Rosetta

26

Trigger Warning
She was 21. She should be happy. She should be excited.

Rosetta wasn't any of those things.

She was instead trapped inside a room, Carlos sitting in a chair by the door, watching her intently.

She couldn't leave the room.

If she did, she was going to die.

Well, not exactly like that.

Esmerelda didn't make an empty threat. She had said that she could find a way to reach her, and she did. If she left the room, she would go outside and pick up a spindle and die.

So, actually yes, in simple terms, if she left to the room she would die.

Carlos ducked his head and then picked it back up, giving her a lopsided grin. "Happy birthday, Gun Girl."

She snorted. "What's happy about it?"

He put his leg over his knee. "Well, for starters, you have me for company."

She laid back on the floor and stared up at the ceiling. "That is pretty good. Oh, and how's the Empress?"

"She's alright. She got a few scratches and bruises- oh, and she's having a child."

Rosetta lifted her head and leaned on her elbows. She raised an eyebrow. "Really?"

"Yep. And I think I heard Mr Thorne and Miss Darnel say it's a girl. Oh, and did I mention they're engaged?"

She sat up fully now. "Stars, look what I've done. I kidnapped an Empress, murdered my adoptive mother, delayed a wedding, almost killed a royal heir-"

"Heiress," he corrected.

She glared at him. "Heiress, and got myself sentenced to death." She fell back on the floor.

"I think I deserve to die," she whispered.

Carlos went over to her and hauled her up by her hands. "What are you saying? You didn't kill or hurt anyone. That witch made you. You don't deserve to die. Look at me and tell me that."

Rosetta looked up at him. This was the boy that had protected her, crossed planets for her, rescued her and loved her. She thought for a second. Did she love him back? Of course she did. She always had. But she didn't deserve him. She deserved to die.

"I deserve to die. I don't deserve you," she whispered. His eyes widened.

"You don't deserve to die. Say it," he urged. His hands were on her shoulders, and she could see the height difference between them. He was quite a bit taller, but not so much that she couldn't reach up and move his hair.

"I don't deserve you," she repeated. She really didn't. She was broken and battered and ruined and staring at him. She was staring at him. He was staring at the tears that had silently begun to form on her face. He brushed them away with his finger, and left his hands there to hold her face.

"Yes, you do. And you don't deserve to die."
Carlos blushed a little upon realising what he had said.

"But look what I've done, Carlos. I deserve to die, and that way everyone's lives will be better," she whispered. She tried to move to the door, so she could leave the room and give in to the death Esmerelda had planned for her. But Carlos held her still.

"No, Rosetta, they won't be. My life will be destroyed. Would it be weird to say you are
my life?"

She chuckled a little, even as the words settled into her head. "Yes, it would be."

"Good. Because I don't mind a bit of weird in my life." He leaned down and kissed her gently. Rosetta couldn't count the amount of times he'd tried to do that in Madrid and she'd just shook him off. But she wouldn't anymore. If she was going to die today anyway. So she kissed him back, both ignorant of them moving away from the door.

She pulled away, shaking. Carlos looked at her and tucked her hair behind one ear. He looked so happy. She would do anything to see that again.

Then she felt it. The control. Her limbs betraying her as she moved towards the door.

She cried out. "Carlos!"

Carlos grabbed her arms and held them by her sides. She was sobbing hard. "I'm sorry, I'm so so sorry. This isn't me, she's forcing me."

"I know," he whispered.

Then she was pushing him, thrashing against him whilst screaming out a thousand apologies, while he stood and pressed her back to his stomach and let her hit. Let her hurt him.

And then, suddenly, she stopped fighting him and was kissing him again. He was cautious to soften his hold, but eventually did.

Stupid, stupid, stupid man!

Couldn't he tell that this wasn't her? That it was a trick to let her escape?

That the trick was working?

She eased out of his arms and ran out the door, not looking behind to face his stunned, distraught face. She rushed past Mr Thorne and Iko and Miss Darnel and Mrs Benoit and Mr Wolf and Sir Clay and Princess Winter, shutting the door behind her before she could watch realisation settle into their faces. She jammed the lock. They were stuck

Rosetta ran to the abandoned stall of a coal miner, broken regolith scattered on the floor.

But yet again, she wasn't moving. The witch was moving her.

She searched rapidly, cutting and grazing her hands on sharp rocks. Then her finger came across something familiar. The smooth polish of sanded wood. The engravings of Mama's handiwork. The point of a spindle.

She raised it from the rubble. It had the initials M.L on them, just as Mama had done on all of her work she had sold in the motel gift shop.

She straightened her arms until the spindle far from her, point directed at her chest.

Esmerelda had taken her tears from her, her voice too. She really was going to die.

Well, at least Carlos knew she loved him. That was the main thing she had wanted to leave behind.

So, with a smile on her face, she drove the spindle into her heart.