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  • 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


    I feel it running through my veins; Perse
    #1

    I need that fire just to know that I'm awake

    There is something familiar here, as though she had been her before. As though she had stood in this very spot, gazing out at this same expansive green. But there is something missing. Something not quite right. But her memories, shattered and fractured inside her skull, refuse to be pieced together to answer the questions she could not ask. Instead she is left to gaze out at the landscape, features still and numb as a hollow settles inside her chest.

    Perhaps there is nothing for her here after all.

    But she does not leave. Cannot leave, as though her feet have become rooted to the spot she now stands. A gentle breeze filters across the sloping hills, ruffling the newly risen grass, tugging playfully at the tangled locks flowing across her slender neck and hiding the vibrant gold of her eyes. She would have been a beautiful woman, but the fissures etched across every finely delineated inch of her body tell a story of hardship. Of pain and betrayal.

    Though it hardly seems to matter anymore, when the story has become as lost to the ether.

    To some perhaps, she is still beautiful. But only in the way broken things can be. A loveliness in the painful fragility and jagged edges. Sharper and harder, inspiring unease in the same way it does admiration. She cannot see it of course, but others might, if they looked closely enough.

    She should leave, she thinks. She cannot remember anything here anyway. And there is so much more she has to find, so many ways to seek those missing pieces of her. And yet, she stays, her feet unwilling to carry her beyond this patch of grass.

    Joscelin



    @[perse]
    Reply
    #2

    i wanted pomegranates—
    i wanted darkness—
    i wanted him.


    Existence is a fickle thing.
    She blinked out of it, for awhile, after bearing her son. When she tries to think back, it’s only an endless blackness, a crackle of static. She does not push for this lost time, or question the new scars on her skin whose origins she cannot recall.
    (He scarred her so often, but had always restored her, after, save for the brand, His one mark.)

    She was in a wasteland when she first woke up and realize she could recall what had happened the day prior. She walked for hours or days and went to sleep again and woke up again with the memories from the previous two days. And so she built upon it, her life segmented in a strange new way – Before, Void, and Now.
    She doesn’t question this, because her life has been strange enough that there are a lot of questionable things that don’t perturb her.

    She finds her way back to Beqanna, eventually. She always does.
    Her son was born here, though she has no idea what happened to him. Carnage has been here too, and quite recently – she hears talk, of visions, of a sickness, and His name is peppered in those conversations, as a cause, an orchestrator.
    She isn’t surprised.
    Also, though –
    She has tried not to think of her too often, because those memories carry a certain kind of hurt, a deeper ache, and she does not want to explore too deeply the cause for such an ache. It suggests things she isn’t so sure of, so she ignores, or buries them.

    The meadow is familiar and not familiar all at once, flavored now with sickness (she doesn’t fear the disease, a life as a magician’s plaything has left her largely unaware of her own mortality). She walks, taking it in, and when she first lays eyes on the fractured woman before her she thinks it a trick of the light.
    She stops, stilled in her tracks, and stares. The woman remains the same. Remains her.
    She comes closer, breathless.
    “Joscelin?” she asks. She knows it’s her, but she still asks the question.

    p e r s e
    ------------------------------cordis x spyndle
    Reply
    #3

    I need that fire just to know that I'm awake

    There is an echo in the breeze, as though it is trying to remind her of things lost to the traces of history. But she cannot quite untangle those faint strains, cannot pick out the notes she should know from the endless whispers. Instead the wind points her in another direction.

    Joscelin?

    Her name on another’s tongue startles her. She’d been so lost trying to hear non-existent things that she had failed to notice that which stood right in front of her. And as her eyes settle on the silver figure, she is caught in the gleaming beauty of the woman who had uttered her name. Her heart tumbles curiously in her breast, as though it recognizes the one who stands before her. But that cannot be. She is far too lovely for someone like she, with an ethereal grace that speaks of things beyond her knowledge. Why would she have ever had anything to do with a broken thing like her?

    “You know me?” she asks, a faint frown tugging at the cracks etching her features. Perhaps the better question was does Joscelin know her? But a part of her is afraid of that answer. Worried that it is not an answer she would care for.

    But for all those tumbling question, there is still a visceral tug that draws her closer. Something she would not look too closely at, even if she could have found the answers. Perhaps it is only her wild imaginations, or perhaps it is something more, but she thinks she would greatly wish to know her better.

    Not for the first time, she silently curses the memories that still elude her.

    She draws slowly nearer, golden eyes wary and wild and wanting, until they are close enough to touch. But she does not reach out (no matter how much she wishes to, if for no other reason to see if she is real). “You’re beautiful,” she finally whispers, an unwitting echo of a lost memory. “Who are you?”

