Court of the Fallen was created in October of 2018 by Odd, Honey, and Crooked.
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if the journey of a thousand miles starts when you take the first step
'Fuck you.' She snarled under her breath feeling ever more like a chastised child the longer this whole thing went on. Not able to come up with a snotty reason why she shouldn't go-ahead first, Eloise did so with as much menace as she could manage. Which, considering she was still shaking slightly, covered in blood, and weighed about as much as one of the dead man's legs, was not very much.
"What was I supposed to say? Hey Jack, fancy a night out? Come hold my hand in the scary caves because I've this idea that I don't' really want to tell you about, seeing as you're a bit of an ass most of the time, but I'd sure appreciate the company, what with me being a useless woman and all." The idea was a way to make the Ark sail in the sky. It was a romantic notion, but also a practical one. They could evade rough seas, out sail or fly anyone who would come after them, and be able to fly over the continent rather than around it, should their travels take them that way.
No chance in hell she'd ever tell Jack she was here to make the Ark fly though.
i'll travel for a little while, & i won't be coming back
"Yeah, yeah, and the rest," Jack muttered in response to her cursing, following after her and keeping his magic sharp for any errant thoughts or whispers as they travelled back down through the Fingers. Their footsteps would leave blood prints, but it was very unlikely that anyone would be around or care. Besides, within a few hours the tide would wash it all away. Soon the pathways became sand, and they opened up into a starlit sky.
"Or how about 'hey Jack, some cunts say they've got mageglass for tradin'. Given that you know a lot about the place where you were born, how likely is it that they're for real?' Somethin' like that?" He glared a hole in the back of her head. And maybe it was the lingering migraine, or the excitement of whatever had just happened, or the ridiculousness of her thoughts, but gods help him, Jack couldn't stop himself.
02-27-2020, 09:46 PM (This post was last modified: 02-27-2020, 09:48 PM by Eloise.)
if the journey of a thousand miles starts when you take the first step
"Right, like what would come after wouldn't be me locked in some cubby below deck with you sussing out the glass for yourself." Eloise snapped back, kicking at the sand and snarling as her toe found a rather sharp shell hidden beneath.
But then he mentioned the thing she had been sure she hadn't actually said, only thought, and her blood turned to icewater. The surprise of that was enough to make all of her illusions fall away. The healing bruises on her face and her wrists only partially covered by blood looking yellowish in the moonlight as she spun around to face him. Eyes wide, her mind a whirl of assumptions and static-connections, she looked at Jack with a mixture of horror and surprise. Speechless, her mind trying in vain to think of all the things she'd ever thought in his presence, her mental narrator, of course, seemed instantly activated. Does he know how often I've thought of fucking him? Would he be any good? Does he know I've snuck extra rations? That I accidentally killed one of the ship's cats? That it was me who didn't tie the rope and caused the mast to nearly crack?
Gods it wouldn't fucking stop.
Of course it was the more salacious thoughts of hers that ultimately made her want to scream and clamp her hands over her mouth as if that would help at all. Not knowing what to say at all, Eloise continued to stare, eyes narrowing now instead of being round as saucers. Then again if he really was reading her thoughts, she supposed she didn't actually need to say much.
So instead she very eloquently said, "What the fuck, Jack."
i'll travel for a little while, & i won't be coming back
Whatever thoughts were starting to barrage and batter against Jack's mental wall, everything slid into a faint ringing in his ears, a strange hum as it dawned on him what he had said. What he had said it in response to, and what that meant. Gods, he could see the cogs turning in her head, the way things fit into place, the questions, the assumptions.
Jack stood very still on the sand in the moonlight, his expression blank, if not just a touch disappointed. In himself rather than in Eloise, it appeared, for when he flicked his wrist the thin, sharp blade appeared in his hand once more. Methodically, he wiped it on the leg of his pants, testing the point of it on his thumb (it welled with blood instantly), before gazing back at his navigator.
The jig was up. Only one thing for it. He began to advance across the sand.
if the journey of a thousand miles starts when you take the first step
Eloise expected Jack to laugh at her, to quip something about her racier sexual thoughts of him, or to perhaps offer that she might find out for herself. At first not even the blade worried her. Naive he'd called her, and she there in the moonlight, bambi-brown eyes wide and confused, was easy prey.
