"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 kissed each of his brood goodbye and told them he had to leave for a while. Ophanim doesn’t want them to see him like this, depthless black like the singularity pit of a miserable black hole. He’s been gone for hours, perhaps days at this point but he isn’t so good at keeping track for the time being. His sons and daughters loved to visit him in the meadows or the rivers where they could curl beneath his wings and play but now he is alone. For a flickering moment, he considered returning to his prison in Sylva and scorching their trees but it seemed like a great deal of effort.
He just wants to stand in the river, right now.
He lets his wings droop into the cool waters and watches as a loose feather floats away from him, bleeding back to its original golden color as it bobs along the surface. Anger isn’t something he’s accustomed to and he isn’t sure what to do with this burning inside his chest. It withers into sadness here and there as he reminds himself that everything wrong right now is entirely his fault – Sylva, Starsin, all of it. But he loves his children, doesn’t he? He tries his best to teach them right from wrong and he hugs them close when they’re frightened.
But the rest of life isn’t quite so easy as that. Self-doubt comes creeping in whenever he’s alone and he wonders how anyone could love him at all. Ophie lowers his head to watch his reflection shudder and flicker in the water but the face never quite matches him anymore. His halo and the lines across his face burn bright as ever but he wonders if he should have remained the boy he was born as – simple and content. It’s far too late to turn back time now, though, he tells himself as he scans the river for anything else to focus on besides this pity party.
His long legs carry him easily against the water’s current as it splashes against his dark chest. An occasional fish clumsily bumps into his legs and he smiles weakly as they quickly dart away from him. Ophanim comes to a stop beneath the shade of an old tree overhanging the water, admiring the glimmering scales of the fish resting here beside him. The autumn sun is still warm beyond this patch of shade and he briefly wonders why they don’t seek it out instead. But then, why doesn’t he?
and if you're still breathing, you're the lucky ones ‘cause most of us are heaving through corrupted lungs
From the outside, Adna can only see the happy.
She sees the joy of Ophie and his family together—a beautiful trio of him, Starsin, and their son. Plus the other children that they have adopted into their brood. And she can only feel left out, abandoned, knowing full well that her two beautiful children would never truly be accepted with open arms.
And how could she blame them?
They were her children after all.
She loves her son and daughter—their smiles and laughter and mischievous youth—but she knows in her heart that she has bestowed upon them a curse that they will never outrun and never outmaneuver. No matter how long they live and how good they may be, they will always have the poison in their veins.
If only, if only, she could save them from that.
Today, she leaves them back home. She gives them a smile, as best as she can, and then turns to the river. To a place where she cannot hear her thoughts over the roaring of the waves and the crashing of the water against the branches—that is, until she finally reaches a place where it grows calm.
It is only then that she sees the familiar form and something twists in her throat. He is beautiful as he always is but he is also the man who led the charge against her mother’s home. He rained fire down on her family and was part of the events that led to her father throwing himself in the volcano.
But he is Ophie.
She feels something like gravity tug in her chest and she grows still, her sage eyes dimming.
She considers calling out to him—saying anything at all—but her throat is dry and her tongue thick and the only thing she can manage is to drop her head slightly until the gentle curls of her forelock hide her gaze from him completely. She stares at the dirt at her feet and wishes herself anywhere but here.
adna
we're setting fire to our insides for fun collecting pictures from a flood that wrecked our home
He wishes his other children would come closer when he is alone in Loess. He knows Rupture and Bela are part of his brood and his heart aches to snatch them up in his loving embrace. They’re beautiful and strong, or maybe he’s just biased because he loves them so. Ophanim wants to tell her these things whenever he sees her in the distance but he remains close to the children who already know him. He stays close to Starsin.
