The new place for my writing stuff and things.
Character background stories and some profiles and whatnot. Ridiculous unnecessary ramblings on alien anatomy and physiology. The usual.
Jewelianna x Jean-Etienne | Eryra - Viridian Isles
This story under heavy reconstruction
Spoiler:
The cliffs that overlooked the white sanded shores of Eryra always made Jewelianna feel better. She sat cross-legged on the ground, hands twisted limply in the space between her thighs. She stared out, unblinkingly, into the rolling waves of the sea. Tall, foaming peaks highlighted by silver strips of moonlight. Salted, ocean air passed though the fur of her ears and ruffled her tail. It felt cool on her face, but made her skin feel dry.
Until this day, Jewelianna had lived in a perfect world where nothing bad happened to the people that she loved. One in which those people promised that they would always be there for you, and lived forever. Reality hit hard and left a bittersweet taste in her mouth. When her father passed away, it felt to her as if a hole had opened up beneath her feet and dropped her into a bottomless pit. She tumbled deeper and deeper into despair and heartache. So far down she could no longer see the light at the beginning.
It would have been comforting to think she sat at the top of the cliffs, reminiscing and sending well wishes to her departed father, but her thoughts were as empty as her heart and she was only here to escape her grieving mother. A childish, ill woman who behaved as if she was the only one hurt by her father's passing. The woman shrieked, and cried and carried on. Her mournful wails echoing down the castle's halls like the calls of a ghost.
It's like she wasn't even really here anymore. She felt so unattached from the world. She didn't hear footsteps approach. She didn't know she was being watched.
"What's the matter, lynx?" a voice like crushed velvet rubbed over her skin, breaking the silence. Her silver-furred ears twitched to either side, sweeping against the fall of her ebony locks. "You're crying," the voice continued. Jewelianna gasped softly, hands rising to scrub at her face with lacy sleeves.
She turned her head to throw a glance over her shoulder. She was greeted with the sight of the lacing on black leather boots that reached almost to the man's knees. Between the first time he had spoken and the last he had moved closer to her. Her eyes skirted up the length of him. He wore the Eryran military uniform, an impeccably cut combination of slacks and sharp jacket, accented with golden edges. He had skin like marble, as pale and smooth as she'd ever seen the stone. Even though the lower half of her face was hidden behind the too big sleeves of her dress, her shock remained obvious, when she reached his face. A widening of her green orbs, a meaningful perk of her brow caused the sliver of onyx hanging from her silver circlet to dance back and forth. He was tip-toeing a fine line between handsome and pretty. He had a lovely pink cupid-bow mouth, but a strong nose; blue eyes, framed by a long fringe of dark lashes; a strong jawline with high cheekbones.
The man walks around and casually sits down next to her. Her surprise remains, but the expression is now punctuated with an stand-offish glare.
"Who are you?" she squeaks, the fur on her tail bristled, ears pushing forward in his direction.
"Who are you?" he counters, leaning back on his palms and bringing his knees up. He stared out over the sea the same as she had before.
"What?" she snaps back, her pitch rising a bit higher as if she was not used to this being the response to her questions. "I asked you first," the emphasis was childish even for her and it was confirmed by the way he chucked softly afterwards. "Jean-Etienne," he replies, turning the intensity of those blue orbs to her green ones.
"Oh," her reply was soft, as if she had just been proven wrong, or scolded. "I'm Jewelianna."
"That's it?" he asks, bemused. The way he smirked was somewhere between a grin and a snarl. She caught a glimpse of pointed canines, where his lips pulled back.
"All you gave me was Jean-Etienne," she was clearly not the sort that was used to people arguing with her, or contradicting her. Benevolent or otherwise. His only response was another throaty chuckle as he looked away from her, back to gazing out across the shores. Jewelianna was not above staring. The breeze threw back his dark curls, revealing the whole of his face, which illuminated nicely in the moonlight.
"You're a leathcine, aren't you?" A half-breed, he had asked suddenly, bluntly. Rudely, considering the nature of the question.
"I am not," she answered too quickly, and the words rode the sound of a growl. It was hard to be convincing that way.
"No?" he shifted his weight to one hand, reaching with the one closest to her, brushing it down the length of her tail. He was obviously knowledgeable to notice that her tail was too long, too fluffy, too wrong for her to be a pure-blooded lynx.
"What of it?" she huffs, bristling once more, crossing her arms over her chest. She didn't look at him, more content to glare out into the night as her ears fell flat to the crown of her head.
"Nothing, of it," he mocks, curling his fingers into the soft fur, brushing through the grey-spotted strands as if he had any right. The appendage flickered out of his grasp, coming around the opposite to curl into her lap. She buried her own hands in it, out of spite.
"Do you have any idea who I am? Who you're speaking to?" When she looked back to him, with a well-practiced indignant mask of an expression, she faltered to find him staring right back at her. He didn't respond, he only stared. "Did you come all the way out here to remind that I am too tall to be a lynx? Too curvy? Too dark? Too ugly?" She spoke as if she was trying to provoke him, but she was the one getting worked up.
The first flickers of annoyance crossed his features, breaking that perfectly sculpted marble expression of collected calm. "Who tells you these things?" he questions softly, though his lips barely moved, hiding clenched teeth. He spoke as if he was closer to her than the stranger he actually was. A curious thing, they was he talked to her. As if she were not royalty and they were at all familiar.
"They all tell me these things."
Annoyance spilled into anger, and in that moment Jewelianna realized she was crying again. She didn't know why, but there were tears spilling out over her cheeks. She was crying because some stranger had defended her? She didn't say anything, but she let him see what was in her face, a solemn mask of acceptance; in her eyes, watery chartreuse orbs staring up at him from beneath dark lashes, clinging together in points like stars. She let him see that she didn't think she was beautiful. Jean-Etienne stared back at her. He seemed determined, as if he would take all the time it took to show her otherwise.
There was only one woman in the world that William Callahan loved, and her name was Sally Masters. She was a short, curvy firecracker with big hair and a bigger mouth. She could handle a pistol, or a shotgun and could pop wheelies on her motorbike well enough to make everyone nervous. She had always made him nervous, and that was not an easy thing to do. She had had the accent of a southern belle, but the vocabulary of a sailor. Which was perfectly suitable for a bandit. But when she showed up at his doorstep with a wiggling bundle wrapped in rags, William realized that Sally was much more generous with her affections than he.
"Yah, gotta take'er, Billy. Please."
He visibly flinched at the nickname, and took a step back when she offered the bundle to him. He rubbed a rough hand over the back of his neck and looked away from her. "I don't know, Sally. What am I supposed to with her?"
Sally pulled the child back to her bosom and her gaze on him hardened, as if he was the one who had done her some great misdeed. "Jus watch'er! I can't keep'er."
"No," William's reply was fast and firm.
"Billy, they'll kill'er!" Sally's desperate shriek rang through the darkness, shortly followed by the cries of a woken child.
He was quiet then. Still standing on his ragged porch, staring down at the woman he loved and the child he couldn't see. He didn't need to see the child to know it wasn't his. If it were, she wouldn't be here, pleading with him so desperately. She'd gone off and broken his heart and now she wanted him to raise the consequences.
