STOLEN LIES || "Death" + Development

[RHIANNON]

―――― //Lowkey a big one-shot for development. The last 2 paragraphs are  really the important ones for the sake of replying! c:

Freedom. What was freedom? Was it the notion of being free, and having free will, or free choices? The right to act, speak, think, and communicate without hindrance? Or, was it partly like Rhiannon's case, where Freedom was in the far more literal sense? The absence of subjection to a dominant, to be free from the slavery that she had been in for the majority of her time in the Pitt? Was it the freedom, the immunity, from a situation, or was it something more? Freedom was to be taken in many senses, perhaps that much was true. But freedom was also taken for granted. Most people didn't consider freedom to be the ability to walk into the room and see who was there, or where the obstacles were. Many didn't consider the open expanse of the desert to be a struggle, because they could rely on landmarks and the familiarity of the sloping hills and the areas they knew. Rhiannon lived in a world of light and shadow. She saw the lights dancing off the gleam of the desert sands in the early evening; she saw the stars shining on the rare surface of a water face in the late evenings when the skies were clear and the moon was bright; but in her life, she had never been able to see properly. She had no depth, even when she was a child, and now as an adult, she did not even know what her own face, nor those around her, looked like. She had no knowledge of freedom, for her freedom was wholly ever her physical bonds, not that of the sight that most took for granted. Trapped within her own body, a body in which denied her the right to see the beauty of the world, to see the people that she had cared for, to even remember her own mother's face. People thought her to be weak because of it. She, when she was young, had begged, and prayed, and pleaded that she would somehow be healed, yet her prayers had never been answered. She had only learned to accept her fate and her circumstances. To make her spirit strong, to be strong, even when she did not feel it- to prove them wrong.

She had watched this girl for weeks now. Another Pitt slave, one that she had known only briefly during her own time served. She was desperate for an escape, desperate for anything that would take her away from the life that she lived here and frankly? Rhiannon didn't blame her. Yet, Rhiannon had no idea how this was going to work: whether it would, or whether she had underestimated her capabilities. But, she knew she had to start somewhere, and even if this one didn't work, maybe another one would, maybe she would figure out something within this girl that would help her. And besides, they had been "friends" once, hadn't they? Rhia had no intent to kill the girl, of course not, but she still wasn't sure what this would do to either of them. She had found control once, however... Maybe it would be just as easy this time around. It was easy to find the girl among the crowd of slaves, the familiar sounds of her breathing and the beating of her heart like a hopeful melody to Rhiannon's ears. Thud. Thud. Thud. Thud. Like the ticking of a clock, like the last few grains of an hourglass, counting down the moments until Rhiannon's Freedom. "Wake, my darling," the words were cooed ever so sweetly into the woman's ear. "I'm going to help you," The girl woke with a start, yet her words made her take in a breath sharply, some hopeful note ringing within that one faint breath, a sweet smile curling over Rhiannon's lips as she dipped her head and quickly began to lead their way out into the territory, away from ears of the camp and whomever else might be around. After that? After that, nothing went according to plan.

