Sochi;

[Castile]

and underneath the layers, I find myself asking what's left
a hollowed out form, the skeleton of a ghost, the pitiful echo of what once was

Sochi witnessed his rage, tasted the anger that rolled off him in turbulent waves, when the faeries made a mockery of him by stripping him down to nothing. In those moments, he was vulnerable and felt so very weak even as she tenderly caressed him with her lips and a lover’s embrace. I’m not a predator, he mumbled to her, but she reassured him just as she always has when he needs it the most.

He realizes he isn’t perfect, that he is volatile and impulsive, but at least she grounds him while still electrifying him with perpetual excitement.

It’s one of the many reasons he loves her.

In his attempt to return to the Mountain, a distraction posed as an obstacle and halted his ambitions. The words were honey, so tantalizing and sweet to hear. It was as though she crawled into his head to extract his deepest and wildest dreams, feeding him ideas that she knew he wanted. Every stream of thought purposefully steered him away from the Mountain and set his eyes on the world as an entirety. It was his to take. They all feared him before, but he was hospitable then, and he was kind. They’ve broken him without even realizing.

But they will know soon enough.

So very soon.

He comes to her by flight, guided solely by his draconic wings. A swift shift in his weight commences a fluid descent that lands him within a few feet of her. Wind dances with the dirt in the last few seconds before his hooves alight on the rocky hill. ”Hello, my love,” a jagged smile stretches across his mouth as he reaches for her, leaning into her neck and breathing her in as though it has been years. He missed her, but the confession never reaches far enough to be heard as he pulls her into him.

Their body heat mingles as they fit together, puzzle pieces finally coming together again. Castile cannot help to bury his face into her neck, holding her for a few more seconds before slowly drawing back and searching her face. ”It seems much is happening,” he pauses to gather his thoughts and to skim the edges of the events he has heard, both directly and indirectly. His mismatched eyes fall contemplatively but soon rise again to level on her own. ”Lepis may be returning to Loess and leave Pteron in charge,” he pauses to swallow the lump of uncertainty in his throat, ”I gave Taiga our daughter. She is pregnant with Pteron’s child. She will be the link between the two territories.” There is so much more to tell her, but suddenly everything dissipates, melting with his mounting curiosity.

They both know Reia is a kindred spirit, never obeying expectations. Their wild child, he has frequently commented with lighthearted laughter. How then, he wonders, will Sochi take to the information that he sold away their daughter for a political stance. She is no Queen. Diplomacy never interested her; she never regarded herself a princess though it is her right.

It makes her the king’s broodmare, almost. A bargaining chip as they combine two families to solidify their strength and unity.

Without having realized he was holding his breath, Castile finally - slowly - exhales.

castile

[sochi]

sochi

‘Mine,’ he had said.

Before then, Sochi had never really put much thought into a traditional romantic arrangement. She had assumed, rather that it was not for her—that she was never meant to be simply tied to one other soul. It had never been anything that caused her much grief or concern. Never anything that kept her awake at night and even after meeting Castile, after knowing him, she had never worried over the future of it.

But then he had said ‘mine’ and the gravity of her life had shifted.

So she has no way of knowing, or truly understanding, the twisting of her gut that something is wrong. She has no way of putting a name on the word for it—the otherness that scratches at the back of her neck, that tells her something fundamental about the life that she knows has changed. It leaves her restless and volatile and rash. She leaves Loess more often for hunts that never satisfy. She fights strangers and comes home bloody, choosing to let her body heal slowly instead of accelerating it like she knows she could.

She seeks relief in the life of a predator because it what she understands.

And when he does come for her again, she is still. Her silver eyes are mercurial and sharp, flashing to the sight of him airborne again. He pulls her close and she doesn’t actively fight it, but she does stiffen as the wind catches his hair—as something in the back of her mind clicks. It’s like a gravity of its own, this knowing, this thought that begins to form—and to her own surprise, she feels something shift within her, something cold and heavy and unmovable. She pulls inward, leaving nothing but a bland exterior.

She lets him continue to talk, listening with half an ear and perking up only slightly when her daughter is mentioned. But Reia has long since become grown and Sochi knows that the girl has no need for her mother anymore. Perhaps she never did. In these ways, her daughter is more like her than she will ever know. She is silent for several more minutes then, breathing lightly and evenly before she lifts her neutral gaze to find his own. There is no heat to it, no suspicion or fury. Just a slight angle to her head.

