Chapter Text
Rio is pouring out quarter glasses of white wine, having just dished out two portions of the chicken soup into two bowls, when Agatha emerges from the bedroom. She walks out with her head held high, like a regal queen marching into her kingdom - or a warrior entering battle. Señor Scratchy hops out in front of her, excitedly loping straight for the plate Rio has placed on the floor for him, loaded with hay and leafy greens.
Her wife has dressed in the clothes she originally put on this morning, before the bath: old black sweatpants and a worn indigo plaid shirt. She’s forgone fluffy socks to keep her feet warm, so she’s barefoot, and has tied her hair in a loose ponytail. She looks a little bit like Agnes, but Rio would never dare to tell her that.
She’s a mess, but she’s still stunningly beautiful, in Rio’s eyes. Agatha could wear a potato sack and she would still think her wife is the most handsome person in the universe.
The spirit witch is carrying her half-drunken cup of willow bark tea, very occasionally sipping at it with a sour grimace. She hovers awkwardly near the stove, watching on curiously as Rio portions out the rest of the soup from the pot for future meals, and places the pot in the sink to wash up later.
“Your bowl’s on the table,” Rio tosses over her shoulder, as Agatha starts to hug herself, clearly feeling out of place and not knowing what to do.
Agatha drops into her seat at the dining table and places her tea mug down next to her water glass, her eyes raking over the flower arrangement in the middle. Her gaze loiters on the white chrysanthemums, as she appears to mentally dissect their meaning, and then goes entirely blank.
“Rio,” she finally says, after staring at the blooms for another long, silent minute. “I know what you are trying to say, but I think you’ve forgotten something very important about those flowers.”
She blinks, bewildered. Forgotten something? What? “I have?” she asks with caution.
“White chrysanthemums symbolize devotion and loyalty, but they’re also the traditional flower of mourners,” Agatha replies stiffly. “People often choose to leave them on loved ones’ graves. And I know that typically, when I say ‘people’, you are not included in that. In this instance, however, you are.”
Rio’s heart drops like a stone into her stomach.
Oh.
Oh, how did she forget? How did she forget that chrysanthemums were one of the flower types that Lady Death decided to drape over their son’s grave? She is suddenly overwhelmed by horror and remorse at her misstep. How the hell did she fuck this up so badly? All she was trying to do was help cheer Agatha up with the flowers - not remind her of Nicky’s death and her indomitable grief over losing him.
Within a blink of an eye, she transforms the chrysanthemums into blue hydrangeas instead. Rio desperately hopes that the spirit witch is able to interpret what these flowers symbolize; a heartfelt and sincere apology, requesting forgiveness. She holds her breath, waiting for her wife’s reaction.
Exhaling shakily, Agatha reaches out to brush her fingertips over the delicate cyan petals, that match the color of her eyes. Then, with a small nod to Rio, she turns her attention to her food. She nearly collapses in relief. Agatha is not going to hold her colossal mistake against her.
Her wife pulls her bowl of soup towards her. Swiping up her awaiting spoon, she dips it into the broth to scrutinize it with pursed lips. Rio observes her out of the corner of her eye as she adds soap and hot water to the pot, to make sure nothing congeals or burns on.
Her wife glances between the bowl, the stove, the green witch, and the pot in the sink, her eyes gradually widening in bewilderment. “Wait, you cooked?” she says incredulously. “From scratch?”
“No, I just dirtied this pot and all this equipment for the joy of doing the washing up later,” Rio answers sarcastically. Rinsing her hands off, she dries them and slips into her chair opposite the spirit witch, the wine glasses in hand. “Don’t look so surprised. I don’t have to use magic for everything.”
Agatha shakes her head, aghast. “I didn’t know you could cook.”
“Green witch. Potions and green craft are intertwined and potions are essentially magical brewing. And brewing is a form of cooking,” Rio shrugs. She’s somewhat proud of the fact she has been able to baffle Agatha so thoroughly. “It’s nothing fancy, just chicken soup. Should be easy on your stomach.” She pushes Agatha’s wine over the counter to her. “Wine, as promised. And that’s all you’re getting, so savor it.”
Her wife’s blue eyes brighten and she’s all too quick to take a hearty sip. Her face twists as she tastes it, but she takes another sip in such a way that suggests she is resisting the urge to guzzle it.
“You couldn’t have gone with a better quality sauvignon blanc instead of a bottom-shelf Chardonnay?” she mutters under her breath, swishing the pale yellow liquid in its glass.
