GoldenCat/SilentTears
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Silent Tears
It has been a week after the purge of Blue Wind.
A week after the confrontation that made the mountain shake, that devasted a great park in Upper Windia.
A week of cold.
Snow fell relentlessly, cold in every aspect. Iselsis was left home, carried there gently by the stranger touched by the void, and left with caring words she barely recalls amidst the haze of drained exaustion. And she was left there alone, for days. The feline lady she did not remember appeared again, but that was the only visit she had in those days.
She told Iselsis of the outcome of the conflict... of how the undead forces were grounded to powder, how their elite had been crushed.. and how, when they looked for the Wretched Anathema Iselsis had hit, amidst burning trees down a cliff... they found nothing.
There was no corpse.
And Whisper left, with the warning that Iselsis should be ready for any possible retaliation if that meant the worst...
Until six days later, Iselsis heard the feet treading into her home, and the voice. Faina's voice, calling out to her... and stepping on her home, like she never had before.
Iselsis: She stopped. In her little dojo space in her delapitated temple. She wasn't wearing as much as usual. The only place she ever didn't wear much was home. A pair of baggy pants, sports bra, and bindings around her hands and feet.
She rests against the punching bag, the regret about what she was about to do already gripping her heart in a vice. She sighs. She had been left no choice.
"In here." she calls out lamely. And as if trying to refocus her resolve she starts laying into the punching bag again. She was never been the graceful martial artist, and even if she had been this was far more effective to focus her anger. She moves fast and delivers furious stings at the object while she waits for Faina.
Faina: Once again, she is dressed in a long, modest dress. It does keep most of her cleavage hidden, and covers her arms, her legs pretty much hidden under the long skirt... you could say it was just another Windian noblewoman, and never the woman in Green Jade battle armor she had been a week ago... once again only a public face or administrator for the secrets of Windia.
She looks at Iselsis, and shows little reaction... despite a tinge of... distress? Dislike? She did not like what she was seeing, that was for sure. "It has been a while, Iselsis. I trust you have been well?"
She takes a couple steps closer, "I heard great things of your actions that night." She says, still lacking emotion behind it.
Iselsis: I trust you've been well? What kind of thing to say is that?
She keeps laying into the punching bag as she speaks, she'd be sweating if it weren't for the cold weather. "As well as I could be, I guess...", she sounded bitter.
"Did you?", she asks, a sort of rethorical tone of sarcasm behind her words.
Faina: "Yes. Even though you abandoned your post and your mission, you were of great help to Valencia. It was hard to explain to people who should not know of your existence who you were, however; You would have had problems with our superiors if not for someone putting good words there for you." She says, standing there, eyes vacant, slightly analitical about Iselsis...
"Neverthless, they understood you did so for excess of zeal... you placed your life on the line more than once that night, and did not back up or run. You really are in the good graces and trust of our superiors now."
Iselsis: She punched again, harder now. So hard her arm momentarily blurs, the punching bag swinging backwards from the blow. In an instant she is on the other side, hammering it soundly with a roundhouse kick, utterly destroying the momentum with a dull thud.
"That's nice. I'm sure you'll inform them of my resignation."
Faina: The beautiful face of the Windian, untouched by a single line of age, by a single scar, by a single signal, changes, only slightly. There is not reply for a moment, and no emotion either - as her face seems to freeze more than anything.
"This is not the time for jokes, Iselsis. And neither am I the person to joke with."
Iselsis: "I guess calling me Izabella went out of style again between now and a few days ago, huh? Odd that."
She punches and kicks the punching bag incessantly. She'd been getting better at unarmed combat. Felt a penchant for it. Much more personal than a gun, much more useful if you really wanted to hurt someone, and wanted to feel their hurt for yourself. The punching bag gave her a focal point for her anger, and anger was gonna make this easier.
"I don't usually let people in." she says offhandedly, wether she was referring to the temple or something else, who knew. "I'll be leaving as soon as I find some way to move my things. I figure I'll head south. Maybe to Nexus. Or beyond, to Chiaroscuro. I always wanted to see the fabled glass towers."