“It does seem much is happening,” she finally says, echoing his words in her own low rasp.

And then, in the same even voice, she continues, “You smell different. Isn’t that odd?”

well, I can try to get you closer but I know you’d break your neck just to see the stars
and if we don’t dare to hold it then this reckless wandering love was never ours

@[Castile]

[Castile]

and underneath the layers, I find myself asking what's left
a hollowed out form, the skeleton of a ghost, the pitiful echo of what once was

Of course, he notices the rigidity in her body and how she doesn’t melt into him. There’s a reservation that he is unaccustomed to – at least, with her – and he tries not to wholly focus on it. A mistake, he considers quietly as his eyes shut in their embrace. A bad day, he offers himself as an alternative even as her heart steadily beats against the rhythm of his own. There’s disconnect, but he refuses to accept it, refuses to think there could ever be discord between them.

But he should know better than that.

Sochi is fierce; like him, she is a predator and far from ever being weak. Unsettled, she will admit it to him, but he glazes over the possibilities and ignores how he has failed her of late. The love is there, still feverish for her, and so he thinks little of it until they peel apart and is met by an eerie neutrality.

The mercurial silver of her eyes dulls, but there is a thoughtfulness brimming behind her unwavering gaze as it locks on him. He leads her into conversation, lying everything on a platter for her observance, but she doesn’t take as he thought. Everything rests idle, practically untouched and hardly noticed, for a long moment. Castile waits with bated breath until it catches and holds in his throat. His brows furrow, his mouth shadowing as it creases uncertainly. ”I’ve been to the meadow and the mountain, even Pangea, so I expect I’ve carried a lot of strange smells.”” A glance toward the western borders enables another moment of recollection as he thumbs through his whereabouts, but he is so blind, so ignorant.

Oceane doesn’t cross his mind, not when the heat of his body mingles with Sochi’s, not when he looks into her eyes and sees the family and life they’ve created together. But he touched her for the first time recently, pressed his mouth to her neck in possession while Ivar looked on in bemusement. Castile is greedy, but also protective since he is aware of the kelpie's past. After many elusive years, the truth surfaced what he did to Isobell - killing her beneath the surf before she changed.

Castile cannot - will not - allow the same fate to fall upon the shoulders of Oceane or any other Loessian under his guard.
But he remembers now how far he took it, how he caved to primal impulses.

Even then, he does not think of Oceane, not when Sochi's underlying tones resonate uncomfortably through him, demanding full attention.

castile

[sochi]

SOCHI

Sochi is not jealous by nature although she is possessive. It is a primal thing, a balance, and one that she finds is easy to navigate. She is content to let the wild things roam—to take her piece of the natural order and leave the rest to the winds and the fangs of the wolves—but once something has been made as her own, it is different. He had claimed her, told her that she was his, and she had done the same.

He is no longer something to be shared, to be passed around.

Or, at least, he hadn’t been,

Still, the idea that growls in the back of her mind is nothing more than an idea—an instinctual knowing without any sort of words. She has no desire to snarl and demand answers. Little desire to beg or fight over something that was no longer hers. So she doesn’t. She merely stands there, cool and unaffected despite the gnawing feeling of unease, the increasing desire to leave once more for the common lands. Where she might fight a stranger to spar with, someone who would offer her a throat to drain dry.

“Perhaps,” she offers, her voice still so carefully dry, a near drawl in the husky rasp. She angles her head a little. “Did you have diplomats accompany you?” Sochi has not yet met Oceane and has no way of knowing her name. She doesn’t pick up her distinct scent but she cannot fight the thought that while Castile does smell of many places, there is one scent that is stronger than the others—and is not a place.

She doesn’t press further though, instead sliding her silver gaze to the horizon. For a moment, she just lets it rest there, feeling the familiar wind pick up and run through her tangled mane, brush down the scarred length of her jawline. When she glances back, her face remains as unaffected as calm waters.

she said a war ain't a war before both sides bleed

[Castile]

and underneath the layers, I find myself asking what's left
a hollowed out form, the skeleton of a ghost, the pitiful echo of what once was

Many would flinch from her, shy away from the snarls that simmer beneath the surface. Her mercurial eyes swirl with a hooded darkness that Castile takes duly note of when he flickers his gaze across her face. He doesn’t lean away from her or take a step back; they are both unafraid, bold. It actually poses a challenge, seeing her so rigid against his touch and unwilling to lose herself in him as she has hundreds of times before.