His ear swivels back when he hears her approaching but he doesn’t pay much attention at first. The fish idly nibble at the detritus caught in the light feathering around his hooves and he doesn’t want to disturb them. Some take cover in the shelter of his wings and he wonders if he could stay forever like this – a safe haven for them. For once, he could keep something safe instead of breaking it apart. All his well made plans before this only served to tear his life apart, though they seemed perfect at the time. Defend his home, love his wife, and father children like his sire before him. It all looked like the natural order of things.
But then, why didn’t it work out?
He slowly, carefully lifts his head as the ink black fades back to gold and snow white little by little. Ophanim turns his head and watches as Adna slowly lowers her gaze like she might disappear any second. The angel boy feels his brows furrow and he wades his way back to the shore so he can pull himself up onto dry ground, dripping and cold in the autumn chill. Maybe he shouldn’t approach her. Maybe he ought to just go back to Sylva and find some way to amuse himself there until his sentence is carried out.
“Hello, Adna. I’m sorry I haven’t come to see you. I guess I’ve.. really made a mess of things,” he says with a laugh, but the sound comes out all bent and distorted so it sounds more sad than anything joyous. “I’m sorry for.. a lot of things, I think. They all seemed like good choices but all I’ve done is hurt people. I really don’t like hurting anyone, you know.”
And it’s the truth. Even when he was tearing down half of Tephra with his fire, the pit of his stomach was in knots. But he’d still destroyed her mother’s home and given her two children without a father. His bright blue eyes find the ground between them as he slowly turns black once more.
and if you're still breathing, you're the lucky ones ‘cause most of us are heaving through corrupted lungs
In another world, one where Adna continued to grow wild and free, she may have never felt as broken as she did by the sight of his happiness. She would have merely been happy for their moments together, would have appreciated his friendship and been thrilled for his future, and would have moved on. But she was broken instead—shattered and twisted into something she does not recognize—and instead of feeling that familiar pang of joy, she feels the far more familiar burn of something more insidious.
She hears him coming and her side twitches almost involuntarily, all of the feelings she has suppressed for so long simmering just beneath the surface. She knows (she knows, she knows) that he is good; that his heart is gold and pure and open for any who were simply kind enough to reach out and touch it. But she also knows that she does not deserve such things any longer and it drives a stake through her heart.
So although she longs to forgive him and fold into an embrace and tell him that it will be okay, she instead snarls, her lips pulling back to reveal her fangs, her head whipping up to stare at him.
“So you did not like raining fire onto the backs of my mother’s family?”
Her eyes narrow, treacherous poison running beneath the surface of her scaled skin.
“Did you not enjoy hearing the screams? My sister and brother could have been there.”
They weren’t. She knows that. But it is better to throw stones at him than accept the beating herself, than let them sit in her chest. At least, it is better for a moment. Because as soon as the venomous words leave her, she is deflated and angry and everything that had enraged her but a second before floods from her.
Leaving her nothing but a sad, empty girl.
Her face crumples and she looks to the ground, exhaling slowly. “That wasn’t fair.” Her voice is as small as she feels, self-hatred curdling in her veins. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” She closes her serpentine eyes and feels small tremors racing up her spine as her cheeks grow damp. “I don’t know who I am anymore.”
adna
we're setting fire to our insides for fun collecting pictures from a flood that wrecked our home
He listens when she speaks and the hurt is evident across his face but he says nothing to stop her. The angel boy just lets her lash out and he takes every bit of it, keeps her anger for himself. Ophanim was never good at being serious and he never wanted to become strong or powerful. In fact, he never really wanted much of anything except friends to keep him company. He lifts his gaze when she’s finished and the apologies come flowing in, watching with his bright blue eyes as she wilts.
“You’re right to be angry, Adna. My son almost died in Loess and I wasn’t there for him. I was burning down Tephra instead,” he says this time without a laugh to steady himself. He remembers seeing all the fresh scars across his son’s tiny body when he came home. He remembers the look of terror across the small boy’s face when Ophanim was bleeding out onto the ground. But how many others have a story just like his now? Can their wives still look at them the same after what they’ve done? He wonders if they feel like monsters or if he is alone even in this.
