#asana dorel

[songsofbloodandfire]

Surprise

((A little drabble I’ve been sitting on. Figure I’d toss it up here since I haven’t posted anything for a bit. No CW outside of mild language! Brem belongs to the wonderful @eyesofsteelandsky and Del belongs to the equally as wonderful @delestadorel!))

The mornings had fallen into a sort of routine that Sana had begun to embrace, even if in part it had only been a few weeks since she’d started. She rose before her mates, letting Del and Brem have the bed to themselves while she took her time dressing quietly and getting Alvin who, out of habit himself, was just starting to stir as well. The infant was getting used to not being fed right away, which made it easier for her to get him settled into his carrier against her chest so the two of them could enjoy her morning run through the Goblet. After was breakfast for them both and a bath for them both before she put her son down for his morning nap and she took her morning tea to settle in the warm light that streamed through the large bay window of their home. 

It was there, in the soft golden morning light that bathed her in a sense of comfort and relaxation that her newest morning routine started. Normally she would take time to meditate and work on strengthening that inner flow of aether and attuning her body and mind, but since her and Brem had started trying for a child, it had turned into something different. Instead of focusing on aether flows and balancing herself, her focus went even further within. 

Setting the delicate porcelain teacup to the side, she settled into the cross-legged position she favored, a few long, deep breaths taken to start to settle herself. She knew her inner flow of aether well, having taken years to perfect finding the flaws and places where things didn’t flow just so and knowing how to work around them or strengthen them. It allowed her to be able to heal herself with some skill but also aided in the more destructive magics she could wield. In this case, however, it meant that she was able to detect when she was pregnant much earlier than normal. Pregnancy created a subtle change in the flow of her aether that, two times experienced now, she knew well enough to know exactly what it was. 

A tendril of awareness went deep within her, it’s touch delicate and grew even more so as she started to search for the subtle signs she prayed to find. She knew to be careful and to have a light hand with the work more so with how early in her pregnancy as she could be if hard work her and her mate had put into trying for the pregnancy paid off. That early, the little life would be so fragile that too heavy of a hand could easily snuff them out before they’d even had a chance to truly begin to form. 

A place felt different and it was enough to catch her attention and make her focus on it a bit more clearly. Just barely, nestled within her own inner sea of aether, there was a small pulse of something other than her. Life. New and fragile, but still life and something very much not of herself. A child.

The rush of excitement that came with that knowledge almost caused her to lose focus in a way that even years of experience almost failed to correct. It was the knowledge that too harsh of an aetherial jar and she could lose that delicate little life within her that helped keep her steady. That excitement also almost caused her to miss something else. 

Ever so subtly a small thread of aether drifted from the little pulse of life that was her child, so faint and tenuous that if she hadn’t already been looking so closely she likely would have missed it. Not only missed it, but she would have missed the second pulse of aether it was tied to. It took a moment for that realization to settle in fully. A second child. 

Twins.

Again…

Carefully she pulled herself away and left her children to their nestled little worlds well away from the reality of the world they were months from knowing. As she became fully away of her physical body again, excitement mixed with fear and a dash of frustration. She was pregnant! She was excited about the pregnancy and thankful that it had taken so quickly but twins...not just twins, but twins after her last pregnancy of children that were still under a year old had also been twins. 

“Shit….” She breathed as her realization truly started to sink in that there wouldn’t be any father to take the second twin. They’d be raising both of these. Three children in the house in diapers. “Fucking hell…” 

While the idea of having twin children to raise with a little boy that was quickly progressing towards the toddler stage in life was terrifying, she’d been looking forward to carrying a single child. The loss of bodily autonomy had come so quickly with twins that she’d been looking forward to it taking a little longer with one. She was excited for the pregnancy, but she was very much not looking forward to another twin pregnancy. 

A shaking hand reached for her tea in some effort to calm her frazzled nerves, not that it helped much. She had to tell Brem. Twins. It was twins. She couldn’t even begin to imagine how her lover would react to that news. 

[songsofbloodandfire]

Travail

(Warnings about labor and delivery ahead.)

Labor came not in a hurried mess, but with a quiet restlessness. Sana woke that morning feeling unsettled, unable to stay resting like most of those surrounding her would have liked. She fussed around the house, doing the little things she could here and there. Anything to help ease the discomfort of restlessness. 

She could feel something wasn't normal, something had her one edge and it wasn't until part way through the day she recognized the little signs for what they were. Six years was a long time but she could remember the same sense of unease and discomfort from her first son. And it brought a wave a fear with it. She was ready to have her body back but labor had been hard on her the first time. Hearing of Zareen's close brush after complications delivering her own twins had Sana even more anxious about her own impending delivery. 

The pain of the first true contraction took her hard and sudden, stealing her breath and forcing her to stop misstep. Everything narrowed to that moment in time. Each breath. Each heartbeat. Even the ever present ebb and flow of aether gave her something to focus on, to cling to as she allowed her body to ride out the pain. 

Though she was calm as she spoke, she felt anything but. "The twins are coming." 

Those four simple words held a weight to them as they were the heralds of lives about to be irrevocably changed. The fact that the two young souls she carried had no concept of the change and controlled chaos they were about to unleash was not lost on A'sana. 

Each new set of contractions brought more pain but they also brought more reassurance. So many had surrounded her, to aid as they could and comfort her when that was all to be had. Her mates, her brothers and sisters, her family all rose to the occasion. Even Brem's parents had come to welcome their newest grandchildren. 

Each took their turns keeping Sana distracted and as relaxed as possible. Dunrai entertained her with stories from the Dazkar, of Nhaama and Azim and of the land she had only seen bits and pieces of. Zareen sang with her, her sister’s beautiful voice carrying over the linkshell, there in mind and spirit but my physically as she recovered from the births of her own daughters. Her mates worried and fussed but added to the love and support that surrounded her. 

Labor hadn't been kind to Sana the first time around and she had hoped this time would be different. Hours passed and her progress was slow and difficult. Each little bit of ground made was done so with great effort. It wasn't until the labor had progressed late into the morning of the next day that Dunrai had truly begun to show any signs of real anxiety over the slow progress and Sana's growing exhaustion. Though he hid it, that anxiety made her worry though it was distant in her fatigued state. 

Everything came in waves. The little tension of her muscles before the pain would come, the release and then the ebb of exhaustion. At first she had been responsive and alert after each contraction but it had grown to the point where Sana felt as if she was in a trance, barely connected to her body let alone the waking world when the contractions freed her.

Herbs helped ease some of the pain and quicken the labor but it didn't help ease the exhaustion that complicated the already difficult labor. It was a fight to rally enough to push, to keep herself connected so she could bring her sons into the world. 

When the first came, it took her a few moments to realize the quiet at first. The almost unnerving silence stirred her some from the daze of exhaustion, adrenaline and endorphins. While she couldn’t see what was happening, the few others present in the room could. Sana’s water had never broken and the first of the twins, a perfect if small little boy, had been born still cocooned within the protective hold of those waters. The odd moment of silence was broken as the delayed waters fell to the floor, moments later the breathy wail of the little boy following. Tiny and perfectly formed, the green haired little boy was settled on Sana’s chest, and for a moment everything narrowed to him for her. Nothing else existed for a moment. Not her exhaustion. Not the continued pain of contractions as her body readied for the second child. Not even the voices of the others. The beautiful little boy with ears a touch to big for him, a stub of a tail and soft patches of dark scales had her entire attention as a soft, happy sob left her. Even as she began to process the birth of the first twin, he was taken to be cleaned and tended so she could focus on the still no going birth. She wanted to call out, wanting to beg for him to be brought back, but between exhaustion and the pain of contraction, she couldn’t find her voice. All that came was a hoarse, broken cry as her body struggled to give birth to the second twin. Minutes passed and once again she’d fallen back into the rhythm of drifting weightlessly in trance in between the waves of pain and exhaustion. Only distantly was she aware something wasn’t right. Labor had taken too much of a toll and had stalled with the second twin. What little strength she could rally again wasn’t enough without help. The soulstone at her wrist was hot against her skin, formless voices whispering to her, encouraging her even as those physically present murmured words of encouragement. It took everything she had to help push with Dunrai’s gentle and skilled hands helping guide the second child into the world. Silence followed his arrival as it had his brother’s but Sana was too far gone to focus on it. The second boy, like the first, was still cradled in the waters that had carried him all these months. Rare enough for it to happen once, but for both twins to be born in a shroud was even rarer. An omen, but of what was to be seen. Sana floated in the odd space between waking and the yawning void that threatened to take her, only barely aware enough to mumble in response to questions about her own state of being. Was she ok? Was she in pain? Anything to try and pull her back to reality. The last thing she was aware of was her father’s voice in that void. I’m proud of you, ibina...my daughter.

