#v: ╳ ┆ x793 ┆◜ main ◞

[nocentis]

Sown Fresh to Bloom┆ X793

╳ ┆A beautiful dawn. Its fingers splayed over the horizon in brilliant golden streaks, flexing heavenward in decorous praise. Their warmth graced his face; cupped his cheeks with the airiness of a lover's caress and tilted his chin toward infinity. A gentle so overindulgent and undeserved.

Still, he felt the spread of his own fingers in time with the sun's stretch. A vigor reignited from skin to soul. He felt victory and defeat in equal measures. Love and life at last, free to take, and yet he'd never felt less qualified to seize either.

Familiar steps approached. He need not turn to know. She was the only one who might seek him out now, as the rest were well on their way. He watched them embark just before new light, smiling fond, waving kind, yet he could only see past as they walked toward future.

“When will you be leaving?”

Meredy chuffed, somewhere between a sigh and a laugh, like she wasn't expecting his ask. “Is that your way of telling me the guild’s disbanded?”

“No,” he answered honest, “Everyone is leaving. I just assumed...“

"Right. You assumed," she chastised, never shy. “Where will I go?” She mused, stabbing forth, “I have no village to return to. Few other friends, and none more important than you. I’ve got nowhere to be but by your side. Why would I leave now?”

“You've grown. Any legitimate guild would be lucky to have you. You don’t need me anymore.”

“Maybe I never did,” she posited simply.

“Maybe so,” he returned evenly.

Her hand curled around his shoulder, light enough that he could pull away and yet present enough for comfort. “You’re my family. What’s left of it, anyway.”

“Family?” He repeated, testing it on his own tongue. It was honey-tart. Sweet dressing to an open wound.

“Like an Uncle,” she clarified with a half-shrug. She smirked, nearly teasing, “A young one, of course. But you’re all I have left in terms of kin.”

So simple. So light. So free. Her voice was airy and unburdened despite how much she'd lost. In that way, he envied her. She made peace with her transgressions, made proper sense of them, and moved to become someone radiant and inspiring. Whatever was left of her hurt was buried; deeply personal and harshly constrained. Perhaps he wanted that for himself — to become a beacon for those harboring remorse or regret and to lead them to peace.

The horizon blurred into something grey and sallow. His own voice sounded foreign when he droned, “And that means you’ll stay?”

Meredy’s light-hearted demeanor dropped. She sighed, combed a hand through her bangs, and took a seat in the grass beside him. Rather than answer his, admittedly, redundant question, she issued one of her own. “Aren’t you happy for the Seis? They’ve finally been awarded their due freedom. They can do what they truly want now.”

“Of course I’m happy for them. Beyond happy. I’m elated,” he answered in truth. "I only wish it could've happened sooner."

“But there’s something else, too,” she gathered. “There’s always something else with you.”

“You’re right." His gaze dropped to his worrisome hands, diligently rubbing themselves raw. In comparison to the blownout blur, they almost looked too real. "It has nothing to do with the Seis though, I'm afraid."

“So, what is it?" She prodded, insistent. "What plagues you?”

“I’m not sure how to describe it," he admitted. "Guilt, perhaps."

“May I?” It was more of a suggestion than a question. Her finger flared a soft pink as she pointed between his wrist and her own. “Maybe I can give it a name. That ought to help. At least a little.” At his blatant hesitation, she coaxed, “Come on. You said it yourself. I’m grown. There’s nothing you could be feeling that I haven’t felt myself.”

“Alright,” he conceded, though he remained less than thrilled.

She closed her eyes, released a stalled breath, and their wrists came alight with shared rosy charms. Her impatience was a fading whisper, quickly replaced by a mix of curiosity and concentration, and then his own hesitation echoed back to him twofold.

“You don’t have to say anything," she coached, nothing but patience in her instruction, "Just... think.”

Just think. Right, then. He could do that, couldn't he? It was one of the things he did ceaselessly, second only to breathing.

Meredy's concern was latent, flowing into him unbidden. More dominant than that was concentration—no, determination. Her focus on sorting him out indirectly fueled his own internal redirection, gently nudging him back into his own head from whence he came.

It felt entirely too open, though he probably should have expected as much. He made her worry, and vulnerability was the unfortunate consequence. He shouldn't have been so presumptuous, assuming she would leave simply because the Seis were ready to move onto bigger and better. He knew better than that. She wasn't so fickle as to spring such a lofty switch on him without first discussing it at length.

