Sous sat at the kitchen table with her eyes as black slits. Two small balls of toilet tissue was stuck up her nose drenched in blood. She ate her food at the table but her mother and her grandfather were unimpressed.
"Sous...why are you ruining our dinner?" Elevyn asked. She looked at her Alpha daughter, disgusted by the little balls of blood.
Sous leaned in her chair and smiled at her parent and grandparent. "Do you want me to take them out?"
"NO!" Both of them said.
"Am I middle age?" Sous asked her mother.
"Well, you're thirty-six so..."
Artreus placed his fork and spoon down. "Did you go to the lumberyard?" He said, wiping his mouth with the napkin.
"Yeah...Ill be cutting wood all day," Sous moaned.
She pulled one blood-soaked tissue from her nostril. A fresh trickle ran over her lip. Evelyn flinched, turning her face away. Artreus stared at his plate, jaw tight. The silence humorous, broken only by Sous' wet sniffle and the clink of silverware scraping untouched food.
Evelyn's tighten her fork. Artreus' napkin crumpled in his fist. Sous watched them, a faint, unsettling curve on her lips as she pressed the tissue back into place. The air tasted metallic, sharp.
"Your nose is bleeding because you're reading that porno," Artreus said.
"WRONG! Its a book that will make me a better lover."
"What happened at the lumberyard?"
"I got offered a job and I start next week."
The fairy nodded his head and went back to eating. In a couple of weeks, maybe even months, Sous would be able to get her own place and get on her own two feet.
Sous showed up to work bundled up and was immediately handed an ax by the fairies on the clock. The only wolf present, she was given an area she was to focus on. She wiped her nose and proceeded to chop wood.
Her nose continued to bleed throughout the day, staining her gloves and dripping onto the logs. The fairies kept their distance, exchanging uneasy glances whenever she paused to stuff fresh tissue up her nostrils.
Sous swung the ax with brutal efficiency, each strike sending splinters flying like shrapnel. The rhythmic thunk echoed through the frosty air, punctuated by her wet, congested breathing.
Sweat drops appeared on the back of her. "I need to hurry up and finish that book." She said with a red face.
The weeks went on like that until a couple of months past and Sous was able to get a little cottage. It was a cottage near the coast, not in the trees like the fairies.
The fairies at the lumberyard didn't speak to her much. They never did. They just handed her the ax and pointed to her section. Sous didn't mind.
She liked the solitude of swinging the ax, the thud of steel biting into wood, the spray of splinters catching the weak winter sun, winter twenty four seven in Faelock.
Her nose no longer bled because she was no longer reading the book, having finished it, only a faint rusty smear on her sleeve most days. She saved her coins, counted them obsessively at night, and finally handed over a fat pouch for the cottage key. It smelled of damp stone and salt. It was too much effort to get a new bank and the cottage realtor preferred cash.
Her footsteps echoed in the cottage as she looked around. Going room to room. It was small and tidy, three bedrooms and one and a half bath. Now she had to work on filling it up with furniture.
The cottage door clicked shut behind Sous, sealing her into the hollow stillness. No welcoming committee, no voices. Just the damp stone walls and the distant, rhythmic shush of the ocean beyond the cliffs.
She dropped her worn pack onto the bare floorboards, the sound startlingly loud. Dust motes danced in the weak light filtering through salt-crusted windows.
She moved through the empty rooms like a ghost haunting its own future. Fingers trailed over cold hearthstone in the main room, grazed the rough plaster in the narrow hallway, pressed against the chill glass overlooking the grey, churning sea.
Her reflection stared back, tired eyes The silence wasn't oppressive; it was hers. A stark contrast to the choked disapproval of her mother's table, the wary silence of the fairy lumberyard.
A couple of months had gone by when Sous heard a knock on her door. She got up, groggy, eyes still shut as she walked to the door. She opened it to see Kara standing there. In the cold, the snow.
Sous just stared at the Omega then ushered her inside to get warm. She was quiet, not saying anything while Sous asked all kinds of questions. What happened? Why she was in Faelock? Did Zhiliary banish her?
Yes, Zhiliary had banished her. She had only the clothes on her back and of course, her kids weren't with her. They belonged to Zhiliary.
Kara sat on the edge of the bed, her eyes casted down, her hands fidgeting. Sous watched with a blanket in her arms.
"You can have the bed," Sous said. "I'll sleep on the couch." Sous gave one last look to Kara before she left for the living room. The Omega just looked so...sad and broken.
Sous awoke the next morning smelling blueberry pie. She jumped off the couch and ran to the kitchen. It was like her tongue was hanging out of her mouth with drool pouring on the floor.
When she got to the kitchen, food was everywhere.
"Wow, Kara!"
"I couldn't sleep last night," Kara said.
"Do you want to go shopping after breakfast?" Sous asked. "Since...you'll be staying for a while." Kara smiled at Sous.
Later that night, Sous and Kara sat on the couch watching television. When it was time to go to bed since Sous had to get up for work the next day, she turned to Kara.
"So...you and Zhiliary?" Sous started to ask.
"We're no longer together. I'm banished. And...I hate to be away from my kids and yet, I feel free," Kara said turning to Sous.
Sous leaned in. Kara's eyes widened slightly, but she didn't pull back. Sous' fingers brushed Kara's cheek, rough from months of axe-work, tracing the tear track that had dried hours ago. Kara's breath hitched, a tiny gasp lost in the crackle of the dying fire.
Sous didn't ask permission. Her lips met Kara's, a hesitant press at first, tasting salt and the faint bitterness of sorrow. Then deeper, insistent. Kara froze for a heartbeat, rigid with shock, before melting against Sous with a muffled whimper. Her hands clutched at Sous' flannel shirt, pulling her closer.