It took time for Sana to come around, coaxed and helped along with things to help bolster her flagging strength. She was fine. Worn from the hours of travailing but safe and sound and in need of a true rest, but not before she’d had a chance to properly meet both of the twins she’d held within her for so long. Small and perfect, they had been cleaned and quieted while she had been tended to. The green haired elder boy and the red haired younger boy. They seemed so tiny in her arms despite how big they’d felt when she’d been carrying them in her womb in the days previously. She wept, not in sorrow, but in happiness. Tiny and perfect, untouched by the fears and worries that came from the warnings given about her failing tribe. They were perfect. She carried that thought with her as they were taken away after a short time so she could rest. There would be time to bond with them further, to celebrate in her own way the beauty of their living. For now, she carried the happiness and relief of her perfect children into the abyss of sleep to rest and prepare to start her life as a mother surrounded by the love of her family. 

(A special thanks to @talesfromthegameff14 @eyesofsteelandsky @dunrai-ffxiv, @ala-mhinyan @yzareenxiv , Delesta and Arden for being patient with me through the rp process of Sana being pregnant. I love you all and look for to more rp adventures with you all!)

[songsofbloodandfire]

The Woman in the Painting

The woman that looked back from the canvas was a face that she hadn’t seen in years. Younger and arrogant, the flame bright hair matched a temper and fire that in some ways hadn’t cooled much since then. Hindsight was an amazing thing, but it was generally hard won and for her it had come at the cost of a few too many close calls and deep scars in body, mind and soul.

This woman on the canvas was the woman that Xavion had known, had loved and been infatuated with. Some of who she was had been manufactured, designed to capture his attention and lure him into her web with the intent of stealing from him, all for the sake of power. She had done so much, ruined so many lives including her own, all for the sake of power. It wasn’t just the power of wealth she had sought, but the power of knowledge and the power of magic. She still pushed her limits, still constantly challenged her own skill and power to further herself, to try and reach further and further in the search of more power and while she was a bit more reserved in the risks she would take, she knew if it came to it she would still take many of the same risks she would have then. The difference was time and gaining so much she held dear was beginning to teach her regret and humility.

At first she hadn’t been sure why she had lied about Xavion’s actions. It wasn’t too long ago that she had been out for his blood, eager to see him destroyed for what he had done to her. The pain and scars he’d inflicted on her body and psyche. Being trapped in the dreamstate with him, being caught in memories and being forced to share his pain, pain she had inflicted on him, had made her realize the depth of her actions. As deep as he had driven the knife in her, she had done just the same to him. All because she’d been too much of a coward to admit her love for him when she should have.

Selfish, nearsighted fear had kept her from telling him the truth back then. Losing Del and the only family she’d known back them in the form of their crew had damaged her in ways she hadn’t understood until gaining the family she had now. She was terrified of losing people. Would go to extremes and justify actions that she shouldn’t in the name of making sure she wouldn’t lose them. She’d done it with Xavion, convincing herself that she could live as R’shana and be happy in that lie because she loved him and wanted to stay with him. She’d done it with Aether, letting him inflict damage on her body, almost getting her killed multiple times because of a nearsighted devotion to him born out of a fear of losing him. A fear of being left alone.

Knowing this didn’t make it any easier to avoid making the same mistakes. She was more mindful about them at least and she figured that had to account for something at the very least. What it didn’t account for was why she’d had a change of heart and had spared Xavion instead of allowing her family to kill him.

She knew the man was a voidmage. That was, once she found the truth out about him, part of what had drawn her to him like a moth to a flame. As dangerous as he was, he had been alluring. Truthfully, time had done nothing to take away from the allure when she admitted it to herself. Something about someone beautiful and dangerous simply did it for Sana, even if she wasn’t fully conscious of it. Even now she had no illusions he was dangerous and yet, despite everything he had done to her, not only had she spared him but she lied about it. The only person who could have bore witness to the fact that his actions had indeed been his and not that of the voidsent’s and she lied about it.

As much as she wanted to blame it on a momentary lapse of judgement, she knew it wasn’t that. As much as she hated him for what he had done, how he had damaged her in ways she likely would never recover, there was still some part of her that loved him. Some part of her that would always have an emotional bond that would lead her to be compromised where he was concerned. She hated admitting to herself that she still in some way loved him, let alone that her love for him had allowed herself to feel enough guilt for what her actions had caused that she’d tried to spare him as much as she could.

If he remained alive seemed to be in question given he was currently being held captive in a property she owned, or rather one of her aliases owned. She wasn’t about to let him anywhere near anything directly tied to him, but this at least allowed her to keep track of where he was and what he was doing. Not that he was going anywhere easily being bound to the bed and his magic suppressed so he couldn’t escape. It wasn’t a permanent solution, but she wasn’t sure what else to do with him.

Annoyance played over her features as she picked up an old and worn palette knife and began to remove still wet oils with sweeping motions. She wasn't the woman on the canvas anymore. She wasn't about to let her own fear and indecisiveness ruin her life anymore, not if she could stop it. She needed to talk to him. She needed to understand the emotions she'd felt from him in the dream and not what her own mind thought they meant. She needed closure that she'd denied herself out of fear of the truth.

Coward. She needed to stop being a coward.

[songsofbloodandfire]

Tabula Rasa (Old Content)

((Random scenes for random moods. Some minor warnings with implied pseudo medical procedures.)

“This could have been avoided, you know.” Araceli’s voice was clear and firm, mostly untouched by her age. Sometimes I wondered if she was one of those unfortunate souls who had experienced such hardship that it had aged her prematurely. Her past was something we didn’t talk about, much like my own exploits in the past. An unspoken rule between us to not dig any further into tales that neither of us wanted to repeat or didn’t want to know about each other.

Pulling my wandering mind back to the present, I frowned at her. Laying on the chaise lounge in Ara’s comfortable little home, I was acutely aware of the pain I was about to put myself through to correct a decision I had made a year ago in a fit of panic. Inlaying sigils into one’s flesh with the intent of using them to stop a natural process, such as fertility, was painful to begin with. Having them removed so that the chance to have a child was an option again would be more painful.

“I’m aware, Ara.” I inwardly winced at the harsh tone to my voice and the chastising look she sent my way had me softening my tone as I continued. “I was scared and I wasn’t thinking. We both know I’m not always the brightest when it comes to making knee jerk decisions when I’m not thinking clearly.”

Grunting a bit, the Hyur went about finishing setting up, the warm light of the room glinting off the delicate surgical knives she had set out. “Well, I can’t argue with that. You were always too hard headed and hot headed for your own good. Always been best to just let you figure it out on your own…” Ara paused for a moment and something softer that I couldn’t quite place ran across her features. “Can’t say you didn’t come out pretty good though.”

“If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you were going soft on me, Ara.” The tease was a familiar one, but truthfully her words touched me. Not prone to being overly flowery or affectionate, knowing that the other woman approved somewhat of the woman I had grown into was comforting. In many ways, Ara was the only mother-figure I remembered outside of faint memories of an aunt from my fallen tribe.

Ara’s response didn’t come at first as she finished cleaning her hands and prepping herself. It took everything in me to not tense with the first press of the blade. “We’ll see if you say that when I get done with you and my woman heals you, hmm?”

The first cut took my breath away before I could respond. It was going to be a long afternoon.

[songsofbloodandfire]

Banati (Old Content)

((Some minor warnings due to death and injury))

An explosion rocked the ground, nearly making A'shatara fall under the weight of her burden. It took sheer, stubborn willpower to keep herself on her feet even though her body screamed with muscles being strained under the stress of being twisted wrong with that extra weight. In the end, the precious burden she carried was more to her than her own pain.

