princess_of_ida | IC Inbox

[ She frowns, trying to understand it as she explains, and yes, that does make a little bit more sense. ]

I follow, I think? Everything would die, the waters would boil, the land would be sick?

Correct. That's what happened to the First House, to Earth, ten thousand years ago. It's why the Great Resurrection was necessary.

It's also why there is no life left there. But a myriad is a long time. By now, there might be life in the oceans again. Deep within.

[ That is such an awful thing to hear she cannot quite - cope in the idea of it. ]

Perhaps yes, often what lives in the depths is so beyond all living beings of the surface. Much of what troubles them, is not even an idea to life in the deep.

Edited 2023-12-07 00:17 (UTC)

Then maybe the First House isn't a grave. That's oddly comforting.

... I cannot imagine such destruction as you speak of it. But... if it should help...

I would ask for discretion. This is matter of the mystery rites, reserved only to the highest of my family, as only we are able to have forms that allow us to go to such depths, even of our own people.

But I have seen the places in the deep, myself, at the bottom of the Great Sea. The old First-Child guided me there himself, with my younger sister, as we came of age, now my brother does it. Where the Sea-Father took the sparks from the Land-Mother when she danced creation to her own splintering. At the deepest places, first it goes cold, and then it becomes very, very hot as you reach the place where the Sea hides over Land, this is the place of their union.

There at the bottom is the nursery of life. Where the first beings were cared for, from long, long before there were birds or beasts or snakes or fish. No trees or flowers. Certainly long, long before man.

They are so small, so fine, so delicate as to feel like they would break if you breathed on them too harshly. Yet strong, for the pressure at the bottom of the ocean is immense, it could crush even iron.

[ that overwhelming pressure Ianthe had felt that day was in part how they endured it, by embodying it. ]

Those creatures, at the very center, made at the very beginning, they have existed long before the follies of man, and they are fed from the heat and hot-poison air that breaks out from the land below. What would kill all other life, sustains them, and continues the cycle. So what would surely kill all other beings, in that place, would never hurt them. From them, all life comes, from the greatest of forms to the lesser of creatures, all will be born once more, even if it might take centuries and centuries for it to occur.

[Longer than that, as it has already been ten thousand years. But Ianthe had only seen the ocean from a distance when they landed at Canaan House. There could be something in that water alive and she wouldn't have known.]

...thank you. For giving me a little hope. I think I'm going to sit with that for a while.

Come see me tomorrow, okay? It's important.

I will be there.

--

[ As well as the conversation could go, given her own lack of ability to truly confront anyone unless it had gone past all reason (or her zadza was playing up -) she is as good as mood as could be expected.

But she is glad to see Ianthe, glad to have the distraction. Ever her practical self, she still makes sure to dress nicely when she goes to visit Ianthe for the night. Hair braided but without her veils, her nicer skirt, and knows to call out her voice rather than try the door. ]

Ianthe! I am here!

[ Basket under one arm for dinner, she waits for the door to open. ]

[The whole door situation would be remedied soon enough. Ianthe opened the door and reached for Gilia, pulling her into a soft kiss and walking them through her ward in the middle of that intimacy. She pulled back and closed the door.]

Hey Lia, let me take that. [The basket was taken and set to the side, practically dismissed as anything important. She put her hands on Gilia's shoulders and then slowly turned her toward the bedroom... where Iggy's finished mural was - a foggy beachside seascape with a storm in the background.] Look.

[ In she comes, about to ask all the usual questions about how she is, how her last few days had been. All sorts of typical nothings to talk about.

Thinks there the purpose is otherwise though, when Ianthe immediately turns her towards the bedroom - ] Ianthe, let me take my shoes off at least before we -

[ And then she sees it, and then she stops.

It was like the air was stolen out of her lungs. Her heart going so still, so quiet, it was like she could not hear it at all, but oh, could she feel it, as she looked across the painted sea over the wall.

Her breath stuck, swallowing down as she stepped away from Ianthe's hold, towards it. Her fingers lifted like she went to greet that painting as if it were real, as if it were an old friend. So utterly, and completely entranced for one moment, so beyond herself.

