] You're the boss.
[ What had been perceived as weakness is strength. Valentine Saint is strongest with his little sister at his side. (Hello, Mutius.) He's called away more often now, because he is the eldest son and poised to take over the family when their mother dies. (A secret: he does not want to rule by himself.) He is called away more often now and soon enough she will be called with him.
He reaches out, then, tapping the very tip of her nose. ]
[ If her other-brothers had any say, little Philomela wouldn't be anything. Not the boss, not Val's favorite, not anything — just a smear at the corners of each of their mouths, just tallow and fat, just bones for the pot. But that's the benefit of being the firstborn, isn't it? It means you rise and so long as you keep rising, there's nothing and no one that can keep you down. Philomela isn't firstborn, or even second or third. No, she's last — the only girl in a long line of boys, and if anything her birthrite should have been a quick death, but Philomela had proven to be stronger than that.
It's hard to believe this pale-faced kitten with her ice blue eyes and white blonde hair has something vicious inside her, but she does. Something with claws like an animal and a jaw that unhinges and opens up wide, like a half-starved snake.
And he loves her, she knows that, loves every part of her. The parts that are girl and the parts that are ghoul. The shock and horror, the bashful smiles. It's near inconceivable that something so human could house something so monstrous, or that a monster be so capable of something so tender and gentle as the way he looks at her, as the way she nudges him back.
She taps the toe of his shoe with the round of her sneaker, careful not to scuff the polish there. ]
Bassianus is most strange, [ she declares and then makes a face (Bassianus likes her least). ] He said you wouldn't come back this time. [ A beat then she smiles again. ] But you did.
[ If her other-brothers had any say, Valentine would be long dead, too. He wouldn't pick her up from school every day, he wouldn't josh about with her on the estate grounds, he wouldn't read to her, he wouldn't tell her he'd teach her how to drive some day with the family car (the one their father had given to him before his untimely death). But they don't have any say, because Valentine is the eldest, and more than that he is the cleverest and the strongest. Valentine is all of these things, and he is in love with his little sister, too. The girl and the ghoul, every part. The Saints are all monsters, but they salvage a little humanity in this.
He smiles as she speaks, head tilting just so to one side. ]
I suspect he didn't want me to come back, [ he notes, with no particular grief. ] But– [ another nudge ] —you're glad I'm back. And that's all that matters.
[ The Saints are all monsters, each to varying degrees. Arguably Valentine is the worst monster of all — the biggest, the baddest and the most insidious (because he's so handsome when he smiles, because he loves his little sister so well and doesn't that make him a model citizen, or something near to one). The other-brothers are monsters too, each scrambling one over the other to model themselves in Valentine's image, but in the end there can only be one. One first born, one inheritor, one king to this heap of torn sinew and gnawed bones (and every king requires a queen and maybe, just maybe, that's what Philomela will be, if she isn't already).
She holds out her hands in the space between them, palms up, fingers neatly aligned, like she's asking to play a game of slapsies. There's a smirk in her eyes, like she thinks this is a very clever trap indeed (she doesn't intend to play slapsies, she intends to take his hands and keep them, intends to drag him down the hall and out into the sunshine before it disappears behind the far edge of the garden to warm some other part of the world instead).
Philomela lifts her eyebrows patiently. ]
Did he try to make you stay away? [ An implication lies in the way she presses her lips together, her smile quieting. I'll ruin him if he did. Cross my heart and hope to die. ]
[ There's an implication to his smile, too. We'll ruin him. Everything together, little one. (Every king requires a queen and Valentine's rides about on his shoulders. Every time Tamora has tried to marry her son off, he has always refused, always found some way of getting out of the engagement. Valentine knows the value of flesh, of a heart, and there is only one person in this world to whom he would entrust his. Philomela Saint is the beginning and the end.)
He puts out one hand, strong fingers (a grip to kill, a grip to wring life from one's body, to rip limb from limb) finding the bowl formed by hers. ]
Just a minor inconvenience, [ he tells her. (A minor inconvenience: a man with a shiv, now gone and consumed. The hand grabbed, the arm twisted, the neck snapped. One, two, three. Valentine is handsome when he smiles and graceful when he kills.) ]
[ Philomela likes we. It's a sentiment that doesn't really exist in the family, no not since Lucius died and Tamora's been left to hold what meager strands of it still exist together (strands that would rather turn on themselves, looking to swallow the family's own tail, looking to throttle the blood of its blood in its sleep). It is every Saint for himself, each with their necks tenuously held over the block, every Saint except Philomela, whose earned a place by her brother's side.
