On my body, the grace of shadows and in my heart: all Hells
The moon hangs large and pregnant within her sky. She bends low, low towards the earth where the lake gleams like a mirror, reflecting her face back at her. The mountains that gather around frame the lake in shadow and mystery.
The waters do not stir, they lie so still that all seems like glass and little more. Across her surface that great lake paints the sky above and she lies and dreams and wonders.
Tenebrae thinks of the lady of the lake. Wonders what she does in the cold bottom of her watery home. Is it light down there? Does she banish the darkness with the glory of her light? Does she glow like the moon with a dress that dances in the water?
Ah, The Lady of the Lake. The Disciple smiles for always has he been enchanted by stories. Always has he listened as they are whispered secretly, written down openly and carved into tree and stone and painted upon flesh. So many ways to tell a story and every word enchants him. Maybe even his own is a fearful tale upon the tongue. His story is sharp and full of blood and yet full of darkness so complete and suns that taste as sweet as dawn’s first dew.
Tenebrae stands within his shawl of darkness. He does not need his magic this night, not when he is stood beneath the bough of a tree that leans out over that too-still water. It is a full silhouette within the night and her boughs are thick and laden with leaves of startling crimson and gold. But in the dark they are all black or sprayed ethereal silver. They let no light down to the monk below and Tenebrae stands in black as dark as pitch.
One cannot know the thoughts that pass through the quiet of his mind. None can say what secrets Tenebrae holds there. The only creature that might ever come close to knowing him, truly, is Caligo herself and she had been absent for so very long. Deeply Tenebrae breathes, in and in and in until all his lungs are filled with midnight and starlight. Slowly he turns his gaze to behold a girl who steps down into the lake.
She makes for him a story as she walks like a goddess into the sea so much more than just a girl into a lake. Her bones are fine, her legs slim. He looks to her and might never imagine her questionable deeds. Except he already marks her dangerous. Like all girls are dangerous.
Looking leads to touching… They said. But already Tenebrae is condemned. He has already touched. He confessed his sins and rose up clean but slipped and slipped and slipped until Moira. Until he saw the emptiness of her and knew that love was never for him, that he was strong and able and he would never let himself succumb to flesh.
Oh he yearns for a story on this night when he has been set free. He looks to the moon and knows he has but an hour. An hour until he will be on his knees again, confessing his sins out. So what harm is there in sinning now?
The darkness does not try to hold him. She does not whisper warnings in his ears nor press her hands to his chest and to his shoulders to say stop… stop! No, she lets him pass and does not even sigh nor ripple like a lake. She parts like the sea for him, falling away and leaving only the parts of him that shroud him in shadow armour.
The water is cool as he steps in like a man determined to drown. It reaches up his legs his knees and its wet grasp gropes for his chest and shoulders. It wants him. It wants to steal his sins from his tongue and fill him up with cold. He looks to the girl he draws up beside. He looks to where she looks and wonders what the lake will give her. Will the Lady bear up her sword for this girl?
They break the glass of the water together. It turns to liquid and dances in ripples about them. Upon her brow a diamond glows white and bright and as yearning as the half-moon sigil upon his. He moves before her, because she has already stopped. He holds her in his gaze and does not know whether it is the sharp hold of a warrior or that of a boy made soft with words of fantasy and dreams of tall tales.
He holds her all the same and murmurs like a man with whiskey on his tongue, “What are you running from?” For Tenebrae knows that none come here when Night is at her fullest for any other reason but to escape. Yet Manon has not escaped, not when she is ensnared in the white light of a Disciple’s too-bright eyes.
we don't have to worry bout nothing 'Cause we got the fire and we're burning one hell of a something
No.
They hang around her like tree boughs bending beneath the weight of their leaves, brittle and begging to snap to relieve themselves. She stands between them all, with a bloodied body and sides that heave with the effort of the aftermath; and even the white parts of her are smeared with the red as it all blends together and paints her as someone not her. That isn't her, as the soon-to-congeal liquid trails fingertip marks down her spine and across her face, tracing the diamond placed so securely there, over ears that once held a crown--that crown, that circlet of twigs and thorns crushed beneath the hooves of the fallen that lay in a heap about her, crystals shattered, lackluster.
