dakitkat-writes

[dakitkat-writes]

The Tragedy of Balmore, pt 2

Mayhaps it wasn’t necessary — mayhaps I had truly gone mad and was looking for something that wasn’t there. God wouldn’t tell me. He wouldn’t tell me anything at all anymore. I do not recall when was the last time I had prayed, or confessed, or even just thought of Him.

I didn’t care anymore. If He had decided to keep his mouth shut, then so be it. I was going to find what I was looking for, and damned I’d be if He didn’t agree.

So I searched. I learnt, and learnt, and learnt. I read books I had skimmed through hundreds of times already. When I ran out of paper, I started writing on the walls. When I ran out of ink, I thought I might start engraving the planks of wood in the yard.

But I found a letter. It fell from a copy of the Ars Goetia, and was brief.

Dear Missus Alaister,

I hope this letter finds thou well.

Your work hath been brought to me after a strange illness hath afflicted Balmore and its provinces. Nay doctor hath been able to find a cure for the infected pass aroint within a day. We hast inurn'd many. Children and elders, we lost so many loved ones 'i the past three weeks. 'tis a long journey from Newlin to Balmore, that I am aknown of. The town shall gild thy travel expenses and any other loss thou may suffer from while absent. I hast sent thou with this letter a sample thou might find behoveful to study as thou prepare thee travel to Balmore.

Yours with esteem,

Sir Darren Alfred, Mayor of Balmore.

I did remember Mother telling me she’d leave for work. She had a doctorate, but was not a doctor who healed people. The letter had a date written at the bottom of the page, on the back. Third of May. The ink was blurred out from how many times Mother had handled this letter and I could not make out the year. But I didn’t need to.

So I looked through the study to find that sample. Surely it held some answer.

A tooth.

An upper left canine, more precisely. The vial that contained it had a residue of a strange, shimmery silver liquid. It looked like liquid mercury, though more matte. The tooth was covered in that strange dried out liquid. The vial was one of Mother’s — she had each and every of them engraved with her initials at the bottom — so that was not the original container. I had searched the study again in hopes to find it, but quickly gave up. I figured it would take me nowhere.

That tooth was strange too. It was very sharp, but I could not pinpoint what animal it belonged to, nor what the silver residue was. Mother hadn’t written anything on it. I thought of a cat at first, but it was too big. A dog, maybe a wolf? Neither, it was too broad and short. I thought of a gorilla, but in truth, I had never seen a gorilla, and the tooth may have been way too big or small to belong to that primate for all I knew. Then, as I lightly shook the vial around, the tooth shifted, and what I saw was… surprising, to say the least.

The more time I spent in this study, the lighter my head felt, like I was in a field of satin, slipping and tripping with each step. The tooth was hollow.

Hollow.

Like that of a snake.

[dakitkat-writes]

10 posts!

wooo!

[dakitkat-writes]

It’s their greatest invention as of yet

[dakitkat-writes]

Indian Summer (1875) by Józef Chełmoński, The artist was one of the leading Polish painters of realism. This studio painting depicts a Ukrainian peasant girl in the countryside inspired by Ukraine’s landscape.

[dakitkat-writes]

sword

Caught one of my favorite wet beasts. The long nose gar.

[dakitkat-writes]

So far you have had a date with Destiny, flirted with Death, and danced with the Devil. You're going to have a serious chat with your wingman next time you go clubbing.

[dakitkat-writes]

hey op what the hell does that mean

shitting with headphones on is the modern day equivalent of navigating the seas by the stars

[dakitkat-writes]

my favourite is

short but hooking synopsis

+

OR [funny one liner summary of the fic]

super simple low-effort ao3 summary methods that are 1000% better and 1000% less annoying than just saying you suck at summaries:

copypaste the first few lines of the fic. u already wrote ‘em. let ‘em be their own damn hook

if ur feeling fancy & don’t mind showing ur hand a bit, copypaste the first few lines of the fic that u feel are esp. Important or Interesting - the ones where u first start getting into the real meat of things

state the main tropes! theyre probably already in ur tags - just say them again - maybe as a full sentence if ur feelin fancy. or with a joke if ur feelin Extra fancy

ask a question. pose a hypothetical. eg what happens if u take [character] and put them in [situation]?