"Give her to me," he says, quite sometime after Sally's shrieks had echoed off into the distance, countered by the still wailing child. He held out his massive hands and the bandit woman eagerly deposited the child into them. The relief on her her face and her posture was immediately visible and William was sickened by it. "Get out of here, Sally," he didn't look at her as he pulled the child closer to his chest. "I don't ever want to see you again."
Sally Masters got on her motorcycle and disappeared into the night without another word.
William Callahan stood on his porch, and stared down at the child in his arms. She had pale skin like the light of the full moon, and her mama's cinnamon colored locks.
There was only one girl in the world that William Callahan loved, and he named her Cashmere.
William and Cashmere Callahan | The Desert Rose Bordello
|Kismet|
Cashmere often went to the trade market with eggs from their chickens, or furs from their rabbits. They were simple enough things to trade and barter, so her father found it easy to trust her with the task. Cashmere considered herself grown enough to be charged with more important things, but all in all it gave her time after to goof off. So she did just that when her eggs and furs were gone and she gave what she'd gotten for them to her father.
For Cashmere, goofing off meant trailing through the crowd and seeing what things other people were trying to offer. Scavenged textiles, and dried meats. Handcrafted this and that; sometimes even livestock.
Someone had recently found a trunk of silk scarves, and was trying to trade them off at much too high a price. Sure, they were pretty, but no one really had a need for silk scarves. Cashmere saw a woman, or perhaps just a girl, lingering in front of the trunk and running one of the scarves through her fingers. Cashmere wasn't really interested in observing the scene for too long, but found herself doing a double take when the woman turned and Cashmere saw the ugly purple bruises that surrounded her eye and her jaw.
Cashmere thought about the woman quite a bit in the weeks that passed. She sought her out at each market day and every time her injuries seemed to be worse. The day that Cashmere saw her split lip, and eye swollen shut, she had seen enough.
"Daddy," she starts softly at dinner, pushing potatoes around with her fork. Thinking about the woman caused her to lose her appetite.
"You finally ready to tell me what's been eating at you this past week?" was his response between bites. Conversation across the table seemed to hush, courtesans did love their gossip. "There's a girl at the market," her tone was clear, but her words were rushed, threatening to stumble over one another. "She there every other day. Someone's been beating on her real bad, daddy, and I don't like it."
William set his fork down with a sigh. Pushing his own plate aside to lean on the table and look across it to his daughter. "And what of it Cashmere?" It's not that he did not empathize with his daughter's concerns, he just usually did not go sticking his nose in the business of others.
"You gotta help her, Daddy," she stood quickly, chair scraping across the paneled flooring. "Please, daddy. No one deserves to be treated like that. No one."
The others eyes at the table turned from Cashmere to William to gauge his response.
"This is really that important to you?"
"Yes."
William leaned back in his chair, rubbing his hand over his neck, a common thoughtful gesture.
"Okay. I will see what I can do."
|Alder|
"Daddy," Cashmere leaned on one of the fence posts, that kept all the desert hares together. "I saw a man at the market selling his services as a mechanic."
She watched as he he gathered a rabbit by the scruff. Likely to be used for that night's stew. "What of it?" His deep voice seemed to echo, he turned away from his daughter as he snapped the rabbit's neck with a twist of his wrists.
Cashmere grimaced. "Nothing if it," she returns, with more sass that was really necessary. "He's real, real pretty though. Got nice yellow hair and sparkly blue eyes." She wiggled her brows in William's direction as if her implications should have been obvious.
William chuckled.
"I will talk to him."
|Vegas|
It was well past dark when the scavenger showed up at the Bordello. William had been organizing bottles beneath the bar, when he came storming in, a young woman in tow. He dragged her by the arm, and she followed, though she did appear a bit unwilling. William stood to his full height and glared at the pair of them when the stopped in the middle of the common room.
"What's all this now?" He gestures with his free hand, his tone rang accusatory in the silence of the bar. The haggard man seemed to toss the girl in William's direction. She stumbled forward, catching herself on the opposite end of the counter.
William could see now that she pale skin, marked with bruises and dirt. Coal black hair, and terrified eyes that she hid behind her bangs.
"How much will you give me for her?"
William crossed his arms over his chest. "What? Nothing. I am not going to buy her from you."
"I found her wandering in New Vegas. This is a whorehouse ain't it? She could be a whore."
"She doesn't look any older than sixteen."
"Well, if your not going to buy her, I am going to sell her to the bandits."
William opened his mouth to speak, but a quiet call lilted from the stairwell to interrupt him.
Daddy..."
It was that one word, soft, and simple. That removed the authoritative mask from William's features. He dropped his arms with a sigh, and stared down at the girl. She hunched her shoulders and avoided his gaze.
"Get out of here. Leave the girl."
"I ain't leaving until I get PAID!"
William pulled his shotgun from beneath the bar and propped it up against his shoulder.
"The only thing I am willing to pay you in is your life. Now, get the fuck out of here. I won't say it again."
The man's hands rose in an automatic gesture of surrender and he backed up towards the door. "Buncha bullshit is what this is. Fucking bullshit."
When the man was gone, William placed the shotgun back in it's place beneath the bar. Cashmere rushed down the stairs, and immediately came to the raven-haired girl's side. She cowered away, instantly, raising her arms defensively.
"It's okay," Cashmere, reassures, placing a gentle hand on the dark crown of her head. "I'm not going to hurt you. You're safe now."
The girl crumpled to the ground in a pile of shaking sobs. Cashmere followed her down, curling up close and wrapping an arm around her waist. Cashmere murmured reassurances until she calmed down. William watched silently. His daughter made a habit of this; collecting broken and lost souls to take care of as if they were own kin. Her desire to mother others, coming from her lack of one. "Why don't you go get her cleaned up?"
Cashmere drew the washcloth in slow circles across thin, pale shoulders. The water that had once been hot and clear was now lukewarm and tinted with dirt and blood. "So, what's your name?" Cashmere's question went unanswered and she washed soap out of black tresses. "It's okay. You don't have to talk if you don't want to, but you gotta have something for me to call you."
More silence. Cashmere stood to get a towel. She sat down at the edge of the tub again, pulling the plug so the water could drain. When it was emptied she wrapped the soft towel around the girl.
"Well, then. For now, I guess I'll just call you Vegas."
When it comes to werewolves/wereleopards and so on, the Wolfpack utilizes most of White Wolf's lore and information on Changing Breeds. Since I will be offering others to take part in playing a Wereleopard in the T?ndu'? M?na Clan (specifically), I have made this quick, nifty reference for those who wish to follow the same guidelines.
Just a quick overview, if you have any questions feel free to ask.
Blue, underlined words are helpful links!
First things first, a Glossary:
Alpha - The head/leader of any Changing Breed Clan.
Beta - The Alpha's right hand. Usually a bodyguard or enforcer of some sort.
Background - A special trait used to represent elements of a character's history or backstory. They establish social status, history or special tools that do not fall under other categories.
Bagheera - Wereleopards/Werepanthers. They are renowned for their mystic insights and ferocious tempers. Bagheeras are a strong and sagacious folk.
