𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐑𝐨𝐬𝐞 𝐒𝐲𝐧𝐝𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐭𝐞

𝐓 𝐄 𝐍

𝐇𝐨𝐮𝐬𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐌𝐚𝐤𝐨𝐫𝐨𝐯

 Where there is love there is always sacrifice. Sacrifice that either brings strength or ruin. A love that will either mend bridges or burn them to nothing but ash. Poets will sing and preach about this. But never do the poets warn of the kind of sacrifice for love that can leave a fracture so deep and so long it will never heal. Love is never supposed to do that, never break someone beyond recognition.

Briéa twists around to look at her bare back in the mirror. This is not the woman she imagined herself to be at twenty. She takes a new count of the scars on her body, the notable ones at least, to include the ones she earned from her visit to Mr. Havenbrook. The number now edges sixty.

Mr. Havenbrook himself was easy enough to deal with, it was his personal guard that gave Briéa a headache. One brute, in particular, was borderline barbaric. She owes the new scratch along her brow, still an angry red, to him. Bastard nearly took out her eye. The scratch is deep enough that it'll leave a scar. Briéa frowns, she's managed to go all these years without any marring to her face. That streak is no more.

There's a knock at the door and before Briéa gets the chance to warn whoever's on the other side of her nakedness, the door is flung open and they barge in. Reihan doesn't even blink and Briéa barely has her robe on when her oldest friend flings her arms around her.

"Gods, it's been ages!"

Briéa laughs. "It's been a week."

Not the longest I've been gone. Last year she spent nearly five months in Theddaburg gathering scattered mystics. Briéa hated it. The province is dreary and boring. Why so many mystics chose to flee there, she'll never know.

"And a week too long." Reihan presses a quick kiss to Briéa's cheek before falling back onto the unmade bed, her brown curls fan out like a crown around her. Briéa's watched as Reihan gets brighter as the years go by. She was one of the ones lucky enough to find some semblance of peace, of purpose, after Kelrose. Ennell lost more than half her Rose Council that night. Reihan never planned to join the crescent but she wears the rose crest well. Easily a favorite councilmember among the Syndicate, she has favor with the younger ones teaches she teaches and favor with Ennell for how many mystics she's rounded up over the past three years.

More often than she would ever admit, Briéa has caught herself envying that part of Reihan. That part who seemed to move on so easily, able to channel the pain into something useful. She wishes she still had the desire to dance and smile like she once did. But Aesira took that part of Briéa when she left. It's no fault of Reihan she's been able to pull herself back together better than Briéa.

With another laugh, Briéa flops down, right onto Reihan. She groans out in pain and irritation as Briéa's butt drives right into Reihan's stomach. Reihan, in vain, tries to push Briéa off. She doesn't even budge. Briéa might only have an inch on Reihan, but plenty more muscle.

"I take it back! You're annoying and dreadful and troublesome and a pain in my arse!" Laughs fill the small room as Briéa rolls off, arms wrapped around herself and clutching her sides. She doesn't laugh often, but with Reihan, sometimes, it feels like how it used to be.

"Liar, I'm undeniably charming and don't try to say otherwise." Reihan snorts. "Speaking of charming, that little setup last night? You truly know the way to my heart Rei." Her friend grins.

"Figured you'd like that."

"Didn't leave me a glass though."

"Did you need one?" Reihan already knows the answer.