    Joscelin

    Reply
    #4

    i wanted pomegranates—
    i wanted darkness—
    i wanted him.


    ”You know me?

    The question is uttered with such innocence, such genuine confusion as Joscelin’s eyes meet hers. They are empty of recognition, and something in Perse shatters, something she didn’t know was there, a deep hurt.
    She must have imagined it, then, fabricated how electricity had thudded in her veins as she traced the cracks of her, an infatuation budding and blooming, words exchanged –
    And now, she’s nothing but an empty stare and no recognition. Nothing memorable.

    “Yes,” she says, “I know you. Or, I knew you, once.”

    She should turn, she knows – cut it off clean, an excision of her hurt. Staying will only prolong her pain, watching the shattered woman.
    But she can’t. She’s frozen to the ground, still fixated by her, the woman who had haunted her thoughts.
    So she stays, and she holds her breath when Joscelin creeps closer, the space between them shrinking. She is so tempted to touch her, to trace the same cracks of her skin.
    She keeps to herself, body held tight, like an arrow strung in a quiver. Something else twists inside her when Joscelin speaks again, an echo of another meeting.
    “Perse,” she says, and her voice is small, giving only her name and not the slew of questions she longs to ask.
    And still, she doesn’t leave.

    p e r s e
    ------------------------------cordis x spyndle
    Reply
    #5

    I need that fire just to know that I'm awake

    Yes.

    That single, terribly brief word is enough to stir a thousand questions. But she is still not sure if the answer would be enough. The bubble that grows inside her chest is fragile, liable to burst at a single wrong note. Sometimes, perhaps dreams are better than truth.

    But she has never been very good at dreams, even when she could remember them.

    Perse.

    Oh how she wished that name to stir dormant memories. To bring to life something which has slept so long inside her. But, truth be told, she is not even certain those memories are even still there. She does not fight a fog or a veil, but a terrible, painful absence.

    But stories can be re-written, can’t they? Otherwise her life would be entirely meaningless.

    Still she cannot give up hope. There is something of her that knows this woman. Not a memory, something far more visceral. Undeniable. And without the past to speak for them, she has nothing to restrain her, nothing with which to gauge how this once might have gone. Are they breaking new paths or treading the same worn ones?

    For once, she doesn’t seem to care. She knows her, and that has to be enough for now. A lifeline she can cling to.

    As though her admission had broken a barrier, Joscelin closes that remaining distance between them. She touches her, tracing the delicate bridge of her nose, brushing the glimmering strands of her forelock. Inhaling a scent she should know but cannot seem to place. Then, as though recalling herself, she stills, lids closing over her golden eyes.

    “How do we know each other?” she whispers hesitantly, as though the answer might break whatever fragile thread now tethers them.

    Joscelin

    Reply
    #6

    i wanted pomegranates—
    i wanted darkness—
    i wanted him.


    She is still debating running when Joscelin comes closer. She can feel the hurt already, the ache of being forgotten, and for the first time in a long time she thinks of her mother, and wonders if this is how she felt, too, when Spyndle looked upon her blank-eyed.
    (She only knows pieces of that great and terrible love story, she was not in her mothers’ care for long enough to learn the whole tale – He had come, and that was all that she wrote.)
    But she doesn’t have time to run (she wouldn’t have – she pretends it was an option, but truth is, she was grounded as soon as she saw her). So the cracked mare moves closer, and Perse’s eyes flutter closed, unable to bear such proximity.
    She feels the soft exhale of breath on her forehead, the velvet softness of her, touching, exploring.
    Remember me, she thinks, but doesn’t say, please, remember me.

    Joscelin pulls away, and she is immediately aware of her absence, a hollow feeling, and she wonders what she has done to herself, to reopen this wound. She wonders, if given a chance, if she would have run.
    The question, then, another tug at her heart, and she exhales. They are still so close, it’s a wonder she can breathe at all.
    “We met in the meadow,” she says, “long ago. We knew the same god.”
    There’s so much more, but it’s all she can manage.

    p e r s e
    ------------------------------cordis x spyndle
    Reply
    #7

    I need that fire just to know that I'm awake

    She waits, frozen in place, but for what she does not know. Common sense tells her that whatever she might say now will not be the answer to all the questions she has, but hope is an insidious and persistent beast. Even if her mind cannot seem to supply the words, her body aches with those forgotten memories.

    She opens her eyes because she cannot seem to help herself. There is something in the silver face that has drawn her in, something in this woman that knows of her past. And whatever that is tells stories on her lovely features, tracing emotions along the delicate lines. Joscelin only wishes she could read them so easily.

    She closes that bare breath of distance between them once more, Perse’s pain stirring uncomfortable feelings in her breast.

