Tedros is skating when she arrives.
The sun is barely up, just skimming the horizon, and the majority of its light is obscured by another low-lying swathe of black clouds which indicate yet more snow-- they make the morning grey and shadowy, which is a perfect cover. The lake isn't visible from the castle.
Convenient, that.
Usually he comes here to blow off steam, stealing skates from the storerooms because he couldn't be bothered to try and make them, and going from one end of the lake to the other as fast as he can. But today, he'd tried something else-- he'd sat down in the snow and crafted two thin blades of ice, and jabbed them into the bottom of his boots. It had taken a few tries to get them right-- they'd been too thick the first time, and the second time they'd been cut at the wrong angle, so he'd fallen over when he'd tried to jump.
But the third time had worked.
He skates in lazy circles, listening to the rasp of ice against ice and feeling the cold wind smack against his face. They are friends, he and the northern wind. He's always cold, so it really just feels familiar. Kindred spirits.
Spirits.
He goes into a crouch, letting his momentum carry him from one bank to the other. He's still yet to properly process what Agatha told him the other night. He doesn't understand how this spirit thing works, and he's had no opportunity to question her about it. Today will be the first time he's seen her since she caught him in the corridor. He's been too busy convincing his court why he should come off the ivy, whilst fighting the withdrawal symptoms.
It's why he's out here-- he'd woken at 2am with a stabbing migraine and cramps, and, in desperation, had staggered out to the gardens and flung himself into a snowdrift, praying it would help. It had, somewhat. Clearly, however his magic works, it has become overzealous now he's unrestricted it. He'd turned half of his bed frame to ice in his sleep, and he'd woken up with his hair bleached white, again. He'd done a shoddy job of re-dyeing it himself, barely able to focus on himself in the mirror, but it was passably golden again, so he couldn't find the effort to care.
He wishes he'd looked more into how the ivy worked. It had just been a tentative trial, at first, but it had quickly become a requirement, and he'd been too frightened by what had happened at the coronation to argue, or even bother to ask about it.
He should have.
As if responding to the thought, there's another stab of pain behind his eyes. Tedros growls and straightens back up, skating faster, faster--
He kicks off into a spin and lets the sudden slap of force and cold air knock any thoughts out of his head.
When he comes out of it, Agatha is standing on the opposite bank, an inkblot in her black gown against the snowy grass.
He can see the crumpled piece of paper, tan against her black glove, and knows she got his note.
Relieved that she'd agreed to come so early, he kicks off and glides over to the bank, the only sound the grind of his skates against the ice.
He stops in front of her and hops up onto the grass, snapping the blades from the bottom of his boots and tossing them into a snowdrift. He expects a barrage of questions, but she doesn't say anything-- just stands, holding her veil down as the wind snaps around them.
"I feel underdressed." he says, eyeing her full gown and headpiece as the wind whistles through his unlaced shirt.
Agatha ignores the comment, and Tedros finds himself slightly disappointed that she gives no visible reaction to the fact that most of his chest is exposed.
"Aren't you cold?" she says blandly.
"Always cold, my lady." says Tedros.
"Do you do that often?" she asks, instead. "Sneak out to skate on the lake?"
"When I can," says Tedros, seeing no point in denying it. "It clears my head." He looks hopefully at her. "How long were you watching?"
"Not long."
"Oh."
"But long enough." she pauses. "It looks a little like dancing. What you were doing."
"It is, I suppose." Tedros looks back at the lake, where the loops and tracks he's left glimmer as more light comes over the trees. "In a way. I don't suppose you want me to teach you?"
"I don't think that's a very good idea." says Agatha, sounding, he thinks, a little more amused. Tedros can see how the grass around her skirt is becoming more exposed by the second, and can't help but agree. "But I believe you're supposed to teach me how to dance normally."
He'd almost forgotten.
"Because... that's what we're doing?" he asks.
"I wasn't lying when I said I couldn't dance." says Agatha. "We may need to alternate."
While Tedros considers knowing how to control his magic rather more important than whether or not Agatha knows the steps to a set of specific waltzes, he, above all, knows the importance of appearances.
With a sigh, he turns back to the lake and stamps on it.
The scores from his skates disappear, and the lake is as good as new.
----
"You have some modicum of control, then." says Agatha, as they climb the stairs to the Eastern Gallery. "If you can clear your tracks."
