• Logout
  • Beqanna

    COTY

    Assailant -- Year 226

    QOTY

    "But the dream, the echo, slips from him as quickly as he had found it and as consciousness comes to him (a slap and not the gentle waves of oceanic tides), it dissolves entirely. His muscles relax as the cold claims him again, as the numbness sets in, and when his grey eyes open, there’s nothing but the faint after burn of a dream often trod and never remembered." --Brigade, written by Laura


    Out with the golden we sew // Warrick
    #1


    kagerus
    and in my dreams I've kissed your lips a thousand times
    I come to him without hesitation, with the trust of a daughter and the heart of one too. I'd caught his eyes during the meeting, and as it disbanded, his words. A summons, low-spoken and desperate. I'd been scared of it's implications immediately, anxiety knotting in my chest as my imagination had its way with me. 

    On the walk back to Hyaline, I struggled with whether or not to share Warrick's words with Solace. It was agonizing, walking silently even as her wing draped across my back, holding me close. We share everything. So in the end, I do tell her - tell her that I'm going to see her father. When she asks why, I break, utterly incapable of lying to one whom I owe my entire life. I don't know why So, but he - he wants to see me. Maybe it's because of something he's dreamt - I swear he didn't mean to exclude you. And I promise I'll tell you everything he says.

    Good, faithful Solace; she understood immediately and kissed me goodbye, right there on the front steps of Hyaline. Our gazes latched for a moment as we stood there in stony silence, our minds trying to decipher an indecipherable future; but then, I am off.

    I make my way across the river and through Taiga, through the field and finally to Tephra. My scent lingers behind me, but I think little of this, having not had to cross into any enemy kingdoms. Instead, I focus on the volcanic land ahead of me, breathing in its ash and for the first time, not finding it stinky as I once had. It smells like my wife, it smells like a home I could always have if I ever wanted or needed it. Without waiting, I walk inland: I walk home.

    He finds me quickly, though I don't call for him. Large and red and mentally shattered, Warrick approaches and I can tell that he's not the man he was when I asked for his blessing upon my union to Solace. Feeling my breath catch painfully in my throat, I step forward and close any distance remaining between us. I curl against him as a filly might, my nose pressed against his wing, holding my neck tucked into his shoulder as I listen for the thrum of his heartbeat.

    "Father..." I murmur, squeezing my eyes shut. "What is wrong?"


    @[Warrick]
    [Image: kag]
    dreamweaver
    #2
    we are crooked souls trying to stay up straight
    All that you have, I have had first.

    The voice never ceases; it’s always there in his mind, sometimes as soft as a velvet whisper, or as harsh as lightning and thunder. His body is still bruised and sore from being thrown down by the mighty hand of Carnage, his nose rubbed into the dirt to remind him of what he truly is (nothing, nothing, nothing), the pain still evident in the tight clench of his jawline as well as the troubled stormy-sea color of his blue irises.

    He hadn’t meant to put the warrior Queen in a compromising position - to go to him without Solace’s company. But the moment their eyes met, he knew that Kagerus could see him; could see the diminishing light beneath the fractured and broken pieces that, despite shattering beyond repair, he struggles to keep together with each quivering inhale of his breath. Tangerine could feel it, he knows, and perhaps she has even seen it in her dream - but Sibyl is too young to part from her mother’s side for more than a few moments, and all that tempestuously stirs within him cannot be smoothed before the ocean’s princess would return, bright-eyed and innocent.

    Warrick would not allow his youngest daughter to see him so weak, so broken. He wouldn’t allow his eldest, either.

    Kagerus pulls into him, the soft velveteen of her muzzle against the muscled mahogany of his shoulder, and a rumbling sigh spills from his cobalt lips, his gaze focusing on something beyond, whether it be figment or reality.

    Father.

    The word - once so delicate and meaningful that gave him the utmost sense of pride and belonging - now causes a shiver to spiral icily down his spine. He tenses, his breath catching in his throat; the word almost seems pointless. Warrick’s jaw tightens, nearly stepping away from Kagerus at the idea of his own lineage now being forced not only on his flesh and blood. But he somehow remains beside her, rigid and stoic, and though warmth radiates from his skin, it is lost in his eyes.