She lays one hand against it, finding it only to be the wood of the wall that stands as the canvas, but she hardly cared. So without the sight of waves for so long, even just to see it in a painting, for a moment, is balm on her heart. The tears hitch, leaking at the edge of her eyes as she leans her forehead to the wall, as if she could tip herself through it directly into those waiting waves as she just breathes there, she just holds and looks at the delicately painted white-tipped waves and imagines the sound, she brushes the sand of the shore, and remembers the feeling of the grain between her feelings that had seemed to fade over the weeks away. ]

Hello, my Great-Father. [ She whispers as a child does their prayers, knowing it is not the same, not even caring that Ianthe sees her like this. This raw, profound emptiness that for a moment is so exposed, this ancient, sacred longing that left a pit in her over the months here now that spills from her lips. Her faith so absolute, and her love is pure to it. ] Sea-Father, Land-Mother, one of your children is here, She Who Sings the Ocean to Prosperity. I am sorry, I am so sorry, that I have been away, to be so far from your glory and give of sacrifice in your honour. But I pray to you still, Holy-Father, I hope you hear me, even so far away. I go to the lakes, and the wells, I give my bread and my flowers to these lesser depths that they may find you. I have your dreams, and hope that means you know me still - all my hope I have. Least amongst your children, I ask only that you remember me one day, to please do not forget me, when I return and grant me place still in your realm as your servant.

[ Her eyes close as she says the prayers she has said nightly since she arrived, turning her cheek into the wood, the tears spilling hot on her face but she does not care as she holds herself against that image for all it means to her. ]

[Ianthe had been expecting tears of joy and longing, but not something as profound as this. For a moment, she wondered if she'd made a mistake. Iggy had asked her what kind of landscape she wanted, listing off a few, and this had been weeks ago. She'd not expressly gotten this done for Gilia but it was because of Gilia that Ianthe had picked the seascape. But the longer she listened, the more the prayer continued, the less Ianthe believed this had been a mistake.

She was familiar with rote prayer, but knew this was true faith for Gilia. Ianthe might be overstepping, but she came up behind Gilia and slipped her arms about her, molding her body to the other woman's. To hold her while not trying to pull her from the painting.]

[ She does not flinch or fold away from the touch. Instead, she lays her arms over Ianthe, and turns her head to kiss her forehead briefly, pressing the tears against Ianthe's cheek. ]

This is my Tuerintis, Prince Ianthe Naberius, [ she continues, brushing her thumb over Ianthe's wrist as she talks. ] I name her so because she has hair like gold of the butterflies of home, like them she is beautiful and yet, is drawn to the dead. [ Why she has chosen the name, all this time later. ] She is Death-Guarder, Death-Embracer, Death-Strider, Saint of Awe. Who Weaves Skin as Silk. Born of Twin-Bodies. I love her, Holy Father, she embraced my soul and the-soul-that-is-you, in whole, without fear as is done by Old Songs.

[ She squeezes Ianthe's hand tightly a moment, fond, caring. ] I ask you, on her behalf, to bring safe tides to her sister. One who is known by the name of Coronabeth, Heir to the Third House, who was thought dead by name but not in flesh. She will be found in Time's Realm, where they sail their ships. Guard her as that of my own family, I give her Blessings of the House of St. Loe, so she knows fair tides and bright skies, quick winds that never tear, and a hull that never rots, so she may return one day, to Ianthe, safe and whole.

[Something crawled up Ianthe's throat like vermin that had chewed into her gut and was desperately ripping and tearing up her esophagus in search of freedom. She realized at the last second that it was a sob threatening to escape and managed to bite its head off before that first breath of air. And though no sound beyond a weird stuttered intake of breath was heard, Gilia would keenly feel the swallowed expression with how she was being held. Tears gathered at the corners of her eyes, and Ianthe managed to give herself hiccups stifling herself for a couple embarrassing seconds before she told her diaphragm to cut the shit out.

There was so much in Gilia's words, her continual communion with the Sea-Father, that the tears slipped free, slipping down Ianthe's cheeks. To be named as she was made her chest tighten, but that prayer, beseeching safe passage for her idiot beloved twin sister... she thought she was going to explode. Or implode. Her chest felt like it was being squeezed and squeezed and no breath would come to her. She felt burning as the two souls inside rubbed viciously against each other though where one ended and the the other began, she didn't know.

This prayer wouldn't help Corona. She knew it was pointless, but Gilia believed so much, had such faith, that she wasted a part if that. It was so unexpected that it soothed her cavalier soul in ways that bled into the necromancer, for if there was one thing the two would always agree on, it was the importance of Coronabeth.

Ianthe closed her eyes, tightened her arms around Gilia, and buried her face in her.]

Thank you.