His insecurity was eating at him again. What he deserved was hardly his reality. He knew that to be true, though on occasion, he allowed that thing in his chest to paint the scene a ghastly pallor; a delusion of death owed.

But true justice wouldn't award him death. It would have him live all of their lives in succession. It would have him live their pain, their futility, their trust and betrayal and their earth-shattering moment of clarity, an endless loop of agony for naught, and then—then it would spit him out at their feet and have him beg for their mercy.

His life should be in their hands, and yet, because of the strength he coveted under the influence of the damned, because of the strength he cultivated in his selfish desire to preserve the ones he so loves, he still held a power he wasn't so sure he'd earned. A power that kept him almost untouchable.

His own magic was a cruel irony. A reminder of the standard he could never embody so long as he breathed and evermore. For all the Heavens he'd drawn from, he was himself the false-prophet, undeserving of the stars' forgiveness. Undeserving of peace. Of light. Of love.

And yet it followed him still.

“This isn't guilt. It's shame,” Meredy chimed in.

“That’s… warranted.”

“To an extent." Her hand rose to her chest, idly rubbing circles just beneath her collarbone. Her face twisted in despair, and he could feel his own sorrow amplified and echoed back to him through their link. Meredy's voice wavered when she argued, “This is exorbitant. It should be debilitating.”

"Break the link," he suggested. Tears brimmed her eyes as her nails sunk into her shoulder, yet he could feel her reluctance to let go; to leave him alone with it. "Please, Meredy."

Despite her obvious hesitation, she honored his request, rubbing her wrist where they were only just connected. There was pity in her eyes, so much of it that it was sickening. Her words came out wet, strangled, like she was still choking back the tears he wasn't willing to shed, "Is that really how you feel all the time?"

"No," he attempted to ease her concern, but it was utterly unconvincing. "There are moments of joy, and pride, and hope."

"What about peace? Calm? Silence?"

He opened his mouth only to close it again.

"Why haven't you..." she stopped herself and started over like she already knew the answer to her initial question, "Do you think it's doing you any good, holding onto this?"

"I don't know how to live without it," he confessed. "It's my burden to carry. I cannot forget. I cannot separate myself from what I've done."

Her face pinched, somewhere between anger and upset. For the first time in a long while, she seemed disappointed in him. "You're not carrying it. You're letting it consume you."

"I don't want that."

"What do you want?" She bawked, voice riding the line between irritation and incredulity. "From life, from yourself, from anything?"

"I want to help others," he answered immediately, no rumination required. "I want to find others like me, like us, and lead them to light."

"How can you do that if you can't find it yourself?"

[nocentis]

╳┆To share even the simplest of his shames is to peel back the flesh one layer at a time, and yet the steady soft of her touch is honey salve to that wound. Featherlight against the rise of his skin and that pattern he's spent so much of his life resenting, faint as a still wind and yet warm. She soothes him through his contrition; lends him the strength to cut sutures sewn far too shallow, to wash the fester from this hurt, dress it new, and leave it in Time's hands. He wants to be that for her — a comfort, and not just a barb stuck too deep to remove; not just a pain familiar enough to curl up in.

When she pulls away, he feels it deep in his chest. The child in him, buried alive, sifts through all of that soot-rot only to find himself stuck behind the cage of his ribs. He can feel those hands, small and brittle as osmium, wrapping and yanking and rattling — making a bitter fuss about the loss. Something even less expected than afforded, and yet one small taste was enough to unearth the taproot of his soul.

She attempts to quell his self-reproach, but her eyes leave his own as her voice thickens. He hangs onto her every word as she slowly unsheathes before him, meeting him where he stands.

His fingers worry against his palm, trying and failing to scratch the marrow-deep itch in his bones. He flexes them once, twice, before he gives in to her gravity — that dense, molten core of hers that keeps him locked in her orbit. Slowly, gently, he slides his hand beneath her own, fingertips kissing her palm, dragging, curling into the base of her fingers.

"If you hadn't changed..." his voice felt small in his mouth — plush like raw wool and too dry to swallow back, "Would that be such a bad thing?"