    What is wrong?

    He couldn’t fathom on where to even begin. Warrick’s mind grapples for eloquent words, but is only given images of Wound (missing, her scent lost on the wind and into the night) and his revelation of his true family (from the loins of a murderer, a torture artist, a dark god).

    She is gone; he swore to protect her. Burning rage, deep despair, the need to avenge in blood.

    How long before he becomes (even if only half) of what Carnage was?
    Is.

    “There is a darkness in me.” His voice does not tremble with the confession; it is eerily even and deep, haunting.
    warrick
    credit to vel of adoxography.

    @[Kagerus]
    #3


    kagerus
    and in my dreams I've kissed your lips a thousand times
    A voice in my mind, that much I can empathize with. That ever varying but constantly present chant of worthlessness in a place where only you can hear; a degrading slander of your own self concept so potent that not even the touch of a loved one could rouse more than a cough of dust from the pit of your heart. I know the feeling; I know the voice; I know the pain.

    I am not his youngest or his eldest, nor even his blood; but he allows me closer than perhaps he ever has the others. With his skin just beneath mine, I can almost imagine the splitting of his seams as the light he once thought himself to be seeped out and is replaced with a dark cavern. The vast and empty darkness can feel like a prison at times, but in truth, he'll simply have to find a balance. That's why I'm here; to help him, to guide him. It's a roundabout sort of exchange when you think about it. After all, Solace had saved me from the suicide that my own inner darkness commanded: circularly, I am now here to help her father as he, too, struggles.

    I inhale his scent; the fragments of his being.
    So rigid and tense, and yet as steadfast as always. Even as the dark whirlpools of his demons pull him under, he hold those around him afloat; it's why he's king, it's why he's father, it's why he's Warrick. But today... Today, I will make him leave those things behind. For he must learn to swim, else cost not only his own life, but all those he supports so earnestly.

    "There is a darkness in all of us," I rasp against his skin, warm compared to the stony coolness of his voice. Without warning, my mouth snakes out and I bite him harshly, drawing blood and stepping back as I'm sure he will too. My eyes are hard; my lips are wet. "Don't you dare succumb to it. Focus on that pain. You are here, you are now, and you will tell me what happened." He may be my father, but I'll be damned if I'm seen and not heard.

    "Because I love you - and you know that you can trust me."

    A part of me wants to go on, to add my sympathies and to tell my own stories of woe and self hatred and of suicide - but I am here for him. He may ask if he so wishes; but it's not what's going to help.


    @[Warrick] Bitchkag says I LOVE YOU.
    [Image: kag]
    dreamweaver
    #4
    we are crooked souls trying to stay up straight
    There is darkness in all of us.

    His jaw clenches, the muscle in his face jumping with the force in which he grinds his teeth together. Dark, oceanic eyes stare at the ground, the shadow of his brow furrowing in a myriad of thoughts and disappointment. Despite the truth of his lineage (from the stars, his mother had told him), the Overseer still clings to a sliver of promise that perhaps the tainted blood is merely just blood - there is no power in blood, and it is spilled so easily and without much thought. Perhaps the darkness would never overcome him.

    But maybe it would.

    The pressure of skin pulling and then breaking pulls him from his reverie, ears flicking into his neck as he whirls his face too meet hers, his own mouth bared in haste. The world of Beqanna has become that much darker with Sylva’s threat (not to mention Warrick’s own threat at his back), and the harshness in which he reaches is not directed at Kagerus, but the surprising pain that she has inflicted. He is on edge, and as his lips come to cover the bluntness of his teeth, a single ear flicks towards her.

    He can smell the metallic tinge of his blood in the air and his nostrils flutter angrily. Though her gesture had been painful, her words are blunt and true. His lips press together firmly, a sharp snort leaving him. “My blood,” he begins, pausing at the actual sound of his own voice, the sensation of dripping blood tingling his skin, “is of Carnage.” There is anger in his voice at the confession, bringing truth to the dark god’s parentage. Warrick’s ears are flat against his mane, his dark eyes looking onward and away from Kagerus.

    “I am not who I thought I was.” Adding this, his voice is less rageful and more defeated, a deep inhale followed by a shuddering sigh. Of the stars, but in a way he could never have imagined.
    warrick
    credit to vel of adoxography.

