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Caitlyn’s reflection is somewhat unfamiliar to her these days. She’s never been insecure of her appearance really (aside from the awkwardness that came with growing into her height), but as she gazes into the bathroom mirror, she sees a woman much older than twenty-three.
Bitterness certainly does age a person, Caitlyn has learned, and that’s not to mention experiencing the horrors of a war that she did a hell of a lot to cause. Everything she’s been through in the last few months have left their marks all over her. Dark rings beneath her eyelids, scars where she’d been pierced by the enemy’s blade, and the slightest lingering wrinkle on her forehead from months of a furrowed brow.
And the eyepatch, of course, but that does happen to be a given, considering how very there it is and how it’s the first thing Caitlyn’s working eye goes to when she stares at herself in the mirror.
The injury itself is far more harrowing to behold than the eyepatch, so Caitlyn has elected to cover it until it has fully healed. She has options for when the time comes, procedures that could restore her vision on the left side to an extent. She isn’t sure if she’ll go through with it.
The injury serves as a reminder. A reminder of what she caused, and a pledge to the people of both Piltover and Zaun that she will work to mend what she’s broken. In a way, it’d feel wrong to fix.
That, and a twisted part of her believes that she deserves it.
Caitlyn’s always had a sharp eye. Whether it be detective work or shooting, her excellent perception comes in great handy. Sure, she can still see, and she’s always been able to shoot with both eyes, but neither of these skills will ever be the same. Perhaps it should stay that way. The rifle in her hands did farm more harm than good, in the end.
She hasn’t picked up the rifle since, not yet. She’s worried the view through the scope will be different without the assistance of her left eye. The thought alone leaves a pit in her stomach.
Her guilt spiral is abruptly halted by the feeling of a pair of warm, strong arms coming around her middle and a chin resting on her shoulder. A smile finds its way to her face. Leave it to Vi to pull Caitlyn out of her own head every single time.
“Hey baby,” Vi says, and Caitlyn melts into her touch, bringing her arm up to cover Vi’s. “Can I steal you from your thoughts?”
Caitlyn turns around in her arms and wraps her own around Vi’s shoulders. “Hm, no. I need at least five more minutes of feeling sorry for myself.”
Vi chuckles in that quiet way that she always does and Caitlyn’s heart skips a beat. “Well, pardon me for interrupting such an important task.” She leans in and brushes her lips against Caitlyn’s, pulling her forward toward the ensuite’s door. It’s late; Vi wants her to come to bed.
“You’re pardoned,” Caitlyn affirms against her lips, then pulls away gently. “I do need to tend to my eye before I join you, darling. I’ll be quick.”
Vi gets that look in her big, grey-blue eyes that Caitlyn remembers from the last time she’d asked to help to assist with her wound maintenance. That look that practically shouts “let me help!” at Caitlyn.
It wasn’t that Caitlyn didn’t want her help, but she felt bad allowing it. She knew it hurt Vi to see her injured. Vi would somehow blame herself like she always did, even though there was nothing she could do to prevent Ambessa’s blows.
And perhaps there’s a part of her that doesn’t want any further attention brought to the injury. Perhaps there is a hint of insecurity that comes with losing such an integral part of oneself.
But this is Vi. Vi, who has forgiven her for every wretched thing she’d managed to do as of late. Certainly she wouldn’t turn away from Caitlyn because of a nasty scar across her eye. Logically, it was preposterous to even think such a thing. It wasn’t as if Vi hadn’t seen the injury before. She’d seen it when it looked worse.
So, what the hell. The ugliest of the injury had subsided, anyway. Caitlyn sighs. “You want to help, don’t you?”
Vi’s eyes widen in surprise. “How’d you know?”
“It’s practically written all over your face.” Caitlyn presses another soft kiss to Vi, this time on her lover’s freckled cheek. Ever the open book, this one.
“You can say no,” Vi says, cupping Caitlyn’s cheek just under her eyepatch. She rubs the skin there with her thumb, and Caitlyn instinctively leans into it. The feeling of Vi’s warm, calloused palm never fails to provide comfort when she needs it most. “But I’d like to take care of you, Cait. You deserve it.”
Caitlyn laughs. “I don’t know about that.”
“You do ,” Vi doubles down, her grip around Caitlyn’s waist tightening ever so slightly. “You’ve been hard at work ever since you were allowed off bedrest. You deserve to relax, let me take this small load off your shoulders, at least.”
