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[regalspectre]

     Ever the Empress, Jessamine does not enjoy being told what to do. Still, Daud has a point. Being out here for this long was dangerous-- especially when she was alone. At least with crowds, she could easily hide her face and blend in with the hoard of people. She has half the mind to tell him that he has no place in even suggesting what she should do, considering the whole reason she's in this mess is because of him, but she bites her tongue. No use causing some sort of scene. 

      She'll mull over the barrage of questions one by one, lips pulled into a thin line. Jessamine can't understand why he's so curious about such things. If he wasn't out to kill her then there was nothing he could gain from this exchange, right? She does not know enough about the assassin to make any legitimate assumptions. That being said, Jessamine will continue to exercise caution, lest she put anyone else she associates herself with these days in danger. 

      "A month or so, give or take," she begins, honestly not quite sure how long she's been around. "I've managed to work something out. I have an apartment to myself." 

      She won't mention the children she takes care of or the family she works for. Too risky. Blue eyes stare at the ground intently, watching as his boots creep closer, forcing her to back up a tad. Jessamine can't bring herself to look him in the eye. 

      "No one else knows... About me-- aside from you, now," Jessamine continues. "As for me 'waking up', it was just on the shoreline, nothing too awe inspiring, I'm afraid. I'd like to believe that this is the only iteration of me here, though. I'd reckon I wouldn't have the scars if it were otherwise." 

"You should get off the street," he hisses. "There could be people anywhere, watching you."

In a moment, Daud realizes the irony of what he’s telling her. It is true, however, that an assassin could spot Jessamine on the street and get close enough to kill without the crowd noticing. Daud had done it even without his powers. If he had wanted to murder her (again), she would already be dead. Again.

If she even could die.

Of course, Jessamine can never know that Daud is intimately familiar with the spot that she is buried, that he has left one of the glowing white flowers of Brigmore upon her headstone. And he has no intention of telling her. It seems stupid now; he is sure that whatever forgiveness he hoped to receive from her drifting soul will not be granted now by her corpse. 

"How long have you been here? Where have you been living? Who knows about you? Where did you wake up? Is your body still at the tower?"

The last question is hushed, and its end nearly clipped away. If there are killers lurking nearby, Daud doesn’t want them hearing this conversation. He doesn’t need to be leaving clues as to who this woman is. All the while, he steps closer to her, trying to get close enough to whisper or to force her back against a wall - either will do.

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     Jessamine takes a step back. It's not intentional, but she can't help the fear that creeps up on her. While her gut tells her that this is real, that he is real, the former Empress still worries that this is just a ruse. There are few things that she's willing to accept as implausible, what with her being back from the dead and all. 

     At his question, blood drains from her face. The truth is, she doesn't know. Jessamine knows nothing about her current circumstances, simply left to her own devices after her 'resurrection'. She'll gulp, head shaking slightly before her fingers spread wide while she shrugs. 

     "I-I... Have no idea," she finally admits. Jessamine licks her lips and takes a single step forward. She can feel tears prickle the back of her eyes, just happy that there's finally an ounce of familiarity in her life now. But even so, she can't help but feel like something is off. 

     "I just-- woke up, one day. I have no other explanation other than that," she says slowly. "I'm... Sorry." 

    Corvo folds his blade and replaces it on his belt. Even though the recognition and familiarity reassures him, he can hardly relax. The tension in his muscles is something that isn’t easily relieved.

    The trembling in her hands mirrors his own. The Lord Protector takes a few careful paces forward, focusing on Jessamine’s voice to steady his breathing. Corvo opens his mouth to speak, but words fail him— what can he say, what could he possibly say to apologize for his ineptitude?

    How would he tell her that he, in his pursuit of vengeance, pushed an already ailing city further toward the brink of ruin? That he had single-handedly brought Dunwall’s mountain of corpses to its peak? His stomach turns.

    The mechanical heart remains still in his pocket, and he tries to wrap his mind around the impossibility before him.

    “How are you here?” he says, as quietly as before— unsure.

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     They're lucky that there aren't too many people around and are even luckier that the people of Dunwall often preferred to keep to themselves these days. No need to stick around to see what these two were talking about. No need to stick around and perhaps eventually observe them long enough to put two and two together. 

     "Yes. I can see that," Jessamine answers bluntly, arms crossing over her arms. She doesn't know what Daud looks to gain from milling about common folk, nor does she really understand the meaning of his keen observation. Then again, a woman such as herself could never be able to understand the mind of a killer. 

