[private] Straia;

[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

Where did they come from? Their scents are overpowering, something new and yet old. Their voices, their eyes, their postures, speak of historic tales. One by one, they arrive much like the morning fog rolling in. From afar, he watches as they materialize and come to fruition, attracting others like moths to a flame.

The temptation rises in his throat, boils through his blood, but he stands in silent wait. His eyes flash with brooding curiosity until one amongst the crowd grabs his attention by the throat.

She is a figment of the past, he assumes, by the weighted stare that roves across the meadow and by the raven that so comfortably perches on her shoulder. Beqanna is in her blood, the familiarity bleeding into her confidence, but the world has shifted more than once and it’s not what she can remember. A deliberate, scrutiny gropes for any and all information around her. Castile, fascinated by her hooded eyes, steps forward and shatters his calculated hesitation. The shackles that rooted him break away and he looms like a storm, arrogant in his ability to live and destroy, much like her.

When he moves, a kindle crackles in his gut. He takes pause, recognizing the warmth that blooms throughout his body. It roils, flickers, coming to life. An instinctual beckon for it claws at his thoughts, but there is not enough of the flame to obey him or to sustain. Another step closer to the woman and there is a faint appearance of scales on his right foreleg, but it vanishes in a quick blink of his awestruck eyes. It’s returning, slowly, but not in full power.

A coy grin hooks and pulls the corners of his mouth while he releases the loose grip on the monster awakening. Is it her that spurs it back to life, or is his punishment edging towards its conclusion? Questions arise but go unanswered as he swallows his enthrallment and consumes the last bit of distance with large, confident strides. His mismatched eyes have already drunken her in, observed every curve of her body and noted the strength underlying her deceitfully subdued arrival. ”Have they started kissing your feet yet?” Immediately, his gaze flashes toward where she had previously been bombarded by gawking nomads, but then he looks at her again, leveling his steely stare on her own. ”I’m curious if you’re deserving of it though,” a teasing smirk arises from the stoic shadows of his face, somehow drawn to her and the unspoken tales mirrored in her eyes.

With mounting curiosity, he cannot help to already ask, ”Who are you?” as the kindle flickers again in his gut.

castile

@[Straia]

[Straia]

sometimes we want what we want --
    -- even if we know it’s going to kill us.

A figment of the past. How true and how sad, lost to the sands of time. Her name has been lost to history, swept under the rug with the loss of the Chamber. It was never her name that mattered though, it was the Chamber’s. She’d created a land that was feared and hated, a land who’s name was said in whispered tones so as not to be overheard. Like calling upon a spirit, the Chamber knew. Really, her ravens knew, a million eyes scattered around Beqanna, but who noticed a raven sitting quietly in the trees? They were perfect little spies, perfect little weapons.

Life without the Chamber would never quite be the same, but there would be another land that sought what she knew how to provide. There was always someone who sought infamy, who craved chaos for the sake of chaos, who craved power through fear, who wanted to know that their name brought a hesitation to the lips of those who spoke it. They would remember her name again, and perhaps, she would lift others up with her.

They find her slowly. She made an entrance, but unlike the one who’d already called to them, Straia was bidding her time. There were duties that came with the power Beqanna had given her, she knew, but that didn’t need to be yet. First, she needed to relearn this land. It was not the she had paid no mind to the things happening in Beqanna, but she’d paid very little. It wasn’t important, wasn’t worth her time then, but now. Well, now is entirely different.

The next to find her is the sort that catches her attention. Embers burn in his chest, not quite a fire, but the kind of ashes that will catch with only a breeze. His words make her grin, that Cheshire grin that’s she’d had since she was a child. It has grown colder, more calculating, and less mischievous than it once was, but it still hers. That twist of the lips, one corner slightly more than the other, something knowing and unreadable. “No. Are you here to remedy that problem?” she asks, her voice amused.

He is clearly not the sort to kiss her feet, and in truth, those are not the sort that she would ever respect. But still, he started, and she can hardly resist. The next part seems more like what she might expect from him, from the way he carries himself, from the way he speaks. He reminds her so much of herself in many ways. “I am curious of the same about you.” For a moment, she debating showing off her newfound power, but all the magic that Straia has commanded she has never been showy with it. She wields it without hesitation, but she rarely shows off. Better to keep her cards close and play them when they are most advantageous.

