☼ s e r a p h i n a ☼
I have lost the things that I said I lived for
and have continued to live
Stop.
Her blood rushes in a way that it shouldn’t. She turns to stare at the mare with mismatched gaze narrowed into a glare, ears snapped back against her skull; she was more obedient, before she grew accustomed to her own authority, and, now, it takes her a moment to feel anything but burning offense at the challenge.
She’s right. Seraphina knows, in her head, that she is right. Her heart, however, wants no more of this offense – her pride already hangs loose and worn about her, tattered as the skin of her face, and she doesn’t know how to piece it together again. She whisks her fervid glare between the mare and her dragon, but then her expression softens, reluctantly, to be replaced with a fresh bought of despair and a renewed misery.
She looks at the mare, this time, and she sees her properly – that rich bay and kiss of iridescent scales like flecks of foam left behind by the tides, that dark spire of horn, that cascade of midnight-dark hair, those endlessly blue eyes that are far older than the woman they belong to. She is a striking creature, in possession of a quiet, delicate sort of beauty, almost untouched by harshness, at least on her exterior; but then there is that curl of chain around her leg, like a brine-touched vice, and something in her eyes is colder than Seraphina might have expected.
She notes the chains of metal that pool around the mare with more than a hint of bitterness, a flash of envy behind those multicolored eyes; though she shouldn’t blame him for her own failure, she can’t help but think that, perhaps, were she not so spurned by her god, she might not have fallen to Raum. She thinks of her foreign advisors and their magics, and she thinks of all of her enemies and their magics, and she thinks of how all of her desperate prayers and all of her efforts have meant nothing - no matter how much she struggled for Solis’s approval, he never seemed to grant it to her. Mortal problems required mortal solutions, or perhaps she was merely cursed; at any rate, her devotion has never been enough for him.
That silver-scaled dragon only makes the sting dig deeper, burn brighter. Truly, this girl must be beloved by her patron, to be granted such gifts, and it aches. She supposes that she should be grateful for them, even grateful to that laughing moon, but it only further agitates her bitterness, her inferiority, her failure.
She watches the mare with those hollowed-out eyes, her mind struggling for the right words, and she is forced to confront that she has always – always – been alone in a way that she doesn’t know how to describe. It isn’t something literal; there are people around her, so she can’t be alone, and yet…
She wonders, at the back of her mind, if anyone would really have cared if she’d bled out on the Steppe – not as the Queen of Solterra or even Seraphina, the Queen of Solterra, but as Seraphina, period. She has always been a bit more title than person, and, now that she has lost her title, she is beginning to wonder what is left behind in its absence. Seraphina, soldier of Solterra. Seraphina, Solterran warrior. Seraphina, Emissary of the Sun. Seraphina, the Silver Queen. When all of that is gone, stripped away in great, bloody sheets, what is left behind but some vast emptiness, a space that she doesn’t know how to fill? She was resented or admired, but nothing more tender, and, even when her world crumbled at her sides time and time again, she managed to hold herself above the chaos and the noise with a manufactured elegance and icy dignity, but now she is the crumbling thing.
She still has a heart under her skin, and, as it burns and pulses against the walls of her ribcage, she wishes that she could rip it out. It was easier when she could keep it constrained beneath the promise of well-laid plans and a cool head. It was easier when the world seemed so very far away, when she could soar over it like a hawk; she used to be so distant, and it suited her. When had it begun to itch? (It had always been itching, but she hadn’t scratched, because she didn’t want to know what was beneath her if she peeled back her own skin. The idea of having to figure out what something meant had always been more terrifying than being nothing at all.) She doesn’t want to feel like this – she doesn’t want to be like this.
She can’t be like this, but-
when she tries to pull herself back inside, she can’t.
