TW: Bl00d, d3ath

The world came to her in fragments as she stood in the courtyard.

There was a pale hand gripping a sword slicked in ink.

There were glowing torches held by shouting knights.

And then, there was the gorgon.

Roche couldn't believe it was the woman she loved. The creature of inkblood peered up at her, lips curled back into an animallistic sneer. At the sight of Roche's eyes, that cruel smile dropped, something like shock painting across its features and stilling the snakes wreathing its face. Warmth flooded the air between them, a mix of love and something too wrenching to be called heartbreak.

Those obsidian eyes flickered, revealing soft grey-blue irises beneath.

Roche staggered, the sight hitting her like a punch to the gut. Medea was the gorgon. Medea had kept this from her.

Both she and Medea were so stunned that they missed the way Tigris prowled forward, growling something guttural and heartbroken.

The gorgon flinched as the sword pierced its chest. Roche could only watch with numb horror. Her mind could only process a few things.

Tigris.

Her sword embedded in Medea's chest.

Medea howling, the sound of her pain ripping Roche's breath away as if she'd been the one stabbed.

Tigris yanked the blade out, frowning at the gushing wound with detached interest.

"Behead it!" Finn shouted across the courtyard, limping towards his sister. His eyes connected with Roche's and he faltered for just a moment. Then he straightened regally, holding her gaze as he added, "We can't take a chance."

Tigris lofted her sword, angling the blade.

Roche couldn't do this. She couldn't watch. Finn's eyes bored into hers as the world slowed.

You're supposed to fight for Tigris, he had shouted at her earlier. His eyes pleaded with her now, begging her to turn away. To let the gorgon die.

No. To let Medea die.

But Roche couldn't shake the memory of starry nights and kisses that tasted like honey. She couldn't forget the sound of tinkling laughter, words shared over glowing lights. Most of all, Roche couldn't forget those beautiful blue grey eyes that locked with hers now.

Time sped up again. Roche lifted her hand faster than Tigris could move, barely hearing herself speak over the sound of her roaring thoughts.

"Olepjid!"

Invisible inkblood spewed from her hands, sailing over Tigris' head and colliding with the castle behind her. With an earthshaking boom, the stone walls imploded in a shower of dust and rock. Tigris cried out in shock and dove away before she could be crushed.

The knights were shouting, running to their princess' aid. But Roche wasn't looking at them. She watched the gorgon's body begin to shrink as it spread its wings, showering the courtyard with sizzling blood that corroded the courtyard's cobblestone. With a pained wail, Medea took flight, soaring into the night sky.

Roche already knew where she was going, to the one place she'd feel safe.

She was running, her legs pumping and chest burning as she raced away from Tigris, from Finn's accusing eyes, from the shouting knights and half destroyed castle. The journey to the tunnel felt too slow and too quick all at once, like a heartbeat before the grave. Roche skidded to a stop in the mouth of the tunnel.

Their stars were gone, but Roche's light remained. A trail of drizzled inkblood led to the shadows where the curled figure of a woman laid. Roche inched closer, freezing as Medea's sobs echoed off the walls. The sound was like a jagged knife to her heart.

"I didn't want you to see," Medea choked out between her wracking cries, her delicate hands pressed against her face. She huddled in the corner, her tears dripping to the ground. Roche watched, emotion making her eyes burn.

Medea lifted her head then. Her eyes were bloodshot. Her lips, the ones that Roche had kissed so tenderly, wobbled now. Roche's heart shattered in her chest.

"You must hate me," Medea sniffled, scrubbing at her face, "I'm a monster."

Any of the betrayal Roche had felt faded at the tremulous words and the guilt contorting Medea's face. Roche swallowed, coming closer to kneel next to the woman. The ground was coated with red and inkblood. Medea's dress was suctioned to her stomach, saturated with sticky blood.

"Never that," Roche whispered weakly, moving a strand of Medea's hair out of her face with a shaking hand.

Medea cried out, the sound a terrible mix of devastation and pain. She folded forward, sagging against Roche. Her warmth and blood leaked out against Roche, sticking to her skin like glue. Roche didn't notice anything but Medea's tears dampening her shoulder. She shifted, locking Medea in her embrace as she tried to hide her own tears in the woman's hair. She stroked the woman's back.

"Let me heal you, love." Roche murmured, her hand drifting to the wound. It was so vicious and angry, a mess of torn skin and fever hot blood. Medea made a small sound of protest as Roche braced herself, pressing her palm against the stab wound.

