Dissonance | Rhee & Celine
Riding day in and day out, Rhee has found his own little niche of success in each wolf village he visited - it started with him going to the furthest cast villages, closer to the slums where poverty led to quicker reactions, then nearer to the capitol, engaging even well-educated nobles in street fights. As much as he loathed Aurelia for all that it’s worth, he loved its need for approval - to seek validation in knowing that they are the strongest and most supreme of any and every kingdom. Competition was just that. And with the war and the death of King Santiago, matters were only made worse - and that really aided in twirling them all around at the ends of his fingertips on little strings, pitting them against each other. Rhee loved it. He grew to adore watching the people fight amongst themselves, in human and wolf form - with their weapons drawn out or relying solely on their hands or claws. Before the riots began, he elevated to a whole new plane of being - and it only reaffirmed itself in his mind after singlehandedly destroying an entire village. It took several hours, from moon up to moon down, but when all was said and done, it left him feeling cathartic. Killing was a lust-driven instinct, it stimulated the same way an alcoholic found fermented barley to be rejuvenating.
Except, as hours wore on, the more apparent Rhee’s exhaustion became to him. A lot of it linked back to one source, one common theme, but still it branched out - infecting him with loneliness, fatigue, and aggression. He knew how unreliable people were, he knew that asking anyone to help him was an automatic dead-end no matter what so he took to doing all of it on his own. And with no council to guide him, no support system to turn to in times of crisis or personal confliction, Rhee was left to let all of it fester. His own thoughts and emotions were eating him alive inside and had been for months now, slowly picking away at him in their endlessly constant cycle, remaining in his head and intensifying - making everything else that much more daunting of a task than it had to be. It made things like sleep a near impossible task for him to do now, even more so after the now newly heralded Queen of Aurelia threatened him openly. At most, he could manage to sleep four hours a night but even then, he always drifted in a state of in-between to a point where when he settled on just staying up out of necessity, Rhee wondered if he had truly slept at all. He was paranoid that he would be captured or ambushed, that someone or a group of people - even his own militia - would come from around a bend and seize hold of him in such a vulnerable state. Sleep had become another nuisance to him. Another enemy. So he refrained from it.
Instead, to busy himself, he pressed both himself and his horse to carry him from village to village all day and all night. There, he would gather members of his militia and any new recruitments, he’d get the required updates then he would move on - by instigating a mass of brawls or just taking to the next place. During this, he went back and forth from the woman blacksmith he commissioned to deliver the silver weaponry he requested she make for him. Slowly but surely all of those that followed under his hand would be armed like him - their skill, on the other hand, was a different matter. Recently, he took to engaging them in the riots to really prepare them beyond training, to give them experience so they would know what it feels like to have actual fists and swords thrown at them, to know what it feels like to be swiped at or tackled by a wolf. The ones that were trained like him or had good enough knowledge on their own trained those who were novices, Rhee made sure of that. How any of them hadn’t turned away from him yet left him in bafflement; it was as if he sometimes forgot the message he made known to all of them, it was as if the traitor he brutalized then stomped on didn’t exist on his mind any longer. But all of them were aware of it and still, it wasn’t just him - it was the objective of them all coming together. Regardless of their reason for joining, they all wanted to take the monarchies down. Did they want genocide like Rhee did? Perhaps some did, but not all of them. Those that didn’t, Rhee was sure they knew of their fate anyways - if he was fated to die, then so were they.
