Tale of Deliverance (Yuuki)

[Yūki]

tale of deliverance

There was suffocation. Suffocation, strangulation, an obstruction, a suppression. An impossibility, that one may snarl in the face of constriction against their throat. Yet, they breathe still, ever harshly, ever strongly. Wheezing through the noose but unable to invoke a vow, or warrant of need. The rope tipped with thorns - the thorns of humiliation, dared to wrap itself tighter, forcing Yūki to inhale through her nose. She could almost see the smoke swimming through her veins, as much as it was doing through the cloyed air. It was an impulsive, gasping choke - repulsive - and turned her gaze, broke the contact, as she refused to look upon eyes so penetrating a blue.

But she could hear the heaven's weep, freezing its tears as they fell freely in quick succession. She could feel the frigidity, so close to the door as she was, but the very fact remained that it was both a literal and metaphorical smothering of her dulled senses and tainted dreams. It brought imagination to a forced halt, wandering at a loss, the brighter beams of shaded scenes swiped away. A stolen sight, and she shut her eyes, perhaps, to envision the rendered skies. It brought a wry smile to her unpainted lips, that morbid image, "As... as far as anyone is concerned, it is certainly an interesting speculation." Maybe, had she been another traveler amongst the crowd, in the right (or left) state of mind, she would have pointed and echoed the thoughts of a realist.

The rustle went ignored as she continued that line of thought. There wasn't another explanation except for eccentricity and oddity, but Yūki was more amused than she should have been. Those orbs of deeper blood crept back to attention at Tiw, seeing yet not, in hapless curiosity, "Was it so necessary then, for you to wander amongst the blazing ice?" It was surprising, where she was capable of forming coherent structures, yet incapable of weaving an intelligent thought. Like the raindrops that dripped patterns on the cement, hidden by the coverage and solace of snow; sacrificing acceptance amongst its brethren.

At the imperative, however, she was slightly shaken to a more sensible line of thinking. "My arms?" She repeated doubtfully, a hand instinctively moving to clasp her own wrist, forming designs with a slender digit habitually. Yūki did not note the bag, nor the substance that lay transparently against its bottom. She would proffer them to those she trusted - not to a stranger who commanded her so roughly. The Princess was almost offended, but she should not expect dainty words and respectful curtsy and bows. She had come to ignore those powdered wigs people still insisted on perching atop their head, or tightening corsets around waspish waists. Oh, how constricting!

So she begged the question, "Why might you see my arms?" And the smoke was back around her ears, around her eyes and breathing through the pores of her skin. The error of her ways refused to accept responsibility, while her erroneous thoughts continued to avoid confessions burning so darkly upon her inevitable epitaph. "I suppose it does not matter, why or why not. It is only as it is," so she outstretched her limbs, as she could, the sleeves rolling back.

Even in the dimmed, murky lights of the den, Yūki still saw her forearms as a pale cut of imperfection. Soft, the flesh malleable and untouched by physical labor - the tone of a royal. It showed the weakness of mind, in her very opinion. Though without blemishes, it had taken on a rather sickly hue and something to be quite disgusted about.That, she was, and so - muttered apologies - made to pull them back towards her body.

[Tiw Fenris]

Tale of Deliverance: Return from the Hiatus

The fire coral and tangerine winked and danced to their own rhythm in a storm of cobalt, matched by Tiw’s vague smile. “‘Interesting’ is much too ambiguous,” the illiterate postman gave a chuckle, “perhaps ‘insane’ would be more suited to such a situation, hm?” She tilted her head in more of a jesting manner than curiosity, though her blood bids her to commit every feature and every movement of what is Yuuki to memory. The shuffle of the bag as she removed the crimson tie disturbed the winding smoke; it fanned and wafted the grayness about as if splaying out a slender hand as tendrils by languorous tendrils of dust would lick the innocent digits. What mockery is this? What debauchery is this?! The calm seduction of such a poison… like hemlock. Six fathoms deep with death; now who would dance as such – a flagitious ritual?

And mayhaps the swirling evil had infiltrated the recesses of her mind – what an excuse. A being from Faery should surely enjoy indulging in such torment through eyes of another. Scarlet eyes. It means nothing.

Without so much as flutter of countenance Tiw continued. “But if I was to break the sky, how many pieces shall I make? A hundred? A thousand? A million? What about a billion? To shatter it and make the world sparkle so for just one day…” Her smile widened enough to reveal a bit of tooth, and she entertained the thought that such nonsense was hardly from the opium but from a mass of processing uncertainty that crowned her head in its proper state. And if I failed? There would be a chasm in the sky.

Tiw forwned at Yuuki’s hesitation, a ripple on a frozen crimson mirror that beckons ghosts of here and there and is and was and will but never showing. And certainly, it piqued her curiosity, and though she liked the woman enough, Tiw wasn’t about to dip her fingers into the blood of someone else’s past – at least, not without proper reasoning. Like a row of dominoes – two dominoes, that is – the ripple grew and reached the next lake that was teal, halting Tiw’s actions for but a moment. And with a rustle of finer fabric, a pair of arms extended before her, so vulnerable.

