i am the man we both couldn't stand, i can't wash the dirt from my hands
what was it like to feel in love?
How many times can he say he doesn’t know what’s overcome him before he believes it himself?
He’s flipped her over, pinning her down as the ferocity of the blight takes charge and control, his teeth baring as he speaks to her. Perhaps Lusea should be afraid of this new version of him, the part that had shifted and changed upon her death until now, through the tribulations and frustrations that had accompanied his escape and drift toward Dorobo, for the tattoos that had been adjusted and added. The old him, who had done everything for her or her memory, gone in the blink of an eye for the creature that hovers over her, predatory, and wrong in not the right places.
His larger frame blocks her from any attempt to move as she snarls to him, asking him if there’s hope for them, and it’s enough to give him pause – to give him a small amount of clarity through the blight rage that’s overcome him, from the blood that drips from his lip down his chin while he stares at her, both seeing and unseeing all the same. But it’s not so much the words that get to him, it’s the change in her expression. The fear, the tears, and while she tries to remain strong he can see her crumbling beneath him, and he can feel the inky blackness rise to the waterline of his own eyes.
He’s never wanted her to be afraid of him, afraid of what he could do – because she was the one that had most seen what the man before her could do, what he had done before.
Instead, she tries to break free and he doesn’t let her. He seeks her vision, seeks her out as a place to steady himself, to grip back onto the truth. As if the blight had created an entire illusion out of her and his mind. But no, that wasn’t true, because Phoebe had referred to her. She absolutely was here…
Wasn’t she?
She asks for hope again, and he softens again, as if the rains to his floods had stopped and it’s a moment of peace before the dam breaks. His voice is softer now, gravely, thick with the accent and language of their home, and it breaks when he finally speaks. “I don’t know who I am anymore either.” He admits, feeling at the end of a rope, burnt at both ends, uncertain where to go from here. But he needs her, because he can’t imagine what it would be like to lose her again. But for the worst of it, to see her with someone else –
He fucked up immensely.
He searches her gaze, shadowed and haunted silver eyes like the storms of Korofi scan her face, scan the scars she had endured for him, and he exhales, steeling himself. He wants to tell her that Phoebe had asked him to choose the midwife over her, and how he didn’t… But that’s not entirely true, because he had chosen her that night. And his stomach begins to tie itself in knots. So he opts for a different approach, reaching up to wipe the black and crimson blood from his face, smearing it along his cheek with the back of his hand. “I love you, Lusea Kotze.” He tells her, nothing but a vowed promise beneath the tone. “Until death and whatever comes after, in the old version of me and whatever this is. You. There is hope in that, for me.” His own voice shakes with it. “If you can forgive me – not now, not soon, I know. But at some point. I will do anything for you.” And he means it. He'd walk through fire and flame, drown in the oceans, endure what she had endured for him, for her love for him, for his love for her. Whatever she wants.
He’s flipped her over, pinning her down as the ferocity of the blight takes charge and control, his teeth baring as he speaks to her. Perhaps Lusea should be afraid of this new version of him, the part that had shifted and changed upon her death until now, through the tribulations and frustrations that had accompanied his escape and drift toward Dorobo, for the tattoos that had been adjusted and added. The old him, who had done everything for her or her memory, gone in the blink of an eye for the creature that hovers over her, predatory, and wrong in not the right places.
His larger frame blocks her from any attempt to move as she snarls to him, asking him if there’s hope for them, and it’s enough to give him pause – to give him a small amount of clarity through the blight rage that’s overcome him, from the blood that drips from his lip down his chin while he stares at her, both seeing and unseeing all the same. But it’s not so much the words that get to him, it’s the change in her expression. The fear, the tears, and while she tries to remain strong he can see her crumbling beneath him, and he can feel the inky blackness rise to the waterline of his own eyes.
He’s never wanted her to be afraid of him, afraid of what he could do – because she was the one that had most seen what the man before her could do, what he had done before.
Instead, she tries to break free and he doesn’t let her. He seeks her vision, seeks her out as a place to steady himself, to grip back onto the truth. As if the blight had created an entire illusion out of her and his mind. But no, that wasn’t true, because Phoebe had referred to her. She absolutely was here…
Wasn’t she?
She asks for hope again, and he softens again, as if the rains to his floods had stopped and it’s a moment of peace before the dam breaks. His voice is softer now, gravely, thick with the accent and language of their home, and it breaks when he finally speaks. “I don’t know who I am anymore either.” He admits, feeling at the end of a rope, burnt at both ends, uncertain where to go from here. But he needs her, because he can’t imagine what it would be like to lose her again. But for the worst of it, to see her with someone else –
He fucked up immensely.
He searches her gaze, shadowed and haunted silver eyes like the storms of Korofi scan her face, scan the scars she had endured for him, and he exhales, steeling himself. He wants to tell her that Phoebe had asked him to choose the midwife over her, and how he didn’t… But that’s not entirely true, because he had chosen her that night. And his stomach begins to tie itself in knots. So he opts for a different approach, reaching up to wipe the black and crimson blood from his face, smearing it along his cheek with the back of his hand. “I love you, Lusea Kotze.” He tells her, nothing but a vowed promise beneath the tone. “Until death and whatever comes after, in the old version of me and whatever this is. You. There is hope in that, for me.” His own voice shakes with it. “If you can forgive me – not now, not soon, I know. But at some point. I will do anything for you.” And he means it. He'd walk through fire and flame, drown in the oceans, endure what she had endured for him, for her love for him, for his love for her. Whatever she wants.
i can't scrub the black from my lungs
SUNJATA
Feel free to use magic/force on Sunjata, without killing him <3
Sunjata speaks with an Australian accent and has a passive magic that makes him produce a subtle scent that matches exactly to whatever those around him most desire him to smell like.