"I know how to do a few basic things very well." says Tedros, bashing the stiff door open with his hip. No one ever comes in here, so it's a perfect choice. "Freezing and re-freezing. And sculpting. Mostly."
He doesn't add that the reason for that is because they're the only things he was allowed to do as a child.
"Sculpting? Making things out of ice?"
"Sure. I'll make you something at the end of the lesson!"
"Alright." says Agatha, and this time he's sure he can hear a smile in her voice.
Tedros turns into the empty room and frowns.
"I thought you said you were bringing Lady Netherwood?"
"She went back to bed." snorts Agatha. "She'll be along later."
"It feels as if that's shirking her duties."
"She doesn't care." says Agatha, stretching her arms and stripping her gloves off. She looks over at the window for a moment.
"Something wrong?" asks Tedros
Agatha waves a hand at him, setting a ring down with her gloves on the sill.
"Just trying to glean how far I can go, today."
Tedros frowns.
"What's that got to do with outside?"
"When there's more sun, it's easier." says Agatha.
"You can... draw power from the sun?"
"No." says Agatha dismissively. "But it's easier for me to create my own fire when it's sunny, especially in the summer. But in the winter, there's usually a good supply of it around for me to take..."
She turns to the lit fireplace.
"It's easier for you to just take it?" asks Tedros, fascinated.
"Surely you've noticed it takes more effort to create or get rid of something new, than it does to manipulate something that already exists." says Agatha, crouching down and coaxing a tendril of flame away from the rest of the fire, curling it around her fingers like a ribbon.
Tedros doesn't respond. Thinking on it, he supposes she might be right, but he doesn't think he's had enough experience to know for sure.
Agatha seems to read into his silence.
"Well, open the window and get some snow from the windowsill. We'll start with that."
Tedros does as he's told, and settles on the floor as she plops down opposite him in a heap of black velvet, exposing servants boots instead of the satin heels Sophie and Vanessa seem to wear.
"Hold that snow in one hand."
He does, shifting it into his left hand, and Agatha copies him with her fire, coiling it into a ball in her palm.
"So, easy to maintain, right?"
Tedros looks down at the unmelting snow in his palm.
"Yeah."
"Now try and create some more, in your other hand."
Tedros frowns down at his right hand, and tries to remember how it had felt to summon it. He's never really done it before. He tends to work with what's already there. Anything he's created has usually been by accident or in panic.
"Er," he says. "How?"
Agatha, veins starting to glow in both hands, now, lifts a shoulder.
"How do you usually do it?"
"I... don't." says Tedros faintly. "They don't let me."
"Hmm." Agatha snaps her fingers a few times, as if striking a flint, and a flame springs up in her hand. "Well, how do you want to do it?"
"What do you mean?"
"I chose to do it like that." she says, tipping the new flame into the one she'd taken from the fireplace, and snapping her fingers again to summon a new one. "I use specific motions for most things, so I can be sure what I'm doing. If I used the same motion for everything, I'd start doing the wrong thing. I snap to summon, I flick my wrist down to make it bigger and up to make it smaller, and I flex my hands to spread it. I could just will things to happen, and they probably would, but having specific motions for them makes it easier to control."
"...oh." Tedros decides not to admit he'd just been waving his hands at everything in a vaguely hopeful way for seventeen years. "That makes sense."
"You've already got one." says Agatha.
"Have I?"
"You stamped on the ice to re-freeze that lake, didn't you? And when you accidentally froze over the floor, that was because you were being childish."
Tedros glares at her.
"So, stamping on something or hitting it with the flat of your hand is probably a good way of freezing things." says Agatha, ignoring his irritation. "Try that, instead. It didn't occur to me that summoning might not work the same way, for you."
Tedros blinks at her.
"Go on, then." Agatha shuffles back and points to the floor.
"But... I can't unfreeze it." says Tedros. "Not well. I did it once, but that was luck--"
"We'll get to that." says Agatha, standing to sit on a chair near a display of several small, dusty pots, still carrying her fire. "Do it."
Doubtfully, Tedros tries to focus, and smacks the floor with his hand.
Nothing happens.
"With conviction." says Agatha. "You have to try. Think of your magic like a cynical betrothed that you have to convince of your power and influence."
"You'll never consider me powerful or influential." snorts Tedros.
"Maybe if you stop stalling and actually try, I might."
"I've tried! I am trying!"
"No, you're not." says Agatha lazily, settling further back in her chair and starting to make what looked suspiciously like a cat's cradle out of her flames.
