i'm always in this twilight, varick - Printable Version +- Beqanna (https://beqanna.com/forum) +-- Forum: OOC (https://beqanna.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?fid=24) +--- Forum: Archive (https://beqanna.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?fid=81) +---- Forum: Lands (https://beqanna.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?fid=98) +----- Forum: Tephra (https://beqanna.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?fid=85) +----- Thread: i'm always in this twilight, varick (/showthread.php?tid=28283) |
i'm always in this twilight, varick - Sabbath - 11-15-2020 She surprised even herself when she momentarily gave in to Varick’s gentle charms. Naturally, Sabbath blames her raw heart on seeing their son ill and the kind way in which his father doted on him until he was well again. Honest affection toward her children was always such a weak point of hers. And, if she’s being entirely truthful with herself, she only regrets it because of the pain in her ankles right now. The twins have gone mostly still the past several days, with so little room to move within her belly. That, coupled with her lack of appetite, cues her that it is time to retreat to the quiet of her den. Crowns has grown so much, though he remains lanky and slender in his youth, and he still pokes his head in every hour to tell her something he’s learned or seen. He can’t empathize, she reminds herself. Sabbath finally sends him on an errand to find her father and learn one of his tired old stories, or perhaps her grandfather can regale the boy with the horrors of war. They’re always delighted to drone on about those things for hours, which will buy her all the time she needs. And maybe he’ll learn something. Shortly after he’s promised to seek them out, her contractions build from occasional pangs to rolling waves of aching hips. She snarls at the pain and bares her teeth. Her wild green eyes focus on the entrance to her den where she assumes Varick is lingering just outside. She wouldn’t blame him. She would probably try to eat him again if he came too close right now, but only because of the pain this time. With gritted teeth and heavy breaths, their second son slips from her. Sabbath lifts her head and stares at him for a moment. He’s a perfect blend of them both, with his father’s scales and a little nub of a horn on his forehead. It draws a smile to her tired face even when her body plunges through another contraction. Their daughter arrives easily, angrily crying at the cold and the sound of her own voice. The serpent woman laughs and stumbles up onto her unsteady legs. “You both have your father’s scales. How beautiful,” she coos gently as she begins to clean them. She hadn’t cared for the way her own body glowed and grew beautiful overnight, but she’s thankful for it as she admires their daughter. It contrasts the annoyed look in her eyes perfectly. “You look like a Katarine, I think.” And then she kisses the colt’s temple with an airy delicacy. “But what to name you, little twin?" may my enemies live long so they can see me prosper. sabbath RE: i'm always in this twilight, varick - Varick - 11-16-2020 so make your siren's call and sing all you want, I will not hear what you have to say -- VARICK @[Sabbath] RE: i'm always in this twilight, varick - Sabbath - 11-17-2020 She doesn’t like the way her body flinches when Varick finally reveals himself. Still, her head turns to him with those pointed teeth bared and ready to strike out at his face. At least this time she manages to uncurl her lip and turn her attention back to the newborn twins blinking into the fresh new world around them. Sabbath had always cursed magic, but she can’t deny the splendid mystery of how her heart swells without bursting when she sees her children’s faces for the first time. Katarine curiously bares her gums in an effort to mimic her mother’s fearsome expression just moments before. On her, however, it is clumsy and awkward. “You are a great and fearsome thing, little one,” she whispers into a laugh as she kisses the girl’s nose. Pleased enough with the flattery, she begins trying to stumble up onto her trembling purple legs. The girl stumbles but seems to draw encouragement when her father breathes over her frosted skin, finally standing on her own. Sabbath’s gaze follows Varick’s to the colt’s tail - a curious thing, but the serpentine nature of it leaves her staring for longer than she means to. None of her other children had carried her curse, she thought, and she worries for him now. She can’t help but think of Gospel, of herself. But Varick says they’re perfect and it would be a lie to say she disagrees. The corners of her lips turn upward and she doesn’t snarl when he touches her neck. “I fall so in love with each one,” she says, and then she deigns to lean against him, her body exhausted from its labors. Katarine observes, wide-eyed, and tucks herself against her brother before searching her parents’ faces for further approval. “I do. Do you think Crowns will be jealous that he isn’t the baby anymore?” she asks with a grin. Their older son had only shrugged and dismissed her when she asked how he felt. He remains ever secretive toward her, playing his cards close to his chest. Sabbath supposes he will reveal his emotions in due time, though. may my enemies live long so they can see me prosper. sabbath RE: i'm always in this twilight, varick - Varick - 11-24-2020 so make your siren's call