    We knew the same god. Her lips trace the the line of her cheek, the subtle hollow beneath, then up, the gentle arch of her brow. As though her touch might erase the hurt that had been etched there. As though she had not somehow caused it.

    She continues, pressing forward, until she reaches the hollow of her throat. The graceful arch of her neck. Here she pauses, eyes closing once more as she presses against her silvery skin. “That cannot be all,” she finally whispers.

    She doesn’t know why, but she feels as though she might break apart, splintering into an entirely unrecognizable woman if this is where their story had ended.

    Joscelin

    Reply
    #8

    i wanted pomegranates—
    i wanted darkness—
    i wanted him.


    It’s such a strange moment, to be with her like this – intimate, touching, but with only one of them holding the memories of the times they had done such things before. It’s heavy and strangely terrible, to be the sole bearer of these things, and Perse feels it like a weight in her breast.
    But she doesn’t move, of course, because hasn’t she dreamed of this?
    (Not this, precisely – in the dreams, she is known, she is seen – but close enough. A semblance of this.)
    Joscelin is still close, listening to Perse’s faulty explanation. That cannot be all, she says, and of course she’s right, but Perse doesn’t know what else to tell her.

    How to tell someone who sees you as a stranger that you loved them once, or still do? It would terrify her, no doubt, and though Perse has lived in pain for years, thrived on it, in His lair, that pain terrifies her in a way that physical pain never has.
    “It’s not,” she admits, voice low and quiet, the words spilling into the small space left between them.
    “I found you beautiful,” she says, “and you didn’t believe me, at first.”
    All cracked skin and light, like a portal breaking open, like broken pottery remade with gold.
    “I still do,” she says, “find you beautiful, that is.”

    p e r s e
    ------------------------------cordis x spyndle
    Reply
    #9

    I need that fire just to know that I'm awake

    Her memories might be lost to her, but still she dreams. Sometimes they are pleasant, and sometimes they are not, but always they leave her with a hollow ache in the pit of her stomach. As though her sleeping mind knows things her waking conscious does not. As though it is only in sleep she could hope to reach for things she had lost.

    But it is not just memories she aches for. It is those emotions that sometimes stir within her that she cannot give name or meaning to. The hollow feelings that remind her of what she’s lost in the most visceral of ways. This is one of them, she thinks.

    In the same way, it is now impossible to put words to what now stirs within her. Were she cleverer, she might have known it is that very love she longs for. Perse fears it would terrify her, but maybe (just maybe) it is the glue that would help hold her soul (as fractured inside as her body is outside) together.

    Perhaps she hopes in vain. But she has nothing else left to her.

    She listens with stilled breath, her skin prickling as she waits for the answer to her hopeful question. It’s not, she says, and she breathes again, pressing her lips against the silver skin only a whisper away. I found you beautiful. She closes her eyes, a heartbeat passing. Her lips curve slightly, smiling against Perse’s nearly flawless skin (not entirely, but perfection in comparison to hers).

    “I still don’t believe you,” she whispers, but a glimmer of light drifts slowly along the dark lines etching her body. Sparking to life beneath words both ancient and new. “Maybe,” she continues, her voice impossibly softer, a bare thread of sound, “if I were less broken...”

    She presses her cheek against her, unable to stop herself from taking that much. She might wonder why Perse would have once thought her worthwhile, but she has been starving for too long now. And her silver companion hasn’t moved away from her yet, hasn’t recoiled from her touch. Joscelin is too hungry for affection to care that she shouldn’t. She would devour every moment and every touch Perse let her take. It might be all she has to sustain her, a lifetime lived on stolen memories.

    Joscelin

    Reply
    #10

    i wanted pomegranates—
    i wanted darkness—
    i wanted him.


    She still holds back the confession, keeps it inside her, because she will not spill herself in such a way. Joscelin stays close, warm and familiar against it, which only serves to stoke the pain, knowing this is a singular nostalgia, and not a shared kind.
    Light breaks across Joscelin’s body as she speaks – beautiful as a sunrise – and oh, it hurts. She doesn’t know how to spark memory back into the woman – she has no powers, nothing to help her, only the poor accounts of their previous meetings, the ones only she can recall.

    “You are,” she says – insists – because if anything’s constant, it’s that Joscelin is beautiful, light filling the cracks of her, eyes kind and shining. Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful.
    “Do you remember anything? Anything at all?” she asks, and perhaps she is desperate, now. She wonders what she could give to bring back her memories, wonders how they were lost, in the first place.
    And still, she touches her, still, she is pressed to her, silver to broken bay, wishing for any kind of magic, so that she could restore her, so that she might believe it when Perse next calls her beautiful.

    p e r s e
    ------------------------------cordis x spyndle
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