[ She nuzzles her briefly, warmly, knowing, knowing and not needing to say how much it could mean, how simple a thing it could be, and yet how - how to look at a painting and feel even falsely, that rattle of hope. Misplaced and misguided, but sorely needed.

She does not stop her from hiding in her hair, she just keeps her touch light on Ianthe's bone wrist, breathing out for the last of her prayers. ]

Holy-Father, Lover of Land-Mother, Born of the Time's march - tell my mother - I long for her wisdom and I wish every day to bear her strength to credit out people. Tell my Fathers, I am glad they never one of their children not know one seed from another. Tell... Tell Elspeth that I hope she finds the peace she deserves and the adventure she longed for, unbound at last, and that I am sorry - and tell Farfalee and Leif to neither get into too much mischief, or spend too much time in books. Father-Salvric worries for their eyes, to spend so much time in them.

[ She lets it go at last, that last fear. ] And may Godfinn find the peace his heart would not give him in life. [ All the things she wished to tell them, all the things she thought about and worried about. Gnawing in her belly that she put down, and away. ] This, I pray in hope, from your Daughter-Sea, She Who Sings the Ocean to Prosperity. Whisper to them, that I love them, so they do not forget that, even if they forget me.

[ The prayer finished, she lifts her hands from Ianthe's and in an easy, yet simple brutality, she fishes for her belt knife she kept for loose threads in sewing - and sliced down her thumb.

The cut is only shallow, bleeding in a red well just as anyone else would - but the scent of the sea grows stronger. Then presses her first two fingers from her other hand into it, and swipes it across her lips and then down her throat.

Then she turns, blood marked in sacred lines, in Ianthe's arms, and offers those two bloodied fingers to her, though it had dried already, and the cut stopped bleeding.

A simple request. ]

Kiss them, so they may go to Coronabeth's brow and know it is you.

Edited 2023-12-08 15:53 (UTC)

[Ianthe sensed the blood before she smelled the sea, lifting her head to observe in that moment. Such a thing wasn't uncommon in the Third House, sacraments and ablution and prayers baked into the Empire's culture even if some Houses were more about lip-service than actual faith.

Her hand was already reaching for those bloodied fingers when Gilia spoke, bringing them to her lips to kiss them. Sacredly. Gently.

And then she took the fingers into her mouth to taste the blood, savor it, discover if it tasted of the sea as much as it smelled of it. Tongue gently cleansing the fingers, it wasn't intended to be sensual but it wasn't not by its very nature.]

[ Her eyes stay lowered to the touch, first of the kiss to send it away, then how she closes her mouth around her fingers, sucking the taste of it.

That yes, it does. The mingling as she always was, that it is blood, and that briney water taste below it, enough that it almost feels like if she ground it between her teeth she would grit on sand. There isn't, but the holiness of it in her body, lingers even there. To lend that belief truth, that maybe, just maybe, if this is real, the rest of it is too, and it would all be answered. ]

He will find her. I know He will.

[ Quite, gentle, she withdraws her fingers, to cup her face in a gentle sweep of her thumbs to smear way the tears, tend her as carefully as she would an altar, as precious, as beloved, as her own faith.

That offers her kiss, soft to Ianthe's, not for desire, but for that just as holy relationship Ianthe had herself, of blood and flesh, that perhaps Gilia did not know in whole, but did not need to, just the same way Ianthe accepted her and hers. That holy blood on her lips she lays in blessing to Ianthe's own. ]

[Another tear slipped from her eye, bidden by the certainty in Gilia's voice, in her faith, even if Ianthe knew how limited terrestrial things were. Unless the spirit she prayed to could reach and touch the sea of the stars, distant systems and perhaps even another galaxy away, it would not find Coronabeth. But Ianthe needed that certainty, just as she needed the taste of blood on her tongue and ambition in her heart. But there were parts of her heart that weren't blackened, that could still beat and be more. Want more. Feel more.

And though Ianthe couldn't say it - not now, not when it was so freshly born and vulnerable - her lips, this kiss, for the first time said back to Gilia what so many times had been said to the necromancer with word and deed. Her arms held Gilia close as soft kisses that made hearts flutter under the blazing warmth of the sacred and the distant crashing waves were given.]

Edited (forgot to finish the sentence) 2023-12-09 16:25 (UTC)

[ It's not a kiss of desire, or heat, to seduce her, it's to hold that hope, that prayer, that love against her lips, so that she does not lose it. Hope is easier for her, than it was for Ianthe, she knew. Ianthe's world was of brittle bone and unforgiving decisions and the cold eye of the world.