Faina: One could say she barely reacted to Iselsis' first words...
If the twitch was not the most expressive she had been since she arrived.
And to her latter words, Iselsis can see Faina's face fighting to remain frozen, as she steps foward, "I... see. This is quite unlike you, Iselsis. What prompted such decision?"
Iselsis: She still hasn't eased up on the punching bag one bit. It was currently her security blanket, the same as her coat, scarf and hat were on the outside.
"You should know better than to trust a monster...", she mutters beneath her breath.
Faina: Faina stops there, only a few steps away from Iselsis... her eyes alçmost unbliking as they watch the demon-blooded, piercing.
"We all do now, however. Because you earned it."
"You think that is what you are, still? After all you have done? You think I - - we would trust a monster?"
Iselsis: ... She stops, for a moment, and stares...
Then a ripping sound, and a fog of down floating into the air of the small dojo. Her hidden set of claws having extended over her fingernails, curved, rock hard and sharp tools of death from the bone of her own body, leaving four tear marks across the punching bag. She stands there, her breathing quick after having punched the thing for minutes straight without stopping.
"Aren't I!?", she turns to face Faina, "Well! Answer me! Look at me, look me in the eyes and tell me I'm not a monster!"
And all around the demoness, fire in her eyes... the goose down serenely floats down to the floor.
Faina: Faina seems to swallow something, something that left a bad, bad taste on her mouth, as she continues to stare at Iselsis, even more displeased now. "Are you?"
"Are you a monster?"
Iselsis: "I have claws and fangs, I have horns and and the flames of malfeas in my eyes. I hunt monsters, I'm so bloody good at it because I am a monster! How could you..." she pauses and swallows "How could any of you even pretend not to see it. We all pretend, and I'm the biggest pretender. The monsters know I'm one of them and they know every day my humanity withers until some day I will be theirs. They told me, you see, the nemesary, the dead priest, even the Acolyte of Violet Whispers while I unleashed the caress of a thousand hells on her! The rage keeps coming more, faster now, how can you expect me to control it! How can you ask me to use this terrible thing to protect the only things I still love when you know, I know, and the monsters know that one day I'll turn on you! How can you ask me to stay here knowing I will destroy what I hold dear! How can you stand there and still keep pretending that I'm something I'm not!", she snarls, "I have to leave or I'll bring damnation to all of this just like my sister! Don't you SEE!? Don't you get it!?"
"You're falling right into the trap set for you with both eyes wide open!"
Faina: Slap
Is the first reply Faina has to it. She stands there, trembling, shaking as she tries not to let her mask fall. "How dare you? How dare you think that of yourself? You saved Windia! You saved me! You gave everything you had to save me! Is that how a monster acts, Izabella? Is that how you think a monster should be?!?"
"The most beautiful, most frail, most innocent thing I have ever seen is anything but monstruous." She says, holding her tongue back already, cursing herself inwardly for the last words.
"No, if anything, I am the monster here."
Iselsis: Her head snaps to the side, her tirade suddenly cut short. She's stunned, her hand moving to her cheek. She takes a hesitant step back amidst the goose down, her hand moving to her cheek, feeling the warmth. Not that it was particularly painful, she'd had far worse. But for Faina to do something like that was totally unexpected.
She stares, stunned, shocked, and speechless.
Faina: She comes closer, and closer. "I killed your emotions. I trrained you not to feel. I gave my consent while our masters gave you to the care of someone who taught you how to kill. How to destroy. We groomed our pet devil to kill monsters for us."
"Do you want to know of monsters, Izabella?!? Your sister is here. In the North. She was in Windia, just last week. And she is just like the Acolyte. You know the trust you so gathered with our superiors? Do you know what does it mean? It means I have come to tell you to go to her, to report on her, to eliminate her if she poses any threat!"