Glancing over her shoulder as he advanced her way—the assumption being that the presence of the knife was because two men were back or some others—seeing nothing but an empty beach was as confusing as the cold look in his blue eyes when she turned back to him.
"Jack?" The colour drained from her face, Eloise taking several steps backwards in the sands, her movements growing ever more unsteady the more distance she tried to put between them.
i'll travel for a little while, & i won't be coming back
"Listen, it ain't anythin' personal," Jack said, continuing to advance across the sand towards her, briefly sucking the blood from his thumb and spitting it onto the beach. "You're too sharp for your own good. It'll be quick, then you won't have to worry about anyone fuckin' you raw anymore, eh?" He shrugged, his free hand snaking out to catch about her bruised wrist, dragging her close.
"I'd say sorry, but we both know it wouldn't be all that true," he muttered. "If it helps, it's how I managed to track you down and save you. A shame, really."
if the journey of a thousand miles starts when you take the first step
"You don't have to do this. I won't say anything." She muttered stupidly, wanting instantly to take the words back. Her last words couldn't be that predictable. Gods how whiny and small she sounded.
Dragged close to him, closer than she'd ever been, she choked back on the breath in her lungs, trying to hold it there so she'd not whimper mere inches from his face. It hadn't occurred to her quite yet how futile this was given how accessible all her thoughts were to him. Her eyes roamed over the flecks of blood speckling his scruff, how the blue of his eyes looked so casual.
"Come on Jack, what would I have to gain by telling, huh? What other captain would put up with my shit day after day? Me swanning about?" She tried to laugh and failed, her fear making the sound hollow and flighty. "Besides, I only know this one little thing about you. By now you must know all there is to know about me. It's hardly much leverage, this one little thing. Not with all you know. Right?" Because her mind couldn't help her now, she resorted to all she had left. He knew her magic too well to believe her normal tricks of hellfire, so instead she tried to loop her arms around his neck, her body pressed suggestively against his. "Right?"
i'll travel for a little while, & i won't be coming back
Gods, it was pathetic. All of this - the way she just kept talking, the sour taste of fear in her thoughts, the way she fluttered from begging to bribery in moments. He stood silent and unresponsive as she draped herself against him, and it was in that slow moment that he considered the alternative to easy. The advantage to having an Eloise, to having that kind of useful talent on board. It was why he had stuck with her to begin with.
”No one would believe you,” he said slowly, casually, the blade pressed flat against her pretty cheek. ”And if a word ever passed your lips besides, I’ll make you wish you’d been left in the Fingers. D’you understand?”
if the journey of a thousand miles starts when you take the first step
Who was she now, to be throwing herself at him like this? Eloise had no idea. What were standards when compared to steel against skin? They would, she thought, her mind a traitorous thing that would not be silenced. They would believe me because it explains so fucking much.
She shivered against him but not because of the cold, unable to help but wonder whether he was enjoying this. Whether he got off on fear. "I understand." Eloise whispered in response, eyes locked on his and her voice entirely free of its usual sass. It was true what she said, that she had nothing to gain from knowing this, that Jack couldn't immediately topple. If these few moments had taught her anything, it was that her thoughts would do as they pleased; knowing what she did would make it harder if anything, to hide herself from him.
He had all of her now, and she merely had this one devastating secret that was likely to fester inside of her, until it got her killed.
i'll travel for a little while, & i won't be coming back
Her thoughts couldn’t be helped - gods but if Jack hadn’t learned that about people - but at her internal rebuttal at his reasoning behind saving her damned life he couldn’t help but raise his eyebrows incredulously down at her. Do you really wanna die? the expression seemed to say.
But she understood. The words left her lips and there was no hint of mutiny in her thoughts; Jack took the blade from her cheek and let it disappear up his sleeve again for (hopefully) the last time tonight. ”No,” he said pointedly. ”In fact I don’t get off on it.” He snorted, reaching up to unloop her arms from around his neck that he might peel her off.
”Don’t sound too positive about it,” he muttered in response to her appraisal of the situation. Words like devastating and fester did not a pretty picture make. ”You still have your life. That’s a marked improvement from two separate occasions tonight.”