They were pale, in the least regards, and it crossed her mind that the woman may be anemic for her dizzy spell certainly confirmed something of a condition. Though, it was unusual that her flesh laid unmarred and smoothly crafted, untouched by physical hardship; how familiar. But it couldn’t be helped, so Tiw made no more note of it; a pass at indifference perhaps, but to step so close was to herald a destruction of every Spiral and Sequence! And perhaps it was self-centered and arrogant to believe so, but it was unnatural to be so close without cracking the world - their world! But still she moved to dip her fingers into the dirty maize-yellow. Wait. And therin laid the dilemma; no touching.

And there it was again, that ripple of wavering glass, and Yuuki was about to pull back. That wouldn’t do. But no touching. No touching. No. A chasm in the sky. Break it all the way. Shatter it, obliterate it. She roughly grabbed the mantle and tore off an already mutilated corner and dabbed it in mustard powder, taking the pouch in her teeth. The other hand still wrapped in cloth reached out and took the retreating arm neither gently or harshly. With the cloth she drew yellow streaks onto the pale canvas of skin, concentration knitted in her features as she hardly registered the mumbled apologies. A muffled response. “For what?”

And Tiw continued to paint with the sickly antidote. It didn’t count. It didn’t count. It didn’t count.

[Yūki]

tale of deliverance

An almost discordant whisper that gently caressed the lobes of her ears, the air in which it was carried, she could only think it a farce. There was only cold; the tips that had pierced straight to her bones. The ligaments, the nerves, all and ever frozen. But it was warm - the fire dancing in her vision had disappeared, like the smoky hallucinations of purity. There was not a single coherent sentence she could think of. It would not pass her lips, and it was unable to scrape the surface of what she thought. However, Yūki was intently focused on the sparkle of rain. Inside. Amongst the gray and stench of sweat, she saw dew and cobalt jewelery. They were melted to form orbs of Perfection, and swirled with colors of steel and lines of beryl. She was unable to recall any forms of Perfection, but at this point, she was far too gone to notice.

The milk-white of her palm, her arms, her neck, had flushed to a dull pink. Her attire was stifling, muffling the beat of her heart and the harsh breath scalding her throat red. Yūki could not answer with truths - nor could she escape with lies. The whimsical nature she was not born with took - no, devoured - her senses hostage. She was remembering, yet forgetting. In another place, she would have lured her thoughts of blasphemy into her keep. Into wolves that lay awake, stone-still. To the lions who kept their pride, jaws open wide to survive the harsh sun. In another time, she would avoid places like these. Where mahogany rims were marred, and frames worn from wear. Dragon pipes puffed smoke, laughing and sneering hidden behind the veil of common sense. She would avoid dark hair, and eyes of sapphire. If she could choose, she would choose.

Finally, she forced herself to recollect the rope of words, and to string them together. Coil it up, like the snakes winding across her forehead. Her jaws were slack, unlike the strength of her companion's. But there was no other way. The era of her Ways and Respectability demanded that she speak. Loud, clear and precise. Her eyes darted, reaching the height of Perfection. She inhaled a copious amount of poison, the air in which she breathed, and could not catch a breath. In between, she spoke sparingly. Nothing important, nothing sensible. Nothing ever.

"Admittedly... I see no faults within sanity." While that was not correct, it was not incorrect. "However many pieces you wish. Scatter them, to the four winds. With your temperance, I'd rather not say how the sky may react." What nonsense. Idiocy. Hypocrisy. Like the streetlamps said to be a torch, it would never be natural. Never pure. She could almost see the silver arrow pierced in her throat, while the apple full of sin perfect on her scalp. It had no scratches, no marks, no bites. It was glossy and beautiful and dainty. The blood that ran through her veins and down the puncture was not, and oh! how she wished it would run faster. It was pumping through her veins, this toxin. It was deep inside her, and she had no means to gouge it out. Yet, she had the audacity to claim herself appropriate?

Her eyes showed no hesitation. Or more hesitation than ever before. Ruddy, tarnished and bloody. Congealed blood. Swirling with that euphoric sense, Yūki could not stop the crack of a smile. The blemish on porcelain. The distance in that expression was far too great, but it was soft. With her wavering visage, and heavy limbs, she could see bursts of gold and flecks of black. But Spring was painted before her eyes - too late? never - Perfection was afoot. The fresh, melt-water that drenched her clothes, and a strange stirring in eyes of rust. Iron gazes, firm and mocking, the Princess only played within ideas with Spring, but the single thread of reasoning had snapped.

She had forgotten her arms; they had been halted by rougher material. It was almost stimulating to nearly feel the difference; the sequence of fabric that lined the map on her arm. It was a distance sense - like a sympathetic desire. Emotions for the weak and sickly. She could not remember the last time she had felt while not feeling - an oddity, and one she was determined not to remember.

