the thicker the skin the deeper the scar
Amalia <3
Deimos Ignatius
the Resurrected Sword
Warden of Halo / Guildmaster

Age: 33 | Height: 6'4" | Race: Hybrid | Nationality: Outlander | Citizenship: Halo
Level: 14 - Strg: 72 - Dext: 72 - Endr: 73 - Luck: 80 - Int: 3
BELIAL - Mythical - Peryton (Blend) ZURIEL - Mythical - Unicorn (Healing)
Played by: Heather Offline
Change author:
Posts: 6,554 | Total: 10,647
MP: 9824
#1
Deimos
THE RESURRECTED SWORD
How did you survive? they ask
How long did you suffer?
how dark did they tint your dreams?
The Sword wandered; mostly for the sake of clarity, for thoughts, for processing, for trying to find a way forward when all he wanted to do was fall straight back into brooding; melancholic ashes.

Their efforts had been in vain, like a pattern, like a cycle; try, try, try, fail, fail, fail, rinse and repeat. For some reason, he’d managed to be a determined slate along the intervals of the Spire, thinking, believing, this time would be different, and they’d make a difference. Perhaps the blight would have ended, would’ve ceased stifling and choking and wrappings its claws around Ronin, around Kiada, around any number of those effected. Perhaps they would have found a way to do anything other than provoke and instigate (like the rebellion, a strong start to backwards intervals, reshaped and remolded). Perhaps they would have been successful.

He snorted, dragging his cart, picking up a few twigs and sticks for the upcoming winter; kindling for fires, for whatever infernos or conflagrations they’d have to summon. It was mindless work, so his skull could be occupied by other venues and considerations, calculating airs, machinations grinding against his enamel.

What were they supposed to do now?

The beast felt limited, which was ridiculous, because he was also obstinate, stubborn, and tenacious, capable of bringing weight upon his shoulders and soldiering on; used to the cumbersome pursuits, the heavier endeavors, the bestial exploits. He could go to the Gods, ask and inquire, offer something he thought of worth, only to be ignored (the customary action; an expectation of defeat the moment he walked near a shrine). Could he contribute to the ongoing studies?

Then there was Long Night, pressing its chilling breath against the leaves, coming on the winds, on the churnings of time. Before they realized, it would be here, and more threats, more nooses, more impending strife would rear its malicious head.

His eyes drifted along the Glade, struggling not to clench his jaw, staring along the expanse as Zuriel wandered nearby – apparently very curious and inquisitive, and Deimos wondered if she’d never been here before. She darted close to the shore, to the embankment, then back again, allured by the glowing stones, soft, dulcet blues as the sun began its descent.

You will be better she rang out across their bond, and it sent a visible shudder down the length of his spine; she wasn’t even looking at him, and he couldn’t follow the echoes, the strains, where he’d heard the stanzas before – then she snorted and stuck her nose into the water.

How? he wanted to ask – but either distracted, deterred, or being purposefully obtuse, the unicorn didn’t answer.
- until you had blood glistening on your teeth
- until your suffering paled in comparison to their own
- until you learned to enjoy the sounds of screams
Amalia Chandrakant
the Archangel
Baker

Age: 29 | Height: 5'6 | Race: Demi-god | Nationality: Natural | Citizenship: Stormbreak
Level: 5 - Strg: 49 - Dext: 45 - Endr: 52 - Luck: 49 - Int:
JYOTI - Mythical - Starwhale (Humpback)
Played by: shark Offline
Change author:
Posts: 3,098 | Total: 4,577
MP: 2580
#2
AMALIA
THE SHIELD OF SAFRIN
i think it's beautiful how a star's light
travels the universe long after it dies
Wings, tan against a bright blue sky, specked with cream and midnight blue and a sparkling spread of stars. She glides upon their broad expanse, letting the gusts of warm air lift her, shielding against the onset of cold with feather and a swiftly beating heart.

She does this when she can do nothing else, when the world feels far too vast and the girl too small, too meaningless. When if she stays herself she will crumble, crushed beneath the pressing weight of an unfathomably expansive world, of sins and stories and failings, falling, failings, more and more the more she tries, two steps forward only to be knocked down.

On the days it is too hard to be Amalia, the girl becomes something else. Sometimes, most days, it is the leopard: fierce and feral, strong and cunning, a beast of instinct and feline grace. In that skin she is fearless, wild, playful and brave; she does not think before she acts but lives to every fullest point, enjoys each moment and fights each war.

Today, it is the owl. She feels her mother in the owl, for it is a wise form, aloof and silent in the starlit skies. Easily, eagerly, it slips between the boughs, less shadow than flash of silver light, calm and cool and pointed. It is the form she takes to clear her head, to see the world in a cleaner light. Clarity is what she needs today: underneath the weight of failure and futility, the looming blight and crumbling Spire, she is spiraling, flailing, drowning in the depths, in danger of becoming little more than a ghost.

But the owl is strong and stalwart and true, and she wears the wings with resolution, a promise to deserve. In her wake and at her side, a cosmic whale flies along, singing and cooing and soothing and believing, still rather unaccustomed to human despair. Over time Amalia has come to learn that Jyoti is infinitely older than she; and yet the humpback is scarcely an infant, each year a drop in the pool of her life. It gives the baker some forced perspective, reminds her that in the end each moment will lead to a million more.

That all they can do is do their best, despite the pressures of the world.

So she muses and so she mulls as she flutters beneath the boughs of trees, wafting like an autumn zephyr through fiery leaves and copper canopies. It is Jyoti who spots the pair, familiar and welcome like a furnace in the cold. She calls out in a low, keen voice, singing softly the song of her kind, a hummed concerto of joyful youth. The starwhale drops down to greet Deimos, swimming lightly about his head three times before flickering off to hunt down Zuriel, starlight shimmering in her wake.