A'sana was cradled her her chest, the five year old disturbingly quiet despite the wet tracks of tears that cut through the soot and dust on her cheeks. It was A'dina that was much more vocal, the eight year old clinging to Shatara’s back with a death grip.

“Kalahti, why are they here? Where are we going? Why-”

Breathless, Shatara still couldn’t help but wince at being called auntie. She was the only mother the two little girls had known and it was her own insistence that they call her auntie but in that moment she wished they would call her mother. They were the last of her tribe she would likely see and she wanted so much for them to see her as the mother she had been to them.

A soft trilling sound was all that was needed to quiet the little girl, even as young as she was she was well versed in huntspeak. Carefully easing herself into the little alcove she had been looking for, she stooped down so that A'dina could get off her back and A'sana could be sat down. Pulling both little girls in front of her, it was all she could do to keep from crying.

“Banati…” My daughters…the word clung in her throat for a moment, fighting through it with a quick kiss to the foreheads of each before her focus settled on A’dina. “Dina…Ibina, listen to me.” She hushed the little girl when she started to talk, her ears flicking at the sounds of heavy armored footsteps coming their way. “Listen…you need to hide and stay quiet. They cannot see you from here, but you need to stay quiet and keep A’sana quiet so they do not find you. Wait until after the sun has set and then risen before you leave if I do not come back for you.”

Shatara knew she wouldn’t be coming back. Those footsteps were close. She needed to pull their attention away from the children so they had a chance. “Ibina…remember everything that I have taught you, yes? Remember how I showed you how to watch someone’s intent by the rhythm they follow. How to read their dance so you can understand the person. Don’t forget how I taught you how to stay small and quiet so you don’t pull attention to yourself on a hunt. Remember these things and help A’sana remember. She’s too young to know any better, so you need to keep her safe.”

Carefully she ushered A’sana into the crack in the cliff wall first before she hushed A’dina’s protests one last time. “If I do not come back, find A'rsinoe and her Hyur. Not matter how you do it, find them so they can keep you and Sana safe. I love you.”

Reluctantly, she pushed A’dina away as she moved to stand, stumbling at her bodies protests and the pain she was in. Everything was shoved away as she quickly worked her way down the narrow path from the hiding place she had tucked the girls in. She wished it didn’t overlook the village that was currently under attack, but it was the best she could do. From their position, anyone looking up wouldn’t see the crack in the cliffside and if they were tucked in far enough, the girls would be well hidden.

Drawing her bow and notching an arrow, she sprung out into the open where the armored imperials could see her, firing off her shot before she forced herself to run. She didn’t even feel the first shot tearing through her shoulder. Death was welcome knowing her daughters were safe.

[songsofbloodandfire]

Lucid (Old Content)

A’sana knew she was dreaming. It was odd to be so intimately aware that she was dreaming and yet being unable to wake herself, though she wasn’t sure she wanted to wake. A desert she had never seen in her life lay before her on the edge of the cliff she found herself standing on and she was breathless with the beauty of it. Majestic mountains rose like silhouetted sentries against the black velvet sky littered with diamond like stars. There was so much light in Ul’dah, even out in the Goblet, that she forgot how expansive the night sky was and how tiny it could make one feel. There was a sense of calm in that dreaming moment within that she hadn’t felt for years.

“You have grown so much, fatat saghira.” A soft, masculine voice spoke from her side and for a moment everything seemed to stop. Her heart ached at the affectionate term for ‘little girl’ that had been used in their tribal dialect, the memories attached with it bittersweet.

She knew that voice. Though so much of her childhood was gone with time and trauma, she still knew that voice and it made her heartache.

Turning her back to the vista that had captivated her, she was stunned to see the face of a man she never once thought she would see again. A’dorel Nunh was not a tall man, barely standing a few ilms taller than Sana’s diminutive height, but there a quiet confidence to that man that many double his height didn’t have. His features were almost too pretty for a man, leaning towards the more delicate, refined features that Sana had and it was easy for her to see with that reference how she had taken more after him while Del had taken more after their mother. What was most striking to her was the color of his hair and eyes. The stark white of both, a mirror to her own, contrasted so sharply with his darker skin. She couldn’t help but wonder what he could have faced with such a high amount of aether to cause that much trauma to strip the color from his eyes and hair like hers had been.

A soft, almost sobbing laugh left her as she realized even their builds were similar, despite the inverse genders. Small and compact, hard muscle giving way to softer curves. She was more her father’s daughter than she realized.

“Baba…you…what…what is this?” The word for daddy in their dialect slipped easily from her lips, as if she hadn’t forgotten the words that went with the other sounds that made up their tribe’s language.

He smiled and moved to join her at the cliff edge, faced to look out at the view as a soft, wistful look played across his features. “The only way I could reach out to you. I’ve tried for so long, but your connection with our land is weak, as is your sister’s. Your blood has forgotten our ways, but I suppose that is to be expected when so much has been lost needlessly.” He looked to her, his colorless gaze carrying the weight of his sorrow. “I was a fool and it cost us everything. I was so certain and so sure of my own power that I let it blind me. I was chosen as Nunh because of my magic and in the end my magic damned us all.”

Nothing he said made sense to her. With so little memory of their people left or the events leading up to the fall of their tribe, she couldn’t even begin to piece together what he meant. Her confusion must have read across her features, but Dorel gave his daughter a gentle, understanding look.

“Our bloodline had been strong for generations. The gift of the ancestors, what you call magic, being passed from father to daughter, mother to son. We were giving the vision of aether, to see the very lifeforce of the land we lived in and the ability to manipulate it to protect our people.” His features were awash with a mixture of pride and sorrow. “But it was given to us with a steep cost. Darkness runs in our blood to give us this gift…a pact with a creature from another realm feeds our gift and in turn our bloodline feeds it. As long as we survive and we breed, it draws life from up. Our ancestor did not realize this darkness would cost the sanity of some of our kin or that it would make us as vulnerable as it does.”

Sana frowned, searching Dorel’s features as she tried to make sense of all of this. She’d known about their void taint, had used it to her advantage and had even figured that it was passed down through the bloodline, but it sounded as if it was something she should have known more about.

���Why tell me this now?” It wasn’t the question she wanted to ask, but it was the one that came to mind.

“Because there is still blood left, besides you, A’dina and your son. I cannot see who, but I can feel them when they step foot on our land. They shuffle and seek through to find the source of our pact, but I hid well in my life, as my mother did before me and her mother’s father before her…so on and so forth. Each generation changing its place of rest to keep our secret and our shame safe. Without it, we do not know what will happen.” He frowned, looking to the horizon and the growing light that heralded the coming dawn. “I have stayed too long. Find it, Saghiri. Find it and protect it. Protect our blood.”

“Wait! Baba, wait!” A’sana stepped towards him and in doing so jolted awake, shouting the words as she bolted up in bed. Confusion played across her features as she sat in disoriented silence between her wife and her mate, trying to make sense of what had just happened. As odd as the dream had been, it felt real and the sense of dread with that realization played down her spine. A storm was coming.

[songsofbloodandfire]

Broken (Old Content)

(Warnings: Possible triggers, mental illness, panic attack, ptsd)

There were bits of broken ceramic laying in stark contrast on the dark wood flooring. The pastel blue and white cup with a delicate and cheerful design worked onto it had been a favorite and now it was shattered beyond repair. She had been stupid and careless. Sana had known her hands were unsteady and that her nerves weren’t the best that day. Instead of choosing something sensible she’d chosen a favorite and now it was ruined because she had been stupid.

Frustration rose as tears burned at her eyes while she worked to start picking up the bits of broken ceramic. She hated crying over nothing. It left her feeling useless and weak, nothing more than some emotional wreck who couldn’t be trusted to do anything right. Tears wouldn’t do anything to fix the issue and yet the more frustrated with their presence she got the more her eyes burned and her throat tightened uncomfortably.

Stupid girl. Stupid, emotional child. Useless.

A sob caught in her throat at her mind echoed the words over and over again. Some in the voice in her head that was ever present, a mocking caricature of her own but others were in an arrogant, masculine tone that would always haunt her. Some days it was his voice that hammered in that reality harder than her own.

