[Training] dreams where you're murdered

first off, you should know, that my light's on but i ain't home

He goes for her again, distracting and entertained, a light to his gaze at how it started off tentative and progressed into the actual spar, the bruises they’d share tomorrow. He can feel the force behind his attack, feel as it digs into the space above her hip. “We’ll have matching bruises at least.” He tips her a wink, breathless, before whirling a small amount as she recovers.

He thinks nothing of the pain, really. These are wooden blades, and bruises were to be expected. It was his dance, the one he leads, and he’s there to teach her. In Sunjata’s experience, there wasn’t a good lesson if it didn’t involve some form of bruising or blood.

He faces her as she approaches, hand gripping around the handle of the fake dagger, amusement lingering in his face as she wearily approaches, wondering if he’s tired her out or not. But she attacks regardless, and he tries to block her by leaning a small amount away from his right side. But she continues anyway, going up for the space under his ribs, and he can feel it press against the muscle, rocking back against his ribs as he aims his own into the middle of her back where a blade might slip between vertebrae and shoulder blades. He exhales a panting breath, a grin on his face, and with his freehand he tries to lift her chin to meet his gaze, shadows hidden with how pleased he is with what she’s learned. “Very good, Maea.”

up high, but i stay low

SuNJATA

MAEA

Her breath was coming shorter as they moved, the pulse quickened, and even without the sun beating down she felt over warm, wished she was a man or just a little less endowed in the chest compartment so that she could pull the shirt off without it being entirely scandalous. Not that Sunjata would mind, but it might be a little too distracting... they were here to train, after all.

Feinting, diving in, striking true. The impact against his ribs sent another shock reverberating up her arm, but this time she knew to expect it, had learned the consequences of hesitating and felt the strain of it with every shift of her body. At almost the same time she felt his blade dig into her back again, and realized she'd not considered how to block or protect herself from a follow up. There was an annoyed little tsk at the mistake... but the vexation drained away into surprise when his hand found her chin and lifted her face up.

Maea met his gaze, a little startled at how happy he looked, plenty pleased with herself that she should earn the praise. Grinning back, a feline little smirk of vicious delight at this new game, she leaned into the touch of his hand, turning the head just a little to brush her cheek against his fingers.

"This is fun," she breathed, a little winded, pupils dialated from adrenaline and pain and quiet elation. Had she finally found something she was actually good at?

Light is easy to love
Show me your darkness

BASE INSPIRED BY ODD <3

first off, you should know, that my light's on but i ain't home

He’s taken aback a small amount by how similar this position is to back home. He lets the wooden dagger drop, to flatten his hand along her back as she leans into his touch. His thumb strokes her cheekbone gently, and he spends the moment trying to catch his own breath. The glimmer in his gaze only lighting further with her acceptance of it, and it’s a reflection of how he’d been once upon a time.

Only then, it had been rebellion skirmishes, for him and Lusea to land in this very same position in the aftermath. His hand on her cheek, along her back, holding her tight while she beams her feral delight to him. The reflection almost makes him slightly weak in the knees, but he recovers enough to focus on her pale, snow white hair, to the water and glasses he’d set out, before letting himself look at her again, his sleeveless shirt sticking to him with the slick sheen of sweat from the heat.

“It is fun.” He hums, breathless with his own delight at how proud she is. “And you’re picking it up quickly.” He adds, giving her a wolfish yet proud smile back down at her, not able to find it in himself to let her go just yet. Just a few more moments, reflecting, reliving, forgetting the recent events, back when he was better.

up high, but i stay low

SuNJATA

MAEA

She could feel his hand shift at her back, heard the clatter as the dagger fell to the ground. His palm was a furnace as it pressed into her, hot even against her own warm skin, even through the shirt. There was something different to this kind of touch compared to the lingering strokes she recalled from their first moments of closeness. Soothing rather than restless, something that sated a hunger instead of feeding it. While that other time had been greedy and careless - despite there being so much care - this... this quiet holding was what really drew her in. Made her want to linger.

Her arms slipped around his waist, one hand still clutching while the other found a home against his shoulderblade, over the feathered tips of navy-lined wings. Leaning in against him, Maea let her head come to rest at his chest, smiling as she breathed in the scent of him. Just for a moment, she just wanted to hear his heart beat for a while. Before someone came to interrupt, before the dance could begin again.