Amalia, too, has seen her lover, though her approach is a quieter thing. Silent and swift the owl descends, dropping just above his head (close enough to notice, wanting to be seen, but not to be captured, not yet, not yet,) before landing in the clearing before him, her back to him as her feet touch the ground. Clad in white and green and brown she is an earthen creature, her long gold hair loose about her shoulders, red scarf tied tight about her neck. "Tell me a story, Mr. Shade?"- and she turns her head to glance back at him, dark eyes sparkling, fondness ringing through her voice. Do you remember? her face seems to say, a small, sad smile tugging at her lips. Do you remember luxere and songs, simpler times when the world made sense?
That's what I want to be in this world —
someone whose light lingers after I'm gone

Coding base by Sky!
Deimos Ignatius
the Resurrected Sword
Warden of Halo / Guildmaster

Age: 33 | Height: 6'4" | Race: Hybrid | Nationality: Outlander | Citizenship: Halo
Level: 14 - Strg: 72 - Dext: 72 - Endr: 73 - Luck: 80 - Int: 3
BELIAL - Mythical - Peryton (Blend) ZURIEL - Mythical - Unicorn (Healing)
Played by: Heather Offline
Change author:
Posts: 6,554 | Total: 10,647
MP: 9824
#3
Deimos
THE RESURRECTED SWORD
How did you survive? they ask
How long did you suffer?
how dark did they tint your dreams?
Maybe he simply didn’t want to turn back into dust, again, without something to his name; more than Sword, more than Reaper, more than one other figure in the wilds. Once, he might’ve been a tower, a monolith, a Colossus with his silence and stony fixtures, a piece of marble, carved out of abhorrence and contempt, promises of bloodshed from the shadows. Now he stood precariously along every precipice with the rest of the fold, striving for clarity beyond their reach, attempting to battle the unknown. At least in the Basin, in Helovia, in Isilme, he knew exactly what their enemies were like – the same as them, twisting and turning back into foils, yearning to keep their lands, their artifacts, their inhabitants safe, their avaricious grasps clawing, tugging, for terrain, for prestige, for power.

Here, they fight against a disease that bites back with fervor, and monsters that linger in the Stygian voids, coming alive only to feast upon bones on crisp, chilling evenings, thriving on ignorance and futility.

So he fought against the rush of damnation slinking over his spine, the murmurs of the past, of yesteryears, stretching over his foundations (not enough, not enough, not enough), maneuvering along the embankment again, mindless motions, fluid, exacted and replicated a hundred times before, as the battle of his own demons waged and burned. It would be so easy, so simple, to sink back into his bitterness, into his rancor, into dwelling amidst the contorted abyss, simmering in the ashes – but it would also be empty, leading him nowhere but backwards.

The warrior lifted his head to the skies at the first familiar call of low keens and soft, whale song, expecting Jyoti’s essence in the air, welcome and enticing when all he’d wanted to do was hang his skull and drift hellbound. The hums were igniting, enlightening, a better, soothing, assuaging effort than he’d ever be able to conduct, the wisps of a smile curling over his lips with little hesitation as the companion lingered along his head. Out of habit, his arms and hands stretched out to greet her, with a light pat, a scratch, while he was emblazoned with stardust.

Then she floated off, towards Zuriel – the unicorn’s cranium lifted sharply, away from her riveted notions on the glow stones, proffering a light nicker in greeting, then gesturing wildly at the rocks again.

And he was left with silence, then plumes, feathers, unraveling and shifting, owl turned woman; unearthly and ethereal, Mr. Shade poised from her lips. His mouth had already turned into a greater grin, maneuvering to meet her, the coy glance enough to entice, palms, hands, and arms softly wrapping around her waist, her navel, pulling her into him. He thought at first to rest his head on her shoulders, but realized she already carried enough, and placed his chin on top of her gilded crown, mischievous and devilish as the glow of the sun threatened to fade.

Maybe it wasn’t fair to have these moments, these instances, where hearts and minds could rest, but he’d always been greedy, always been selfish, always been wanton for everything and anything; and he would rather tell a tale than sink into the murk of their own making. The last intervals they’d had in the glade, besides songs with the bard, had been coaxing Luxere, his stanzas and lyrics whittled from drunken exploits, ivory tents shrouded in victorious depths – shattered the next day. But theirs had been better, glowing deer and stares, before, before, before - he’d gladly do it again. “A story,” he murmured at first, voice and chest rumbling against her, reverberations calm, composed, grin dimpling his cheeks. “There was once a boy born beside the ocean, who would race along the waves and tides all day long. The rest of the children in the kingdom would gather on the shores alongside him, swim, laugh, and play until the moon was lit and their parents called them home.” The story itself was meaningless, just a passing moment in time that he could recall and remember, but simple, better times, better days.

“His mother always warned him not to chase the gulls. So, whenever she was not looking, he would instigate a challenge. ‘Who could catch one?’ he would holler, and they would try until exhaustion drove them to lie on the sands.” He paused, blue eyes looking out over the glade and visualizing the sea, the rolling currents, the depths and fathoms of things no longer there. “The gulls were smarter than the children, and would sit on the waves, far, far out from the shore. Even if they were strong swimmers, they knew better than to risk life and limb, had heard the legends of the tides and their vengeance.” Eventually, they’d outgrown the myths; but not that hour. “One day, the boy’s father seemed troubled and vexed. He had not laughed in what felt like ages.” Ignatius had always been bold, boisterous, and exuberant: politics might’ve had a hand in his mood, dire, pending consequences coiling over fire and fury. “So he believed he would catch a gull for his father. He went out in the early morning, and found a fledgling, not yet experienced in avoiding wild children, and pounced.” Deimos waited, amused, seeing if she would become curious in the absence of his continuation, or simply linger, ready for the ridiculous narrative to be over.