There was a smear of blood on the floor that she seemed oblivious to as she sat there with a little pile of broken cup in front of her, unable to bring herself to standing. He would have punished her for breaking the cup and then for damaging herself in the process of fixing her mistake. The unbidden memory pulled a little hysterical sound from her caught between a sob and emotional giggle that had nothing to do with humor. He was coming up more and more, and with him memories that were getting clearer than before, though she wished they wouldn’t.

“Finish it. You might be a beast, but you are a properly trained one.”

His voice. Try as she might, she could never forget his damned voice. More and more recently it seemed to bring unbidden flashes of memories. Things she didn’t remember and couldn’t begin to decipher if they were truly memories or twisted nightmares that her fracturing mind was creating. Some, like this one, were so strong that her body ached with forgotten injuries and her lungs burned to pull in a proper breath as panic hit hard.

Useless, broken girl.

She needed to fix her mistake. Everything had narrowed down to the damn shattered cup that was beyond repair and the fact that it was only made it worse. How could she fix something so completely and utterly broken? Everything depended on an impossible task and she couldn’t find anyway to make it possible. Her mind seemed stuck in a loop of blame and self-loathing that just continued to feed itself until she felt like she was drowning in it and the only thing she could do was sit there with her knees to her chest on the floor and cry uncontrollably to the point of hyperventilation.

Time passed and eventually her sobs would begin to lessen and then stop, her breathing calming to something easier to maintain. Like so many times before, she felt broken and empty, the panic gone and leaving behind a shell with nothing left to give. Even the mere thought of forcing her body to move almost seemed too much but there was shame in not wanting her mates to see just how bad the day had been for her. She was supposed to be strong and unbending, the fiery temptress and blooming homemaker, but in that moment she felt far from any of that.

As she bent to pick up the broken pieces of cup with shaking hands, she saw herself in the ceramic; fractured beyond repair.

[songsofbloodandfire]

Mother (Old Content)

Sleep, baby, my dearest,

Hushabye, a-bye.

Quietly the bright moon

Is looking at you in the cradle.

 A’shatara sang low and sweet, the lullaby just carrying itself over the distant rumble of a storm in the distance. A’dina had already fallen asleep, the wild mess of ginger waves framing the young miqo’te’s features, giving her a sort of angelic peace that the little troublemaker didn’t have while awake. She had fallen asleep quickly after her and A’sana had been laid down for the night, but the younger A’sana was proving to be the harder of the two to get to settle down. 

 “Auntie Shatara, where is mommy?”

 A pair of brilliant green eyes looked up at A’shatara, a much more guileless version of her father’s. Even if both sister’s had taken on their mother’s brilliant red hair, A’sana’s eyes were definitely her father’s. As was the promise of magic that was still sleeping within the little one, though turbulently so. She had inherited A’dorel’s gift of magic, but there was concern that it might waken early in her just as it had for him. Though, those whispered worries had gone well over the tiny kit’s head, along with other concerns in the trib.

 At just just barely four summers old, A’sana could tell there were problems in the tribe if only because the adults were fighting. She couldn’t understand why and most of the time either A’dina would drag her off somewhere away from the fighting, or one of the tribe what wasn’t directly involved with the dispute would usher the sisters and the other tribes little ones off to work on chores or play elsewhere. She knew their mother, A’sharae, was often one of the ones talking the loudest and seeming the most angry.

 A few moments of quiet were finally broken as A’shatara moved to gently scoop the small kit into her arms. “Your mother has gone on a long hunt, Sana. She will return before the next full moon.”

 “She’ll make it in time for the big fires?” The excitement on the kit’s features was brilliant, making those emerald eyes shine in the time light of the fire.

 With the autumn came their days to remember those who had fallen and honor those who had earned the right to hunt. A celebration of death and rebirth, a turning of the seasons celebrated with offerings to the gods in flames, songs and dance. Of course, the kits were most excited about the sweet treats they would likely get for the special occasion.

 Chuckling, A’shatara smoothed at the wild long red waves of the little girl and the ears that were just a touch too big as the girl hadn’t had a chance to grow into them yet. “She will be back before the fires, yes.”

 “But why isn’t she here now?”

 That wasn’t something A’shatara could answer so easily for the kit. There was no way to explain to one so innocent that A’sharae was discontent with their Nunh, her father. That her mother was risking being outcast or worse for her actions, the threats she’d made towards the safety of the tribe. Already the worried of the rumors of trouble in Ala Mhigo, they didn’t need dissent within their own tribe to add to their worries. While the general thinking was they were far enough out from the city for it to be too much of a worry for them, there was still concern of disrupted trade from the city that they relied on.

 A’shatara also could not explain to her niece that her sister had little interest in raising her daughters. While she had carried them for A’dorel, A’sharae had wanted nothing to do with the actual raising of children. She had dumped that on A’shatara as she, unlike her sister, had proven to be not only barren but eager to care for children that she herself would never be able to carry. And so, while A’sharae showed only the barest of concerns for the two daughters she had borne, A’shatara had raised them as her own along with the help of the tribe. She had not taken the title of mother, though she was more that to the two than their birth mother was.

 “It is long and hard to explain, Sana. When you are older, you will understand. For now, sleep.”

 A furious shake of that red crowned head was given even as the kit was laid back into her place next to her sister A’dina. The older sister curled an arm around A’sana to pull her close as if she were a security blanket and despite the frustration that played in her eyes, A’sana didn’t pull away. It had always warmed A’shatara’s heart to see how close the two were despite their age difference. If anything, it seemed to make A’dina that much more protective of her younger sibling.

 Smiling gently, A’shatara tucked the two back in. “Sleep, Sana. The Nunh wants to spend time with you tomorrow, so you had better rest.”

 Watching the little girl settle back down and at least try to make a valiant effort at sleeping, A’shatara smiled gently and lovingly. Even if she had not carried them, the two little kits before her were her daughters. That knowledge added further warmth to her lullaby as she picked up where she had left off to lull the two girls into a deep sleep.

 I will start telling a story, Sing a song; You dream a dream, closing the eyes, Hushabye, a-bye… Over the rocky bed flows the river, And splashes the dark waves; A sly gryphon crawls over the bank, Sharp his claws and beak; But your mother is an experienced warrior Trained in battles: Sleep, my little one, be peaceful, Lullaby, a-bye.

[songsofbloodandfire]

Heaven or Hell (Old Content)

(Random bit of work. As always, adult themes lie ahead.)

Safe. That word was something that had always been foreign to A’sana except for in one context and that was when she was with Delesta. Yet, somehow she found herself feeling the warm comfort of safety in the arms of an unexpected source. Bremwyda Abylnpfefwyb, that statuesque giantess of a roegadyn who’d settled quit neatly into a heart that was more battle scarred than she cared to admit to herself. To many times she’d let herself trust and found herself broken by it and yet someone, Brem had won a place just a precious to her as Delesta was.

The dawn’s light had just begun to spill through the windows throughout the room, adding to the dim glow of the single lamp that stayed on throughout the night to help combat the fear of the dark that Sana could not seem to shake. That warm, gentle light played across Brem’s pale features, bringing life to her sleeping form and for the first time in months she actually ached to draw. To try and capture that moment in something still and beautiful to preserve but even then it wouldn’t bring justice to the reality of the sleeping woman before her. There was no way to capture that intangible feeling that Sana experienced in the safe warmth between Brem and Del.

These two women were a miracle to her. Delesta had always been a part of her life, given that her older sister had been there from the day she’d been born. They had gone through the fall of their tribe together, surviving on the streets of Ul’dah and eventually thriving there. Delesta had been so many firsts for her that she was so tightly woven into Sana’s soul and being that A’sana knew losing her would destroy her and that was something she both cherished and was terrified of. The idea of needing someone so much, being so entangled with that person that they could so easily break her was terrifying and yet she craved it with Delesta.

The taboo nature of their coupling was not lost on her. While incest, as much as she hated the word that sounded so ugly for the feelings she had towards Delesta, wasn’t unheard of among the small tribes like what they’d come from, she knew it wasn’t spoken of openly either and it definitely wasn’t accepted among the cities. What was an accepted necessity at times for small tribes was almost criminal to some of the more closed minded in the cities. She hated having to hide that part of their relationship, even if it meant being able to openly and proudly call Delesta her mate and eventually her wife. That was only one part of the relationship with Del and it seemed shallow not to be able to openly admit to the other parts, even if their closest friends and loved ones, people Sana was beginning to see as family, knew the truth of things.

