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let me steal this from you now, leliana - Khuma - 10-25-2018 i'd break the back of love for you.
@[leliana]
It’s Wane’s turn to babysit their egg and so she ventures out to stretch her legs for a while. Occasionally, she shivers, and the feeling causes her shimmering scales to cascade along her body. She eyes them all curiously as she passes by them. A faint smirk rests pleasantly her lips as the tall grasses brush along her skin. The trees have shed their leaves and they reach, naked, for the gray sky above them. This is her favorite time of year. The way her breath puffs from her lips with each delicate breath mesmerizes her for a while.
Until she sees a girl with serpentine wings all glittering against her tired body. She thought she could pick out most of her remaining siblings but it seemed she was mistaken. She and Kerrigan used to make a game of it and laugh cruelly at the other rejected offspring who took it personally. They were all cast aside in favor of the golden family, she used to think. Anadil told them from a young age that their father would never come looking for them and they accepted it. (It hurt so badly at first, of course, but time gifted her with a calloused heart.) So she wanders closer, eyes flicking from rich hazel-brown to vibrant green with a sliver of a pupil watching the stranger. Her coat sheds along her shoulders and hips in favor of the pearlescent and blood red scales. But she keeps her teeth. Fangs never made for warm introductions. “Are you one of us?” she asks with a slight tilt of her head as she examines Leliana’s body closely. She’s got a kind face that lacks the sharp lines of Khuma’s father. No, she’s something new and different. How exciting. Kerrigan would be so envious that Khuma had found another red serpent in their midst, so she makes a note to mention it next time she sees her. “I’m Khuma,” she explains as she finally brings her gaze to meet Leliana’s. She only vaguely resembles Vulgaris and Shiya – namely in the quiet danger lurking behind her eyes. But that primordial need to consume and conquer coils, twisting itself deep within her all the same. khuma. RE: let me steal this from you now, leliana - leliana - 10-25-2018 I waited for something, and something died it's our dearest ally, it's our closest friend @[Khuma] RE: let me steal this from you now, leliana - Khuma - 10-25-2018 i'd break the back of love for you.
@[leliana]
She remembers crying when Tatter left. God, she fell to pieces when Zed stole her sister away from her. The whole world crumbled between her fingers and she could never gather all the pieces to put them back together again. All her kindness went dormant within her and kept itself slumbering beneath the weight of all her lamentations. Now it’s impossible to tell she ever felt a thing other than her smiles with too many teeth.
Khuma leans her face closer and breathes the stranger in, watches with wonder as her wings change to mimic the fallen queen. A soft laugh even finds its way through the ink black of her insides toward the light of day. I’m no one’s. The response makes her smile fade and she regards Leliana more seriously now. Not one of their clan, then. Just a girl with a heavy heart. Slowly, all that softness stretches from its hibernation. It sheds the ice and silence that kept it tucked away. She hates it, but she’s always had a soft spot for bleeding hearts. “Leliana. We all belong somewhere,” she coos so close that her breath wisps across the pregnant woman’s cheek. Her voice has grown gentle. She used to tell Varus these things when he wept at night. “For me, I belong with my sister. I don’t know where she is but our hearts have always had a way of returning to one another.” And it’s true. She rests easy knowing that Kerrigan will find her way back home, until the twins can raise their children together once more. Her wild emerald eyes watch the way her wings change again. Khuma resumes her usual distance and shifts her weight, looking out over the meadow for a moment as she digs her way through her memories. Her scales burrow back beneath her skin and the hazel-honey of her eyes returns once more. All her happiest memories were spent with her true face looking out at the world, after all. “Why did your wings look the way they did?” she asks idly, unaware that her question could summon anything from the well of hurt digging its way into Leliana. khuma. RE: let me steal this from you now, leliana - leliana - 10-26-2018 I waited for something, and something died it's our dearest ally, it's our closest friend @[Khuma] RE: let me steal this from you now, leliana - Khuma - 10-29-2018 i'd break the back of love for you.
