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  • Beqanna

    COTY

    Assailant -- Year 226

    QOTY

    "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


    [private]  I know it goes from bad to worse
    #11

    Relief spreads through her, potent enough to extinguish the glowing markings on her back that had remained. They’ll be back in short order, more than likely given her current company, but for now Mazikeen is just glad to watch the golden pain in the ass get back to his feet. She should step back again, return to where she was before, but she had already shown how easily rattled she was and giving up ground still felt like weakness to her.

    His cough inspires another flicker of concern but she does her best to cover this one up. He’s fine. He was fine the whole time. She repeats this to herself. It is strange hearing him use her nickname and her ears flick backwards in annoyance at that familiarity, as though they’re old friends. But they aren’t, right? She knows she had wanted to be his friend once - but he had never wanted to be hers.

    She huffs out her own humourless laugh at the 'I live to serve' comment. “Oh yes because you’ve always been so amenable. Surprisingly, nothing gentler is coming to mind.” Which, despite her comment earlier about how she was not the one who lied, is a lie. She wants to ask him if he can shapeshift, wants to see if he can take some of the prehistoric shapes that she can. But she’s still rattled by how quickly her concern had risen up and she’s not sure she wants to make such a friendly request. Isn’t sure where the interest in sharing something with him is stemming from.

    Mazikeen is very imaginative when it comes to shapeshifting but that’s where her creativity tends to end, so she is left feeling unsure of what to ask for next. So instead of a trick request - her orange eyes shift down his now-fine neck and she asks “Did that hurt?”

    Because she wants to know if it had hurt when she had torn him apart too, or if that had been just another trick.

    MAZIKEEN
    mazikeen


    @[firion]
    Reply
    #12

    that day even the sun was afraid of you and the weight you carried

    Not even magic makes the sting of death shake off easily. It settles into his bones, a deep ache that he hates feels familiar. It’s a pattern he knows. One that knows him, as well. It plays along the edges of his mind, whispering to him of the time where death was all he knew, and he fights against the way that it wants to sour his mood. The fear and loathing writhing in his belly—reminding him of how powerless he had once been. He wrinkles his nose and shifts, trying to breathe in deep to remind himself that he can.

    She brings him back though—her jabs causing his eyes to flick upward and study her face, one corner of his golden mouth pulling into a smirk. “I have been nothing but pleasant to you,” he quips, rolling one of his spotted shoulders. “I am well-known for being the best of company. Ask around.” He laughs a little. “In fact, my mother is a literal angel, so you know there’s no doubt that I am the same.”

    It’s a bitter joke that tastes like acid on his tongue, but he smiles around it.

    At her next question though, his face grows more somber. It’s not the kind of question that he wants to treat casually, not even in front of her—someone he has always felt the need to stay armored around. So he looks her in the eye, holding her fiery gaze for a second. “Death always hurts, Mazikeen.” There is no coy smile or laughter now. Just raw, honest truth. “Not even magic has been able to take that way.”

    so you saluted every ghost you've ever prayed to and then buried it where bones are buried



    @[Mazikeen]
    Reply
    #13

    Mazikeen begins to see red when Firion smirks back at her, quipping about how he’s been nothing but pleasant and the fiery markings on her back return - burning bright. Her lip curls back in annoyance and distaste at this rewriting of their history, even as she starts to doubt what she believes. Her faith in her ability to know how things have happened has been rocky lately - she’s currently being eaten by doubts that Gale hadn’t meant it when he said he loved her, that the version of their history where he thought her not worth his time was the true one after all.

    No, she could not have possibly misinterpreted her last few handful of meetings with Firion that badly. And she tries to remember now how she had gotten under his skin last time, tries to remember where she can push to needle him so that he can no longer (successfully) do the same to her.

    But whatever remark she might have made is interrupted by him mentioning that his mother is an angel. Her annoyance falls away and her markings extinguish once more. She tilts her head, taking him in - trying to see the similarities. Maybe there are other angels, but Mazikeen has never seen or heard of them - she only knows of two, and one of them is a young colt. Your mom is Ryatah? She asks, incredulous.