In her life, A’sana had only trusted five people with her heart. She had only spoken words of love and affection to those five people and out of those five, only two were a part of her life. The love she had for Brem was new and tender, but strong and growing even stronger. Already, she meant so much to her, was equal in the love that she felt for Delesta and it was surprising to Sana to have found that. The other three had been people she had loved and trusted, but hadn’t earned what Brem had.

A’sana had to admit to herself that those loves had also been tainted in their own ways. Somehow broken or muddied by whatever events were in her life at that time that had shamed her needs and wants in that point of her life. Part of her wanted to feel guilt for that, and indeed one did garner some sense of guilt and regret, but for the most part she had come to terms with her actions and choices and had grown beyond them. Time, age and experience had taught her what her mistakes were and she was trying so hard to grow beyond them.

The first of those loves, a man that had started as an almost father figure before growing into something more, had been T’resh Tia. When she’d first met him, A’sana had been young and tender, just beginning to understand what it meant to be a Thaumaturge. Just barely a year into her studies, she had been rebellious and hard headed, balking against her mentors in the desire to do what she wanted. Part of it had just been her nature, something that had been encouraged by Del because it helped keep them alive more often than not, though Del was usually quick to put A’sana in her place when it was turned on her, but part of it was also frustration. The formally trained and proper mages were hard on A’sana, not only in her perfecting skills that were needed to to help the young prodigy control her gifts, but also in correcting language issues that had come with being young and uneducated along with lack of cultural understanding that stemmed from the same source and residual lessons from her tribe.

T’resh had been introduced to her on a particularly hard day. A Tia from the Condor tribe, he had grown up with his people, had been taught by them before he had struck out on his own out of a desire to not only see the world but to learn more of the magic that was so rare in his tribe. While not of the same tribe that A’sana had come from and not overly familiar with how life in the street had shaped the young orphan, he was understanding and tried to see where she was coming from. It had taken time, but eventually he had earned her trust and even a little respect from Delesta which was a feat in and of itself. Even after she had begun to master what she was being taught as she grew into a young adult, she had turned to T’resh for guidance and as a confidant. When T’resh had left to continue his travels and studies, A’sana had left the Thaumaturges, her last reason to be with them gone without T’resh there.

She had been bereft when Delesta had ended up imprisoned trying to protect her. A year and a half in Gridania, giving birth to a child and shifting her studies to Conjury had done nothing to distract her from the hole left by losing her sister and mate without any way of knowing if she’d ever get her back. It had left her angry, restless and resentful to the point that even her friend that had taken her in was losing patience with her.

Running into T'resh in Gridania had been pure happenstance but hours of spending time together and catching up had reminded her of what she was missing and, in some ways, helped ease the loss of her sister. When he offered to take her with him as his student, she jumped at the chance, eager to cling to someone familiar and stable. Now she could admit that T'resh was nothing more than a means to an end, but then she couldn’t see past her own needs.

Their relationship developed quickly from just mentor and student to lovers, but always in the back of her mind she found reason to not give herself fully to him. Ultimately it was because he wasn’t Delesta and she was still reeling from that loss, but then it seemed perfectly reasonable to insist on not giving him the love he deserved even as she professed it. He got part of her and in her own ways she did love him, but she was too damaged in that point of her life to give him more than a pale offering of what she’d given her mate.

In the end that wasn’t what had driven them apart. While she excelled in the arts of being a red mage and he praised her for that, T'resh became increasingly concerned with her growing ruthlessness. The driven and violent child he had known had given way to a woman who was violent and ruthlessly cruel when the urge struck her, not above killing in cold blood if it suited her needs. Eventually even the morally gray Tia couldn’t use his love for her to overlook what he saw as flaws that she refused to change and he left her in the cover of night with little more than a written letter explaining why.

For nearly two years, she was on her own. Angry, bitter and resentful, she turned to grifting not only to survive but also as a way to torment others to make herself feel better. Watching men and women she made fall in love with her be broken when they realized they’d been had and she was long gone gave her pleasure. The times in between grifts were filled with drink, sex and increasingly dangerous magical studies, trying anything to help ease the emptiness in her life that nothing seemed to fill.

Her drive to use magic, along with other things, to fill her life would eventually lead to her meeting the man that would become the next love of her life, and ultimately the source of her lowest point in her life. Xavion Savageau was a handsome, cultured and dominating man that matched her in intelligence, wit and sexual hunger. He’d been a target she had chosen not for money, though he had plenty of that and at first she had been more than happy to let him lavish her with it, but for the library he had. More so rare books, one in particular, that dealt with void magic.

At first, playing the game was easy. He was attracted to the beguiling and intelligent persona she played, leaning a bit more heavily into who she was as a person because it would be closer to the type of woman he wanted. As months passed, she found herself falling into the carefully laid trap she had set for him, coming to actually enjoy the long intellectual talks, the passionate and sometimes savage intimate moments between them and everything in between. She found herself falling in love with him and contemplating telling him the truth of who she was.

That was never meant to be, however. Even then, as she contemplated the sharp and ugly turn that would come, fear and panic stirred in her before she pushed them away. Despite having well and truly loved him without the baggage of her loss of Delesta, he had left her utterly broken and still fractured after three years of being away from him. What hurt the most was that some small part of her still loved him, though she would never admit it a loud let alone acknowledge it to herself.

Xavion had laid a trap for her, having found out on his own that she was not the woman she claimed to be. He had brutalized her and tortured her. Forced her to do things that she still only remembered in fractured nightmares. A large swath of time was lost to him because her mind simply refused to remember what he had done to her. Even in the present trying to actively reach for those memories was met with a vague sense of fear and unease but no actual recollection of what he had done and had made her do.

It had taken nearly dying to escape him and truly she would have died if luck had not been on her side. Even after she had woken, weak as a newborn in the care of an old friend, it had been a long road to recovery. It took weeks for her body to physically recover from the abuse it had been put through and she still didn’t know everything physically Xavion had put her through. Her body recovering had been the easy part. There were days where her mind still felt fractured and fragile. Xavion hadn’t left many scars on her body, his torments kept so that her body was kept beautiful while he broke her to his use. No, the scars were deep in her psyche, still raw even three years later.

A'sana drew her thoughts from Xavion and his place as a boogeyman in her past to focus on the familiar hold of Delesta.  The snoring from both of her lovers was familiar too, but in reality she didn’t mind it. It was comforting, a constant reminder they were there with her. They helped her forget at times that she was still so broken, more than she let on.

They saw the effects of the nightmares and the rare breakdown, but they couldn’t see the anxiety that gripped her hard some days and left her struggling just to function. The guilt that would find new ways to wear at her and the flashbacks that sometimes would come without warning. She hid so much behind masks or isolation in her studies because, despite knowing what she had gone through was traumatic and scaring, she felt weak for the days when the struggle was a bit more than others.

It seemed like the bad days were getting more common, something that had started shortly after she’d started dating Aether. Yet another mistake in the line of men who’d done nothing but ultimately bring her pain and leave her more broken than what she had come to them as. Aether alone had claim to being responsible for having left the biggest physical marks on her body, things she would bare until the end of her life. All because she had loved him and let her love blind her.

Aether came into her life with an air of mystery that drew her like a moth to a flame. Delesta had just come back into her life but six years was a long time and both of them had changed in ways they hadn’t expected of each other. It had caused friction and strife between them that had only been amplified by Aether’s presence in the midst of things. Him choosing A'sana and refusing to be anything beyond monogamous while begrudgingly allowing the sisters the intimacy they’d had before him had ultimately been a match to the tinder between the two women.

She had lost Delesta, seemingly forever, and it shook A'sana to her core. At first, having Aether to lean on helped. Once she’d gotten past the literal mask he wore along with the emotional ones, he was sweet and kind. It had been easy to enjoy that and bury herself in her work towards his cause and the Societies work.