@[leliana]
Her maternal instincts remain firmly in place despite her distance from her incubating egg. It tugs at the walls she's built around her kindness, searching for the loose bricks to make them crumble when Leliana says she has a sister as well. The words foster a foundation for some trust to be shared between them. She thinks of how she and Kerrigan used to shift together, knotting themselves around one another and laughing at the mess they made of themselves. When Mother left, they stayed huddled close together until their knobby knees filled out into strong legs. They tore down anyone who meant to bring them harm and together they were invincible. Or so she thought.
She watches Leliana when she begins to explain, lets the lies pour between her fingers until the truth lands in her upturned palm. Like her father. Khuma’s head tilts curiously, almost too far as she waits for the words to come out of her mouth. Father was dead, buried in the sand, which meant only one could sire more serpentine offspring anymore. The prince of the prized brood, she thinks as she grits her teeth. Anadil had taught her which siblings were to be avoided, lest she tempt Father’s rage. She carved their names into her heart and let the wounds fester there. She and Kerrigan were greater than any spawn he had with his queen. “How blessed, to know the golden family,” she says with a slight frown on her lips. “How blessed and how cursed.” But she likes Leliana. She doesn’t want to rub salt in her wounds, so she sighs slowly to soothe her own frustrations. “Did he ever tell you about his parents, his brothers and sisters?” she asks as she steps closer again. She begins to gently fuss with the stray hairs of Leliana’s mane as she used to with her children, smoothing the locks into place with her lips. “Mother said Kerrigan and I were born the same year as Vulgaris. She pointed him and Father out, told us to never approach them. The chapter of his life that included us was over and he had returned to the woman he loved.” She can still recall how much it hurt to hear the words but she obeyed them. Khuma learned to be content with what she had, knowing that entertaining her greed for her father’s attention could spell death for her. Anadil used to scare the girls with stories of how Larva ate the children who displeased him until they stayed up all night watching for him in the darkness. But she says nothing else. Those are stories for another day. This moment is for Leliana, whether she’s the true love in this story or the abandoned mother. khuma. RE: let me steal this from you now, leliana - leliana - 10-29-2018 I waited for something, and something died it's our dearest ally, it's our closest friend @[Khuma] RE: let me steal this from you now, leliana - Khuma - 10-31-2018 i'd break the back of love for you.
@[leliana]
Khuma only knows what she’d been told as a child, half-truths and omitted details to spin the stories how her mother liked them. She always put a blind sort of faith in Anadil and trusted that what she said of Larva had been true. The serpent girl assumes that the reason Leliana never knew their family’s history was because of the gruesome details. In truth, it was a more beautiful story than either of them may ever realize, dark chapters and all.
She watches the horror trickle over Leliana’s face and she frowns, realizing how much her words must have hurt the other. It’s so easy to forget how unprepared others might be for these things after the time she’s had to digest it all. But then comes a question that makes her grit her teeth, a question that sounds like nails on the chalkboard to her. Khuma gently tucks the last untamed lock into her new friend’s mane as she moves in front of her. Their eyes meet and she searches Leliana’s gaze for a while before sighing slowly to herself. “Yes, I know who Shiya is,” she answers in a bitter tone, spitting once the name leaves her tongue. “She’s our older sister by one or two years. Why?” She resumes her careful stare as she tries to find meaning in Leliana’s expression, searches for some hidden truth that she doesn’t know. Khuma had always regarded Shiya as a spineless, sniveling thing to be abhorred and avoided. If her half-sister hadn’t been born then Larva might have never been her father. She might even have a normal family with loving parents who didn’t terrify their children just for fun. But the damage has been done and so she lives with the weight of all that has come to pass. She begins to entertain the idea of hunting her siblings as their father had, wiping out the mistakes and the children who should not be. Kerrigan had always stayed her hand but now her precious sister isn’t here to cool the heat of her anger. There is only Leliana and her story of agony to fan the flames. khuma. |