Bastet - Werecats. One of the many Changing Breeds.
Breed - How the Fera was born. See: Homid, Metis and Feline.
Changing Breeds - Also called 'Fera.' Refers to all the shapechanger races.
Concept - An outline of a Fera's traits and personality.
Delirium - The overwhelming fear that affects human beings who see Garou and some other Fera in their war forms.
Feline - A Fera born from natural wild cats. Very rare. Also, refers to the Fera's 'regular' cat form.
Gamma - The Alpha's left hand. Usually akin to an assistant or legal counsel.
Gifts - Special powers granted to Fera by spirits.
Homid - A Fera born of human parents. Also refers to a Fera's human form.
Metis - A werecat born from the union of two Fera. They suffer from deformities and defects, but are still treated as equals within werecat society.
Pryio - "Moon Favor" used to determine a Fera's place in society and how the cat approaches life and handles challenges. It is often determined by the time of day in which the Bastet achieved the First Change. A Pryio can change if a Bastet undergoes severe life changes.
Triat - The Triat are three of the greatest entities in the Changing Breed spiritual hierarchy: the Wyld, the Weaver and the Wyrm.
Tribe - The 'family' of each Fera. Such as Bagheera (Wereleopards) or Garou (Werewolves).
the Weaver - Its function was thought to be to make Order from the creations of the Wyld, giving them form and function for the duration of their existence before they were destroyed by the Wyrm, maintaining a balance between creation and destruction.
the Wyld - One of the three spirits of the Triat. The Wyld is a generative force: it creates absolute Chaos, which is given order by the Weaver before it is destroyed and returned to chaos by the Wyrm.
the Wyrm - Also called Cahlash by the Bastet, is one of the three incalculably powerful spirits comprising the Triat. The Wyrm's purpose is the cleansing and rectification of Creation, furthering its descent into Entropy. He achieves this by eliminating that which the Wyld creates and the Weaver structures.
Metis: The offspring of a censured union between Bastet. They have a permanent disability but a deep link with primal creation.
Initial Gifts: Create Element, [color="#1979e6"]Sense Primal Nature
[/color] Feline: Big cats birthed and raised them, whether wild or in captivity. Their kind are all but gone, and they must fight to survive.
Initial Gifts: Mark as Mine, Shriek
Bastet Pryio: Time of Day of First Change.
Daylight: They have an open and honest heart, and tackle things head-on. Twilight: They see life in many shades and prefer complex, artistic pursuits to plainer things. Night: They like to be left to themselves, and grow angry when someone intrudes on their private pursuits.
Bastet Backgrounds: Special Traits.
Allies: Friends of any species. Contacts: Your sources of information and aid among the human population. Den-Realm: A magical place where the Bastet and the land are one. Jamak: A spirit ally with whom you exchange favors. Pride: Non-Bastet relations, usually feline, who are immune to the Delirium and know what you are. Mentor: For the year, your teacher and friend. Afterward, you must trade this for another Background. Pure Breed: Your pedigree and lineage among your people. Resources: The amount of wealth you have at your fingertips. Rites: The ceremonies you know and can perform. Secrets: Inside information that can be both valuable and dangerous to possess. Trinket: An object you possess that has some magical or mystical powers.
Alternate Forms:
-Homid: Regular human.
-Sokto: Near-human.
-Crinos (War Form): Human-Cat hybrid, incites a dampened form of the Delirium.*
-Chatro (War Form): primordial cat-form, incites full Delirium.
-Feline: Regular cat.
(Although, Cheswick Strider (pictured above) is a Werewolf. This is an accurate representation of a Fera's alternate forms. Cheswick belongs to Kat)
The T?ndu'? M?na Clan
To be part of the T?ndu'? M?na, the Fera must:
-Be a Wereleopard (Race: Bastet, Tribe: Bagheera)
-Bagheera are typically African or Asian. Exceptions will be made.
-Recognize Lakshima as the Alpha of the Clan.
-Take on the name of a Hindu God/dess within the Clan or on Clan business.
She had been gone fortwenty-four dayswhen he first tried to replace her. He filled an inexplicable void she'd left behind with women that weren't small enough, or dark enough to really be anything like her. The right combination was just too difficult to find, apparently. Or perhaps, he'd gotten too picky.
There had been a brunette from a bar with too many curves.
A skinny redhead from a coffee shop that was entirely too tall.
One would have the right body shape, but be artificially platinum blonde, and another would have the same raven curls but with breasts that were entirely too large.
Regardless of their looks, they didn't drag thick, acrylic nails through his hair, either. Or leave mint-colored lipstick smears on his skin. They all took themselves too seriously to be beautiful to him; refusing to be too loud or too expressive as if they were self-conscious.
They didn't giggle with his cock in their mouths, and they wouldn't let him take their picture.
Grayson had too many pictures of her. Pictures of her smiling and pictures of her coming. Exhausted and tangled in his bed sheets or grinning on the couch, looking childish in one of his sweaters. Candid Poloroids and carefully developed four-by-sixes littered his desk and his dark room. He sometimes found them in his dressers or in the kitchen. She was a fleeting, but somehow reoccurring aspect of his life. Cackling loudly with a beer in hand, perched on a stool in his kitchen one minute, and gone before the sun came up the next.
He refused to say he missed her.
It was quieter when she wasn't around. He didn't find beer bottles littering his coffee table from where she fell asleep in front of the TV. He didn't have to carry her to his bed when he came home from work in the middle of the night. He remembered to take his medication. He reminded himself that he liked the quiet; that he liked being alone, and having the house to himself.
After thirty-two days he still wasn't eating right, still wasn't sleeping well. Lace was always the first to notice because she cared about him more than he deserved. She would bring him lunches and invite him to dinner. Invitations he would accept, even though he knew it was unusual, because he didn't want to make her worry.
"What's wrong?" She would ask, watching him, concerned, over the rim of her glass.
"Nothing," he would replay, with a careless shrug after forcing down another bite of a cheeseburger.
"You just seem really… off, is all."
He would shrug again, and tell himself she didn't know him that well, because he wouldn't let her know him. She couldn't possibly be able to determine if he seemed off.
Besides, it's not like he could explain that he missed someone that know else knew about.
And he refused to say he missed her.
After forty days his solitude would almost feel normal, again. He took his medication on time, and slept on the side of the bed he'd been keeping empty for reasons he couldn't comprehend.
He took another woman from another bar. She'd been closer than the others, but she smelled like perfume that was too expensive, and tasted like the wrong kind of cigarettes. She didn't talk enough.
Forty-seven days had come and gone. She had gone, but he'd not forgotten her, but he'd figured out how to go back to being normal. As normal as he could be, anyway.
He could sleep without the sounds of someone breathing, again.
After forty-eights days his doorbell sounded off in the middle of the night.
It was the rain that Julianna noticed first. Stinging, and ice cold where it dropped onto the exposed skin of her limbs and her face. She didn't know where she was, didn't bother finding out. She was cold, and steadily becoming cognizant to the fact that she ached all over. She rolled onto her side, and curled into a ball, pulled her knees against her chest, and pressed her face into wet grass that was mostly mud. Her tail curled around her body in vain attempts to keep her warm, and when she moved to circle her arms around her legs was when she noticed near insufferable pain surging through her left arm.