Trouble was quick to come and Sana was willing to admit she wasn’t innocent of the blame that came with it. Her temper often got the worst of her and working within the strict confines of Society rules had chafed at her. At first the punishments had been light and she knew it was because Aether was struggling to choose between her and the Society. Eventually he stopped choosing and with it came a punishment that was vastly disproportionate to her ‘crimes’ because Aether had felt the need to make an example of her.

Beating her would have been a godsend compared to the mutilation he inflicted across her back with a bladed gauntlet. The humiliation of being drugged so that they could bypass her high tolerance for pain in an effort to break her before her peers and then forced her to endure being punished before them had been shattering. As if that hadn’t been enough, she’d spent weeks having to recover slowly, unable to use her aether to heal herself without risking further punishment. All over the words of three individuals that had proven to be cravens without any interest in the Society once it proved to no longer meet their needs.

She should have left then, but A'sana could finally admit to herself that she’d been terrified of being alone again and had clung to her waning love of Aether, hoping it would rally and give her reason to stay. Without Delesta, the idea of leaving and once again being on her own, alone and still so broken, wasn’t something she wanted to face so suffering to stay with Aether had seemed the better option. It was easier to stomach when she lied to herself and said it was for the good of the cause and the Society.

Yet, her love for Aether would nearly get her killed and would leave her permanently changed for life. The void mage that he was, Aether’s problems there had become hers. Eventually the void beasts that had chased him had caught up to him and put her and the Society as a whole in danger. With Aether gone and seemingly dead, the other leaders in the Society inept and ill equipped to handle anything needing to be done, A'sana had stepped forward, prepared to sacrifice herself for a cause she ultimately would come to regret aligning with.

A creature from some obscure tribe in the Steppes had been released from the body of one of their members through a mixture of the tribes broken summoning ritual and A'sana’s blood magic. The resulting blast of aether had left the already aether sensitive woman blinded for weeks from her aether-sight having been damaged in the process. Regaining her sight had left her horrified to find that her hair and eyes had been stripped of color, left a stark and eerie white. Even still she struggled with her aether sensitivity being much too strong, overwhelmingly so in some situations.

So much damage had been done to her physically and in the end, Aether had betrayed her. His lack of refusal to heed her warnings of the other leaders and his lack of direct influence on the members of the Society had led to his downfall. Of course his own waning grasp on his void damaged mind only amplified the problem and in the end, he proved to be nothing more than a coward.

Instead of standing with her when she challenged the way the other leadership was taking things, he backed away and left her standing alone. Instead of staying to help her track down Xavion who was becoming a potential threat, he ran way. He abandoned her when she had needed him and in the end the one that had saved her from herself had been the last person she had expected to get back in her life: Delesta.

Leaving the Society to fall in on itself had been easily done. The first few months away from them had been hard for Sana as she battled with the anger and betrayal, all the self loathing at allowing herself to be so stupid and try to become something she wasn’t. Even if Del didn’t realize fully, it had been Delesta’s constant presence in her life and willingness to love and protect her that helped ease her through it all.

Her fingers ran along Delesta’s arm as it held to her even in sleep while her tall curled firm along Brem’s leg. For once, cradled in the safe warmth of her lovers, she didn’t regret her choices. The road through everything had been hellish and hard. It had left her broken and fractured in ways she was still learning but in that moment it was worth it. They made it worth it and that gave her a peace she didn’t realize she had needed in her life.

Heaven or Hell inspiration songs:

Hail to the Liars by London Grammar - Sana/T'resh

No Guilt in Pleasure by MS MR - Sana/Xavion

Weight of Love by The Black Keys

White Blank Page by Mumford & Sons - Sana/Aether

I Gave you All by Mumford & Sons - Sana/Aether

Thistle & Weeds by Mumford & Sons - Sana/T’resh

I put A Spell On You (Cover) by Annie Lennox - Sana/Xavion

Never Going Back by Rotana - Del/Sana

Heaven or Hell by Digital Daggers

I Am The Fire by Halestorm

Lovesong by Adele - Del/Brem/Sana

[songsofbloodandfire]

Trepidation (Old content)

(Random bit of story progression for A’sana. As always, potential adult themes.)

The chill of the late summer morning air clung to the air with the promise of the coming fall and of cooler months to come, but I knew in a few hours time it would be chased off by the scorching desert sun. It was one of the truths of living in Thanalan that I had learned from a very young age. The heat of the desert was pure, unforgiving and punished those who didn’t respect it, like so many other things in nature. I suppose it was one thing I had always respected about the heat. It wasn’t constrained by things like emotions and politics, it just was.

I reveled in the chill of the air on my bare skin and the weak morning light that was just starting to peak over the horizon and paint the various houses below with the first hints of the coming day. More than that, I clung to the image and let the light sink into the very depths of my soul and psyche, knowing very well that soon I would be throwing myself into a darkness I had tried desperately to run from. I was about to stop running and that terrified me more than anything else I had faced before.

For three years I had run from a man I had once loved, despite my best judgement. I was a grifter, a con artist and I knew the games I played weren’t real and yet with him I had been foolish enough to let myself get caught in my own web and still I was paying the price. I had broken his heart and he had left me a shattered woman who was still, three years later, trying to desperately pick up the pieces of what was left. I wasn’t the same woman he had known and had broken and I hoped that would be enough. I prayed the fires of the hell he had put me through had forged me into something stronger than I had once been.

Touching the warm metal of the collar around my neck, I still found myself hesitating to turn and head in to begin the task I knew that needed to happen. I had so much to lose and that collar represented the biggest of the things I could lose if I didn’t finally put an end to the terror that haunted me. My mate, the family we had built for ourselves and the home that was now ours. All of that was at risk, but more and more I feared I was the risk to them.

I knew that Delesta and Hyde wanted me to wait for them until we could find a better way to track Xavion that didn’t put me at risk. My mate and my best friend. I knew they had my best interests in mind, and I understood their concerns, but I also had faith in my own skills and power. I hoped that, if my gambit paid off, I could coax Xavion, the boogeyman that he had become to my life, into the open and hopefully to a small army of people who were quite eager to kill him.

Even as I had that thought, there was a hint of guilt that played in the back of my mind. This was my fault. All of it. If I had done my job, played the game correctly those three years ago, none of this would be an issue. I would have been out of Xavion’s life and he wouldn’t have any reason to come after me and I wouldn’t be conflicted. Instead, I found myself hating that part of me, despite everything despicable thing he had done to me, that still carried some hint of love for him. That part of me was what was responsible for the guilt that I felt for him, knowing that I had left him a broken man from the proud, beautiful creature he’d been when I had first found him. I did this and I needed to fix it.

Stilling myself against the tears that burned at my eyes and throat, I silently prayed that those I loved would forgive me when the time came but I needed to do this on my own terms. I had to face this demon from my past and I needed to prove to myself I was strong enough to stand face to face with him and not panic. I needed to do this, even it was was likely the stupidest thing I was likely to do. I’m sure I had done worst, but right then it felt like this choice was up there.

With one last look to the shimmering sliver of the sun’s disk as it peeked over the horizon, I turned to head on into the building behind me and to my apartment. Stepping across the threshold sent a shiver down my spine as the rush of aether trapped within the room hit me. What had once long ago been a home for Delesta and me, our first real home, was now a safe haven for the magics I worked, both things that people knew of and the darker things that I tried to keep hidden from common knowledge. Normally the aether wasn’t so heavy in the room, but I had spent most of the night reinforcing the protections on the room, layering them one on the other to try and shore up any potential holes that I hadn’t thought of. What I hoped was they would keep Xavion from being able to find me. It might keep me from being able to pinpoint him as well, but I would work around that eventually.

The latest of those protections lay etched out on the dark wood floors in bright red chalk edged with white candles that, with the barest touch of my own aether, flared to life while the other lights in the room went dark. The circle of protection was intricate, a relic from a time long before I had lived from a people I knew of only from tomes and scrolls that were fragile with age. It was designed to protect a summoner from the void creatures they summoned and I hoped that it would be a line against any such voidlings that Xavion might send for me.

Crossing over circle, I settled in the center of it and there was a moment when I hesitated. I could leave. I could go back to my mate and our lover, go back to my home and do this the smart way. I could hope that doing it that way would actually work and that I wasn’t putting everyone I loved at risk of being hurt by a man I wasn’t sure I knew how to fight. I could just let all this go and deal with the lingering demons of my past, but even as I had the thought, I knew I couldn’t. I tried to fight my own battles and this was a battle I needed to fight on my own, at least in part.