With the new Queen, more people seemed ready to disparage the crown than ever before. This was good news to Rhee, it was a new market of people he could take advantage of and use - wolves he could add to his growing army. Sooner or later, Queen Catarina would learn of her place on the totem pole - how low she truly was without her people to support her or be loyal enough to willingly die for her. Rhee would make sure of that. He wanted to personally cut off the heads of her council members and hang them like lanterns all along her room; he wanted to use her mother’s bones as broth seasoning and the rest of her body as a three-course meal. He wanted to string up the Queen’s closest confidants and drain them slowly of their blood, to have Catarina watch while he made her suffer by his hand - because he knew how to exploit people’s weaknesses, he knew where to strike and how much venom to use. Catarina’s image lived inside of her people and if she had no one left, then who was she really? How strong would she be without their guidance, their voice for her reasoning? The riots was only just the beginning and none of that even scratched against the surface of the monstrosity done by him for the past decade. His body count had no number, merely just an estimation - villages worth of collateral damage. Even cities. It had been a mistake on her behalf to call him a traitor, to not seize after an opportunity that her own mother and father would have greedily taken at his proposal - it was valuable information, it was the perfect opportunity to fulfill on a bounty of Ronsaella’s most wanted woman. It would have been another marker of pride for Aurelia. Did Catarina not understand that? How competitive her nation is? Was she incapable of seeing the victory Aurelia would have had, boasting of yet another success and titling themselves as great for such an accomplishment. If she had been smart about it, peace could have prospered, the resistance would’ve had an entire realm to fight against - but she didn’t know, no, she relied on the people but even now, they were unhappy with her succession.
Rhee never had been prince or such high-tier nobility, he never was raised to seek after anyone such as that - he only knew how to survive, he only knew how to find strength out of weakness and use that to his advantage. And Catarina gave him an entire weapon to dismantle her throne. In a way, that was already a victory but he could not stop yet. He never could, never will. He wanted to storm into the castle next, he wanted to break through its walls and set everything on fire. He wanted to burn Catarina’s world down. She could have had all of his help, she could have won and been given the final key to unlock the way to actual peace…
Only now, Rhee was here - facing against three sides. He truly was backed into a corner and he would fight just as he always has. Everything he has done for the past two months has been done out of preparation. He had to catch up, he had to recover from lost time. And it exhausted him to no end. It left him literally bloody from head to toe, it left him angry and frustrated that he had to do all of this on his own. But that was fate at work, wasn’t it? A lone wolf. He would always be a lone wolf and the only one who he could rely on was himself, no matter what. Sometimes it hurt him deeply than any other sword or claws could. The only person who he thought could be a pinnacle of support for him no longer crossed his mind as much anymore - her place was amongst the others. Either way, she or one of her resistance members would kill him. Everything he has built and created for himself would be destroyed in a matter of a few seconds by himself or someone else, and death was only a beckoning call away but if he had to die, he would do it by his own hand - just like he has for everything else in his life. He would give no one the satisfaction of destroying him completely and finally. That was the same principle he applied when he exposed himself as the true wolf killer he is, that village of bodies all dragged to the center market for wandering travelers to find. His resignation from the knighthood, after years of abuse and dehumanization, served as his official declaration that this was a war of him versus the entire world.
Now the hunt for him would begin. Rather than go elsewhere, rather than stray away and command for his militia to begin influencing devastation in Sansoria where he knew more members resided, Rhee headed for his tudor - a place that no longer felt like home. Returning after his time away in the forest became less of an option for him - it was a known place, a surefire way of finding him immediately, and what could he accomplish if he lingered on his grounds? Until eventually, it had been entire weeks since he’s stepped foot into the foyer and set his gear down which had become just as weighted as him. On his mind was preparation for a new chapter in his life - living as a known devil chasing after darkness to remain hidden within. It was liberating to unravel the bow that held him together as a chivalrous knight, it carried him this far and would have for longer, but this was the path he was destined to be on. If Catarina wanted to chase him then he would flee ahead of time while there was a celebration. For those that supported her, this was a grand, rejoicing day but for Rhee, it was a new layer of hell he gained access to. How soon would it be until he reached the tenth and final?
But sitting atop his steed, slowing its once charging speed to a saunter, there present to him was a thrumming heartbeat. Fuck, he swore in his head because he knew what that meant and he had managed to not think about her once since April’s full moon. The hair along Rhee’s nape and forearm raised, his attention reaching a new state of vigilance than ever before. All he wanted to do was gather his essentials, burn down his home then leave. What did she want? To lecture him? To kill him? Or to offer a proposition that he’d undoubtedly refuse because he would never work with or for her. Dread filled in the pit of his stomach and his hands tightened their grip around the leather reigns. “Come out, come out wherever you are, little lamb,” He lilted, feigning indifference at her felt presence. It was suffocating how easily she could infect him. Rhee loathed it. Absolutely, entirely, completely detested it. He fucking hated her. He didn’t understand how quick that could happen. Her venom, it seemed, worked faster than his own - all it took was the sound of her heart, the faint smell of her scent to launch him into this state of tension. With everything else going on, he didn’t need this. He was doing just fine on his own - which, technically, meant that he was obviously miserable and his own delirium was consuming him alive like liquid silver seeping into his heart.