His final question hits like a knife, twisted in her gut. Not that she is surprised, and it doesn’t show on her face, but oh how strange to not be known by, at the very least, the raven’s already nearby. The one of her should seems like such a giveaway, but then again, so very much time has passed. “Straia. And you?” 

-- straia

the raven queen

@[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

”Sorry to disappoint, but I don’t have a foot fetish,” a wry grin and airy chuckle float from him like the acrid smoke he once exhaled. The humor twists around him, a cloud suspended in the space between them as their eyes meet and lock. He holds her there, a fire crackling in his gaze because he can nearly sense the same in her. There’s a reason that her mere presence attracts so many while others are obscured in the crowd. Castile searches for it now, reads the soft lines of her face. She is a shepherd, they her mindless lambs – or perhaps they will soon become her slaves. It’s only a matter of time until she reveals to them all what – or whom – she truly is, what greatness lies beneath the surface of her calm demeanor.

And he wants to know, but not like them, not like the brainless fools groveling at her feet.

It’s tempting to edge closer, to touch her and be the first to taste her skin on his lips, but he diligently refrains and remains poised confidently in front of her.

And what kind of first impression would that be?

A nonchalant sigh passes through him. ”Everyone wants to be on the monster’s good side,” he admits it as though he has a hundred times before. A contemplative haze crosses his face when he glances toward the distant horizon, counting back on his own experiences. They are wise not to make an enemy of him, and perhaps it’s equally as wise to pursue her own friendship, or respect at the very least. ”Straia,” he echoes her name, placing it alongside his ambitions and grand schemes as though she naturally belongs in his life, like she was placed back in Beqanna solely for him. ”Castile,” only his name, not a title, not a land. Like her, he doesn’t flaunt what he is or what he is capable of. They have time for that, so much of it, and he knows this to be true.

Their lives are already beginning to weave together.

castile

@[Straia]

[Straia]

sometimes we want what we want --
    -- even if we know it’s going to kill us.

“What a shame,” she says, though it is clearly not a shame. Those that grovel aren’t the kind worth her time. She wants a fight, wants a challenge, wants an equal. Weed had been an equal, Warship had been an equal. Both of them had never groveled at her feet. Weed walked away, left her wanting time and time again, though of course she had always chosen the Chamber over him. Not that this new stallion lived in the realm of space Weed had occupied for Straia, but perhaps something similar to Warship. Her general; stoic, unwilling to shy away from a battle.

The simmering ember of a stallion before her didn’t seem like the type to shy away from anything either. No, he seemed to burn in the same way she did, seemed to yearn toward some unseen future. Did he know that his name had been on the lips of the group that had found her first? That they said his name with the same trepidation as they once said hers?

For a moment, worlds burn in her mind.

If he had tasted her skin, she might have even let him. Maybe. She can never be sure even of her own actions sometimes, but he might be worthy.

“And in this case, who is the monster?” she asks, the question rhetorical. The answer is obvious, for they are both monsters, both predators circling one another deciding if they ally or they kill. “I am curious though, what is it about us that seems so very different than the other dead swarming Beqanna?” Us because she is not the only one. There are others, she can feel them, feel their connection to the land. She has no idea who they are, only that they move as living things do.

The mares that had approached had been pleasant enough. The stallion had been convinced that she could tell him what was going on in Beqanna. In truth, she couldn’t tell him everything. Some things, yes, many more hunches certainly, but all the details were lost even to her right now. Beqanna revealed things in her time. Besides, even if Straia did know all the details he’d picked the wrong mare to come barking at, huffing and puffing like an out of breath wolf. She was hardly likely to tell him anything unless it suited her, and it didn’t suit her.

This one though, she may divulge a few secrets. He says his name, and grin grows just a bit wider. “Ah, I have heard your name. What have you done to get them in such a tizzy?” It is a compliment that she’s only been alive for a few hours and already his infamy has made its way to her.

-- straia

the raven queen

@[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

They both know who the monster is. Who the monsters are.

The knowledge ripples through him, beginning small until it swallows him. Somehow, he recognizes the sense of power that she possesses and realizes how much greater she is. Even as she swallows down her capabilities and maintains a steadfast appearance, something pulses across Castile’s skin like a magnet. It holds his attention and stabs another bot of curiosity into his loins.

And he knows she is doing the same.

Their gaze weaves together, intricate and meticulous, as they drink in and memorize every curve and every muscle. He cannot help to wonder if the fire stirring in his gut is reaching for her, provoking her. Can she sense it? Can she sense that he, too, is not all that he seems?

