☼ fia the crownless ☼
tell me : is the blood on your hands dry? is it slowly disappearing?
mine isn't
“Inventive. Yes. She has made them very beautiful.”
He meets her gaze momentarily, before it drifts to her scars with a pointed intensity; she looks down at the aspilia, trying to ignore the prickling of his stare on her cheek. There is something to the way he has said it that she isn’t entirely sure how to respond to; like remarking on the gold-tone of the sands or the brilliant blue of the sky on a cloudless day. She doesn’t know how to react to it - she’s not sure that it’s a compliment, or, if it is, if it’s really any compliment to her, rather than Isra, who was, of course, the one who crafted her scars. Seraphina considers. She does not look up to see what expression he might be wearing.
“I’m sure you’ll meet her, at some point,” she says, after a moment’s consideration. “You can tell her yourself that you’re a fan of her handiwork.” Seraphina still isn’t sure that it’s the right response, but – well, she supposes that he will probably meet Isra, at some point or another.
He lingers somewhere behind her while she works. (Perhaps she shouldn’t be so quick to turn her back on an assassin of all people, but she has always been a bit too quick to trust.) While her traitorous magic combs itself through his mane, her gaze locks itself on the glint of her blade and the brilliant yellow of the aspilia, the way that the moon washes the water in silver. At some point, he speaks. “I thank you, Fia, for your knowledge and your care.” Her dark ears twitch back to catch his words, but she does not turn.
“It’s the least I can do – really. You did just agree to help me overthrow a dictatorship.” Her words come out candid and unfocused; her attention is clearly invested only on her sword and the medicine she is crushing to a pulp. She certainly does not notice the tone in his voice, nor her magic sorting its way through his hair. It is only, in fact, when she turns to bandage him with her scarf that she notices his braids at all, and, for a moment, she thinks nothing of it; clearly, he has taken the time to fix his mane.
And then he drops into a sweeping, elaborate bow, or something like it. “Consider me thoroughly humbled — I have never received such meticulous care before.” For a moment, Seraphina is too distracted by the gesture to contemplate his words or the way that his braids fall every so deliberately down his neck. She would be remiss to admit it, but the girl inside of her – her mother’s daughter, raised on fairy tales – is always rendered just a bit ecstatic and perhaps very slightly spellbound at the sight of courtly gestures. However, she is hardly some noble lady (anymore) staring down some knight, and, as her gaze flits from his – smug – expression to the braids spilling down the sides of his neck, she realizes, with a sudden flush of embarrassment, what he is implying.
She is rendered speechless, initially, inwardly cursing her own unmanageable magic and impulse towards control; he takes this moment to spring away, those dark wings flaring out, and, for a moment, she wonders if he intends to spring away, but he merely strides past her. Seraphina does not immediately turn to look at him, but she hears him yawn, and narrows her eyes at the horizon, fixing the rolling dunes with a withering expression. (But, she decides, a bit of humiliation is far from the worst thing to happen to her recently.)
Seraphina turns, then, throwing him a glance. “Humbled, are you?” She arches her brow, willing her expression to be as distinctly unimpressed as she can muster, and moves to follow him without any further explanation.
“There is something I am curious about.” Before she can reach him, he is on to another question; curious as a cat, isn’t he? That silver gaze trails to the scarf wrapped around his torso and then back up to her. She catches up with him, and he slows to her pace. “Why do you not wear your collar?”
She is suddenly, abruptly, even harshly, reminded of the ring of raw skin curled around her throat, patched here and there with thin fur that will take some time to grow in. She freezes momentarily, a sudden rush of shame taking root in her stomach, and stumbles, though she catches herself before she can fall. Her throat closes up, and she has to struggle for words, and she knows that she is hearing an accusation in what is only a simple question, but-
Seraphina takes a breath. Steadies herself. Maps out the stars in the night sky – finds the constellations that will lead them to the canyon. Continues to walk, her steps slow and deliberate. Finally, she casts a reluctant glance to the dark man at her side, grasping for an explanation; she has an answer for him, but she isn’t sure that she has the right words to make him understand it.
“I…” Her voice trails, lingers; she doesn’t realize it, but, though there is no wind, and little chill to the desert even in the middle of the night, she has begun to shiver like some dry leaf in an autumn gale. In the absence of words, her teeth chatter together jarringly. “I took it off.” Her voice comes out like a sigh. “I felt…like I had to. It felt as though I was keeping something locked inside of me, and I couldn’t let it out, when I was wearing the collar. I couldn’t…feel anything properly.” She doesn’t know how to explain it, exactly. She has never been able to feel anything properly – so many of her emotions were cut out by Viceroy, and it has taken them years to grow back, like flowers cut at the stem; she still doesn’t think that she can feel anything normally or naturally, only too much or too little, apathy or a grief that wrenches her soul into knots, but at least she feels. She cannot survive as a statue, an illusion of personhood crafted into the shape of a girl. (But, then, she supposes that she is no girl any longer – she is old enough to be a woman.) Not when everything is on the line.
