If there was anywhere Bexley could cry, it would be here.
She's been thinking about that a lot. If Bexley ever felt the need to cry, which of course she doesn't - where would she go? The Day Court has no place for such theatrics, and her peers seeing her as anything less than bulletproof would be a misstep that she can't make up this early in the game. Now that sovereigns have been put in place, her options are limited. There's no longer free rein to wander. Bexley has responsibilities, a community, even, and she's running out of places to explore, at least ones that are socially acceptable. So that leaves this. A tiny golden mare at the bottom of a stairway to the gods.
Bexley stares up at it, numb. It's well past sunset and bitingly cold, so that her lungs almost feel frosted when she takes a shuddering breath in, but the sky is clear, and the stars freckled all across it are shining their hot white, incredibly lush, so that there's no difficulty in seeing the very top of the peak where it curls up and spirals to a hard, snowy point. Rain from a short-lived shower is still lining Bexley's shoulders, pulling her many curls to the ground. Really, this whole thing wasn't very well-planned. She should go back home, think about what she's going to say, organize herself a little more. Leave at a reasonable time. But she knows she won't. What is worship if not fevered? What is this place for if not for half-made plans, for being unprepared in order to better receive whatever the gods will give her? What is her dedication to Solis if not irresistible?
With that she begins to trudge upward. There is no uncertainty in the heavy steps she takes, winding through the softly weather staircase leading up the side of the mountain. A headwind fights her, which she stubbornly ignores. For the first time Bexley is entirely empty. She can feel the insistent brag of her self-assured heart, and the pump of blood under that delicate rose-gold skin, and every flicker of her eyelashes as she blinks, the chill and the wind turning her mind blank except where it follows the movement of her body, step left, and right, and right. The chain around her neck seems tighter than usual. Colder, maybe. She can feel every link, the tiny, interlocking fragments, so intricately and exhaustively made, pressing against her throat. It feels like Laszlo.
At that Bexley’s tears - a hypothetical until this point - really do well up, lining those butterfly lashes, the salt spilling onto her cheeks only to dry as she continues to walk against the wind. Her chest goes hot, her vision blurs. The sky begins to fall away but leaves its stars above. Shreds of pure black envelope her. She hasn’t thought about him in a long time, hasn’t seen him in what feels like a century. Never will again. She’s gotten used to the necklace, for her own benefit; whenever she becomes aware of it the cut reopens, her wounds reform, her heart shelling its chainmail, and everything becomes harder, brighter, more painful. His body becomes its own figure in the back of her head. Like a chant that’s made to stick with you. Except it’s somewhat less pretty than a song, the memory of his blood, of those fantastic, familial Briar-blue eyes set into a skull half bleached, half covered in gore. She was sick over it for days.
Was? Okay. Still is. She’s almost to the peak of the mountain, which is a startling realization. The air is so thin it almost hurts to breathe, and while Bexley’s already stopped crying, she can feel the damp tracks that are being frozen onto her cheeks. Chunks of carved stone are starting to spiral from the ground around her, warping into huge columns, sliced by vines, by flowers, by dead leaves plastered to their sides. The stars are shining a hard white that almost hurts Bexley’s eyes. With a last reserve of energy she hauls herself over two steps at once and emerges onto the clearing that marks the end of this journey.
For a moment, she stands perfectly still and inhales it: the clear sky, the wind smelling of saltwater, the towering stone on every side, the presence of magic, godliness, whatever name you can put to it, but that /thing./ And then she exhales. And it breaks. And Bexley is reminded of her incalculable anger, the many favors she isn’t afraid to ask for, and of why she’s really here. Something so nebulous she’s not sure how to describe it, but so intense that there’s no use fighting it. Bexley’s intuition is a creature of its own - something fanged. She is not going to waste her energy thrashing against its grip. Instead she drops to one knee and bends forward until she can feel the press of hard, cold stone against her forehead; oceans of hair slough forward to cover her face, and her muscles are going to ache if she holds this too long, but she breathes, brittle, and ignores it, closing her eyes and gritting her teeth, as if her body is going to explode if she holds this in any longer.
“I don’t know what you want from me.” You fucker. “Solis. But I’m here because I know you asked me to be. Trust me when I tell you I’ve been operating in your image - causing trouble, having fun. But I know that’s not everything. I know I’m supposed to be something else, something infamous. In your honor. Whatever I can give you is yours, whatever you want. But give me something. A piece of advice. A sign that I’m headed in the right direction.” It hurts to say out loud, to admit that she’s unsure of herself.
But who’s going to hear it?
ooc: this is a worship thread, feel free to hop in but fair warning bex is not gonna be very happy <33