Their eyes lock, and he caresses her with a stern, marbled face. ”Yes, I had diplomats,” a short pause, ”Nimue Isolde.” It would be easy to lie, but he doesn’t. The woman accompanied him to Pangea, but there is more to Sochi’s question. Like an iceberg, Castile sees only the tip and not the perilous dangers lurking beneath the waves. That isn’t to say he is oblivious or dumb; there’s a shift in her that he carefully regards.

She looks away toward the distant horizon; Castile hesitates before turning his head to follow. Their thoughts trail apart in different directions, tendrils that get whisked with the soft breeze as it tousles their locks. Slowly, admiringly, he looks at her again even if it isn’t met. Quietly, in the lull of conversation, he waits until the stoicism of her face stares back. No smile, no adoration.

Just, stillness.

Pressing forward, Castile pushes through the wall she builds. ”Sochi,” her name is gruff, firm, as he stop mere inches from her, their noses nearly touching as he searches her for something, anything. The words come  like a tsunami, relentlessly beating and sloshing through his mind without order, and so he hesitates all while holding her gaze and resisting the temptation to pull her back into his embrace because he knows she will not happily accept it.

A slow, calculated breath sighs from his lungs.

”I love you. There is only you,” his voice is strained by the raw emotion clawing his throat as he navigates his musings to piece it all together for her. ”You are the only one that I have said that to, no one else.” Not Ciri, not Solace, and not even Sabra. The words never reached his tongue or clouded his judgment until Sochi stepped into his feverish, crumbling life.

But he sinfully wants. There is a possessive lust for Oceane, a need to have her near and to display her to the world, but it strikes him now that she wants the same. But she also has political goals that he can help her achieve. They are tools to one another, useful tools.

Alas, want isn’t the same as love. It is sinful whereas his adoration for Sochi is pure and admirable. It hangs in question, he sees, and his jaws clench uncomfortably for a fleeting moment although he still does not elude the knives sinking into his flesh when she looks at him. ”When I said – say – I love you, I mean it.”

castile

[sochi]

SOCHI

There is a part of her that is relieved to hear the words. Part of her that wants to swallow them down and then forget the suspicion that has ever sprouted in her mind—whichever part of her first picked up on the sense that was something was amiss. But the larger part of her loathes that reaction—hates herself for even feeling it. It is a weakness, she knows. It is a cowardly thing to cow to her own needs, letting it bend her spine like a sapling so that she may continue to keep that which she was unable to keep on her own.

No, she may turn a blind eye to her emotions, but she would not blind herself to the truth.

So she doesn’t instantly warm to his raw confessions, despite the way she would have once folded into his embrace. She remains steely, still, her face wiped clean of whatever emotion churns within her. She just watches him and realizes that he wouldn’t be saying such things if there was nothing to spur it onward. She, after all, had not accused him of anything—or even demanded answers.

This reaction more than anything perhaps cements the feeling in her belly.

Turns the suspicion into something more real, more tangible.

A single ear flicks toward him in the thicket of her mane, her scarred lips pressed into a clean, neutral line. For another section, she is silent before she continues. “I once told you to never apologize to me for being a predator.” She remembers the day clearly; remembers how often she has told him that he would never need to apologize to her for his base desires, his feral nature. She would not turn her back on her word now. “I certainly don’t need nor want to hear you begin apologizing for it now.”

It is still a guess, a pivot of the conversation based purely on her conjecture, but she doesn’t waiver or act anything but confident. Her nose twitches lightly, tail flicking at the back of her legs as she brings her gaze to his mismatched ones, holding it steady without blinking. “But if you are not mine, completely,” she lingers on the word a little, mulling it over as though to learn the meaning, “then I am not yours.”

She says it decisively and yet, still, almost casually with little heat behind the words. After all, she meant was she said about him not apologizing for acting every inch of the predator he was—for going after that which he may want in the moment. She knew he was a dragon before she agreed to these ties, but she was not something to be tucked away—someone to be content being claimed and owned while he was free to act on his every whim. So she lifts her chin, studying him, surprisingly relaxed in the silence that follows.

she said a war ain't a war before both sides bleed

[Castile]

and underneath the layers, I find myself asking what's left
a hollowed out form, the skeleton of a ghost, the pitiful echo of what once was

There’s hardly more that he can do than watch her. The steeliness of their eyes remain steadfast when they lock, neither flinching from the increasing frigidity of the conversation. Sochi is unfazed by his confession, her lips pursed in a thin line as she stares into the fiery depths of his heart and soul. Castile lifts his chin, his eyes narrowing underneath the unruly nest of his forelock. What smile had been on his face has since dissipated, chiseled away by the distance she keeps between them.