She doesn’t know what’s left behind for her to gather, so she rages against it; she doesn’t want to pick herself up again, but she has to. More than anything, for once in her gods-damned life, she wants to give up in peace, without the persistent prickle of shame or necessity biting at the back of her throat like a snarling wolf. For once in her life, she wants more than anything to be able to think of herself before anything else, because, really, what has this world given her to deserve everything that she is, but she can’t - but she gave up the option years ago. Her crown had been taken from her, but responsibility – for what he had done, for what he would do, for what she should have put an end to years ago - still sat like a leaden weight across her shoulders. But they wouldn’t want her back, would they? A dishonored queen was nothing, nothing, nothing; the weak meant nothing in Solterra, and now she was weak.
She is left with two fundamental truths: one is that she has been lonely for years, and the other is that she cannot fix what she has done alone.
Perhaps she could have, were she still Seraphina the Queen, who was predisposed to standing alone, to making herself the sole figure responsible for the welfare of her kingdom in the wake of Zolin’s irreverent tyranny, but now she is simply Seraphina, and she is still stumbling to piece together what that means.
You'll die before you make it to the summit. Dead things cannot fix anything. Her words are spitefully true; they dance to the rhythm of the chain-mail that clinks like water (but Seraphina would liken it more easily to the push-and-pull of war) beneath her hooves. Let me help you.
Her smile is like a lit flame.
She wants to defy this mare, with her fire-licked smile and her sea-touched dragon, because she wants the strength to deny anything that has been put in front of her, – to drive her hooves into the ground and refuse to bend - but she knows that would be foolish, and, though she feels like one at the moment, she is no fool. “You’re right,” she concedes, softly, and the admission stings on her tongue. “I…would appreciate the aid. I must…speak to my god. I have done…” Perhaps it is because she does not know what to expect on Veneror; certainly not Solis, who never seems to heed her call or the call of any other. Perhaps it is because the conclusion of her sentence makes everything around her so terribly, undeniably real. In any case, her voice stumbles; she’s forgotten how it sounded, to tremble.“…I have done something unforgivable.”
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tags | @Isra
notes | ambiguous sera is ambiguous and in shock, probably
I have lost the things that I said I lived for
and have continued to live
Stop.
Her blood rushes in a way that it shouldn’t. She turns to stare at the mare with mismatched gaze narrowed into a glare, ears snapped back against her skull; she was more obedient, before she grew accustomed to her own authority, and, now, it takes her a moment to feel anything but burning offense at the challenge.
She’s right. Seraphina knows, in her head, that she is right. Her heart, however, wants no more of this offense – her pride already hangs loose and worn about her, tattered as the skin of her face, and she doesn’t know how to piece it together again. She whisks her fervid glare between the mare and her dragon, but then her expression softens, reluctantly, to be replaced with a fresh bought of despair and a renewed misery.
She looks at the mare, this time, and she sees her properly – that rich bay and kiss of iridescent scales like flecks of foam left behind by the tides, that dark spire of horn, that cascade of midnight-dark hair, those endlessly blue eyes that are far older than the woman they belong to. She is a striking creature, in possession of a quiet, delicate sort of beauty, almost untouched by harshness, at least on her exterior; but then there is that curl of chain around her leg, like a brine-touched vice, and something in her eyes is colder than Seraphina might have expected.
She notes the chains of metal that pool around the mare with more than a hint of bitterness, a flash of envy behind those multicolored eyes; though she shouldn’t blame him for her own failure, she can’t help but think that, perhaps, were she not so spurned by her god, she might not have fallen to Raum. She thinks of her foreign advisors and their magics, and she thinks of all of her enemies and their magics, and she thinks of how all of her desperate prayers and all of her efforts have meant nothing - no matter how much she struggled for Solis’s approval, he never seemed to grant it to her. Mortal problems required mortal solutions, or perhaps she was merely cursed; at any rate, her devotion has never been enough for him.
That silver-scaled dragon only makes the sting dig deeper, burn brighter. Truly, this girl must be beloved by her patron, to be granted such gifts, and it aches. She supposes that she should be grateful for them, even grateful to that laughing moon, but it only further agitates her bitterness, her inferiority, her failure.