    @[Kagerus]
    #5


    kagerus
    and in my dreams, i kissed your lips a thousand times
    My blood is of Carnage.
    You are nothing except that which you make yourself.
    I am not who I thought I was.
    You are confined by your own self concept - a completely arbitrary and intangible source of self reflection that is utterly under your control.

    He is defeated, deflated, deformed. Deformed in the fact that he cannot find it within himself to right this problem on his own. I can feel my heart breaking to watch it happen before my very eyes, and yet my skin is iron, impenetrable, blackened. It's not that I've had it worse - no, far from that. It's the undisguised terror of having to watch one you thought indestructible crumble like dried sand. Since the day I met him on the battlefield, my father in law has been one I could have never imagined as broken.

    And yet, here he is, shattered before me in a show of raw, unfiltered vulnerability.

    I bare my own teeth at him when he pulls away with an instinctual reaction. He must know that I am not here to play games. But he quickly regains his composure, hiding behind these massive emotional barricades he's erected in an attempt to shelter those he loves from the darkness within him. But the mortar of his walls never did quite set, and the bricks are one by one dislodging; a king cannot be seen as any less than stellar. A king cannot be broken.

    "Your blood does not define you unless you allow it to." I think back to Kagerou, of us having met; not a day passes  that I am not happy to be defined by her legacy. But my mother - a stranger, a liar, a fake - she stopped existing to me the moment I left her womb. "The function of our parents biology does nothing other than allow for our physical existence. We are the product of those who raised us, not those who made us."

    I bend my head, catch his gaze. "Carnage is prolific, he is evil, he is cruel - but you are not his legacy, nor are you to be ground into the dirt under his heel." If only I knew exactly how Warrick had been punished; how fitting my statement would be. "Look upon him as but another thread of darkness - not the source of your own. Existence provides enough of that; why shoulder more."


    @[Warrick] can I get any less structured with my ideas and dialogue? I dont think so. So sorry for this mess.
    [Image: kag]
    dreamweaver
    #6
    there was a heaven in you
    but god there's a devil in me
    She tells him the words he knows are the truth - whether they fall from her lips to rouse him with a firm fist from his reverie, to awaken him once more into the man she already knew he was or if their purpose was something much more brutal, as if to ward of the darkness that draws closer in around them, with bated breath and dripping teeth. Her voice hurts - blunt and forceful, tearing into him with knives of adoration and expectation. The cobalt of his mouth is pressed into a thin line, inhaling deeply with a sound that can only be interpreted as exhaustion.

    The Overseer’s body quakes slightly at the mention of Carnage’s name - not in fear, but in remembrance of how the dark god had slammed him into the earth (reminding him of his mortality, his smallness, his insignificance), how his face had ground into the bitterness of the dirt, crumpling into nothingness beneath the magic and prowess of an absent, evil father. Warrick’s eyes flutter closed, wishing away the memory with a rugged exhale of breath, the lithe bone of his wings stretching slightly at his sides as he regains himself. There is even a toss of his head and a roll of his muscled shoulders, auburn lids slowly peeling away to reveal burning blue irises that flash to Kagerus with intensity and ferocity.

    Despite the ferocity in his gaze (renewed strength, maybe), the osprey-King is gentle as his head turns towards the overo woman. He surveys her for a moment, absorbing her words and realizing quite admirably that she - not of his blood, a once stranger that now holds his firstborn daughter’s heart, the caretaker of his grandchildren, a protector of his growing family - has found herself here, beneath the hollows of the volcano and the precious guarding of the King himself. 

    “Thank you, my daughter.” It does not resolve the pitted feeling in his stomach, or the way his throat burns with the thought of the recent events in the meadow - but there is a sliver of hope somehow shining brightly from her and he clings to it (much like he does with Tangerine) and he gravitates towards her strength, her protection. Warrick’s muzzle brushes the soft slope of Kagerus’ cheek, gentle in his touch despite the unwavering look of emotionlessness that has settled restfully upon his face.

    “You speak from experience.”

