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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


    used to have a lot, but i got more now, adna
    #1

    Ophanim
    Starsin has been so busy lately, whispering in the mad king’s ear and instigating entire wars within Beqanna. He wants to trail behind her like a lost duckling but he knows he would only distract her from her work. Ophanim allows himself to fade into the background for now, wandering until she is ready for him once again. These aimless strolls have brought him to the meadow where the spring rains have made a mess of things. Mud sticks to the light feathering around his ankles but the sun occasionally peaks out to reflect off the brilliant gold patches of his body. He’s managed to turn the upper half of his body to scales to keep the rain off him for the most part, while his tender underbelly remains vulnerable.
     
    But he has no enemies in this life just yet.
    Ophanim has never had a reason to fear as others do.
     
    He extends his wings and lets his scales consume them until they are draconic in appearance. The golden eyes that line the underside of the wings glow even in the shade of the appendages. Ophanim sighs slowly as his body begins to soak up the warmth available beneath the spring sun. The largest snow mounds still linger defiantly in the corners of the meadow but he doesn’t seem too bothered by the last signs of the dead winter.
     
    The angel boy moves forward, wondering if his mother ever found somewhere safe to hide until the plague retreated. Somewhere in the depths of him, he’s finally begun to miss seeing her face each morning. His wings slowly fold halfway against his sides to act as an umbrella for the time being. Ophanim’s bright blue eyes search across the meadow for something to occupy him for the time being, but everyone seems so preoccupied already. He does his best to keep the faint smile curled across his lips as he waits patiently.

    Either he’ll find someone to keep him company or Starsin will call him home, he supposes.
    @[adna]
    Reply
    #2
    @[Ophanim] is plagued by request.
    He will show symptoms (rolled a 3).
    He will express a trait (rolled a 3).
    Reply
    #3

    and if you're still breathing, you're the lucky ones
    ‘cause most of us are heaving through corrupted lungs

    She hasn’t caught her breath since she saw her father.

    It is trapped in her throat and under her tongue and she is dizzy all of the time. Her vision, for the first time in her life, begins to click between her normal vision and that of the predator—the bodies around her turning into heat maps, turning into prey. Her fangs ache with the need for release and she feels a wild thrashing in her chest, a need to be free, a need to run, a need to find some release for the bitter hurt.

    All of it leaves her a little wild-eyed, her edges sharp, her path wandering.

    She doesn’t go home, but she doesn’t go anywhere else either.

    Today, nowhere is the meadow and she walks through it without any sort of clear destination. The rain leaves her mane curled and clinging to her slick scales, the mud crawling up her mahogany legs although she doesn’t feel it. Adna wants to run but her legs feel as heavy as her heart and, as with all things, the duality of her feelings nearly rends her apart. She wants to flee but remains anchored. She wants to fight but cannot swallow past the guilt. She wants to rage but drowns in her sorrow, her chest heaving.

    She cannot tell if she is lucky or cursed to run into the scaled boy, draconic and angelic in the same breath. She cannot tell when she looks up, her body but a breath away from him. She was by herself and she is suddenly surrounded by him, his scent flooding over her. Adna inhales sharply and takes a step back, the rain heavier now although she is not bothered by it. In some ways, it enhances that feral, sharp beauty of her. In others, it leaves her muddled and confused. Girlish and feminine and serpentine.

    “Oh,” her voice is tight, that breath still caught in her chest. “I didn’t see you.”

    Perhaps I shouldn’t have, she wants to say. Wants to keep going.

    Perhaps you can save me, in the next breath, the next thought.

    adna

    we're setting fire to our insides for fun
    collecting pictures from a flood that wrecked our home



    @[ophanim]
    Reply
    #4

    Ophanim
    He watches her wandering approach, head tucked down in though and drenched in the rain, but he doesn’t move to avoid her or say anything to get her attention. He just waits patiently until her skin nearly collides into his. When she finally meets his gaze, he is still smiling and the world is content to continue spinning on its lazy axis. Ophanim extends a wing over her to shield her from the raindrops and offers a brief shrug of his pale white shoulders when she says she didn’t see him. Maybe she meant it as an apology or just a statement to fill the silence.

    The droplets run down the scales of his wings and drop off the tiny claws at the end of each section. He’s not used to this appearance just yet but his eyes roam across Adna curiously, admiring her own skin and finding it lovely. Maybe being a little reptilian isn’t so bad if someone can look as beautiful as her. His bright blue eyes finally return to her face and he tilts his head, trying to figure out if she’s crying or if the weather just turns her into a sad portrait of herself. He reaches out and gently bumps his nose to her cheek as though to reassure her.

    My name is Ophanim,” he says, still smiling like the summer. The golden lines painted down his cheeks make the expression look bittersweet despite the kindness in his eyes. “Do you normally wander around staring at your feet?