    He can’t really be related to Selaphiel, someone she had protected until there was nothing left in her, and he certainly cannot be related to the mare who had given life back to her that same day.

    At his response to her question about death, she winces a little - wishing he had responded with something other than raw honesty. She didn’t know what to do when he spoke to her like that except answer in kind, like it's drawn out of her against her will. “I knew it did for me I just…” She shakes her head, knowing how stupid her hopes that death or pain didn’t affect him were. “I didn’t think there was enough of a soul in you for it to matter.” Which isn’t quite the truth, and she frowns as she says it, but it’s close enough that she does not try to take it back.

    MAZIKEEN
    mazikeen


    @[firion]
    Reply
    #14

    that day even the sun was afraid of you and the weight you carried

    As her markings spark to life again, Firion feels something like relief sweep through him. It is a relief to know that he can still induce that in her—that no matter where the conversation will go, he will always manage to find a way to bring it back to this. It only serves to deepen his smirk, to ease the tension in his belly, and he cocks a back leg, ignoring the ripple of pain that races through him as death holds on.

    At her incredulous face, he laughs—unable to stop himself from reacting. He is tempted to peek inside her mind and figure out the connection. Learn for himself exactly where she had met his mother. But he has a morsel of decency left so he refrains, instead tilting his head to the side and considering her. “I am indeed the son of Ryatah and Atrox.” The formality of it makes him grin, no less for thinking of his parents—the duo tucked away in Hyaline, as far as he knew. “I take it that you know of them.”

    But his amusement faces into a frown as she considers her.

    “You died?” There’s something that sparks in him—something like rage, or fear, or both—that he cannot quite dampen. His shadows explode around him in barely controlled blast, a wash of cold air that he pulls back with considerable effort. He grits his teeth as his anger licks up the back of his throat, brightening his already crushed gold eyes. “What happened?” Not that he should care, he thinks.

    Her life was never part of his own.

    He had been careful to avoid just that.

    But the idea of her lying somewhere, the life ripped away from her, turns his stomach. He tastes acid as it fills his mouth. It’s enough to set him on edge that he doesn’t laugh at her last jab or rise to it.

    Instead he just answers simply:

    “I lost most of my soul a long time ago. It, unfortunately, never stopped mattering.”

    so you saluted every ghost you've ever prayed to and then buried it where bones are buried



    @[Mazikeen]
    Reply
    #15

    Is that a real laugh? Her ears twitch a little at the sound. Atrox and Ryatah. She didn’t know much about the panther, except that she had often been tempted to (playfully) harass him when she was younger and the pack had first moved into Hyaline. And lately, her method of leading the kingdom so far had been making a point not to interfere with the lives of anyone else living there, she was there guarding the borders and she’d be there if they needed her and that was the extent of it. So she knows of his parents more than she knows them at all, despite the fact that the first time she spoke to Ryatah the angel had been stained with Mazikeen's blood.

    Mazikeen doesn’t step back when the shadows explode around him, though her eyes do widen - in surprise, and in confusion. Was that anger, much like the fiery markings that appear on her back? She wonders whether he’s pissed that he hadn’t been the one to do it, though if the glimpses of his tricks are any indication, he certainly could if he wanted to. She doesn’t like not knowing what’s behind the brightness of his eyes. Doesn’t like how a bit of her heart aches at the response to her jab about his soul.

    So instead of thinking about either of those things she answers his question honestly.

    “Twice now.” She states simply. “The first was not long after we first met, actually. When I was young and stupid. In the forest, something… something found me. I still don’t know what it was, but it was bigger and stronger than any of the shapes I could take. Guess I didn’t taste too great though, there was enough of me to patch back together.” There’s no humour in the smile that shines in her orange eyes when she says this. “The second was during the eclipse. One of those creatures got too close to a colt… your brother, I guess. I didn’t have my shifting so things got a little messy.” She angles her body and gestures with her head to the mess of scars on her belly, one of the places where she had been torn open. “I killed it, but defense isn’t really my strong suit so it got me too.” This inspires a little laugh though again, there is no humour in it. Because it’s true. She never guards herself as much as she should - in anything.