He allows whim to take him by the wrist. It guides his free hand to her face, knuckles hovering a breath away from the crest of her cheek, and he gathers the scarlet of her first ever armor and tucks it behind her ear. He hovers there a moment, tempted to bury his hand in that lush red, cradle her cheek with his palm, but that hesitation lingers too long, and his hand instead buries itself in his lap.

"I've always admired you," something that went without saying, and yet another thing he'd yet to shove through the mesh of his teeth. "Even when we were children, you were the bravest of us. You smiled through the fear, stayed true to yourself despite it all, and I..." let the hatred become me. Let it take me in mind and soul.

"I have changed. Many times, and in many ways." And in many ways, he's still that same child. Hung up on self hatred and grief. Looking to the stars on the off chance they might rewrite themselves; spell out a new path. Hand-writing his questions, sending them to the heavens, and never updating his return address — maintaining the illusion that someday he can return home to a drawer full of answers.

"I've come to realize that my wish for Death was never anything more than escapism — a misguided attempt at settling a debt unsettleable. I deluded myself into thinking I could atone for all I've done with my life, and yet... atonement was a self-serving ideal. You were right to be angry with me. I spoke thoughtlessly. Thanklessly. You had already lost enough, and I should have known..." the frustration has soured his voice, and so he takes a moment to reel himself back in. A breath in. A breath out. Softer now, he begins again, "I know that was never what you wanted. Even at my very worst, that wasn't what you wanted."

the weight of his tenderness is comforting in her palm, neither of them shying away from the grand gestures their small touches are. they unwrap this wound together, still pulsing and weeping, if only slightly. it’s ghastly, a part of themselves they recognize but still keep to the shadows—to be brought to the light is almost a greater task than having them anatomize it. their fingers sink into the soft tissue of the years before, this time to heal rather than simply remember. her hand stays put on his head, unsure of when to let go, when to hold tighter—when to bite, when to touch. she finds a small comfort in the mindless small repetition of her thumb, only separated by skin and bone from witnessing the flashes of memories and train of thoughts within his mind. 

her eyes never leave his face, almost reveling in the suffocation of anticipation, the tense moment just before a geyser erupts. when he speaks it's a cork pop, as if they’ve finally come up for air only to be met with the biting breeze of the chilled air, but he persist nonetheless. erza, in her own way, persists as she takes his words as he lays himself bare, almost entirely too still when compared to her usual fiery. 

he confesses to thoughts she’d been too blinded by rage to consider, too desperate to cling onto a memory so far in her mind's eye. fingers glide downward, matching in length with his flesh sigil, a whisper of a touch before she pulls back completely. despite it being healed in front of her she vividly recalls it at its youngest, raw and irritated on much more delicate skin. a boy forever marked. he had once held a noose to that boy's neck, despite sharing the same name, and it had scared her—like a beast she flexed her quills, acting on instinct to the prospect of death.

he then confesses to something she's already known, pulls back the curtain on a lie so blatant it felt unfair to have it sit in silence and so she speaks before much thought, “ you’ve never failed me, jellal. you being here now proves that. you were scared, and… ” she hesitates, her throat squeezing around her heart so tight she’s forced to break her gaze. she pulls her own curtain back, heavy in steel. “ and so was i. ”

“ it was just as unfair to expect you to move past everything, to remain that same boy from before—i wasn't the same… or, maybe i was and that’s what upset me the most. ” that little girl is forever buried inside, different parts of her deeper than others and when she finally found a chain linked to hers the cuffs were found empty at the other side. jellal had been the stronger of the two that day, regardless what her words may have conveyed. “ whether or not you lied to me didn’t matter, as long as you could. ”

[nocentis]

╳┆your love is bittersweet, lemon tart, sugar-rot in the pulp of your teeth and powdered-icing acid reflux; sown into your flesh like shrapnel, too close to your heart, too fine to remove.

[nocentis]

Reforged┆x791

╳┆The ground beneath them groaned, preceding its shift by mere moments. He prepared to leap from one platform to the next, but his borrowed attire got the better of him and he sorely undershot the landing. The ledge scraped him from shin to chest on his downward plummet, arms just barely catching the platform before he managed to sink toward oblivion.

As he began dragging himself toward safety, fighting the rotation of the still-turning maze, he felt someone grab his wrist and hoist him to relative safety.

