breath-of-eternity reblogged
And From Nightmare to WTF
Fire rippled over Melusine and burned away most of the skin from her front—she’d had worse, yes, but not in a while. Pain blotted out everything else, but she focused on the ground underneath her, the pebbles showering down on her, and rose above it.
If Agni were here, this never would have—
Wow, way to make the lack of skin the more appealing misery. At least the physical pain began to fade, but the more she was aware, the less she liked. Her hands had been twisted behind her and shackled in metal, which would take Resh about five seconds to undo. She tried to lift her head and find the other Knight, but her body was numb, ice water freezing her veins. It wasn’t the first time she’d been paralyzed, though it never lingered in her muscles like this before. She wriggled her fingers and they twitched.
“This one’s coming around,” a voice said.
White shapes danced in her vision, the color slowly bleeding back into them. A sharp point punctured her back, high up, near her neck, and there went the color. What the fuck were they doing to her?
Something like sleep washed over her and she fought it, though she couldn’t do more than that, except maybe berate herself for how stupid she was to allow them to defeat her. Many bodies floated around her during the battle, most in the midst of escape, and she had focused her energies on the ones who were steady in their approach. Clearly she had missed one and he nailed her with the poison. The next thing was aware of was Resh radiating magic, darkness, a shower of soil dusting her face. The explosion had probably killed her again, she wasn’t sure. Damn it, she had never seen anything like that before…
No, wait. The Forge before the volcanic eruption. The explosions there had been similar. Fuck, she kept forgetting the technology she was fighting.
Her eyes twitched open, and this time the world was a faded gray. Long, dark hair tickled her face, and she had to assume Ereshkigal was draped over her, as benumbed as Melusine. Her arms twitched, crawling down her leg to the knife in her boot. A needle pierced her shoulder and the world began to swim.
“No one can survive that much,” came a voice, different from the last one, higher and tighter.
“They can, trust me.”
Then she couldn’t hold on any longer, she slipped into a pool of icy cold water, her element, she could sink to the bottom and had no fear of death, except this was no water under her domain.
You do need to fear death, she reminded herself. You aren’t supposed to, but they took Agni from you. There is much for you to fear. This is the first time in a long time you’ve had to deal with it, but deal with it you will. You have no choice. You are the Waters Of Life. Now wake up.
breath-of-eternity reblogged
breath-of-eternity reblogged
breath-of-eternity reblogged
The End Of The Beginning
Melusine had not expected that finding Imatar would be the easy part, but there they’d been, sitting on a dusty slope and hugging their knees while they waited.
“Please tell me you have my clothes,” they said.
She’d been ready to yell at them for losing track of their things—again—before she remembered, oh yeah, she did have them. The pants were stuffed into the pouch attached to her belt while the shirt and undergarments were hanging half out of her pockets. They frowned at the crumpled state of the garments, but come on, what did they expect? She wasn’t an attendant who carried their clothes.
breath-of-eternity reblogged
breath-of-eternity reblogged
Almost There
Chapter 23
Agni shut his eyes.
Yes, the power from whatever they did to collapse the caves was fading, but lurking underneath was the rage of earth and flame. The magma had no more room to conceal itself, and now that it had been stirred, it would break free and devastation would rain from the sky. The last time it had happened, it wiped out the temple, all trace of the pillar once standing there, and the city below had been buried under a layer of rock.
The sky all over the world had turned gray for three days, which was how he and the others had found out about the eruption despite being on the other side of the planet. They arrived too late to do anything but clean up the aftermath, and make it so another explosion would not darken the world for eons.
Now the time had come, the debt was due, and death the currency.
“Fuck it,” Imatar said, taking off their shirt. “Let’s just fly up to the rim of the volcano and take care of it directly. Trying to hide our existence has made things worse, so it’s time to head up there and get things done and deal with the consequences later.”
As usual, they were direct. Less usual was them being completely correct. Hundreds—he did not want to say thousands—would die without intervention.
Once their clothes were off, Imatar changed into their rukh form, whipping their head back and forth angrily until Melusine got the hint and picked up their garments. They lowered themself so the others could get on and summoned the wind to take them soaring into the air.
In the dark, the volcano stuck out from the earth like a broken tooth. Its shadows were black as eternity, the dusty hills turned into pure ebony. It appeared innocuous, but the energy inside screamed to come out.
Imatar let out a piercing roar that made Ereshkigal cover her ears with her hands. They were trying to warn the others about something, but communication magic couldn’t help him figure out more than that. Wind rushed up, allowing them to hover, but Agni could not hear anything other than their wings assaulting the sky.