The girl, at first, as Rhiannon had expected, was willing and wholly believing a former-slaves words. Yet, that was never how the Pitt operated, was it? Rhiannon's heart had been twisted over this night for many a moon, but now that she was doing it, she knew that she could not turn back. Failure was not an option. The girl's steps stumbled and faltered over the desert sands, the malnourished feline besides her struggling with each step, her breaths wheezing, but she persisted, her own hope like a bright flame keeping her moving forward. Rhiannon had felt that flame, and yet, if everything went according to plan, they would still get what they both wanted, only simply with different terms and conditions. Her pawsteps slowed beside the girl as she came to a stop, taking in a deep breath as she tried to focus, to concentrate like she had before. Give me your eyes... the thought sprang into her head, and she clung to it like a lifeline. "Wha-.. What are you doing?" the woman's voice, terrified now, only faintly breaking Rhiannon's concentration, who now, seemingly, had a tight grasp around the woman's soul. "I-i-it... It hurts.. Stop! Please, stop!" the begging made Rhiannon's heart pang for a moment with a faint shred of guilt, but it was far too late. Before she could even register it herself, a pain like wildfire spread across her body, running down her back like the wicked lash of a whip. Her body contorted suddenly at the pain, a sharp gasp leaving her lips as she tried to pull her control away. What was happening? Suddenly, she felt as though she was in a cloud, her head swimming and pounding as though she had just been hit by a train. Her shoulders tensed, her body feeling as though it were being ripped out from the inside. A scream tore through the air, and she recognized the sound of her own voice somewhere through the haze of excruciating pain, gasping sharply for breath as though her lungs had stopped working. How long did it go on? The screaming went on for what felt like hours, and by the time she could finally make sense of where her own body was, she felt the hot press of sand against her belly, her paws dug in deep as though she had tried to ground herself, to physically escape from the torment. Shaking. She was shaking. The pain still radiated through her like a faint memory as her muscles failed to relax, as if each attempt she made to even shift her paws was another stab through the chest, another flash of fire running across her nerves that made her groan. This didn't feel like her body. She wasn't supposed to be the one in pain. Each breath wheezed in her chest, her head still pounding with each thud of her heart, spots dancing across her eyes as she tried to lift her head, met with another flash of pain that she exhaled shakily. What had happened? She blinked slowly, trying to make sense of it all. But suddenly, her eyes widened, some hopeful catch of her breath lifting her lungs, springing tears to her eyes. Sand. She could see the sand. Through the spots in her eyes, a grainy-textured thing at her small little paws. Her gaze swung further, suddenly wanting to both laugh and cry for joy at what she had seen, at the world that was barely processing through her irises. A body, though how far she couldn't tell; a big form, with her... WIth her blue cloak. She had taken this body. She knew she should have felt guilty, but she only felt relief, she felt freedom like she had never before. The pain was still sharp and unforgiving, but she would bear it if it meant she could see this.

But the world had other plans. Just as quickly as she had begun to process what she had done, the spots in her eyes grew worse, the haziness of the world around her returning. No! No! She knew what this was, she had faced it before! She had already watched the world turn into a haze, and then into blackness! This body shouldn't have been able to do this! That girl had been able to see! Why wasn't she allowed to see?! Her brief moments of joy turned into a gut-wrenching sorrow as she felt a sob choke at her throat, sobbing as though her life had just been stolen from her, her weak body shifting in an attempt to move, as if fleeing would allow her to keep her stolen treasure, but the body would not cooperate. Her sobbing led into a series of short, hacking coughs of these sickened lungs, her paws digging with frustration into the ground beneath her, clinging to fading appearance of texture before her eyes, something that faded all too quickly into blackness. "No!" she wailed, her voice broken and froggy with whatever sickness this girl had had, dizzy and filled with so much pain and hunger like she had never felt before. "Please..." she suddenly begged, her voice small, and soft, a whisper as she buried her face into the sand with another struggled sob. "Please.. Please let me have this..." But she could not. For she had tried to steal what had never belonged to her. This was her punishment. Two lives, she had taken, her old body lying lifeless next to her while she herself could not even move without a flash of torturous pain. "You were supposed to fix me!"

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[LUCKY LUCIANO]

[glow=#000,1,400]BUT YOU WERE BORN UNDER A BAD SIGN — TAGS[/glow]

Freedom held meaning to Lucky, but perhaps in the more figurative sense than a literal one. Freedom meant having free roam of the world, being independent, traveling the lands like a lone wolf. He had taken upon that lifestyle months ago after he had fled the city. Things had gone wrong, way wrong after his uncle had died. While Lucky could have taken matters into his own hands, it wouldn't have been easy, and he would have risked his whole family turning against him. Instead, he had slipped away and had broken free of the holds that the pack had held over him. It felt new, it felt exhilirating. No longer was he just a simple pawn in their game.