    WARRICK


    @[Kagerus]
    <3 it's perfect!
    #7


    kagerus
    and in my dreams, i kissed your lips a thousand times
    He is exhausted, and it shows in the way he breathes and the way he wears that thin line upon his lips as if a single mote of emotion could at this point shatter the foundation of his being. The dark voice inside me cackles to see him in a state so similar to the one it had put me in, but I silence it in the same severe tone as I silenced Warrick's. We are not what those voices say we are - that is, not for as long as we fight their lies.

    But then, at the mention of his accursed father's name, something snaps. Those ice blue eyes close, followed by a stretch of his navy wings and a roll of his rugged shoulders. As the toss of his head falls into stillness, those self same eyes reopen, but this time with an intensity that I'd not glimpsed before. The pressure in my chest drops, though I don't remember breathing; but his movement is gentle despite the chaos which swims in the depths of his gaze, reassuring me that I have not gone too far in my attempts to rid him of his traumas.

    Thank you, daughter.

    The words are far more than I deserve, but I do not rebuke them. Indeed, a warmth spreads through my chest at being called such from the man who I hold in the highest regards; for despite the frigidity and intensity of our conversation, the underlying current of our familial bonds courses powerfully. No act of war or of gods could separate us; our connection is immortal; is of a father and daughter.

    He reaches for me, and I tilt my head in towards the affectionate touch. Although his eyes have taken on a hue of numbness again, there's a tenderness to his touch that inspires ever more warmth within me, and for a moment, I believe that my work here is done; but his next words chill me to the bone, and the gentle sway of my skin against his grinds abruptly to a halt.

    (Scared of being the vulnerable one darling? Always the selfish whore, wanting everything for yourself and expecting others to give it to you. Warrick will never be able to trust you if you don't put out, emotionally anyways; but do you really want the world to know about me? Isn't it enough that Solace saw you literally drowning? How much more embarrassment and shame can you realistically handle? Everyone has a breaking point and I'm counting down the days until you reach yours.)

    "I do." The sound of my real voice cuts off the rambling of the fake one, though it still whispers and giggles and scowls just beyond where anyone but me can hear. "I... I submitted to the darkness and its voice some time two years ago when it was brought to my attention that I will die upon birthing my first child. My character and behaviours spiraled far past eccentric and towards catatonic."

    I swallow, brows creasing as I glance at him and then quickly away, my hooves sending me a step away from him as if to be near one such as I might be a disgrace to the Tephran King.

    "When labor came, I avoided birth via my dreams, and -" My voice breaks. For some time, I remain silent as the words clog up in my throat and fail to gain access to my mouth. I become intimately aware of the detailing of the leaves on the ground where we stand, not knowing how to recover from this sudden inability.

    (At least Warrick was able to actually talk about it. I don't even need to say anything for you to be ashamed; you just are. Fucking hilarious. What a joke.)

    My brows crease further, and I swallow again, closing my eyes as if that could silence the voice. "I'm sorry, I've never - told anyone this story - in full." Solace knew it all of course, but she'd not needed to be told of the worst - she had been there.

    Looking up, my nutmeg gaze grapples his blue one, hanging on for dear life as the clog suddenly gives and the words come tumbling out, desperate to be free from my throat as tears threaten to obscure my vision. "And so I watched my mate give birth to my son, and a sickness of the heart and mind overcame me - I was a mother but not, my rightful pain of birth had been stolen from me, the child was not mine - I fled the scene and entered a dream with a desperate queen, I was too tired, I shouldn't have - that night I birthed a second son as a demon used my dreams as a portal from his realm to this one." My lips suck in a huge gulp of air, but not without first eliciting a single sob. "And so by the time morning came I found myself at the lake, and - I went in."

    My eyes refocus, my face draining of emotion, the tears clearing from my eyes as that all too familiar numbness settles over me.

    "And I didn't try to get out."

    (You should have died that morning.)

    "Your daughter saved me that day. Physically. And from there, mentally, too. I wouldn't be here were it not for her; were it not for her undying love for me."

    Silence befalls us, and I flit between holding his gaze and looking away. The newer, better part of me, the Queen of Hyaline wants to present a strong and united front: but the foolish, emotional girl that I'd been when I abandoned my son and attempted to kill myself is too present for me to deny her rights to my actions. So I stand, looking to him and away, terrified of his reaction especially since it was he he needed help in the first place, and not me.