He steps forward and presses his lips to Adna’s forehead in forgiveness, maybe for her or maybe for himself. There’s no telling at this point and he’s stopped trying to untangle the mess he’s made of his life. “I don’t really know who I’m meant to be either. I don’t want to keep hurting people, but then how can I keep my children safe?” He turns his body so their shoulders are pressed lightly together and he rests his chin over her neck. The fire in his chest still calls for blood but he doesn’t know what to do with all of it. For now, he just pushes it down and lets it smolder in the pit of his stomach.
“I’m not a clever man, Adna. I don’t know a lot of things, but I’m absolutely certain that you are better than you think,” he says as he watches the river continue to flow lazily before them. He keeps his wings tucked tight to his sides but for a moment he considers hugging her close with them. Things are a mess enough as it is, though.
and if you're still breathing, you're the lucky ones ‘cause most of us are heaving through corrupted lungs
She expects him to lash out again; she expects him to meet her flood of fury with his own. Instead, he just absorbs the blows and she can’t help but wish he hadn’t. This would be so much easier if he sharpened his own weapons against her instead of never lifting his fists. It was so much more difficult to accept what a monster she has become when he becomes such a clear mirror image. When he lets her look at herself.
She deflates, draws inward, swallowing the poison down again and again.
“What have we done,” she whispers when he draws her close and she feels the tears on her cheeks again. She can feel it racing through her—the grief that she has never known how to turn off. So many others around her seem so capable of becoming immune to it but as the years go along, she just fractures more and more. Perhaps she grew up too sheltered. Perhaps she never learned how to truly protect herself.
Maybe she was always made to feel the way that she does.
Forever broken by the world and then remade by it.
“All I know how is to hurt people,” she confesses, pressing it into his palm. “I am so scared that I don’t know how to find my way back to good again,” and then the part that she hides from even herself begins to spill out. “I am—I am so hungry all the time.” She closes her serpentine eyes and shakes in his embrace, “I don’t even know for what, but I would tear the world apart to satiate it.”
Her fangs press against the back of her lips and she shudders.
“You have no idea who I really am.”
She can practically feel the poison on her tongue.
“You have no idea just what I am capable of.”
adna
we're setting fire to our insides for fun collecting pictures from a flood that wrecked our home
He has never been on a first name basis with anger and so he doesn’t feel any semblance of rage ignite within him when she bared her teeth. Ophanim is a perfect little punching bag who smiles with a busted lip and says thank you. The angel boy learned at a young age that the loneliness he and Adna feel is a fracture that will never heal quite right. Like a crooked bone set all wrong, it’s always there to remind them of that familiar ache even when the sun shines brightest on their faces.
He feels the quaking in her skin as all her secrets come tumbling out like rotted apples for him to eat. But he doesn’t step back or sneer in disgust. His embrace just grows a little tighter and he sighs weakly against the tangles of her mane as she speaks of hunger that would consume this planet if it only could. Though they do not share this same curse, he ears a similar burden in that his heart is a bottomless pit that can never know satisfaction. It just waits for more love to be poured hopelessly into it.
“You are not your hunger. You are not the things you’ve done or will do,” he whispers so delicately against her ear. He closes those bright blue eyes and smiles like he hasn’t slept in centuries. “You are Adna, capable of as much good as you are evil.”
The idea of her harming someone or something on purpose is foreign to him and the image can’t form clearly in his mind. Maybe she’s tasted blood and found it to her liking. If she did, would he still call her his friend after learning that violence disgusts him? Ophanim likes to think he would but he doesn’t delve too deeply into it for now.
“I just like to think of you as my friend. I don’t need anything beyond that, really.”
He pulls his head back only to lightly bump her cheek with his nose, leaving it there for a few moments longer as he seems to consider saying more.