She watches the mare with those hollowed-out eyes, her mind struggling for the right words, and she is forced to confront that she has always – always – been alone in a way that she doesn’t know how to describe. It isn’t something literal; there are people around her, so she can’t be alone, and yet…
She wonders, at the back of her mind, if anyone would really have cared if she’d bled out on the Steppe – not as the Queen of Solterra or even Seraphina, the Queen of Solterra, but as Seraphina, period. She has always been a bit more title than person, and, now that she has lost her title, she is beginning to wonder what is left behind in its absence. Seraphina, soldier of Solterra. Seraphina, Solterran warrior. Seraphina, Emissary of the Sun. Seraphina, the Silver Queen. When all of that is gone, stripped away in great, bloody sheets, what is left behind but some vast emptiness, a space that she doesn’t know how to fill? She was resented or admired, but nothing more tender, and, even when her world crumbled at her sides time and time again, she managed to hold herself above the chaos and the noise with a manufactured elegance and icy dignity, but now she is the crumbling thing.
She still has a heart under her skin, and, as it burns and pulses against the walls of her ribcage, she wishes that she could rip it out. It was easier when she could keep it constrained beneath the promise of well-laid plans and a cool head. It was easier when the world seemed so very far away, when she could soar over it like a hawk; she used to be so distant, and it suited her. When had it begun to itch? (It had always been itching, but she hadn’t scratched, because she didn’t want to know what was beneath her if she peeled back her own skin. The idea of having to figure out what something meant had always been more terrifying than being nothing at all.) She doesn’t want to feel like this – she doesn’t want to be like this.
She can’t be like this, but-
when she tries to pull herself back inside, she can’t.
She doesn’t know what’s left behind for her to gather, so she rages against it; she doesn’t want to pick herself up again, but she has to. More than anything, for once in her gods-damned life, she wants to give up in peace, without the persistent prickle of shame or necessity biting at the back of her throat like a snarling wolf. For once in her life, she wants more than anything to be able to think of herself before anything else, because, really, what has this world given her to deserve everything that she is, but she can’t - but she gave up the option years ago. Her crown had been taken from her, but responsibility – for what he had done, for what he would do, for what she should have put an end to years ago - still sat like a leaden weight across her shoulders. But they wouldn’t want her back, would they? A dishonored queen was nothing, nothing, nothing; the weak meant nothing in Solterra, and now she was weak.
She is left with two fundamental truths: one is that she has been lonely for years, and the other is that she cannot fix what she has done alone.
Perhaps she could have, were she still Seraphina the Queen, who was predisposed to standing alone, to making herself the sole figure responsible for the welfare of her kingdom in the wake of Zolin’s irreverent tyranny, but now she is simply Seraphina, and she is still stumbling to piece together what that means.
You'll die before you make it to the summit. Dead things cannot fix anything. Her words are spitefully true; they dance to the rhythm of the chain-mail that clinks like water (but Seraphina would liken it more easily to the push-and-pull of war) beneath her hooves. Let me help you.
Her smile is like a lit flame.
She wants to defy this mare, with her fire-licked smile and her sea-touched dragon, because she wants the strength to deny anything that has been put in front of her, – to drive her hooves into the ground and refuse to bend - but she knows that would be foolish, and, though she feels like one at the moment, she is no fool. “You’re right,” she concedes, softly, and the admission stings on her tongue. “I…would appreciate the aid. I must…speak to my god. I have done…” Perhaps it is because she does not know what to expect on Veneror; certainly not Solis, who never seems to heed her call or the call of any other. Perhaps it is because the conclusion of her sentence makes everything around her so terribly, undeniably real. In any case, her voice stumbles; she’s forgotten how it sounded, to tremble.“…I have done something unforgivable.”
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tags | @Isra
notes | ambiguous sera is ambiguous and in shock, probably
I'M IN A ROOM MADE OUT OF MIRRORSand there's no way to escape the violence of a girl against herself.☼please tag Sera! contact is encouraged, short of violence