“I almost died, recently -occupational hazard, I’m afraid -, and I realized that I…” The admission comes out stiffly, and she wonders if it isn’t almost too much information about herself; or perhaps the stiffness comes from her own unwillingness to talk about her almost-death, her near-passing, or perhaps it is because some part of her did die there, did bleed out on the Steppe, or perhaps, just perhaps, it is because some sullen part of herself, buried deep beneath her persona of Fia wishes – craves – for the death that was so nearly within her grasp. “…could not do what needed to be done if I couldn’t feel, so I had to…take the collar off.” Or maybe she had just wanted it off. Maybe it had begun to feel more and more like it would strangle her the longer it hung around her neck, and she was already near-dead without a hangman’s noose around her throat. “I suppose that my intuition wasn’t wrong – when I took it off, I gained…certain abilities. It seems you’ve already noticed that they aren’t entirely under my control yet.” She cast a look at his braided mane. (Even if she hadn’t intended it, she had to somewhat admire her own handiwork.) They are powerful – more powerful than she’s been told that a fledgling mage’s abilities should be, at any rate, perhaps as a result of her years of combat training.
“We’re heading for the Elatus Canyon,” she informs him, with a sidelong glance, deciding that she should probably tell him where she intends to lead him. “It is…certainly the easiest place to hide in Solterra.” That is certainly true. The Mors are too clear, and the Oasis is too obvious, but the Elatus is naturally serpentine and deceptive, the perfect place for a troupe of fledgling rebels to set up their base.
Before he can change the subject, she decides that she has a question of her own. “I’m curious myself, Caine. Why did you agree to help me?” Seraphina doesn’t doubt his good intentions, somehow – there is something innocent to his gestures, to the way that he tried to pick at her, but she is well aware that he is a trader of secrets and an assassin. (In fact, that is why she sought him out.) Perhaps it is merely a matter of pragmatism; he has already said that Raum is mad. However, Seraphina has always had some interest in other people, in trying to take them apart and understand how they work – and, she supposes, she has put herself at a bit of a disadvantage. He knows – most – of the darkest stories she can tell of herself, even if he does not know her true name, and there is a certain danger in that.
She watches him thoughtfully, the look in her mismatched stare ambiguous.
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tags | @Caine
notes | this post sure goes all the way across the emotional spectrum, doesn't it
tell me : is the blood on your hands dry? is it slowly disappearing?
mine isn't
“Inventive. Yes. She has made them very beautiful.”
He meets her gaze momentarily, before it drifts to her scars with a pointed intensity; she looks down at the aspilia, trying to ignore the prickling of his stare on her cheek. There is something to the way he has said it that she isn’t entirely sure how to respond to; like remarking on the gold-tone of the sands or the brilliant blue of the sky on a cloudless day. She doesn’t know how to react to it - she’s not sure that it’s a compliment, or, if it is, if it’s really any compliment to her, rather than Isra, who was, of course, the one who crafted her scars. Seraphina considers. She does not look up to see what expression he might be wearing.
“I’m sure you’ll meet her, at some point,” she says, after a moment’s consideration. “You can tell her yourself that you’re a fan of her handiwork.” Seraphina still isn’t sure that it’s the right response, but – well, she supposes that he will probably meet Isra, at some point or another.
He lingers somewhere behind her while she works. (Perhaps she shouldn’t be so quick to turn her back on an assassin of all people, but she has always been a bit too quick to trust.) While her traitorous magic combs itself through his mane, her gaze locks itself on the glint of her blade and the brilliant yellow of the aspilia, the way that the moon washes the water in silver. At some point, he speaks. “I thank you, Fia, for your knowledge and your care.” Her dark ears twitch back to catch his words, but she does not turn.
“It’s the least I can do – really. You did just agree to help me overthrow a dictatorship.” Her words come out candid and unfocused; her attention is clearly invested only on her sword and the medicine she is crushing to a pulp. She certainly does not notice the tone in his voice, nor her magic sorting its way through his hair. It is only, in fact, when she turns to bandage him with her scarf that she notices his braids at all, and, for a moment, she thinks nothing of it; clearly, he has taken the time to fix his mane.
And then he drops into a sweeping, elaborate bow, or something like it. “Consider me thoroughly humbled — I have never received such meticulous care before.” For a moment, Seraphina is too distracted by the gesture to contemplate his words or the way that his braids fall every so deliberately down his neck. She would be remiss to admit it, but the girl inside of her – her mother’s daughter, raised on fairy tales – is always rendered just a bit ecstatic and perhaps very slightly spellbound at the sight of courtly gestures. However, she is hardly some noble lady (anymore) staring down some knight, and, as her gaze flits from his – smug – expression to the braids spilling down the sides of his neck, she realizes, with a sudden flush of embarrassment, what he is implying.
