and who cares if i'm coming back alive
so what, at least i had the strength to fight
too much, too much, too much, too much
is never enough
so what, at least i had the strength to fight
too much, too much, too much, too much
is never enough
There is a hairsbreadth of a moment where she feels the same bliss of that summer night again; with the roar of thunder chasing across the angry sea and the crack of lightning showering from the heavens. A moment between breaths where her lungs pause, and her heart remembers another night laid under an ocean of stars. But this one.. this one is the high of touching the sky with outstretched fingers, and a kiss planted on a wounded wing. This memory is the hope that sings lullabies, soft and sweet, before reality twists its ugly blade between her ribs where her heart should be.
She remembers too much, and this is her curse. Her Night King is also the ghost that holds the blade buried in her chest. And now, she watches as he turns, her orbs meeting his own. A small part of her cannot help but be glad to see his familiar face, even if the pain threatens her so. For they share something that cannot be described; save for twin, untame hearts that feel too much and breath carnage on the other half of their coin. But despite this, Reichenbach's words taste like ash in her mouth; she remembers the reasons why she left. She cannot forget. No manner of apology can undo the pain she has endured.. not now, at least. Now, she is a pillar of stone that stands rival against a ruthless sea of rain. It is the battlefield her emotions war in her soul.
He is still the handsome man she had fallen in love with, once upon a time. But he is also the assassin who struck her, cleaving her swollen heart into pieces.
You're home..
"For now." The words leave her as quick as a dagger in darkness — cold and brutal. Her plea to the Dusk Queen, her new friend, still lingers on her lips. The spring goddess's pain is equal to her own, and their sister hearts share a cavity of havoc whose eyes meet her own now. Reichenbach is many things; a lover, a gypsy, a warrior, and a king. And his hands have not only crushed her heart in the fists of his shadowed grip, but now her beloved friend's. She cannot stay silent.. and her storm answers so, with the expanse of an ocean laid with darkness and stars between them growing more and more.
How was..?
"Don't," she interrupts, "you do not get to ask me how I've been after all this time." Her words are even, but wrought with chaos — like the hush of quiet before a star dies. She is fatally calm, despite the electricity that sizzles deep in her muscles like a beast chomping on it's chains. Memories flood her in glimpses like swords of lightning flashing across her eyes; his kiss on Florentine's cheek as she stood nearly broken at the sight of them; his proclamation of love for another, although he played her own heart like a drum. Then Florentine's embrace, as their weeping hearts bled onto the snow at their ankles in unspilled tears. He made her out to be a fool; had made Florentine — sweet, brave Florentine — a fool. Damn him for it, and the allure of Night's embrace that once ensnared them both.
I'm glad you're back, Aislinn.
The smile that strains at the corners of his black lips is tainted, and she knows it as much as he. She notes the darkness that curls beneath his skin, well hidden, but there nonetheless. Be it rage or uncertainty or anguish, she does not falter to think of it. Her own broken heart bleeds — just as it had since summertide. I'm in love with.. No. His words do not bruise her anymore. Because now.. now, she stands before him. Not only for herself, but for her flower queen, and for every heart that might taste his sweetness and be shattered by his wildness. For she knows the price of a gypsy soul all too well.
She notes the strange magic to him that she cannot deny; akin to the storm that builds in her bones and blood. A violence wrecks inside her as the symphony of her emotions roil. The bonfire showers unwanted heat on her skin, and she is sweltering beneath it's orange glare. Under the flickering light, the Champion wars with her own desires. Her relief to be home is a truthful one, but with it, the demon in her claws. There is a price to be paid for her return, and it begins and ends with him, in this very moment.
"I have been asking myself why since that night at the mountain temple," she breathes, her words full of ruin and a wickedness that stirs hurricanes from quiet slumber. "What in the hell were you thinking, Reich?" Not 'my King'. Not 'Your Grace'. No titles will be born on her lips, for her rage has tumbled over. The shreds of her long held anger and sorrow spark — a flame that kindles and burns brighter than any sun. And in the shadows that cast from the fury that shines in her blue eyes, Calligo grasps her closer. Aislinn is a storm barely constrained in the black silk of her frame; her emotions swirling dangerously, intimately. Ever word left unsaid, every wish made on the stars of her tears, and the pain left in Reichenbach's wake have now built into a crescendo.
Months have passed and she had said nothing. Months have passed and she still served him; a loyal protector of her kingdom and his Court. Months have passed while she wallowed with a cleaved heart beating in her chest. And still.. she said nothing. She did nothing. If her time away from Court had taught her anything, besides the gift bestowed upon her by Calligo, it was to speak before it was too late.
Too late had gone and passed long ago.
Murmurs of snow whisper along her burning skin and toss stray strands of her mane. She can hear the hush of voices around the crackling fire as her temper begins to flare, but she ignores it. Let them see the stormsinger for who she is — a woman who is not afraid of any man, not even a man she once loved, not even man who is also her king. A muscle twitches in her upper lip. For she can feel, with an unmatched hyper focus, the thunder that begins to roar in her blood. But Aislinn does not back down. Instead, her gaze bores into her king's. Where once, the liquid silver of his eyes made clear the shadows that kissed her skin, now.. her knees do not shake, her spine does not waver from nervous shivers.
Aislinn is a beacon of hurricanes, and the brightest blue of her gaze is a mirror of that fact. Her irises swirl with the lightning that laces her blood; her heart racing. "You broke my heart." The words are fire and ice on her tongue, clipped and seething under the facade of self-control. Daring, Aislinn steps closer to the shadows that writhe along the mahogany of his skin; the firelight catching the planes of his face in the moonlight that begins to shine. She needs to see his face, and those eyes that her heart once melted for, and now, they are the eyes she meets without waver.
They are dangerously close, and the swirl of storm in her center is near its breaking peak.. so so close to tipping over and unleashing a hell of lightning and rain. He deserves her rage; deserves every ounce of unleashed poison to shower down upon him in reality. For her king has hurt her, and now Florentine, and Aislinn will not stand to let his wildness latch onto another soul with no query or consequence. She thinks of this, as she steps into his shadows, and the dark of him encompasses the stardust that shimmers along her skin in silver.
That gauze of stars is the only beautiful part of her in this moment, as her mouth curves into a strained whisper of promised chaos. "How dare you. Just because you are king, does not mean that my feelings — Florentine's feelings — mean nothing. When will you answer for what you've done?"
@reichenbach bloop, hello muse ♡
"Aislinn speech."