Skepticism rises inside him and uncertainty sinks its nails into his throat, silencing him when she finally speaks. The words are weighted, and he considers her carefully. Every ounce of love seems washed away. Every fiber of her being appears decided and firm, but still, he doesn’t resign or buckle underneath her unspoken accusations. ”I’m not apologizing for anything,” when he finally answers her, it’s with a rumbling baritone that emanates his own confidence and unwillingness to fold. ”You asked if I had diplomats with me,” his mind pieces it together and mulls it over. His eyes flash with surprise and question. ”Are you threatened?” He assumes that would be the only reason she asked, the root of her leading questions and cold eyes.

Castile rolls his shoulders, the muscles rippling beneath his taut skin while his jaws clench, frustrated.

”Why do you sound like you’re giving up at the drop of a hat?” All the years they’ve spent together, the nights huddled close, and the children borne between them, flash feverishly before him when he looks at her. The battles for a home, the war. They’ve been at each other’s side, but Sochi’s grip loosens now. ”… On a whim…” he adds as an afterthought, casting his eyes away in a moment of concentration before bringing himself to look at her again. Once, years ago, he would have crumbled in front of her, but he was weak then and still so broken. She has lifted him from the ashes, but even then, he doesn’t retrogress. Even if she is the core of his strength, he doesn’t fall to his knees as she begins pulling the rug from underneath his feet.

Both stubborn, both proud.

A heavy breath sighs from his lungs, black smoke pooling out and billowing into the space above him. He stares at her through the cloud, piercing his mismatched gaze through her. ”You haven’t been happy,” it’s the only reason he can muster, the only wedge that comes to mind in his frantic search for answers. ”Why?” He finally asks, not realizing how heavy the question truly is until it leaves his lips.

castile

[sochi]

SOCHI

“Threatened?” The word leaves her mouth before she can catch it and there’s a hint of something like incredulity in it—surprised he would level the question at her. “I’m not threatened by much, Castile,” her voice remains even despite the anger that starts to lick at the back of her mind, the certainty that he was being willfully obtuse at this point. “But I promise you I am least of all threatened by your diplomats.”

It doesn’t cross her mind that she could be more direct when she feels as though she is chasing shadows, guessing at the things that stir in her belly, scratch at her mind. It doesn’t occur to her that she could simply give a name to the suspicions that have grown in her, taking root and flourishing.

And it certainly goes to the wayside at his next question.

For the first time since they started talking, heat rises in her throat truly. Something dangerous flashes behind her silver eyes as she barely registers him asking why she hasn’t been happy. She dismisses the question outright, choosing to flagrantly ignore it. it was difficult to believe that he would turn the tables on her—accuse her of being unhappy, of being threatened, of giving up on them—and she swallows down the bitter anger that he is. She’s never had much experience with being gaslit, but she’s sure this is it.

“I’m certainly not giving up,” she growls, her husky voice dropping even lower, the rasp of it licked with flames. “I’m just stating a simple truth. One I assume is acknowledged between the two of us.” She levels her silver eyes with him, forcing herself to separate her emotions—violently divorcing them so that she can be collected in this moment and not think about the pain that might accompany it. “If you are mine, completely, then nothing is different.” She watches him carefully, feeling heat rush beneath her skin.

“So, are you, Castile?” She angles her head. “Or have you been giving pieces of yourself away?”

she said a war ain't a war before both sides bleed

[Castile]

and underneath the layers, I find myself asking what's left
a hollowed out form, the skeleton of a ghost, the pitiful echo of what once was

It’s near impossible composing himself; it always has been a struggle. The fire inside him is volatile, set ablaze by plans gone awry. Sochi’s emotional distance is enough of a trigger, but he inwardly battles himself from the havoc of which he is well capable. She has always been safe from him, from his wrath. Has she ever seen him in his other body where his instincts are primal and his hunger fierce? Has she ever seen him lose control?

Castile’s brow furrows and his eyes smolder.

Successfully – rudely – he provokes her, extracting emotion from her knowing well that she is hardly threatened. ”Good,” he snips, ”then why ask if I was with anyone?” He pauses, clenching his jaws as the words spill, an undammed body of water. Black smoke billows from his nostrils. ”Don’t answer that.” It was more or less rhetorical, and yet he still adds to that, as though afraid to hear her answer.