“Stay on yer feet,” Gajeel snapped, irritation laden in both face and voice, “If yer gonna be embarrassing, do it away from me.”

“Right,” he agreed, just barely managing to suppress his mortification. Only the first event and he was already making a mess of things. Not using his own magic was going to be even more of a challenge than he'd already anticipated.

Blasted pants. It’s hard to believe there is any alternate version of himself that would wear these gravity defying monstrosities.

Belatedly, he tossed out an underbreath, "Appreciate it," as they turned to catch up with the others, who had taken the shifting map into stride and carried on without missing a beat.

Gajeel grumbled back, "Don't mention it."

╳┆As the third day's events began and the stadium came abuzz, he found his window to slip away unnoticed. The past few nights of aimless roaming about, catching whispers of that sour presence on the wind, have yet to bear fruit. All that time wasted was compounding; it made his bones itch. He hadn't attended these games on holiday — hadn't broken the rules and risked Fairy Tail's elimination just to suffer a humiliating forfeit and then sulk in the stands. No, there was something evil lurking about, and he fully intended to find it.

"They went that way."

Despite his prickly countenance, Gajeel seemed adept at sneaking about. Jellal barely heard him approach before he'd issued his offhand comment, pointing in the opposite direction in which Jellal originally intended to go.

Just as he opened his mouth to respond, Gajeel cut him off to explain, "They stink."

Jellal nodded, remembering the reaction he received upon his last expression of gratitude, and shifted his stride accordingly. "Tell me how the day goes."

"Nah," Gajeel called behind him, "I ain't yer fuckin' parrot."

[nocentis]

❝You‘re brooding again.❞ — from @timesrepentance

╳┆ It seemed he wasn't the only one who'd yet to kick the habit of rising in time with the sun. Either that, or she hadn't slept at all. Whatever her reason for being awake at this glimmering hour, he thought himself fortunate for it. Good company tended to keep the idle mind from pulling at threads best left in their weave.

Rather than respond to her astute observation, he deflected, "Would you like to join me? Sunrise's peak is nigh."

[nocentis]

“Jellal, are you done moping about your tragic past for the day. You are over the limit of your allotted time for moping.”

“Moping? Hardly. I was simply reflecting.”

“How can I appreciate life as is and that yet lived without respect to the past?”

[nocentis]

@meganeviolet liked for a starter!

╳┆He placed a small box on the table, unwrapping it to reveal a modest copper reliquary turned green at the seams. He was unfamiliar with the parable it was fashioned after — some tale of beast, brawn, and divine intervention, no doubt — but if someone could identify it, he might be able to return it to its proper home.

“Looks well loved, wouldn't you say?”

"Any clue where it might have come from?"

[nocentis]

@pretiumus liked for a starter!

╳┆Admittedly, he was skeptical of this hand-scrawled map and the craggly stranger who'd drawn it up, but it was the best lead they had so far. Rumors of a cursed artifact had been swirling around this area long before they arrived, and yet the moment he started asking around, everyone went mum. Everyone save for the map-maker, who responded in broken rumbles and half-words, beckoned them into his shanty, and scribbled out a crude path.

Now they stood at the end of a dock, staring straight across the still bay at a small, lush island. It seemed their target was somewhere in the midst of that overgrowth.

"It seems we'll need a boat."

[nocentis]

@nulltopia liked for a starter!

╳┆Midday has never been his favorite time to travel. The night sky is a map he can easily follow, but the bright open blue — it is amorphous and directionless. Clouds are constantly moving, losing their integrity, joining up with others of their like. Utterly undependable.

It doesn't help that this town is built like a maze. So much of the architecture is cookie-cutter, each dwelling identical to the next, and the longer he wanders, the more he feels like he's seen these same exact buildings before. To make matters worse, not one of these establishments have their numbers on display. Is it some kind of illusion? Some kind of trap?

Once he finally happens upon a humanoid figure in these eerily empty streets, he calls out, "Excuse me. Do you know where I might find the town square?"

[nocentis]

" i understand more than you think . " / from juvia >:)

✧ ┆Not Accepting

"I don’t doubt that you do."

The trouble never lied in whether or not she was familiar with the plague. It lied in whether or not he was ready — no, that wasn’t it either because he was never and would never be ready. It lied in whether or not he was willing to share.