She cups her cheek and kisses her with all that love that spills like blood. Warm and drowning. Letting it pin her to the wall, to that bright and beautiful mural that soothed her own aching heart to just see, for one second, the sea she missed so much.

For one moment, she feels safe. Safe and whole and loved. ]

[They kissed and kissed and kissed some more. Soft and open, vulnerable and filled with everything. Ianthe had never expressed such before except with her sister, and even the was different than this. Was it Babs that made the difference? That didn't make sense considering how much he loved Coronabeth. Why would this--

Ianthe drowned her stray thoughts then, holding Gilia close as she enveloped her in the bleeding wound that was where Gilia's love had struck with the precision of an assassin. She wasn't sure how long the stood there kissing by the painted sea before Ianthe pulled back.]

I take it you like the painting. Let's sit down?

[ There isn't really any answer to that, that had not been said in a way far more profound than a simple yes. So giggling a little, she nods. Then she rises up when Ianthe pulls away to let her speak.

Her hands slip into Ianthe's, letting her lead her on. ]

By all means.

[To the couch Ianthe took them, sitting down in the corner with her leg stretched out along the back, Gilia pulled down to sit in the v formed with the freedom to face her. She brought Gilia's hands up to kiss before letting them go, her bone hand dipping down into a pouch tied to her hip, searching for something.]

I want to give you something... if you want it, that is. And you're willing to give me blood to store, but that's just for the wards.

[Finding what she agreed in the pouch, Ianthe took Gilia's hand and held it palm up. A key was pressed to her palm, Ianthe's eyes flickering up to find the sea queen's. She didn't say what the key belonged to, thinking it obvious.]

[ Like the day she vowed her acceptance of the Sea that lived within in Gilia, she felt the world go so very quiet, so very still, with a faint ringing of a far off bell that chimed something sweet and high.

She blinked widely, in shock - and selfish happiness as she looked at the key Ianthe offered. Yes, yes she can guess quite rightly, that the key is not to any chest or door, but to Ianthe's own house. Her property, shared, for Gilia to pass into as others could not.

Do not think it - she does not mean it that way. She does not. She does not. ]

Truly? I - [ her heart hammering, she wets her lips. ] - I am honored, my love. Are you sure?

[Ianthe knew not what it meant to Gilia, what such an act, an offer, was in her culture. That was true. The sentiment, though, was real.

She curled Gilia's fingers over the key, holding it with both of her hands.]

I trust you. I want you to be able to be here without needing me to invite you in. I... want to be pleasantly surprised to come home and find you here, a balm to my souls. I want you to find solace here, away from the mess out there. Safety. Security.

[Her thumbs rubbed Gilia's hand gently.]

I want you to have the freedom to find warmth in my bed in the middle of the night without needing me to wake. To know you are welcome and wanted.

So yeah, Lia, I'm sure.

[the tears were still drying from her happiness to say that they are more or less wet than before. But they were there as she smiles, she smiles so hard her cheeks hurt. Like she is suddenly, ten years younger to the twenty something she ought to be, happy and bright.

So happy she glows in it. ]

It would make me so happy, Tuerintis. I would like that, so very much.

[ Her fingers curl back over the key, but more importantly over Ianthe's hand. She does not mean like that, she reminds her traitorous wretched, elated heart, but it does not listen. ]

I promise, I shall never neaten your notes and move the bone piles, and I will always make sure you never go a day hungry.

[Why was she crying? It was just a key. Ianthe didn't think she was offering Gilia anything more than she already gave her aside from free access. But there was something about having a key that did denote a deeper relationship ~~real deep apparently~~. That smile was certainly something, though.]

My research is really the only sticking point. Same with not bringing anyone here without my knowledge. [The wards wish let them in anyway.]

Oh, I've offered Quentin temporary sanctuary here behind the wards if needed. Should I not be present but you are and he seeks it, cut your palm and pull him with your bloody hand across the threshold.

[ Real, real deep.

Possibly irreversibly deep, from the first time Ianthe's sure, elegant fingers slipped against the cool waters of her soul. ]

Of course, yes.

[ She brings her hand up, wiping away her cheek with the inside of her wrist as that smile never leaves her lips, bright and sharp. ]

You need my blood, yes? For the - ah, wards? How much? If it is a lot I will need to sing to ensure my other nature is unresponsive.

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cw: mild-ish blood sacrifices

Re: cw: mild-ish blood sacrifices

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