    Here he laughs, a sound like delicate fingers expertly plucking the strings of a harp. The sun briefly peeks through a part in the clouds as though summoned by the angel’s laughter, painting them both a hazy golden-orange color. There is something serious behind his eyes once he grows silent, however, and he watches her closely to pick apart her answer. He’s learned to speak more through body language than words after realizing how little Starsin said with her lips. Ophanim edges closer, letting their sides briefly graze against one another each time they breathe.
    @[adna]
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    #5

    and if you're still breathing, you're the lucky ones
    ‘cause most of us are heaving through corrupted lungs

    She doesn’t expect the kindness of him extending his wings over her—doesn’t expect it and doesn’t know how to respond to it. Part of her wants to violently push it away, lashing out and sinking fang into his flesh for daring to soften the world around her, and another part of her wants to sink into it. She’s not sure which reaction, which desire, is more frightening. So, instead, she does nothing. Instead, she remains still as he bumps the velvet of his nose into the curve of her cheek, her sage eyes sliding to his own.

    “Ophanim,” she repeats the name, letting her youthful tongue wrap around the syllables of it.

    It’s not a name like any she has heard before—the vowels more pronounced, the edges of it softer—and she finds that she likes the way that it sounds. “Ophanim,” she says again, trying it out before nodding, the motion a little mechanical and a little curt. “I like it,” and it should be a compliment but her serpent tongue makes the words a little too sharp for it to be flirtatious or coy.

    But there is nothing sharp about him.

    Nothing painful or cruel or dark.

    Just kind eyes and golden lines and that strange angelic beauty that engulfs him.

    “I don’t normally wander,” she admits, because she’s always been someone who sticks close to home and family and those she loves. “I think I was running away, but I can’t even do that right.” She frowns, the shadow of it chasing across her face, pinching her lips. “I just,” she exhales, glancing up to search his eyes.

    “Have you ever just needed to find a place to breathe?”

    A brief laugh as she shakes her head, water droplets falling from the angles of it.

    “Probably not,” she sighs, feeling alone.

    adna

    we're setting fire to our insides for fun
    collecting pictures from a flood that wrecked our home



    @[Ophanim]
    Reply
    #6

    Ophanim
    He watches her lips when she forms the little string of syllables that form his name, sweet and soft in her voice. She says it again and his smile grows a bit as though she’s paid him a compliment just by sampling the sound of his name twice. When she actually does offer up her approval, he laughs softly as he grows bashful beneath her kindness. The angel boy doesn’t seem to mind the way she nods that predator head or how the words come snapping between her fangs. He’s entirely focused on the color of her eyes and the different colors her scales turn as the light shifts so comfortably across them.

    Ophanim nods when she explains how she normally doesn’t just wander off like this but he can’t really relate as he pretends to. He’s always on the move, always searching for something to keep him busy when his thoughts are too full of Starsin. Was he running away or toward something? Neither, he supposes, since he feels lost so much of the time. But her eyes are troubled and it helps him forget his own worries when his brows furrow together in concern. Bleeding heart boy, he presses his lips to her cheek when she sighs.

    You’re too hard on yourself,” he mumbles, lips poised over her skin still as he speaks. “Everyone should stop and breathe every once a while.

    He leans further against her so their sides press tight together now while he explores the vulnerable regions of her neck. Ophanim is slow and careful, impossibly gentle as he kisses the rain from her skin before pausing to look up at her. His cheeks grow warm beneath a pink blush and he clears his throat nervously.

    I’m sorry,” he says, shifting his weight so there is a small gap between them once more while his blue eyes stare off in the distance. “I’m sorry. I didn’t even ask your name. That’s awful of me.

    She’s not Starsin and he knows that but the ache and that ravenous loneliness in her eyes is enough to fool his heart for now. The puzzle piece fits just fine but the picture turns crooked and clumsy without the proper girl. (But if he just closes his eyes and reaches out to kiss her again, then it feels just the same. It packs the wound just long enough to let him survive another day without the real thing.)
    @[adna]
    wow hawt.
    Reply
    #7

    and if you're still breathing, you're the lucky ones
    ‘cause most of us are heaving through corrupted lungs

    He is soft and sweet and in many ways, his kindness reminds Adna of her mother. It brings a sharp pain to her stomach, a blade that cuts quickly. She has to grit her teeth against the onslaught of it; it makes her eyes brighter and then duller all at once. But he is so sweet that she cannot help but soften to it. She cannot help but close her eyes against the feel of his lips against her cheek, his murmur into her flesh.

    “I don’t have time to stop,” she confesses, and it’s a relief to say the words. “I’m running away and toward something and I couldn’t tell you the name of either.” A single shudder runs through her at the feel of his lips on her neck. “My family is falling apart and I’m not doing a thing to hold them together.”

    She’s just running away and leaving the wreckage to them.

    She’s not protecting her sisters. Not caring for her mom.

    She hasn’t even bothered to tell them where she’s going.

    “Don’t apologize,” she turns her gaze to him, studies the angelic, draconic angles of his face. “You have been the only kindness I have felt in a long while.” One corner of her youthful mouth tips upward, although it is difficult to not miss the fact that her smile looks like a frown. “My name is Adna.”

    She hesitates as she reaches over to press her mouth into the strong angles of his neck. She lingers there for a moment, taking in the sweet and the spice of him, her lip dragging slightly against the flesh. It is an alien feeling to touch someone so intimately—someone who is not family, someone she has never met.

    “I want to be a stranger,” another confession that she presses into his hands. “I want to forget.”

    Adna closes her eyes and then presses the damp scales of her forehead against him.

    “I want to be anyone but who I am.”

    adna

    we're setting fire to our insides for fun
    collecting pictures from a flood that wrecked our home



    @[Ophanim]
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