Page 98 of Magdalene Nox

“You can’t embrace me like this, Magdalene. Everyone will see. You can’t—”

“Everyone has already seen plenty. Circumstances have changed, and I don’t care.” Despite Sam’s feeble attempts to put some distance between them, Magdalene only cuddled closer to her and turned her face into the warm rays of the sun.

Sam was lost in thought for a few minutes, and Magdalene could sense those tired eyes slowly roaming her countenance, as they had earlier when they’d been scrutinizing her for injury. This time, it seemed they were looking for something else. That something else was quite easy to guess, considering Sam was one of the most selfless people Magdalene knew.

“You should care. You’ve been dreaming about this school and this job all your life.”

Magdalene just tucked a stray lock of Sam’s hair—which was currently more black than blonde—behind her ear and touched her lips to Sam’s temple, eliciting a contented sigh.

Neither of them said anything for a while, and another few minutes passed, Magdalene’s fingers tracing patterns on Sam’s back beneath the blanket. She couldn’t help but touch her. And judging by Sam’s reaction, it was fairly clear that Sam never wanted her to stop either.

However, any moment now Sam’s conscience would rear its head and her tendency to care for everyone but herself would take over. This woman really did carry the world on her shoulders, giving of herself without ever receiving anything back. Well, those times were over. Magdalene had once prioritized the school and her obsession above Sam. Seeing everything go up in smoke was an eye-opener like no other, and it also immediately set her priorities straight. Or gay, as they were.

She could see the gears turning in Sam’s mind, the eyes still assessing her face. She was probably thinking it was Magdalene who had hit her head, since to Sam’s mind, she must appear to be the one acting out-of-character.

Any minute now…

“You should care, though,” Sam repeated and tried to pull away again, only to be held even closer. Magdalene smirked at her own prescience, then just sat there, still looking at the dawn, saying nothing, allowing Sam to banish her worries before Magdalene dismissed them.

Sam did not disappoint. Magdalene bit her lip and let her forge ahead with her speech.

“I mean, I understand that you probably got scared by the staircase and that may have traumatized you, and you’re acting as if I might have died, but I’m okay.” Magdalene turned to face her fully, and whatever Sam saw in her eyes made her mouth fall open. Good, she did not know how to express that the words ‘Sam’ and ‘died’ in one sentence would never not choke the life out of her.

She let Sam continue, sensing she was almost finished.

“Look, this isn’t a romance novel. It’s not like you are the tormented heroine who suddenly realizes her lover could have perished and that triggers a massive revelation that she needs to abandon her dream and throw her life’s work away simply to somehow make a grand gesture to said lover.”

Sam stared at her, clearly lost as to what to expect next, but Magdalene leaning in and firmly kissing her on the mouth wasn’t it. After all, they were in full view of the whole school and a trustee, people milling about all around them. By Sam’s logic, they were caught red-handed. Magdalene wanted to shout from the rooftops. For the first time in her life she was flooded with the sensation of her heart occupying the entire chest, filling it the way it had always been meant to. It felt right, it felt glorious.

“Sam Threadneedle, have you been reading lesbian romance, you adorable darling?” She ran a fingertip over Sam’s lips, a charge going out from the silky skin under her finger all the way to her shoulder like electricity. God, she was so in love. It was such a delight.Samwas such a delight, her one and only, all shocked, wide eyes and delectable mouth, opened slightly in something akin to outrage.

“That is not the point, and also stop looking at me like that!” Her aforementioned delight obviously still had not gotten the message. Magdalene raised a perfectly groomed eyebrow, but Sam barreled on, clearly desperate to quell whatever river was overflowing inside her lover and causing her to act so out-of-character. “We agreed. We had a deal. You love the school. You need the school. This is your life.”

Magdalene just looked at her, filling her gaze with all the affection and all the love she held—all the devotion she felt would spill out at any moment, all the affection she wanted to cover Sam with and never, ever stop. It was time.

“I do love the school. I love you more.” Sam’s eyes glazed over, and she slowly shook her head as if trying to clear it, as if trying to figure out whether she’d heard her right. It cracked Magdalene’s heart a little to see Sam struggle to believe her, to see Sam unable to fully realize just how absolutely amazing she was. Well, Magdalene would make it her life’s mission to show her every day that she was the love of said life. She would start right now.

“When I watched the banister collapse on top of you and then dug to reach you, all I thought was that I had not said it back. You know, you told me on the cliffs as you were drawing those ridiculous chalk hearts, and I felt it was unfair of me to say it right then and there when we couldn’t be together in the open. So I didn’t tell you, and I thought we had all the time in the world. And then you go and save my cat and get hit in the head by a chunk of centennial oak… I love you. Yes, this school is my life. You are also my life. I am not having some sort of romance-novel-crisis precipitated by my lover having a near-death experience. I am simply saying that I love you. And I will fight for you and for the school, and maybe—since you followed me into fire—you will fight by my side.”

With Sam still speechless and entirely shocked, blinking at her happily, Magdalene proceeded with another tender application of lips to the temple where bandages held swollen, torn skin. She then opened her arms and held Sam to her, the last pieces of flesh over her thirty-year-old wound threading over and holding her chest tightly and whole now. Sam breathed in deeply and nestled in that very place where Magdalene had once bled the dark ichor of vengeance that had clouded her entire life with resentment and obsession with this school, with revenge. It all seemed so foolish now. So silly.

Magdalene had found herself, she had found her life’s purpose in the arms of a woman who held her heart and on the grounds that held her affection, and she would make sure she’d keep them both safe.

Sam’s lips moved at her neck and Magdalene smiled, her eyes filling with tears of true happiness as she inhaled the fall air, mingling with a hint of lily-of-the-valley as the sun rose majestically over the ocean.

27

OF DESTRUCTION AFTERMATHS & TAMED ICE QUEENS

The aftermath of destruction is either abandon or reconstruction. And underneath the surface of everything, it’s grief.

Stanton Alden’s millions would ensure the reconstruction. The revelation of his relationship with Sam would make those millions sustainable. As long as Sam was at Dragons, he would pour his gold over the cracks of their wretched history, trying to buy his absolution.

But Alden’s money could not paper over the grief Magdalene carried around her neck these days. The clean-up had started. The plans were being drawn to rebuild in the exact image of the original school. The public opinion had swung 180 degrees in its support of her leadership.

She leaned against the once-white wall of the former Aula Magna. The largest auditorium, which once had the capacity to fit over 300 students and faculty, was gutted. The skeleton of walls, the occasional tendon of torn and burnt electric, the excoriated pipes like drenched blood vessels were all that was left.

Magdalene closed her eyes and allowed herself to listen to the silence of the now-quieted down construction site. The laborers were gone for the day, and only the sound of the forest behind the school and the ocean beneath it were discernible. The cold stone at her back seemed to imprint itself through her blouse onto her skin, and she allowed the vast emptiness to wash over her.

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