.. Right. She can just have that. 

"I think I would like you to pet my hair."

"Then you shall have it. Bed in my room?"

" I - would like to eat - but I don't - I can't - It's too much."

"It's alright. We can come back to it." 

Rose pushes back her chair from the table and goes into her bedroom.

Ember trails after her. 

She sits down on the edge of the bed. 

It's hard.

It's really really hard.

But Rose... wants her to be strong.

Rose reaches up, and gently strokes her fingers through Ember's hair.

It's good.

It's really, really good.

She could do this and the - goat leg - 

She breaks down and cries.

Rose nestles her against her side, and takes her hand from Ember's hair and instead gently rubs her back. 

"It's okay," she says. "It's - it is okay to need time. It's okay to cry. I won't hurt you for it. It's okay."

She had thought she'd figured it all out. That she'd - realized it, that it would then just be over - 

It's not over.

She rests against Rose and cries her heart out.

Rose holds her. Patiently, calmly. Not doing an inch more than she asked for.

"Yeah," she says. "I thought it might be like that."

Ember pulls away from her touch, after a while. 

"I -" She takes a slow breath. "I feel -"

She's never had to analyze her own emotions before. 

"Bad. I feel bad."

"What does it feel like, physically? What's your body telling you?"

"I feel... almost pain in my chest. It's hard to breathe regularly, my breath wants to rush. It feels heavy in my gut and my body is all tense."

"Fear, I think. And sorrow. And maybe a tinge of guilt."

"I just -" Ember runs a hand through her hair. "I feel naked. I'm - unscarred. You couldn't tell that I'm from Nidal looking at me. I could - vanish into a crowd and tell no-one where I'm from and they wouldn't guess. I'd just be... another person. Another foreigner."

"Yeah. Those scars you bore, some of them mattered to you. And some of them were crippling you. And you still need to - figure out which is which."

"It's not right for my skin to be unblemished. No daughter of Nidal should be without scars."

"And who taught you that?"

"My family." A note of warmth creeps into her voice, even now.

"And they learned that from...?"

"... The kuthites."

The words feel like a dagger in her heart.

"It's your choice to bear or not bear scars, Ember. But you must remember that you've been taught deliberately to harm yourself by the priests of a god of suffering. It's not harmless to you to scar yourself. It's part of how they get you to accept that you're theirs to hurt."

She gathers herself. It's hard to get through to this foreigner, especially when everything is so hard. But she has something to fight for, here.

"It's - It's my art, though. Kumi says my designs are beautiful. That I'm able to - make something good from it."

"Yes. And she's accepted one of your patterns on her own body. It's not an either-or thing. I just want you to stop and think before you do anything new to yourself. Before you harm this body you've been given anew."