Tedros scowls. He knows how much further ahead of him she is in terms of control. She doesn't need to rub it in his face.
"You're just going to sit there and do cute tricks with that, instead of helping?" he snaps.
"Sure. How am I supposed to help if you're not doing anything?"
Tedros turns away for a moment to check his anger, but planning to get her back later, when they're dancing--
He turns back to see a stained glass pot flying at his head.
He doesn't think, he just does-- slashes his hand out at it and shatters it into a spray of snow, which goes drifting harmlessly to the ground.
"What the hell are you playing at?" he demands, wheeling to Agatha--
Then he realises what he's done.
"Now that," says Agatha, "is interesting."
"What are you playing at?" demands Tedros. "You threw glass at my head--!"
"Fighting already? I shouldn't have slept in."
The door bashes open and Callis comes sauntering in, her ugly bald cat dangling from one arm and a basket from the other.
"He operates best in self-defence or panic." says Agatha, barely acknowledging what her nursemaid has just said.
Callis frowns, letting a wriggling Reaper jump down and sprint over to the snow on the floor.
"Unsurprising. Might be a problem, though."
Uncomfortable, Tedros opens his mouth to ask why he's being talked about like a specimen--
Callis turns to Tedros, eyes piercing.
"How did you actually survive that assassination attempt?" she asks.
Tedros blinks.
"I didn't lie. I said I grabbed the knife, and I did, but the reason I grabbed it was because I turned it to ice. I squeezed it and it exploded."
"Took the weapon off him." muses Callis. "Clever. And you did that... on instinct?"
"More or less."
"It makes sense." says Callis, turning to look at both of them. "Agatha, fire is mostly man-made, and controlled by humans. It's not surprising that Tedros operates more on instinct, since snow and ice is natural."
Tedros hasn't ever thought of it that way.
"So you think I just need to... act on instinct?"
"Not entirely. But more than Agatha, who needs to be on guard more to keep it under control. It's more of a natural part of you."
"...oh."
"You still have some white roots, by the way."
Callis gathers her skirts and goes to sit in a window nook.
"I brought breakfast." she says. "Mind heating the tea for us, Agatha?"
"I don't even drink tea. This is just for you. I'm not your portable kitchen." sulks Agatha, but she does come sloping over to sit next to Tedros again, taking the teapot in her hands. Tedros looks between them, irritation replaced by bemusement.
"How do you two know so much?"
"Anything you tell Agatha is immediately relayed to me." says Callis cheerfully.
"No, not about me." dismisses Tedros, though he is storing that information for later reference. "Just about... the magic thing in general."
"Oh." Callis props her foot against the wall and dumps the basket in Tedros's lap. "Well, I have been researching it for nearly eighteen years."
Tedros sighs, selecting a croissant before immediately having the basket snatched from his hands by an enthusiastic Agatha.
"If my parents or the court did any research, I was never party to it."
"I've been eavesdropping on conversations and asking around," says Callis. "--Agatha, stop pigging on those pastries until you've heated the tea--"
"I cam do bowth."
Callis ignores Agatha, and Agatha ungraciously clamps her hands on the tea, counts to thirty, and then slams it on top of the basket.
"Who raised you?" sighs Callis, wiping the spilt tea off the top of it.
"You." garbles Agatha, shoving another pastry under her veil. Tedros snorts and takes an apple.
"You were saying...?"
"Oh, right." says Callis, deliberately spilling tea on Agatha's knee as she pours it. Agatha makes a very unprincess-like gesture at her, even though there's no way she's actually burned in the slightest. "Well, it looks like they actually don't know that much. They've been begging Vanessa for help, which, obviously, she can't provide because she has nothing to do with Agatha. But she could at least tell them about the spirit thing, which they didn't seem to know, which doesn't fill me with confidence--"
"Can you explain it to me?" Tedros begs. "It's about me."
"Yeah, yeah, I'm getting to that--" Callis shoves the rest of an orange into her mouth and pulls a piece of paper and a pencil from her pocket, scribbling down some notes. "If you can connect the dots, it's pretty well-documented. Going back around seven hundred years, there were about three or four extremely powerful mage families that loads of people attempted to marry into. Their names have mostly been lost, because royal families married into them and the names got mangled as people married. Obviously, royalty were getting there first because they saw that magic equalled money and power. So, skip forward a hundred years, there's lots of magic-inclined royal families running around, and, as royalty's nature tends to be, they try and preserve the power within their bloodline-- although they're warned against concentrating the power, and mages advise them to marry people without magic, they don't listen. For a couple of centuries, all the royal houses were getting more and more powerful-- and then, about five hundred years ago, it all just stopped. Heirs got less and less powerful, and eventually stopped being born with magic altogether. People who could use it were incredibly high in demand. Magic became rarer and rarer, and most people who could still use it went into hiding for their own safety. Relations drifted apart, people started marrying for love instead of power, and magic became more of a story that your grandma tells you than a reality. I found all this in records in the libraries and archives in Gavaldon."