Wryly, he finally answers her in a cool tone. ”I think you already know, Straia,” that they are the monsters in this wild world, and that is what draws them together the second Death’s Gates crash and fall. As the words tumble freely past his lips, Castile already considers what is next and how best to describe this odd sense of precarious lust. Why is she so different among the returning faces? It’s a fair question, one in which he mulls over inquisitively before inching a step closer. His warm breath – it’s beginning to feel like smoke again – reaches toward her in crawling tendrils. ”Children of chaos always seemingly find each other,” they thrive on upheavals and havoc. Their hearts flutter to hear shouts of anguish and to watch their enemies burn. Even as Castile desperately clutches to his self-control, he realizes how he is slipping. The whitening of knuckles can last only so long until there is only one thing remaining:

To let go.

Their rumors and gossip fill his head until his thoughts are swimming, drowning. For the past few years, he has led Loess in an uneventful but flourishing life. It has been quiet, eerily so, and he has been anticipating a shift or a war. What he didn’t expect were his friends and comrades to turn against him. They speak of him as a monster instead of considering the kindness he has offered them. They threaten him, spread lies like wildfire, and still, he has done nothing to retaliate. Little do they know how thin his patience wears. Perhaps, that is why a sly grin stretches across his lips and a mischievous gleam catches his eyes. It comes as no surprise that his name coats the tongues of his peers. Inclining his head like an inquisitive bird, he asks, ”I made them fear me.” Not all of them cower at his feet or at his name, but they refuse to turn their back on him. They keep their eyes trained on the dragon king, wanting to rip him down and destroy his ambitions that they have fabricated. ”I have half a mind to give them what they want. They’ve obviously forgotten how charitable I can be,” a low growl twists into his husky voice that elicits a broader grin as magic seeps bit by bit back into his pores. ”They say I am a monster, a conqueror, a warmonger – and that’s while I’ve been sitting patiently in the back with Loess quietly in the palm of my hand. Can you imagine…” he trails off, assuming Straia already knows, for she, too, is a child of chaos.

Can you imagine the destruction if I actually tried, he thinks but doesn’t say.

castile

@[Straia]

[Straia]

sometimes we want what we want --
    -- even if we know it’s going to kill us.

She shouldn’t be surprised to know that magic calls to others, that it emanates across space and time and doesn’t simply beckon, but commands attention. It has always commanded hers, after all, called to her even when no magic flowed through her veins. It was not that she needed magic to be powerful – they were two separate things so easily confused, magic and power, want and need – but that she wanted it. Want and need so often feel like the same thing. Straia had been Straia, with the same values and the same goals, long before the Chamber had given her her particular brand of magic. She would still be herself, would still be a fearsome thing, without it. But her magic makes her memorable, turns her into something that commands rather than merely beckons.

Children of chaos always seem to find each other, he says, closer to her now. She takes a step, the distance between them closing in illicit inches, tantalizing breaths, but she is certain to leave just that hint of space between them. Everything is better when it’s denied just slightly. “We only need a match,” she says, skipping some of the details in between. It seems unnecessary to ask if they were going to cause chaos together. They were either going to cause to together or on opposite sides, but the point wasn’t the sides at all, it was simply the chaos.

The embers are already there, she knows. Before, she’d had to create the embers. Before, she was the one who built fear from ashes, who became the subject of rumors that weren’t true but led to brilliant ideas. Once, Straia had not been a murderer, but they all saw her as one and when the time came, she found it shockingly easy. To stop a heart, which should be no small thing, takes only a thought, a breath, and it is done.

She has never looked back at the bodies left in her wake.

Her lips curl into that Cheshire grin as he admits that he made them fear him. He is to Beqanna what she once used to be. Then she’d had a land, she’d had a sound. Now she was a loose cannon, her heart not tied to a place; she had become chaos unrestrained, made into the sort of goddess one often finds trapped in a box. How kind of Rhy, then, to open the box.

Can you imagine…

Of course she can. She knows what comes of becoming what they seek. War, chaos, something beautiful and burned and broken. Fear. Oh, fear is such a powerful thing. Love too. Put them together and you have something unstoppable. It’s possible to be like them but to love still, to care fiercely for the things that matter. Love is what drives them. Love doesn’t have to be a peaceable thing. Love isn’t a peaceable thing, not really. “Oh, I know,” she is half a breath closer now, speaking into his ear. “They will never see you as anything else, so you might as well become what they fear.” A pause, and then, “I can help.”

