![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
archiveofarethusaHolly is sauntering down the Black Aisles of Arethusa Library, her fingers trailing across the dusty covers as she passes them, and she laughs as the terrible things inside brush their fingertips back against hers. She's looking for something, perhaps, or showing off for the shadows. There are worse crowds to play to, and she's dreamed stupider dreams. The Library is cold and still as a corpse, but Holly doesn't mind. She doesn't even shiver.
"What are you doing here?" Sofia's voice demands from behind. Holly turns around to face the woman and a smile cracks open on her face. It doesn't feel right. Holly wants to open her mouth to speak, but she only smiles wider, a giddiness bubbling up in her chest that isn't hers, and suddenly Holly is acutely aware that she isn't dreaming and hasn't been in control of her body since she opened her eyes.
"I live here, too," Helene says with Holly's mouth. She isn't talking to Sofia. "If I'm going to share space with you, I'm going to enjoy it."
And Holly is suddenly in control of herself again, breathing heavily, and poor Sofia has never looked so confused and scared since Holly's known her, but she's breathing under her own power now and everything else is just a little less important right now. Which of course means that just then several of the sealed tomes whose dust still coats her fingertips start gushing old, twisted up dark curses. The air glitters gold for a moment, and Holly tries to calm herself down long enough to help Sofia stop the world from ripping in twain and melting into the Cimmerian planes. She spends the rest of the day looking over her shoulder and seeing colors that don't exist drifting through the shadows of the library.
From the corner of Holly's mind that isn't hers, Helene says, slyly, "Tag."
"What are you doing here?" Sofia's voice demands from behind. Holly turns around to face the woman and a smile cracks open on her face. It doesn't feel right. Holly wants to open her mouth to speak, but she only smiles wider, a giddiness bubbling up in her chest that isn't hers, and suddenly Holly is acutely aware that she isn't dreaming and hasn't been in control of her body since she opened her eyes.
"I live here, too," Helene says with Holly's mouth. She isn't talking to Sofia. "If I'm going to share space with you, I'm going to enjoy it."
And Holly is suddenly in control of herself again, breathing heavily, and poor Sofia has never looked so confused and scared since Holly's known her, but she's breathing under her own power now and everything else is just a little less important right now. Which of course means that just then several of the sealed tomes whose dust still coats her fingertips start gushing old, twisted up dark curses. The air glitters gold for a moment, and Holly tries to calm herself down long enough to help Sofia stop the world from ripping in twain and melting into the Cimmerian planes. She spends the rest of the day looking over her shoulder and seeing colors that don't exist drifting through the shadows of the library.
From the corner of Holly's mind that isn't hers, Helene says, slyly, "Tag."