She pauses to take a gulp of tea, and then points the mug at them.
"Then, people start being born that are far too powerful. Most of them have died now, but, wouldn't you know it, two specific babies are born within months of each other. One in House Pendragon and the other in House Aldridge, who were the worst for marrying for power, back in the day. And both babies have the unrestrained consequences of hundreds of years of built-up power finally manifesting at once. Because it's so potent, it takes one form-- elemental, rather than any kind of general talent. And it's so potent that it more or less strips you of your status as human. You two look and act and think like humans, but I've seen Agatha angry."
She lets the statement hang.
"What happens?" asks Tedros, fascinated.
"What do you think happens?" snorts Callis. "Whoosh. Fire. Absolutely destroyed the rhododendron garden. Burned half her hair off."
"Is that--"
"That is not why I wear the veil, Tedros." snarls Agatha.
"Right."
"You should probably stop asking." Callis advises Tedros. "But yes, it was scary. And she was only eleven. I would not like to see what she can do now. And you're clearly not completely human, because neither of you drink enough for normal humans, and you have odd physical attributes that just don't happen to humans."
"I don't have that many." scoffs Tedros.
"You have permanent frostbite colouring on your hands." says Callis. Tedros shoves his hands in his pockets self-consciously. He'd forgotten to put foundation on them this morning.
"So, history lesson over." says Callis, swinging her legs down. "What happens when you have children is a mystery. Maybe no magic at all. We'll see."
"If." mutters Agatha.
"I'm afraid it's a when, sweetheart. You're both the only legitimate children of the current rulers, and my position in your court more or less relies upon mini Agathas."
Tedros and Agatha look awkwardly away from one another.
"But you're both still kids yourselves, so, yes, I did tell Lord Harris to worry about his own illegitimate brats instead of yours the other week."
Tedros's mouth falls open.
"How did you know he's got ille-"
"Shall we practice a little more?" asks Callis cheerily. "I'm too hot. I should know better than to wear black and antagonise Agatha."
----
"This is pointless." Tedros growls two hours later, shaking snow out of his hair. "I can't do anything."
"You're doing plenty." says Agatha.
"Yes, we've learned that if we annoy you enough, you throw a chunk of ice at my ward's head." says Callis from her window seat.
"It was an accident." moans Tedros. "I said I was sorry."
"We're even, I threw a pot at you on purpose." says Agatha. She looks down at the sheen of ice on the floor. "I know you can make it disappear. You said you could-- you got rid of that puddle."
"Not this much." Tedros sighs, sliding about on it like a penguin.
"So? It's thinner than that puddle." she frowns. "Tell me what you did, again."
"I just... was firm with it, I guess."
"It makes sense." says Agatha. "It's harder to budge than fire, so you'll need more force to control it-- I need to be more fluid to control it, and you need to be firmer."
"But then again," says Callis, "You need to be firm to stop it going further than you want. And he was perfectly fluid when he was pissing around on that lake this morning."
Of course Callis saw me, thinks Tedros gloomily. Nothing got past that woman.
"I think you're right about the fundamentals of it," adds Callis. "But maybe applying aspects of each other's techniques could work...."
Tedros sighs. Agatha and Callis look at him.
----
Five minutes later, Tedros is lying on his stomach on the ice and Agatha is trying to guess what he's making.
"Um, a magic wand."
"Ha ha, no."
"Move your arm!"
"No."
"What's that, a golf ball?"
"Give me more than twenty seconds, won't you?"
"Fine." Agatha sits huffily back on her melting patch of ice and tries to pet a bad-tempered Reaper.
Tedros runs his hands along the ice he's pulled from the floor, willing it to take the form he wants, pinching the edges--
He gets the impression he's being watched, and glances over to see Callis watching him over the top of her book.
"What?" he says.
She shakes her head and says nothing. Frowning, Tedros goes back to his ice for a few more minutes--
Then he rolls over and presents it to Agatha.