Before she takes his hand, she turns it over in her own. It's much larger than hers, its fingers are broader and the skin upon the fingertips is harder and thicker (hands for ruin and wreckage). Philomela's hands are graceful and delicate in comparison, their touch is deft and nimble. She can peel the skin off of a grape and can pluck the lashes from a dead man's eyes but when she pools those fingers together and uses them to squeeze she can bruise even the most resistant flesh, she can make even the most plaintive throat go terribly silent. Carefully, carefully, she traces the lines of his palm with a fingertip and then laughs, like he's just told a joke.
She's still smiling, her eyes watching him, suddenly wolf-like, when she asks: ] Did you save some for me?
[ Their family name holds a lot of meaning, but more than anything else, it is a joke. A joke because the Saints have never been saints, a joke because the lot of them smile with animal teeth stained by blood no matter how many pearls or tailored suits they might try to drape over the truth. A joke because this particular monster is made human through a sort of love for his sister in a way that the other families have never quite managed to grasp. ]
I saved you something, [ he mock whispers, leaning in in a conspiratorial manner as he reaches into one of his jacket pockets. What he brings forth is not flesh, but the intended murder weapon: the shiv. Not a tool that she needs, he knows, but an extra precaution. (Another part to the smile that he offers her every time he leaves without her. I'll be back, don't you worry. Keep yourself safe.) ]
[ Philomela exhales when he uncurls his fingers and it's there, sitting in the hollow of his hand: the shiv, made tiny by the broadness of his palm, scrounged together from so much sharpened metal and leather and glue, its blade ragged but small, almost dainty. In a way, it's a lot like Philomela — a looming danger couched in such a tiny package, something held up one's sleeve or slipped between one's fingers and being a good little sister, she's never protested Valentine's attempts to wield her (in fact, she welcomes it, her smile spreading whenever she does, a white slash upon the darkness that bows upwards in his direction). ]
I think I like it, [ she tells him, teasingly, that glitter in her eyes more than simply amusement (it's approval and adoration and I love it, I do)
When she places her hand upon the hilt, she doesn't draw it back, doesn't pocket it or take it straight away, just holds the thing loosely as her other hand curls around his wrist (again, tugging). ] I think I want to play a game.
[ Tag. Marco Polo. Manhunt. (Some of these games are bloodier than others.) ]
[ She's never protested his attempts to wield her, and things go much the same the other way around, a broadsword as light as a feather in her hands, a guillotine tucked away in her pocket. (That's the way love works, isn't it? Give and take in both directions, without the slightest qualms.)
She tugs and he offers no resistance. ]
Sure thing.
[ It's what he always says, when it comes to her. Sure thing. Whether it's going out to get ice cream, taking a walk around the gardens, or I don't think Mutius likes me much. It's I love you, dressed in other words, though he says those words too, sometimes, when nobody can hear, when he tucks her into bed and he could snap her neck right then and there, perched as he usually is on the edge of her mattress, and she could slit his throat as he leans over her to kiss her on the forehead.
But for now, she says I think I want to play a game and he has never been able to say no. ]
[ By rights, it should be a weakness, being unable to say no to another human being. It should be the making of a downfall but Valentine and Philomela's are too tightly bound; an invisible cord — as strong as iron, as red as blood — ties one to the other in inextricable ways. (Codependent's inaccurate, symbiotic may be closer, but whatever it is, it makes them both stronger, more vicious, more willing to do what's needed to be done. It gives them something to fight for, to strive towards and protect; it gives them purpose beyond simply guts and gore; and that makes them mighty compared to the rest of their kith and kin.)
The garden is sunny in an early evening way, the summer sun bright golden and fat and ripe in the boughs of the trees casting long, dappled beams across the grass and the flowers that sway in the breeze. Philomela tugs Valentine along, onto the rise of a small hill that falls away to rows of sunflowers (planted there on a whim by Philomela herself and which, hardy as they are, grow without tending; grow wild and reedy, much like her). Once there, she gives him a little twirl and then smiles up at him in a knowing way and asks: ] When will we get Bassianus to play? He thinks he's smarter than us and he isn't and I want him to know that he's not.
[ The estate is beautiful, perhaps deceptively so considering the family that lives upon it. She gives him a little twirl and he sweeps her off the ground completely, settling her in his arms as easily as if she were just as light as a feather. The sun casts lines of light over both their frames, binding them together with bands of yellow. ]
Soon, [ he tells her, as if they were simply discussing an upcoming birthday or holiday. Then, a little more firmly: ] He's getting complacent. [ The implication: it'll be easy. It always is, so long as they work in tandem. ] There's no one smarter than us, anyway. [ Another smile (quick, this time), as he presses his forehead to hers. ] Not together, at least.