One match. That’s all it takes.

-- straia

the raven queen

@[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

A match; only a match. That’s all it would take to set the world aflame.

It sounds so easy when the comment slips like nectar from her lips; tantalizingly sweet and tempting. He would inch closer, to test the idea of it, but Straia is already inching toward him. Their eyes lock amid the mischievous glittering and he holds it for a long moment as she’s pulled into her memories. Castile sinfully lusts for her knowledge, for her wielded power, and for the stories that swim in the hooded darkness of her eyes.

There’s blood on her hands, he wants to accuse, but the worse are knots that he swallows back down. They both have seen the life fade from their victim’s eyes, seen the bodies break underneath them and the hearts stop. For months, Castile hated himself, but the truth of it slowly sunk to the back of his mind like a capsized ship. The memory remains, lingering at the bottom of his mind’s dark depths, but never revisited. As the years creep past, it continues disintegrating until the corresponding emotions fade into nothingness. Observing Straia, he assumes that decades have long since passed and the bodies in her wake are faceless, nearly forgotten. Once, she was something,, someone.

He can see it in the steeliness of her observance that she craves that same reputation, the one that he is creeping after. Prowess and recognition are vain wants, but they are both sinners.

She understands him and feeds him in a way that Karaugh nearly had when he was a juvenile. They want to help create disruption, and Castile is the willing participant. A slow blink and she is closer, her breath fanning across his cheek as she whispers decadently into his ear, laying down the trap for his arrogance to ensnare. ”You’re right,” he murmurs back in quiet realization, her barbed words a solid confirmation of his thoughts. They see him volatile and nothing more; they’ve dismissed the kind laughter they’ve shared, the loyalty, and the amiable warmth. He has done nothing to them and still they see him a monster.

You might as well become what they fear.

The words are weighted, and they burrow into his mind for a long while as he imagines succumbing to it all, falling into the category they see him in – to truly be the destruction they perceive. Castile glances down. He breathes slowly, contemplatively, before meeting her eyes again as she offers her help. Children of chaos he had said. We only need a match, she responded.

Nodding his head, he seizes the rare opportunity of greatness and immortality. ”Yes,” and then, because somehow he can picture her eons ago in her glory he adds, ”Show me. Make them regret crossing me…”

castile

@[Straia]

[Straia]

sometimes we want what we want --
    -- even if we know it’s going to kill us.

Just like that, it begins. Embers become a spark.

She steps back, leaving nothing but the scent of her and the warmth of her breath where she had been. Her amber eyes glitter, mischievous and malicious and wild. There is a fire in them, a power that burns, fed by barely contained magic. It brims at her edges, the power of Beqanna overflowing her veins. The heart of the world beats steadily beneath her, unchanging despite the plans that happen just above its surface. Again, she wonders why she, of all dead, had been given such power. Why choose chaos and destruction? Surely Beqanna could have chosen someone like Rhy instead, someone with kindness in her veins.

Yet Straia had left Rhy crumpled on the beach, tossed aside not far from the body of the nameless stallion who’s heart she’d stopped. There was blood on her hands, certainly. Some caused by her directly, most caused by her indirectly. Though did it matter if it was direct or indirect? At the end of the day, she was the catalyst. She was the thing they feared the most.

Was. Oh the brutality of past tense. Yet the possibility of present tense stands before her. Her role has shifted, changed as she is changed. The Chamber is gone and with it, some part of herself. Yet she was so much more now, so much more capable of inciting flame in more than one place. It was strange to be so free, but the possibilities spread out before her, glittering like gems.

“There is a cost,” she warns, for there is a cost to all things. There is a cost to the magic that flows in her veins now. There was a cost for the reputation she built and the world she once destroyed. She had paid it willingly, will pay what she owes Beqanna willingly as well. “You will take everything you want. We will build you an empire and we will tear down your enemies.” We, because she could help him. We, because she no longer needed to be the center but simply the match to start the fire.

“In return, be prepared to have everything taken from you. Will you pay such a price?” She had given her crown for the war she started, and in some way, her life. Her goal had never been the crown though, it had been to build the Chamber back to a truly ‘evil’ kingdom, as such distinctions existed then. Her goal had been to create fear at the name of the Chamber, not her own. She had succeeded, and the price felt like nothing to succeed.

The question though, was such a price worth it to Castile?

