Solo Log: Cards on the Table

**Winter(?) ??, 501 AOV - Clover, The Dreaming**

It’s not just nostalgia that drives Cleone to invite Florette to share a room for the duration of their rest, really. Florette wouldn’t have exactly been safer if they’d left her behind in Methia, but if Cleone finds the full Dreaming experience mind-bending after seventeen months vaguely adjacent to their business she can only imagine how Florette is doing. The relief on Florette's face as she accepts probably doesn’t begin to cover how they both feel.

Still, Cleone can’t deny that the two of them curling up together on a bed reminds her of simpler times, murmuring in the dark during dorm sleepovers about things like *so that Gauthier guy I mentioned asked me out* and *I think you would have gotten along with my mother, if she were still alive* and *it's not tattoos I'm trying to hide, actually*. Secrets and intimate thoughts shared cautiously, then freely.

Cleone had never needed to know the specifics of Florette's job to understand the rest of her. But the silence between them isn’t as comfortable as it used to be, and she doesn't know when that started.

…Yes she does, Cleone admits to herself as she trudges back from the bathroom. It started when Cleone started having her own secrets to keep, and that damned Sending only escalated things.

Florette is studying her carefully, although her first observation hardly needs much attention. “You dropped the makeup.” She’s known that since Methia, so it’s more a question than any real observation. *What happened?*

Cleone sighs. “Yeah.” Her legs are aching from…far beyond too many stairs, so she picks a side on the bed and flops down onto her back. “No point anymore. He knows who I am now.”

Florette settles down beside her, exhaustion clear in her slouch but still sitting upright. “That…man. Ghost. Whatever he was, back there.”

“Nicodemus.” Cleone opens her mouth to give an unflattering description of the man, then closes it. Ignores her aching body to push herself upright, because this next part doesn’t feel right without eye contact.

“How much do you want to know, Florette? I would never lie to you, but all of this…well. What do you want to do when we get back to the Waking?” *Who will you tell?*

Florette smiles grimly. “I’m figuring that out. Back to Danor, maybe…but not to the Sovereign. I was walking a tightrope already, Cleone, but by now I’m compromised if I’m not dead.”

Cleone can’t find the words to respond, except with a litany of swears. Sixteen years of service, literally half of Florette’s life, all gone because–

Florette grips her hand, leaning close enough that their noses are nearly touching. “Don’t you dare. I’d rather be compromised knowing the truth than go on serving in ignorance. I’ve…done enough of that.” She pulls back, though her hand remains. “Tell me everything. I need to understand the truth of what we’re dealing with.”

Cleone nods and falls back down onto the bed, because this is going to be a long conversation and everything from her feet up to her brain hurts.

The Obscurati. Nicodemus and Kasavarina, the founders. The Jierre line, dedicating Danor to the cause. Srasama’s fall, and the descent from idealism to revenge to tyranny. The planes in the sky, and Borne’s purpose. The agents woven into the fabric of each country’s society so as to be inseparable. Alastor, who believed and murdered and was murdered. The constables’ ever-deepening involvement, as the scope of the matters they dealt with expanded ever further.

Florette listens through it all, interjecting occasionally to ask questions and comment on things she was piecing together on her own. At some point she’d laid down next to Cleone, holding her hand in quiet support. At some point tears had started leaking out of Cleone’s eyes, even as she continued talking.

“Sometimes I wonder if I’m a completely different person than I was two years ago,” she admits, voice hoarse. “I came to Risur to represent Danor and help improve people’s lives. But Danor is–not what I thought it was. And the things I’ve let happen, people who were killed because I didn’t do anything…”

“*Could* you have done anything?” Florette's voice is carefully neutral.

“Yes. In some cases.” Cleone thinks of that undercover mission on the train, of her lingering doubts that they really needed to abandon Damata or Isobel to their fates to complete the mission. Nathan’s grief, learning that the Obscurati had consumed both his cousins. An argument from the very beginning, back when the Obscurati was only a name, about how all they could do was wait while an alien creature killed Flint townspeople. “Not all of them. Probably not most of them. But some, maybe, if I'd had the courage.”

"If you could go back, would you have saved those people?"

Cleone's thought about this too many times not to have an answer already. "I don't think I could have done it alone. I would have needed to convince my team. But at the least, I should have made a stronger case. Maybe I wouldn't have the power to save them singlehandedly…but I'd have to try in what ways I could."

Florette smiles fondly and rolls over to kiss her on the cheek. "Then you sound like the same Cleone I've always known and loved. Just tossed into a world bigger than one person can manage."

“I…” Cleone chokes on her words, and her vision gets blurry as the tears come stronger and thicker. “Do you really think so?”

“I know so. I’ve known since our school days that you’d get yourself in over your head with that drive of yours, even if I didn’t imagine it…quite like this.” Florette laughs, though it’s cut short by exhaustion. “That’s why I did my best to prepare you to survive.”

Cleone lets out a tired laugh of her own, wiping away the tears on her face with her free hand. “Well, you got your vindication there.”

“That’s only the first part of it.” Florette squeezes her joined hand. “When we get out of this place I'm going to go back home and find a way to expose what's really going on in Danor. I’m going to keep our country safe, a different way this time…and someday, you’re going to come home from Risur and bring Danor *forward.*”

Oh.

Florette’s faith in her is too much, given that Cleone quite literally shot her down not…a day ago, or something like that. (Gatria’s right to hate this place, honestly.) "I'm sorry to drag you into this," she says quietly. "I mean–I didn't know that we’d end up here or that you’d be stuck with us for this long. But this job is, well…"

"Mind-bending?" Florette smiles weakly. "I'll say. But I'd take this over being at the bottom of that tower. And everything before that I got myself into through my decisions, not yours."

"Still–"

Florette bumps her shoulder. "You're not responsible for everything even if Risur wants to pretend you are, Lady Weld."

Cleone raises her head off her pillow to mock-scowl at her. Florette only hums and moves off the bed just long enough to start pulling the blanket up before flopping back down, throwing an arm loosely over Cleone’s body. "Let’s get some sleep. It’s been a long…who knows, I’m still going to call it a day. I'm sore all over, and I can't imagine how you feel."

“...Yeah. All right.”

And soon they’re both asleep.