I had always had most describe using their magic as having to reach for it, as if it were some deep well of power within them that took conscious effort to pull from. It was something that always puzzled me since it had always seemed to be the opposite for me. Using my magic was more relaxing the hold I had on it to keep it from just lashing out, as if I was releasing the floodgates with the breath I let out.

A shiver ran down my spine as my magic seeped into the circle around me, seeking direction and form to be realized into something more that just the formless energy it was. With hand motions and the harsh tongue of a language long dead, I gave that magic the direction it craved. Each careful word and movement was a set of instructions. A piece of a puzzle designed to cast my magic along the odd connection between Xavion and me until finally it seemed to snap in place and pull me along, forcing me to hold on or risk losing myself in it.

I hated the way void magic felt. A cold so sharp it burned rushed across my body and set my nerves ablaze with it for a moment before I could adjust and then the true reason why I hated this particular flavor of magic came. The alluring draw of power, the promise of the rush of it if I would just take hold and let it in came. It spoke of so much, offered so much, but I knew the ugly reality of what would happen if I were to embrace it and simply give into that sweet trap it laid out.

As I came to the end of that connection, I opened my eyes and I could feel panic well in me for a brief moment as all that met my gaze was darkness. Knowing the danger of that panic, I shoved it away even as I tried to make sense of my surroundings. It wasn’t just darkness, it was an emptiness, as if someone had carved out a hollow in the darkness and given it depth. There was a sense of space even though my eyes couldn’t make sense of it fully.

Even as I puzzled over this place, I could sense a presence with me, one that I knew intimately but I wasn’t prepared for the punch in the gut that came as I turned to face him. Three years had done nothing to dampen the emotions I felt when my gaze rested on Xavion. Love. Fear. Panic. Hate. It all played through my mind as my gaze rested solidly on the features I had once seen look on me with affection, lust and the comforting sternness of a dominant as well as hate and loathing.

He was confused, at least at first. I could see the play of emotion dance across his features like watching shadows from a flame dance across a wall, but finally they settled into hate and loathing, more so as I spoke his name.

“You! All these years and you were right in arms length and I didn’t know it. You are a more crafty beast than I gave you credit for.”

“Perhaps…but you never allowed me to let you know me well enough to know what I was capable of.” I was thankful my voice held steady and calm, a confidence in my tone that I certainly didn’t feel gave weight to my words. “Xavion…we need to talk.”

(Trying something new this time. Music inspires me greatly, and typically a few select songs really push the theme of whatever I happen to be writing. I’m planning on including the links to the songs that really speak to me just to give added flavor to the stories themselves.)

Unmarked by Shireen

What I’ve Done (cover) by Marie Digby

Gun In My Hand by Dorothy

Bones by MS MR

This Means War by Avenged Sevenfold

The Fighter by In This Moment

Hurricane by MS MR

[songsofbloodandfire]

Awake (Old Content)

(Part two of a multi part writing exercise focused on retelling the past through A’sana’s eyes. As before, a warning to adult themes in the text.)

Arnica, lavender and cypress were the scents that coaxed me from sleep, their presence in the air thick enough that I could taste them on my tongue. The first deep breath of waking as I stirred sent a shock of pain through me that, if not for whatever alchemy had been used to dull my pain, would have sent me right back into the abyss of sleep. I hurt, but it was a distant pain, one that I didn’t care to chase after. The fogginess of the drugs was a much better than facing whatever hell they were covering up.

The events that led to those injuries were nothing more than a void as I tried to reach them and I wasn’t sure if it was a trick of whatever had dulled my pain or my mind refusing to let me remember. For that matter, I wasn’t even sure where I was, my surroundings foreign to me as my eyes finally began to focus enough for me to see clearly. Or as clearly as I could with the hazy shimmer of my aether-sight creating eddies and whorls that were real and yet not that distorted my physical sight. Where were my glasses? They would have made my aether-sight dimmed to the point of being non-existent and I rarely went without them.

Even as my mind lingered on the question, a memory rushed to met it. I was blind! Panic rushed through me as my eyes struggled to make sense of the purple-black abyss that I stared in, just barely making out silhouette of things in the distance. A blink followed by another as my eyes started to adjust. There was no familiar blue-white sheen of hazy aether that I was used to, but the dark oppressive taint of Void. That realization came with another. Voidlings. My mind started to make sense of the silhouettes and instantly I wished it hadn’t.

“I wonder how long you’ll last? I’ve heard many don’t last more than a few minutes. Of course, it’ll feel like an eternity to you, R’shana. I’m counting on that, beast.” Xavion’s voice was cold and anger filled in a way that I had never heard it before.

“Xavion, plea-” A scream, my own scream, stole the words as I felt myself falling into that void…The Void. I wouldn’t survive there! He had to know that! I needed him to understand that I-

There were hands on my shoulders, pressing me down into the soft warmth beneath me and not the cold hard ground I could vaguely remember from my time in the Void. Even as I struggled to reach for that memory, to try and remember fully what had happened, it fluttered away like a twisted butterfly. Why couldn’t I remember what had happened to me?

“Careful there, lass. You’ve been through the seven hells and back if your body tells its story true.” The voice that spoke was weakened and raspy with age but no less commanding in its own gentle way.

I knew that voice, even if I hadn’t heard it since childhood. When I had first heard it, it hadn’t been so aged but had still had the same gentle sense of command to it. Araceli wasn’t a commanding woman physically, but she was the type of woman that seemed to fill up a room with her presence and quietly demand attention from those around her with her subtle confidence and pride. She was the only woman I had come to trust as much as my sister and someone I considered almost a mother.

Settling back into the bed, my eyes finally focused on the elderly Hyur, finding her presence comforting in the midst of my confusion. It had been over a decade since I had last seen her and time hadn’t been kind to her, though many had been left burdened and aged beyond their years from the terrors of the Calamity so that wasn’t surprising, even as sheltered as her life had been within the Thaumaturgy Guild.

Still, there was a hint of the beauty that Ara had been in her youth with the graceful, patrician features of her high cheekbones and the delicate slope of her nose still pleasing to the eye. I had been told she had been high-born Ala Mhigan before city-state had fallen to Imperial control and I believed it. With her black hair silvered with age and wrapped in a stately coil around the crown of her head, and her dark brown, almost black eyes watching me with quiet patience, I could see in her the nobility she had never claimed in earshot of me.

As I settled, she seemed to relax and the tension I hadn’t noticed in her body faded some. Why hadn’t I noticed that before? I was better at reading body language than that, more so from someone I knew as well as Ara. I was off balance, and as much as I wanted to blame the drugs for that, my mind screamed at me that I knew better.

I hadn’t realized that I had tried to speak until I found my vision blackened with red frayed edges from the pain that blossomed in my ribs as speaking sent me into a coughing fit. Ara held me gently and I felt something cool pressed to my lips as instinct took over and I drink. Earthy marshmallow root and the sticky sweetness of honey coated my tongue and throat and eased the cottony dryness that the painkillers had caused. It was only then that I realized just how much my throat hurt and it was a familiar pain. I had screamed hard and long, enough so that it had damaged the delicate folds in my throat.

“What happened?” My own voice was foreign to me, harsh from the damage that had been caused to it. My mind danced away from the question of why I had been screaming, not wanting to risk another memory stealing Ara’s answer from me.

“To tell it true, Sana, I do not know.” It had been over a year and a half since anyone had called me by my real name and it was comforting that it came from a familiar voice. As she continued to speak, Ara settled the herbal infusion she’d had me drink to the side, her hands gently checking over the various bandages on my body. “I found you two nights ago stumbling through Pearl Lane, naked as the day you were born and looking like you decided to pick a fight with a wolf and lost. Gods be praised I found you and not someone else. I doubt you could have fought your way out of a wet towel in your state.”

A comfortable silence fell as she focused her attention on her work and I couldn’t find the strength to speak again. Instead, my mind drifted on the warm haze of the drugs, trying to grasp at thoughts only to have them dance out of reach as soon as I tried to focus on them. All I had were indistinct impressions of what had happened. All of it centered around Xavion and none of it pleasant. He had tortured and violated me. I knew that and that was a solid thought that I could hold to, as ugly as it was, but what exactly he had done my mind couldn’t face.