Almost blindly, she began to see shapes form against the bloodless arm. Convulsions of sparks, jagged lines of teeth. Yūki tried to guess what it could be; trying to focus on the numb sensations that pulled and pushed the skin on her forearm. Like the tide of an ocean - oceans within oceans, by the force of dusk and silver lights. Gleams as points on the surface of the sea, a whole Universe in the face of cerulean calamity. That's what she saw. To ignore the (im)Perfection, she looked towards Perfection, never registering the finger points. But she traced the profile, the point of chin, the fine glints of an artist's engagement. Unpainted lips which vibrated against coarse cloth, and her mind wandered further into thoughts of tangible objects and the softness-

"For... this."

A low hum had begun to spread through her chest.

[Tiw Fenris]

Paint a picture on my pearly skin.

Don’t stop.

The mumblings of her inner persona swirled together with the sickly sweet gray that had muffled her senses, suffocated her mind, smothered every wrinkle of her brain; her thoughts drowned. It was an urn of tepid indulgence, a base of thick smoke and a liqueur of thought, a sorceress’ brew: scale of dragon, tooth of wolf, witches’ mummy…root of hemlock. Take a sip. To Hell, to Hell with thy sin. A single caress too many, a streak of yellow too many, a linger of cobalt steel on porcelain too long, one breath too many… And so, that thought of a broken sky with a billion pieces glittering the world for a single day wound itself under the gates of her mind occupying whatever crevice that was yet to be infiltrated by the witch’s poison.

However, many I want…?

Tiw stopped her ministrations to watch the delusion swim drunkenly in pools of merlot as a staunched reply diffused through the porous fabric; “If I could choose, I would break it in two,” as hemlock and dragon scale shrouded her eyes and burned her lungs, she presented a practiced smile that disturbed the brown fabric, “that way, it’d be easier to put back together.” Wishful thinking. The postman exhaled an easy breath, and it was it. So close. So close to the soft features of her companion’s that there was almost an inkling of recognition.

And where have those crimson pools laid claim to her teal ones? Once upon a twisted time that gnawed at her bones and sucked them dry of precious marrow. Where have those pale features greeted her finger tips with ink and paper? Everything melted together into a fondue of opium, past, and present; sensitivity, delusion, and clarity. And it was it, a mild candle in the smoke that sought to murder its mirage-like flame. And Tiw thought, you should smile more, but thought became a physical manifestation as a vocal breath permeated the delirium.

The unconscious consciousness cracked as the alto note tickled her ears and travelled behind her breastbone to where something should have been; the incoherent melody sifted through the air and poured itself into the witch’s brew to add its poison. Or was it an antidote? And blue met red, ice and fire or boiling water and frozen fire. Cobalt doused the pale profile with a pensive gaze to trail springwater from hairline to hairline, cheek to cheek, jaw to jaw… What’s with those eyes? The brown sack slipped from her lips onto the floor with a light pat.

[Yūki]

tale of deliverance

Her sense of being was left undoubtedly cluttered; embroiled in pains of grace and evanescence. Like a gross illness, her eyes had gone soft with elated relaxation. The very lucidity of recollections, a near disintegrated mass of hallucinations, phantasms and delusions of various colors. An assorted array of feelings where Yūki considered the possibilities of a bloodless life went unheard, as she whispered onwards, trou de loup, crush the wolf's paw. The stake through jaws, and streams of viscous liquids - not blood. She thought little of it as a hindrance, and more of a gratification. A release, one may say, from the square pegs of here less than equitable social expectancy.

That is to say, she almost proclaimed - or questioned - why the Devil hadn't stopped her in his tracks.

Swathes of gray choked her words indecorously, breaking advantageous misfortune and ill affluence. The miasma surrounding the misshapen bodies were palpable. Yūki had half an inclination to shut her eyes, but her vision was constantly drawn to the composed designs sketched upon her forearms. Like lead, embedded deep within the very essence of her mirth. At this point, quickly diverging into a light, yet muffled giggle. The motions enchanted her humor, grabbed the nerves and wrung them tight. It amassed to a single outpouring of syllables, tumbling from her pale lips, down to the fragile throat.

"To break in two would be aiming for less. To break it in more... that leaves much desire for nightly excursions."

To hear what the implication was, between those fine lines of useless trepidation, was impossible. Yūki was a little less apprehensive, now that the motions had a rather embalming effect on her limbs. Was it a crime now? To hear the rusty keys scrape the lock in her heart, opening the floodgates wide open, bare for all to stab and wrench from her chest. Fireplace and fire, glaciated rivers which contained into orbs of speculation.

"You dropped something." She said wisely. But a pause broke her silence, and she tilted her head with a nonchalant huff. "Or did I?"

[Tiw Fenris]

Paper aged yellow and dusted with those fateful grains of sand…two pools of wine splashed the center of the interwoven fibers…

Who are you? Those eyes…

A momentary lapse of mind when soft murmurs and heavy breaths intermingled with drugged delusion and mindless ponder as colors of green, blue, and gold folded upon gray and white. The page in her mind, so carefully crafted, slipped from her grasp dissolving and cascading between her fingers as yellow faded, painted over with smoke and sultry powder by feather-light finger tips, leaving only drops of red wine in the guile of marbles to clatter onto the decaying, inner-floor.