“The gull bit him, left him bleeding, and the entire crowd of kids began laughing. His father had joined them, on a hunch, and was amidst the clamor too.” Stone had been amongst the unimpressed; but he’d shrugged off the pain for the glory of his father’s smile, the grin that wouldn’t come again for some time.

The saga finished and curtailed, silly and stupid, and ended on his sigh, breath curling and coiling before him. “Your turn.”
- until you had blood glistening on your teeth
- until your suffering paled in comparison to their own
- until you learned to enjoy the sounds of screams
Amalia Chandrakant
the Archangel
Baker

Age: 29 | Height: 5'6 | Race: Demi-god | Nationality: Natural | Citizenship: Stormbreak
Level: 5 - Strg: 49 - Dext: 45 - Endr: 52 - Luck: 49 - Int:
JYOTI - Mythical - Starwhale (Humpback)
Played by: shark Offline
Change author:
Posts: 3,098 | Total: 4,577
MP: 2580
#4
AMALIA
THE SHIELD OF SAFRIN
i think it's beautiful how a star's light
travels the universe long after it dies
He comes to her, and she wonders if she is not a little the siren, able to lure men and gods with the lilting tone of a gilded tongue. Will their bewitchment spell their deaths; will she snare him in pretty words and soft embraces, only to dash him on the rocks, to leave him drowning in the deep? Not on purpose, never on purpose- but she does not yet trust herself to be otherwise, anything but the harbinger of ill.

But no matter what mistakes she makes, how much she destroys through good intent, she trusts that he can swim.

Arms slip easily around her waist, as though they were meant to be there, to rest so lightly on her hips, to shield her lonely heart. She reaches her hands up his forearms, gently caressing the first and skin, her fingers tracing trails on his and lingering, resting, belonging to him. A smile flickers over her face as his chin rests on her gilded crown; "Hi," she murmurs, her chin upturned, wrinkling her nose as his beard tickles her face.

Compliant, generous, he begins to spin a tale of seafoam and gulls, children laughing in daring challenge, his voice a rumble upon her back. Amalia listens, enraptured, enthralled, humming her laughter at appropriate intervals, her fingers still playing a game on his. Her dark eyes close as she tries to picture it, but it is hard to envision something she has never seen. The ocean remains a mysterious thing, too large for the snow globe girl to comprehend. Water which stretches as far as the sun, and he but a boy, buoyant and free, trying to capture a bird for his father, laughing and lively, happy and bright-

A wistful sigh and a quiet laugh escape her coral lips as he ends his tale on a triumphant note. "I wish I could have seen that," she hums, leaning against him and breathing his scent.

Then he asks for another, and the girl licks her lips, the age old game of give and take an easy dance to step with him as guide, the only one she understands. "Hmm... There once was a girl who dreamt of flying, but had been born without any wings." Every time she's asked to change, the same reply: not yet, not yet. It was one of the only battles her mother had won against her Nani, to keep her from choosing the life of attuned until she knew she wanted nothing else.

"She would not let this deter her, though, and soon became infamous for her determination to try, climbing to the top of every structure and perching on every impossible roost." Her mother had found this trait amusing, laughing as her scrawny child clambered and challenged and frequently fell, never quite injured enough to be deterred.

"One day, she decided to do something daring: to attempt to reach the highest part of the wood without wings, despite the impossibility of the feat. So she gathered her friends and slipped away before her mother woke one day, making her way to this very Glade, to the tall tree over the Oasis- just there." She points at the offending growth, still towering above the quiet pool. It is an impressive specimen, though now that she has seen the Greatwood lacking in any real grandeur. Still, to Amalia's younger self the giant seemed to touch the sky.

"The ascent went well, until it didn't. She was feeling confident, cocky even, and in a moment of hubris leaned out to wave to her assembled friends below. It was then that her finger slipped, and before she knew it she was tumbling through the air- flying, sort of, but not in the way she always dreamed.

Luckily, the water below was deep, and her friends were able to fetch her home. Unluckily, her mother was not amused. It was a full season before she was able to go into the glade again, and only then with the promise to stop climbing. A promise she absolutely did not keep."
She laughs, shaking her head against him, remembering fondly the follies of youth.
That's what I want to be in this world —
someone whose light lingers after I'm gone

Coding base by Sky!
Deimos Ignatius
the Resurrected Sword
Warden of Halo / Guildmaster

Age: 33 | Height: 6'4" | Race: Hybrid | Nationality: Outlander | Citizenship: Halo
Level: 14 - Strg: 72 - Dext: 72 - Endr: 73 - Luck: 80 - Int: 3
BELIAL - Mythical - Peryton (Blend) ZURIEL - Mythical - Unicorn (Healing)
Played by: Heather Offline
Change author:
Posts: 6,554 | Total: 10,647
MP: 9824
#5
Deimos
THE RESURRECTED SWORD
How did you survive? they ask
How long did you suffer?
how dark did they tint your dreams?
Mistakes were a constant, and failures were imminent – his mother used to say it was how they would grow, even as her mouth took on a thin line, even as she watched him make the same ones over and over again, even he boldly proceeded where he shouldn’t have. He followed in his devotion, in his ardor, in his strength, might, and convictions; and if it led him down into rubble and ruin again, he would only have himself to blame. He followed and guided, escorted and guarded, never to touch the divine – always thought he was closer to the heavens with her, in the gilded, halcyon moments, either when they scorched and scathed, or when they whispered, crooned, and cherished.

“Hello,” Deimos murmured in return, intertwining fingers, hovering around her like a mantle, a dark cloak with wistful pieces amongst the rubble. When his portions were concluded, depths of sand stuck between toes, a rise of salt air, I wish I could have seen that brandished on her tongue, and it was a funny thing to him – to have never seen anything beyond these woods or glades; but he has lived too many lives and journeyed too many places, rooted in one and then the other, drawn by blades and glory, triumph and disaster, only to learn devastation was the only true foundation he’d ever held. One day they might see it again, the ripple of the waves and the vast unwinding of current, the tide rolling over rocks, only for them to appear later, when traces of water waned, pulled elsewhere by the moon’s clockwork disciples.

