"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
He had the strangest sense that he was walking.
But he must be sleeping.
There was a haze over his mind, a deliriously comfortable fog that he’d welcomed eagerly. He didn’t have to think, didn’t have to worry. All the pain and stress couldn’t reach him here. He could see his own heartache as though peering into someone else. He could see her face, every last strand of deep auburn hair, every glimmer of sorrow he’d put in those beautiful eyes. Every kiss he’d trailed along her mahogany skin as he held her in the darkness of his home. Every last terrible mistake was there, every last wonderful thing he’d screwed up.
He could see it all, but he didn’t have to feel it.
The movement lulled and rocked him. His own movement, his own legs. But he couldn’t find the desire to care or understand what this was. It was nice in here. Quiet, peaceful. He didn’t have to think. He could just watch memories play like silent films, watch the love and the tragedies without having to feel them. Watch her expression as he stared into her eyes, her black hair framing her dark face, that look of uncertain adoration staring back at him. Beautifully confused, perfectly nervous.
Leliana.. he heard himself whisper under his breath. He frowned. That wasn’t her name. The sound and the confusion were enough to gently jar him from the stupor, and he realized as everything slowly came into focus that his eyes were open. He blinked, watched the brown of her skin -brown again- blend and become the earth, her upright ears shifted into trees standing tall. The breeze toying with her black hair -black again- was the shadowed draft through the branches of the forest. The forest? Dizzy?
He blinked again, seeing a number of purpled bodies in his eyes like spots of sunlight, seeing Ashley’s too, and Sabrael, and others. Ischia. He’d been in Ischia. There was an invasion. He was waiting... for answers, waiting for the magician to explain what was going on, to command his weapon of blood and bone. He turned his head slowly, studying this place. Not Ischia. The forest. He realized he was standing. Not sleeping. How..? Ashley? Had he teleported him here? Wasn’t he far more useful in Ischia with him?
His head turned more, took in more, and landed on a slender figure as black and dangerous as demons. Not Dizzy. He tried to blink her away too, but unlike Leliana, unlike Diz, her image did not morph and fade into the surroundings. She looked particularly amused with something, staring back at him with a gleam in her eyes. Perhaps not Ashley’s doing, after all.
Hello, he said dimly, testing the reality of this waking dream, his rich and smooth voice contrasting with the sharp edges and chiseled angles of his sunken body and plates of bone. A weapon, he was a weapon. Was she a threat?
As though a powerful painkiller was wearing off, he felt something in his mind recede and all the agony of his transgressions flowed back into his awareness. All the heartache he’d caused, all the heartache he felt, all the death and destruction he left in his wake everywhere he went. And, oh, what timing. As he swallowed that pain down, the physical pain surfaced. His bones rumbled deep in his body, shifted and pressed outward, split his skin with a sharp hitch in his breath. Fresh blood joined the crusted edges around his armor as the plates grew a little more. Not enough to see visibly, but enough to sure as hell feel. So much pain.
Had the numbness been her doing? Had she brought him here somehow through that wonderful fog that shut off all the heartache? And could it shut off the physical attacks on him too? The only evidence of his excruciating suffering was a bead of sweat on his brow as he fought it down, fought to ignore it, forced himself to breathe evenly through it as the magician had taught him. It wouldn't last all that long, but it sure as hell felt like an eternity until it would end.
He stole a glance around them again, then locked back to her eyes again. She’d done something, he hadn’t come here on his own, but what?
Do it again, he challenged evenly, testing her.
Begging her. Stop the pain.
I'm a wanted man, I got blood on my hands Do you understand? I'm a wanted man
05-01-2017, 07:37 PM (This post was last modified: 05-01-2017, 07:38 PM by violence.)
violence
Easy.
He’d opened to her like a flower to the sun, this stranger, and when she took his mind – of course she did, how could she ignore such ripe fruit? – she found it a well-used place, contoured for magicians. And though she is no magician, she is powerful, and she fits into him easier than she had the others.
She trembles and whirs at the possibilities spread before her, something new and beautiful in her filthy hands, a thing to take and use and ruin – she always ruins – and she knows not to miss her chance.
(She recalls, too well, how it had felt to be powerless. The empty way she’d walked, no bones beside her, the subtle ache in her marrow at the integral part of her, gone.)
So she makes the most of her presents, of these fools who come across her – or whom she comes across – and if they open the way this boy does, well –
She slips him from his kingdom, takes him to the forest (she pilots him, her own body trudges behind, mechanical, strange). When they are some semblance of alone she releases him, falls back into her own body – breathes deep at the power there – and watches as he blinks, a babe walking into the sunlight.
