09-19-2018, 03:23 PM
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BASTILLEPRISONER AURELIUS
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The air stiffens and is suddenly heavily, almost too heavy to breathe; he can feel her immediately, the way everything shifts just the slightest bit as their distant bond tightens and pulls taut. The heady scent of vanilla fills the clearing, and Echo cocks his head to the side, rolling his eyes. Unimpressed, as usual. They already knew how this went — how many times had he found himself stuck here before, alerted to the fact that it wasn't permanent by the same tell-tale signs? — and the stealth-walker looked annoyed by the wait, as always.
"Ha," Zaniel says, eyes lighting up in the exact manner that said he had nothing good to say, "God, I love waking up to—"
"Shut up," Bastille cuts him off, irritable and— and burning. His chest heats with vicious flames, and it feels like his blood is burning; it's white-hot and uncomfortable, pushing and spreading out from his center as if he still has a heart to pump the molten blood outwards, and he pressed his palm to his chest with a frown. Fuck. That hurts more than it ever had before (usually it was just a slight tang of heat taking over, the fire-poker brand tracing over his neck, his wrists), and he's on his knees before he realizes it, brought down by the force of the fire licking through him.
He tilts his head up, teeth gritted, and finds himself eye-level with Grimm's blank green eyes. "You never answered me," he says, bitter, but the familiar vanilla-honey-warm-cinnamon smell is practically suffocating, his lungs burning as he inhales jaggedly, going light-headed; golden radiance flickers along the edges of his vision and he knows immediately that she's closer now, there, pulling and yanking and wrenching him back just as she always did; burning him on the alter and scooping up the damned ashes.
"Fuck," he hisses as mist rises in the clearing, everything hazy; his chest is still on fire when it all vanishes.
His skin is on fire. Despite the expected chill, he's warm — too warm, even, burning up and clammy as the heat radiates from his chest and spreads just as rapidly as it had back there, heating even more under the press of Hazel's fingers. Impossibly, his skin knits and crawls and forces itself back together sluggishly, slowing the outpour of blood and pushing together to form thin lines of red peaking through the tears of his shirt, instead.
The burning is the first thing he feels, golden flames making it all sear with pain; distantly, he realizes he must have broken a rib or two either in the fall or when Valkyr tore into him — he can feel it snapping back into place in a way that hurts worst than the breaking and it's all fire, fire, fire. It takes him a beat after he's really come to consciousness to be functioning through the pain, still light-headed with the golden light flashing in the darkness and the vanilla choking him.
Her aura and the intensity of her golden eyes hanging over him are just as blinding as always when he blinks at her, vision still blurry and hazy as fire curls in the pit of his chest. No pulse, nothing — his heartbeat doesn't pick up at her proximity because he realizes, like a side thought, that he doesn't presently have one. Everything still burns like hell and it hurts to breathe, and he has the brief, bizarre thought of Valkyr's trophy going up in flames as his body tried to reclaim the ashes. Unlikely, really — he had no idea how Grimm ever healed his broken vessel, but the deranged mental image had him huffing a laugh before he could stop himself.
And then he focused a little more intently on Hazel, on the molten gold pressing from her fingers into his burning chest, and he grinned with a bloody mouth like an idiot because... he was an idiot. And possibly a bit delirious. "Hey, princess," he said, voice rough and scratchy in the same manner as it was after a particularly deep sleep, "Beck said yes." He could feel her panic, the terror, the hysteria bubbling through their bond, but it was distant, weak; everything was just a little too muted and dazed and he couldn't pretend that he was actually concerned for his own wellbeing because... Well. He wasn't. And the first thing that came to mind and out of his mouth was probably one of the stupidest things he'd said to her yet.
[align=center][table][tr][td]"Ha," Zaniel says, eyes lighting up in the exact manner that said he had nothing good to say, "God, I love waking up to—"
"Shut up," Bastille cuts him off, irritable and— and burning. His chest heats with vicious flames, and it feels like his blood is burning; it's white-hot and uncomfortable, pushing and spreading out from his center as if he still has a heart to pump the molten blood outwards, and he pressed his palm to his chest with a frown. Fuck. That hurts more than it ever had before (usually it was just a slight tang of heat taking over, the fire-poker brand tracing over his neck, his wrists), and he's on his knees before he realizes it, brought down by the force of the fire licking through him.
He tilts his head up, teeth gritted, and finds himself eye-level with Grimm's blank green eyes. "You never answered me," he says, bitter, but the familiar vanilla-honey-warm-cinnamon smell is practically suffocating, his lungs burning as he inhales jaggedly, going light-headed; golden radiance flickers along the edges of his vision and he knows immediately that she's closer now, there, pulling and yanking and wrenching him back just as she always did; burning him on the alter and scooping up the damned ashes.
"Fuck," he hisses as mist rises in the clearing, everything hazy; his chest is still on fire when it all vanishes.
His skin is on fire. Despite the expected chill, he's warm — too warm, even, burning up and clammy as the heat radiates from his chest and spreads just as rapidly as it had back there, heating even more under the press of Hazel's fingers. Impossibly, his skin knits and crawls and forces itself back together sluggishly, slowing the outpour of blood and pushing together to form thin lines of red peaking through the tears of his shirt, instead.
The burning is the first thing he feels, golden flames making it all sear with pain; distantly, he realizes he must have broken a rib or two either in the fall or when Valkyr tore into him — he can feel it snapping back into place in a way that hurts worst than the breaking and it's all fire, fire, fire. It takes him a beat after he's really come to consciousness to be functioning through the pain, still light-headed with the golden light flashing in the darkness and the vanilla choking him.
Her aura and the intensity of her golden eyes hanging over him are just as blinding as always when he blinks at her, vision still blurry and hazy as fire curls in the pit of his chest. No pulse, nothing — his heartbeat doesn't pick up at her proximity because he realizes, like a side thought, that he doesn't presently have one. Everything still burns like hell and it hurts to breathe, and he has the brief, bizarre thought of Valkyr's trophy going up in flames as his body tried to reclaim the ashes. Unlikely, really — he had no idea how Grimm ever healed his broken vessel, but the deranged mental image had him huffing a laugh before he could stop himself.
And then he focused a little more intently on Hazel, on the molten gold pressing from her fingers into his burning chest, and he grinned with a bloody mouth like an idiot because... he was an idiot. And possibly a bit delirious. "Hey, princess," he said, voice rough and scratchy in the same manner as it was after a particularly deep sleep, "Beck said yes." He could feel her panic, the terror, the hysteria bubbling through their bond, but it was distant, weak; everything was just a little too muted and dazed and he couldn't pretend that he was actually concerned for his own wellbeing because... Well. He wasn't. And the first thing that came to mind and out of his mouth was probably one of the stupidest things he'd said to her yet.
BY THE GRACE OF THE FIRE AND THE [color=#b4d5ee]FLAMES
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Honey, you're familiar, like my mirror years ago, Idealism sits in prison, chivalry fell on his sword, Innocence died screaming; honey, ask me, I should know, I slithered here from Eden just to sit outside your door. [b][sup]▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃[/sup][/b]