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330 lol way to repeat entire sentences accidentally sieee -ninja edit- dis what happen when you write posts in chunks and fill in the 'blanks' \:
Myrika is by me!
She remained upright a moment and then laid flat on the ground beside the paler figure, never releasing the grip on her sister's hand but shifting her own limbs awkwardly to minimize shuffling her around, too. She did not want to talk as she did, no more than she wanted to hear it from the sister she still remembered more as she was. But neither could she stand to be anything less than hateful to defilers and those who would be. That same piece of stone in her, too, was glad to hear her sister's lowly-voiced promise.
Cassie, she said, too close to pleading to be true chiding. You're not a burden. And even if true, the "burden" of her sister was one Myrika gladly would have carried around the world twice over and then some. Maybe it would have been easier if Cassie stayed away, but Myri needn't search her soul to know her preference was for her sister's presence. She held onto the smaller hand with her own and wished touch or words were enough to soothe some of that hurt. There was the smile, though, punctuated as it was by a cough. Myrika returned it, the tip of her dark-splotched tail even twitching a time or two.
Thank you for coming here, thank you for telling me, the redhead said. She could not say she was glad for the latter, but neither would she mourn the knowledge before Cassandra. You're stuck with me watching out for you, though. She wanted to ask if there was a place that would not require protecting one another, if there were any safe places in the world, but she thought she knew the answer and didn't want to hear it aloud, affirmed. Perhaps one day she would pull the head of a Luperci back and expose the throat, as Vesper had done for her, and watch her sister kill -- or vice versa.
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[html] Over time, she had made herself stronger, but they were mostly surface-level tricks and defenses. She could deceive easily, put on a convincing smile, grin like a fool, play the part of a meek, silly girl. She could lie and laugh and stick a knife in someone's stomach without a moment in between to pause. She could play a slyer role, the enchantress most wanted her to be, and after they'd given everything to her, her teeth would find their throats as well. She could run and dodge, twist out of outstretched arms and dart in between bodies. She played pretend and she killed and she survived. She had made herself stronger. But merely strong was a lonely thing to be.
And none of her new strength went into her heart. It, alone in the dark, protected by her teeth and her disguises, had been withering slowly, growing ever weaker. She would not trust; she would not believe. And she practiced her lies on herself. She didn't care. And these things didn't matter.
Cassandra was desperate to trust and believe, and she pulled her sister closer, dying of want for closeness and warmth, for touches that were not so unwanted and poisonous. Again she buried her nose in the auburn hair, slowly inhaling. "I'm glad you're okay," she said. "I'm glad you've been safe." Part of her was even glad for Inferni, in that moment, but she could not say it. She was glad Myrika had found her sense of belonging, though she still felt certain it would not last. Inferni was a place of betrayers, as much as any other place was, and one day, they would hurt her sister; physically, emotionally, she didn't know, but she knew they would. Perhaps she would be there to stop some of it, but she had no delusions of being able to forever. But there would be time enough for vengeance, and Cassandra would murder them in their beds.
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Myrika is by Alaine!
Safe, and soft. Perhaps that was why Ezekiel had picked her, after all the rest -- because she was soft, and therefore malleable to his will. How many ways had he influenced her? There was still a softness to her, but she was learning to lead -- however slowly and however awkwardly, still uncertain of her own authority. Having shed it in the privacy of this room with her sister, she could look at it with a more cynical perspective. Perhaps she was only a half-finished sculpture, her shaping truncated; perhaps Ezekiel had not meant to depart so suddenly from the clan. She did not feel like a leader, however often her voice betrayed her.
The pale muzzle in her hair and closeness of her sister drew some of the creeping thoughts and their shadows away. Myrika squeezed the smaller hand and then clutched it with her other one, too, so both hands were wrapped around her sister's. She had never felt quite so utterly useless ever before in her life, and it was a difficult feeling to combat. This, her smallness in and useless gestures in the face of clear anguish.
Perhaps she would have been safer still if she'd never left the tiny cabin, tucked away in the forest. She had revisited it, and it seemed none had taken residence there since her -- at least, not long enough for their scent to have permeated the walls. She had still smelled lingering traces of herself and Thamur -- not canine scents, but the lingering breath of some leatherwork or fabric, the ash and dust of an old fire, the stale scent of old hay and firewood. Separated from the world, she might have been the safest canine on the planet. And she still would not have Vesper or friends or family. But perhaps she wouldn't have had to fight or kill, either.
You deserve to be safe and okay, too, she muttered, glancing toward the wall. There had been a chalkboard there, and its faded online still stood starkly against the paint. She did not deserve all her safety and happiness, for some of it was certainly at the expense of her sister. She looked back toward the translucent eyes, the pale coyote face with an appropriately shaped and sized coyote body to go along with it. And if you're not, if -- something else happened and I didn't do anything, she started, shaking her head just a little. I won't be.