And she dared to retrieve those crimson irises, emboldened her dexterous fingers to pluck such deep maroon vestiges from their resting place, challenged her hands to roll them around and to feel their smooth texture – so smooth almost like an emollient on her skin…she should crush them. Such marble and color were ephemeral as it was done away with by the encroaching mist, eventually dissolving them away. So she forgot and drank the witch’s brew stirred oh-so surreptitiously in tea, swallowed the concoction as it seared her throat red.

A light giggle breached, then erased, the transient moment, and Tiw looked up from her moment of mental quake to catch the somber woman losing her wits in bouts of uncontrollable chuckles. Silver-steel eyebrows arched high and pale-cherry lips quirked upwards in amusement. The poor woman was as high as a kite.

“And what, my lady, has thou so elated,” Tiw said, mirth tickling her lips as she returned the remark, “ah, but then to aim for more would be much too promiscuous.” At the questionable implication, a flush spread across her cheeks as the tumbling words leapt to freedom before the guards that were lips could restrain them.

“Hm?” Tiw chuckled – and perhaps she was a tad wrung up a ladder – at Yuuki’s sagacious confusion: so it took this much to get the sullen woman to loosen her shoes. “Not to worry.” She bent to retrieve the pouch.

[Yūki]

tale of deliverance

She was waiting for the smile. That smile.

The collection of nerves, the buckle of concave cheeks. Sunken from wear and spots of blood that made everything seem like nothing. Eyes, swirling - why did you do... - brushed with malachite sorrow, specks of peridot coiling around pale irises. Death, decay. There were accusations, and implications that could not be ignored. Did she do it? If only to place the blame on a single cause, and external influence, she would think it inappropriate. She waited for the smile that would never emerge. Never grow, never contained. To be shoved into a perfect box, to be buried beneath the perfect soil, and to be prayed for. Cried on.

Sleeping.

Yūki liked it. That idea. Shut those eyes, that were so far gone. Feelings of drastic relief, and adamant injections. It was corrosive, this attitude. Fire to a haystack - she was the needle hidden beneath the straws. Who would seek that which harmed them? Kill it, burn it. She felt a furnace, sparks against her fingertips and jolts up her spine.She blinked thrice, hooded spheres turned to watch the fine spray of frost against the glass. Beneath the snow line was damp with moisture. What a gentle lover, with strokes so carefully played out. A frame of frozen passion.

"You speak of elation and of promiscuity!" She breathed, her voice unusually ardent. Yet, it seemed to be the most natural. Her fingers curled around the fabric covering her frame, the air crackling. Yūki tilted her head in curiosity; the most entertaining bloom of rose-red had decided to grace the other's features. Her once listless expression was now performing the crudest act of joy. Twitches of her lips, tugging up. She saw through bright eyes, tangled with smoke ablaze and hesitant mirth.

"But I," another giggle, "I speak of... of..." Delicate eyebrows were drawn together, in purpose and thought. "Wallflowers." Her heart whispered the wisps of fog, an illumination. Her illumination. "Elegant nights... candle-lit floors." The frayed edges tickled her mind, needle points carving rhymes of discord into thoughts that meant nothing. Thin fingers flexed, the need to pound the pricks into oblivion only offset by her inability to move properly.

Inhale, exhale. Inhale, exhale. Inhale...

A sharp sigh. The pain was there now. Like the prickles across her body, and the sting across her nose. Against the light, she could hear the murmur of a response, before a dull shuffle brought her attention. Yūki stared, forgetting to blink, thinking of paths and specters and pleated lamps. What did it matter, if she dropped something. As the other reached for the pouch, she reached for the object that was never there. Slowly stretching her arm out-

And fell, terribly ungracefully. Off the stool, and as the female's peripheral vision collected smudges of black and various grays, her mind registered the soft ow that escaped her lips - habitual - and the softness of her landing. Yūki felt her eyes settle as the world spun threads of discontent around her ears, the low buzz grinding to a halt as consciousness slipped from her fingertips.

[Tiw Fenris]

Wallflowers; their visage strewn with lines of deepened thread, chasms on silk skin, cuts on yellow veins. Tears of dew drip from wrinkled petals of down-turned heads as limbs of withered green web the peeling paper. Elegant nights; the veil of midnight splashed with viscous crimson, smudged dry-copper across the heaven’s ocean, mud in water. Silent cries of anguish fall from an unheard mouth. Candle-lit floors; their solidarity dispelled by a mirage of water, drops of water on undried paint, watercolor smudged. The perspiration of wax splashed on stunted candles paint black on white.

What was, what will be, and what is – all just a hair unfocused.

In the guise of sea foam under a layer of steel, she looked up at the forming words from pale lips of powdered pink. That intriguing act of a face unpainted; the gentle upturned curve – so unfamiliar upon her visage – was almost natural. And she watched those words tumble and roll over one another as birch brows knitted together. Yes, I speak of the promiscuity of fate. But any pitch that labored behind died within tangled vocal chords. Forgotten, lost, buried.