Julianna opened her eyes for the first time. It was dark, but her eyes caught traces of moonlight that flooded through what she assumed were trees. Looking down at her arm she saw that it was a mess. Hardly recognizable as a limb, the forearm all torn muscles and ligaments, bone that was clearly broken visible through missing flesh. The true gore of it was obscured the grayscale of her darkvision, and was probably the only thing that kept her mind from being thrown into a panic.
There was no thunder, no lightning, just rain. So when a door opened Julianna was able to hear it. Ears twitched against the unexpected sound, and she twisted her body to find the source. It was a house. Had it been there the whole time? A two-story federal looking thing. All beige bricks and black shutters. Her senses were out of alignment, obscured by the pain her body was trying to shut out, but she could see a figure standing in the open door. A silhouette in a wash of yellow light. Julianna uncurled her figure, tried in vain to push herself up on her good elbow. She blinked through her bangs and the rain to get a better look.
It was a child. A boy who had stepped out on to his porch to scowl at the rain. He had light hair, and could only have been eight or maybe nine. Determining the ages of others got harder as she got older. She called out to him for help, but it was not words that escaped. The sound more akin to the yowls of an injured feline. Not that the comparison was entirely inaccurate. The boy startled, scanning the darkness for the sound. When he finally spotted her surprise covered his face, and he shut the door again.
Julianna sank back into the mud, clutching her injured arm closer to her chest. Bit and pieces of the night came back in staccato flashbacks. Another bar, another argument, another altercation. But it wasn't her. Belial had been the one to saunter into the tavern like it owned the place, Belial had been the one to cheat at pool. Only to hurt her, never to kill her.
Like always.
She wasn't aware of how much time had passed when the door opened again. She didn't look to see if it was the boy. She drifted in and out of consciousness, until warm hands on her broken arm brought her to alertness. Julianna jerked away, snarled on impulse, hiding the sounds of pain with a threat.
"Come now, dear," a woman said softly. Her voice was gentle, melodic. "Come inside and let me look at your arm."
There was no fight left in her, so she complied as the healer helped her stand. Slowly, they made their way back into the house; two children scattered as they came through the door.
The woman called herself Ishara, and she was healer. The true kind that was a dying breed. Talents steeped in shamanism and druidism, in spirits and magic. She helped Julianna bathe, found her dry clothes that would keep away the chill. She had fed her and done the best she could to heal the ugly remnants of her arm.
When she was patched and bandaged, Ishara left the room to tend to another patient. It wasn't long after that the children from before came back into the room, seating themselves with Julianna on the floor in front of the fireplace. It was the same boy, now accompanied by a girl, still a child but older than he. The girl looked like the healer, auburn hair and green eyes, so Julianna was left to assume she was their mother. The boy wasn't making eye contact with her. Julianna couldn't tell if he was shy, or just pouting.
She wondered who the boy, pale and blue-eyed like an icy Nordic prince, resembled.
The girl was more than willing to do enough talking for the both of them. "Are you okay?" she asked, crossing her legs and looking up at Julianna in what could have been wonder. "What happened?"
Julianna's ears pinned back. "I don't know," she explained, a half-truth. "I think I was attacked in the woods."
"Oh. Well, you really shouldn't have gone out there after dark," she said, very matter of fact. "Anyway, my name's Victoria, and this is Owen," she continued, jerking a thumb in the boy's direction.
"My name is Rylan," she lied, ears pushing forward as she cocked her head at the children. "How old are you?"
Victoria beamed. "I'm eleven and Owen's only nine. How old are you?"
"Two hundred and fifty six."
Victoria's face was clouded in disbelief. Julianna cleared her throat, tail curling against the line of her spine as she tried again. "Uhm. Twenty," she ventured, sounding unsure.
"Where are you from? Not from around here if you're going into the forest after dark." This from the boy, sounding suspicious and vaguely accusatory. Emerald hues cast down to look at him. How practical.
"Eryra," she replied, finding no reason to lie this time.
Owen frowned at her. "Where's that?"
"The Veridian Isles. In the Kartik Sea."
The boy pushed himself from the floor, seemingly without provocation, and all but stormed out of the room. The remaining two watched him go, and Julianna turned her attention back to the girl, ears falling lopsided as she cocked a brow.
"Don't worry about him," Victoria reassured. "He's probably going to try and find it on his maps. He's really into maps." She sounded bored by the prospect just explaining it.
Julianna shook her head. "He probably won't find it. Most modern maps only go as far as the Abian Sea." Looking around, she found a shadow cast from the fireplace that was close enough for her to reach into. Victoria gasped as her hand disappeared into the darkness. From the shadow she pulled a weathered piece of rolled up parchment and handed it to Victoria. "Give him this. He might enjoy it."
The girl eyed the parchment warily, as she obviously wanted to ask a million new questions. Deciding she would save them for later, she snatched the offering and ran off to join her brother.
"That woman gave me a map."
Ishara smiled as she sat on the edge of Owen's bed. "Did you thank her?" she asked, as she tucked the blankets around him. She brushed strands of blonde hair out of his eyes.
Owen shook his head. "It was of islands. They're not on any of my other maps. And it was in a weird language."
"Veridian," Ishara offered, but Owen only looked at her with confusion. "It is the language they speak were she comes from," she said, before leaning to press a kiss to his forehead. His lips parted to ask more questions, but she shushed him, and he closed it again. "Goodnight," she said, as she stood, turning off the light and closing the door as she left
It was the nausea that woke Julianna. The turning of her stomach and the taste of bile on the back of her tongue. She sat up in the bed that Ishara had offered her as a kindness, and her head swam. This was not an unfamiliar feeling, different from a common sickness. Julianna tried to fight it. Tried to fight the demon that was attempting to force control over her body. No, no, no, she chanted in her thoughts, trying to push the demon back down into the dark part of her mind that it usually enjoyed. Not this time. It wanted out, and there was nothing to be done about it.
It was like flipping a switch. Green eyes turned blood red, as her ears and tail stopped twitching. Belial lifted its arms above its head, stretching its presence through Rylan's body and testing its control, before pushing up from the bed and out of the room. Belial didn't waste any time, it had a goal, and it sought out the healer.
"I knew I sensed you, monster," Ishara said darkly, turning from her work to face Belial as it sauntered into the room. Belial only smirked in response. "You've come to kill me then." The words were not a question, and she pulled a dagger from some hidden place in the robes she wore. "Your host is kind. She will not forgive you."
Belial's smirk faded, expression twisting, nose wrinkling in disgust. "I do not care about her feelings," the demon's tone implied that it should have been obvious. "She is a tool, a pawn. Temporary."
It was Belial who attacked first, all teeth and claws as she tried to maul the healer. The woman was skilled, dodging and blocking Belial's assault with more prowess than she expected from an aged shaman. It mattered little, in the end, Belial would always be faster, stronger. More ruthless, because despite fighting for her life, Ishara still wasn't fighting to kill.
Belial did not play by the same rules.
Pinning the woman against a wall, with a hand around her neck Belial's smirk had reappeared. It was a very sore winner; needed to gloat. To revel. "Thank you for fixing my arm," it said, holding the appendage at eye level. "It will come in handy when I kill you."