The grounds surrounding his tudor were vacant, his servants away tending to the festivities outside of the capitol or holed up in their living quarters. They had kept his land maintained and pleasant which meant that the inside of his home was just as well. Coming to a halt outside, Rhee remained atop his horse’s saddle as he looked across his surroundings - for her. It didn’t help that he could smell her - even if she wore dead wolf skin or used their blood to cover her own, Rhee could always pick her out in a crowd. It was frustrating, that amidst all of this chaos - his own messy blend of internal damnation and a further aggravated kingdom - she could fuck all of it up. It was times like these where he wished for the world where she never sat across from him, never touched him, never spoke to him. It made him wish for the alternative path that he should have taken, the one he knew he would have been successful at when becoming an alpha. He should have left her to die between the borderlands of Aurelia and Sansoria that night; there were so many things he could have done differently to never be here right now and it even went beyond Celine. Then an idea presented itself to him. All of his aggression had been pent up, contained in his tense, restless body - used only as motivation in the fights he participated since demanding all of Aurelia prove themselves and their strength to win. He was reminded of how much he wanted to hurt her, to make her bleed and maybe this was what she wanted. A fight. He would give her that. Slowly she had ebbed into the background of his mind, his vendetta against her being overshadowed by more demanding circumstances - and even if she and the resistance were still apart of the larger movement, he always thought he could deal with that in time. And at this point, Rhee didn’t know how much of her he wanted in his life anymore. A ghost of a whisper told him that he wanted her still, that he always would no matter what, but a disdainful part of himself loathed even acknowledging that as undeniable fact. He prided himself in being able to separate himself from the idea of a true bond but how distant had he really become? All he had done was push away feelings and thoughts, locking it away behind a door - first done out of spite, out of vengeance, and it became easier until he convinced himself of an illusion.
Still, he took the time to come up with a story for the day he would see her again. He came up with a ghost of a woman. Even during his lone massacre, he had been captivated by a white pearl pressed into a silver band - a ring from a noblewoman. He ripped it right off of her rigid finger before moving onto the next body, a fellow knight - a younger one, probably just graduated the ranks.
Maybe he could mess with her too if she still even cared about him as much as she pretended to before in that cave. Either way, he’d find a way to tear her asunder - he still wanted to hurt her and those feelings were returning with a powerful, unyielding force. Did she know what she was walking into? Did she know that she wouldn’t be confronting the Rhee she knew previously, she was going to be confronting the one who ran rampant throughout all of Aurelia at age eighteen, convinced just as he is now that he is unstoppable, unreachable, and untouchable. He pulled free the ring and rolled it around in his hands before he hopped down from his horse, pocketing the jewelry. The only reason Celine was here was to scold him, he was sure; he probably trespassed onto her territory somewhere at some point but she must know by now all of Aurelia belonged to him, being claimed in gradual succession. The only way she’d reclaim anything she owned is by killing him, and he never made that a very easy goal. His entire life leading up to this very point spoke of his success. Death was merely a friend at this point, the one he reaped souls for in return for the glance of fate at what should have been a killing blow. Plenty of people wanted him dead, he wouldn’t give them the pleasure. Moving to his door, Rhee waited with it ajar, looking out into the horizon. All he wanted was to get his things and leave with rising flames in his wake, now all of that was being put on hold - whatever her reason was for visiting, he really hoped it wouldn’t be for very long. He had things to do and he knows she does too. She was wasting his and her time by being here.
Rhee was rugged - he needed a bath, he needed a change of clothes, he needed to replace his leather cloak. Everything that once was contained neatly inside was brandished for all to see: in his eyes, in how he carried himself with an arrogant confidence and insatiable bloodlust, in the smell of scents of the dead - both new and old all coaxed on him. He was the living embodiment of feral madness.
He spoke with agitation in his tone, “What have you come to bitch to me about?”