(Nothing can stop us)
(Destroy everything – anyone – in our way)

It speaks to him, that primal hiss in his mind, but rather than act on it, Castile’s muscles flinch with the struggling effort. If there is one woman that he wants to preserve from his blinded fury, it’s Sochi. Slowly, thoughtfully, Castile slides his tongue across his teeth, quietly confirming their bluntness before casting his eyes back to her and reading the deepened lines of her face. ”Then why—“ he nearly asks for reasons to her space, almost presses her for the details he has assumed correctly since the beginning, almost.

She is not threatened, but he can attest their possessive nature. Underneath the rippling of her anger, her ferocity could nearly be mistaken for that of a dragon. Their eyes flash similarly, their snarls meeting each other.

he creature inside him rattles the bars of its cage, screaming for release, and yet Castile begins to melt in front of her, just slightly. Slowly, tension dissipates from his body, but there remains his hooded expression combating hers. I’m certainly not giving up, she jadedly says, suppressing her anger enough to still speak. ”Don’t ever give up on me,” he strains through his teeth, the ridges of his face still sharp, ”On us.” The others had, except for one, but they were fire and gasoline together – they needed to end. But this? Them? As angry and frustrated as he outwardly is, Castile’s heart gropes for the relationship they’ve forged, the memories they’ve created. He wants to keep it, to cherish it, but he has admittedly made a mistake. Only one, he tells himself as though it doesn’t matter. ”Ever.” He adds, rolling his shoulders as he watches her lips.

When she says pieces, he thinks only of one thing. Suddenly, his body is lax and his head inclines slightly as though in confusion. ”My heart is entirely yours,” he pauses, unable to fathom an ability to roam that far from her embrace, ”It always has been.” It’s too late to apologize for gas lighting her and flipping it onto her. The threat of it chokes him, forming a lump in his throat as their eyes meet. Still, he does not confess that he is sorry, or even that Oceane may be expecting. He isn’t perfect; he never will be. Impulsive, brash, and primal – a recipe for frequent disasters. His life. So rather than fight her again or throw polished knives at her with his words, Castile falls quiet.

castile

[sochi]

SOCHI

He’s opened up the edge of her anger and she wishes she could turn it off. She wishes that she could turn back into that endless coolness of being unaffected, of burying herself in her more primal instincts. It was easier to turn toward the apathy then it was to face the knife of her fury. To acknowledge that she is hurt and confused—to try and wrap her mind around these emotions without somehow imploding with them.

It flashes across her face, something like a shadow, a bruise underneath the surface, and although she does her best to wash it away, there are remnants of it that linger—that stick to the corners. She presses her lips together, tries to swallow the pain that rises up her throat, the way it tangles around the burrs of her confusion, the way she still chases shadows because he can’t, he won’t, name them.

She shakes her head when he orders her to not give up, as though this was on her. As though she bore the brunt of it—carrying the gravity of this situation on her spine. She was not the one who had taken them here. She had not been the first to claim him—the first to set their relationship down this path of monogamy. She had not been the first to whisper the words that cemented it, that solidified it.

She had not been the one to take an axe to it.

And yet—

And yet, he asks her to hold onto it.

She growls, low and frustrated, a sound born of a reaction more than anything, a response to the emotions that churn in her belly. He places his love in her palms again and she hates the weakness in her that would bend to it, that part of her that would still slip into it and let it warm her from the inside out. Instead she quashes that weakness. “Don’t use your love as a weapon against me,” her voice is hoarse now, the emotions thick in her throat. “I know when you’re hiding. We have always been open—been honest.”

It was the very foundation of their relationship. She had been completely unformed when they had first met. Trying to wrestle with these parts of her that she didn’t understand. The predator. The woman who had killed, who had answered a dark god’s demand. It was he who had seen that, who had heard her talk about it—who had not passed judgment when she told him the truth. And now he speaks in riddles and offers her platitudes, dancing around the subject that drags a knife keenly across her heart.

She takes a step back.

“I need to go,” another shake of her head as her inky body begins to bleed away.

“I have to—” her silver eyes glance up, study him for a second before she shifts fully, the mare replaced with the tigress, powerful and wild in her own right. This time, when her eyes meet him, they are utterly feline. There is a flash of distress on her face before she turns and runs into the distance.

she said a war ain't a war before both sides bleed