Clothed fingers unclasped and reached for the dusted pouch, a display of absolute forwardness, to prostrate such an inadequate position for this manner of act. Then! Then, had the woman almost picked for her! To break the sky into a billion pieces as she tilted. Wilted as a slender torso bent! And it was much too far off, now. The other of bloodlust murmuring by the postman’s ear turned to evade. But she was too far gone! Body leaning much too precariously as the luster vanished into murky pools of wine and disappeared into oblivion!

In the midst of a muffled “ow,” something soft had verily invaded an intricate borderline of personal boundaries. Some important thing cracked and delivered a single dagger to her brain. Bursts of white spotted her vision, clouding waves of bistre, dispelling clouds of gray.

Upon listening to whispered words, the postman lay prone. Eyelids gently sealed. Arms instinctively around warm flesh… While about the twisted faces continued to twist, the gaping mouths continued to gape… hysterical laughter rang about. Murmurs died. Blackout.

[Yūki]

tale of deliverance

The sound... whispers of altitudes, higher than the sky and decrepit lace that bordered the gossamer clouds. Further forward, fading the colors of Heaven's revolution, and the dull heart beats - one two three - stilling into the barricades of reality. Pricks of red in obsidian depths; swathed in the starless stratosphere. An awakening none held dear, the Maiden doth proclaim too much, whilst the absence of fear and constant edges closer brought the peak of existence to a pause. Where was this air, so dark and warm and pulsating with energy?

It was a comfort she was unfamiliar with. Once in purity, now in sin. Even so, she knew not the cruel nature of what the darkness could bestow. A still image within the distance - hers? - but flinch as she did, it budged not in the slightest. Yūki's eyes flickered shut, dispelling the confusion and doubt with every small mutter. Her thoughts ached with concern, and every feeling brought forth a pinch of recognition. Everything ached - every single place one could name. Shoulders cramped, neck twisted uncomfortably and her cheek pressed against something that smelled of burnt pine.

On top of that... in her ears, the crackle of a fire. Or the hissing of winter rain, streaming down as the Gods declared their sorrow. She thought of bistre storms and the hurricane clouds, a mass of swirls and jagged pauses - hope, that it would drift away. Hope, that drifted towards the resplendent orbs, to the eye of everything worse and worse. Hence, her mind mirrored the green mist of confusion; the rain, the storm... everything came crashing down. Crushing as her arm jolted up with a snap of her eyes.

What...!

Yūki tried to fit the pieces together, like the simplest puzzle with inconsistent fragments. Her brain was addled with smoke and the remenants of what she knew now to be some kind of... something. It had made the colors explode before her eyes, and where she could tell the furthest object from the closest. This was when she was made aware of an unfamiliar weight pressed against her; a firm grip around her body, warm and taut with smooth muscle. Her eyes laid to rest on her own pale limb, contrasting densely with the ruffled sable locks that her fingers had decided to tangle themselves in, and press closer to her--

The scarlet of her cheeks almost match the hue of her eyes. Glowing with pure realization of the situation at hand, the female removed her hand from her unfortunate companion's head, deciding also to inch back just an inch. Yūki was clearly failing in capturing her composure - the lid had been unscrewed, and all there was, was to watch her sensibility fly out the window. The heat was as stifling as ever, and as wrinkled as her clothes were, her ultimate decision was to repeat the thought - what she didn't know, won't hurt her.

Situations, circumstance consequence... the assumption that never really left.

[Tiw Fenris]

Murmuring breaths…in likeness of soft steel and cool flame, a mellifluous whisper. The cacophony of metal striking stone was languished away – muted – by the gentle oscillation of inhales and exhales; and undulate as it did – the scaffold taken down, sliced at the legs, boarding burnt. It collapsed in a heap, the unfinished obelisk exposed, thou hath ventured too far. Now bare-breasted – the limestone brick and liquid cement. Eaten by weathering. Darest thou meet Virgil? In the cold of hell? Then what is this warmth – this comfort that heats her tangled limbs? But still deliverance was far.

And where has the rain gone?

I hear it. An illusion?

Where has the rain gone? The fisher king sits at the rim of a dried lake, and he hears not the whisper of the Lady and dares not seek the Blade. So he waits such as the fate of another, the other Lady, perched within a tower only greeted by a mirrored image and spools of thread, lest a curse. It would take her – push her – over the window’s ledge and have her float along the Thames. Eyes open, mouth slightly ajar. But it was dry. The crackling breath of Hell had kissed the world and drank the water! What a sight to behold.

Da.

In the back of her mind, an echo of thunder as the harbinger of rain. Or the maelstrom of Heaven’s temper raging from without, inveighing against man beyond inculcating. Unsettling, yet, something was not; the familiarity of sin before it was committed was absent. The sin of innocence. So foreign. To have it acquiesce to a fishing line threaded with impurity was too much. Thus, the sin that was not has become. Da? And why was it just one strike of Thor’s hammer? Ash-brows furrowed as consciousness slipped back into her fingers. As if to grasp the ever-evasive thing, fingers flexed tangling them further with the robes of that other … something – or person, rather.