    @[Warrick]  KAG SAD.
    [Image: kag]
    dreamweaver
    #8
    there was a heaven in you
    but god there's a devil in me
    Part of him regains his composure - a roll of his shoulders, a shifting of his great navy wings - just for her, to remind her that he is still the King she believes him to be, despite the harboring burdens that lie just beneath the surface of his stoic face. The change in his expression, though he is not completely without doubt (would he ever be?), gives him a sense of strength; one that he did not know still lingers beneath each coiled muscle of his body, one that is somehow different than he used to know.

    There is a semblance of empathy that roils into his oceanic gaze, idly burning just beneath the surface as he is given entrance to the inner workings of her mind. The darkness that howls just beyond her own door is so similar to his own, akin in the way they claw mercilessly into their mind; a voice that is not at all their own.  She glances away from him and for a moment he is devastated that he has brought this upon her - to relive these moments for him all over again only because he has asked. His jaw clenches tightly as his teeth press firmly together in a grinding motion, his chin pressing to his chest with guilt. But it only lasts a moment before the King is stretching his neck towards her once again, the tenderness of his whiskered mouth brushing against the stark auburn and white of her two-toned cheek.

    “Do not be sorry, Kagerus. Ever. Warrick’s voice is stern yet soft, intermittent between her words so that is not interrupting her, only encouraging. We will never be sorry. Not anymore.

    It is then that her eyes turn to him - searching their depths as if the answer is hidden beneath the darkness of his pupils, and he desperately hopes that she finds something there to cling to. The rest of her story unfolds and Warrick remains in silence, watching her and listening intently. There is sadness that blooms in his eyes and onto the sharpness of his jawline at her once hopelessness and the darkness that most likely still broods beneath, covered by Solace’s love.

    There is no smile that finds his face yet there is a glimmer of something in his eyes. “The love of another can cure many things,” he murmurs to her, his own thoughts idly giving him images of Tangerine and the many children they have bore, as well as the grandchildren that have grown fruitful beneath the Beqannan sun. But their love cannot will the removal of the plague in our minds.

    “We must always be strong, then. For them.”

    He pauses, pressing his lips firmly together.

    “For each other.”


    WARRICK


    @[Kagerus]
    #9


    kagerus
    and in my dreams, i kissed your lips a thousand times
    If I could have but a glimpse into the inner workings of Warrick's undying empathy, I would be astounded. For as stoically as he presents, even I, his daughter, must reassure myself that he is entirely here. The regal and certain countenance of Warrick will be one greatly renowned for decades to come, the roiling, oceanic nature of his eyes enough to mark a time in history forever. And I am lucky enough to know him now, in person and not just in legend; in love and family, and not just from a distance.

    He gazes upon me calmly, those very eyes nearly dark as he listens, and yet glimmering with that deceiving shred of empathy which, far beneath, blossoms into an orchard of undying love.

    And, as if to reassure me of his emotional presence, he reaches for me, the stubble of his chin reminding me that not every bump in the road is one I need to fear for. Closing my eyes, I lean into his touch, inhaling shakily, steadying myself for the tale to come. Unspoken gratitude floods me as he chastises and yet consoles me, the thanks colouring my eyes as I drift away, speaking in a rush.

    By the end of my spiel, the crimson king is yet silent, simply absorbing my message as calmly as any who rules must. I make a not to do so myself, to be able to hold my composure as excellently he does his: but a part of me knows that that simply is not who I am. When I am pressed to, I wear my heart on my sleeve; and as he said, I ought never to be sorry for such things; for such things that make me me.

    "It is your love, too, that cures what ails me, Father." I blink at him slowly, lowering my antlered head in acknowledgment of all that he has done for me. "And I will be - strong."

    "For Hyaline."
    "For Solace."
    "For you."


    I stay the night in Tephra, absorbing the wisdom and trauma that has been so abundantly shared. By morning I will have to return to my home and to reality: but for now, the moment is mine and mine alone, though in truth, I will always share this moment entirely with Warrick, too.


    @[Warrick] A nice lil ending for us. <3
    [Image: kag]
    dreamweaver




    Users browsing this thread: 1 Guest(s)