"Llanosus," she tried first. Her inkblood pressed against the wound, curling up around it but not seeping in.

Roche gritted her teeth, panic seeping in. "Llanosus qui alget ol mordere."

The wound gushed with blood and inkblood alike, remaining stubbornly unhealed.

"Roche..." Medea's gentle voice filtered through the air, already resigned. Roche shook her head, desperation clinging to her like blood. She squeezed her eyes shut.

"Please, no," she whimpered, incanting raggedly, "Llanosus mordere tirrigo!"

A whine slipped past her lips as her inkblood pooled around them, pulsing with energy. Medea shifted with a wince.

"Some things cannot be healed, love," Medea whispered, her hands rising to caress Roche's tear stained cheeks, "Some things are not meant to be."

"No," Roche whispered, her breath coming out in frantic pants. The world spun around them, Medea's face becoming the most beautiful blend of tawny, grey, and blue. This wasn't how it was supposed to be. "Medea, you can't. We have so much left to do. I-"

Medea's lips crashed into hers, cutting off the plea. She pressed her weakening body against Roche's with the longing of a dying woman. She sucked at Roche like a lifeline, like a last gasp of air. Her tongue swiped against Roche's bottom lip, her warmth fleeting. For a moment, they straddled the edge of life and death, daring the universe to separate them.

Nothing could pull them apart except themselves. And her kiss tasted like goodbye.

Medea pulled away first, her hand cupping Roche's cheek.

"I already did everything I wanted in this life," she murmured to Roche. Her eyes gleamed with unshed tears, her thumb brushing Roche's jawline, "I met you."

Roche closed her eyes, trying to contain the explosive, animallistic terror shredding through her. But Medea was fading fast. She didn't have time for Roche's denial.

Roche scooped the woman up in her arms.

"Kalid vestigian. Kalid vestigian. Kalid vestigian." Roche said the words like a prayer as she walked, the trails of blood and inkblood fading behind them. She walked towards the forest, bearing the weight of Medea in her arms. Her joints protested, her legs aching but not nearly as much as the throb of her own heart.

Medea sighed, eyes rolling back in her head. Her body began to go limp.

"I wanted to tell you," the dazed woman murmured. Roche held her tighter, ignoring the gush of blood that splattered her chest as she did so.

"Hush, save your strength."

"No, you must hear this." Medea insisted faintly, her beautiful eyes cracking open to peer at the stars. Her face was as pale as the moon. "I wasn't always this creature. I used to be part of a coven. My family was with me. During the day, we ran with the covens. We worshipped ink at night, listening to stories kept safe from the knights.

"Then came the day of the ceremony. All of us were meant to have inkblood placed in our arms, to symbolize the beauty of all things ink. But there was a raid. The knights found us. My brother and I were the only ones who escaped. And there was this boy who was with us. H-he was my brother's best friend. H-he was captured, killed in front of us. We couldn't stop it."

Medea's breath hitched, blood frothing on the corners of her lips. Roche felt her pain as keenly as her own, choking and overwhelming. Tears dripped down both of their faces, a temporary tribute to a lasting pain.

"His parents blamed my brother for not doing more to save him. They wanted to curse him, curse him the way the knights had cursed them to eternal pain without their young ones. I found him as they laid the curse and I jumped in the way."

Medea shivered in Roche's arms, her eyes glazed and not seeing the thick canopy of trees hanging over her. Her skin glistened in the moonlight, crystalline with her pain.

"They were dead when it was over. So were my parents and most of my coven. They'd tried to stop me and ended up dead for it. There wasn't even anything left of them to burn. That was the moment I was bestowed my inkblood by the universe. After that... the rest of the coven couldn't keep me. They banished me, and I've been alone ever since."

Roche clutched Medea tighter as the woman's voice choked off. "I'm so sorry, Medea. I'm so sorry," she murmured to the woman. Roche's chest was on fire with emotions so nuanced she'd never be able to part through them. She slowed to a stop, pausing to glance down at the woman she loved. "You deserve so much better than what life gave you."

"You gave me all that I needed," Medea murmured. She coughed wetly, blood slicking her lips. Roche dabbed it away, and Medea smiled weakly, "See? You made me feel loved. You hold me now even though I'm-"

"You are not a monster," Roche swore fervently, her tongue burning with the anticipated words. She gazed at Medea, wondering how the woman could have had such a terrible life and still be so gentle, "You are the most incredible person I've ever known. You're beautiful and kind and smart. You deserve to live."