Ishara sneered, struggled against the demon's hold. Belial's grip tightened, choking, immobilizing until the woman stopped fighting. "Do you know who I am?" the demon asked. Ishara shook her head the best she could, mouth opening in silent protest. "Do you know who Rylan is?" Ishara nodded this time, and Belial's smirk fell into a frown.
"Of course you do. Little spying bride of the Covenant. Just couldn't be bothered to keep to yourself. Just like your husband."
Ishara's eyes widened at the mention of her husband, murdered while on a Covenant mission only a few months back. Questions danced behind those wide peridot orbs, but Belial would not be giving her the satisfaction of asking them.
Belial's free hand pushed into the woman's abdomen as if she were composed of something less than flesh and bone. She probably would have screamed had Belial's grip on her neck not been so silencing. That did not keep her from thrashing, mouth opened wide but no sound came out. Clawed fingers pushed up behind her ribcage, blood staining carefully applied bandages, until they gripped her heart, pumping and fluttering like a frightened bird. "I'll be taking this."
Belial released the woman all at once and her lifeless body slumped to the floor. When Belial's hand was freed from the gore it had created, it still held the healer's heart - no longer beating, no longer struggling. Belial tsked and looked down at itself, frowning at the blood soaking its clothes and skin. It contemplated stripping, until small, prey-like whimpers drew its attention.
Turning at the waist, it found itself locking eyes with the children from before. They cowered against the wall in the hallway, tears streaming down ruddy little faces. Belial took a step towards them, covered in blood and holding their mother's heart like a trophy and they screamed. It moved closer still, the children held each other hiding their faces in any way they could; begging to wake up from this nightmare.
"Do you remember my name?" Belial asked, leaning closer to the children, voice barely above a whisper. Only the boy looked at it, nodding slowly as brows furrowed into his best imitation of a glare. "Good," Belial replied, sounding positively chipper as she reached out to poke him in the nose, smearing blood across ivory skin. "You would do well not to forget it. We will meet again."
Belial straightened, turned its back on the children and left the house in the woods. She left the dead body of the woman who had shown Julianna a kindness, and she left the children orphaned and sobbing on the floor. In any other circumstance it may have burned the whole thing to the ground. But Belial liked leaving a legacy.
Veronica ignored the knocking on her front door. Why wasn't Melanie answering? More than a morning person her tiny roommate would surely be up at-she searched blindly for her phone, blinking against the harsh screen light- eleven AM. Clicking it off, Veronica rolled over, pulling blankets up to her chin to fend off any light that dared filter through her dark curtains.
Just when she thought peace had returned to the modest apartment, the knocking began again. With inexplicable urgency. Kicking off her comforter in a childish fit, she rolled out of bed and quickly pulled on the jeans she'd been wearing the night before.
People usually called in the event of an emergency. Green locks of hair floated in disarray around her head. They dropped into place as she unlocked the front door and swung it open, half expecting some overeager Mormon to be on the other side.
Her visitor paused, mid-knock when she opened the door and upon laying eyes on him, she all but closed it again. More accurately, she laid eyes on an expanse of chest hidden by a forest green dress shirt and a heather gray vest. He was taller and wider than she was, and she glared at him from the crack in the door.
Spoiler:
"Solarflare," she said icily, her gaze snapped towards his face. "To what do I owe the pleasure?"
"Makai," he corrected, and frowned when she only hummed in response.
He looked annoyed, perhaps by her cold stare, but otherwise he didn't have the right. She certainly hadn't invited tall, dark and handsome to her apartment, and she'd done nothing to warrant a visit from the so-called superhero that had taken down her parents.
"Are you going to let me in?" he asked, rough voice presenting more of a demand than a question.
"No," she replied, automatically. She should have been more considerate of her benefactor-slash-parole officer, but unsurprisingly they'd never gotten along very well. "You can't stay long, I'm sure," she suggested. "Akiona International will be missing their CEO."
"You don't think someone will notice the CEO of a multi-billion dollar company standing on your porch."
He had a point. She pursed her lips and pretended to consider his words, before stepping back and letting the door fall open. She walked to the kitchen as he came inside, closing the door behind him. She started making coffee and didn't offer him any because they weren't friends and she was a terrible hostess.
"What do you want?" she asked, less polite this time, not that the bar had been set very high. Pushing her hair back with one hand she watched him wander into the living room. He looked around, hands shoved into the pockets of pressed slacks.
"Where’s Melanie?" he asked, instead of getting to the point.
Veronica shrugged, didn't care that he couldn't see her do it. Her roommate's whereabouts wasn't the business of either of them.
"I got your e-mail," he finally explained as she washed out her favorite coffee mug in the sink.
"Y'know, the great thing about e-mail is you can respond to them from your own home," she replied, reaching for a paper towel. "Your billion dollar mansion. Or even from your high-rise office downtown."
He turned to look at her and his handsome features probably would have made her more compliant had she given them the time of day. "I wanted to see you." As if that explained everything. Or anything for that matter. Veronica was aware of what it usually meant, but he couldn't have possibly meant it that way.
He shouldn't have meant it that way.
"Here I am," she said, despite not being nearly as presentable as she could in an ill-fitting seasonal t-shirt from an old job and wrinkled jeans. She had no idea what her hair was doing, or to what extent her mascara made her look like a raccoon. She'd feel less sloppy if he wasn't always wearing one suit or the other.
"Your e-mail said you were going out of state? To some sort of music festival?" he paused, so she could hum and agreement from behind her coffee mug. "I don't think that's a very good idea."
"I wasn't asking permission," she replied like it was obvious. "I was simply informing. Like I am required to do. Per contract." When her parents had been defeated, her freedom had come with a variety of clauses. Being a rehabilitated villain and vaguely part of a witness protection program meant the government kept loose tabs on her.
A superhero in her living room made it seem like those tabs were tightening.
"Veronica…"
"Need I remind you I'm an adult?"
"I'm only suggesting…"
"You don't get to make suggestions!" She dropped her mug to throw her hands in the air. It floated above the counter, liquid precariously clinging to its own surface tension. "You're not my father. You're not my boyfriend. You don't get a vote."
He inhaled slowly, hands reappearing from his pockets to adjust his tie. His staccato movements implied she had hit a nerve, but she didn't know which one. "Who are you going with?"
"This guy…Max and some other people."
"Max? Maxwell Pennington? From your English class?"
Veronica didn't mask the disgust on her features, displeased with the tabs they were keeping on her. They stared at one another in silence.
"That's…fine, I suppose. He's shown no signs of villain activity."
"And neither have I," she reminded him.
"True enough. But you've also been spending a noticeable amount of nights away from your apartment."
She was floating before she could stop herself, unable to keep herself on the ground. "Stop. Watching. Me."
"It's my job to watch you," he replied, calmly. "Are you going to tell me what you're doing out all night?"
"I'm allowed to have a life. I'm twenty-four. I go out. I'm not doing anything wrong."
"Veronica."
"Maybe I'm seeing someone."