Then he listened, and despite his lack of imagination, gone with the stalks of plots and strategies, gone with the tomes and annals, the choreographed, artistic work of battlefield blood and sin-stained hands, he smiled at the notion of girl Amalia, dreaming of flying, no wings, no feathers, hastened to her sides. He wondered if some were born in the stead anyway – immediately recognized as animals, as beasts, as ethereal creatures, like the measures of his Abandoned veins; already known by the time they stole their first breath. Or did they all have to be earned, begged, asked for?

He likely thought of flying once too, before he was old enough to bear armor and carry swords – spreading his arms out wide across a great chassis, hollering and howling into the skies – and probably thwarted by an older boy or one of his parents before he made a sacrificial leap; blessed one moment, crushed and devastated the next. It might’ve been awe-inspiring for that singular second, to stand, to glide, to hover over everyone and everything.

But a tiny Amalia hadn’t been foiled or derailed, grinning at the notion of determination, the same thing he saw day after day, cultivated and concocted in the scheme of flight, in the realm of structures and perches meant to hold birds and not little girls. A gathering of friends below, a challenge, a provocation, how they’d all managed to slip away from unsuspecting elders, how mischief reigned even at tender ages, similarities sparked even amongst their differences; he withheld his laugh, but only because she’d persisted in the tale. His eyes followed her pointed measures, at the towering tree, at its monolithic shroud hanging over water – he would’ve launched too, if only for the thrill of the descent into the pool, scattering his companions with a wake of rushing water, a cool, chilling call to home.

Then failure, because while she hadn’t lacked motivation, aspirations, or ambitions, the world hadn’t granted or gifted her the plumage, or insight, of an owl. Friends had saved, mothers had scolded, and timeframe punishments had been arranged. A blow – but not forever. “She did not,” he chuckled in response, so his chest rumbled and his head unearthed itself from her crown, lifting higher, straightening out his form, so he could glimpse and wonder again. He wanted to say he was proud of her, that he admired her tenacity, that he wanted to stoke its efforts and alight her soul again. Instead, the twist of curiosity overtook him. “What is it like?” To fly?

Was it as natural as the enchantments seething in his veins – the death, the vehemence, old, natural allies and comrades to his damned, doomed heart? Or was it a learned, practiced nuance, that came with blessings and consecrations, granted and given to those who deserved?
- until you had blood glistening on your teeth
- until your suffering paled in comparison to their own
- until you learned to enjoy the sounds of screams
Amalia Chandrakant
the Archangel
Baker

Age: 29 | Height: 5'6 | Race: Demi-god | Nationality: Natural | Citizenship: Stormbreak
Level: 5 - Strg: 49 - Dext: 45 - Endr: 52 - Luck: 49 - Int:
JYOTI - Mythical - Starwhale (Humpback)
Played by: shark Offline
Change author:
Posts: 3,098 | Total: 4,577
MP: 2580
#6
AMALIA
THE SHIELD OF SAFRIN
i think it's beautiful how a star's light
travels the universe long after it dies
He lifts his chin off of her head, and the girl resists the urge to spin around, press her face against his chest and close herself off from a tumultuous world. It would be nice to take shelter in his arms, ignore the failings and falling and trials of a world that has never forgiven them for their arrogance, never rewarded the mischief of youth with anything but loss. Yes, she defied, and yes, she climbed, and in the end what did she gain? A fear of drowning, a broken arm, her mother's anger, a hundred tears. She climbed many things in the lapsing days after, but she never again took on that tree.

Wiser, perhaps, for her fear, but oh, at what cost, at what cost?

These are the parts of the tales they do not tell: the dark edges on a silver cloud, the painful failings, the things that have gone wrong.

Sometimes it feels like it is hard to find any silver lining. But then she remembers him.

He follows her tale with a quiet question, and she knows what it means even if he doesn't say it, the thing that he actually asks. "Hmm," comes her thoughtful exhalation, eyes on the water as she raises his fingers to press against he lips, musings punctuated by the pads of his digits as she kisses them softly, one at a time. What is it like? Like dreaming. Like singing. Like standing on the top of the tallest tree and knowing that the world is beneath, wide and waiting for her to live.

"It's like swimming, I imagine, but you can still breathe, and there are no limits except the sky." Arms raise up to paint the picture of it, fingers stretching toward the clouds, wistful and entranced. "It's like freedom," - a novel concept, still, to the girl born in a dome.

Letting her arms drop, Amalia pulls away from him, his hands still in hers as she spins to face him, smiling and falling into the blue, the endless expanse of his glittering gaze. "If you were Attuned I could take you flying," she says, tilting her head, her lips upcurled wistfully, arms extended as she dances lightly away, never breaking her hold on his hands. "And you could show me the sea."
That's what I want to be in this world —
someone whose light lingers after I'm gone

Coding base by Sky!
Deimos Ignatius
the Resurrected Sword
Warden of Halo / Guildmaster

Age: 33 | Height: 6'4" | Race: Hybrid | Nationality: Outlander | Citizenship: Halo
Level: 14 - Strg: 72 - Dext: 72 - Endr: 73 - Luck: 80 - Int: 3
BELIAL - Mythical - Peryton (Blend) ZURIEL - Mythical - Unicorn (Healing)
Played by: Heather Offline
Change author:
Posts: 6,554 | Total: 10,647
MP: 9824
#7
Deimos
THE RESURRECTED SWORD
How did you survive? they ask
How long did you suffer?
how dark did they tint your dreams?
The Reaper, the Sword, could spend eternity painting his failures on canvas, but he was convinced she had no use for tapestries stroked and stoked in blood, in catacombs, in sepulchers, the demonstrative mistakes becoming unholy nightmares, reality sinking farther and faster than girls who wanted to fly or boys who thought to catch things they couldn’t have. His father laughed and then it dissipated, she sunk, and then time sought to riddle them with promises and aspirations, to keen their ambitions, to instigate, to provoke, again and again – and to what ends? To what means? They were not broken – because he refused to bend entirely, because he refused to snap in the direction of their fractures and fissures – but some days it was close. The warrior had things, beings, to guard now; no moments to hang his head in sorrow, shame, and humiliation; the world didn’t rest for the weary or wicked, held no sympathy for those who couldn’t endure. Find another way, it would shrug, apathetic at miniscule layers and lacquer left in dust.

