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    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


    ramiel, talulah, anyone;
    #1

    dress me up and watch me die

    How funny that Tiphon's children all embody death in some way (or, almost all of them, it seems). The angel is the essence of purity and all that is good and yet his children are somehow tainted by darkness. While Elaria is blackened by genetics Ramiel simply acquired it as though it was destiny. Tiphon will never escape death and neither will his children.

    A shudder runs down the length of Elaria's spine. Autumn is waning and winter is looming. The frigid air slips through her nostrils and kisses her open wounds. With the passing of time her body has sloughed away and she wonders if this is normal or if this is another curse in itself. Never will she be beautiful. That luxury has been stripped from her. The instant she was born and peered up at the faces of her parents she noted their hesitation and false smiles. What should have been a cherished and loving moment instead was awkward and forced. While reflecting back on it Elaria doesn't realize how tightly her jaw is clenched or how knotted her muscles are. Only when a dull ache travels through her does she notice.

    She forces a deep breath, expanding her tarnished lungs as her molten eyes peer through her unruly forelock. It has been quite some time since she's last seen the Dale. Nothing has drastically changed. Ramiel may still perhaps be king with his dearly beloved at his side (a beautiful girl, much unlike Elaria). Like a shadow she lurks. Only when the sunlight brushes across her skin does the golden sheen sparkle, marking her as one of the half-angel children. It's difficult to see, however, as her body tries to retain some dignity with pieces of her flesh missing and destroyed.

    Much to her dismay, she is almost identical to her grandfather.
    Much to her father's disgust, she is almost identical to her grandfather.

    elaria

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    #2
    The winds change, again, and winter is upon them.

    The seasons pass too quickly, as they always have.  Ramiel feels as if just yesterday he had been kissing the top of his second child’s newborn head.  But spring has long since passed.  Kha is now a gangly boy well on his way to his first birthday.  It is still impossible to believe that he’s been a father twice over (soon to be thrice over, possibly more), but the fact remains that his family is ever-growing.  It has always been a rather large, amorphous one, anyway.  His parents are no strangers to expanding their broods with and without each other.  But as important as family is to all of them, Tiphon and Talulah have a certain knack for scattering their offspring to the same winds that now blow snow down the mountainside.  

    First, it had been Joscelin.  His beloved sister had fled home the first chance she could for better opportunities in the Jungle.  Despite his desire to keep her in the Dale, at his side in a high-ranking title merited by blood alone, the cracked-skin girl had other plans.  She wanted to prove herself elsewhere, and he will always admire her more for it.  Tiberios had tucked himself away long before Joscelin had left.  He had resented his brother for abandoning them at their lowest point (as the Dalean hills had been leeched of every trace of Tiphon’s golden light; the angel had taken flight and not touched down for years).  But once they had come to understand each other better, they had unified under the strength of their familial ties – just in time for the sabino to be murdered in cold blood.  Ramiel’s other siblings were similarly scattered: the enchanting Isilya, the fiery twins Terran and Titanya, the elusive Dalten.  

    It is the same case with his only full sibling, Elaria.

    The ghost-king had been there just after her birth, as the morning sun glinted off the child’s coat and set her alight with gold.  It had almost been enough to conceal the horror of her body.  It had almost been enough to hide the poking bones and peeling, rotting skin that had just been slipped brand-new into the world.  He hadn’t been as disturbed as his parents, seeing his little sister like that.  Ramiel had seen more monsters and aliens and blood and gore than the both of them combined.  He had witnessed a whole man reduced to a skeleton with only bits of flesh to cover him.  He had seen the souls trapped on the Other Side, had been nearly eaten by a great mollusk at the end of the universe.  He did not share the fear and disgust that Tiphon and Talulah had in meeting their daughter for the first time.  He loved Elaria, anyway.

    But she had left between the changing of one season to the next.