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[html] This thread, man.
In contrast, she was broken and hard, and far too quick, perhaps, to want to destroy. If she could end an argument by tearing out someone's jugular, she would, because it was easy. If her flattering negotiations broke down, if they did not believe her, if they changed their minds, she had her one solution. Take what could be taken, and so lives scattered in her wake. No one expected her to, and it was easy. That they were permanent solutions to frequently temporary problems did not matter; that sometimes they were permanent solutions to things that were her own fault more than anyone else's, she could not dwell long on. She survived; she breathed.
Cassandra scooted back on the bed a little and weakly, pulled her sister with her, pulling her close again. "I'm safe and okay now," she whispered. "I'm okay. I'm fine."
She didn't know that she deserved to be, really. Perhaps she had not deserved the very first wrongs (though she could not be entirely blameless), perhaps not even the ones that came after, but she hadn't stayed innocent long. Enough time had passed and she had not gotten better. She destroyed everything she touched, and there was no repenting. She did not even think she was sorry for most of it. It was easiest not to feel. One emotion gave way to another and always another. "Nothing else will happen to me." She nuzzled Myrika gently. "You'll be okay.
"We'll both be okay."
Cassandra did not know that she believed it, but sometimes it was hard to know what she really believed. There were lies she believed on purpose and truths she ignored with quiet desperation. And in the end, it probably didn't matter what she believed. She hadn't always believed the world was cruel, but that had changed nothing. She hadn't always believed that murder was the easiest solution (and maybe she didn't, still), but that changed nothing. Things would happen as they happened as they always had.
"We'll both be okay."
If she pretended to believe enough, maybe she would. [/html]
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328 oof, right in the feels
Myrika is by Alaine!
Her experiences seemed trivial in comparison. How much a child she still felt, still was -- her crucible was as she'd told her sister, the farm and Tyveni and Lami. There was not so much hurt or horror in that, and she felt foolish for having shared it. Then again, it had brought her to the question and the conversation. As a pathway, maybe it wasn't so bad -- at least she had some sore spot to share.
She shifted and readily moved closer when beckoned, turning to put an arm around Cassie. Her turquoise eyes lingered on the difference in coat -- drab earthen tones and metal rust against a moon-hued color, pale as bone. She wished she might have traded places; she would not have been a goddess, and her purity would not have mattered. If her sister had been the one in the cabin, perhaps -- she would have listened and learned from Thamur in Myrika's stead. They could not go back, and even if the awful things had not befallen her sister, things would have been different, all the same.
We will, she agreed. She would make it so, no matter what needed to be done. There would be cost -- life and blood, most likely, but Myrika would pay both gladly for Cassandra's continued safety. We'll kill for it, some small and sour voice, perhaps her conscience, muttered. Myrika ignored it and only smiled. She wanted to apologize, repeat the things she'd said in a more coherent fashion, but she could not rouse the energy, and only looked at the smaller coyote adoringly, trying -- and miserably failing -- to convey in look what all her words couldn't.
It was good to rest; her body felt heavy from lack of sleep or turbulence of life or, more probably, both. The tawny-furred coyote refused sleep, however enticingly it called, and blinked rapidly to keep herself awake, occasionally shifting an arm or leg. In the end, she lost the fight. Her head nodded to the side and rested against the uninjured shoulder of her sister, cerulean eyes closing shortly thereafter.
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[html] Over long moments and longer minutes, Cassandra's breathing steadied and the thundering in her heart faded to a quiet pulse. The tightness in her chest remained, along with a dull aching, but it no longer made her body tremble and shake, and it no longer tried to erupt from her throat. She had slept a long time already, but the new exhaustion was no less potent than the old. Her arms and legs felt flimsy and weak, as if there were no bones to hold their structure, and the muscles stung distantly, reminding her of some pretend marathon she'd run to escape phantom pursuers.
Warm and shielded in her sister's arms, the pallid woman recognized many things. They were basic observations, but no less profound for their simplicity. They had betrayers' blood in them, madness and treachery in scores, a list of crimes for life lived thus far. And they would each fall further. But Cassandra supposed that falling would not kill them, necessarily, and they didn't have to fall alone. Not yet. And there was still forgiveness, in each other, if no one else. There was forgiveness and trust and maybe the weakness that came with that was worth it. Maybe.
Her breathing matched Myrika's, and her mind emptied into the comfortable silence. The memories were gone again, whatever they'd been. She closed her eyes, eventually. If they came to her there, she didn't remember.
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