[ Ask a Saint and they'll tell you: Valentine has always been more than a big brother to Philomela. When she was still a child (and before that a babe), he was the father otherwise made absent by a moving violation and an overlooked traffic light. He was the one who rocked her, who discovered all the things that kept her from crying, who bandaged her bruises and kissed her scraped knees. Who fed her first from the bottle and then the jar and then, much later, the knife.
And when she got older, he became the friend that she didn't have otherwise, Philomela having been kept on the estate with her nannies and tutors when they wouldn't let her back onto school grounds. He'd been the ride that picked her up after the first incident; and then again, after the second and then the third. It wasn't Philomela's fault none of her classmates were as strong as she was, that they didn't understand what it meant to be a Saint. But that wasn't how the school board saw it, no matter how many times Valetine argued it, and so at home, she stayed, left to fend for herself against the den of voracious wolves that were her other-brothers.
And now, older still, Valentine is something else again, but it's harder to discern its shape or understand its intentions this time around. It's there in the way his hand presses against the small of her back as he hoists her up and off of the ground, there in the way her ankles hook and her hips settle as if it were the simplest thing in the world to do. It's in the way his eyes threaten to shut when their foreheads press and Philomela laughs like he's just told a joke (and maybe he has, maybe it's he's getting complacent). ]
Does that mean we get to go on business? [ Her eyes crinkle at the corners when she asks, like she already knows what Valentine's going to say and she already knows just how she plans on rewarding him for it. ]
[ (He remembers: staying by the side of the cradle when the news of their father's death came to the family. There had been other-brothers, after all, to fend off following the news.
He remembers: helping her with her workbooks when the schools finally closed their doors to her, when the tutors went away for the day. The school board didn't understand what it meant to be a Saint so they learned, soon enough, and he made sure that there weren't any more hitches in her education.
He remembers: he's getting complacent.) ]
It does, [ is the response that Philomela earns. She's old enough, now, and he has been promising for so very long. ] Would you like that?
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no subject
That is what Mutius had hoped to do on the afternoon he'd found Philomela in the garden. He'd smiled at her that other-brother smile and stood with both of his hands hid behind his back and he'd asked her if she knew the story of the first Philomela. And when she'd answered no, he'd just smiled more and told it had to do with teeth and tongue and would you like a lesson, sister. (And Philomela had asked, would you like a lesson of your own and that's when Valentine come and scooped her up.)
She thinks about that day often, whenever she feels unhappy or sullen or whenever Valentine is away on something called business. (Philomela knows it's not business, it's blood and it's eating, but Valentine promises one day soon, she can come with him and be on business too.) It makes her feel nice and maybe, yes, a little strange too. But it's a good kind of strange, like she's going to burst, like she loves her brother so much it'll kill her and she'll die smiling. ]
I know so, [ she says and crinkles her nose at him, like a kitten whose whiskers have been touched. ] Cause I'm the boss, right?
no subject
[ What had been perceived as weakness is strength. Valentine Saint is strongest with his little sister at his side. (Hello, Mutius.) He's called away more often now, because he is the eldest son and poised to take over the family when their mother dies. (A secret: he does not want to rule by himself.) He is called away more often now and soon enough she will be called with him.
He reaches out, then, tapping the very tip of her nose. ]
I'm less strange. There.
no subject
It's hard to believe this pale-faced kitten with her ice blue eyes and white blonde hair has something vicious inside her, but she does. Something with claws like an animal and a jaw that unhinges and opens up wide, like a half-starved snake.
And he loves her, she knows that, loves every part of her. The parts that are girl and the parts that are ghoul. The shock and horror, the bashful smiles. It's near inconceivable that something so human could house something so monstrous, or that a monster be so capable of something so tender and gentle as the way he looks at her, as the way she nudges him back.
She taps the toe of his shoe with the round of her sneaker, careful not to scuff the polish there. ]
Bassianus is most strange, [ she declares and then makes a face (Bassianus likes her least). ] He said you wouldn't come back this time. [ A beat then she smiles again. ] But you did.
no subject
He smiles as she speaks, head tilting just so to one side. ]
I suspect he didn't want me to come back, [ he notes, with no particular grief. ] But– [ another nudge ] —you're glad I'm back. And that's all that matters.
no subject
She holds out her hands in the space between them, palms up, fingers neatly aligned, like she's asking to play a game of slapsies. There's a smirk in her eyes, like she thinks this is a very clever trap indeed (she doesn't intend to play slapsies, she intends to take his hands and keep them, intends to drag him down the hall and out into the sunshine before it disappears behind the far edge of the garden to warm some other part of the world instead).