Rio extends her hand out, threatening to take the glass back as she smirks. “I can drink it myself if it’s not up to your standards -“
Agatha slaps her hand flat on the table. “Try and take this glass from me and you’ll find your face quickly reacquainted with my fist,” she says sweetly. Rio aims a very pointed, stern look at her, turns her hand beneath Agatha’s to grip her wrist, and pins it down. Her other hand reaches to grab the glass. “No!” Agatha bursts out. “No, it’s wonderful. I am very grateful.” And then, as if the two words physically pain her, she chokes out, “Thank you.”
Grinning, Rio winks. “You’re welcome, sweetheart.” She pulls back, motioning to Agatha’s untouched bowl. “Eat. You’ve had nothing since breakfast and need something substantial to fuel your healing.”
Narrowing her eyes, her gaze darts back and forth between the soup and Rio. Apparently her suspicions have been raised once again upon learning that the green witch made the meal in front of her without magic. She lifts a sample of the soup tentatively to her lips.
After a few more spoonfuls - picking around the celery, which Rio snickers at - she comments, taken aback, “This is good. Not just edible - this is nice.”
“Told you I can cook,” she preens.
“When did you start?”
Rio has to laugh. Agatha looks up at her, irritated and confused by her amusement. “Do you not remember me cooking for you during your pregnancy with Nicky?” she asks.
She supposes that Agatha had other concerns during that period of time - namely morning sickness, heartburn, and growing a baby - so she maybe wasn’t paying too much attention to how food was ending up on the table.
Her wife’s jaw drops. “Wait, all those meals you brought me - you cooked those? I thought you used magic.”
Oh, well, she guesses that makes sense. The majority of witches use magic to aid them in cooking meals and conjuring food. Agatha can’t, because the dark and spirit magic she possesses do not allow her to create from scratch - Nicholas being the absolute exception.
She lifts one shoulder in a one-sided shrug. “Now you know.”
She doesn’t want Agatha to feel self-conscious about Rio purposefully cooking just to feed her, but Agatha’s thoughts drift in that direction anyway. “Did you learn to cook for me?” she asks, shocked.
Rio nods. “Who else would I be cooking for? I don’t need food,” she chuckles.
Agatha frowns, puzzled. “Then… why?”
It’s a short question. And Agatha probably imagines the answer to be a complicated one, but for Rio, it’s not. It’s crystal clear and simple as anything, because it comes down to a single reason: she loves Agatha. “You have a pathological habit of forgetting to eat. I understand why - you were barely fed as a child, then spent decades living out in the woods foraging and stealing for survival. You got used to eating very little and not all that often,” the green witch replies carefully. Agatha has hungered for food and magic and knowledge her entire life. Rio has the ability to supply her with all three. And she’s happy to, because - “I like providing for you.”
Agatha mulls that over for a few minutes, spending that time eating. Rio is pleased to see that her wife devours half of the bowl without overthinking it, meaning that it has likely stimulated her appetite and she enjoys the taste of it. “Is this part of the whole… taking care of me kink you have?” she mumbles, around a mouthful of soup.
Wow, she knows that Agatha is an overtly sensual being, and that Rio is also a bit of a maniac in the bedroom, but does her wife automatically assume everything Rio does for her has a sexual motive? “It’s not a kink to want my wife to be safe and healthy, Agatha,” she sighs.
The spirit witch regards her shrewdly, studying her for signs of deception. Upon finding none that are visible to her, she turns her attention back to the soup. “Scratchy ratted you out by the way,” she says casually.
The bunny’s head pops up from where he’s munching on a kale stem, bleating at the sound of his name, before returning to his chewing. Rio hits him with a fierce glare and mimes slitting her throat at him. Señor Scratchy hops in a circle until he’s aiming his butt at her. Rio is both offended and impressed by his gall.
“That rabbit secretly works for the Sokovian mafia and is plotting to destroy the universe, you can’t believe a word he says,” she mutters.
Agatha rolls her eyes. “Haha. Funny. He carries a part of my soul, so I know when he’s telling the truth. And he told me that you stayed in bed with me all day watching me sleep. Didn’t I tell you not to do that?” She sounds more exasperated than angry. “Why’d you do it? What were you doing - tracking the life cycle of every single red blood cell in my veins or some other weird shit? Didn’t you get bored?
Agatha? Boring? These two words are mutually exclusive. Agatha Harkness is the most intriguing and mesmerizing person Rio has ever encountered, out of trillions of souls.
