Doom Upon All The World

Chapter 11: Camille

Long strands of red hair twine in her fingers.  

She pulls deftly at them, twisting and manipulating in the rhythm and method she's always used.  There is only the sound of their breathing throughout the room.  The girl before Camille Montilyet doesn't make a sound.  Her big green eyes stare at her in the mirror, watching as the bronze skinned girl weaves her hair in that practiced, silent way that she does.  

Their mornings weren't always silent. 

Most mornings when they did this, Camille would smile as her lover told her jokes or complained about how pompous Pierre had become.  And in return the dwarf would squirm and struggle the harder Camille pulled on her hair, the closer she got to finishing the skilled braiding she'd been working on.  

There would be a certain smell, a feeling in the air that everything was right, that they're where they're supposed to be.  Octavia would smile as she watched Camille moving her fingers across her scalp like a dance as she pulled it up into a braid, starting somewhere near the top of her head.  When her work was done, she'd push the braid over Octavia's shoulder for her to examine, in the process brushing the back of her cold, thin hand against the dwarf's freckled cheek.  Octavia would grip her wrist in her own hand, bringing it to her lips, kissing the inside of her palm tenderly.  Camille's cheeks would heat up brightly with blush and her hand would shake as if she was afraid of what happened next. 

But not today. 

Today, she doesn't smile as she works, she doesn't put the long red braid over her shoulder, she doesn't let Octavia touch her, she doesn't blush.  She simply turns her back and puts a bag from the floor on the bed.  "I'm going to stay in my sister's quarters for a while."  Camille utters just loudly enough for Octavia to hear her.  

The dwarf turns around to look at her.  "Olive's?"  She asks, minutely curious, but only for her safety.  

Camille stifles an angry snort at this as she shakes her head.  "No.  Not Olive's, because thanks to you, she's not speaking to me."  Camille isn't one for spite or malice, but her words cut deep, reaching Octavia in all the places she means to hurt her.  "I'm sorry."  Is all the dwarf can manage to get out.  

Camille is inconsolably angry for a moment, looking at her with wild, disbelieving eyes, as if she can't fathom the words.  "You're sorry?!"  She states with a raised voice.  Her hands are on her hips, then on her head, then in her hair, looking like she might pull it out.  She gathers herself. "Olive and I are very different people, Octavia, but she is my twin."  Her dark Antivan eyes fall to the floorboards.  "Now, she won't talk to me, she won't listen to me, she won't even look at me because she's so angry."  She pauses, her chest heaving with breath as tears pool in her eyes.  "And she doesn't even blame you for telling Anthony!  She blames me, she's mad at  me.  And I can't blame you for not keeping her secret.  But I can damn well blame you for telling mine."  Tears swim in Octavia's eyes now and her vision blurs.  

"Please,"  She mutters, desperate, sad, angry.  

"You don't know what it's like to have another person that is so part of you, someone that has loved you since the very day you opened your eyes, ripped from you because of something that someone else did.  Whatever pain you're feeling, however sad you might be, that's on you, Octavia.  But trusting you, believing that you could put my wishes above what you thought needed to be done because of your fear of what Nicolynn and Mythalus can do, that's on me."  She ties the bag off and goes to the door, taking the handle in her hand.  

"You do realize that we'll lose Nicolynn and Adelaide for this, don't you?  He's come to take her away and once she's gone from here, we won't ever see her again.  She'll end up dead, probably by his blade, or worse, locked up in a circle tower somewhere. You just,"  Camille sighs. 

"You don't understand the severity of what you've done."