"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
09-20-2015, 09:25 PM (This post was last modified: 09-25-2015, 06:57 PM by Carys.)
I'm looking for the sky to save me,
looking for a sign of life
She is so, so tired.
For so long she’s been holding it together for Hael, trying to keep herself from crumbling for her dear sister-niece.
But she just can’t keep doing it.
She’s had enough.
She’d slipped away from Hael in the dead of night, away from their little home on the outskirts of Beqanna. She’d felt bad for doing it that way, for not saying goodbye in person, but Hael would have never let her come in a million years if she’d told her what she was doing.
It’s for the best though. She’ll be out of her misery, she won’t drag down Hael’s life any longer. Hael can move on, and move forward.
She stares out at the ocean, dark eyes dull and glazed over. Who would have thought it had come to this? She’d had such a promising start to life - a princess, with two loving parents, and whole bundle of sisters (and a brother!) that had loved her too.
Then her mother had been murdered. And it had all gone down from there.
She and Hael had moved to the Deserts and had eked out a simple little existence, finally learning to move on from their grief. She’d met Mikhael, fallen in love, gotten pregnant, had a beautiful little girl … then Mikhael’s devil mother had appeared. She can remember it as if it was yesterday, every detail set in stark relief in her memory. There’d been so much blood …
They’d fled the Deserts then, and had lived on the outskirts of the meadow. And then, one day, while Hael had gone off to do something, Cal had found her. The vile bastard.
She never had asked Hael what had happened to the boy she’d given birth to 11 months later. She thinks that Hael had found him a home. She hopes so, anyhow.
Poor Hael had tried her best to pick up Carys’ broken pieces, but there’s only so much you can do with someone so utterly shattered. At least Hael won’t have to deal with her any more.
She starts to walk forward into the water, deeper and deeper, her colourful wings tucked close into her sides. Soon, it will be all over.
Soon she’ll be at peace.
carys
html by maat
@[Zeik]
Note: I have permission from Cassi to post her here without killing her.
Who is he? Zeik can’t answer his own question. It sits in his mind, troubling him as he drifts along the currents. The season is mid-change and the cooler weather feels good against his feathers. But he can’t enjoy that sensation, or the blissful joy of flight because he’s too busy thinking about the question makai had roused. Who is he? Until now he’d just been Zeik: the falcon-shifting blue roan stallion who roamed Beqanna. But now? Now he was Zeik: the horse without a purpose. That had never seemed to bother him before now. All he’d ever had to worry about was where his food was coming from and where he was sleeping. But that was the other side of him - the predatory side. Now there was another side that begged for attention, the side that Makai had awoken in him.
Would anything in his life ever affect him the way that Makai’s downfalls had? It irked Zeik to think that he was missing out on something so, provencial. His thoughts, though, are interrupted when he catches a rather violent lift of air, causing him to peer down at the source. The sea, responsible for the shift in flight, stretches out below him. The beach itself is littered with the decaying, a dismal sight. But it’s not the dead that cause Zeik to circle and drop, it’s the living.
Far below him is a single form, wading into the frothy waters in some slow, peaceful lament. His curiosity piques and he descends, screeching out to the lone creature. A downward spiral brings him to the beach and he lands, sinking his talons into the sand before shifting into his natural form. There’s no time to adjust so he struggles to his feet and trots quickly to the edge of the shore, stopping only when the water laps against his hooves.
“Wait!” He calls out, neck stretching over the water as if he could grab her and haul her back to shore. “Why?” He asks, more subtle in his approach. What causes her to welcome death?
Everything we are and used to be is buried and gone
09-23-2015, 12:42 AM (This post was last modified: 09-23-2015, 12:43 AM by Carys.)
I'm looking for the sky to save me,
looking for a sign of life
And then a voice rings out across the water.
She blinks, startled. The voice seems wrong, out of place in her mind. For a moment she thinks she must have imagined it, but then a flicker of movement at the edge of her sight proves her wrong.
She turns slowly, fighting against the resistance of the water. She’s up to her withers now. So, so close to oblivion.
At the water’s edge stands a blue roan stallion, staring at her with a concern that she knows well by now. Her face twists into a grimace at the sight of him. Why had he had to come? Why could he have not let her die in peace? She deserves that much surely, after all she’s been through.