That seemed to take him for a loop. He paused. Opened his mouth to say something, but closed it with an audible click of his teeth. There was a hard set to his jaw that made it difficult to ignore her creeping suspicions. He was not allowed to have feelings for her. He'd ruined her life. One parent dead and another in prison because of him. He was not allowed to like her.
"Have fun a your concert," he acquiesced sharply, and she felt her feet come in contact with the ground, hair falling down around her shoulders. He moved towards the front door and she followed close behind him.
"I will," she replied, challenging and childish.
Wrapping fingers around the doorknob, he turned abruptly and she almost ran into him. Huffing, she looked up and he was towering over her. She didn't back up of spite, keeping her gaze on his. She could feel heat radiating off of him, and he smelled like soap and fancy cologne.
"You know the second you step out of line, I will be there to stop you." He was being unnecessarily hard with her, perhaps she had hurt his feelings.
"You can try," she said, feeling unusually bold in this context. Normally she wouldn't bother being so pugnacious when it came to him, or her past, or her abilities, but it seemed they were both annoyed with one another.
Wrenching open the door he stepped out of her apartment, leaving her to close it behind him. She released a breath she didn't realize she'd been holding and padded back to the kitchen to reheat her coffee. She pushed Makai Akiona from her mind, and decided that if she were going to be awake, she might as well pack.
She rolled over to the sound of a voice she didn't recognize, and a name she hadn't been called in years. It was hardly more than a murmur, close to her ear which twitched against the sensation. A hand smoothed over her hip, callused and strong and almost familiar. She didn't know where she was in this dream. Or this hazy memory. But it smelled like mint, and vetiver and gun oil.
Spoiler:
"Julianna," he said, again. She didn't know who he was, but she sighed in response as he pressed his mouth to the hollow of the throat. He left a trail of kisses between her breasts that felt hot and cold simultaneously. He came back up and crushed his mouth against hers. She couldn't see his face, but she hummed in delight when he pulled her closer.
There was piano music. She didn't recognize the score, or this particular grand piano. She looked down, and wasn't acquainted with this particular little black dress. She moved closer to the piano.
"Julianna," he sounded surprised, and the music stopped abruptly, but the man smiled at her. When she reached out to touch his face, he closed his eyes and pressed his pressed his cheek into her hand, prickly from a few days without shaving.
His eyes were blue.
His eyes were grey.
8-ball corner pocket. She had lost, but this didn't feeling like losing. Pressed against a wall with his mouth on hers, her fingers clawed through thick blonde locks and he groaned against her mouth. A firm grip slid down her thigh, hooked beneath her knee to draw her leg around his waist, then the other. Feet off the floor, and he ground against her. She was grinning more than kissing; victorious.
He was a sore winner.
"Where is it?" He was yelling. He was angry. Pacing back and forth in front of the bed like a caged animal. He turned to her, eyes wild and drenched in sweat. He threw the wooden box he'd been holding, and she flinched, ears falling to the crown of her head as it splintered against the wall behind her.
"Julianna." It was a plea. It was a demand. He stalked towards her and when she moved to back away from him he grabbed her by the arm, fingers digging into her flesh. He pulled her closer, violently, grip bruising as if he would shake the information out of her. The room was dark, it was raining. The rumble of thunder masked the sound of the back of his hand against her cheek.
He released her with a shove, and she fell to the ground. Stars behind her eyes, with a mouth full of blood and eyes full of tears.
"I rather like Julianna," he said, placing the book he'd been reading face down up his desk. Later he would complain about how it was bad for the spine.
"No one calls me that," she replied, looking down at him from the other side of his desk. The corner of his mouth curled upwards in a cocky half-smile.
"I think I will."
His eyes were grey.
His eyes were blue.
Rylan woke up alone in her apartment with the face of a man she didn't know quickly dissolving from her memory. Her lips tingled with kisses that didn't exist. Her skin burned for hands that had never touched her. The piano she had never seen and a dress she had never worn faded from her thoughts.
Had his eyes been blue, or grey?
She forgot his voice as she dressed for the day. The smell of mint and gun oil didn't haunt her as she stepped into the bookstore, slipping easily through a shadow in the bedroom upstairs. It's usual occupants were gone, save for Jean who was considering the contents of his closet with disinterest.
"Ma belle chat," Jean murmured pleasantly as she approached, and she no longer blushed when he said it. «I missed you,» he continued, reaching to toy with a lock of hair that fell across her shoulder when she was close enough for him to do so. It was unlikely that he had. Too many other things to occupy his attention for him to lament her absence.
«You should wear green today,» she said, instead of contradicting him.
«Green?» His hand moved from her hair to the buttons of her blouse.
«Green,» she repeated, and didn't bother to explain herself. Didn't have to as Jean's mouth found hers.
Grayson received the last Fire Stone for his sixteenth birthday. Had been receiving them periodically before then.
He'd just blown out candles on a birthday cake, despite insisting that he was too old. He had just eaten an uncomfortable amount of it, because his mother thought he was too thin. Vanilla with strawberry filling and too much buttercream frosting. Just the way he liked it.
It was very suspicious.
The guests quieted as his mother took his plate and pushed one last gift box into his hand. There was a buzz of hushed excitement around the room. He felt it too, but it quickly dissipated. It was not what he had expected, when he opened the small box, decorated with opalescent foil and curling bows. It was safe to say he was disappointed, with his brow furrowed, mouth set in a thin line.
"What's this?" he asked, the tone of his voice dropping the volume of the room to silence. He picked up the stone, tentatively, turning it over to inspect the glimmer in the center of the rock. It shone like it housed a tiny flame. It was warm to the touch.
"It's a Fire Stone," his mother explained, her smile was too wide, too sweet as if to suggest he was being rude. Grayson's sisters fidgeted in their chairs where they were seated across from him.
"I know that." He shifted the rock one way and then the other before setting it back on the table, finally looking away from it, and across the table to his father, expecting more of an explanation. "But for what?"
Grayson didn't need to follow the eyes in the room to know that they were all falling to Growlithe, sitting at his feet. Oblivious and obedient. Panting with his tongue lolling out of the side of his mouth. His runty Growlithe with the strange, shining yellow coat. Stranger still that he was still a Growlithe.
"Grayson." His mother only said his name once, but it was the inflection of it that made him push away from the table. He left his guests and the Fire Stone in the kitchen, Growlithe at his heels. His mother said his name again. The front door slammed when he closed it.
Ariana looked to her husband helplessly, throwing her hands up in the air as if to suggest he should do something about his son. Michael, all too accustomed to his wife's pushy nature and his son's tantrums, didn't notice as he continued to fork cake into his mouth. "Michael," she hissed, brows flying upwards towards her widow's peak. The fork paused and he rolled his eyes up to his wife, not exactly sure what he was supposed to do.
"I'll go get him." Lace volunteered and hopped up from the table, other guests rustling around her. Angie and Mary had buried themselves in their PokeGear to avoid the tension. Her Emolga pattered behind her as she followed Grayson's retreat.
Lace found him throwing sticks for Growlithe in front of Route 19. "That was quite the exit," she commented lightly. Emolga scurried up her back to perch herself on the top of her head.