Jack walked past her, only to turn and look at her properly, bruises and tears and all. ”This stops.” He gestured vaguely at the state of her. ”When cunts in Torchline lay a hand on you, they’re as good as sayin’ they can lay a hand on me. So if you do shit like this again you better know what the fuck you’re doin’, got it?”
if the journey of a thousand miles starts when you take the first step
Eloise didn't of course. Want to die, that was, but she couldn't help the way her mind seemed to instantly form a rebuttal to what he was saying, even if it did shift the needle more towards better kill her to be safe.
Some it made it worse to know that, Eloise' stomach dropping as he removed her from him like some sort of bothersome leech. It just went to show that she truly was still alive by absolutely none of her own efforts. Even whatever feminine charms she had failed her in this. She really did just have Jack to thank.
Straightening under his words, suddenly the bruises disappeared. They appeared to anyways: her skin was suddenly free of blood, no part of her clothing was amiss and her eyes were once again bright and free of tears. Trotting to catch up to him like some beaten puppy that still promptly heels when told, Eloise took a breath that did absolutely nothing to still the flutter of her heart. "What I meant, was that if she could fly, we could avoid all sorts of things. Bad storms, other ships following behind, the Maw." This attempt at normalcy was poorly done, but then, Eloise hadn't been a duchess for a while and her social niceties had greatly decayed. "I mean, with the mageglass it wouldn't actually be flying, just me lifting her up—" The plan having been to increase the strength of her telekinesis, "—but maybe there are other ways." Godly ways, mayhap.
i'll travel for a little while, & i won't be coming back
Jack watched as, before his eyes, her injuries melted away. And for the first time in this whole mess, he felt some of the tension relax from his shoulders. They walked along the beach, the Ark a dark silhouette in the distance, and although Eloise's thoughts were utterly unsettled, on the surface she was passable as normal. "That," he said slowly, regarding the Ark and her idea about it being able to fly, "is probably one of the best ideas to come outta your mouth since you set foot on my deck." Sand turned to wood beneath their feet, and they were near enough the only ones around as they meandered along the docks.
"There doubtless are other ways," he agreed. "All the more reason to get back out on the sea, to visit other places and find other ways to do it." He cast a sidelong look at her, blue eyes cold. "Were you even carryin' a weapon when you went out tonight?" he asked.
if the journey of a thousand miles starts when you take the first step
The backhanded compliment was received precisely as that, Eloise feeling both elated and gutted to hear him say so. Knowing now her thoughts were open to him, she did her best not to dwell on her wounded pride. She'd lick that particular wound later, in the privacy of her own bunk. So she thought, anyways.
"The gods apparently don't look favourably on my kind," or yours, she thought. "Might be worth a try." Swallowing, Eloise looked towards Jack with a sort of naked ignorance. "Is there any change of mageglass rattling around Torchline?"
His gaze stopped her heart for a moment, the cold steel of it more terrifying than the blade against her cheek had been. Biting the inside of her lip, Eloise held out her hands which suddenly held a plethora of different blades. Her hands blazed with black flames that sparked and smelled of brimstone. "No." She said at last, hands dropping and with them, her illusions. 'Physical feats have never been my strong suit."
i'll travel for a little while, & i won't be coming back
Jack, of course, was a blank slate as he always had been. Her thoughts had been open to him from day one, of course, so he was used to skimming them and packing away the important parts. They reached the gangway in record time, and given that he was the only one covered in blood, he didn't think anyone would do much questioning. He beckoned for her to go first; it appeared gentlemanly, but in reality it was to stop her running off, and to keep her where he could see her.
"Worst they could say is no," he muttered, not planning to go and find out. He had his own relationship with the gods. It was much less pious than visiting a shrine, but he did that when he had to. Only when he had to. "Not unless the Governor has any," he replied to her question. "Raza would know if she came across some, too. It's a rarity in general, given that it comes from that frozen asshole of the world. Doesn't stop fake stuff croppin' up every now and again."
Following her up the gangway, Jack's feet hit the deck of his ship with a satisfying thud, and he caught the blades and fire in her hands out of the corner of his eye. He scoffed. "So fuckin' talented, but you didn't even think to bring someone with you?" He raised his eyebrows. "Next deal I make, you can come with."