Caitlyn knows Vi means it in general. That she’s deserving .
They’ve had this conversation before, and it’s led to arguments where Caitlyn refuses to relax because there’s so much work to be done, so many mistakes to correct. How could she deserve to relax when the people she’d once defended were suffering even more all because of her? How could Vi look at her and decide that she deserved peace, when so many had never known peace a moment in their lives because of the very system she’d pledged her loyalty toward?
Vi would hold her face and tell her how badly it hurt to see her this way. It was one thing to own up to her wrongdoings and to pledge herself to fixing them, but another to drown in the guilt, Vi would tell her. And she’d remind her of the dirt under her nails, how she’d always be there to nudge Caitlyn in the right direction.
How she was forgiven, despite it all. Caitlyn thanks every possible god for giving her Vi to steady her course.
Tonight, Caitlyn didn’t feel like arguing. It wouldn’t kill her to indulge this sweet woman who looks at her like she’s hung the moon and stars.
“You’re awfully hard to say no to, did you know that?”
Vi beams.
Caitlyn gives her the rundown, pulling the topical cream and antibiotic drops she’d been prescribed from the medicine cabinet. The routine is simple enough, Caitlyn’s been doing it for weeks now. Two drops in her eye, and the cream atop the slow-scarring skin after disinfecting the area.
“It doesn’t hurt too terribly anymore,” Caitlyn says, because she knows Vi will naturally worry about causing her any extra pain.
“I’ll be gentle anyway,” Vi replies. “Now c’mere.”
Puzzled, Caitlyn tilts her head. “Wh—“
She’s cut off by Vi’s arms coming around her again, this time scooping her up from behind her knees. Caitlyn nearly drops the ointment as she’s bridal-carried out of the ensuite.
“Vi!” Caitlyn laughs incredulously. “Where are we going, exactly? The lighting is much better in the bathroom.”
Vi carefully places her down on their bed. She looks Caitlyn in the eye with a smug smile as she flicks on the bedside lamp. “I can see just fine to take care of you, Cupcake.”
“You’re ridiculous,” Caitlyn replies, feeling so stupidly in love with the woman in front of her that she could fully explode.
She remains in one piece, somehow, as Vi sits down on the mattress and faces her, one leg tucked beneath the other. Vi lifts a hand back to her cheek, warming her face with her gentle touch. They smile at each other, and the air between them is thick as Vi slowly cards her hand back through Caitlyn’s navy hair until she finds the tie of her eyepatch.
“Can I?”
Caitlyn takes a breath, then nods her approval.
Vi pulls the black string until the tie gives, and the eyepatch falls away from Caitlyn’s head. They stare at each other for a moment. Caitlyn has very rarely felt so exposed under Vi’s gaze.
Caitlyn’s left eye, once a bright shade of turquoise, is a milky, near-white hue. A jagged, angry line runs through the pupil and out past the outer corner of her eye. The redness of her stitched skin has begun to scab, the outer edges puckering into a dusty pink.
It isn’t pretty. Caitlyn still winces when she looks closely at the damage.
And yet…
“You’re beautiful, Cait,” says Vi, which does not come as a surprise to Caitlyn, but her heart still swells three times its size and no, the heat radiating from Vi’s palm is not assisting in the slightest with the flush forming upon Caitlyn’s cheeks.
“You’re a sap,” Caitlyn replies in the only way she can think to follow such a bleeding-heart declaration. Vi laughs her assent, that soft sound that hugs Caitlyn’s entire being in a way only familiar to someone who has experienced such deep devotion to another, that even the sound of their laughter is made to feel like the warmest of embraces.
Vi says nothing else, instead proceeding with the care of Caitlyn’s eye ever so gingerly. And though expected, Caitlyn is amazed by the gentleness of her lover, how calloused and bruised hands that had fought to protect and defend for so many years could still be so careful, so intent on providing comfort.
Vi murmurs an apology when Caitlyn winces at the sting of the antibiotic, to which Caitlyn assures her she’s fine with a soft pat on her knee.
The thickness of the air between them, the one-sided tension Caitlyn felt upon first having the injury revealed, has very nearly vanished and been replaced with an overwhelming feeling of love for Vi. It warms her very soul, and she leans into every touch, every brush of Vi’s fingertips against her cheek and temple. She remains unconvinced that she deserves her, or any of the care and comfort that comes with being loved by her, but she’s grateful for all of it.
