shelley_winters | (no subject)

(no subject)

Heat from the water soaks through her skin - real heat, not the strange almost burning of being healed. Shelley lies back reluctantly as he puts her gently down in the water, white foam thankfully covering the surface. One small hand grips the side tensely as the other splashes a moment, before bringing out the ridiculous scrap of gold-shimmering gauze, now sodden with water, and throwing it as hard as she can onto the floor.

It takes a shaky sigh as she turns her head away again before she glances back at Ishamael, noticing him more clearly than before. And more to the point, the fact that he is still here.

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Ishamael simply sat and watched her for a moment. He inquired quietly, politely.

"Are you doing better?

Shelley doesn't reply, only tightens thin fingers around the heat of her mug.

Better than what, after all? She hasn't been doing well since he came for her, months back. Now she just... lives, day to day. And she can do nothing to change it, she can't get away, or... God. Nothing.

Glancing away from her, Ishamael commented quietly, but not without a note of satisfaction. They had paid dearly for their transgression, and they would pay dearer still.

"You needn't worry. Those who menaced you will not do so again."

Still Shelley doesn't answer, only shivers slightly in the silence after finishing her second cup of tea.

If she was feeling anything like herself, she might have laughed at that. Bitterly.

After a moment, Ishamael slid over to sit next to her. His voice sounded genuine as he spoke after a long sip of his tea.

"I am sorry that this had to happen."

Maybe, she thinks vaguely, she would have glared, or snapped or sneered at that. Instead she places the cup back on the floor, just as carefully, but with hands made clumsy by exhaustion, and shies from the rattle of porcelain on stone.

She's sorry, too. For lots and lots of things.

His hand gently laid over hers in a supportive gesture. Turning as if to say something, but he had nothing to say, instead he just sat there in silent support.

This was the best way. After her experience in Graendal's hands, accentuating their differences would be far more beneficial.

Shifting to nervously adjust her towel, Shelley sighs shakily. Her skin has mostly dried off in the cool air of the corridor, but her hair still drips cold water down her back. She doesn't move for a long time.

"...I want to go home."

Ishamael nodded. He suspected that she might, and it would honestly be helpful for her to do so. He did not want her to completely unravel. His hand lay over hers and did not move.

"I will send you back so you can go to Tackleford for a time after the repercussions from this latest incident quiet."

She looks at the floor, the hand not under his still clutching at the join of the towel. Still too much time to go, when she stays here, on her own.

She's so tired.

Ishamael thought for a moment and then quietly inquired. He doubted that she had been fed during her time in captivity. Graendal and Lanfear were... not known for their care.

"You must be hungry. Do you want something to eat?"

Shelley swallows, then nods silently. Her stomach almost aches with emptiness, in a way that she has never really felt before. She might not eat much, but food has always been there when she needed it before.

"Please."

Ishamael nodded and glanced over at the panel across the room. A few buttons pressed themselves on the console as he peered intently at it.

In a few moments another servant brought by a tray with some neatly arranged biscuits of several varieties as well as some fresh fruit circling a small dollop of yoghurt. After setting the tray in front of Ishamael and Shelley, the servant quickly departed.

Shelley doesn't eat much of it, for someone so hungry, but makes fairly quick work of what she does. After about half the biscuits are gone, she slows, still taking small bites from a slice of pear, but with less interest and urgency than before. It feels better, a little.

Ishamael did not touch the food. He wanted her to eat all that she wanted without regard for him. His hands perched, folded in his lap.

"Have all that you wish."

Shelley carries on nibbling the piece of pear, but does not look inclined to have any more. She shivers vaguely, tugging the towel more closely around her after licking sticky fingers halfheartedly, then giving up.

Ishamael paused for a moment. A quiet, amused smile as Shelley finished the pear. She was probably unaware of its status as a yonic symbol, and thus keenly associated with female sexuality. Was it perhaps an expression of her subconscious, and if so, oh but how he would like to lick the clear, pungent juice from her fingers... though, they would be his, of course. There would be many opportunities in the future.

"Do you require anything else?"

Shelley shakes her head, wet tendrils of hair flicking water onto the floor as they fall forwards across her face. She could ask him to leave her alone, but she can't summon the energy to fight - a worrying feeling. She will fight him, she has to, but...

Gently, Ishamael put his arm around her shoulders in a supportive gesture. It was simple really. He had saved her from her captors and tormentors. Her perception of him must inevitably change.

"Shhh..."

"I am shhh," she says in a small voice threaded with unhappiness as she shifts restlessly and uneasily under his arm.

His voice is a little harsher as he retorted quickly. His arm remained around her shoulders.

"It was meant to be a soothing noise."

"Don't need soothing."

Her tone is a mutinous mutter, spoiled a little by the way she shivers, huddled and pale in a damp towel on the floor.

His voice is soothing and indulgent as he commented quietly. His arm did not move from around her, if anything then it tightened slightly.

"Of course not, but should you have need..."

The final implication of the sentence is left dangling as Ishamael trailed off.

Shelley rests her forehead down on her knees, squeezing her arms harder around herself, and doesn't answer. She doesn't need anything from him. Doesn't need him.

His arm tightened snugly around her as he commented quietly.

"You will need to get to sleep soon. You have had a very trying time."