And yet he asks why.
And for some reason she finds herself answer.
Shaky with disuse, her voice echoes back across the water. “Because I’m tired. I’ve had enough.” Enough pain, enough abuse, enough loss. She’s experience far more than any horse should have to experience in their lifetime … far more than most horses ever will experience. She has suffered again and again. She just wants it to end.
“And … I deserve peace.” She can give herself that much. She owes herself that much. Who is he to question that?
“You won’t find rest in the sea.” Zeik says, wondering if he was already too late - if she was too far gone. She seems eerily transcendent, as if she were a ghost already, but the waves had brought her spirit to shore so that she might torment him. His eyes were just beginning to open to the world, and already they’d been filled with so much pain. Zeik doesn’t understand. “Abandoning life won’t give you recompense in death, trust me.” He says, looking away from her for a brief moment to glance out across the jade sea. He figures that explaining himself would catch her attention, even though she’s already slipping from his grasp.
“I’ve abandoned all that life has to offer up until this point.” He calls out, smiling with an unattractive, lop-sided grin. “I thought it would save me from going through what you all experience - loss, pain, heartache.” Zeik pauses, sighing with this realization. “And it did - but that’s not the point.” He says, holding her eye. “Life is about pain and loss and heartache! That’s what makes it worth living.” He says, his expression growing ever more animated. As if driven by his speech his legs move forward, driving him deeper into the churning waters. He thinks that maybe, if he can grasp one hair on her tail that swirls in the current, he can confirm her existence and save her in one fell swoop.
“Please.” He petitions, “Come back to shore.” His head rises, ears soon following. In his eyes grows a steely reserve. If she will not come back to him, he will go to her.
Everything we are and used to be is buried and gone
I'm looking for the sky to save me,
looking for a sign of life
Why won’t he just leave her alone? She was ready to go, ready to die. Still is, mind - even as she stands there, the water calls out to her, offering her peace.
He says she won’t find rest there, but she doesn’t believe it. Down there in the depths she will be nothing. Will feel nothing, remember nothing. What else would that be, but rest? “I don’t want recompense.” It’s silly to want compensation at this point. What she wants is to not remember her mother’s death, to not remember Esther’s death, to not remember Mikhael and Hael and Cal and Cai and all her siblings. She just wants the void.
But his next words anger her - an emotion that she hasn’t felt in a long time. Life is about pain?!
She exhales, trying to steel herself. Her experiences are not simply sad occurrences that make life more interesting. “Watching people die does not make life worth living.” There’s a venom in her voice that she’s startled to hear. Who is he to discount what she’s been through? He does not know her, does not know her life. “Being raped does not make life worth living.” She’s half tempted to walk out of the water to give him a good kick, but she knows, even before he says it, that it’s just what he wants.
He wants to save her, be the white knight that brings her back from the edge. But she doesn’t want to be saved. “Why? There’s nothing left for me.” Besides Hael of course, but Hael will be far better without Carys dragging down her life.
He can see she’s beyond reason. Already death has begun to creep into her eyes, and Zeik sees it reflected back at him when she looks his way. Her sigh is something Zeik is actually happy to hear - he may have hit a nerve, but that nerve is an indication that something within her still lives, still fights. The disgust in her voice is all that he needs and he sighs back, knowing that this isn’t a lost cause. Her words have the intended effect - Zeik’s shocked. But he’s also not willing to give up on her, perhaps now more than ever.
“If you really wanted to die,” He begins, feeling the pull of the current against his legs, “You wouldn’t have even indulged me with a reply. You’d be deep underwater by now.” He says, holding her gaze. His ears fall, and he watches her closely. “Stop feeling pity for yourself. Bad things happen to good people, but that doesn’t mean you just give up.” He challenges her, looking out and away from the scene she’s giving him. He was only doing his best, but he can feel himself fall short.
He’s angry now, angry that he’s wasted his time on someone who only wanted to view the world from a one-way lens. There’s no helping this mare, and he sees that. “I’m sorry for bothering you.” He mutters, backing slowly out of the ocean. “I can see you’re determined to deny any kind of help.”
Everything we are and used to be is buried and gone
09-29-2015, 07:32 PM (This post was last modified: 09-29-2015, 07:34 PM by Carys.)