Voices, sobs had piqued his aurals. Call him nosy or just call him plain curious, but Lucky had gone to investigate. It was possible that someone was just having a bad day and needed to release their emotions into the open, and in that case, he would make for a swift exit. However, he was met with an unexpected sight — the form of the cloaked snow leopard, Rhiannon, lifeless upon the ground. A few lengths away was an unfamiliar feline, the one who was shaking and sobbing. The fellow Skald had been in prime health, at least from what he had assumed. How could she have gone so soon? There was no blood, no wounds, nothing. Lucky could only assume that this was a Roseblood or perhaps a loner they had paid off, maybe they had poisoned her or stripped her of life in another way.

The hellhound moved forward, dark form nearly blending into the inky night. His deep amber hues were alight with a boiling anger, fiery embers beginning to glisten in their reflection. He looked as if he had crawled out from the deep d e p t h s of Hell itself, a rumbling growl escaping his throat. Lucky locked his gaze onto the domestic feline, stepping around Rhiannon's body and baring deadly, pearly whites at her as he advanced slowly but in a threatening fashion. He was ready to lurch forward and enclose scissorlike jaws around the cat's neck. Lucky didn't know Rhiannon very well; in fact, none of these Pittians had succeeded in earning his loyalty. However, if this was meant as a threat, then he would not tolerate it.

[ninazu]

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© lexasperated

I WISH YOU COULD SEE THE WICKED TRUTH
CAUGHT UP IN A RUSH, IT'S KILLING YOU

Sounds died in the desert, choked under the still air and burning heat. Ninazu, however, attuned herself to the suffering of others – in every sob they breathed, each begging plead to their betters. She caught the pitiful noises against the quiet backdrop of her wasted lands. Her muscles flexed under her pelt as she moved over the land, fire mane extinguished as she moved over the dunes towards the source. The lioness profited off the weakness of others – and she had practice hunting these sorts of creatures down.

Arriving shortly after Lucky, the woman’s mane flared to life throwing light around her. The red flames licked around her neck, wrapping across her shoulders and down to her stomach in a mockery of a male lion’s glorious mane. Rage flared in her chest with it, lips curling back for a moment as she saw the lifeless body; how dare anyone, especially a slave, dare to hurt one of her trusted advisors…!

But her rage never overpowered her the way it strangled the minds of others. Her anger fell around her thoughts coldly, drawing attention to the limp snow leopard – and noticing a few missing pieces. No signs of blood. No signs of a struggle at all. In fact, this looked quite similar to how Ninazu herself took over a new body – and she should know, she’d done this many times before.

Rounding on Lucky, the lioness moved in front of the hellhound to intercept with her lips pulled back. A warning growl rumbled in her throat, but she didn’t waste much time with telling him to back off; she trusted the ardent rank enough to assume he would listen to her commands. So her golden eyes rounded on the malnourished feline, so small against her and the hellhound behind her. But Ninazu could see, now that she was closer, how the domestic feline’s eyes clouded with the same cataracts as Rhiannon’s.

“Rhiannon, relax,” the lioness purred, lashing her tail. Taking a half step closer, she attempted to step into Rhia’s mind and temporarily squash all those unpleasant fears and sorrows and angers. At the same time, she’d also use the opportunity to quickly verify that her assumptions were correct – while Ninazu trusted her judgement, she wasn’t an idiot. She knew she could be wrong about something like this.