"I won't pretend I haven’t heard a bit of your story.”

The only thing that guildsfolk liked more than drink was gossip; a quick-spreading and boisterous blight that often changed shape to fit whichever mouth would host it.

“I won't pretend to know the whole of it either, but something tells me that we have more in common than either of us know."

[nocentis]

" you're being unfair . " / erza

✧ ┆Not Accepting

"So I am," he wasn't so proud that he wouldn't concede when he was so obviously out of line, but he stood by the fact that it was necessary. Denying her anything felt like stepping out of his own skin, like up 'til now he'd been wearing himself like a suit he must shed in the pursuit of impartiality — if that's what this was.

"There is no version of us where I am truly fair — not to you, not to myself — but this is…”

"This is the closest we will get to fair."

[nocentis]

" the look on your face says there's more on your mind . " / from midnight

✧ ┆Not Accepting

The guild scraped together enough jewel to book a few rooms for the night, and while he probably does not want to know where most of it came from, he's sensible enough to appreciate the reprieve. The inn is modest yet comfortable — especially compared to the creeping chill of the countryside — but he's not yet accustomed to the prospect of showing face without fear of recognition. He's not sure he'll ever be used to it.

He finds comfort in the night sky — the vast and unforgiving nothing that encompasses everything. The stars and their space between always set him back to scale when he feels he is outgrowing his skin. It seems he might not be the only one with a wish to moonbask.

Midnight joins him at the hour of their namesake and returns his cordialities with the expected amount of enthusiasm. Silence fills the air between until they break the sterility to comment, "The look on your face says there's more on your mind."

He’s always been transparent that way. What he doesn’t express through words ends up bleeding through his face, gathering in the worry-worn lines that deepen at the start of each new day. If Macbeth has chosen to mention it, he must look more pathetic than usual.

“With opportunities abound, it’s difficult to decide where to begin."

Half-truths always felt mealy in the mouth, but the whole of it was a mammoth. There was only so much he could chew up and spit out at once.

"Do you mind if I ask where you'll go from here? Or, more precisely, what you'll do?"

[nocentis]

╳┆@mamorigami liked for a starter!

╳┆He disembarked from his train with every intention of heading straight home. But that was before something scarlet snagged his periphery.

The doors to an outgoing train snapped shut behind him, and the realization of what he'd just done began to set in. Swiftly behind that came the embarrassment. He hadn't even bothered to check where the transport was headed before he boarded, and now he was stuck until at least the next stop, whenever that was. Nothing to do now other than admit his mistake.

It didn't take him long to find her. She was sitting alone, staring out one of the windows at the steadily rolling scenery.

"Pardon me. Is that seat taken?"

[nocentis]

let her kiss his brand...

He sees her in the way that bees see flowers; the way that leaves see sunshine.

╳┆Honey spilled over the horizon and painted the high tide. Gilded fingers twisted into the amber silks draped upon the throne of cloud, wrapped them up in their glittering palms, around their wrists, and the day's ruler hoisted themselves slowly to claim, leaving blood and syrup in their wake. Their white robes did little to shield their pride; their radiance. There was something to be said about that immeasurable beauty and the karmic toll of viewing it. The price of a look, one held long enough to truly see, was to surrender the gift of future sight. There was something to be said about the periphery. Something about those colors, that warmth, that marvel, and how maybe close enough should be good enough, and why couldn't it be? Something about the cost of love, something about moderation, and maybe something about the comfort of cowardice.

Winter and Spring began their waltz, slowly slinking ‘round and ‘round with fingers interlaced high above their heads, eyes locked in lovers’ snares. Winter, condemned to play the role of callousness; of indiscriminate reaping, and Spring, the tender, the nurturer, tasked with the labor of rebirth. They found their compromise in the snowdrop’s bloom; in its frozen dew. They found it in the chill of the morning and the warmth of the afternoon, in the cool breeze, in the jewel-toned sky and the first blades of grass yet bitten by frost.

It must’ve been love, he thought, for what else could compel the harsh hand of Winter, cold and cruel as it was, not to strike, but to dance? It must've been love, he thought, because when Winter slipped from her grasp, Spring, in her loneliness, would begin to weep. Beautiful things bloomed from her pain, and so her pain was expected, demanded again and again. It must've been love that drove Winter to destroy those sorrow-sewn fields so that Spring would come back to him comfortably, and so just for a little while, they could find peace together.