"You're a good teacher," she said, swelling a touch at the pride in his voice. "Someone else might show moves and make me copy it, but instead you allow for mistakes... and force me to think. I like it."

Light is easy to love
Show me your darkness

BASE INSPIRED BY ODD <3

first off, you should know, that my light's on but i ain't home

Her arms link around his waist, a gentle touch that she leans into, and he exhales a panting breath to shift his hand from her cheek to the back of her head, tangling in silky hair to hold her closer. His heart thunders as he tries to capture his breath again despite the shortness of his illness, and he tries to cover it by focusing on something else, though he’s unable to really figure it out. He chews on the inside of his cheek instead, at least until she picks up the silence.

A good teacher is something he’s heard once or twice before, but not enough to really mean anything, but it does spark that lingering smile to stay. At her explanation, however, Sunjata nods and rumbles a quiet sound of agreement – something she’d likely hear echo through his chest. “You can learn as much as you want, copy as much as you want, but it doesn’t matter when you’re faced with it.” A slight shrug of those tattooed shoulders. “You’d react far differently if I were showing you hypotheticals rather than tossing you straight into it.” He takes a moment to take a deep inhale, lungs expanding slightly as he keeps her close.

“But you’re a Loreseeker, so your mind is always looking for other vantage points, is it not?” He asks, but there’s a hum of teasing beneath the vibrations.

up high, but i stay low

SuNJATA

MAEA

A moment of bliss. Of stormcoulds parting to let down a ray of golden light, and blue skies beyond. His fingers found their way into her hair, and she could hear the uneven beat of his heart, thundering through the chest. Too fast for this short waltz. Home, home, home, it whispered to her. But it was a house besieged, slowly flooding. Maea also heard the gurgling within his lungs as he struggled to breathe, and it made her scared. It wasn't right, for her to ask this of him. Not when he was ill, and should be resting. Recovering.

"Well, it's also what I'm trained to do," she replied, amusement coloring her voice in response to his tease. "For example, I'm still holding my dagger..." She shifted her hand, and the tip of the blade scraped against the fabric of his shirt as she raised it, angling the wooden model until the tip pointed straight into his back. Somewhere on the opposite side of the spine his heart beat, and if the blade had been longer, sharper, held by less gentle hands...

"Or I could always borrow this." Something small and unseen tugged at the hem of his trouser leg, pulling it up slightly to expose the handle of the hidden knife in his boot. "Don't think I'll ever forget anything you tell me, Advocate. I really love secrets..."

Lifting her head so she could look up at him, with chin resting against his breastbone, Maea smiled a sly, almost wicked grin at him, those pale eyes indeed very keen and alert in that wasted, wan face.

Light is easy to love
Show me your darkness

BASE INSPIRED BY ODD <3

first off, you should know, that my light's on but i ain't home

Her amusement is reflected by the easy smile that crosses his face when she speaks. He’s attuned to where she moves her hands, a sharp inhale at the way she lifts the hem of his shirt to point the tip of the wooden dagger against his spine. He tilts his head slightly with delight at the way she’s thought of it. But he follows the point of her words as she begins to tug at the hem of his pant leg until he can feel the air brush against too warm skin against the handle of his hidden dagger.

And when she looks at him, she’ll find a positively wicked smirk along his face. Her chin on his chest bone, his hand in her hair, one hand along the small of her back. “I might not have a dagger in hand, but I’m never unarmed…” He hums to her, the hand at her back shifting into claws, where the tips of them poke at the shirt that she wears – dangerous and tempting yet unharming unless she presses back against them.

His heart continues its thundering rampage within his chest, fingers tightening in her hair and moving slightly to stroke through the pale white tresses as he gazes down to her – a predatory delight glimmering within the storms of his eyes. He’s pleased by this outcome, pleased with her thought process of never quite giving in even when the battle is ‘done’. Though, perhaps to be a bit more of a test for her, he leans back ever so slightly into the fake blade she presses against his spine with a playful wink.

up high, but i stay low

SuNJATA

MAEA

The sharpness of those claws pricked her skin through the loose weave of the shirt. Not painfully, but enough for her to know that they were there. It drew a breath from her, slow and deep, considering, pressing ever so slightly into the touch to feel just a little bit more. Goosebumps were flaring all over her arms, the close proximity of him awakening all those parts of her body where they were connected.

