Hang hallowed halos

KIADA i wish that i could say, i am a light that never goes out. There are some days when the Harpy forgets when Deimos had died and the world around her fell with him – some days when she thinks he was still there, a pillar in the north, waiting, watching, brooding. But she recalls that terrible day when she was young, when her brother was missing and she was searching for him, that the news spread of the fall of the monarch. And she hadn’t even gone to see him – instead, creating false promises with false, chaotic gods. She looks ahead as she mentions the Rift, shooting a quiet glance toward him, before her gaze remains on the path ahead as she walks beside him. “It’s a long story.” She sighs sadly, stuffing her hands into her pockets as she walks, icy gaze softening and darkening. “After you died, there was a creature named Kisamoa that came to Helovia. He was supposed to help us fix the darkness in the land, through the bone marshes. We had to collect things to clean it up. Ru’in was there, and Zo… Thranduil had found him and brought him to my mother. And things were nice.” She recalls, head tilting up to glance at the sky, at the boughs of trees up above them, of the lanterns that danced in the winds. “I had helped Kisamoa previously and he gave me an amulet. He told me it would protect those I cared about, that it would give me the power to help them. But one day, all the gods appeared. Those Rift gods? Kisamoa was a combination of them all, revived and ready to pull us to his world. Naturally, many refused, including our gods that Kisamoa killed without a second thought. And Ru’in was one of them. I watched as he and Romina were killed. I lost Kianzo through it, my mother threw me and Khairi into the portal before following.” She looks over to him to see how he’s handling it. “When we arrived, the world was dark and different, with eyes that watched your every movement. And that amulet he had gifted me, gave me this.” She says, turning to point at the X etched into her neck, gnarled and deep, with a blackened hue within it’s depths. A dirt that no matter how much she scrubbed and scrubbed, it never left. “He called a meeting of sorts, and I screamed at him.” She snorts with the memory, recalling how brave she had once been. “Have you ever yelled at a god? It’s terrifying and exhilarating. He… He apologized, gave me gifts and a tenderness I don't think many saw.” She begins to stutter over her words. “And then, he tried to bring those who died back, he opened a river of them, a river of the dead – but they came back wrong and vengeful. And Kisamoa, he began to drown within the river. He was weak, so very weak. And I braved the river, swimming down into it after him. I found some armor of the Rift gods, helped to retrieve it and give it to him, brought him back to the surface.” She looks down to her feet. “I thought maybe if he died, the world and everyone within it would die too. And I wasn’t ready yet.” but i flicker from time to time.