After all, he could tell her a thousand times he didn’t deserve her, and she still wouldn’t relent – kisses on callouses, a tremble in the line of his motions, not parting, not swaying, breathing over the mass of gilded tassels, ghostly plumes devilish and tender, thinking to tilt his cranium a fraction and billow air along her neck. But then she answered and he had to divulge into thinking, pressing his lips on the back of her nape; like swimming but with air, lungs filling instead of biding their time, no limits except the sky: freedom, liberation, deliverance. Those were things he’d once had – only when he was young and foolish and incapable of understanding what it meant – gone in the clink of armor and chainmail, in the slash of a sword, along and upon a cold throne, encased in rime and ice. More nuances he couldn’t have again; but nicer indulgences and dreams. Her arms were a depiction: clouds and light, reaching for horizons and being truly able to touch, to ignite, along their unending surface.

Then she spun before him, dancer steps in his stoic, solid immobility, an arch to his brow in the midst of her smile, and he wondered if she was planning something – a whimsical bout to their stories and myths. “But I am not,” and he refused to let his grin diminish; the lines yearning to topple down into a frown, teased, tormented, and taunted again with moments of splendor and decadence he couldn’t have. I am Abandoned went unsaid; some truer words never spoken. He moved his arm, let it extend her into a twirl, another spin, without passerbys and strangers to bombard, mutilate, and ram into. “One day I will show you anyway.” Because the rivers, streams, and brooks had to lead somewhere, and there might’ve been an endless, eternal blue beyond those means – powerful and insistent, sublime and potent, yielding to nothing and no one.
- until you had blood glistening on your teeth
- until your suffering paled in comparison to their own
- until you learned to enjoy the sounds of screams
Amalia Chandrakant
the Archangel
Baker

Age: 29 | Height: 5'6 | Race: Demi-god | Nationality: Natural | Citizenship: Stormbreak
Level: 5 - Strg: 49 - Dext: 45 - Endr: 52 - Luck: 49 - Int:
JYOTI - Mythical - Starwhale (Humpback)
Played by: shark Offline
Change author:
Posts: 3,098 | Total: 4,577
MP: 2580
#8
AMALIA
THE SHIELD OF SAFRIN
i think it's beautiful how a star's light
travels the universe long after it dies
He traces lips down the nape of her neck, more attention than she could ever deserve, sweet and soft for one so rugged, the gentle edge of the Sword. They do not need music to dance anymore; the know the steps intuitively, can bend and sway to the beat of their hearts, finding rhythm and symphony in one another's embrace.

Her fingers curl against his as their arms extend apart, the grin on her lips matching his, mischief for mischief, ardor for ardor. Again her black eyes sink into his blue, sparkling, shining, opals in the deep; he makes her feel like gemstones, like gold. He looks at her like she has all the value of precious stones and painted glass, and she does not understand it, but it makes her feel alive.

Bare feet don't feel the cold of the quickly approaching frost, protected as they are by a leopard's pads. Her head tilts inquisitively at his denial, thoughts and thoughts and thoughts and thoughts racing through her mind. There is something in the simple denial that catches her off guard, makes her pause a moment in her mischief to regard the man before her.

He raises his arm to spin her away and the girl's mirth is back, a pealing laugh escaping her lips as she twirls barefoot on the shore. Smiling, laughing, she coils beneath his hand, happy for a moment to leave her worries be, to bask in the wonder that is him, to give and take and share. "And then you can reach me to swim!"

Whirlwind complete she crashes back, her body pressing up to his as she falls into his orbit, letting her face rest a moment on his shoulder before tilting up her chin, onyx eyes vibrant and glittering as she searches in his blues. "You're not Attuned," the shield says softly, "But you could be." You do not have to be Abandoned. You are loved, and loved, and loved.
That's what I want to be in this world —
someone whose light lingers after I'm gone

Coding base by Sky!
Deimos Ignatius
the Resurrected Sword
Warden of Halo / Guildmaster

Age: 33 | Height: 6'4" | Race: Hybrid | Nationality: Outlander | Citizenship: Halo
Level: 14 - Strg: 72 - Dext: 72 - Endr: 73 - Luck: 80 - Int: 3
BELIAL - Mythical - Peryton (Blend) ZURIEL - Mythical - Unicorn (Healing)
Played by: Heather Offline
Change author:
Posts: 6,554 | Total: 10,647
MP: 9824
#9
Deimos
THE RESURRECTED SWORD
How did you survive? they ask
How long did you suffer?
how dark did they tint your dreams?
“Yes,” he answered; no more profound, but another easy promise when all of these colossal, monumental things seemed to seethe apart or become solved (until the next, then the next). Swimming was an escape into power and potency, blending and lending souls into a world amassed in its own blinding prestige; embarking, twisting and turning in its hold. There were no queens or kings snarling along their thrones, no rules, a liberation along its own terms, freedom from land, from the grueling fault lines, from ambitious knives, from blighted aspirations. It was endless and eternal, rough and gentle, all depending on which coil one’s form, one’s figure, was swept within – laden and laced with respect for an authority far greater. It wasn’t faith, not like the gods, not like the deities, but ability, strength, and convictions, learning roles and capacities in the undulation of waves, of currents, of seas.