make an equation. [character] + [thing] = [outcome]

just write like a one-sentence summary of what the fuck is going down. just one (1) sentence. doesnt matter if it doesn’t cover every important aspect. or if it sounds bland. any summary sentence is gonna be miles better than “idk i suck at summaries”

just…explain the fic like u would to a friend? it doesnt have to be a polished back of the book blurb. it can just be “[pairing] coffee shop au, but like, still with murder, and also i made everyone trans. enjoy”

just stick a meme in there

honestly who cares

just put literally anything but a self deprecating comment in there & ur golden

[dakitkat-writes]

Body Language

When someone is...

Sad

Face/Body:

Avoidant/reduced eye contact

Drooping eyelids

Downcast eyes

Frowning

Raised inner ends of eyebrows

Dropped or furrowed eyebrows

Quivering lip/biting lip

Wrinkled nose

Voice:

Soft pitch

Low lone

Pauses/hesitant speech

Quiet/breathy

Slow speech

Voice cracks/breaking voice

Gestures/Posture:

Slouching/lowered head

Rigid/tense posture

Half formed/slow movement

Fidgeting or clasped hands

Sniffing or heavy swallows

Self soothing gestures (running hands over the arms, hand over heart, holding face in palms, etc)

[dakitkat-writes]

The Sensuality of Flowers

II - Lily the spider

Lily she, now free

Where the blood lies still, she is

No more tears for she.

[dakitkat-writes]

[dakitkat-writes]

The Sensuality of Flowers

I - Cradle the rose

Soft as breathe, wet as want —

a red bloom slick with the hush of dawn.

Sweet is man, deep is dusk —

velvet petals part with the touch of wind.

Beloved she, beautiful rose —

left breathless, left helpless,

left alone, the rose withers

with no hand to cradle her

and no face to bask in her scent.

[dakitkat-writes]

The Tragedy of Balmore, pt 1

My mother was a good woman.

Though now vague, I can still recall her smile as she read me textbooks about human biology and diseases. She was amazed by those, seemingly entranced as she sat in her study for hours and hours on end. Theresa had to drag her out of the room for supper. Her fascination rubbed on me at a young age, probably. At age six, I could list all the human bones. My poor little sister never really understood our mother and I, not that I could blame her at all. I myself didn’t quite grasp this passion at the time. Theresa was more of an artist.

But maybe scientists and artists aren’t that different, she said once after a piano lesson. They look for answers where Mother Nature left a blank space, she said woefully. That stuck with me for many years. I was only fourteen at the time, she was twelve, yet she changed my perspective on this passion of mine.

Maybe, yes, I am an artist.

My mother died the following year.

It was very sudden. Too sudden. One day, she fell ill, as if suffering from a flu, and the next, she was gone. She who loved to study human affliction, and knew all the known diseases, died of something unknown. I’m sure Theresa was going mad after that; our doctor suggested I have her put in an asylum by the seaside. Only God knew what a mad woman was like and I wished not to see my dear sister in such a state.

It was probably ridiculous to have thought such a thing. Foolish, even, yet I was only fifteen and did not know a thing about grief. It was too soon. Way, way too soon.

I could only watch as the house slowly deteriorated over the years, dust filling in the gaps of loneliness.

Theresa was one wise child, I recall. I do not know where she got it from; our mother was very straightforward, like me. I often reflected on her words as I sat in Mother’s chair. For three years, I just sat there, sometimes glaring at the two cabinets of curiosities and the many books on the shelves, sometimes looking at them longingly.

But I never touched them.

Not until I received a letter from Theresa’s asylum.

Gone. She was gone. Not dead — they had not found her body. She left.

I was afflicted with regret — why had I sent her there? where had she gone to? It was my fault. I failed her, I realised, but it was too late. That at least I came to understand right away.

That’s folly, Lawrence, I told myself many times as I searched through Mother’s books. There is nothing to find, Lawrence, you’ve gone mad like your sister, a voice in the back of my head kept on shouting.

Maybe it was folly.

But I had to know.

I had to find the answer — or maybe find the confirmation that fate was simply cruel.

Anything, really. It was necessary.