No.
She was alone, but not really. How alone can someone be with the sins of their past resting peacefully upon their brow, whispering, reminding them of a darkness that threatened to lift them by their throats? But they weren't her sins, they couldn't be her sins; she has killed, surely, but the number that is strewn across the landscape is more than her mere hooves could amass solo. Everything told her she did it, that she, solitarily, committed these crimes and was the sole blame--but she didn't believe, couldn't trust it. She knew better, despite the mounting dread and the racing of her heart yelling to be released. She wanted to scream, to stop the shaking that wracked her dripping body, blood pooling at her feet as she stood unable to move. And then he laughed. It was more haunting than the massacre that spanned her sight, more evil than the deed she had done. It rose out of a shadow of a creature that she could not make out, but she didn't have to guess at who it was: her father lingered with his apparitional appearance, joyfully applauding her for a job well done.
No.
Maybe she did scream, or maybe her jaw hung wide in the horror she had just witnessed; it was a dream, it had to be dream. She threw the throw off her body, the one that had kept her warm in a bed so snug, and jumped to stand. There was no taste of iron in her mouth, no droplets of blood that stained her wooden floors red; her room... she was in her room, in the White Scarab, and though her sides heaved just as they had done moments prior, she was safe. She was not standing in the middle of those she had slain, not lost in the midst of a battlefield she didn't recognize. She was home, at least in as much of a home as the Scarab could be to those like her who claimed no fealty to any one place. Most importantly, though, she was truly alone--no black, shadowy figure materializing as a father she never met. No laugh that sounded like a god she didn't believe in. She hated him, both in and out of her dream-like consciousness, and she needed to get away. She needed to get out of that space slowly closing in around her, one she tended to feel so comfortable and confident in, behind that door with the clearly marked red rose. That night though, through the haze of a just-awaken daze, she needed to leave that comfort behind and, really, leave his ghost in her place. Maybe he'd be gone when she returned.
In a flurry she left the confines of the Scarab's walls, all decor hung neat staring at her as she pushed through the hallway, down the stairs, and brushed past those few guests that remained in the darkening night to play their games and tell their tales. No one dared open their mouths to speak to her, for surely she would snap back with bared teeth and words that stung like the coming winter. She had just recently returned from a long hiatus away (albeit one she was forced into) and leaving again so soon was bound to raise suspicion among the devout patrons. She wouldn't be gone long, no, just enough to drown whatever managed to plague the spaces of her mind.
And though the soft touch of the coming cool weather ran its fingers across her cheek and sent a chill along her back, she set out into Denocte and toward a place she and Vikander found soothing in their restless nights. With her pace quick, she managed to reach the edge of the lake with her thoughts still swirling and heart beating determinedly. Without hesitation she gently placed one hoof into the lapping waves, then the other, and soon enough her loosened mane was floating along beside her coppery body that became indistinguishable from the silver-kissed dark water. It was cold, colder than she expected the still-Fall night to bring, but she welcomed the way it stole her breath, and, subsequently, the thoughts that raced. Her gems gleamed beneath the glowing moon, reveling in the way they could shine unabashed. She, too, beamed under its watchful eye and stared off into some far-away place. The water trembled though she was still, and she didn't turn to look at him as he waded through as she had just done. There was no fear that she felt, no reason to think she was in danger; she would have been dead by then if he desired it so.
She had been somewhere else when he entered her line of sight, curling around her as she had often done to others. Finally, softly, her tri-colored eyes flicked to him, more of a washed-out blue as the moon reflected back at the partial one on his face. Her features did not change, and there was no smile to welcome him, as his words broke whatever spell befell them and rang against her ears despite the hushed nature of their simplicity. Running from. No, maybe that was her some moments back, but she never ran from anything. She brashly pushed headlong into things, into others, into action. Under normal circumstances, no one would have thought her capable of running away from anything at all.
But she could tell, at least there with a stranger in the middle of a lake that wrapped them together, she wasn't under normal circumstances.