    That’s probably why she’s actually standing here, talking to Firion instead of guarding herself from whatever barbs are coming her way for sharing these pieces of her. Her deaths.

    “Your mom ended up saving me.” This time her smile is more genuine, gratitude for the healing she had received - for the new, potential friend she had found in Selaphiel because of it. “That’s how I know her. I live in Hyaline too.”

    MAZIKEEN
    mazikeen


    @[firion]
    Reply
    #16

    that day even the sun was afraid of you and the weight you carried

    He shouldn’t be surprised that Mazikeen had died before—that she had died multiple times. She seems the type to try it. The type who doesn’t protect herself when she should. Who runs toward the thing that she should be running away from. It’s why they’ve crossed paths so many times now, he thinks, with no small amount of bitterness. He had done his best to drive her away from the very first interaction when it could have evolved into something more—when she had extended her hand and he had bitten it instead.

    But she hadn’t stayed away and he guesses that he hadn’t either.

    Maybe he’s as inclined to death as her.

    But he keeps all these thoughts hidden away, tucked away from even himself. He shoves them down in the darkest corners of his soul to never examine—instead looking at her with his sharp golden eyes, his fury barely reined in but starting to come back under his control once more. He focuses on what she says about his mother, about his brother, and he white-knuckle holds onto that as a focal point.

    “My mom saves a lot of people,” he says with a tight-lipped smile. “Even when she doesn’t realize that she’s doing it.” It was both his most and least favorite thing about her. Her heart, being his most. The way that she never saw just how angelic she was—even when she was mopping up the mess left behind by everyone in her life—being his least. He’s not certain he’d ever stop trying to show it to her.

    But instead he gives a shrug, a casual motion that does nothing to ease the tension on his stance, in the shadows that writhe around his legs, licking up like dark flames. “I grew up in Hyaline,” he says, his heart racing but the pulse beginning to slow down. “Back when my dad pretend he ran it.” It was never a kingdom for Atrox, he knows. More a piece of land he stuck a flag in and called home. So Firion had never minded when Atrox had handed it over to the shifters—he was long gone by then anyway.

    “Thank you, by the way,” he manages finally. Nearly choking on the words, his gold eyes intense.

    “For saving my brother.”

    He frowns, clearing his throat.

    “For dying to do it.”

    so you saluted every ghost you've ever prayed to and then buried it where bones are buried



    @[Mazikeen]
    Reply
    #17

    Mazikeen isn’t self-aware enough to know how little her own life means to her, that much of what drives her to be more is the belief that maybe she can mean something if she’s strong enough, fast enough, brave enough to save someone else. Ryatah healing her should have been a life for a life but it wasn’t - to Mazikeen, even without consciously thinking about it, Selaphiel’s life meant more and so she felt indebted to the angel enough that interaction had helped inspire her to change the rules of Hyaline. So Ryatah would not have to send away any other children.

    It is good, though, to hear that the angel saves many. That she needn’t have felt special at all for the attention she received. And though Mazikeen does not plan on ever having children, she can’t help but wonder if they’ll speak of her with the same fondness Firion uses for his mom or if it will be just hazy, distant affection like she has with Agetta. How strange to think that she should be so lucky to have someone speak of her like he is of his mom.

    His thanks comes as a surprise, and combined with the intensity of his stare she almost believes he means it. She is quiet for a moment - unsure of how to respond, uneasy with the gratitude for something she had done on instinct. It hadn't even been a choice. She had just acted. She doesn’t know what to say in reply so the truth comes out. “I’d die for anyone, Firion. If it meant they lived.” A weakness of hers, undoubtedly. A character flaw. Especially given the next two words she says and how she actually means them. “Even you.”

    This is an uncomfortable truth to linger on, though, even with his new tricks - so Mazikeen continues, glancing away and up to the sky for a moment. “My theory is that since I like shifting into cats so much I have nine lives.” She’s had no such theory, of course, before this very moment - she’s just speaking whatever comes into her head right now. Mazikeen doesn’t know how to handle this bizarre version of peace, it’s too unlike everything she’s come to expect from her interactions with Firion. Given his previous disinterest in a friendship with her, she can’t imagine he would mind the return to something more familiar. To sharper words.