Today, they were dancing.

╳┆The swell in his chest shined through his broadened shoulders, the length of his neck, the lift of his chin. Still, the habit of treading brazenly, maskless, through stone-laid streets, was one he’d yet to pick up. His formal pardon hadn’t barred the eyes from prying, and it certainly hadn’t muted the whispers. If anything, they’d only grown louder, more opinionated, so he'd yet to find comfort in the breeze's naked palms.

The repetitive swish and clang of his garb and the thud of his armored boots against the cobbles were familiar enough to become mute to the mind, like absorbed by his black-bleeding subconscious. Gone with it, the songbird’s tune, the whistle of the breeze, the sway of the trees. But not today. No, today he heard it—the way the wind howled in harmony with the river’s steady rush, the beat of his own pace, the trill tittering above, the cheerful chatter of life—like it was his first time. In a way, he supposed it was. Every other time he’d walked this path, he’d walked it with closed eyes and wool-stuffed ears, in thrall to the rotten echoes of his own mind. But not today. No. Today, his chin held high, as his spirits did.

He must have looked every bit the manic fool that morning, sliding through the doors of the Fairy Tail guild at the first wink of sunlight, sporting that glued-on grin he'd still yet to unstick, with nothing more to present than a pair of mismatched daffodils and their attached note. Thankfully, Mirajane and her sister, Lisanna, were already in-house preparing for the day ahead, undoubtedly taking advantage of the peace and quiet of the empty hall while they still had the opportunity. Though naturally surprised to see him so elated, they were both pleasant in their greetings and eagerly agreed to deliver his message (though he was nearly certain they were teasing him about his intentions with their fair lady Erza).

His cheer was met equally and enthusiastically. Both sisters were practically teeming with glee by the time he turned to leave, giggling and covering their mouths like they knew something the rest of the world was yet privy to. While he found their giddiness puzzling, he surely welcomed the departure from gloom; from the doom-written reeds he so often dragged in. It was nice, he thought, to share weightless words, to have a laugh, to venture beyond Winter's shadow into the first light of Spring.

From there, he'd practically skipped to his next task. Never in so many years of travel had he received such bemused faces from passersby. He'd actually paused once to check his skin, just to make sure he wasn't actually glowing. Heaven knew how long it'd been since he felt something so carefree as genuine excitement. Long enough that he found it uncontainable. Long enough that it felt like sunshine in his chest, crawling up his throat, bursting through his teeth.

Mrs. Ito was no exception to the day's pleasantries. She'd always been kind in the short time he'd known her. Recently widowed, she decided she had too much house and not enough home, in her own words, so she moved in with her eldest son, his wife, and their children. He'd met with them all one evening for dinner (Mrs. Ito wanted to know to whom she was handing over her home), and even after stories were shared and intentions were laid, he was met gently with understanding smiles, warm hands holding his own, and Mrs. Ito's hushed, "It's time to go home, son."

When he arrived to pick up the keys—his keys to his house—she greeted him fondly, like they'd always known one another. Her son stood in the doorway as he exchanged the gift of home with a box of market candies, his smile slowly melting like he'd finally found the bitter side of sweet. He'd waved goodbye with a promise to visit again soon, but as he turned towards his new tomorrow, he missed the pinch in Mrs. Ito's brow and the tears that followed. He missed the shake of her shoulders as her son ushered her back inside and the red-rimmed eyes that lingered on his back.

His elation carried him through thinning streets and into the countryside. Horse-drawn carriages passed him by with blinders on, kicking up dust and bouncing rocks off their spokes as they went. The folks tending their land paused to spare him a sprinkler's glance. Just around the bend, there sat a humble brick house on a quaint piece of land. Its stone pathway stood out in the sparsely grown, mostly browned lawn, and it drew a path straight towards that painted-red front door. The very same one that he was now standing in front of, staring at.

The key poised betwixt his fingers had been left to steep in his pocketful of sunshine long enough for the heat to transfer, and now it was burning, blistering his skin, and it felt something like rejection. Like the soul of the land had its hands on his shoulders and was shoving him backward. Like he wasn't meant to be here. He was never meant to have this.

But he wasn't ready to give it up just yet.

