The sound of silence captured Roxanne's mind, and in its sliver amidst the storm of her heart, she chased a question. Why she ran? The thought clung to her like moss and felt just as cold and gross to the touch. Was the notion of being with Rudy as his partner that repulsive? Was she simply not ready for a relationship? Pervasive as the questions were, she found a sort of comfort in exploring them.
That is, until the sound of the creaking floorboard snapped her out of her head. Blinking her eyes, she narrowed her vision at the swinging ceiling light. Snapping her further out of her stupor was a hushed moan and the words of a succubus.
"Ahaha~ I love you so much, my…"
Her voice broken by a hush, Aura's voice waned–losing itself in the silence. The sound of the gradually rocking bedframe, however, relented. Followed closely by the hushed moan of a woman making love with a smile on her face. Roxanne, of course, could not see what was happening, but from the many novels of romance which she'd read, an image was already painted in her head.
How the protagonist pushes the girl against the bedsheet, how she struggles against his hold, and yet her hips rock against his passion. The taste of sweet saliva shared through a kiss and the chill felt to the marrow as a trickle of sweat trails down the spine until it drips down the naked skin.
'What am I thinking?' She asked herself, her heart pounding faster and faster the longer she tried to etch more details in that painting.
"Having trouble sleeping?"
"HA!" Growing stiff as a board as she heard a voice next to her ear, Roxanne turned her head to find Okio standing next to her bed. "O-oh… I'm sorry, I didn't–"
"It's okay," masking her face while laughing, Capra offered her a mug of steaming hot tea. "I shouldn't have crept up on you."
Nodding politely, Roxanne sat upright on the single bed and leaned her back against the wall with her head. Reaching for the mug, she tried to hold a smile, but the moans leaking from upstairs quickly turned that into a rosy red blush with averted eyes.
"Don't mind them," smiling once more, Okio grabbed Roxanne's hand and handed the mug to her herself. "They are quite energetic at night, which makes me wonder how those two can even function in the morning, but then again, the potions they make and those items–going down that rabbit hole would only lead to more questions than answers."
Holding the warm mug with both hands, Roxanne tried to push the moans to the back of her head. Meanwhile, Okio sat at the edge of the bed with her legs stretched onto the mattress on the floor where she'd been trying to sleep for the night.
"Isn't that distracting?" Wearing half a grimace and an awkward smile, Roxanne pushed further. "Like listening to them going on and on, I thought it was bad at the inn, but here too? Don't they get tired of doing it all the time?"
"Hmm…" Heaving a sigh, Okio shrugged. "Have you ever been in love, miss?"
Turning her head, she barely held the same smile as before.
"It makes you do strange things, you know?" Taking another deep breath, Okio's eyes reflected a sombre slice of her past. Smiling once more, her lips parted, and she laughed. "I once loved a man; I did all that I could for him. But then he sold me to another man."
Placing her hand on top of Roxanne's, she squeezed it lightly.
"And that man was my father, not even he loved me enough to keep me around." Pursing her lips as Roxanne's heart stilled for a moment, Okio laughed again. "How I would kill to have what they have. The desire to hold each other, to be close every night, and well…"
Letting a chuckle slip through her lips, Okio drew her hands back.
"The energy, too, I suppose."
"I…see," hanging her head low, Roxanne awkwardly brought the mug closer to her lips. "I, I guess you're right."
The sip of the bittersweet tea felt like a reminder to her own abandonment. One moment, everything was fine; the other, the gods had forsaken everything and everyone. A ruin of a world left behind by what's left, in tatters and texts that were barely legible.
"Love…" She muttered to herself, but then came a reminder.
Lifting her head, she looked to the slave woman.
"But isn't Cecilia a slave? Does she really love him, or is it an act?"
Holding the question in her head for a moment, Okio bobbed her head left and right.
"I wondered the same at first, but then," for once on her face, appeared a genuine, happy smile. "I started to fall in love with him as well."
Closing her eyes, Okio chuckled some more.
"But then again, I'm a slave." With a slight tilt of her head, she looked at Roxanne. "Who would love me? I'm a toy to be used and then discarded."
"Why… would you think like that?" Visibly concerned, Roxanne reached out to Okio and placed a hand on her shoulder. "Does he not treat you well? Is something wrong?"
"Not him…" Shaking her head, Okio placed her hand on top of Roxanne's. "I couldn't have asked for a better master. He even told me that I can walk out anytime, there's no slave seal to make me obey him."
Lifting her head, she held Roxanne's gaze for a moment. Her eyes lingered on her face as if contemplating something, and eventually she said it.
"Maybe it's because your friend, that hero, came to buy me before master Custer."
"What?" Roxanne's hand retreated to her words, and her eyes widened with pure horror.
"Many before him came as well, but to think that someone called a hero wanted me to be his sex slave, and from what little I know, it was for some practice to get better in bed for some other girl." Okio's expression contorted with anger as she turned away once more. "Used and discarded, maybe that's why I still feel this way."
At a loss for words, Roxanne felt a rush of cold shooting down her spine. Trying to say something, her lips quivered with angst, yet not a word came out.
"Maybe someday, I will get to kiss him." Shaking her head, Okio smiled one last time before getting up. "Thankfully, my kind only gets the urge during mating season, so it's easier for me to ignore all that noise, haha!"
And that was the end of their night, a bittersweet interaction much like the tea itself.