"For you."
Agatha doesn't react for a minute, staring at the ice rose. Tedros hesitates.
"Maybe it's stupid. I used to make them for Beatrix and Dot. And my mother." he bites his cheek, starting to feel severely embarrassed. "I-- I know you can't keep it for very long, but I just thought--"
Agatha leans over and plucks it out of his hands, setting it in her lap.
"Thank you." she says quietly.
Tedros, still uncertain if he overstepped, glances over at Callis--
"Do what you just did to that rose to the floor." commands Callis.
"Huh?"
"That was control. You just only know how to do it on a small scale. Whittle it down!"
"But I--" Tedros trails off, standing up and looking at the floor. It shouldn't be too hard for him to take the edges off, and if he just--
He and Agatha jump back at the crack as half of the ice shudders, splits, and disappears.
"I didn't even touch it!" he says, bewildered.
"You don't have to." muses Callis. "I think it's just easier if you do. But if you're focused enough, you can do it without it. I see Agatha affecting fireplaces sometimes."
Tedros frowns, feeling the chill emanating from the floor, the presence of something familiar to him--
Another crack, and the rest is gone.
Tedros wheels to Agatha.
"I did it! I got it to--"
Behind them, the door creaks.
They hear Vanessa's voice too late, and the door is opening before they can process it--
Without thinking, Tedros grabs Agatha's hand, flings an arm around her waist, and yanks her against him.
Callis makes a quiet, strangled sound that Tedros realises too late is meant to be a warning.
He panics and tries to let go--
Agatha seizes him harder, squeezing his hand in hers.
"I'm not slouching." She snaps, improvising faster than Tedros ever could, but he can feel her heart pounding.
"You were." Returns Tedros hoarsely, wondering what it feels like to be burned properly. He clears his throat and turns to the door, as if he's only just noticed them. "Oh. Queen Vanessa. Lady Sophie."
"Good morning, highness." Says Sophie, uninterested, from the doorway. Vanessa is lurking behind her, frowning. "I was wondering where you were practicing. Looks like it's going... well." She grimaces at Agatha, indicating the opposite. "I wouldn't want to teach her, so you're practically a saint. Well, let's not interrupt, Mother dear! I don't want to let that feral cat out--"
Reaper hisses on cue from by Callis's feet, and Sophie manages to hustle Vanessa away from the doorway, twittering airily about betrothals and cats and rondels--
The second the door shuts, Tedros snatches his hands away from Agatha--
"I've got burn ointment." says Callis immediately, as Agatha backs away, holding her hands away from him. Tedros stares unseeingly at her, mind racing, flexing and unflexing his hands, trying to work out why they feel so odd--
"You've both been using magic," continues Callis. "So there's no way you managed to regulate your temperature enough. Tedros, let me look at your hands-- Tedros, no!"
For Tedros has lunged and seized Agatha's hands again.
"What are you doing?" barks Agatha, trying to pull away. "Stop! You're going to--"
She goes quiet.
"Are you trying to kill each other?" Callis stands up and starts for them--
Then she realises, too.
They're not going to hurt one another.
Because it doesn't hurt. Tedros hasn't been burnt.
He was just feeling warmth for the first time in his life.
"You cancel each other out." Callis says blankly. "Don't you?"
Slowly, Tedros and Agatha look at one another.
---
"I don't know what she thinks she's going to find in the library." mutters Agatha, breaking another petal off her melting ice rose and squishing it in-between her fingers. It appears that even if Tedros himself can withstand her, his creations can't. "There's never been interaction between spirits before that I've ever read about."
Tedros sighs, watching her vandalise his sculpture. Agatha's fingers still.
"Sorry. Stressed."
"It's okay," says Tedros. "It wouldn't have lasted long anyway."
They fall silent. Agatha shuffles in her seat uncomfortably, wondering what to say to him. She barely knows what to do. So, they couldn't hurt each other. It was the first time she'd ever felt cold, but it wasn't too cold. It didn't hurt. It was just... there.
So. The vast majority of her previous problems have suddenly become void, and she doesn't know how to feel. Of course, there's still the issue of her face, and the fact that Tedros can't control his magic, but...