Their head fixed forward, and in the inky blackness, Agni spotted an artificial light that was moving and worse, heading towards them. Imatar’s wings flapped and they darted around the mountain peaks, but the light grew closer. A column of wind engulfed them and they went soaring high above the volcano. Agni gripped the rukh and pressed his face the soft down before he went flying.
Imatar folded his wings and went screaming towards the ground. After all these years, Agni believed nothing existed that could make him want to vomit, but nope, staring at the darkness and wondering where the ground was concealed while you plunged toward it still did the trick. Rukhs, he supposed, could see better than humans, even magically enhanced ones, and Imatar always seemed to know when the shadow was made of something more substantial than air.
“We have to get to the volcano!” Melusine grunted out.
Light blared into their faces, making Agni squint. Something beat the air at regular intervals, and when he lifted his head, he could almost make out something rotating, a mill attached to a vehicle and somehow capable of levitating.
“What—”
Sharp reports thundered through the air, just like the ones the first time they tried approaching the volcano. One ripped open his cheek and then Imatar was screaming, shrieking and Agni flailed his arms but was unable to keep from sliding off their back. He was falling.
His mind shifted into overdrive. He got his hands under him and fire jetted out, licking the hem of his jacket but slowing his descent. Then he slammed into the ground and his arm snapped and several ribs shattered like glass. Closer than I thought, drifted through his mind as he ran his hand down his leg and pain momentarily blinded him.
Almost There
Chapter 23
Agni shut his eyes.
Yes, the power from whatever they did to collapse the caves was fading, but lurking underneath was the rage of earth and flame. The magma had no more room to conceal itself, and now that it had been stirred, it would break free and devastation would rain from the sky. The last time it had happened, it wiped out the temple, all trace of the pillar once standing there, and the city below had been buried under a layer of rock.
The sky all over the world had turned gray for three days, which was how he and the others had found out about the eruption despite being on the other side of the planet. They arrived too late to do anything but clean up the aftermath, and make it so another explosion would not darken the world for eons.
Now the time had come, the debt was due, and death the currency.
“Fuck it,” Imatar said, taking off their shirt. “Let’s just fly up to the rim of the volcano and take care of it directly. Trying to hide our existence has made things worse, so it’s time to head up there and get things done and deal with the consequences later.”
As usual, they were direct. Less usual was them being completely correct. Hundreds—he did not want to say thousands—would die without intervention.
Once their clothes were off, Imatar changed into their rukh form, whipping their head back and forth angrily until Melusine got the hint and picked up their garments. They lowered themself so the others could get on and summoned the wind to take them soaring into the air.
In the dark, the volcano stuck out from the earth like a broken tooth. Its shadows were black as eternity, the dusty hills turned into pure ebony. It appeared innocuous, but the energy inside screamed to come out.
Imatar let out a piercing roar that made Ereshkigal cover her ears with her hands. They were trying to warn the others about something, but communication magic couldn’t help him figure out more than that. Wind rushed up, allowing them to hover, but Agni could not hear anything other than their wings assaulting the sky.
Their head fixed forward, and in the inky blackness, Agni spotted an artificial light that was moving and worse, heading towards them. Imatar’s wings flapped and they darted around the mountain peaks, but the light grew closer. A column of wind engulfed them and they went soaring high above the volcano. Agni gripped the rukh and pressed his face the soft down before he went flying.
Imatar folded his wings and went screaming towards the ground. After all these years, Agni believed nothing existed that could make him want to vomit, but nope, staring at the darkness and wondering where the ground was concealed while you plunged toward it still did the trick. Rukhs, he supposed, could see better than humans, even magically enhanced ones, and Imatar always seemed to know when the shadow was made of something more substantial than air.
“We have to get to the volcano!” Melusine grunted out.
Light blared into their faces, making Agni squint. Something beat the air at regular intervals, and when he lifted his head, he could almost make out something rotating, a mill attached to a vehicle and somehow capable of levitating.
“What—”
Sharp reports thundered through the air, just like the ones the first time they tried approaching the volcano. One ripped open his cheek and then Imatar was screaming, shrieking and Agni flailed his arms but was unable to keep from sliding off their back. He was falling.
His mind shifted into overdrive. He got his hands under him and fire jetted out, licking the hem of his jacket but slowing his descent. Then he slammed into the ground and his arm snapped and several ribs shattered like glass. Closer than I thought, drifted through his mind as he ran his hand down his leg and pain momentarily blinded him.
breath-of-eternity reblogged
breath-of-eternity reblogged