"Hmm..." The sound was slow, melodical, a bit questioning as he leaned back into the dagger against his spine. Did he test the see if she would let up? Press harder? Try some other trick? "Thing is, you let go of your weapon," she pointed out slowly, the fingers of her free hand closing around the back of his shirt.

"So... I guess that makes it mine, now?"

In the space created by his slight recline, a new dagger appeared, swept up from the ground behind her to rest against the side of his throat. And just because she could, simply because she wanted to see what would happen if she did, Maea pushed herself up on tiptoes and pressed her lips against the other side of that strong, tanned neck. Just above the navy ink of a compass needle, currently pointing straight at herself.

Light is easy to love
Show me your darkness

BASE INSPIRED BY ODD <3

first off, you should know, that my light's on but i ain't home

He can feel the goosebumps cross over her skin, and it flares within him as she presses back against it slowly – his claws flexing slightly to poke and yet not draw blood. But she questions him as he leans back into her wooden dagger, and he listens with that same delighted wicked smile along his face, head tilting slightly as she moves her fingers along his back, goosebumps rising in their wake as well.

Her comment and the quickness of where she places the dagger to his throat causes a deep rumble of a breathy chuckle to leave him, pride blossoming from her advantage, though his fingers tighten in her hair ever so slightly. She steps up on her tiptoes to do… Something, he’s not entirely sure what at first, but he watches her with a predatory intent as she enacts it. And then there’s lips at his neck, and his claws immediately disappear on the hand at her back, curling until his nails scrape gently against her skin.

“Mmm…” A cross between a purr and a growl. He tilts his head into the dagger at his throat with a smirk. “You know, I’ve been in this position before.” He offers her – wondering if she notices where the scar on his neck sits, that it sits directly under where she’d pressed the fake dagger, where Sunjata had pushed against the guards and sliced himself open once upon a time. But he tilts his head back toward her, angling it down in the hopes of capturing her lips with his own before she retreats, the hand tangled to cradle the back of her head lowering until his thumb can rub against the softness of her neck.

up high, but i stay low

SuNJATA

MAEA

She had too, though in a slightly different context. Maea had felt his pulse beat against her lips once before, floating in his arms in the swirls and eddies of a river. She doesn't care about his scars, not really. The pain and the memories might find some echo of empathy in her if she paused to consider them, but for her they were just another part that made him up to be who he was. Just like Lusea was a part of him, and Phoebe, and everyone else he had ever met and touched, been touched by, loved and lost and loathed... Sometimes it bothered her to think of them, but not today. Not right now. This day she felt bold, and brave, and a little wicked, with life pulsing in her veins and a fire burning somewhere in her soul, perhaps just a little too brightly...

He leaned down, hands tightening in her hair and she leaned the head back into it, eyes turning a little hazy as she looked at him, watched him descend. The hunger in those stormy gray eyes wound her stomach into a tight knot, and she thought to give in. Just give up, give him what he wanted. Taste him, feel him, close every possible distance that might exist between them.

Then, when his was only a heartbeat away, when she could taste his air on her lips and breathe the same breath... she became like water in his hands, slipping out of his grasp and back, back until there was several feet of open space between them. One dagger still in her hand, the other continually pressed against his neck.

A little dizzy, she grinned at him. Tried to return that cruel, amused smirk he'd given her that night in the bar, when she'd stolen his drink - though she wasn't sure it came out quite right. Maybe it just looked like an invitation to try and take it, whatever it was he wanted... if he could.

Light is easy to love
Show me your darkness

BASE INSPIRED BY ODD <3

first off, you should know, that my light's on but i ain't home

So close, and yet… She slips away before he can meet her – heartbeat thundering deep within his chest. He can feel it beating against his neck, and he exhales a slight hiss of his own frustration yet amusement all the same, looking up to find the space between them large, the wooden dagger still at his throat, and a challenging look to her eyes and her face that he drinks as though its sweet wine. "Cruel thing." He teases her with a breathy purr, a reflection of what he'd said of the night they'd shared together.

