[open] no promise sweeter than a blood pact - Printable Version +- Beqanna (https://beqanna.com/forum) +-- Forum: Explore (https://beqanna.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?fid=1) +--- Forum: The Common Lands (https://beqanna.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?fid=72) +---- Forum: Forest (https://beqanna.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?fid=73) +---- Thread: [open] no promise sweeter than a blood pact (/showthread.php?tid=26582) |
no promise sweeter than a blood pact - thorn - 04-17-2020 Between now and the monster’s belly, Thorn has shed the skin of a kind boy and grown the scales of a monster. In his worst moments, there is the stark sound of gasping accompanied by the blistering white of rolled eyes. In his best . . . there is nothing. Nothing because Thorn is mostly a zombie, the faint drip of his wounded chest the only sound that follows him, eyes so glazed they look like they might just roll out. Nothing—because what remains of him is the constant presence of suffering thoughts but no actual coherency—because ever since that monster threw him up he hasn’t been able to loosen such heavy shoulders—because when he breathes he is often heaving through a pain-locked chest— “God, I’m tired,” Thorn exclaims, though it comes out more like a question and he isn’t sure he actually spoke. The sun above is hot, dries sweat against his neck and blood against his legs. He pants a little then squints through the bright dapples of the canopy to see if there might be some relief ahead. Nothing, mostly—except for the occasional cloud passing over the sun. He’d sigh if he was capable of such an expression; instead his head limply falls and his eyelids droop in exhaustion, not disappointment. Forcing numbness is a better alternative to a constant barrage of stranger’s suffering. The wound in his chest pulses. Fresh blood drips down his chest, drip, onto the forest floor. Thorn stops. He’s too tired now. thorn under your skin, over the moon don't let me in, I don't know what I'd do roses are fallin', roses from fallin' for you, ooh RE: no promise sweeter than a blood pact - prayer - 04-17-2020 RE: no promise sweeter than a blood pact - thorn - 04-17-2020 The silence that blankets Thorn’s mind is all-consuming. Prayer that appears like a dream and reminds him of a nightmare, seemingly materializes immediately before him. Thorn, she says, and it sounds like an echo, or like a scream made underwater. All of his blood rushes to his head and he flushes, hot and dizzy, out of breath. That strain, the way she draws back just before touching him—that’s what really drives the dagger in. “Prayer,” Thorn gasps, casting eyes so disturbed that they look surreal paired with such a lovely lilac. There’s a plea that sits on the tip of his tongue: please touch me. Because this pain Thorn can feel, the one balled tight in her chest, is the heaviest he’s borne and maybe—maybe, if her touch were too much for him, it would be a fair way for him to die. Thorn hesitates to respond for a moment too long. He can’t get the crystal clear sound of the wintertime river he had met her in front of out of his head. Thorn’s there, now, small and belly-deep in water too cold for any being, but especially a child. “Don’t touch me,” he calls from that frigid water. The glaze over his eyes is cold, his voice somehow distant even as they stand next to each other. “You can’t be here.” With a gasp, the boy locked in the river hops out—Thorn’s eyes glimmer with just a hint of light, just enough to furrow his brow. “There’s nothing you can do.” It’s the truth, and it’s spoken more sweetly than his previous words, but to speak to her in such a way still stings. thorn under your skin, over the moon don't let me in, I don't know what I'd do roses are fallin', roses from fallin' for you, ooh RE: no promise sweeter than a blood pact - prayer - 04-17-2020 RE: no promise sweeter than a blood pact - thorn - 04-17-2020 Those first moments back with his father had been the worst in his life. Nightlock’s initial grief and confusion had made Thorn so nauseous it took days to eat again. He didn’t think there would ever be another like that—he thought that he could get used to the weight of the ones he adored the most but— Here Prayer stands, bearing the silks of a rosy childhood friend, and it wrenches his chest in ways he didn’t know existed. Even the simplest, unselfish kind of love is tainted by his curse. He would be angry if he could feel something other than Prayer’s heart splitting in two. Thorn genuinely cannot remember what happiness feels like. When he sees this face that brought him so much joy, all he can feel is the pain he causes her. Thorn would take dying again over bearing such knowledge. Prayer asks her questions and he does not interrupt, simply standing while the curse’s gash weeps faster so near another’s pain. Thorn wants to drag her to beneath his neck and tell her it will be okay. To know what a touch like that feels like one more time—oh! just once—before banishing himself to the bottom of some shadowed lake. He wishes to convince her entirely that this hole in his chest is meant to be there, that he is the boy from the river— Oh, to know his differences cause her suffering. “You can’t,” Thorn finally coughs out. “You can’t.” This time more defeated. “Magic won’t fix it.” thorn under your skin, over the moon don't let me in, I don't know what I'd do roses are fallin', roses from fallin' for you, ooh RE: no promise sweeter than a blood pact - prayer - 04-19-2020 RE: no promise sweeter than a blood pact - thorn - 04-20-2020 If Thorn could turn back time, he absolutely would. There is no romanticized it made me who I am mania. If there was a way to drag himself from the mouth of that cave, he would say or do or sacrifice anything. He only had so much to offer, with the way his chest tells his tale, but maybe his slim pickings will earn his loved ones a new story. Thorn. Her voice is throttled by all the hands that tore Thorn’s chest open. They come back to him to dig deeper into his wound, flat palms pressing into the bleeding flesh, hungry to see more pain crease his face. Satisfied with the work they’ve done on another. Will you die? Prayer’s question is one Thorn doesn’t think he can answer. The leviathan had said no, he will not die from this curse; but every passing day increases the chances that he’ll die by his own hand. Sometimes, when the wound stings and swells with infection, Thorn thinks he’ll let it go just long enough for him to be too weak to heal it. He’ll have taken himself just far enough into the woods to be too far away to find another healer, and he’ll die (alone). Thorn looks down at Prayer, holding his breath because the distance between is so small and so fragile that even a reckless exhale might shatter them. “Not from the wound, no,” he whispers, desperate to break Prayer’s gaze but wholly incapable of doing so. “Not from the wound.” thorn under your skin, over the moon don't let me in, I don't know what I'd do roses are fallin', roses from fallin' for you, ooh |