BEXLEY BRIAR
my carnivore heart comes out after dark -
Come again, sweetheart -
Bexley’s snarl comes so suddenly she chokes on it. Shakes in place, Tries to form her mouth around something less guttural, and for a moment, finds it impossible. Then comes the murmur from deep in her chest - if you insist - and as she prowls toward him everything melts away but the narrow tunnel of vision straight ahead, encased in flame, in glittering smoke, in blood that is visceral if not visible. Bexley thinks of hungry dogs and how they do not mind their masters, thinks of bite the hand that feeds you, and thinks, more than ever, that anything she could do to him would be Gods-justified.
Briars have killed since the beginning of time, and what’s on more body on the family roster?
The space between them vanishes near-instantly; rabidity pulses through her veins in manic absolute. Adrenaline is the only thing reminding Bexley she is still alive, not a single-minded walking corpse. Fire still burbles at her feet, picking up dry tinder and stall-fabric and spilled oil, and unthinkingly vicious, Bexley reaches with her bloody teeth for the nearest lighted torch, blue-white with heat and swings it toward Acton’s chest in a chaotic arc. The smell of singed hair fills the air, though it’s too smoggy to see just how much the fire has taken hold of him. Let him burn, says her most-hated voice, and she wants to listen. Why would she not? He deserves it, doesn’t he? Doesn’t she deserve some kind of closure? Bex is blind, almost, with emotion and with the burnt-white speckles of light that flare throughout her vision. A wild thing she is now, no brains, no thinking, just heart and brawn and blood and -
The flame spits back at her and she drops it instantly. The scent of burnt hair fills her nostrils. Felt good, sure fucking did. Hazy and bitter, barely centered, barely standing, filled with a bubbling eldritch horror, Bexley’s head drops past her chest, snaking slowly back and forth, hair blooming around her neck, eyes blackened and haunting. Clank-clank-clank goes the chain around her neck.
The space between them closes again, is negligible now, and, sick with anger, violently nauseated, she comes close and ducks low and slashes a hoof out at Acton’s front leg, slamming into bone, crunching and thudding.
Her lungs spasm at the sound. Pleasure or regret? It’s hard to breathe, now - impossible, even - a surge of emotion overwhelms Bexley as she watches him buckle, pushing her off-balance, bringing tears back into her eyes. She chokes on it. Heat and anger and lust and disappointment. Her breaths are pants now, ragged and dry and absolutely unsatisfying. Her vision blurs with tears. You - you - Bex clenches her jaw, tries to steady her breaths, the wavering timbre of her tone. Fuck you. Her voice snaps sharply in half. Tears sting the open scar on her face, blood and salt filling her nostrils, her mouth, drip-drip-dripping on the cobblestone - asshole - she smashes out at his other leg, carnal, vicious - you took away the only, the only -
And for a moment she can’t speak at all, choking on how much she wants to cry, on how much she has left to come to terms with.
The only thing I had. Bex inhales sharply, rubs blood off her face and onto her shoulder. Ash and tears cluster on her lashes. Apocalyptic is the scene that plays around them - two broken people swathed in swirling flame. Her heart hurts now, is a beast of its own, paralyzed deep and painful in her chest. The dark around her grows, grows so many heads, grows deep and hot, and strangling, and she sways on her feet, dizzy, in pain and capricious, unable to contain her tears - the only thing I had - and the blood starts to seep again, insistent, impulsive.
@acton <3