     But eventually, the long awaited question rises to the surface. What is she doing here? Much more than just a simple existential crisis, one would suppose. Usually, people who are dead tend to stay dead-- and she was very much so, last she remembered. Jessamine almost feels silly for not knowing the circumstances of her resurrection. As the Empress, it was only obvious that she follow the predominant religious order of the Isles. But with that being said, she had never been a believer in any sort of deity, or lack thereof. Such things the arcane fell far beyond her radar. 

     That had to be it, right? Something not of this world-- something more powerful than the human will. That could be the only way. The woman was not about to begin spouting these notions to him, though, despite the whisperings she had heard about his own capabilities. It was one thing to be consorting with a criminal, but it was another to be caught with heresy on her tongue. 

     "You did," she confirms. The last thing Jessamine wants to do is make him doubt what he had done to her. 

     "I do." Her tone is solid as she finds herself calming down a touch. "But believe me, if I knew what-- or how I came to be here, I wouldn't be stuck roaming about in such a way. There's honestly not much I can tell you." 

His only answer to her question is to gape like a fish out of water for a few seconds longer. In the end, the only reply he can come up with is the truth, which pops out of him without a further thought.

"I came out to see the people," he says abruptly. "…They’re alive," he adds after a moment, and looks over his shoulder to watch them walking by.

The words are so simple, and yet saying them drains him. They seem like an admission of guilt, which in itself is odd. Jessamine needs to hear no confession to know that he is guilty.

Which reminds him.

"What are you doing here?” he demands, considering his a far more salient question. “I thought you were…”

Once again, Daud swallows his speech and trails off. The adjective he’s about to use is obvious, and, what’s more, it seems to be out of date. If he hadn’t touched her, he might not believe that she’s real. But his fingers remember her form, brushed in the fleeting second he had held her sleeve. She sticks out, frighteningly fragile in his memory, but solid. As she stands before him, she continues to be. His body knows that she is real, but his mind also knows that her existence is impossible, and the two cannot reconcile.

Ignoring the fact that his gaze might be impertinent, Daud looks down at her chest and strains to see the hole from the sword he knows he put there. But no sign of violence touches the woman in front of him, save for the memory of blood that he can still see in her face.

"I killed you," he says finally, and he looks into her eyes and stares with almost physical force. "You remember."

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     Her nose twitches and scrunches up in disgust when she smells the familiar scent of blood. It's enough to force shudders to run through out her body as her hands slowly unwind. She's trembling ever so slightly, suddenly acutely aware of every other sound around her, from the waters hitting the shores to rail cars in the distance. It feels like time has stopped. 

     As the murder slowly unmasks, Jessamine can feel the blood drain from her face. Even the slightest breeze sends chills down her spine as blue eyes narrow and struggle to recognize who lays behind the menacing visage. But soon enough, squinted eyes widen and her jaw drops, releasing a held breath accompanied by the smallest of gasps. 

     Her own name rings through her ears in the tone of a voice so familiar. It's enough to keep her from breathing for another split second or so before she shakes her head, trying to calm shaking fingers. Against her own will, Jessamine takes a step closer, incapable of accepting who stands before her. Though, in all honesty, he should be the one in awe. 

     "It's me," she begins, almost relieved to finally admit her identity to someone.. "It's me, Corvo..." 

    Hearing her speak again further cements that yes, this is actually happening. Jessamine Kaldwin is standing in front of him, and he almost put a blade to her throat. He is suddenly aware of the gore spattered on his coat, and shame settles in his gut. Corvo is not the same man he was when the Empress died—

    —but here she is. Alive.

    The Lord Protector reaches up with his left hand to remove the mask, noting the way his fingers tremble the slightest bit. The metal frame surrounding the lenses leaves small indentations around his eyes. (There’s nothing that can obstruct his vision now; it is her and he doesn’t understand how—)

    A brief, shuddering exhale parts his lips:

    “Jessamine,” he says quietly, more statement than question, in a voice that rasps and breaks on the last syllable.

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    It takes a few moments for her to come up with a proper reaction. Her mouth opens, closes and opens again before finally clamping shut, lips pulling into a thin line. If she had a heart beat, Jessamine was sure it would have just stopped completely. Her only consolation was that he had yet to make a move. By the looks of it, he seemed just as petrified of her as she was of him. 

     She'll examine him now, taking in every feature slowly but surely. Jessamine didn't get a chance to take a good look at him-- what with being stabbed and all. A more morbid part of her psyche found it funny-- finally being able to put a face to a name, while the rest of her was more than happy to scream bloody murder in her head. She should get out of here. Pretend nothing happened. 

     But something stopped her. An apology. But what for? He did what he was told, did he not? Jessamine can only assume that he was paid quite the amount of coin to do it as well. The idea of the likes of him, a man who made a living out of murder, feeling remorse was almost laughable. But the former Empress does not laugh. Instead, she swallows the lump in her throat and clamps blue eyes shut, fingers pinching the bridge of her nose. 