When Vi finishes, her palm returns to its spot upon Caitlyn’s cheek, as if a magnetic force pulls her there. Caitlyn’s eye weeps with excess, so Vi wipes the droplet as it rolls down her face. Caitlyn leans toward her palm and kisses it. I love you, she thinks.
“I love you,” Vi says, and Caitlyn can’t help but close the gap between them.
It’s gentle, to begin with, as most everything had been between them thus far. A meeting of soft, smiling mouths, moving against one another as if time had slowed just for them to savor the moment.
Vi’s hand travels to the back of Caitlyn’s head, fingers tangling into navy hair and ever so slightly pulling her forward. There’s very little force to it, but the action alone excites Caitlyn as she chases Vi’s lips.
She twines both arms around Vi’s shoulders and sits forward, readjusting, as their soft kisses devolve into something more heated, behind each slow brush of lips is a fire that burns both of them deep within their chests.
Lately, it’s hard to stop once they get going. Caitlyn looks forward to getting lost in her lover after a day of hard work, and she knows Vi does too. The intensity varies, depending on the mood, and Caitlyn loves it all. She loves Vi. She loves wanting Vi.
Equally, she knows Vi loves wanting her, if her open-mouthed, noisy kisses don’t speak for themselves. Their tongues dance together, taking their time tasting each other, each kiss so languid they’re dizzying, causing Caitlyn’s head to spin on its axis.
And then Vi moves to her neck, leaving Caitlyn chasing her lips on the way down. She misses the feeling of Vi’s full lips on her own for but a moment before her head’s lolling off to the side, allowing her lover proper access to the skin under her jaw. Each gentle kiss is electric, sending their sparks straight to Caitlyn’s core and causing goosebumps to erupt down her body. Her breath hitches as Vi nips at her, soft, but enough to feel.
Vi laves her tongue against her pulsepoint, giving extra attention to the mole just below it. Caitlyn can feel Vi smiling against her neck, and she smiles too, letting out a huff of breathy laughter at the sheer dorkiness of her girlfriend.
If there’s one thing about Vi, it’s that she’ll map every mole across Caitlyn’s body with her lips if able.
“Find one?” Caitlyn teases, no, purrs, but not without an air of neediness to her voice. Oh, how Vi could work her up just by kissing her. In theory, it could be humiliating, being so easily turned on by something so small in the grand scheme. And perhaps that would make the ache, the need worse.
Vi nuzzles her way up just behind Caitlyn’s ear with her nose, inhaling the alluring scent of jasmine and vanilla that she’d spritzed on her neck earlier that day. “Mhm,” she hums, her voice gruff against Caitlyn’s ear, causing a shiver to race down her spine. “I’d like to find more.”
Caitlyn gasps as Vi sucks her earlobe into her mouth. “Would you now?” she coos after a moment of finding oxygen. Vi had such a talent for taking her breath away.
“ Yeah, ” Vi replies, her hands now roaming south, grasping at Caitlyn’s waist through her silk nightgown. “Let me take care of you, baby.”
As if Caitlyn could refuse her.
“I’m yours,” she says, and Vi wastes no time pressing her into the pillows. Caitlyn’s eyepatch falls off the bed and onto the floor.
Their kiss is searing this time, and Vi full on moans into it as she rucks up the fabric of Caitlyn’s nightgown, exposing her thighs and stomach to the cool air of their bedroom, and the warmth of Vi’s palms.
Those hands roam the expanse of her stomach and drift upward, causing Caitlyn’s muscles to flex involuntarily at the way the movement tickles her skin. Vi palms her breasts beneath what remains of her gown, and Caitlyn’s back arches on impact as her fingers brush over each pebbled nipple.
“Can I?” Vi asks, her voice quiet despite the huskiness of it. She’s pulling up the hem of the silk before Caitlyn can even respond, exposing the underneath of her breast.
Caitlyn nods, giggling at the absurdity of the request. “Darling, you’ve practically taken it off already.”
Vi’s smile shows off her teeth as she pulls the nightgown off the rest of the way over Caitlyn’s head, who raises her arms over her head in assistance. Caitlyn is left in nothing but her matching pair of panties. And Vi is still clothed, which simply will not do.
“I’m feeling a bit left out,” Caitlyn says, fiddling with the hem of Vi’s cotton shirt.
