between the greys of shadow and stone, vaelena watches over AURION PYKE in silence. ╱ @bloomsred
there was a sickness that came with the sea. it turned the stomachs of land-borne men, slipping their innards inside-out like lambskin gloves, and stole away the good hearts of those who lived by the salt by rending from them their affection for all else. it had turned her ill in its own way, vaelena knew — a pearl was borne from the affliction of its host — but she loved dearly her own indisposition.
as another licked by the depths, it’s his ailment that she looks for between the blades of his shoulders — watching as salt accumulates there from the effort he expends, trying to read the sweat the way some harridans gauge arrangements of cards. it’s the malady she’s interested in. the sickness. she thinks she can see something there in the way he bends over the whetstone, tight as the hook in a dying creature.
“i never met your father, lord pyke.” she slips forth unheard, a little blade that has worn softly through its sheath and been stuck gently between your ribs.