“Nothing about you could ever be boring, Agatha,” Rio laughs. Her wife does not look convinced. She wants to hear an actual reason. So she tells her, with a shrug, “My perverted staring had a purpose. I wanted to make sure you didn’t have any seizures in your sleep. The first time you had one, you stopped breathing, so I was monitoring that. You didn’t seem to have any, if you were concerned at all,” she adds.
Agatha snorts in disbelief. “You just laid next to me all day and watched me breathe? What about your job? Aren’t there bodies piling up that you need to collect?” she quips, quoting one of the phrases that Rio commonly used whenever she had to dash off in the middle of the night.
“I have agents I’ve assigned to cover for me,” Rio informs her, swapping Agatha’s now nearly empty bowl of soup for the one she made for herself, but hasn’t touched.
If her wife is willing to eat, she will keep offering her food until she’s full. Agatha grumbles a little bit, muttering about how she’s not hungry, but still begins scooping the pieces of shredded chicken from the fresh bowl into her mouth.
“They were all too delighted to help when I told them I’d finally found you. I’ll still need to duck out every couple of days or so to manage the bigger jobs, but for now, everything is handled.” Rio kicks back on her chair, drawing one leg up as she pushes her wine glass around on the countertop in lazy circles. “Time doesn’t pass linearly for me. I can sort of… skip back and forth, if needed. So if there’s a backlog of souls, I can handle it later, once you’re better.” Agatha is her priority right now.
She was hoping to reassure Agatha that she doesn’t need to leave, with her words. Instead, she seems to have triggered some distrust, as her wife squints at her skeptically. “You told me before you didn’t have a choice in maintaining the natural order, as Death. Are you saying now that you can just postpone it, whenever you fancy taking a few days off?” she says, her tone accusing.
Agatha really doesn’t know how to have a single conversion without being confrontational; it’s good to know that hasn’t changed. Rio peers down at the glass of wine she’s poured out for herself, wishing that the alcohol would affect her as much as it affects humans. There are some downsides to being an immortal cosmic entity, and not being able to get drunk is definitely one of them.
“Postpone, yes. Stop, no,” she explains. “Time may not affect me the same way it does you, but it always flows, one way or another.” Time is as ineluctable as death is inevitable. Neither can be escaped, and they exist in a perpetual cycle. “I’ve got another few days before I’ll start feeling a call to action because of the backlog.”
Agatha bobs her head in a nod, angling her head down as she stares into her wine glass, which only has a few precious sips worth left. But then her lips twitch up into a smirk, and her eyes glimmer mischievously as she probes, “Did you say you told your agents about me?”
“My reapers, yes,” Rio replies, cautious. What exactly is Agatha asking about them for? She’s never shown an ounce of interest before. Concerned this may be some sort of manifestation of jealousy, she tags on, “They adore you.”
“I suppose that makes sense,” Agatha muses, a smirk still firmly plastered on her face. She throws back her wine glass to consume the last drops, and then immediately turns her gaze to Rio’s. She narrows her eyes, as if contemplating how she might be able to steal it. “I must’ve killed hundreds of witches over the centuries. They probably have fond spots for serial killers for giving them work.”
“Well, yes, they do admire you for being such a notorious murderer, but mostly they like you because of how happy you’ve made me,” Rio says honestly.
Once the rumors started to spread around the universe that an Earth spirit witch had the gall to court Lady Death herself, it wasn’t long before her entire realm knew Agatha’s name; her reputation as a slayer of her own kind proceeded her, but Death’s subjects were mostly interested in the way Agatha was able to charm Rio into falling in love with her, and awed when they discovered that the two handfasted. Nobody ever thought Death would be one to settle down, especially not with a mortal.
They don’t know the ins and outs of their relationship - Rio has squashed any and all rumors about their bedroom dynamics, for example, and she’s been careful to never let anyone find out about Nicky - but they do know that Death is married to a powerful witch, whom she loves dearly.
“Hmm, you always did get incredibly cranky and mean when you were sexually frustrated. Did they realize Lady Death was in a much better mood whenever she returned from her visits to me?” Agatha purrs, fingers inching forward over the table towards Rio’s wine glass.
Amused by what is clearly an attempt by Agatha to distract her with flirting, so she can get her hands on more alcohol, Rio responds mirthfully, “I was certainly a lot more forgiving about any mistakes the reapers made after having my back blown out by you, yeah.”