"She just won't leave it alone," he replied, tugging a stick away from Growlithe and launching it into the distance again. Emolga leaped from Lace's head, chasing after the stick as well. Empty hands pushed angrily through his curly mop of hair. "I don't know why she insists on pushing the issue. Growlithe is fine the way he is." The canine raced back, and dropped the stick as his feet. They repeated the process two or three time in silence.
"I think I'm going to leave," he said, cutting through the peace, testing the weight of a new stick in his hand.
Lace looked dubious. "Little late to be a trainer," she commented, and Grayson scoffed. "Like I could ever be a trainer. I'll find something else."
"Something else?"
"Yeah, like photography or something."
"Okay."
Lace sounded a bit sad, and Grayson wished he couldn't hear it in her voice. They both knew she couldn’t come with him if he left. Already training to be a police officer, her place was here until she was finished. He was supposed to be doing the same, but Grayson was used to being the family disappointment.
"I'll come back to visit."
"Okay."
"You can call me, whenever."
"Okay."
"Lace…"
"It's fine." He turned to look at her and it was very clearly not fine. Emolga clung to her leg, Growlithe had flopped down at his feet. Grayson swallowed. He didn't know what to say, didn't know how to fix this. Didn't know if it was fixable. He took one step forward and stopped, unsure of himself. Lace closed the distance between them, and where head bumped into his chest he circled his arm around her.
Julianna cocked her head. A cup of coffee paused halfway on its path to her mouth, because she was nearly certain that those words had come from her husband's mouth. She listened intently, ears pricked forward and waited for the conversation to continue.
Spoiler:
"No, it's his pectorals."
From Victoria this time, and Jules was less surprised. Perfectly reasonable for her to be commenting on her boyfriend's physique. Settling her elbows on the island counter, she sipped at her cooling beverage and continued to eavesdrop. It wasn't particularly difficult, given her advantages. And they weren't exactly trying to be subtle.
"Have you seen his arms, though?"
One ear fell to the side, brows disappearing behind her bangs as she was surprised to hear the voice of her best friend. Julianna's gaze flicked to Holland, sitting across from her with his own coffee and a newspaper. They'd taken to staying in the kitchen while the rest of the company moseyed off to entertain themselves. He'd not seemed particularly hooked by the conversation until that moment.
"They're bigger than my thighs," the melodic blonde continued. Julianna smirked as Holland looked back at her, brows knit over the bridge of his nose.
How would she know that? He mouthed. The cat only shrugged, still smirking, but she hid the expression behind her oversized mug. Holland carefully folded his newspaper, before pushing back his chair and leaving the kitchen to see what all the fuss over Sai was about. After a few moments of silence, Jules hopped off her chair as well. If only to find out what Sai was up to that had them all distracted.
She'd found them huddled at a window and when she was near enough to see out of it, she was witness to Sairus chopping wood. Honest to goodness chopping wood. His hair was down and his shirt was off and he looked like some sort of lumberjack wet dream with the blue flannel tied around his waist. His jeans and boots were covered in mud and he was in full view of his admirers, but clueless about his audience.
"I like his back," she chimed in, sipping coffee and ignoring the simultaneous and withering glares she received from both Hart siblings. Aphrodite nodded solemn, and serious beside her. "You're right that is also a very good part."
"Babe," Holland interjected, and Aphrodite shushed him with a quick peck to the cheek. He responded by looping and arm around her waist and pulling her closer to his side. She was smiling all the while. Owen and Victoria had turned back to the window. Another silence fell over them, as Sairus reached for another block of wood, and steadied it on a ground out tree stump. Julianna couldn't for the life of her figure out why we was doing it. They were staying at a cabin for fun, but it was summer.
"How's his dick, though?" Aphrodite's question hung in the air, like a palpable thing they could all reach out and touch.
"Babe!"
"What! We all want to know! I mean c'mon look at him. " Aphrodite gestured to Sairus over Owen's shoulder. Owen moved away from his position at the front of the group and Julianna assumed he was finished with the conversation. Except, he only moved behind her, placing both hands over her ears and pressing them both to her head.
"Hey!" she protested, releasing the coffee with one hand to bat at both of his. He didn't release her and she heard a muffled, "yes do tell."
"Oh my god," Jules deadpanned, before another sip of coffee.
Before Victoria, the only one in the group with any knowledge could respond, Sairus stopped mid-chop. Busted. He had spotted them. Frowning he dropped the ax and lifted his arms in a what the fuck gesture. The group dispersed in opposite directions in a fit of loud laughter.
Aphrodite immediately felt bad for making Holland tag along. Not only with meeting Owen, but with all of the wereleopard politics, in general. He expressed the latter was for her safety, but accompanying her put him more at risk than anything. She made a disapproving noise at the mention of Owen's creative process, but otherwise didn't comment. When her husband's arm settled across her shoulders, she slipped one arm beneath his jacket and around his waist, leaning against him as they left the casino in tandem.
Spoiler:
The corner of her mouth that he kissed, turned upwards a touch, but she still looked disappointed overall. "I don't feel like I did good," she expressed as they waited for the valet to bring their car around. "I feel like I made it worse, and I didn't even have any useful information."
Holland separated himself from her when their car appeared, and she frowned at herself in the tinted passenger window. "Babe, it's fine. There's not really anything you can do." She looked up at him, still pouting before he disappeared inside the vehicle. With a childish huff she opened her own door and slid inside the car. As she settled, Holland smoothed his hand over her knee and they drove away.
They didn't talk in the car. The radio filled the silence with sad indie songs, until Holland changed the channel to something a little less emotional. Heavy drums and noisy guitars. Aphrodite didn't protest, mostly resigned to watching the lights pass outside her window, fingers laced with Holland's against her knee.
"Sorry, I made you come out tonight," Dite said at length, voicing her earlier concerns. Holland squeezed her fingers with his in response. Not quite accepting of her apology and not quite dismissing it either. She turned her head away from the window to examine his profile. His tongue pushed and pulled at the base of his lip ring in lieu of his busy hands. The one not holding hers, gripped the steering wheel and she knew she had about pushed him to his limits tonight.
She let her apology hang untouched in the space between them, until eventually they were home.
There was a process to coming home. Shoes taken off at the door. Double, triple, quadruple check that the car was locked. The signifying beep echoing in the darkness until Holland was satisfied. Aphrodite stayed with him to watch that garage door close all the way. She stayed with him as he turned off the light. Then turned it back on. Then turned it back off.
Only one repetition this time. That was good.
Inside the house, she hugged him again in the darkness of the hall leading to their bedroom. He hugged her back, because it was one of the few things he could manage to do. He was unsure of what it would be like to be unable to touch her completely. Holland tried not to think about it. In their bedroom he watched her pull the pins out of her hair, blonde curls fell over shoulders left bare from the cut of her dress. Taking off his jacket, he slid it over a hanger. It would have to be washed before he was willing to wear it again. He removed his tie and unpinned the cuff links from his sleeves.
Everything had a proper place.