Her response wasn't immediate, instead tipping her head slightly to the side while she pondered the one who approached willingly in chilling water. She certainly wasn't special enough for someone to go to such lengths without a reason; maybe that would be the night she died, but instead she merely feigned innocence and blew a breath that fogged between them. "A nightmare." Her voice was a sewed blend of the smooth surface spreading around them and the face of the moon's craters, lilting and as soft as his; she didn't wish to disturb the peace that had enveloped them. And without a shift in her demeanor, she accepted him fully and whatever fate he might have brought her. "Have you come to be another?"
If I’ve touched your finger
with a ravenous tongue
licked from your palm a rift of salt--
The night was so beautiful that Anandi was not thinking (much) about the hunger, the constant, gnawing hunger, the devil dressed in white. She did not think she was thinking of the ocean, and yet… as the rosy twilight faded to night, she found herself drawn to the water. Not the violent, salty water she was used to but something far different. This water was flat and still and fresh. The scent of it was almost sweet; while this intrigued the kelpie, it also faintly disgusted her-- if the lake were not so beautiful in the way it fashioned itself a temple to the moon, it would be atrocious.
Anandi needed deep water and strong currents, waves crashing delightfully on the rocks. She needed salt and blood and room to hunt, to pierce and shake and thrash. She needed all of these things (and more, always more, more red, sticky, beating red) to bow low to the devil that lived behind her eyes. And the lake contained none of them.
She was not alone at the water tonight, but this did not bother her. Such beauty deserved be shared and reveled in. And the mare standing knee-deep in the lake was an exquisite specimen. Anandi just watched for a moment as a boy approached, peddled conversation, left. No game at all. The kelpie snorted, unimpressed.
As the boy leaves, Anandi approaches. She moves smooth and sure as a sickle over the lake’s sloping shore. Her skin greedily soaks up the moonlight. One quiet step into the cold water, then another. She does not flinch. She does not feel the cold. Eventually she draws next to the crowned stranger, no more than a length or so away. When their eyes meet the water horse smiles coyly, almost shyly.
The way they stand together they are oil, slick-beautiful on the moon-mirror lake. The earth holds its breath like the start of a fairytale, or a song.
And then Anandi is gone.
She slips beneath the water with a very quiet, shucked-oyster sound, and Manon is all alone with the night and the water and the moon... and the moon’s reflection, which wavers delicately like an illusion about to burst. Like the film of a dream, on the edge of exploding and revealing either something very terrible or very marvelous.
The kelpie's head eventually rises from the water several lengths in front of the exquisite stranger. She smiles shyly at the other mare once again, water dripping like diamonds from her muzzle. “Are you a princess too?” Anandi gestures towards the stranger’s crown, her jade eyes gleaming silver beneath long, dark, fluttering lashes. The full, heavy moon sits behind her shoulders and shimmers around her beautiful features like a wedding veil.
we don't have to worry bout nothing 'Cause we got the fire and we're burning one hell of a something
She found that they would all go to her eventually; the cold-hearted with a mind but naught for disaster, the weak-willed who could resist no urges, the most elevated of them that never quite escape their buried desires. She was a cliche--a moth to a flame, a lighthouse guide to wayward ships--and it seemed that even those not looking for her came around at some point or another. But she was no siren, sang no calls to beckon them forth. Fate, as it simply was, just always leaned into her favor.
Her words, her question, hung a heavy blanket over their heads as the water wavered and held its breath for the boy's answer. It would not be appeased that night, and so neither would she, as the silence spanned and nothing more was said. He seemed far away, so far away as she might have been before he came, as though their places had been traded and they stood where the other had just been. Maybe the moon was more captivating than she, maybe the shock of the cool water had worked its way up, up, and consumed him entirely. But whatever the reason, he merely nodded once and made way back to the shore, and she was just as alone again as she was before him.
Perhaps, after all, there was nothing more to be shared between them.