“Multiple orgasms in a row can be so relaxing, can’t it?” she cackles. “What was our record? A dozen? Your reapers should worship me for keeping you so appeased.”
There’s a hint of humor in Agatha’s voice that Rio is thrilled to hear. She’s growing much more comfortable and relaxed around Rio once again, enough to start joking around with her. It’s been over two hundred years since they poked fun at each other like this, and Rio didn’t quite realise before how much she missed this. She missed Agatha’s amusing little quips, and she missed being challenged and teased by her wife.
Rio zeroes in on her wife’s index finger brushing the base of the wine glass, and gives her hand a flick. “Agatha,” she says warningly, pulling the wine glass closer to her, and further from her thieving partner.
“What?” Agatha bats her eyelashes.
“Don’t test me,” she tuts.
She scowls, dropping the innocent act. “I want a divorce.”
Rio raises an eyebrow. “You want more wine, and I won’t allow you to threaten me with the impossibility of a divorce to get it.”
“I could divorce you,” Agatha seethes. “I could figure out a way.”
She can tell by the way her wife’s hand twitches ever so minutely on top of the table, towards Rio’s own hand, that she doesn’t mean it seriously. The Darkhold probably did hold the secret to breaking an eternal soul bond. Maybe Agatha even found it, whilst she was in possession of the cursed book. But if she did find some sort of spell to shatter their bond, she never utilized it. And that’s what matters.
“Not without tearing a whole ass chunk out of your soul, you couldn’t, my love,” Rio finishes her glass, knowing it’s a waste of alcohol since it won’t affect her, but not wanting Agatha to try and pilfer it again.
Her wife looks hysterically betrayed. “I hate you,” she whines.
“No, you don’t,” Rio laughs. “I let you have one small glass with dinner, despite your seizures, because I knew it would help you calm down and feel more like yourself. Don’t push it.”
“You like it when I push boundaries.” She decides to steal Rio’s glass of water instead, even though she has one of her own directly in front of her. And then, just to try and annoy her a bit more, doesn’t even drink from it, instead gulping down the now lukewarm bitter willow bark tea. “Do you call me your consort when you talk about me to your subjects?”
Rio tilts her head. “That’s what you are.”
This time, it’s apparently the answer Agatha is looking for, because she rewards Rio with a shit-eating grin. “So what you’re saying is that in the Realm of the Dead, I’m technically considered royalty?” She looks far too pleased with herself as she leans back in her chair, crossing her legs. “Do I qualify for my own throne? My own crown? Do I get to give orders?” she asks eagerly. “There must be some afterlife perks to being married to Death.”
Barking out a sharp laugh, Rio teases, “Oh, so now you’re happy with the idea of being my consort and my glorified bedwarmer, because you’ve realized it puts you in a position of power.”
“What can I say? Queen Agatha Harkness has a good ring to it,” she says in a sing-song voice, lifting her chin triumphantly.
What she wouldn’t give to see Agatha in the full Consort of Death robes she had designed for her centuries back, with her own crown. “Oh, and I’m sure you would be a beloved, benevolent ruler, and not abuse your position at all to covet power and fortune,” Rio says sarcastically.
Agatha pinches her fingers close together, so there’s less than a centimeter of space between her thumb and index finger. “C’mon, just a little bit of power every day. Just enough to keep a girl’s thirst satiated. And if your kingdom already adores me then I don’t see what the problem would be.”
Her reapers probably would be all too happy to donate power to Agatha to stay in her and Rio’s good books. “My subjects’ fondness for you is the only reason I can afford to stay with you here for so long. You’ll have to occupy yourself on the days I have to go to work.”
Agatha’s joyful, playful attitude that she has been enjoying is wiped out in an instant. Rio is immediately on the alert, concerned, when she sees her wife’s deer-in-the-headlights expression and troubled frown. “‘Occupy’ myself?”
She thinks at first that Agatha is bothered by the unintentional double entendre. “I mean, you can and should masturbate if you want - personally, I’d rather you do that while I’m here, feel free to invite me to watch, I’d be delighted to lend a hand - but I meant you should find things to entertain yourself and engage your mind around the house. You know. Hobbies.”
“What do you mean?”
Rio stares at her. Surely she’s joking. “Honey, I’m Death, you think I know about human hobbies?” Agatha continues to stare, skeptical. So she starts spitballing. “I don’t know - read. Solve newspaper crosswords. Paint. Throw pottery. Do some fucking baking or even gardening - so long as you don’t ruin my plants.”