A single tear runs down her eyes, but her face keeps being white. No blood rises to her face yet. "I have come to tell you to spy and possibly murder your own sister!"
She says it, and looks away, for a moment, unable to look at Iselsis in the eyes. "This is what a monster is."
Iselsis: Most beautiful?
She had heard the rest of it though. The thought of her sister. It did not phase her. Selina was what she feared turning into, but any empathy she had long ago was crushed. She knew of the monster she had become, she knew the sister she once had was no more. She wouldn't regret releasing her from her torment.
But what Faina said, what that tear said, what everything about her said confused her far more. She didn't know what to say... so she said the one thing she didn't get a chance to say earlier: "The wretched whispered to me, said I would be the doom of Windia, that I am fire, silence and destruction... Said there's nothing I could do to change that... I couldn't...", she looks away now, choking back the rest of the sentence. Her claws retracting out of sight. The flame in her eyes doused by a single tear.
Faina: Fana reached a hand, and touched the demon-blood's face, where she had slapped... at a loss of words, searching for something to say about... that. "So... she did. I..."
"I do not believe you could be the doom of Windia. I do not believe it. You gave your life for it. You just... couldn't..."
Too rational. Too, far too realistic. Faina cursed herself inwardly, even as she said, "And even if you do... even if what twisted you did make you into a trap for us... I know you would stop it, at any cost. You would give your life for us." Another tear. The image was too clear now. She believed what the Wretched said, and Iselsis could see so. And she was certain that Iselsis would take her own life in that day...
"Something a monster can never do."
Iselsis: Her eyes, far softer now, focus on the floor while she speaks, but she leans slightly into the warm palm of Faina's hand. And when she's done speaking her eyes move up hesitantly, looking into Faina's.
Her voice trembles and wavers, unsteady under the emotional pressure she seemed to be under far too often lately.
"If I'm not a monster... what am I...?"
And what am I to you...
Faina: "Izabella de Windia."
The child Faina had seen crying... the demon-blooded she had told to harden... the Exalted she handled for training... the young woman who had saved her life... who...
She caresses Iselsis' face softly, barely noticing she is doing so, "It already means too much."
Iselsis: She takes a breath and closes her eyes, and when she opens them again she starts to speak.
"I... I feel...", her words falter. She wasn't sure what it was she was trying to say, she wasn't sure if she could say it after what was just said, that one day she might have to stop herself from hurting the things she loved.
She couldn't say it, her eyes locked on Faina's, slowly filling with tears which she blinks away. Even if she hadn't said it, her eyes did.
Faina: Faina looks at Iselsis... remembering all that again...
"You... have never been held since that day, have you?"
Is all she says before coming closer, and taking the young woman in her arms, holding Iselsis' head to her chest.... and whispering.
"I feel it too."
Iselsis: Her eyes grow wide for an instant as the other woman who scrambled her thoughts and put knots in her stomach wraps her arms around her. She stiffens up out of reflex, shock, but only for a moment.
The woman who was nothing but a keeper and a spy to her for so long, now something else entirely. Her body slowly relaxes, and she leans into Faina's embrace. Her arms hang limply for a few moments, before wrapping around her. She'd had such problems letting Faina in that she didn't dare let go now she had. Burrying her head against her shoulder.
"It's not fair...", she murmurs. Not what a weathered black ops should be saying, but then this was hardly a typical moment.
Faina: Faina's hand holds Iselsis' head, caressing the demon-blood's hair...
"Nothing ever is... you should know this much already, Izabella..."
"But I am here with you. And not just me.. your brother asked me to take care of you. We care. Windia cares."
"That is more than most of us can ask for, my dear..."
She leans her face against Iselsis' hair, filling her with warmth, as she whispers, "I will still have to order you to do your job, however..."
Iselsis: She pulls back slightly at the mention of my brother, looking quite surprised at first, until slowly recognition dawns on her face as she puts two and two together.
”My brother... he's the voidwalker who came for me in Blue Wind, isn't he? I couldn't recognize him... guess I'm not the only de Windia to get good at hiding."