and sing all you want, I will not hear what you have to say -- VARICK @[Sabbath] RE: i'm always in this twilight, varick - Sabbath - 11-27-2020 There is a part of Sabbath that wonders if Varick is right, if their daughter may come to hate the men of her family as she does. But she remembers that he is not like the others she has met in her life. He is kind and patient, even when she goes for his eyes or tries to bite through his scales as he sleeps. No, she thinks Katarine has a fine example of what a husband should look like. A frown creases her face, though, as she realizes that she considers them to be bonded for life. At least she didn’t say it aloud. She sweeps the thought away to dissect later when the conversation turns to their older son. Sabbath likes the idea of him bonding with his younger siblings, as Eucharist had when he was no longer the baby. But Crowns lacks whatever darkness has fit itself so perfectly into her middle child. Instead, their boy is kind and gentle, always striving to mimic the most admirable parts of his father. “He was getting himself too anxious, so I told him to find his grandfather and ask for stories,” she confesses with a soft, tired laugh. “Vulgaris will bore him to sleep with history lessons.” And she is careful to call her sire by his name, only ever saying Father when she was spitting it at him. Her lips begin to roam the length of Varick’s neck as she delicately searches for some soft spot for old times’ sake. What would she even do if she found it, after all they’ve been through? Maybe she could prick his skin and hold the venom back, a quiet reminder that she could end him and chooses not to. Sabbath doesn’t pledge her love to him, but she could vow not to kill him. It’s more than she’s given anyone else. may my enemies live long so they can see me prosper. sabbath RE: i'm always in this twilight, varick - Varick - 11-30-2020 so make your siren's call and sing all you want, I will not hear what you have to say -- VARICK @[Sabbath] RE: i'm always in this twilight, varick - Sabbath - 12-02-2020 She briefly wonders just how Crowns and Vulgaris are getting along or if her child has already driven her father to the brink of madness. They are entirely opposite from one another - Crowns thrives on the strange and unusual while her sire is repulsed by it these days. Sabbath wonders why she didn’t unleash her son on him sooner, then. “As long as he has fun,” she says with feigned innocence. He lifts his head to give her better access and she knows he recognizes this sort of touching from her. When Varick speaks, Sabbath glances up at him to stare through the thick line of her eyelashes. A wild shiver runs down her spine at his touch, then, and she bites down harder than she means to as a reflex. Naturally, it doesn’t pierce his armored scales, but it sends a clear message. She carefully gathers her venom across her tongue and spits it with a careful aim away from his eyes. Her pulse still hums in her veins at his touch. There is a piece of her, somewhere in the tangle of her rage, that enjoys the cold of his skin against hers. It extinguishes some of that inferno that she always keeps burning in the kiln of her heart. When he kisses their youngest children, it only serves to soften her further. Maybe she’d slowly begin to regret her cruelties toward him. The wild green of her eyes studies him as he speaks, narrowing in thought rather than malice this time. “Crowns doesn’t like it when you sleep out there. He likes to have us both near him. I imagine the twins will feel the same,” she says as she steps closer, seemingly forgiving his previous overstepping of her boundaries. Her voice does not soften but she avoids his eyes as she lowers herself beside Riptide, pulling him close to her. may my enemies live long so they can see me prosper. sabbath RE: i'm always in this twilight, varick - Varick - 12-06-2020 so make your siren's call and sing all you want, I will not hear what you have to say -- VARICK @[Sabbath] RE: i'm always in this twilight, varick - Sabbath - 12-17-2020 Sometimes her heart feels like a wildfire she lit the match to and never managed to control the flames. The smoke burns her lungs and she’d like to extinguish all that anger built up around her sternum, but she can only let it consume her now. Maybe in another life, she never learned what it is to be engulfed, and in that life, she learns to pronounce the word love without making it into a knife. She could tell Varick she cares for him as easily as she tells her children and still be able to breathe after. Sabbath has dreamt of this life, before, but the memory is gone by the time the haze of sleep lifts from her eyes. She watches Katarine crane her neck to accept her father’s affection before wiggling closer to Riptide and settling in. There is still hope for their daughter to be gentle and fragile in all the ways Sabbath would like to be. The ways she used to be. Her wild green eyes watch Varick for a while as she thinks. It isn’t hard to see she’s lost in her thoughts as she stares him down, as though calculating how to break him down into bite-sized pieces again. Can he hear the rampant thump of her pulse thundering in her veins? She leans her head to his and presses a light kiss to his temple before she loses her nerve. And then, before he can speak or reciprocate, she curls around their newborns and closes her eyes to sleep. may my enemies live long so they can see me prosper. sabbath |