Her wife might try and purposefully piss her off by spraying pesticides on them, knowing her. And the baking is a bad idea, in reality; Agatha might burn the cottage to the ground just attempting to bake cookies.
Agatha looks revolted. She pushes the half-empty bowl of soup away. “I think I would rather chop my own arms off than subject myself to the New York Times daily crossword. And if you think I would willingly get down on my knees in the dirt to play around with weeds, then you’ve got another thing coming. I’m no green witch, and you won’t catch me dead with a trowel in my hand, unless I’m using it to bash somebody’s head in.”
“Fine, no crosswords or gardening. But something low effort and relatively relaxing, that takes time and doesn’t put your life in any danger,” Rio tells her slowly. “I don’t know if your interests have changed or what pastimes you’ve picked up in the last two and a half centuries.” Didn’t Agatha used to embroider, in her free time? She used to sew clothes and blankets for Nicky, but maybe that was out of necessity, rather than as a recreational activity.
“Hm, well… I suppose I can catch up on all those reality competition TV shows that glorify people’s failures and pain,” Agatha muses. “It’s always fun to relish in their misery. Nothing has quite made me laugh as much as watching the Great British Bake Off when they deliberately choose to run chocolate or ice cream week during the UK’s singular heatwave of the year. It’s always deliciously disastrous.”
Somehow Rio is not at all surprised to discover that her wife likes to watch trashy TV, probably with a bottle of wine to accompany it. She hates to break the news, but she feels obligated. “There’s no wifi here and definitely not a strong enough phone signal, so no internet access at all.”
Agatha blanches. Her voice turns somewhat desperate as she questions, “You raided the Westview house when you brought me here, didn’t you? Did you find my pocket dimension in the basement? All of my grimoires and other books were in there. I can at least try and brush up on analog magic if you’re going to be a sourpuss and refuse to bring me a witch to feed on.”
Sensing that Agatha is done with her soup, Rio swipes up the bowl in front of her, as well as the one her wife emptied earlier, to carry them over to the sink. She takes the two empty glasses of wine along with her. “As if you would be content with reading just the passages about analog magic. You’d be tempted to try anything that could restore your power, and you have a severe lack of self-preservation,” she declares. “No, no studying any magical books or artifacts until your core doesn’t look like it’s been run through a blender.”
Agatha says nothing in response, and Rio, who is busy rinsing out the bowls, reckons that she is silently raging once again, plotting how she might be able to gain access back into her pocket dimension and steal back her books. It would be a fool’s endeavor; she won’t be able to, without Rio’s help.
Her magical core is far too weak and fragile to handle dark magic right now, and so if she wants to get her hands back on her grimoires, then she needs to concentrate on resting and healing. And Agatha can be mad at her for that for as long as she wants, but Rio will not budge.
When she turns back around to face her partner, however, Agatha does not appear to be furious. Instead, she’s staring at her hands, resting on the tabletop, fingers twitching in a familiar manner. She’s trying to summon tiny wisps of magic.
“Agatha…” she says warningly. “You’ll hurt herself.”
“Shut up,” her wife snarls.
Rio winces in sympathy when Agatha’s breathing grows ragged and pained as she tries to draw on her injured magical core, and prepares herself to step in, lest Agatha start to actually cause harm to herself. But she doesn’t. Her hands flop limply onto the counter in defeat.
Agatha looks like a kicked puppy, and peers up at Rio with a lost expression. To her horror, there are the faintest traces of tears in her wife’s eyes. “What am I meant to do?” she whispers.
“Hey, no existential crises before dessert,” she jokes. But Agatha just stares at her, spaced out and anxious. Rio’s shoulders slump. “Agatha, your entire life since we parted cannot have just been scamming covens to siphon their powers, collecting grimoires and magical objects, and studying the fucking Darkhold.” It would be immensely sad if that were the case.
“No, some of it entailed triggering disasters and starting riots for shits and giggles, and selling binding spells and faux healing potions to make a quick buck,” she snaps, straight away on the defensive. But when Rio nods, quirking an eyebrow to prompt her to go on, Agatha appears to wilt. The fight drains out of her, and she looks broken. “Rio, my whole existence has involved magic. I - I don"t know what to do without it. The only reason I’ve survived past infanthood is because of it. Who even am I without my purple?” she croaks.