It moved, allowing chill and air to caress bared flesh drawing mumbled protests from confused lips. With the absence of the pellucid mind, lithe arms only sought to draw the missed warmth – the softness – closer as a cool forehead buried itself within the folds. More movement. A dull throb pounded area of her skull…and another…and another…

Like a shock of rattler poisoning, teal blazed open. Vision laid upon arms – her own arms – wrapped around a slim waist, one that was not familiar, though rather comfortably, in all her honesty. Another smoke-laden throb. Da. Like a hammer strike. Pink powdered her cheeks as “what happened” – or the tendentious possibility of it – dawned in Tiw’s misguided mind. Pulling away, she met mirrored scarlet ones and watched the composure leak away and away. A nervous chuckle broke the tepid silence. “Good morning, sunshine!” Muchly a cheery greeting with a toothy smile. She had touched, despite her vows of emotional chastity – mayhaps it was best to send the rest of it to Hell.

And so she shall. “I hope you slept well. I sure did!”

[Yūki]

tale of deliverance

Here she was, upon foreign lands and facile amplitudes, awaiting with abated breath for a cloudburst. When the clouds would burst, their billows would carouse; dancing upon her graven image, await to unfold with au courant grips and puerile gripes and grumbles so blusterous. If anything, the uncharted waves would tell muchly, the story of shipwrecks and drowned sailors riding upon the sea foams further into depths and depths beyond. The Wall of Stone, impaled on a rusty mantle, further seeks the cry of abandonment - whereto now, fairest maiden - oh, how it was wished for, if only to seek the way into the ivory tower.

Yet, affixed to lights of opalescent skies, and with yet any sign of paroxysm, never had roses thirsted so for the dew of discontent. One could cry for the love of a wolf, though it was not taken as such, the love from a wolf. The Jaws of Destiny snapped shut, unfettered yet from its screaming post. A misguided soul? Perhaps, an erroneous traitor who played most dubiously with fire and rage. Therein lies, her heart-ached soul and soulless heart. Apocalyptic as it was, Yūki concurred that she could do no more error than to stay a second more on forbidden continents.

She has seen smoother heavens, but sent back whence she never appeared, there was nothing to pause the contortion of expression. Like drops of blood, her eyes were dark, wondered of tamper or of ungodly theaters. The gong further rang with pestilent tones, when her bones did vibrate so from such soft resonance. Yet, it was from the figure of cheek, that caused the frozen princess to stare in incredulous abhorrence. T'was not from the female herself, though Yūki was dishonest with herself. The fact that, if she stands to be corrected, this atrocity should have happened further away from the ground and more inclined towards the low crafted ceiling.

This saucy character was too much for her poor, un-minded disposition to bear, to which she had nothing more to question. Where there were tender entanglements only moments before, how the tide did turn with passionate inclinations. Her skin, once burned with affection, now left with merely caressed with deaths and faults. The dead shall sleep, but the faulty worlds on ends should never cease.

"Did you ever want to see what it would be like, to break the sky?"

Impoverished sighs, a flicker of a blink was the silence that greeted a question which was asked with too blithe a voice. An inquiry which deserved no true thought, to whom she understood as a simple complication one could never afford in their lifetime. Should she, in spite of this, look harder to see behind the jaw and rigid posture? Should she, in spite of that, look for thanks and praise, and to see truly not with her heart, but falsely with her eyes?

"You can't do that."

Now she spoke of altercations, lack thereof, and where the past once ruled her life, her life would no longer be ruled by miseries. Staring straight into the calm of storm, she gathered herself (with a flush of crimson) and inclined her head to the companion of hallucination. To which she would have once considered a copper taste to her tongue, and an arrow to her ankle, there was nothing more than greetings and farewells. Nothing, of course, didn't seem to enjoy her company as much as Yūki did.

"I... hope... you did." It was strange to avoid the questioning lilt in her tone, yet she avoided it like the plague. "I suppose I must thank you for... last night..." Where all she could see was dried yellow against her arm, and the mess of fabric against her breast; what more could be said, but to imply the implied, and ignore what it was not?

[Tiw Fenris]

Desert, I walk.
Who art thou – thou who strides ahead of me?
Wherefore art thou always beside me…
Thy head never turns…

To think of salvation was erroneous. Erroneous as the wanderer walks through the Valley.

And there it was; a carp of red fished by the expert’s bamboo rod. The splash of tender flesh over an ivory palette. She had never been graced with such a delicacy – a wolf denied its game and drink. Where had the rain gone? Droplets of sententious dust, thirsting for water, filling Earth’s pore with vacuity… The intriguing bloom within an imminent end when the desert wind scorches red the sand into glass, spreads.