She is rendered speechless, initially, inwardly cursing her own unmanageable magic and impulse towards control; he takes this moment to spring away, those dark wings flaring out, and, for a moment, she wonders if he intends to spring away, but he merely strides past her. Seraphina does not immediately turn to look at him, but she hears him yawn, and narrows her eyes at the horizon, fixing the rolling dunes with a withering expression. (But, she decides, a bit of humiliation is far from the worst thing to happen to her recently.)
Seraphina turns, then, throwing him a glance. “Humbled, are you?” She arches her brow, willing her expression to be as distinctly unimpressed as she can muster, and moves to follow him without any further explanation.
“There is something I am curious about.” Before she can reach him, he is on to another question; curious as a cat, isn’t he? That silver gaze trails to the scarf wrapped around his torso and then back up to her. She catches up with him, and he slows to her pace. “Why do you not wear your collar?”
She is suddenly, abruptly, even harshly, reminded of the ring of raw skin curled around her throat, patched here and there with thin fur that will take some time to grow in. She freezes momentarily, a sudden rush of shame taking root in her stomach, and stumbles, though she catches herself before she can fall. Her throat closes up, and she has to struggle for words, and she knows that she is hearing an accusation in what is only a simple question, but-
Seraphina takes a breath. Steadies herself. Maps out the stars in the night sky – finds the constellations that will lead them to the canyon. Continues to walk, her steps slow and deliberate. Finally, she casts a reluctant glance to the dark man at her side, grasping for an explanation; she has an answer for him, but she isn’t sure that she has the right words to make him understand it.
“I…” Her voice trails, lingers; she doesn’t realize it, but, though there is no wind, and little chill to the desert even in the middle of the night, she has begun to shiver like some dry leaf in an autumn gale. In the absence of words, her teeth chatter together jarringly. “I took it off.” Her voice comes out like a sigh. “I felt…like I had to. It felt as though I was keeping something locked inside of me, and I couldn’t let it out, when I was wearing the collar. I couldn’t…feel anything properly.” She doesn’t know how to explain it, exactly. She has never been able to feel anything properly – so many of her emotions were cut out by Viceroy, and it has taken them years to grow back, like flowers cut at the stem; she still doesn’t think that she can feel anything normally or naturally, only too much or too little, apathy or a grief that wrenches her soul into knots, but at least she feels. She cannot survive as a statue, an illusion of personhood crafted into the shape of a girl. (But, then, she supposes that she is no girl any longer – she is old enough to be a woman.) Not when everything is on the line.
“I almost died, recently -occupational hazard, I’m afraid -, and I realized that I…” The admission comes out stiffly, and she wonders if it isn’t almost too much information about herself; or perhaps the stiffness comes from her own unwillingness to talk about her almost-death, her near-passing, or perhaps it is because some part of her did die there, did bleed out on the Steppe, or perhaps, just perhaps, it is because some sullen part of herself, buried deep beneath her persona of Fia wishes – craves – for the death that was so nearly within her grasp. “…could not do what needed to be done if I couldn’t feel, so I had to…take the collar off.” Or maybe she had just wanted it off. Maybe it had begun to feel more and more like it would strangle her the longer it hung around her neck, and she was already near-dead without a hangman’s noose around her throat. “I suppose that my intuition wasn’t wrong – when I took it off, I gained…certain abilities. It seems you’ve already noticed that they aren’t entirely under my control yet.” She cast a look at his braided mane. (Even if she hadn’t intended it, she had to somewhat admire her own handiwork.) They are powerful – more powerful than she’s been told that a fledgling mage’s abilities should be, at any rate, perhaps as a result of her years of combat training.
“We’re heading for the Elatus Canyon,” she informs him, with a sidelong glance, deciding that she should probably tell him where she intends to lead him. “It is…certainly the easiest place to hide in Solterra.” That is certainly true. The Mors are too clear, and the Oasis is too obvious, but the Elatus is naturally serpentine and deceptive, the perfect place for a troupe of fledgling rebels to set up their base.
Before he can change the subject, she decides that she has a question of her own. “I’m curious myself, Caine. Why did you agree to help me?” Seraphina doesn’t doubt his good intentions, somehow – there is something innocent to his gestures, to the way that he tried to pick at her, but she is well aware that he is a trader of secrets and an assassin. (In fact, that is why she sought him out.) Perhaps it is merely a matter of pragmatism; he has already said that Raum is mad. However, Seraphina has always had some interest in other people, in trying to take them apart and understand how they work – and, she supposes, she has put herself at a bit of a disadvantage. He knows – most – of the darkest stories she can tell of herself, even if he does not know her true name, and there is a certain danger in that.
She watches him thoughtfully, the look in her mismatched stare ambiguous.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
tags | @Caine
notes | this post sure goes all the way across the emotional spectrum, doesn't it
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
