The Same Coin

Your Soul At Risk

After she had eaten, Chrollo had taken himself to sleep. He had done as she did, taking a pallet and layering it with trapping from around the warehouse. It seemed long abandoned, this place where the vestiges of the past had been forgotten. Pieces from past shows were kept here, from what Winry could deduce. She had found old mirrors, platform stages that some magician had dropped through the trap door of, feather boas, racks of sequined costumes and gowns. Swords and pokers, lengths of rope. There was plenty to take to cushion a pallet for a bed. Chrollo laid his out beside hers and swiftly fell asleep.

Winry changed into her night clothes then burrowed herself under her blanket to watch the stars until her eyes could stay open no longer.

Then she dreamt.

Her sleep was restless. Her nightmares were filled with the sun and the moon, the shadows and light reaching for each other. They moved in a dervish circle, seeking each other out and dancing back, to and fro until her head spun and her legs tangled in the sheets.

"What could be more beautiful," she heard Kimblee whisper in her ear, and felt the weight of his hands on her shoulders. "—than doing work that puts your soul at risk, because that's what it means to be alive!"

Sweat beaded on her forehead, and her breath quickening in the wake of the approaching eclipse. Then the night and light met in an eruption of flames, and Winry bolted upright in bed.

She didn't scream.

Her hand was over her mouth, but she didn't scream. Chrollo was awake all the same, watching her from his pallet with silent interest. Winry could feel him evaluating her. She lowered her trembling hand from her lips.

"What wakes you?"

"I dreamt of a friend," she murmured, her eyes wandering to the window and the crescent sliver of moon shining through the pane.

Kimblee had been more than a friend though, hadn't he. He had been Ed and Al's enemy, and her lover. They had been conspirators. Would she have made those same decisions if Ed had told her the truth? She couldn't help but wonder, though, why she dreamt of him now after so long.

"Hisoka?" Chrollo asked.

To that Winry let out a curt laugh. "Hisoka doesn't have friends. Not even me."

"Nor us."

He meant the Troupe, and he would be correct. He'd told her what had transpired in Yorknew City — Hisoka had been largely absent for the duration, uninterested in what business they had been conducting until it had left an opening for him to confront Chrollo. Winry remembered the day she, too, had realized that Hisoka's involvement with her hadn't been about her at all. She, too, had been nothing but a means to an end. Winry couldn't even bring herself to feel hurt by it because it was so completely true to who she had learned Hisoka was. Would Hisoka have her back if she ever needed it, if there was nothing in it for him? There was a knot of doubt in her chest.

"I'd like to fight you."

Winry turned to Chrollo, brows furrowed in confusion. "Why?"

"Whether you or him deny or accept the fact, you are his protege. I think it's only natural for me to thus want to fight you."

"But you have no Nen," she objected.

"I am perfectly capable of sparring without it," he shrugged. "Although I wouldn't want you to restrain yourself from using your Nen ability because of it."

He wanted to see her ability. Illumi had warned her against letting Chrollo see her Nen ability, lest he steal it for himself. She knew some of the conditions for him to take it so she should be able to avoid that. Furthermore, if Chrollo had no Nen then he wouldn't be able to take it from her to begin with.