Tiw will let it be – let the sands boil under the wordly wind. Of course, the verity of such a statement was much in likeness to that of a wolf in a lamb’s skin. That would not do. Her demeanor would not permit for such an unbefitting guile; to perforate the misty heat with the luminescence of temperance – or lack thereof – would be much more suited to feed the mischief of an innocent beast. Though to attest that Loki poured a pitcher of sin into a cup for her would be much too pretentious, for it was only in the nature of a wolf to want to play.

Thus sea foam blue lit up with a beacon within waves as remembrance fled from stained merlot… Now to test the shaken grounds of razed ground and cracked glass. It was most difficult to turn a blind eye to such abhorrence painted on the woman’s face, and a chuckle almost revealed her compromising position. Lips pouted and brows drawn together – a small, white, feign of hurt. “You don’t… remember, do you?” It was decided, the sky will break in two. “And after all we’ve been through last night!” Though words of innocence drawn from guilty thoughts, a phlegmatic butterfly shall be drawn from its silk cocoon. In collection of herself as well, the postman would allow the woman overtaken by black bile to place false puzzle fragments together.

Half-clothed fingers tangled within folds of disheveled fabric for excessive effect as teal stared into crimson. To attempt to fish a fish from a dried pond was much too arrogant – the pond teems with the dust of the past unknown. And the fisher king shall bait his line without the hook.

[Yūki]

tale of deliverance

Cleanse thyself with flame
I know not the fear of Hell-
only of mine self.

The Kiss of Judas was upon her cheek, the kiss of betrayal. Before all that despised the blood red aperture; those that cursed clefts so deep yet preferred the icy lagoons with... what? Olive branches, or perhaps the colored woodspurge? Omnipresence and omniscience shattered as one - but there was no God. Would it then be ostentatious to, in all its glory, pen herself as the Holy Christ? The savior?

Alas, t'was naught but casuistry. Even when the arrowhead flew to embed itself upon the trunk, one must pull the bowstring taut first. If the silk so snaps and twitches, the course will be but a distant mark. A blemish against the ground, whilst the tree remains still, ever giving, ever silent. One such arrow, one missed mark but for the four wounds within ashen skin brought light the truth. The stone embellishment throbbing against her ribcage pounded faster still, breaking bone and splintering fortitude. But still the floodgates held. It would have been unjust to dampen the atmosphere (that was, fortunately, so cleverly disguised).

Yūki, who pondered upon the non-existence of Gods and necromancers. She, who refused redemption, yet yearned for forgiveness, had been wrapped in the thorns - a crown of suffering and regret, around her brow, across breast, under her ankle. She could not think, could not breathe, could not move, as paler blues brightened at her unfortunate gaze. The barbs shrouded her in distraction, but she knew it like she had never known anything. And Yūki was... muchly afraid, of what this tale would entail, of whether the beast had devoured its last meal. The chill against her chest deepened as Tiw - oh, I can take you to an inn - frowned, her youthful face feeding the Princess' suspicions.

She felt her own countenance blur from heat; why must the wolf bite at her so?

Yūki could ignore this. There was no remembrance, no connections. There was evidence, but proof was still untrappable. She hoped it would stay away. When this favor was received... there was a glimmer of hope, pushing against her eyes as... corrosion set its feet against her elements. An assimilation of fire, her blood boiled with doubt and chagrin. Thus, she took one breath, inhaling the lingering smell to harbor within her body. Perhaps it would help her get through this minor... misfortune.

"Unfortunately, I don't remember," it was always best to be polite when one was uncertain. Especially in times that stood so still, it was also best to act regretful and rather like one had nowhere to go. Her eyes were drawn to the muffled rustle, the other's appendages clenching deep within. The second strike against her thoughts.

If there was no God, she blazed within, then what was this who mocked her?

Her expression almost mimicked that of her companion's, yet it was more so disbelief than mischief. Though she knew it not as that, but aggravation and distress. The claret orbs, drowned in the lacerated sea, could not break from the spell. Much like a moth to a flame, as she spoke, "...to...to be quite honest, I don't remember much of anything."

To be quite honest, she could only lie once.

[Tiw Fenris]

Foolish sleeplessness with sweet tantalizations of a silk tongue and smooth lips, the herald of Perfection’s death, elucidated such truth behind ocean eyes. The maiden had kissed the serpent, stood too close to the crimson apple, and was the martyr for what would be Tomorrow. The Willows shed crystalline tears for the crimson spilled from an ivory throat. She couldn’t gainsay truth, what was behind and beyond the tempest in wine-red seas. Hackneyed images of forbidden fruits, snakes, blood, tears, and sand sought to smother her morning ebullience.

Congregation of darkness…
The witch’s brew of drowned doves…

Its lingering effluvium of sweet confusion, so familiar now yet so unwelcomed locked the door from the outside, silencing sighs of delusion and silent cries of Selenite. But slivers of the silver moon colliding with the horizon refused to be contained to the sky; its erudite luminescence seeped passed crawling mildew and intertwined with streaks of steel and waves of bistre. And Tiw knew; she wished for nothing – not for deliverance, not for damnation, not for normalcy… It was not the apple that tempted her so, but the arrow – the arrow that broke ivory and distended the tendons within, drawing wine from the opened faucet. Darest thou cut the arrow in two?