Coming up behind Aphrodite, he smoothed his hands down her arms, pressing a kiss to her shoulder. A brief moment of clarity, a release from the constant repetitive din in his head. He gently touched his lips to the curve of her neck, and she giggled. She turned to face him, mood visibly lifted from their previous outing by those simple gestures. His lips against her collarbone, his hands on her waist an he gently walked her backwards until the back of her knees hit the edge of the bed. They fell upon it, Dite's giggles erupting once more as he settled his body between her knees. He kissed her other collarbone, the hollow of her throat, her jaw, the corner of her mouth. He repeated this loving pattern; collar, throat, jaw, mouth until Aphrodite curled the fingers of one hand into his hair. The other slid between their bodies to caress the length of his erection, and Holland seemed to freeze all at once. She felt his entire body stiffen above her, his lips discontinued their patterned ministrations.
Aphrodite moved her hand, knowing she had been too bold. Asked for more than he was willing to give. Able to give.
"I'm sorry," he murmured against her ear, and she touched a gentle hand to his cheek. He sighed, pulling away from her all together to sit upright at the edge of the bed. "I'm sorry," he repeated. She sat up on her elbows, could see the tightness between his shoulders. He leaned heavily on his knees, head down. Dite pushed herself up all the way, tucking her legs beneath her and smoothing a hand over his back.
"You don't have to apologize to me, Holly."
When he didn't reply Aphrodite pressed a kiss to his temple, and got up from the bed. She walked into the bathroom and closed the door behind her. She found the light switch in the darkness and flicked it on. She removed her make up at the sink, careful not to leave too much of a mess and to clean up the small mess she did. As she wiped lipstick off her mouth, she tried not to notice the fine wrinkles forming at the corners of her eyes. She tried to ignore the silver that mixed with blonde at her temples. She pushed her fingers through her hair, staring at her own violet eyes. He loves you, she reminded herself. He loves you and he thinks your beautiful. It isn't anyone's fault.
When she opened the bathroom door, Holland was no longer sitting on the bed.
Official Language: English National Language: Veridian Demonym: Veridian or Verdant Native Inhabitants: Verdant Lynxes
Spoiler:
Government: Matriarchy Legislature: Monarchy: Current 51st Verdant Queen Julianna Darkwillow Regent Monarch: Kama Darkwillow. Elliot Darkwillow High Court :Comprised of 32 elected officials. 8 from each island.
Military: Veridian Royal Navy Colors: Green, Black, Gold. Flag: A crescent moon behind and upright lynx wearing a crown on a field of dark green. Motto: "By Skill, Not Force."
Eryra
Demonym: Eryran Capital, and largest City: Luse Port City: Berdea Largest Duchy: Darkwillow Area: 10,991 km^2 Population: 2,950,210 Biome: Temperate Coniferous Forest Climate: Mild winters. Cool Summers with heavy rainfall Highest Peak: Sabuja Mountain Landmarks: Berdea Harbor, Leighton Castle, Vastil Hot Springs Main Exports: Sugar, bananas, coffee, gold, corundum, bauxite, aluminum, textiles, precious metals, glass, paper.
Covered in temperate evergreen forest and expansive mountain ranges. Many trees inhabit these forests including pine, cedar, fir and redwood. Coastal areas experience heavy rainfall. Coast is made up of reflective, sub-tidal beaches. Eryra is known for it’s strange purple beaches caused by manganese garnet granules eroded from deposits littered throughout the region.
Laine
Demonym: Lainine Capital and Largest City: Yasil Port City: Zialiony Largest Duchy: Wilder Area: 9,989 km^2 Population: 2,000,521 Biome: Boreal Forest Climate: Low annual temperatures characterize northerly latitudes; precipitation ranges from 40-100 centimetres per year and may fall mainly as snow. Highest Peak: Zelen Mountain Landmarks: Junen Oil Fields, Redmar Ski Lodge, Posk Caverns. Main Exports: Oil and petroleum products, rolled steel, ferrous and nonferrous metals and minerals, natural gas, timber, fertilizers, machinery and equipment, armaments.
Comprised of boreal forests and taigas. Nutrient poor soils, a result of permafrost, and the resultant of poor drainage favor the coniferous species. Coastal areas are elevated with no beaches. Melting snow drains to verdant inland valleys.
Macrilan
Demonym: Macrilanic Capital and Largest City: Kesk Port City: Zelena Largest Duchy: Weatherfare Area: 7,251 km^2 Population: 1,856,210 Biome: Mediterranean Chaparral Climate: Significantly hot and dry summers. It has cool and moist winters. Spring and fall are usually a mix between both summer and winter. There are moderate amounts of rain, and mild temperatures. Highest Peak: Mato Plateau Landmarks: Cyan Market, Zelena Harbor, Macrilan General Hospital, Royal Vineyards, Royal Orchards. Main Exports: Spices, fruits and vegetables, fish, livestock, leather, pharmaceuticals, medical equipment.
The vegetation is mostly made up of shrubs and small trees. These include evergreen shrubs and most deciduous forms of shrub. The trees, like cork oak, live oak , stone pine, and olive, usually have low branches, are very gnarled and have thick bark. Intermediate low-tide bar beach coast. Known for its cave beaches caused by erosion and ‘blue sand’ caused by a host of bioluminescent phytoplankton scattering across the coastlines at night.
Dakannore
Demonyn: Dakannorian Capital City: Tellan Largest City: Roanare Port City: Skarsa Largest Duchy: Sorenson Area: 6,765 km^2 Population: 962,653 Biome: Tropical Rainforest Climate: Very humid because of all the rainfall, which amounts to about 250 cm per year. Highest Peak: Mount Nagarr Landmarks: Dakannore Rum Distillery, Hagma War Monument, Mount Nagarr (a Volcano) Main Exports: sugar cane, pineapples, rum, flowers, coffee, tropical nuts and fruits.
The most diverse of is Isles in terms of flora and fauna. Intermediate sub-tidal barred 3D beaches are lined in geometric rock and black sand from high concentrations of eroded lava and volcanic rock.
they look at you and say,
condemned
accursed
damned
they look at me and say,
look at him
look at those red-stained hands
look at those cracking bones
look at those ghosted eyes
those serrated teeth
those hellbound feet
he is the wretchedest picture i’ve ever seen
i look at them and say,
listen to her
listen to this haunted breath
listen to this trembling pulse
listen to this creaking skeleton
this shotgun voice
this hollow footfall
she is the purest melody i’ve ever heard
i call up to god and say,
see the holiest blasphemy that i know
see the sweetest damnation that i know
see the happiest tragedy that i know
i swear even you cannot wrest her from me
![[Image: 4308487.png?946]](http://wcbv-ocs.weebly.com/uploads/2/3/6/8/23681795/4308487.png?946)
![[Image: tGF6uYR.png]](http://i.imgur.com/tGF6uYR.png)
![[Image: uozgyej.png]](http://i.imgur.com/uozgyej.png)
![[Image: PMYsGRS.png]](http://i.imgur.com/PMYsGRS.png)
![[Image: AY7Z1cp.png]](http://i.imgur.com/AY7Z1cp.png)
![[Image: Qw4miQm.png]](http://i.imgur.com/Qw4miQm.png)
![[Image: XbgwdZD.gif]](http://i.imgur.com/XbgwdZD.gif)
![[Image: GLcVXrX.gif]](http://i.imgur.com/GLcVXrX.gif)