Medea's breaths were shallower now. She was going limp in Roche's arms. Still, she tilted her head up, weakly murmuring, "I love you, Roche. I love you, I love you, I love you."

She whispered the words like she wanted them to be her last. Roche choked on a sob, swallowing it down.

The walk took hours.

Medea's breathing turned into a gurgle, a sure sign of blood entering her lungs. Her skin turned pallid, glassy and glowing in the moonlight. Her blood became tacky against Roche's skin as she became boneless in Roche's burning arms.

Every step felt like torture.

Every moment with Medea's pained breathing seared into Roche's mind like a brand.

Roche finally made it as the night waned and the promise of morning threatened her. The night stars twinkled, dwindling into gentle pinks and oranges that painted the spaces between the trees as Roche set Medea down on a soft bed of moss sitting atop a large sunning stone.

Medea's eyes fluttered with surprise as Roche nestled against her. She lifted her head, a weak smile tugging at her lips.

"You... remembered..." she choked out between gurgling breaths. Roche held back her tears. Her grief would not be the last thing Medea saw. She knelt in front of the woman, gripping her hand tightly.

"Of course I did, love," Roche whispered, her voice ghostly in dawn's stillness, "Our little grove."

The moss carpeted the forest floor in gentle rolling mounds. The small grove was surrounded by trees with gnarled roots and ancient, flaking trunks that curled around them protectively. A few fireflies glowed, their light dwindling as morning came.

Medea smiled softly, her wise grey-blue eyes gazing at Roche. Those eyes were heavy lidded with pain.

"Roche," Medea murmured her breath smoothing out for a moment, "I love you."

This was it, Roche realised as Medea's chest strained for air. This was their end. Panic seized her, and she bit it down. The world wobbled around her, tears rising with her grief. Already she felt Medea slipping away, even though the woman was right in her arms. Where she belonged.

"I want you to stay," she whispered, trying not to reveal her desperation. Her chest burned with suppressed tears because she knew she only had moments to say what should have lasted a lifetime. Her shaking hands clutched Medea like a lifeline. "Medea, I love you. I love you so much it hurts."

"We weren't meant to be," Medea told her softly, squeezing her hand. Roche nearly shattered then and there, but she mustered her strength. When she cracked open her eyes, Medea was still smiling, her teeth bloodied. "But I'm glad we were."

"So am I," Roche replied. Death was hanging onto them both, counting the seconds. Roche leaned forward, pressing their foreheads together, "Tell me what I can do, my love. There must be something."

Medea's breath stuttered, and Roche held her own breath as if death could take her too.

"Tell me... the poem." she gasped out, her face bloodless.

Roche sucked in a breath, as painful as it was. Her lips brushed Medea's earlobe, letting the words fill them both.

"Sunset and evening star,

And one clear call for me!

And may there be no moaning of the bar,

When I put out to sea,

But such a tide as moving seems asleep,

Too full for sound and foam,

When that which drew from out from boundless deep

Turns again home.

Twilight and evening bell,

And after that the dark!

And may there be no sadness of farewell,

When I embark;

For tho' from out our bourne of Time and Place

The flood may bear me far,

I hope to see my Pilot face to face

When I have crost the bar."

Roche held a bated breath as Medea's smile softened. She turned her head, her eyes cracking open to gaze at Roche. Her gaze was longing and loving. Roche savoured her as Medea's shaking hand pressed against her cheek, stroking it softly.

"My Pilot," she murmured, her eyes going glassy, "How I love you." Her eyelids drifted shut, weighed by a life so dark and lonely. Roche's face was contorted with the effort of holding back unending tears. She clutched Medea tightly, tapping her lover's cheeks desperately.

"Medea, please don't go," Roche begged, her tight control over her desperation snapping. "Please, I need you. I need you!"

Medea's lips curled. For a moment, Roche dared to hope that she had fought the blanket of death, that she would return.

Medea opened her eyes for one more moment. Roche's heart jumped. But those eyes, once so bountiful and bright, were empty. Glassy. They peered past Roche's face, somewhere beyond that Roche couldn't see or touch.

The morning was too still for Medea's death. Roche held the woman's limp hand, squeezing and squeezing like Medea was trapped within and would send her a sign. But it never came. The corpse before her grew cold as reality crashed into Roche, as chilling and jarring as the morning air.