She’s bold today, he can tell. He’s not sure if it’s that she’d done so well with the training to blossom a good amount of pride to come from him or if it’s just… This. He finds he doesn’t really care, not as he gives her a fanged smirk – that hunger reflecting in his gaze as he burns from within. And he shifts, then, to his panther form, hoping she doesn’t follow up with the dagger as he darts toward her to close the space.

Ears pinned back, large paws swallowing up the ground beneath him as he aims to press his body against her legs and follow through behind her until he ends up at the other side, hoping it might be enough to knock her off balance, a feline growl of delight leaving his throat as he looks up to her with steel eyes.

up high, but i stay low

SuNJATA

MAEA

She only grinned at him, steadying herself with deep breaths and a ready stance as she waited to see what he would do. The look he gave her was enough to curl the toes in her boots, a thrill of something a bit more than excitement rippling down her back. And then... he shifted? And it was something she should have expected, but just like last time it took her completely by surprise.

Startled, it was all Maea could do to lean into the fall as the big cat barreled into her. She fell, probably just as he'd hoped, but rather than stay in place where she'd ended up she tried one of the movements Deimos had given her, and rolled right up again, from back to knees and up on her feet. Crouched down, mock dagger held at the ready.

"You're gonna have to try a little harder than that," she laughed, a little breathless. Her eyes were bright, sparkling, fixed on the midnight cat with the stormcloud eyes. She wondered what it would be like to touch that fur... if burying her fingers in it would be as velvety soft as she imagined.

Light is easy to love
Show me your darkness

BASE INSPIRED BY ODD <3

first off, you should know, that my light's on but i ain't home

She does as he expects her to, and as she falls he prowls around her as though he’s hunting her. But she’s back up on her feet, crouched and waiting, her pale eyes meeting his steel and there’s a twitch of his long pale whiskers in response, ears wavering in what seems like he’d entertained. He is, entirely, but he can’t convey it other than what the feline will let him show. All he can do is prowl, watch, grin as much as he can in this form.

Waiting for a chance to get to her.

So when she raises the dagger toward him, there’s a purr that leaves him, a revealing of pearly fangs as he rounds his ‘prowl’ to stand before her, low to the ground – his long tail flickering back behind him. His ears flatten as he focuses on her, waiting for the right moment to pounce, and a few heartbeat later he finds it. He pushes off from his haunches, aimed at her with paws outstretched but claws retracted, hoping that it might push her back onto her back beneath large black paws to pin her to the wooden floor.

up high, but i stay low

SuNJATA

MAEA

The focus of her gaze was intense, palpable almost as she matched her breathing with his slow prowling. There was a simplicity in this new turn, this sudden game of cat and mouse, and Maea found that she enjoyed it just as much as before. Of course, she knew he was holding back against her. There was no doubt in her mind that he could move faster, sharper and with greater precision if he really wanted to. That, if this had been a real fight, she would never have been able to recover from that barreling bypass. She would have been dead, downed, defeated... But somehow, this was still a lesson. Still just practice, and a really really fun time. Taking the chance, the gesture for what it was, the girl absorbed it all like a thirsty plant, drinking down every little thing he offered her here like the gift it was.

He crouched, lowering down to the ground, and just like a stalking housecat she could see his muscles bunch, steel themselves, eyes searching for something, anythingl... and there it was. The rush, the charge, and giant paws stretching out to catch her. For one fraction of a second she felt a thrill of instinctual fear at the sight of this massive predator launching itself at her, and in that instant Maea sank down again, ducking down beneath the paws as she went onto the ground and rolled up again, just like she had before. It was her favorite of the dexterity exercies the General had drawn up for her, and this time she didn't wait for Sunjata to take the offensive. She pushed herself forward straight away with the momentum of the roll, launched herself towards the side of the cat with arms outstretched. Trying to get onto its back, wrap her arms and legs around the body and hold on.

It was a bit crazy, but.. hey. She hadn't tried that either, yet. Sanity was growing boring.

Light is easy to love
Show me your darkness

BASE INSPIRED BY ODD <3