She leans back against Faina's shoulder, closing her eyes and soaking in the type of warmth she hadn't felt for so very long. She nods her head slightly. "I know... my sister is dead already. I'll only be helping her to release her from the torment of being a monster..."
She bites her lower lip slightly. After all, I would know, wouldn't I?
Faina: "Good... remember, we wish you to follow her first. Only dispose of her when needed..."
She says, her breath coming slowly... warming. The scent of northern flowers about her filling Iselsis, and with eyes closed, one mine imagine herself on a field in the spring... as Faina stalled her response to the first question.
"Yes... he is. He has been watching you for quite some time, but... he never comes any close. He talks to me, however... he is the Durant's trump card. Out of all the people on that room, one of the only ones who comes, goes and does what he wishes in our organization..."
Iselsis: She smiles a little. Apparantly people did care, and she'd been mistaken all along.
"He wouldn't let me fight the acolyte. He pulled his rapier on me, I pointed my plasma repeater at him. All in the family, I guess. Did he tell you that?"
Then some random thought seems to snap her out of her reverie and she stares incredulously at Faina. "Wait, does this mean you're coming with me?"
Faina: "Whisper did, she heard from him. He did not want you to go fight an anathema. He wishes to protect you..." She smiles, a little bit embarassed. "No... I am not. And I am hurting his trust right now. Since I am asking you to go to your sister.."
Iselsis: She seems a little dissapointed at that, but understood. Faina was someone very important in Windia, though she never quite fully grasped how and why. Maybe she'd find out sometime.
Her brow furrows at the mention of spying on Selina. "Why wouldn't he want me to do that? She killed our parents... ruined our lives, and became a monster."
Faina: "She did." Faina says, taking a flower and nesting it on Iselsis' hair once again. "Is it any surprise he will not wish his kid sister anywhere near such monster? That he does not wish to lose anything else?"
"He is... an interesting person." She smiles, "Someone so contained, so focused, and yet... you... Selina... set something else in him. He would be sent if we knew he could keep it professional.. what we know he cannot."
"Not hard to see what Whisper saw on him..."
Iselsis: She nods her head again. "He seemed a lot more powerful than even I am though... but I see what you mean. When... when I yelled at him that the acolyte knew more about me, what I am and what will become of me... the void dropped from his face. He was rattled, I could tell."
But even as she says this, her mind is on something else entirely, and only relating this to not break the flow of conversation and tip off that she was somewhere else entirely with her thoughts.
Swift Whisper. The woman she'd forgot once, if she hadn't forgotten her more than that. Even now it was hard to remember her, but she could.
Those who wish to not be remembered by their peers must have something to hide... I don't trust her.
Faina: "He... probably is. I don't know wether they ever forced the limits of either of you... but what he gave himself to... and the arts he learned, much like your own... are frighteningly powerful, yes..."
She takes a document then, wrapped up, and places between Iselsis' pants and her flesh. "This is the report on them. They were here, and are with Valencia now, the people with your sister, under the Lover's orders. The Pale Angel. The Windwraith. The Prince... know them. Be among them. Stop your sister..."
Faina leaves the document there, taking a step back, and cupping Iselsis' face on her hands.
She is still a child... the child I saw, crying, the little girl who thought herself a monster.. the little girl I tried to kill the emotions off... the.. young woman..
Yes, that is what she is now...
And then, Faina comes closer, and her lips touch Iselsis'. Gentle, seeming to melt Iselsi' own.. and keeping there for a long, long moment. "... stop your sister, and return to us. We will be waiting..."
Iselsis: She curls her fingers around the envelope, and nods as Faina speaks. Seemed different than before. Probably because it was. She still expects Faina to remove her hands, turn, and simply walk out the same she had always done, not prepared for all these sudden changes at all.
Then Faina's lips touch her own. Her eyes slowly close as she melts into the kiss...
The envelope slips from her trembling fingers and falls to the floor...
Things would never be the same again...
And she was glad...
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