“I’m doing the work tonight, Cait,” comes Vi’s reply, and Caitlyn’s already full heart threatens to spill over.
“I know.” It’s Caitlyn’s turn to reach up and cup Vi’s cheek. “But I still want to see you.”
That is decidedly all the convincing Vi needs. After a moment of allowing Caitlyn’s touch to linger, her thumb brushing over the VI tattooed on her cheek, she pulls her shirt over her head and tosses it to the floor. And oh, what a sight.
It’s a sight Caitlyn’s seen dozens of times by now, but she’s still enraptured by the way Vi’s muscles flex beneath the skin of her abdomen, the way her shoulders roll every time she sheds her shirt. When she does it, Caitlyn just barely catches a glimpse of the elaborate tattoo that stretches down her back, and though she knows she’s about to thoroughly enjoy every moment of Vi’s affections, a part of her wishes to trace every inch of the markings on her lover’s back.
Caitlyn reaches forward and pulls Vi back down for yet another hungry kiss, a whimper slipping from her throat when their breasts press together, the coolness of metal brushing Caitlyn’s nipples from Vi’s own.
Vi moves down.
Down, down, down Caitlyn’s body, Vi trails her lips over every dip and curve with a reverence Caitlyn feels wholly unworthy of, but she allows it to happen, allows herself to unwind and to feel, to let her ever-racing thoughts be stilled and covered by Vi. Vi, Vi.
“ Vi, ” Caitlyn moans, a quiet, breathy sound, as Vi decorates her collarbones with saliva and blooms of pinkish-purple.
A shiver rushes up her spine, causing her to arch up off the mattress as Vi’s hands find her breasts once more. She feels Vi smile against her skin as her mouth soon follows.
“Sensitive,” she remarks, before her tongue darts out over a nipple, swirling over the brown bud to elicit any and all reaction from Caitlyn. And oh, it works.
Caitlyn’s hands move to Vi’s hair, coaxing her along as she sucks pretty marks into the swell of her tits, strong hands groping at the other while her mouth is occupied. Every electric touch from Vi is sent straight between her legs, which she presses together in a desperate attempt for friction. But Vi takes her time, savors every inch, moving from left to right to mouth over her breasts and leaving not a single patch of skin untouched by her tongue.
She pauses on Caitlyn’s left side, where another mole dots her skin just adjacent to her nipple, and showers the area with affection, leaving a reddening bite around it as if to stake her claim. Caitlyn cries out as the scraping of teeth, the feeling so intoxicating it leaves her breathless.
“So good,” she whines, barely audible but Vi hears it and reacts the way she always does to praise, egged on as ever, tilting her head back down to take Caitlyn’s nipple back into her mouth and suck just a bit harder.
Suddenly, Caitlyn cannot wait to see herself in the mirror come morning. She’ll be a sight, a map of all of Vi’s favorite spots to mouth at.
Vi’s lips traverse down her sternum, the wetness they leave behind cooling on Caitlyn’s flushed skin. She looks up at Caitlyn, grey-blue eyes glistening with all the adoration they’re capable of producing. Caitlyn brushes her pink bangs out of eyes as she makes her way further south.
Her abs clench on Vi’s way down her stomach, a particularly ticklish area of her body and her lover knows it. Vi squeezes her waist, digging her fingers in just enough to make Caitlyn squirm beneath her. They both laugh, their voices roughened by circumstance.
The moles that dot her stomach are no match for Vi, who eagerly laps at them the moment they’re within reach. Caitlyn’s sure there won’t be a single mole on her body not graced by Vi’s kiss-swollen lips when the night ends.
After what feels like ages, Vi dips far enough to reach her pelvis, where her now soaked lacy thong hugs her hips. Caitlyn clenches on nothing as her fingertips graze the hem of her panties, and she looks at Vi, pleads with her eyes.
“Tell me what you need, baby,” Vi says, nipping at the skin where her pelvic bone meets her thigh. The action makes Caitlyn’s leg twitch, and her lover smirks.
“You, please,” Caitlyn begs without being told to do so, because she just can’t take another second of Vi’s mouth not on her. But Vi is unrelenting in her teasing, if only for a moment longer. Her fingers dance from Caitlyn naval downward, but stop at her panties.
“You don’t say,” Vi murmurs against her skin as she leans down to kiss at her underwear line. In her frustration, Caitlyn grips Vi’s hair, tugging at her scalp and ripping a low moan from her girlfriend’s throat.
