09-19-2019, 09:14 PM
SabbatH
i'll let you play the role. i'll be your animal.
Their father taught Adna how to navigate the world, how to hold it in her palm like a pearl and watch it fester. Sabbath used to dream of going on hunts with them but she was always too small, too weak. Instead, their father taught her how to build and empire built on the spines of everyone you’ve ever claimed to love. He taught her to use others and to hate them for being too weak to join them. He taught her wrath, and self-loathing, and everything in between. All the lessons come flooding up her throat when her sister apologizes and she can taste the venom dripping so carelessly across her tongue.
“You didn’t know how to speak?” she questions, steps closer with her head tilted a little too far so the sun glints off her many teeth. “You didn’t know how to tell the sister who always idolized you that you betrayed her?”
And then she laughs, but the sound is all hollow and sick when it leaves her lungs. When her precious sister, the biggest piece of her heart, apologizes, she bites down on her own tongue to keep from screaming.
“But what are you sorry for exactly, Adna? Are you sorry for the deceit or the way it crushes me? Are you sorry that my child grows up without her father?”
She turns her head and watches when he approaches. The voice of hunger no longer whispers softly in the hopes its words will hook her; it screams and demands with a frothing mouth now. Sabbath is moving faster than her thoughts can keep up, jaws open wide and venom dribbling from her fangs when she reaches for him. If there is anything Vulgaris has taught her, it is to bite until they go still.
But she stops, eyes now watching Gospel. That sage green gaze locks on her and she imagines Prayer learning to kill like this, with her dull teeth and feather heart. Her girl is filled with love and light. Sabbath closes her mouth and takes a step back, tears still running freely down her cheeks. Her children deserve a mother who doesn’t shed blood in the name of some crumbling empire. They deserve a mother who comes home at night and never forgets their names in her search for power.
“I hate you. I hate you, Bethlehem,” she finally chokes out. “I hate you for giving me Prayer and not loving her. I hate you because she doesn’t even know your face.”
She turns and looks at him now, eyes burning and blurred with her rage as her body trembles. Sabbath will never speak his name to her, and she prays her daughter learns to love herself all the same.
“You didn’t know how to speak?” she questions, steps closer with her head tilted a little too far so the sun glints off her many teeth. “You didn’t know how to tell the sister who always idolized you that you betrayed her?”
And then she laughs, but the sound is all hollow and sick when it leaves her lungs. When her precious sister, the biggest piece of her heart, apologizes, she bites down on her own tongue to keep from screaming.
“But what are you sorry for exactly, Adna? Are you sorry for the deceit or the way it crushes me? Are you sorry that my child grows up without her father?”
She turns her head and watches when he approaches. The voice of hunger no longer whispers softly in the hopes its words will hook her; it screams and demands with a frothing mouth now. Sabbath is moving faster than her thoughts can keep up, jaws open wide and venom dribbling from her fangs when she reaches for him. If there is anything Vulgaris has taught her, it is to bite until they go still.
But she stops, eyes now watching Gospel. That sage green gaze locks on her and she imagines Prayer learning to kill like this, with her dull teeth and feather heart. Her girl is filled with love and light. Sabbath closes her mouth and takes a step back, tears still running freely down her cheeks. Her children deserve a mother who doesn’t shed blood in the name of some crumbling empire. They deserve a mother who comes home at night and never forgets their names in her search for power.
“I hate you. I hate you, Bethlehem,” she finally chokes out. “I hate you for giving me Prayer and not loving her. I hate you because she doesn’t even know your face.”
She turns and looks at him now, eyes burning and blurred with her rage as her body trembles. Sabbath will never speak his name to her, and she prays her daughter learns to love herself all the same.