     She realizes that she shouldn't have said anything at all. Maybe that way she would have been able to brush him off as a a stranger and gone on her way. It was far too late now. 

     "What are you doing here?" are her first words after a long bout of silence. Perhaps he's here to do her in again? Or maybe this was just a cruel coincidence. 

The fear he saw in her eyes stabbed right through him as if he had fallen on his own sword. Recoiling in horror was the only move he found himself capable of making. Afterward, he could only stare right back at her, his right hand clutched in his left like he was nursing a burn. Daud thought that he might wake at any moment, but he had never had this dream before.

His eyes might be as wide as hers, white showing all the way around deep green. The color had drained from his skin, leaving his cheeks ashen and his lips stark. The scar over his eye showed by contrast in an angry red which make him appear both fierce and wounded.

Part of his instincts screamed for him to clap a hand over her mouth and keep her silent.  The other part urged him to flee before she could call the guards, even if the act of running meant he might never see her again. As each half warred inside of him, the basest part of his nature won through, and he breathed the words that he had been whispering to the indifferent night for months on end.

"I’m sorry," he said. For what - grabbing her sleeve, startling her, killing her, destroying her city, kidnapping her daughter, threatening her bodyguard - he didn’t know. Perhaps he meant all of it at once.

Once the words were gone, there no longer seemed to be anything inside of him to hold him up. His face shattered, finally winning the power of movement. Despair won through, shining like a ray of sun peeking past clouds.

"I’m sorry," Daud murmured again, and staggered backward a step. "I…"

And he trailed off rather pathetically with a supplicant gaze.

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    The former Empress, licks dry lips, thin hands balling into fists as she, too, steps back. She has a chance to run, now, but by some odd power, she's more compelled to stay. Maybe she wants to know who lies behind the mask-- or maybe she just wants to know why they won't just end this. Was this a part of their game? Did they just want to see her suffer? 

     "I won't run-- if that's what you're waiting for," she says, voice shaking. "I won't even scream. I-- You'll just kill them all anyway, won't you? It's better that you take my life than theirs." 

     Always the negotiator, Jessamine believes it's a much better decision to spare the lives on unknowing guards than to lead them to their deaths by alerting them. After all, she's supposed to be dead. 

    Corvo is nearly desensitized to the squelch of a blade through body and bone. Blood is sticky on his hands, under his fingernails— the scent of it follows him everywhere. Anyone else would be disgusted. Would feel guilty. But the Lord Protector already wades through the corpses of those he’s killed in order to reach the next offender. In the act, he does not show remorse.

    He has killed witnesses before; not out of rage, but to keep them from alerting more guards. In the wrong place at the wrong time. It’s a marvel that the woman doesn’t scream at the sight.

    However, as Corvo steps closer, he gets a good look at her face through red-tinted lenses. Links the face to the voice— real, full. Not the hollowed out whispers that come from the organ in his coat pocket. How is this possible? A trick, it has to be. But there’s no mistaking who she is.

    The man in the mask lowers his sword and takes an unsteady step back.  

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  She knows that sound all too well. Blades clashing, feet scuffling against cobble and finally the sound of blood spattering. The same sounds haunt her at night-- they remind her of her own final moments; and though the pain has long since dissipated, the feeling remains the same. If she thinks about it hard enough (which she tries her best not to do), Jesssamine can often feel the blade leaving stomach and her body slowly draining itself of life. 

     So, to see this-- to see these men killed right before her eyes, only works to bring everything back to the surface. So much so that it's paralysed her. Jessamine wants to scream, wants to run, but her mind blanks out of pure fear. This, whoever this was, was far more menacing than the staple pickpocket. This was a face she had seen plastered all over the walls of the city, propaganda not doing justice to bring about how terrifying he truly was. 

     Jessamine can only gulp down the lump in her throat, trying to slow her breathing. A part of her tells her to beg for her life-- but Empress or not, her pride refuses. Another part of herself hopes that his blade strikes her and that this time she won't come back. 

    "I-I... If you're going to do it, then be quick." 

    There are those quick enough to criticize Emily’s placement on the throne— those who speak in hushed whispers, who pin the city’s decline on her little shoulders, who speak subversively without thought for who can hear.

    People continue to sight a figure in the shadows; inevitably, the nobles who discuss the toppling of the monarchy are found dead.

   Emily faces challenges enough in court. Corvo is there to keep her from harm, but the majority of ensuring her safety is done behind closed doors— under cover of darkness and behind a mask. But tonight, Corvo has a bout of carelessness, stepping into the open a moment too soon. This struggle is between Death and an unlucky guard on a side street; a man who bites off more than he can chew by confronting the apparition that appears from the shadows.