He tapped the door with a single knuckle, just to see if it'd turn to ash. It held steady, materially, before him, just the same as it ever looked. Its bricks spoke no threat of crumble, its roof showed no sign of collapse, and yet none of it truly felt real. Even as his head bowed and his forehead pressed into that cool crimson, even as he traced the ridges of the keys in his palm, even then, he couldn't bring himself to believe it.

A moment of silent prayer. A deep, grounding breath. Eyes open, back straight, he finally found the will to turn the key. The door slowly creaked open, allowing light to pour in through the front door.

His lingering joy was a sweet wine on the brink of spoil, turned to vinegar in his gut. The morn's candied shell cracked between his teeth and its well-concealed bitterness flooded his tongue like it had been waiting for the opportunity all along. It leaked from the corners of his still-smiling mouth, even as his lips began to twitch; even as heat brimmed his eyes and tears threatened to spill. He stood in the doorway, still, watching the walls of that front room stretch higher and higher as the moment dragged on, like he was waiting for something—something like Karma—to come along and destroy it all, strip it all away; to take from him again, as he'd taken from so many others.

He forced himself to step inside, to turn, to close and lock the door behind himself.

And then it was quiet. Devastatingly so. Gone were the wind, the leaves, the birdsong and the horses' trot. Static rushed in to fill its place, skating rings around his ears, and his periphery began to blur, his chest to ache—oh, he felt ill, and the dam threatened to burst, and his throat tightened until he audibly choked. A hand rose to cup his neck, and another to cover his mouth, stifling his upward bubbling sob as heat rose to cloud his vision. He sunk to his knees as the first tears fell, crushed by the weight of overwhelm, one hand scratching helplessly against hardwood while the other heeled at his bleeding eyes.

How audacious could he be? Already living on borrowed breath, daring to walk the path of the benevolent man. Now he dared to seek normalcy for himself, to smile gleefully while so many still woke in a cold sweat, in terror, at the sight of him, and others would never wake at all. A sick joke. He hardly deserved a proper burial, much less a place to lay his head, and yet he wanted it still.

He turned and sat with his back pressed against the front door, and he tried to find comfort in the nothing. He tried to find comfort in the emptiness, the darkness, the hollow and desolate, but the shadows had autonomous hands. Those mangled fingers were rotten down to blackened bone and had mouths where their nails should've been, and they'd been picking at the threads of his mind's drawn curtain, picking, pulling, unspooling, until they made their hole big enough to climb through. When they finally reached him, they were dripping ink like blood, wrapped up in memories' silk that they used to bind him where he was.

How long had it been? He was a child when he'd last called a house like this his home, before the raid. If only his mother and father could see him now, what would they say? Would they smile? Would they cry? Would they be proud of their son, even to this day, with all years considered, and would they love him still? Would they hand their heads in shame, or would they lift their chins in disgust? He never got the chance to know them well enough to answer those questions with any certainty.

His head thumped against the wall, tears trailing unbidden as he stared through the ceiling. His breath shook as he exhaled, voice straining when he pleaded directly to God, "Please," his face curled inward and he nearly choked, "It's more than I deserve, but please, may I have this?"

But it wasn't God who'd condemned him. It wasn't God who'd damned his soul to roam, so God need not answer.

The silence was a swarm that eventually overtook the sounds of his wet misery. The numbness accompanying that insidious peace was a welcome shift. It gathered over his shoulders and draped from him, robe-like, as he finally rose from the floor, intent on washing his face.

A few short steps brought him to the bathroom. He blindly palmed at the wall until he found the switch. Light sprung from the top down, bathing the back of his hand as he turned on the sink. He let it run over his fingers until warm and watched years-old blood run off and stain the porcelain. The water he gathered in his palms was soon spilled over the flesh of his face and beyond his sleeves.

While the salt may have washed clean, the evidence of his deluge clung to the skin beneath his eyes and around his nose in Pollock pink. That much became obvious the very second he met his own glassy stare, though its juxtaposition to the hot iron's bite made its consequence seem all the more fleeting. The tips of his fingers idled against his still-dripping skin, at first tracing the risen path, then covering it. He tried to imagine what he might've looked like without it. Would he look more youthful? Would he look kind when he smiled? Would children be less afraid when he waved to them?