“-you stopped breathing and I truly thought I had lost you if my woman hadn’t been quick to pull you back to the land of the living.” Ara had been talking and it seemed for several minutes while my drug addled mind had been pondering the atrocities that Xavion had done to me. “As much as she wanted to use aether to heal you, as heavily tainted as you were, we were afraid if might have done more harm than good. I know you, Sana. I know why you left the Guild but gods, Void magic? I taught you better than that, lass.”

The old guilt I felt for dabbling in the “forbidden arts” was nowhere to be found at Ara’s words. I wasn’t a practitioner, not like she seemed to think, but I knew that I had been tainted. Another mentor had speculated that the tiny sliver of void that was nestled so deep into my own aether that it couldn’t be removed was likely the remnants of some old pack that had left my bloodline tainted. That I knew of and had used in my own dabblings in blood magic, but from the way Ara spoke, it had been more than that. The only thing I could figure was either Xavion had done something to taint me further or being in the Void had caused harm to me.

“I didn’t…the man that did this…” My voice broke from the damage caused to my throat, but enough of my point had been made and Ara simply nodded as she helped me drink again.

“I rarely wish death on anyone, lass, but I sure hope you killed the man that did this. It took work, but we rid you of all but a little bit of the taint.” The disapproval of having to leave me even slightly tainted was clear in her voice. I was too tired to explain my bloodline or argue any point about avoiding a source of power being ignorant and dangerous. As if taking my silence as invitation to continue, Ara went on speaking while she worked. “As long as you avoid such magics, you will be fine, though I worry it might make you even more enticing to the critters that have been coming through since the Calamity.”

I had heard the rumors that weaker voidlings were coming into our realm in larger numbers since the damned moon had been pulled down on Eorzea. Ara out of anyone I could have thought of that still remained of those that had taught me at the Guild would have been the one to know such things. Her knowledge on the void was purely scholarly but she likely knew as much about it as any void mage, even if she didn’t practice that school of magic.

My mind drifted to her first words though and whatever showed on my face seemed to convey the knowledge that Xavion still lived. Even as I had the thought, I realized I couldn’t explain why I knew. Somewhere deep within my fractured psyche I knew without a doubt that Xavion still lived. That realization brought a distant anger but also fear and memory stole the world from me for a moment.

“It’s true then. You are nothing more than a petty, common thief.” I froze at Xavion’s words and my heart broke at the raw pain and anger in his tone as well as the panic that came as I understood what those words meant.

He knew.

The irony of the moment wasn’t lost to me as the book I had wanted from him, that had brought me to target him and work my way into his life was laid out in front of me and I wanted nothing to do with it. I would have given it and so much more to not hear the hurt in his voice. Hurt that I had caused because I had been too much of a coward to tell him the truth.

“Xavion, let me explain, please?” The tribal accent I had been using was gone in my panic and that only seemed to anger him more as I let the facade drop.

Instinct had saved me, allowing my body to react and put a hastily erected shield of aether between me and the blast of void infused lightning that had been thrown my way but I realized too late my mistake. Tendrils of void energy wrapped around my torso from behind as others captured my wrists and ankles. Any aether I tried to channel was drained away by them and just like that, I was helpless before him, unable to do anything but watch as he walked to me and started tearing at the dress I wore.

Pain brought me back to the present, cutting through the memories cleanly and leaving me breathless from it and threatened to steal my awareness away in its own fashion. Ara had paused in her work to look at me with that motherly concern, looking as tired and worn as I felt. Her lips drew themselves into a thin line as she quickly finished changing the bandages at my ribs, leaving me trembling and sweating in pain once she finished.

“You’re safe, lass. Stop fighting the drugs and just sleep. We’ll talk more when you’re in a better way.”

For once in my life, I wasn’t too stubborn to be contrary and prove a point. With open arms, I welcomed the blissful abyss of sleep so I could escape not on my physical pain, but the mental as well. For all that Xavion had done to me, even if I couldn’t remember it, I mourned the loss of his love the most.  

[songsofbloodandfire]

Ruined (Old Content)

(Part one of a writing exercise focused on retelling the past through A’sana’s point of view. Warning for this and any entries to follow. Adult themes including violence, and sexual themes follow.)

Of all things, the sound of rain woke me with a start, something I would instantly come to regret as pain shot through my body like a wildfire. At first the pain was all consuming, stealing all sane thought from me. Without that clarity, that sanity, I found myself in a downward spiral of panic that I knew would do me no good. Panic got you killed. I had learned that lesson the hard way in the past and I did not care to learn it again.

It took effort to force my mind away from that panicked state it had been in where thoughts and the mere concept of them flitted through my minds eye too fast for me to comprehend. I needed to focus and the pain gave me something to focus on. Something to take stock in.

The protests of my ribs as I breathed was the first thing my mind took hold of to focus on. They were, at best, badly bruised but I was willing to guess at least one was cracked. That rain that fell on me brought attention to a myriad of cuts and scrape burned in the cool water. A wiggle of my feet told me they worked though my legs protested the movement and then I tried to lift my arms only to be blinded by pain momentarily. My right arm was broken and it took effort to turn my head to see the odd angle it was bent at in the wrong place for it to bend. Fantastic.

Even as the thought to heal myself crossed my mind I knew it wasn’t possible. The familiar fatigue of being physically and aetherically drained weighted on my body. I couldn’t remember casting spells, not enough to leave myself that drained.

The moment that thought went through my mind, I realized I couldn’t remember how I had gotten into this state. I wasn’t even sure where I was or how i had gotten here. I knew I was alive, but that wasn’t going to last long in the wrong areas. Still, I fought to push down the panic once again as I realized I didn’t know a lot of things that I should have. The date. The time. Where I had been.

There was one thing that I did know. My name. A’sana Dorel. One of the infamous Sultanas of the Sapphire Market. The silly moniker helped, gave me strength and the memories of better times to lean on. The memory of my beloved sister to cling to, even if I could hear her voice gently chiding me and calling me a sissy for staying down instead of fighting to get back up. I would have given anything to have her there right then, but she had been gone for three years at that point. My situation didn’t allow for idle wishes.

Everything in my body protested movement as I pushed myself to sit up, cradling my right arm to my body. The pain alone darkened my vision and threatened to steal away my consciousness for a few moments before I was able to fight it back. Braced for that surge of pain, I started to stand, thankful I was near enough to a wall to get myself up by leaning on it. It seemed an eternity before I managed to find my feet.

My vision was fogged by ambient aether, which told me I was without the glasses to filter out the “gift" I had been born with. Being so sensitive to aether that I could see it was more often a curse than a gift and in that moment it was useless to me. Even so, as I focused I realized I knew where I was. Intimately so.

Pearl lane. I had grown up here. I had run these streets with my sister at one time, staking our claim and taking what was ours. We hadn’t started that way and those humble origins would be a boon to me now. Being small and defenseless meant knowing how to hide when the time to hide came. I knew those places just as intimately as any other part of these streets.

Progress was slow and not particularly steady. More than once I was forced to stop or risk fainting. Being in familiar territory was a boon as much as a curse. I had enemies here. People who would have loved to catch one of the Dorels at a disadvantage if only for the glory of saying they took out a Dorel. Even locked away, I knew that kind of news would get to my sister and I didn’t want that. I didn’t want my death to be someone else’s trophy and bragging rights.

I found the spot I wanted. A small hollow hidden by the odd angles of the walls that created it. One of the walls was worn away enough that you could get to a small empty space behind it. It wasn’t a well known spot which made it perfect to hide in. It also required me to get on my hands and knees to crawl into. Even as the thought crossed my mind, I could feel my consciousness starting to wane.

A voice called my attention. More specifically, my name. My real name and not the assumed one I’d been living under. That woman was dead. She had to be. Even as I had that thought,  the reason behind it was gone, lost in the mire of memories that weren’t coming easily for reasons unknown to me.

The movement to face that voice were too fast and the instant I did it I regretted my actions. I heard myself say “Oh. It’s you.” before the yawning void that had been just at the edge of my existence since I had woken finally consumed me.