Philomela lifts her eyebrows patiently. ]
Did he try to make you stay away? [ An implication lies in the way she presses her lips together, her smile quieting. I'll ruin him if he did. Cross my heart and hope to die. ]
no subject
He puts out one hand, strong fingers (a grip to kill, a grip to wring life from one's body, to rip limb from limb) finding the bowl formed by hers. ]
Just a minor inconvenience, [ he tells her. (A minor inconvenience: a man with a shiv, now gone and consumed. The hand grabbed, the arm twisted, the neck snapped. One, two, three. Valentine is handsome when he smiles and graceful when he kills.) ]
no subject
Before she takes his hand, she turns it over in her own. It's much larger than hers, its fingers are broader and the skin upon the fingertips is harder and thicker (hands for ruin and wreckage). Philomela's hands are graceful and delicate in comparison, their touch is deft and nimble. She can peel the skin off of a grape and can pluck the lashes from a dead man's eyes but when she pools those fingers together and uses them to squeeze she can bruise even the most resistant flesh, she can make even the most plaintive throat go terribly silent. Carefully, carefully, she traces the lines of his palm with a fingertip and then laughs, like he's just told a joke.
She's still smiling, her eyes watching him, suddenly wolf-like, when she asks: ] Did you save some for me?
no subject
I saved you something, [ he mock whispers, leaning in in a conspiratorial manner as he reaches into one of his jacket pockets. What he brings forth is not flesh, but the intended murder weapon: the shiv. Not a tool that she needs, he knows, but an extra precaution. (Another part to the smile that he offers her every time he leaves without her. I'll be back, don't you worry. Keep yourself safe.) ]
What do you think?
no subject
I think I like it, [ she tells him, teasingly, that glitter in her eyes more than simply amusement (it's approval and adoration and I love it, I do)
When she places her hand upon the hilt, she doesn't draw it back, doesn't pocket it or take it straight away, just holds the thing loosely as her other hand curls around his wrist (again, tugging). ] I think I want to play a game.
[ Tag. Marco Polo. Manhunt. (Some of these games are bloodier than others.) ]
no subject
She tugs and he offers no resistance. ]
Sure thing.
[ It's what he always says, when it comes to her. Sure thing. Whether it's going out to get ice cream, taking a walk around the gardens, or I don't think Mutius likes me much. It's I love you, dressed in other words, though he says those words too, sometimes, when nobody can hear, when he tucks her into bed and he could snap her neck right then and there, perched as he usually is on the edge of her mattress, and she could slit his throat as he leans over her to kiss her on the forehead.
But for now, she says I think I want to play a game and he has never been able to say no. ]
no subject
The garden is sunny in an early evening way, the summer sun bright golden and fat and ripe in the boughs of the trees casting long, dappled beams across the grass and the flowers that sway in the breeze. Philomela tugs Valentine along, onto the rise of a small hill that falls away to rows of sunflowers (planted there on a whim by Philomela herself and which, hardy as they are, grow without tending; grow wild and reedy, much like her). Once there, she gives him a little twirl and then smiles up at him in a knowing way and asks: ] When will we get Bassianus to play? He thinks he's smarter than us and he isn't and I want him to know that he's not.
no subject
Soon, [ he tells her, as if they were simply discussing an upcoming birthday or holiday. Then, a little more firmly: ] He's getting complacent. [ The implication: it'll be easy. It always is, so long as they work in tandem. ] There's no one smarter than us, anyway. [ Another smile (quick, this time), as he presses his forehead to hers. ] Not together, at least.
no subject
And when she got older, he became the friend that she didn't have otherwise, Philomela having been kept on the estate with her nannies and tutors when they wouldn't let her back onto school grounds. He'd been the ride that picked her up after the first incident; and then again, after the second and then the third. It wasn't Philomela's fault none of her classmates were as strong as she was, that they didn't understand what it meant to be a Saint. But that wasn't how the school board saw it, no matter how many times Valetine argued it, and so at home, she stayed, left to fend for herself against the den of voracious wolves that were her other-brothers.
And now, older still, Valentine is something else again, but it's harder to discern its shape or understand its intentions this time around. It's there in the way his hand presses against the small of her back as he hoists her up and off of the ground, there in the way her ankles hook and her hips settle as if it were the simplest thing in the world to do. It's in the way his eyes threaten to shut when their foreheads press and Philomela laughs like he's just told a joke (and maybe he has, maybe it's he's getting complacent). ]
Does that mean we get to go on business? [ Her eyes crinkle at the corners when she asks, like she already knows what Valentine's going to say and she already knows just how she plans on rewarding him for it. ]
no subject
He remembers: helping her with her workbooks when the schools finally closed their doors to her, when the tutors went away for the day. The school board didn't understand what it meant to be a Saint so they learned, soon enough, and he made sure that there weren't any more hitches in her education.
He remembers: he's getting complacent.) ]
It does, [ is the response that Philomela earns. She's old enough, now, and he has been promising for so very long. ] Would you like that?