Anxious, she clasps her hands together, wondering how to explain this to Vanessa. They could keep it secret until after the wedding and pretend they'd found it out by accident-- if they admitted they knew it now, it would raise too many questions. But then, even if they knew after the wedding, it might mean that Vanessa would consider them too much of a threat, if she knew they weren't dangerous to one another. Maybe she'd try and separate them, or take control over Tedros using Weatherford, or--
Tension, presumably panic, is building in her chest. She stands to pace, wringing her hands, and realises she can smell smoke. She looks down at herself, looking for where she's scorching her clothing, but it's not apparent. Maybe her stockings. She turns and takes a breath--
And realises she can't.
She freezes for a second.
Not again not again not again not again not again not again--
Her legs buckle and she grabs a side table to keep herself upright, her other hand shooting to cover her mouth.
She vaguely hears Tedros stand up behind her ("Agatha? What's wrong?") but she can't focus on him, fighting for air--
Her lungs give up on her and she starts hacking, spitting embers onto the floor and struggling for breath more than ever before. Shuddering, she sinks to her knees-- she might not be human, but she still needs to breathe, fire needs oxygen and she hasn't got any--
Head fuzzy, she barely realises she's crying until she finds she hasn't the breath for that, either. Desperate, she yanks her veil back to try and get more air, but it doesn't work-- instead, she starts to cough up smoke along with the embers.
Agatha starts to hyperventilate, wondering if this time, it'll finally finish her off--
Someone grabs her from behind and clamps their hands across her ribcage. Agatha makes a shaky attempt at fending them off, sure it's Callis come to drag her under water, and desperate for her to let go, she can barely breathe as it is--
But it's not Callis, because Callis isn't that cold. So it's-- so it's--
Agatha takes a shuddering breath, shallow and painful... but it's a breath.
Shaking, scraping ash from her lips, her brain finally catches up.
She jerks, horrified.
"Tedros--"
"I'm not looking." Says Tedros firmly. From the corner of her eye, Agatha can see that Tedros is facing away, looking out across the room instead of at her. "Here."
He takes the front part of her veil from where she's pushed it back and carefully drops it back over her face.
Still wheezing, Agatha leans forward, suddenly more aware of how Tedros's chest is pressed against her back and how cold his hands are on her ribs.
"How..." she pauses and clears her throat, trying to be rid of the hoarseness in her voice. It doesn't really work. "How did you know that would work?"
She spits a stray ember onto the floor.
"I remembered that you said you'd been using snow to stop it." Says Tedros. "So I thought... I thought it'd be okay-- I asked you but you didn't hear me--"
" 's fine. It worked, faster than anything else has." Says Agatha faintly, tipping her aching head back. She's fairly sure it's against his shoulder, but she can't bring herself to care. She pauses. "... Are you sure you didn't--"
"Doesn't matter how nosey I am or how much I keep bugging you about the veil." Mumbles Tedros. "You said not until the wedding. So not until the wedding."
Agatha finds it highly unlikely that he can't have seen anything, but he sounds earnest enough, and she appreciates the sentiment.
"Okay." She says faintly. "...thank you."
There's a pause. Agatha's not sure whether her heart or Tedros's is beating harder.
"Are you alright?" Asks Tedros anxiously.
"I... think so." Agatha tries to sit up a little straighter, rubbing her chest. "Didn't last as long as some, but it hurt a lot."
"Why's it happen?" Asks Tedros, slowly letting go of her. "What triggers it?"
"I don't know." Croaks Agatha. "Stress, I think."
"I'd have thought you'd be less stressed, now." Admits Tedros.
"I--"
"What in god's good name are you two doing? I didn't think I was actually supposed to be preventing debauchery."
Callis is back, and Tedros springs guiltily to his feet. Agatha slumps back against the table and points wordlessly at the ashes on the floor.
Callis is over to her immediately, fussing like she always does, but Agatha is waving her off--
"I'm okay, it's alright--" She wipes her shaking, ash-streaked hands on her skirt. "Tedros stopped it."
Callis raises her eyebrows. Tedros shuffles awkwardly, struggling to find an explanation.
"She said that the cold stopped it, so... I grabbed her..."
"I see." says Callis.
There's a pause.
She sounds and looks reproving, but Agatha knows she's not. In fact, she gets the distinct impression that Callis is trying not to laugh at them. Agatha, shaking and ash-streaked on the floor, and Tedros standing twitchily over her, picking at his frostbitten nails.
She makes a note to smack Callis for it later.
"Well!" Callis chirps, helping Agatha up. "You two are going to have an interesting marriage, aren't you?"
"You think you're so funny, don't you." says Agatha blackly.