It dawns on Rio then what the true issue Agatha is facing is. It’s not just a loss of her magic - although that is a problem all in itself. No, it’s a loss of identity, of purpose. Agatha has tied both to magic, the study and hoarding of it, since she escaped her attempted execution by her mother and coven. She taught herself spirit craft and became a masterful scholar in matters of dark magic.
For a time, she gained other roles, and had other aims and goals in life; she became a wife, and a mother. She dedicated herself to not just her craft, but to love and motherhood. But then she lost Nicky - and she lost Rio too. So as a coping mechanism, the trauma too much for her mind to handle, she funneled all of her energy into becoming the most powerful, knowledgeable, and skilled witch in the world. To block out the agony of losing her family.
The Scarlet Witch, however, knocked her down. Not just a few pegs, but stripped her flag off the ship’s pole entirely. Now, powerless and unable to pursue restoring her reserves whilst her magical core is damaged, she is at a complete loss for what to do. She can no longer hyperfocus on witchcraft to avoid that gaping hole in her heart.
She is being forced to confront and process her emotions regarding the fracturing of her and Rio’s relationship, and the death of their son. And Agatha is petrified. She is terrified of vulnerability, and especially of self-examination. She feels set adrift at sea without land in sight, and the raft she’s on is slowly sinking.
Rio draws her chair around the table, so she’s directly next to her wife. Taking her seat, she reaches out and places her hand over the top of Agatha’s fidgeting ones, squeezing tightly. “You are not defined by your magic, or lack of it, Agatha. You’re still a witch, no matter what. But on top of that, you are a magnificent, wickedly intelligent, and cunning woman,” she reassures her lowly. “You’re going to stay here for a while, as you gain back your strength. You need to figure out who you are beyond just your magic. You’ll probably never find a better time in your life to self-reflect.”
“But I don’t want to,” Agatha replies, a slight whine in her voice. Dipping in volume, she murmurs bitingly, “I already know I’m an awful person with corrupt morals, Rio, I don’t need time to come to that conclusion.”
She does not think that Agatha is awful, but saying that would be contrary and invite Agatha to quarrel with her, so Rio responds, “Then reflect on the past, and not the present. You may think you’re a horrible person now, but what about in the past?”
Agatha’s face contorts into one of panic. “No. No, I don’t - I don’t want to think about that.”
She sighs, rubbing her thumb over the spirit witch’s knuckles. “I know it hurts, sweetheart, but pain is the best teacher. If you resist it, you will never accept it. Without acceptance, there’s no understanding.”
“I don’t need to understand my pain in order for it to be real,” Agatha argues, her expression bleak. “Sometimes there is no understanding. Sometimes those wounds don’t heal or scar over, they just remain open and bleeding and draining the life out of you.” She yanks one of her hands free from Rio’s, to wrap her fingers around her locket, clutching it frantically as she gasps out, “Sometimes the only way to get rid of the pain is to bury it down deep and just hope it dies.”
Rio shakes her head. What Agatha is describing is not at all healthy, and screams of denial, but it’s all she’s known to do to survive. Her grief after Nicky’s passing was so great, so all-encompassing and agonizing , that Agatha did the only thing she could: she shoved her crushing heartbreak and sadness into a box and locked it away.
Only when her emotions were too great, when she experienced a trauma trigger, did she allow them to explode outwards, and her suffering was overlaid with rage and hatred.
“And let the memories die with it?” she says gently. “I don’t think you want to forget the events that made you the person you are today, Agatha.” She stretches out her hand, fingers brushing over her wife’s, coiled around the locket containing their son’s lock of hair. “You don’t want to forget him. Or us. Do you?”
Agatha sniffles, releasing her locket to frustratedly wipe at her wet eyes. “Of fucking course not.”
Rio withdraws her hands. She so badly wants to pull her wife into a hug, but she has a feeling it would not go down too well currently. Instead, she rests her fingertips on Agatha’s knee, offering silent support. “Do some soul-searching, explore new interests,” she suggests lightly. “Just let me know if you need anything and I’ll conjure it for you.”
“You’ll help me?” the spirit witch asks quietly, looking up through her eyelashes at Rio, mortified but also awed.
“Unconditionally,” she swears.
Agatha appraises her wordlessly, and after a minute or so, swallows heavily, nodding. She believes her.
Rio breathes out in relief. It’s another very small step towards healing. A branch that she’s been steadily and warily holding out, that her wife has finally touched the other end of. Agatha is accepting her help and it feels utterly monumental.