The waves from his departure had no time to settle before they were disturbed again, and Manon had done much the same as the first time: she merely looked out, away, somewhere else except there, and accepted the next challenger to try their hand against hers. But this presence was different, it was not like the man's that stood beside her only breaths prior, it wavered with an air of allure and threatened to send shivers down a spotted spine. How strange it was, the unusual feeling that took hold of her heart and mind and gave her every sign to run. How ironic it was, that she had both just stopped the running from her dreams and seemed to have entered a new one. Why her heart picked up its pace--why she chose to stay and find out--were enigmas that would probably never find answers.
Little did she know she had more reason to fear this companion over the last.
She was very suddenly alone again, but not truly, for the subtle hush of the underwater spaces that swirled around her legs told her the girl wasn't really gone. A game, perhaps, of hide and seek, but Manon would sate no desires save her own that night. With the moon holding steady above them, so full in its cycle, it would not bare witness to the copper lady lowering her head for the sake of formalities. And so when the finned creature appeared once more, head on and outlined in silver by that watchful moon, Manon simply flicked her ears in disdain and gazed upon her washed out frame, sure that if she kept some semblance of indifference the pounding in her chest would ease. The girl was captivating, entrancing in her appeal, and whatever spell had befallen Manon shattered at the words posed to her; she blinked once, regarding her company, and a saccharine smile spilled across her lips as she tilted her head just enough to allow a hanging gem on her crown to swing freely. "A queen of something, maybe, depending who you ask." Of roses, of deception, of the Scarab--she wondered what Senna would think of the latter. "And you--" child, she almost added, but hastily caught her tongue, "--what are you queen of?"
Maybe some part of her knew she was in the presence of a kelpie but chose to ignore it, maybe she was simply dangerous--like Manon. Regardless of what she was, Manon held onto her smile and softened her voice, "A princess has someone who rules over them, and you should bow to no one..." slightly encouraging, slightly sinister, she trailed off and allowed them both to be consumed by the growing night.
if I’ve dreamt or thought you
a pack of blood fresh-drawn
A gem dangles alluringly near a piercing blue eye. Anandi feels something hinge in her stomach. It swings in time with the gem on the stranger’s crown.
The kelpie has seen that beautiful face before, although not in nearly this level of detail. The drawing the twin had made (she couldn’t differentiate the two twins, didn’t much see the point anyway) was undeniably the woman before her, but it was so flat and lifeless in comparison to reality. He was talented, but it simply was not possible to capture the look in those piercing blue eyes, or the character expressed in the elegant jut of her chin. The effortlessness of being, and the gravity formed by such effortlessness. Hers was a beauty that transcended vision. It reminded Anandi of her sisters, of herself.
Even as she slipped beneath the dark waters and darted along the lake floor, she felt the weight of Manon’s presence, calling to her like the moon.
It was a shame that Anandi had to do what she was about to do. They might get along quite well otherwise.
She calls herself a queen of something. Maybe. Anandi smiles. She’s thinking of Apolonia, how they talked of being queens. Apolonia, weapon at her hip like a love letter. “Oh, I’m just a princess. Princess of a twilight kingdom. But the night suits me better, don’t you think?” She floats closer, lets the moonlight play silver light across her sleek grey back.
Anandi practically purrs as Manon says she should bow to no one. She loved the way a compliment felt, and the shape it made on the lips of someone beautiful. “Queens can be useful,” she murmurs with a shruglike sway of her head. “Don’t you think?” More useful than not-queens, generally.
“And sovereign Marisol is good to me.” It was not entirely a lie. There was something dangerous and confusing that pulsed like a velvet heartbeat between emissary and sovereign. She still had not decided exactly how she felt about Marisol, and the more time passed the more uncomfortable this made her. Anandi did not like nebulous things, even when they were dark and delightful. She strove for control, internal and external, and the relationship she developed with her queen was something that felt wildly out of hand.
But at least it wasn’t boring. “Plus, she has interesting tasks for me, sometimes.” Anandi rises to her feet. Her tail shifts fluidly again to two long legs. Knee-deep in the lake, water drip-drops from her belly, scattering ripples across the still water. She smiles sweetly, and takes a single step toward the other mare. Nothing about her should be threatening, but everything is. “Your name is Manon, isn’t it? I'm Anandi.”
hanging dark red from a hook
higher than my heart
A N A N D I