   The guard’s shouts are silenced by steel, Corvo’s sword buried in his windpipe. The Lord Protector doesn’t learn that he has a witness until blood is sprayed on his mask and the fallen guard releases his last choking gurgle.

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     [ from here ] 

     Surprisingly enough, Jessamine found doing mundane tasks calming. Her initial paranoia had worn off significantly after the first few weeks-- once she had managed to find herself a steady source of income and a roof over her head, at least. She no longer felt the need to look over her shoulder every other minute nor did she feel as if she needed to cover her face from suspicious onlookers. It had been made clear that no one cared much for her appearance, dark hair and pale skin a staple around these parts. So long as Jessamine didn't make eye contact with any one person for too long, she would be safe. 

      She was a bit proud of herself, actually. She had never considered herself too spoiled, but it was hard to ignore the fact that she had spent most of her life being doted on at all times. And yet, Jessamine liked to believe she was making a good life for herself as a regular person. It was hard to adjust to things, of course-- but she had adapted better than she originally expected. Still, Jessamine would drop all to return to the Tower in a heartbeat-- but she knew that could never be an option. 

      There was a different lens to look through these days. Even with no power, Jessamine still felt the familiar pang of guilt every time she heard word of something bad happening, whether it be in Dunwall or across the Isles. Unlike when she had been perched upon her throne, the former Empress was now condemned to suffer alongside her own people. Whispers of unrest would float above her as they always did, but there were no words she could possibly provide as consolation. There was no chance at compromise, no way of fixing things for the people she had tried to care for for so long. 

     Even so, the city seemed to mend itself. Each day there were more things going on, more voices, more signs of life in a once empty wasteland. It was as if blood was rushing back through the veins of Dunwall, bringing life back with every gasping breath. For that, Jessamine was thankful for. It would be one thing to be stuck here as a peasant, forced to live out a lie-- but it would be completely different if she had to watch her own city go further into ruin. 

     It wasn't until she felt a hand on her arm that she froze. Perhaps she was only startled because she had been so deep in thought-- heat rising to her face, tinting light cheeks pink. Eyelids squeezed shut before she released a small breath. A laugh passed through her lips as she regained her composure, body slowly but surely turning to face the stranger. 

      "Is there something I can help--" 

      Words hung dead in the air as her mouth ran dry. Recognition hit her hard, much like a punch to the gut. Blue eyes widen, blink once-- twice-- three times before her head shakes. Jessamine forced down a gulp, trying hard to stay calm. The last thing she needed was a scene. As much as she wanted to speak, to scream, to cry, speech had been lost to her. Her mouth gaped before finally forming one single sound. 

      "You." 

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i forgot what writing is lmao end my suffering

[regalspectre]

      For one such as herself, whose mere existence was a mystery in its own right, there were many things made clear to her in the short amount of time that she was once again, corporeal. First and foremost, was that the suffering of the common man was far greater than she had originally believed. Jessamine had always done her best to lessen the load that her people were forced to bear and yet it was not enough. 

     Secondly, she had learned that despite being, well, who she was, people still were incapable of putting two and two together. People had noticed her resemblance time and time again and yet the conversation never moved past a gracious smile and a small shrug. Jessamine would look away, fingers patting her cheeks as if to stifle a non-existent blush. She was grateful for it, though. There was no need to attract attention to herself-- not when she was merely a shadow of who she used to be-- and definitely not when it was very much possible that her existence could beckon a rather dismal response from the authorities. 

     Tonight, however, Jessamine felt little worry as she slowly paced down the empty street. This part of the city was not half as treacherous as other places; the biggest threat usually being the odd thief here or there. Suffice to say, if a person dies once, it's incredibly hard to be afraid of much else. Jessamine was on her way home, a bag of groceries held closely to her chest., stopping only when she hears sounds of a struggle. 

      "...Is everything alright?" her meek voice questions into the dark. Perhaps this is not the smartest idea-- but Jessamine Kaldwin had never been conventional. 

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"But when you are near, It is different. My heart is at peace…."

-Jessamine

YOU KILLED HER. YOU COULDN’T SAVE HER. YOU KILLED HER…. YOU COULDN’T SAVE HER.YOU KILLED HER. YOU COULDN’T SAVE HER….

[regalspectre]

"Shall we gather for whiskey and cigars tonight?" Empress Jessamine Kaldwin in the style of Cedric Peyravernay’s concept art.

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do not wait on me.

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whoops idk how to make a formal post thing but whaddup hi friends i'm here, used to be shadowofanempress, sorta back to rock and roll :)