WRITTEN BY AXIOM * TAGS

© LEXASPERATED

[RHIANNON]

―――― //this is latttte sorry

Rhiannon tried to control her shaking breathing as she bowed her head slightly, as if physically trying to take control of the automatic gasps of air that this body was able to take in, for a moment deaf to the warning growl of someone next to her. In the next moment, her gaze snapped upwards, a hitch in her breath replaced with a slight trace of fear as a blinded gaze swung towards the source of the sound. Was she going to die anyway? All of this, for utterly nothing at all? Lucky's slow, threatening approach met blind eyes, but she could hear the faint shift of sand with each heavy pawstep that landed closer, and closer to her, the familiar smell of the male reaching her nose, "Lucky.." she breathed, sounding as though she might have started to beg, but no further words left her lips. Let him. If he didn't believe her, let him. The tears still pooling in her eyes despite her best efforts, the sudden flash of heat from Ninazu's flames were only scarcely welcoming, this body weak, and cold. Nina.

Relax the ardent instructed, and were it not for her labored breathing Rhiannon might have laughed bitterly, wondering how relaxaing was such a possibility when each twitch of movement was nothing but pain and longing. The faintest touch of a bitter laugh that did touch her lips only ended in a bout of coughing, frustration crawling up her paws and making her claws flex, the frustration blinding her to Ninazu's attempts until the cold, icy tendrils of her powers were winding itself around her mind, causing a note of panic to suddenly rise in her voice as she shifted, "How DARE you!" the hoarse voice suddenly yelled, a sob choking the end of the words, so unlike the softly-spoken Rhiannon, but it was too late. Like a switch going off, the fears and anger she held, the frustration that had prickled up her paws like tendrils of ice began to melt away, the woman's gasping breaths relaxing slowly with a few spilt tears as the body relaxed and sunk against the cooling desert sand, her head bowing into the soft earth with a slow exhale that was in every word an unspoken thank you. The memories that Ninazu would see, too, were correct; every moment leading up to that fateful night, from her leaving the house, manipulating this poor girl, and the brief glimpse of the desert sand before everything went dark again. Rhiannon briefly shuddered as she shut her eyes, her words suddenly dim and whispered with this false-suppression of her emotions, "I'm sorry, Nina. I'm so sorry..."

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[ninazu]

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© lexasperated

I WISH YOU COULD SEE THE WICKED TRUTH
CAUGHT UP IN A RUSH, IT'S KILLING YOU

Snapping a snarl, the ardent pressed forward into the frail woman’s mind – it made no difference whether this feline was Rhiannon or Rhiannon’s killer. The ardent dared to do as she pleased, especially when she needed to be sure of someone’s identity. Without clairvoyance or a trustworthy member with the ability, peaking into the mind remained the best way to know. And when had Ninazu cared about personal freedoms, like privacy? If she knew how to wield her magic earlier in her life, her path wouldn’t have taken her on the medical tract.

Peaking into the memory of the snow leopard’s manipulations, the woman’s snarl faded to an expression of quite satisfaction. Her instincts solved this little problem; she certainly felt glad she thought to check, otherwise the group might’ve lost its only erudite out of reckless revenge. “You killed a useless slave on a hunch – I see nothing wrong with that,” Ninazu stated, glancing at Lucky to see if he understood the situation. Nobody called her Nina but Rhiannon; frankly, she’d probably gut anyone else that butchered her name; the marauder appeared clever, but she’d explain if he had his doubts about who stood in front of them.

Looking back to Rhiannon, the lioness suppressed the urge to sigh. If Rhiannon wanted to body hop, she had no problem with that – but killing her own snow leopard body in the process and picking such a frail sleeve? Rhiannon usually presented as intelligent – this whole situation, with its half-cocked plan and disastrous results, stank of dumb emotional bullshit. “It’s alright, we’ll get you back to the pyramids. Perhaps some hot chocolate or coffee will help?” she suggested, thinking of the best way to keep Rhiannon calm while they moved her to a better location – it wouldn’t make sense to let her freak out again and fight them on getting back. But with the smell of emotional bullshit in the air, Ninazu couldn’t properly guess how Rhiannon would react. But she knew that, if the feline blew up at her again right now, they’d need to drag her back – preferably not kicking and screaming.

// no worries, this is a late reply myself psh

WRITTEN BY AXIOM * TAGS

© LEXASPERATED