The ink burns Dove’s skin going in as intensely as the brush of her fingers used to send electric shocks up their spine. The ink burns like how Dove’s heart burned at the cremation.
The blood, ink, and ash mix, and Dove screams as they absorb her powers. They didn’t keep her alive, but Dove is burning like the ink as it sinks into their skin and stains them. Like the loss of her stained their insides, crumbling them. Ashes to ashes. Dust to dust.
Ink to ink.
When it is done, Dove trembles. The pain fades away to the feel of those gentle caresses they once knew. The brush of fingertips across their fresh skin, unmarked. But now Quill is writing a new legacy with those fingertips inside Dove’s skin: coiling waves, beacons of light, and soft flowers to show what Dove has lost; teeth, blades, and skulls to show what is coming for them.