I'm looking for the sky to save me,
looking for a sign of life
She knows he’s manipulating her, knows he’s intentionally pushing her buttons. But she can’t help it, she can’t let it go. Who is he to judge her? He doesn’t know her, doesn’t know what she’s been through. He should keep his damn opinions to himself.
She takes a step towards him, half ready to rip his head off. But then he says something that gives her pause. “If you really wanted to die, you wouldn’t have even indulged me with a reply. You’d be deep underwater by now.” It strikes a chord with her, somewhere deep inside. What if he’s right? What if there’s some tiny little part of her that still wants to live?
But he’s backing up now … giving up. And her anger blooms.
She takes a few steps forward, following him up the beach and stoping when she’s up to her knees. Her sodden wings hang limply at her sides. “Screw you! You never wanted to save me!” Her ears lie flat against her dark skull, and her head snakes slightly from side to side. “You just wanted to be someone’s white knight, to have someone indebted and grateful to you. Well I’m not going to be that person for you, jackass.” She takes another step closer, itching to sink her teeth into his shoulder. “You’re no better than the rest.”
It’s true. He wanted to get a rise out of her. Sue him. He’d pushed her little buttons and gotten exactly what he wished for. But you know what they say about that, be careful... and all that other bullcrap. What he hadn’t expected was that she’d push his buttons right back. He can hear her splash around behind him, drag herself slowly back to shore. Zeik smirks, considering it a win. But then she opens her mouth and his smirk disappears quicker than he can shift (and for him that’s pretty damn fast.) His head snaps to the side so he can look back at her, a heaving wet mess of tangled mane and spitfire. His own ears fall and he swings around to face her, teeth baring in a rude imitation of her.
“Don’t flatter yourself, princess.” He spits, ears burying themselves while he draws his head up to loom down at her. “Why would I waste my time on a drowning rat who’s so far up her own asshole she can’t even accept the fact that someone’s trying to save her life?” He shakes his head, disgusted by the sight of her. Who did she think she was? Running around the beach doling out accusations like she knew him. Like she had suffered more than anyone else had ever suffered before. If he could spit, he would.
Instead he glares, letting his anger get the better of him in the moment. “You want to kill yourself so badly, go ahead, be my guest. Hell, I’ll even hold you under.” He’s shaking, trembling from the effort of holding back a sharp bite to her wrinkled nose. He thinks about shifting and clawing her in the face, but that won’t do any good. Instead he turns away from her and continues to tread back to shore, regretting even looking twice at her. He thinks he could possibly explode if he has to face another second arguing with someone so thick-skulled. “You know what you are?” He says, stopping suddenly in his tracks before turning back to look at her one more time.
“Just a spoiled rotten brat who never grew up.” Without thinking, the roan pulls a quick rear and throws himself back down, hooves displacing the seawater in her direction. Childish, he supposes, but maybe it’ll douse her snarky attitude.
Everything we are and used to be is buried and gone
I'm looking for the sky to save me,
looking for a sign of life
Well apparently she’s hit a nerve.
The stallion swings to face her, anger burning in his handsome face. She chokes out a laugh at his expression, both angry and amused that she’s managed to get a rise out of him. What a self-righteous ass. Can’t face the truth at all.
The princess comment does rankle though, just a bit. But only because, once upon a time, she actually had been a princess. A princess of two kingdoms, with a large, loving family. But it’s long gone now. Her mother is dead, and she hasn’t seen her father and siblings in years. They could be dead too for all she knows. But he doesn’t know about any of that. He doesn’t know her at all. “Well why don’t you enlighten me then? Because apparently you thought me worth stopping for.” She can’t keep the sneer from her face. He’d likely been looking for some pathetic, wilted flower. So much for that.
“Oh fuck you.” He’s getting nasty now, lashing out after being called out on his bullshit. What an arrogant little shit. Her anger carries her a few more steps forward. “Wow, your inner asshole is showing. So much for your white knight act.”
And then she can’t hold herself back any more. She springs out of the water as the word ‘brat’ leaves his lips, sodden wings flared (too heavy to fly with), ears pinned and teeth bared. Her dark neck snakes out, teeth seeking purchase in his roan hide. “Shut up!” She’s crying now, though she doesn’t know it. “Shut up, shut up, SHUT UP!”