Two could play at this game. They make eye contact, but instead of Caitlyn biting back any teasing words of her own, they both laugh at the sheer silliness of Vi’s falter.
“Your mouth, Violet,” Caitlyn relents with laughter on her tongue. “Must I beg you again?”
“Nah,” Vi says, dipping down between Caitlyn legs finally , her nose brushing against the soaked fabric of her panties. Caitlyn squirms. “I think I’ve made you wait long enough.”
The first stroke of Vi’s tongue is heavenly as it always is, even if it is through fabric, the friction sends stars into Caitlyn’s vision. After that, Vi wastes very little time pulling her panties to the side to get a taste of the real thing.
Vi spreads Caitlyn wide, delving between slick folds and eliciting downright sinful sounds from Caitlyn’s mouth. Her grip in Vi’s hair tightens once again as need burns within her, coaxing her along with each flick of her tongue.
Eager as ever, Vi closes her lips around Caitlyn’s clit and sucks, and Caitlyn’s eyes squeeze shut as she throws her head back in unbridled pleasure. She swirls her tongue around the swollen, pulsing bud expertly, and Caitlyn finds that she can hardly stop herself from rutting up into her lover’s mouth. Vi encourages the motion, grasping at her thighs and pulling them forward into her, nose buried in her shock of trimmed curls.
There is a halt in Vi’s movements, and Caitlyn’s hips stutter, bucking up into nothing. When she opens her eyes, Vi is looking right at her, the bottom half of her face glistening with Caitlyn’s juices and in that moment, just how wet Vi makes her is put into perspective.
Vi runs her thumb over Caitlyn’s clit to replace her mouth momentarily as she speaks. “Watch me,” she says, and Caitlyn nods softly, her seeing eye now fixed on her lover as she dips back down to get back to work.
Fingers are added to the equation this time, heightening every feeling tenfold. Vi’s mouth flicks over every inch of heat it can reach while a single digit breaches Caitlyn’s entrance. They both moan. It takes Caitlyn every ounce of strength not to tilt her head back and take Vi out of focus, but she holds her lover’s gaze obediently despite herself.
And gods, is she glad she does. The sight of Vi going down on her would easily be enough to bring her over the edge alone. Those beautiful eyes holding her gaze, the view of her tongue as it slides against her clit, the glimpses of her finger as it slides in and out of her. A second is added not long after the first, and Caitlyn announces her appreciation for the stretch with a call of Vi’s name.
“ Violet, ” she moans, her voice rising in pitch. It is evident to both of them how close she is.
Caitlyn feels it pooling in her abdomen, bubbling to the surface at a rate much quicker than she’d like, to be frank. Oh to have this last forever, to never cease knowing the feeling of Vi positively devouring her.
Vi feels it in the way her hips stutter, hears it in her voice as she cries out for her, begs her not to stop. And while Caitlyn wishes to savor the moment, Vi works her faster to get her over that finish line.
“Just like that,” Caitlyn practically sobs, back arching into every touch, hips rutting down onto Vi’s fingers in an effort to get them deeper. “Violet–fuck, I’m so close.” Watching Vi had become an obsolete task by now, once the pressure began to build with such fervor. Vi groans against her and curls her fingers in response, reaching for that familiar spot to drive her girl absolutely crazy.
"I've got you, baby. Cum for me."
She reaches it, and with a particularly drawn out lick from bottom to top, Caitlyn sees white. Her body shakes against the mattress and against Vi as her orgasm hits her, waves of red-hot pleasure overtaking her senses. Her ears ring, and she is distinctly unaware of the sounds that are ripped from her throat, but she can taste Vi’s name on her tongue as she is worked through it.
Vi does not let up. She never does right away. With the goal of maximizing Caitlyn’s pleasure, she rubs her until Caitlyn is begging her to stop, until she shakes from the aftershocks and bats Vi’s hands away weakly.
“Can’t give me another?” Vi asks after a moment of letting Caitlyn come down. She’s panting herself, and Caitlyn briefly wonders if she’d forgotten to breathe.
“Are you trying to kill me or something?” Caitlyn replies through her own labored breath.
Vi shrugs. “Might not be the worst way to go out.”
Caitlyn chokes out an incredulous laugh. “I cannot believe you. You’ve just eaten me out and now you’re threatening to kill me.”
“In my defense, you almost drowned me with how soaked you are.”