His smile remained while she twirled and spun, along her laughter (and how long has it been since they’d all chuckled, been amused, diverted, not hollowed but hallowed?), tilting his head in study, arm continuing its extension and movements, contorting her into coils of motion and glee – reeling back into him when her rotations and revolutions were complete. That was when he breathed, long and low, intentionally sighing so her hair fluttered, spinning back into the wind. Everything else has been about catching falling voids and crashing into patterns of failures – and he was determined not to keep doing it, striving to avoid the pitfalls and nuances again and again and again –

Her head rested on his shoulder, a tilt of her chin indicating some aura of mischief he couldn’t fathom, ignorant and unknown towards the details – his life a myriad of calculations foreign to this world. This realm seemed to enjoy taunting him in his ignorance; once he believed he understood and comprehended gestures, seasons, and cycles, something else reared its head and he was bewildered, confused, and surprised, repeating the inquiries, the questions, like a fool, like a dunce. For a second or two, the Sword thought the Shield was teasing him; but you could be dangling on a thread.

The thing was – he didn’t want to give up magic or incantations, the invocations curling through his skin, flesh, and bone. The deadly machinations were a part of him as owl feathers and leopard fur were a portion of her existence: he’d never been without their dastardly wake, their foul touch, their humming, crooning, breathing irreverence. Is that what she was asking of him? He didn’t know – and while her eyes were vibrant, his narrowed, speculation raw and uncertainty prevailing. “What do you mean?” His thoughts weren’t on those who had both; despite knowing several individuals who harbored and harpooned both reaches: shifting and enchantments.

He’d never even believed himself capable of anything other than destruction.
- until you had blood glistening on your teeth
- until your suffering paled in comparison to their own
- until you learned to enjoy the sounds of screams
Amalia Chandrakant
the Archangel
Baker

Age: 29 | Height: 5'6 | Race: Demi-god | Nationality: Natural | Citizenship: Stormbreak
Level: 5 - Strg: 49 - Dext: 45 - Endr: 52 - Luck: 49 - Int:
JYOTI - Mythical - Starwhale (Humpback)
Played by: shark Offline
Change author:
Posts: 3,098 | Total: 4,577
MP: 2580
#10
AMALIA
THE SHIELD OF SAFRIN
i think it's beautiful how a star's light
travels the universe long after it dies
Their interludes are magic, songs written in the way their fingers touch and their bodies intermingle, the dulcet caresses and innocent laughs that promise so much more. She lets her arms slip up his chest, a slow dance instigated now, swaying softly in his arms, her face against his neck. The world seems to shrink around them, softening into hues and stanzas, less real than here, than now, than him. Storms might rage and spires crumble, but she will find solace in his embrace, in the words he whispered late at night, in the way his body fits her curves.

And if he were Attuned-! The idea is breathtaking, beautiful, something she never dared to consider, never dreamed that he would want. Oh, but they could share the sky, taking wing and rising, rising, far beyond the trials and sorrows that mark the ground below. She sees it now: he a beast of mettle and strength, vast enough to blot the sun; she a creature of snow and stars, dancing in his wake. Together they could outpace storms, could ride the wind to horizons anew, could speak and dream and hope and achieve, take wing and meet the heavens.

He questions it and she glances up, wonder still awash on her face, her fingers rising to trace his cheek. What do you mean- she tilts her head, not sure if she has done something wrong, if she has pushed her dreams too far upon him. But Amalia can do naught except explain, sharing knowledge at every interval, her heart an open book for him to read. "The gods... they bless some, to be both. To use magic and be Attuned. Like Remi, or Ashetta."

Excitement is a drumbeat in her narrow chest. Guessing at his protests, the things that he might say, Amalia is quick to smile and add a disclaimer to the idea. "You have done so much for Safrin. For this place. For me. You do not have to feel abandoned anymore, Deimos. You are so much more than that."

She bites her lip, searching his face, wondering what he will think of the idea. She wants it for him - for herself - but does not know, cannot know, what it is he will say.
That's what I want to be in this world —
someone whose light lingers after I'm gone

Coding base by Sky!
Deimos Ignatius
the Resurrected Sword
Warden of Halo / Guildmaster

Age: 33 | Height: 6'4" | Race: Hybrid | Nationality: Outlander | Citizenship: Halo
Level: 14 - Strg: 72 - Dext: 72 - Endr: 73 - Luck: 80 - Int: 3
BELIAL - Mythical - Peryton (Blend) ZURIEL - Mythical - Unicorn (Healing)
Played by: Heather Offline
Change author:
Posts: 6,554 | Total: 10,647
MP: 9824
#11
Deimos
THE RESURRECTED SWORD
How did you survive? they ask
How long did you suffer?
how dark did they tint your dreams?
Deimos had never been much of a dreamer: grounded in reality from early on, when the world was no longer a stage and he only had one integral part: survive. There were too many calculations to be instigated, too many motions to be machinated, too many intervals where it was just him, bordering on desolation and perseverance. He endured because he had to, and it left no room for lofty, lilting aspirations, even here and now, he felt somewhat foolish for wondering what it was like to fly – he wouldn’t have the moments, he wouldn’t have those breathless instances gliding and hovering in the sky. The Reaper had roots, and the Sword had ramparts, and somewhere in between there was no room for mercurial, whimsical, capricious things that had no foundations.