“Hello,” she says, and her voice is smooth, and could even be mistaken for kind – like she is some Good Samaritan who stumbled across him.
She expects questions - who are you or what did you do - but his next words surprise even her. Do it again.
She almost shakes her head in disbelief. Easy, so easy.
She grins – wide, shark-like – and walks a bit closer. She moves like silk on the water, liquid, examining him further – a strange boy, bones growing on the outside of his skin. She wonders if they could be controlled she way she does her bone menagerie, or if his armor is still a living thing. This is an experiment she notes for later, filed in one of hundreds of dark corners in her mind.
“Well,” she says, mild, as if considering, “since you asked so nicely.”
She slips back into his mind, that open, gaping thing (like a battlefield wound, innards exposed, terrible and stinking). For a moment there is pain – his pain, raw, unfiltered, savage – and she quiets this, hushes it like a disobedient child. Such hurt, she says, what have you done, boy?
Then -- I could make it all go away.
She’s such a liar. If you’re good for me. If you let me play.
I’d stay the hand of god, but war is on your lips
1. lemme know if you want me to change any of this
2. feel free to play her as making him do if you wanna get to more Pain
"Hello," she said back, watching him as he adjusted to his new surroundings. And the smile that spread after he challenged her -tested her- to do it again, was slow and wide and dangerous. For a moment, he doubted the wisdom of pushing her that way, this stranger with powerful secrets. Then again, he'd never been wise, had never had concern for himself enough to think through his actions.
She glided towards him, smooth and fluid, and he held his place as she studied him. He welcomed that perusal, her eyes taking in all the skin pulled grossly tight over bone as if he hadn't eaten in months with more unnatural bone thrusting out of him. One day, the armor would protect him, but at only five years it had yet to cover the most vital places.
Still, he returned that open appraisal, noting her impossible grace that was so quietly lethal. Like a poisoned dagger you couldn't help but admire as it pierced into you and claimed the life within. She was terrifying in a way he found to be beautiful. Maybe that would be his last conscious thought someday.
"Well," she pulled his attention back to her face, "since you asked so nicely."
He could sense her, so focused as he was, as she slid back into him again, but he stayed open, so open. So curious. There was a perverted sort of amusement to have someone inside him, rather than the other way around, and he smirked at the thought. It was wiped cleanly from his face though as his inner pain came loudly to the front of his mind again. He heard himself cry out, felt it clawing and rending through him with each appearance of a face from his life -didn't matter who, didn't matter which; he had destroyed them all.
Then it gently quieted. Numb, wonderfully numb. He hummed a sigh, sinking into this blissful relief. Such hurt. What have you done, boy?
That was what it would be like without her?
He preferred this painkiller of a witch within him.
A lot, he admitted heavily in his mind, believing she would hear him as he had heard her. He had done much, caused a great deal of damage -most unintentional, even. Turmoil and heartache seemed to follow in his wake wherever he went. He was like a catalyst, a bringer of dark and painful things. A bad omen, maybe.
I could make it all go away, she promised. He believed her, trusted that she could silence the emotional pain and he could stay in this numb where he didn't have to feel it, didn't have to think or make choices. He could just be. It was such a tempting thought, relieving, but at what cost? Did any price really matter, though? He had sold himself to a magician. What was one master for another to him? It was so hard to care when it felt so good here. So empty.
If you're good for me. If you let me play.
He smiled slowly, -or he thought he might have. That sounded good. Harmless and fun. What was a little time away in this world with her where nothing else mattered? Just a while, wasn't it? A while to be free of the pain in him. And fun, she was fun, wasn't she? Maybe.
Hmm, he mused, drawled so low and smooth. He tried to press his mind against her, testing her hold on him, her strength with this strange power she had. I'm often so very bad, though. As if she didn't already know, couldn't already tell. What happens when I'm bad, he whispered into his mind, brushing against her presence again there. Too much curiosity, too much interest. Always testing boundaries with people; he couldn't help it.
What kind of play, he asked next, not caring to remove the suggestion flirting in his tone. He couldn't help it. Always pressing and pushing. How much was too much for this one? How much would she give him? Curiosity only, really. He had Dizzy, didn't want anyone else.
But he couldn't help it.
Come play with me then.
Another quiet challenge, another innuendo.
Another deliberate nudge against her hold on him.
Its alright, you'll be fine baby, I'm in control Take the pain, Take the pleasure. I'm the master of both
