After what feels like an eternity but is probably less than the full rotation of the minute hand of a clock, Kiki stands, a long wooden box in her hands.

“Give me.” I extend my hands toward her, curling my fingers rhythmically.

With another roll of her eyes—honestly, she excels at that—Kiki thrusts the box into my eagerly waiting hands.

“Happy birthday,” she says as I fumble with the latch on the box.

“But my birthday isn’t for weeks.”

“I know. I had this commissioned ages ago. I was going to give it to you then, but…”

Her voice trails off, soft and sad. But then our lives crumbled down around us, all our plans and dreams foiled in the most violent manner. I pause in my fumbling and reach out to take her hand in mine. “I know. It’s all right.”

She nods, a bit too briskly, but then she’s smiling and it’s not entirely forced. “Go on. Open it.”

I do. And when I see what lies inside, my breath catches.

“Oh, Kiki. It’s beautiful.”

The dagger lays in a bed of deep green velvet, all the better to display the flawless gleaming steel. Vines dance along the center line of the blade—roses and thorns, twining their way from the handle almost to the very tip. The hilt itself is a work of art. Two iron branches form the quillons, shaped to look as though they are wrapped in the very same vines on the blade. The handle itself is finely etched with a flurry of leaves, culminating in a rounded pommel in the shape of a rose.

“There’s a matching scabbard, too.” Kiki reaches around me to trigger some sort of mechanism on the underside of the box. A hidden drawer shoots out, revealing said scabbard. It’s green leather, embossed with more roses, more vines.

“Kiki, this is too much,” I say, unable to keep the awe I feel out of my voice. She has bestowed upon me far more than my fair share of gifts over the years, from gowns and horses to swords, but nothing as fine or as personal as this.

“Nonsense. It’s just right.” She lifts the dagger from its berth and slides it into the scabbard. The steel whispers softly against the leather. “May I?”

I don’t know what she’s asking but, honestly, at this point I’d agree to anything she wanted.

What she wants is to kneel at my feet and lift the hem of my voluminous skirts, a gesture which makes every last bit of sense left rattling around in my brain flee with tremendous haste. My mouth goes curiously dry. My tongue feels too thick for the space allotted to it.

“Kiki…”