Her explanations came along though – other beings who’d been anointed and consecrated, Remi, Ashetta, capable of holding both forms, of wielding their flames and lightning and creation, then melding into animal precisions. He balked immediately at the insinuation of gods; she knew he was no one’s favored beast, and it had long since been embedded and carved into his soul that he was not worthy of their time. You are nothing the stars would yield. You are nothing the sun would beam. You are nothing the shadows would crawl. And all along he’d believed it – undeserving, irreverent monolith, indifferent and apathetic towards them in turn, caring little for their thoughts or interactions, giving naught, tending naught, applying naught to their prayers. Instead, he’d chiseled his way into warrior interludes and barbaric enterprises, silent slashes of blades, treacherous and terrible deeds for the sake of his people, his comrades, his kingdom, no apologies rendered to those who favored and savored life. “But they will not-,” he started.

She must’ve anticipated his rebuttal, the downward sweep of his gaze, leaning into her fingers along his cheek when he could only listen. Her excitement and ebullience was a palpable thing, but he couldn’t hope, he couldn’t yearn, he couldn’t long for things he wasn’t allowed to have – felt the walls clambering along his throat, his chest, striving to make her understand that no matter what he ever did, it wouldn’t be enough. He wouldn’t be enough.

He still didn’t understand what she saw in him sometimes, when everything else he ever committed to felt like the opposite; like knives and rubble, like demolition and ruin, like the spread of wildfire and infernos, like rage and vexation, meaningless ventures resulting in more questions than answers. If not for her, Rexanna, or Kiada, who was to say he would even be here – stagnant and bound for more brooding, more brewing, until he was in a tomb again, tethered to his destined catacomb. They hadn’t let him remain abandoned – and that was far more than any deities could ever give or grant.

You are so much more than that echoed against his skull and he shook his head, denial and insurrection because it was habit, incapable of accepting something that went against every fiber of his existence (demon, ogre, fiend, heathen, monster, beast, vermin, infidel, pariah). Perhaps he was too far gone, and change was too difficult for him even now, damned to erode and wither and decay over time – somewhere along the way he’d threaded his hands with hers, heaved a massive breath that pulsed its way through his chest. How to make her see that he was afraid to take the chance, that he no longer dared to hope or dream or wonder, that he didn’t want the opportunity ripped away from him the moment he stepped near a shrine, to listen to the echo of silence and nothingness (over and over and over again; broken records of forsaken, rejected requiems). “They have not answered me before. I doubt much has changed.” There was a self-deprecating smile on his lips, like ghosts and phantoms of things he’d never held or had, lifting his gaze back to stare into sable, signifying he was tired of failure, of falling, of defeat. Maybe he could convince her the idea was muted (when he didn’t want it to be; the contradictions pervading through his soul and tearing him apart – the crags and nefarious dealings and the frozen, chiseled, chilled heart uncertain of what to do or where to go).
- until you had blood glistening on your teeth
- until your suffering paled in comparison to their own
- until you learned to enjoy the sounds of screams
Amalia Chandrakant
the Archangel
Baker

Age: 29 | Height: 5'6 | Race: Demi-god | Nationality: Natural | Citizenship: Stormbreak
Level: 5 - Strg: 49 - Dext: 45 - Endr: 52 - Luck: 49 - Int:
JYOTI - Mythical - Starwhale (Humpback)
Played by: shark Offline
Change author:
Posts: 3,098 | Total: 4,577
MP: 2580
#12
AMALIA
THE SHIELD OF SAFRIN
i think it's beautiful how a star's light
travels the universe long after it dies
He doubts, he doubts, he doubts. Amalia cannot understand it, his endless doubt in himself of all things. How can he question the devotion of a mountain, the stalwart nature of a glacier, the inherent goodness of a lighthouse in the storm?

She will sing his truth until he hears it, until he sings it back. You are good, you are good, you are good.

Her hand stays flush against his cheek as he leans into her fingers, a gentle caress, a reassurance, a guard for his unraveling. She keeps it there as he shakes his head, trying to steady him, to bring him back to her. Black eyes bore into his blue, a flaring memory of that day, the day he denied something else she told him on the banks of another body of water, beneath another sun. Then, too, she had held him, had touched him, had forced him to see the light he carried, the things she knew and saw and loved. I think I love you, she told him then, honestly for honesty is all she has to give him.

You are so much more than that, she says today, and gods if he hasn't proven as much time and time again. Their hands are entwined, their fingers locked, his cheek abandoned for his palms, but Amalia does not look away. She watches with attentive eyes each smile that threatens upon his face, the trembling lines, the heavy sigh, the things he leaves unsaid. "They will answer," she says simply, confident in her faith (confident in him, and now she has two things to believe in- the beings for whom she is a shield, and the man who is a sword for her). "I will go with you, if you like. If... if it is something you want."

For he has to want it, has to ask, has to be committed to this thing, to flying at her side. She tries to hide her own intentions, her investment in the idea- but oh, she cannot subdue her trembling, the way her fingers squeeze on his, the eagerness on her angular face. To hold and be held, to rise by his side, to dance through clouds far from the blight, while the burdens they bear are left far behind.

It is all she wants, and she wants it with him, and she wants him to want it with her.
That's what I want to be in this world —
someone whose light lingers after I'm gone

Coding base by Sky!
Deimos Ignatius
the Resurrected Sword
Warden of Halo / Guildmaster