"Wake up," she begged quietly, pressing her lips against Medea's lifeless cheeks, "Please! Wake up! Don't leave me alone." She pecked her lips, her forehead, trailing kissed up her arms.

Medea didn't stir. Her skin grew cold against Roche's lips, made colder by icy tears.

Grief tore through Roche as she gathered Medea into her arms, feeling the weight of a life not lived. She bent over the still body, sobs wracking her as she wept for her lover. A thousand knives carved a single name into her heart.

"Medea!" she wailed, keened, pleaded, her grief shaking the trees, "Come back!"

So many times over the last few days, Roche had thought herself to be alone. She'd gone to the tunnels, hidden in what she'd thought was her safe haven, and was reminded that there was someone like her, someone who loved her.

But now, Roche realised as she sobbed against Medea's side, that her safe haven had been the woman in front of her.

Now, she was gone.

And Roche was truly alone.

-------

The grove was quiet and empty, cocooned by the warmth of the rising sun. Roche had returned to the castle, gathering the supplies she'd thought they'd need and returned to Medea's final resting spot. Her hands were gummy with unwashed blood and memories as she carefully slid Medea, clothed in Tigris' gown, back onto the mossy gown.

She moved robotically, unable to think beyond the steady pulse of shock filling her mind as she stared down at the body she'd carefully prepared. Fog rolled off the mossy ground, swimming around Roche's legs like a playful puppy. The humidity plastered her hair against her forehead as she knelt, straightening Medea's dress with trembling hands.

"How cruel you are," Roche murmured numbly, her thumb skating across too cold skin, "To die first and leave me behind."

Medea didn't respond. Her eyes stayed stubbornly open, no matter how much Roche tried to close them. They were too stiff with death to move.

Roche swallowed a wave of emotion that felt foreign, pushing against her numb chest. She felt wrung dry as she stepped back, smoothing back Medea's hair tenderly. The woman looked stunning in the fine gown. The shifting, cerulean fabric flared from her thin waist, stretching in thin waves towards her ankles, dressed in Roche's only pair of heels.

Her dark locks framed her face like a halo, highlighting her sharp jaw and moonlight skin. Medea looked perfect.

She was perfect.

Roche's breath shuddered in her chest as she stepped back, feeling the loss of Medea like a hollowness in the place of her heart. Her grief clung to her lashes with tears she could shed still.

The sun was rising. And Medea was only meant for the stars.

Roche swallowed back the mounting pressure in her throat, holding out her hand. The word caught in her throat, but she still managed to choke it out.

"Fyra,"

The fire spread slowly, staring at the edge of Medea's dress. It caught quickly, engulfing the fine fabric in an inferno. Roche sank to her knees as the fire swelled, Medea's beautiful skin blackening in the white hot flames. The terrible smell of burning flesh filled the air, and Roche threw in her offerings, the food they were supposed to eat when they ran, before feeding more heat into the fire.

The flames turned obsidian as they licked up Medea's arms, her inkblood bursting from her veins. The flames suddenly roared and exploded outwards, reaching the treetops. Searing heat brushed past Roche and she bitterly wished they would take her into their fiery embrace too. But then the heat rushed back towards Medea's burnt body, drawing in a rush of air. The world was blurred by orange, red, and white for a moment, blinding Roche.

When she cracked open her eyes again, she nearly dissolved into sobs again.

Because in the place where Medea's body had been, a large tree towered, glowing with a warm silvery grey light. The thick trunk was speckled with white dots, and golden sap leaked from the glistening golden leaves.

Just like their little sapling.

Roche lay prostate before Medea's tree, her tears watering its inkblood roots long into the morning.

A/N: Everyone say "Bye, Medea!"

But on a real note, I am sorry for this chapter. It took me a very long time to write it because I knew how strongly Roche would feel this loss. Hopefully that emotion came through. 

What did you think of Roche and Medea's short lived romance? I think I mentioned this in an earlier chapter, but this is my first time writing romance of any kind, so I'd love to hear any thoughts or criticisms :D

Also, for anyone who was wondering or guessed what the poem might be, it's called "Crossing the Bar" by Alfred Lord Tennyson! It's one of favourites, each time I read it, it seems to have a different meaning. What do you think of it?

I hope you enjoyed this chapter! As always, happy reading!