It’ll bleed out. A playful nibble from the wolf …

Then another enigmatic flare across the glassed sands. Tiw could mimic the koi swimming across her none-so-collected companion, she could untangle those mindless digits from strange cloth, but the wolf howled for her to be the appendage that drew the red fish across pale glass. What was it that drew the leavings of the wolf to wine waters? The flavor of opium dangling in the air, perhaps. But mistress Nyx had stolen away the awakening breath of the eternal dreamers for far too long. The flecks of golden poppy sprinkled onto the silver threads as the morning Charioteer readied his horses. Though he paused to listen to the mortals’ plight.

Uncertainty threaded with words so proper – Tiw recognized it without a heartbeat’s notice as histories danced and of scornful eyes turned to her in memory. There was no regret, yet, much to her own ambivalence, there was no dispassion any more than the previous. Just the desire to play. Gold-dusted teal stones turned to rouge rubies to look. To see something.

The innocent articulation tempted the unbitten hand to prod at the wounded dove in curiosity. Her own voice rivaled the one of Yuuki’s in disappointment, “Ah… I see.” Limber limbs untangled from and released the unfamiliar territory. Though her gaze remained firm as a star-struck light lit the ocean. “Oh! I’ll remind you!” The chipper voice caused some disgruntled neighbors to shift lethargically.

Another grin worth too little gold. “You were having a great time,” an innocent chuckle as she tried to gauge Yuuki’s reaction, “I didn’t know you were a giggler!” Another glint that could have been defined as “evil” dashed Tiw’s eyes, “and at the end of it, you even hummed!”

Hook, line, sinker.

[Yūki]

tale of deliverance

Acrimony was but a lucid state. Delight was naught but perpetual arrogance. Thou shalt not covet and if one could do nothing, then what could they do? Venture forth towards the deep forests, dogs by your side, a feline brow upon another's countenance. Forward, forward; slower! A shallow lake, and a figure - submerged falls of water dousing fatigued necks... and rufescent quartz beading convulsing ankles.

"Bow to the lion!" the huntress cried impetuously, shadows crawling across her eyes, chapped cherry-reds diverged at the acclamation, "scorn the wolf!" Moon-kissed fingers flexed, feathers against stinging breasts; still the claws retracted not from fleshy sides. Self-glorification, the maned beast hinted. Would the heavens then curve at the waist, or will the sun drag his wheels beyond the sky, day after night after? But never should one rise from a golden stool once stood upon. The wolf in all its cunning and trickery, will devour the legs, to never stand again (whose legs?) for gold within silver was simply the stars against an atmosphere of raw streams and cantaloupe ripples.

The light had arched its back, bursting through the glass as pellucid speckles painted shattered against pale skin, and not-too-pale eyes. Shining with the dawn of realization - or defeated meaning - the powdered snow lifted from her gaze, and she stared further into murky clear pools. Yūki could almost see - dared she, who looked closer - cardinal pearls who wrapped around another's weakness. The inexperienced day brought about mistakes from the past - she who claimed it thus - so serenity was quickly sought for. How far this façade could last - she who practiced this - hearts could never tell. For as rubious her eyes, her cheeks still pursued the same attractive shade. Stains of crimson still spread across her face, but her mouth had shut its shape of discontent.

This hero of her night, so dared to place evidence against her, whilst celestial bodies danced across a darkened coliseum? She felt so much, yet it was quickly refused for the surface was embroiled in an empty war. Though courage could not give her much, there was an inkling of tails and tales. Not a wolf, but a mere pup pawing at the ground with yelps. The Princess was not one to play (that is to say, she was not one for anything), nonetheless, she paused her gathering to hear the allegory.

"Then I will listen to this... enlightenment..." Yūki replied affably. As she refused emotion, she refused the lugubrious tone that threatened to puncture her lungs. Instead, she shook the voice that broke from her. How convincing she could be, in times of plight, "... with passion." She enumerated, for effect. She saw Tiw's eyes light up in honest enthusiasm, but it reassured her only of one - that she should not have--

Like a bullet from a gun, her arm recoiled at introduction. Her jaw locked, mindful of the flame burning her. Eyebrows drew in further, as the other went further. Oh, this was hearsay! Here she was, curling her palm against the threads encompassing her frame. T'was all very well, but Yūki feared the permanent pigments tattooed into her. Though the suffering was not yet over, the surface was still not broken enough to fly from the inn. Will she stay to hear more, or should she ignore the fragments and simply flee?

Thus, the conclusion.

"No more, pirate!" Disintegrated, her patience needled against her brain, had been snapped by veins of ire. Collisions against her mentality, conscious morality... mortality. One from the list had been dashed against the claret rocks, blemishing her presence. "I'll hear no more of this." While it could have been misinterpreted, hearing what the night before entailed... and the morning after at present, it could have been no more than a corruption of innocence. The petals had fallen, and what was the bud to leave in its wake but a mere stalk?

It was, after all, the calmest before the storm.