“ Violet!”
It’s Vi’s turn to laugh, and she crawls back up to Caitlyn’s face to crush their lips together, saliva mixing with the slick juices Caitlyn left behind on Vi’s mouth. It’s filthy and perfect and Caitlyn loses herself in her girlfriend as those strong arms come around her once again. She hadn’t realized how much she misses having Vi up here with her, her lips and arms accessible again.
Caitlyn’s the first to break away when she realizes Vi hasn’t gotten off. Her hands travel downward, but Vi catches her wrist. “I’m good, Cait. You did me in yourself.”
“What? But–” and then it hits her. Vi’s panting. Caitlyn cannot control the bright pink flush that rises to her face. Even now, after everything, she can hardly believe the effect she has on Vi. “ Oh.”
“Yeah, oh. But I suppose I’m not opposed to another,” Vi says, pecking her cheek. “If you promise to make out with me first.”
As if Vi had to tell her twice. “Deal,” she says, and their lips find each other again.
Caitlyn finds herself face to face with her reflection the next morning. It’s still unfamiliar; the person she sees on the other side of the glass is older, scarred, changed beyond recognition.
And covered in hickeys.
She hadn’t bothered to throw any clothes on after wriggling her way from underneath her lover’s tattooed arm, so every mark Vi had left in her wake is on full display in front of the mirror. Caitlyn traces down her own body with her eyes and follows along with her fingertips, admiring Vi’s work with an amused smile. The majority of the marks are concentrated to her chest, to no one’s surprise, and in particular, Caitlyn is incredibly fond of the bite marks around each mole on her skin.
“Damn,” comes Vi’s voice from the corner of the bathroom, breaking Caitlyn out of her trance. She’s leaning against the ensuite’s entrance, arms crossed over her chest in nothing but her boxers. There are a few marks on Vi’s neck as well, because Caitlyn is also incorrigible when it comes to her lover, but they pale in comparison to the multitude of purplish marks that cover her own skin. “Admiring my artistry alone?”
Caitlyn snorts. “That’s certainly one word for it. I look like I’ve been mauled by a beast.”
“That’s what they call me,” Vi confirms, nodding her head as if she’s proud of herself. “A beast in bed.”
“You are incredibly annoying,” Caitlyn replies.
“Ah, but you’re not denying it.” Vi pushes off the wall to join Caitlyn at her side, wrapping an arm around her waist. Caitlyn gives her an inquisitive look through their reflection, her brow furrowed, as if indecisive. Vi gives her a sideways smile.“What’s that look for?”
“I’m trying to decide whether to kiss you or kill you.”
“I’ll take option A,” Vi says, and pulls Caitlyn forward to join their lips. They smile against each other, and Caitlyn briefly feels as though her head is full of cotton.
When they pull apart, Vi leans against her shoulder, her gaze fixed Caitlyn in the mirror, who has once again returned to staring at herself. There is a silence between them, as Caitlyn ponders her form in its rawest state, completely bare, even her damaged eye left uncovered.
“Do you like what you see?” Vi asks finally, her voice distinctly lacking in flirtation. She’s asking genuinely, if Caitlyn likes who she sees in the mirror.
Well, she certainly likes who stands next to her. Vi’s presence had kept her sane ever since they’d reunited. But as for herself? Caitlyn is unsure. She’d hated herself for a considerable amount of time, letting her grief take her to a place so dark that she’d nearly been consumed by it. Now, in the aftermath, her feelings were confusing. Definitely not good. Perhaps somewhere between neutral and negative. Admitting that to Vi felt cruel.
“I think,” Caitlyn begins after another period of silence between them, “if you stay beside me, I could.” And she means it, she needs Vi; it had been an impossible task to hold onto her best qualities without Vi there to keep her whole. She would need her there to find those qualities within herself again. Somehow, Vi already sees them all as clear as day.
“I’m not going anywhere.” Vi turns to look her in the eyes with a furrowed, determined brow, and Caitlyn knows she means it. She knew she meant it the first time she’d declared her commitment to Caitlyn. She was still in the fight, still on her side despite the wretch she had become.
“I know,” is Caitlyn’s reply, because she does. She’d learned her lesson in doubting Vi long ago. It was a mistake she’d vowed to never repeat.
One day, Violet will ask her again: does Caitlyn like what she sees in her reflection? And Caitlyn will tell her yes, and it will be all thanks to her.