He supposed it didn't matter. The choice was never his to have. That glowing sunset crest lived inside of his eyelids, lurking there, daring him to blink. Within each lapse, he saw the devil's eyes. He saw split-curl smiles and broken teeth outlined in stolen blood. He heard the devil's laugh, shrill and gleeful and giddy, and felt its dank breath against his neck, and he felt its hands curling around his ankles, his wrists, his arms and legs, puncturing his skin with nails of obsidian glass, and he felt it climb onto his chest, crack his ribs, and he felt his face begin to sweat, even though he was so, so cold.

It was so, so cold. White cold. And he was awake. Wide-eyed, shocked mute. His skin shrieked as its moisture fled, and it began to peel away, to bubble and blister and burn—God, it burned, and the smell—

Knock-knock, knock!

His visitor's early arrival nearly sent him out of his skin. He quickly turned the water off and killed the light, and he hoped that his sorrows stayed in the drain depths where they belonged.

The door swung inward, and she was there, waiting patiently, graciously, for him like she always had. His breath turned to dust in his lungs.

In her hands, those inverted daffodils dressed in yellow and white, not a petal out of place. Gold spilled over her crown, revealing that halo he'd always known was there. The breeze tossed her scarlet flames about semblant of Venus, and rosey lips sat in their gentle curve, smiling softly at him, yet before they could split to spill a greeting, he'd already begun to pull her towards him. As he wrapped himself around her, his eyes began to burn again, and the second he felt her hand at his back, returning his embrace, he broke, and the tears spilled forth once more. His head fell to rest against her armored shoulder, and through the rain, he began to laugh.

She pulled away to view him at arms' length, mouth slightly parted as though a question had come to peer through her teeth. He wiped at his face with tremors in his hands, chuckling softly when Erza finally shoved out, "Tears?"

"It's silly, really," he holds up the keys, "I'm overwhelmed."

It didn't take her long to put it together.

Warmth graced his jaw with the weight of a whisper, so faint he'd thought surely that he'd imagined it. That is, until it struck again, soft and sweet against his cheek, beneath his eye, his forehead. His eyes blinked open as she sunk back to her heels, bashfully peering up at him through the veil of her lashes; waiting for him to do something, anything.

The raucous buzzing faded into a melodic hum like the swarm had finally found its queen.

His blood sang as it rushed red-hot through his shoulders, crawled up his neck, and began burning its way through the skin of his face. The ear-popping clarity of his thought-storm's sudden abandon left him staring mindlessly with eyes much too wide and jaw much too lax, narrowly remembering to breathe, until her shy expression began to melt into something more reminiscent of unease, like she was preparing to flee.

Perhaps a touch too quickly, he grabbed her hand, careful to keep his grip loose enough that she could pull away if she wanted. Slowly, surely, his opposite hand reached to tuck her hair behind her ear, and his palm cupped her cheek in a silent plea not to retreat from him. A silent plea to stay here, right here, in this moment, in his grasp, just a little while longer.

And she did. She stayed. She smiled gently, warmly. Her head fell to rest against his chest and she leaned into his sway. There, in the silence, they found their rhythm. They began to dance.

"Welcome home, Jellal." -------------------------------------------------------------------------- @mamorigami

[nocentis]

@chidoricry said, “Stop pouting. We have work to do.”

╳┆Although he hardly considered assessing their options pouting, he'd rather not argue so early in the morning. He was no stranger to being accused of brooding, anyway. Perhaps it had something to do with the well-worn worry lines or the tension that never seemed to leave his shoulders. Whatever it was, it hardly mattered now. So long as he inevitably finds what he came here for, he cares not how his newest acquaintance interprets his demeanor.

"We should take the second path and head left at the fork," he advised, pointing to the trails branching from the base of the cliff and using his hand to illustrate. "It will be denser at first, but once we clear the thickets, it will lead directly to the temple."

[nocentis]

@ilumiis liked for a starter!

╳┆Of all the places he expected to track a practitioner of dark magic, a charity auction fell far down the list.

Over the years, he'd become quite adept at sneaking into places he was not formally invited to. Of course, it always helped to don some form of disguise — be it his cloak, a costume, or something else similar — but the venue was checking names, faces, and tickets at the door. Even better, the estate was lined up and down with magically armed security.

It seemed he would have to get creative. He really did not want to make this a bigger spectacle than necessary.

"I must be overlooking something."