    So the smile she offers him when her orange eyes return to his face is alive with dark amusement. “Eight deaths then, until the final one. One of them has your name on it, I’m sure. It's only fair.”

    MAZIKEEN
    mazikeen


    @[firion]
    Reply
    #18

    that day even the sun was afraid of you and the weight you carried

    He shouldn’t be surprised that she brushes off his thank you, but he still feels the twinge of something in his breast that stings. He shifts in place as though he could dislocate the discomfort, but all he manages to do is feel it more acutely and he laughs, the sound a little bitter. “Then I retract my thank you,” his smile is sharp in the corners but dull in comparison to his eyes that sweep over her. “I didn’t realize that I was speaking to someone so versed in the act of dying that it was commonplace.” He swallows and ignores what she had said about saving him—he was beyond saving anyhow. Her death wouldn’t change that.

    Instead he lets her move forward, musing thoughtfully, and he cannot help but wonder if this would be more commonplace had he not driven her away during those first interactions. Would they share their thoughts with each other like this? Would they be able to simply interact casually? Or would they always have been destined to be this guarded with one another? Hiding away their true thoughts.

    He watches as she glances up, taking the opportunity to study her unabashedly. She had grown since the last time he had seen her—the last time she took tooth and nail to his throat, deservedly so. She was stronger now, more mature. There were more edges to her, more scars, and a weight over her shoulders that he wasn’t sure he was imagining. He was surprise that she did not simply bend beneath it.

    At her pointed statement, he laughs again, this time more genuine. He shakes his head and, for a moment, he looks like the boy he might have been, was almost, still was. The boy who would have laughed and raced Hyaline mountains with her instead of provoking her into fight or flight mode at every turn.

    “Don’t tempt me to collect, Mazikeen,” a grin as the shadows curl like living things at his feet.

    "I am as good at that as my mother is at saving."

    This said with a near sadness he doesn't bother to hide.

    so you saluted every ghost you've ever prayed to and then buried it where bones are buried



    @[Mazikeen]
    Reply
    #19

    It is difficult to say whether Mazikeen likes it when he retracts his thank you, but the little barb there is familiar and she appreciates that. She rolls her eyes because that is the reaction she’d make if they weren’t standing on strange new ground as the feeling of discomfort grows, like maybe she should have just accepted his thanks. She doesn’t know what to do with any level of kindness from him, and she is glad that he does not say anything about those two little words - even you.

    Something softens in that dark amusement in her eyes when he laughs, and for a moment it’s almost as if they’re friends. It doesn’t last long, of course, when he speaks - when she picks up on the tone with which he admits to being good at killing. It is not the bragging, haughty tone she would like for it to be.

    And if they were friends, she’d let herself move forward. She’d act on the concern that rises up at the sadness in his voice and try to offer some comfort. She’d ask him about it, tell him that he could tell her anything. She’d joke that her opinion of him was already low, what did it matter if he told her about whatever horrible things are going through his mind right now.

    But they aren’t friends, are they? The instincts are still there but Mazikeen doesn’t act on them. Doesn't give him the chance to recoil from her.

    So even though understanding and concern flash across her expression, when she speaks it’s just more distraction for them both - just taking the words he said at face value without any of the emotion behind them. “I have a promise to keep first but after that...” Her grin falters for a moment, thinking of Gale and her promise. And she is choked by that uncertainty about whether he will return, whether he’ll retract his love the way Firion just retracted his thanks and she'll be tipped back into where she had been all through the eclipse. The thoughts linger but she does her best to ignore them, telling herself if that’s what is waiting for her back home there’s nothing she can do about it right now. As if it was just that easy.

    Still, a thought comes to her in the spirit of distraction and her head tilts a little to the side as that grin returns, something as dark as the shadows that had been swirling around his hooves. “How would you do it, do you think?” Would he snap her neck like he just did with his own or would he claw her apart piece by piece the way she had tried to do to him?

    MAZIKEEN
    mazikeen


    @[firion]
    Reply




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