-- straia

the raven queen

@[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

It would be so easy to acquiesce and to shackle his wrists to her, all for the power to bring down his enemies. Just sign his life away, it seems, and so much more could become his. The temptation is delectably sweet, and his eyes gleam underneath the unruly state of his forelock. They – for it would be a partnership – could accomplish so much and he could force regret into the throats of those whom have betrayed him. So loyal has Castile been. So kind, so grateful, so willing. Friendships that he forged years ago, ones that he thought to be as sturdy as his iron will, have disintegrated in the blink of an eye. They’ve turned on him during Loess’ peaceful lull, and for what reason? Castile scours the options, but he finds none except Lepis. A greater more populated land, she described Taiga. Should it not take the helm as kingdom when the opposition is stagnant, poorly populated, and weak? He supported – still supports – his niece’s argument, and that, it seems, was the nail in his grave: his familial loyalty.

The rope-like muscles along his body contract and twist, prepared for something more in the heat of this mounting opportunity. His tongue slips across his lips thoughtfully, but he pauses in his musing to hear her simple statement.

There is a cost.

Of course there is. He could not expect anything less, and yet the admission still takes away his breath. Quickly, his eyes flash to meet hers, to search for a hidden purpose behind the windows to her soul. But she is stoic, calculative. Like a starving dog, he latches onto the meat of her proposition – empire, tear down your enemies – but wavers when she mentions how with gain, there is also loss.

Drawing in a breath, he weighs the options although they both seem to know which path of mayhem he will take. A small plume of black smoke rises from the flare of his nostrils, but his mind reels too feverishly for him to take notice. When he does finally speak, it’s slightly softer. ”My family,” he begins as his weight shifts to consider the possible outcomes, ”I want only for my family to remain safe. Can you at least promise me that?” His children, Sochi, Lepis, his parents and siblings. He wants all of them shielded from the looming chaos, but the hesitance rises in his throat. What if that is too much to ask for? Beating against his chest, Castile’s heart turns over its longing desires and hopes. It gives him pause when he was so close to diving into the offer without even a second thought.

He still wants it, nonetheless, but he remembers – more so with her reminder – that his decision will have a greater impact than only on himself.

An expansion of his lungs gives his whirling thoughts some air, subduing (only slight) the hunger roiling in his gut. ”You’ve tempted me, Straia,” but she already knows this by his actions, ”but what else is expected of me?” Will she take more from him than he can fathom – his soul, his identity, his crown? ”We’re equals,” he reaffirms, intent on maintaining the image they’ve already concocted with each other, ”I will not grovel or kiss your feet.” His voice rumbles with the low growl of a hidden creature inside him as it begins rising again to his needs and wants.

castile

@[Straia]

[Straia]

She knows his heart better than he might think, though not because of the magic that courses through her veins, but simply because she was him once. Straia cared for her family as well, though still she let them be used as pawns knowing she could save them, or knowing they were strong enough to save themselves. Weaver comes to mind above all her other children, an image of her black and white daughter dangling miles above the earth in the talons of a golden dragon forefront in her mind. She hadn’t worried, knowing that her daughter could not die and simply gifting her daughter large black raven wings in that moment, but still, the image haunts her.

How casual she had been, or at least looked, as her daughter was used to threaten and scare her (or to try, anyway). The “good” are no better than anyone else. The only difference between good and evil is that some admit to it and others do not.

“Your family and children are not safe now. I will not make a fool's promise, and I don’t think you are a fool anyway. I can only offer to protect them as best I can.” Her magic had been powerful before and it was more so now, but still, she could not guarantee the safety of anyone at any time. Not in Beqanna, and certainly not in the middle of a war.

Because that it was it took, sometimes. War.

“Do they want your protection though, or do they want to be at your side?” Because her family had always been at her side. They were strong enough they did not need her protection, even when she offered it. It would have been an insult not to trust them to make their own choices, to allow them to stand by her side and lead the charge with her.

His concerns change, morphing into a different face worn by fear and she laughs lightly. “I have no interest in someone who grovels at my feet,” she says. She has been a Queen once, she has been the name they feared once. Now, she finds herself content to simply fan the flames, to create chaos for the sake of others rather than herself. “You only need to be willing to do what it takes.” In the end, it is that simple. It is a willingness to have your name be spat into the dirt, to be raked through the mud, to plague the daydreams and nightmares of others. It is an impossibly hard skin, a stick straight backbone, and unwillingness to be cowed by rumors or pain.

“I have lived and died once already. The world has been mine. This time, we will make it yours.”

@[Castile] please enjoy this nekkid phone post.