Age: 33 | Height: 6'4" | Race: Hybrid | Nationality: Outlander | Citizenship: Halo
Level: 14 - Strg: 72 - Dext: 72 - Endr: 73 - Luck: 80 - Int: 3
BELIAL - Mythical - Peryton (Blend) ZURIEL - Mythical - Unicorn (Healing)
Played by: Heather Offline
Change author:
Posts: 6,554 | Total: 10,647
MP: 9824
#13
Deimos
THE RESURRECTED SWORD
How did you survive? they ask
How long did you suffer?
how dark did they tint your dreams?
Doubt was clarity, doubt safeguarded him from falling into cracks and crag of blinding, binding faith; hardly capable of believing in kismet, in providence, in whatever clauses those with fair fortune had managed to muster. He’d only ever claimed convictions in himself – not the gods, not the celestial beings, not the ones he’d seen constantly flawed and skewed as the rest of them, nearly as human, marking their mistakes with shrugs and indifference. Deimos had carved his own paths and left them bloodstained, reeling, damaged, torn, never a smooth course, never lined with perfection and adornments; chaos and predilection a line in his touch, mayhem and bedlam never far away. He soaked his zeal and fervency into violence and abhorrence, had assured the world he wasn’t its plaything, but a weapon, a means to an end time and time and time again, carving up the insides of other men to ensure he and his comrades faced another day. It wasn’t good. It wasn’t kind. It wasn’t anything Amalia was made up of – and he wondered if she just didn’t want to see the broken wiles and the scattered errors, the constant fault lines along his back, curving along his spine, spinning their webs in his coldblooded machinations, or if they were gone, and he never noticed, never realized, never thought they could billow away.

He couldn’t sing it back because he didn’t know the words, the harmonies, the inflections – maybe once, as a boy, yelling and hollering and thinking nothing of swords and blades and the thunder of war.

The light was glaring and he didn’t want to see it, yearned to pull away because he couldn’t handle another stretch of denial, one more wasted effort twisting and gnarling away at his form - not enough they would murmur upon his flesh and bone again, and then what? Then what would become of him, firmly rejected, resounding in the pendulums of the damned? Would he be the same, just a little more torn, a little more worn, a little more consigned to oblivion?

One day she’d see it, one day she’d realize, and then she’d be gone too.

I do not deserve it was on his tongue and rattling against his teeth, but her eyes kept hold of his and he couldn’t resound the words in the strength of her confidence. His was absent, fleeting and maimed, frayed and split apart, wanting to take shelter in the roots of his darkness, where he was safe, where the decadence was familiar, where treacheries were something he could fathom and understand. But she wouldn’t let him, and he thought about fracturing there, declining everything before it could do the same to him. But the beast stilled in her grasp, striving to take her belief, and terrified to place himself in its breadth and breath, constantly circling the abyss, the refuge in shadows. “And if they do not?” He whispered, it shook on his lungs and was a mercurial thing in his heart, a storm brewing, preparing himself for the inevitable; then he wouldn’t be so hurt, wouldn’t be so scarred, wouldn’t be so brutalized again.

She offered to go with him and he was adamant in that refusal, because he didn’t long for anyone else to see him fracture once more, because he’d rather sink into the void than turn around to witness her disappointment, to reel in his savage abandonment again. I told you so he could say, one more siege upon his form in a barrage, a multitude of others, nothing more, everything less. “I can go on my own,” he nodded, and it would only prolong the agony, give him time to tell her, when the dismissal and spurning was complete. Then she’d understand, be one more witness, to how he was merited naught. He’d beat the war drums of his own defeat; he wouldn’t set her up as a bystander, to watch her gods ignore and desolate, place their isolation on his shoulders.

Deimos wanted to fly and wanted to bask and wanted to do so much more, didn’t dare to hope. “I will try once,” he swallowed, because it was all he was going to be able to take, this close to fraying in her touch, in her grasp, fingers squeezing when he had no other lifelines.
- until you had blood glistening on your teeth
- until your suffering paled in comparison to their own
- until you learned to enjoy the sounds of screams
Amalia Chandrakant
the Archangel
Baker

Age: 29 | Height: 5'6 | Race: Demi-god | Nationality: Natural | Citizenship: Stormbreak
Level: 5 - Strg: 49 - Dext: 45 - Endr: 52 - Luck: 49 - Int:
JYOTI - Mythical - Starwhale (Humpback)
Played by: shark Offline
Change author:
Posts: 3,098 | Total: 4,577
MP: 2580
#14
AMALIA
THE SHIELD OF SAFRIN
i think it's beautiful how a star's light
travels the universe long after it dies
Still he doubts, and the Shield wonders what his life had been before here, today. Oh, she knows he was a soldier, a son, a fighter, a king. She knows that there is blood on his hands that will never wash away, scars to mark his every wound, the lingering remnants of a revenant's past. But she does not know what left him so hollow, without an iota of love for himself. Was his generosity left unseen, his guardianship taken for granted? Was he never told he was more, greater than the sum of his mistakes, better than the blistering death in his hands?

Did he have faith in nothing?

Amalia has faith in the gods, and she has faith in him. "They will." Faith is Amalia's hallowed chord, her anchor in the storm. Faith is the rope she stays tethered to as the world falls away, ground giving out beneath her feet, threatening to send her spiraling down into the abyss. Hands slip down to his waist, wrapping around him, a gentle embrace, reassurance in the way her muscles contract, in the easy way he fits against her, in her cheek upon his breast. She inhales deeply from his scent, listening to his heart: a drumbeat, but nervous, quickened now. Amalia wants to tell him he has nothing to be afraid of, that he has earned it all once and again, but she knows the words will not be enough.

So she holds him, explaining in the language he speaks, action and adoration, devotion and prayer. Her face rises up as he makes his refusal, any momentary hurt quickly wiped away; she nods, understanding, remembering how it was, the pristine privacy of that moment, the intimacy of gaining another form. It is with pride and bliss that she hears his acquiescence, happiness for him as he agrees. He of all others deserves this, and Amalia touches his face again, her own alight with joy.

Rising up on pointed toes the Shield looks into her Sword's eyes, reassurance and adoration and pride and love in her onxy gaze. Gently she presses her lips to his, lids fluttering shut a moment; then she lingers, her nose beside his, their breath intermingling in the cold air. "Okay," Amalia promises, "I will be here when it's done." I will always be here for you.
That's what I want to be in this world —
someone whose light lingers after I'm gone

Coding base by Sky!


Forum Jump:


Users browsing this thread: 1 Guest(s)


RPG-D