       He sees her now, through the curtain of white that tries to hide her (as it seems the world is intent on doing, keeping the unfinished sectioned away from the finished).  The flash of gold is unmistakable, though, and he hurries to her side.  “Elaria,” he names her, though he hardly recognizes the almost-adult she has become.  A quiet smile curves his lips.  He is soft, hesitant; she is like a deer that might bolt from his well-meaning attention and he doesn’t want to lose her again.  The same lines crease their features, even if their bodies are so vastly different.  It is easy to see the relation, to see the smooth edges of their metal mother in the angles of their shoulders and their father’s bright curiosity of the world in their light eyes.  Ramiel nearly forgets that he doesn’t know the girl, not really.  He has no idea how she’s changed in her time away from home.  She had been stark after her birth, quick and inquisitive of everything around her.  They had been so similar as children, Talulah had told him, but he had seen the way her gaze had dropped just after.  

    He makes it a point to hold her eyes.

    “Welcome home, sister.  I’ve missed you, the grey says, placing a gentle touch of his muzzle on her rotting cheek before withdrawing.  The Dale seems to agree with his sentiment.  The snow slows, enough that the mountains become visible once more behind them.  He wonders if she will stay but doesn’t ask.  For now, it is enough that she’s here.  The stallion glances to the relative protection of a group of evergreens close by (the same ones he had been sheltered under before spotting her approach).  “Care to get out of this weather?  I am certain we have a lot to catch up on.”  He starts to turn, looking behind him to see if she is following.  “You have a niece and a nephew to meet as well.  No point in freezing while we wait for them to find us.”







    R A M I E L
    this is a man pulling at his iron chains
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    #3

    dress me up and watch me die

    He comes like the older brother he is with adoration in his eyes and a familial tenderness in his voice. A smile stretches across her peeling lips, but it quickly withers away as she looks at the Dale in front of her. Ramiel welcomes her and comes to her side, but she flinches as though in fear. "I'm sorry," she whispers with pain chiseled into her voice, "I'm not so used to being approached." Their parents weren't willing to show her quite so much love and she has never before received it from anyone else. Estela would stay close, but there was never any real love; it was the connection of blood that bound them together and nothing more. They had no one else at one point in time and so they leaned on each other for companionship. Without her here, Elaria feels almost lost, even confused. No one else ever wants to come near and so she's startled by how easily Ramiel finds himself next to her as though unfazed by her ugliness.

    "I'm ugly," she thinks aloud to him, but she regrets saying it the second it slips from her lips. Her head shakes disapprovingly but she tries to recover quickly by replying to him, hoping he didn't hear her previous comment. "I've missed you too," but in reality she missed everyone and everything. Although her family hasn't been most approving of her the idea of having one makes her feel as though she is somewhat normal and not a monster. Estela is proud that they're different, that they look like Hell spat them out, but all Elaria wants is to be beautiful and to be admired. From any perspective the girl is frightening and defying all odds; she should be buried in her tomb rather than walking, breathing, living.. But Ramiel gives her just a moment of that satisfaction. It's enough to warrant a smile from her. "Thank you," she leans forward and presses her cheek into his shoulder but the moment her skin weakens she pulls away, afraid to leave a trail of her peeling flesh.

    When Ramiel's eyes drift to the evergreens, hers follow. The trees are so familiar and yet somehow she almost forgot about them in her absence. Their scent, their sentinel-like stance, it's all rushing back to her now when her gaze levels onto them. It was near those trees that she was born, or so she thinks. There were hills around her but it was farther into the heart of the kingdom where mother did not have to concern herself with outside dangers. Father would've protected them, but no risks could be taken. Elaria is their second love child. They had to take every precaution, but once she was born, that adoration was forced, fleeting.

    She still remembers father's distress and mother's confusion.
    They tried to mask it, but Elaria knew something was so very wrong.

    The gentle tone that Ramiel adopts pulls the girl from her bitter memories. Her attention flickers from the trees back to him and she nods happily. "So very much," but in reality she doesn't have much to tell, "I look forward to meeting them." Her family is what gives her a sense of normalcy and so of course she's excited to meet her niece and nephew. With a renewed happiness in her step she follows Ramiel to the evergreens. "What are their names?" she asks on the way there before, "Will your son be your heir?" Because isn't that what father did? Pass on his throne to a son?

    elaria

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