‘Verse: Resistance
Story: Unlikely Salvation, co-author @whump-sprite
Timeline: Arc 5, Ariadne has been rescued from interrogation
Home Again, pt1
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Reyan is invisible until the door closes behind him. As soon as she lays eyes on him Ari tries to get up. Relief and fear blur into each other, coming together as a hot, unnameable spike of emotion behind her sternum.
She wants to go to him. Reyan will protect her – from the feds, from Dev, from the world.
But her ankle blazes with pain on pain and she cannot make it take her weight, not for all the will in the world.
"Hey," Reyan says to her. "Let's go home." His smile is worried and gentle.
Shame closes over Ariadne like thick, filthy swamp water, and she can't breathe.
It takes all the will she can muster not to hide her face in bandaged hands. She hugs her elbows tight against her body, ignoring all the places that hurt to move.
“‘kay,” she manages, in a very thin, strained voice.
Reyan moves a hand as he approaches. Ari can’t look at him but she glimpses the faint glow that trails behind his fingers. She expects a spike of irrational panic – and when it doesn’t happen the feeling is like missing a step.
She sits frozen, paralysed between the need to pull away and hide, and the shame of being seen to react so childishly. When Reyan reaches down to her, she very stiffly gives him her less-bad arm.
She’s been picked up with magic enough times to recognise the buoyant feeling as it takes most of her weight. She feels too dirty to touch, but her ankle doesn't give her much option but to fall against Reyan as he pulls her upright.
His body is warm against hers. The steady support makes Ari's heart ache. She wants it. She can't stand it. She doesn’t deserve it. She needs it.
Reyan knows better than to put an arm across her back, and she’s pathetically grateful for that.
“Take care of yourself out there,” Dev tells her at the door, “I’d hate to see all my hard work go to waste.”
“Thank you,” Ari answers softly. “For… all the help.”
She means it. She hasn't forgotten screaming and begging for them, but it feels… distant. This time, they have been good to her, and she needed it so badly.
Reyan makes it easier for her to walk than it ever was leaning on Dev. She's lighter, and the splints don't dig in the same way, the breaks – all the breaks, ankle and feet and arms and ribs – don't shift as painfully with every step. She can only guess that Reyan's magic is wrapped invisibly round her broken limbs, keeping them steady. She’s grateful for that, she’s intensely grateful.
(Would he still expend that energy on her if he knew the whole truth?)
A thought tries to form, while the elevator goes down and Ari has a chance to catch her breath, about what kinds of faults Reyan would or wouldn't judge her for. But then they’re moving again and she loses the idea, loses everything but the narrow focus on keeping her balance and forcing her limbs to move.
When they get to the car – not a vehicle she recognises, doesn’t matter – she all but falls into it. She would fall, and probably hurt herself worse, if not for Reyan’s magic. Instead she’s lowered carefully onto the back seat.
“What’s easiest for you?” Reyan asks. “Want to lie down? Sit sideways?”
The car isn't wide enough to lie full length. She doesn't want to fold her bad leg up, but if she sits sideways how will she brace herself against the movement of the car…?
She almost starts crying again just trying to figure it out. Sharp humiliation cuts inside her chest and behind her eyes.
“Just… just the normal way?” she wavers. Her back is all tightly wrapped in Dev’s neat bandages. Maybe resting it against the car seat won't be so intolerable. It's a less terrifying prospect than being thrown around on every turn.
She doubts her decision as soon as she leans back.
Reyan watches her with concern in his eyes as she tries to settle. His hand rests briefly on the front of her shoulder. The simple gesture sends a fresh lance of guilt through Ari’s heart.
“I’m sorry,” she blurts out, only barely remembering not to sir him. “They – got everything I know, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.”
Reyan leans a hand on the roof of the car. He's trying to make eye contact but Ari can't lift her gaze from her lap. “Most of what you knew is no longer true,” he says.
Ari clings to the assurance like a lifeline. She told herself the same, in the long hours between tortures. Tried to hope that they’d treat everything she knew as compromised.
“They have mindfuckers,” Reyan says.
Yes, Ari tries to confirm, but she’s choked up and it comes out as a tiny croak of an “‘s.”
“We knew it.”
Tears are spilling uncontrolled down her cheeks again. Reyan shifts stiffly as if to get into the back seat with her, so Ari – a little bewildered – shuffles over to make room. Anders sits carefully on the edge of the seat beside her, takes her arm, and pulls her in close.
Baffled, Ari is pliable in his hands. He guides her – not forcefully, almost hesitantly – to put her better arm across his chest, and lets his hand linger on her upper arm. His other hand goes to the back of her head, fingers sliding carefully through her hair.
A sob wells up in Ari’s chest, then another. She buries her face in the crook of Anders’ neck and clings as the tears overtake her.
“I’m sorry,” she cries, over and over. “I’m so sorry, I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay,” Anders repeats in answer, over and over to match her apologies. “It’s okay.”
Slowly, almost cautiously, his hand moves across her scalp, stroking through her hair as Ariadne weeps wretchedly into his shoulder.
She’s seen him throw lightning from those hands. She’s been pinned beneath them while his magic cut into her mind. Some part of her thinks that she should be scared – but she isn’t. She has nothing to hide, not from him. If he hurts her, it will only be because she deserves it. She trusts, absolutely, that whatever he chooses will be right.
And he’s choosing to hold her.
He knows what they took from her and he still wants to hold her. She’s still worth something to him. She still deserves comfort.
Slowly, she’s able to stop putting voice to the apologies.
The tears take longer to stop. She sobs long enough and hard enough that she can scarcely breathe through the stabbing pain of her broken ribs. Anders doesn’t let go. His hand rubs gently up and down the back of her head, not pausing, not changing pace, until the sobs tail off gradually into sniffles, until the shaking stops and at last even the tears run dry and Ari starts to almost fall asleep on his shoulder.
She startles a little when he moves.
“You’re okay,” he tells her gently. His hand on her arm guides her to sit up, and reluctantly she does. “Let’s get out of here, shall we? Alex will have my head if I don’t bring you back soon.”
Ari nods, perhaps a little too sharply. She wants to ask how Alex is. If he’s been hurt, if he’s been overusing his magic, if he’s okay. She wants to ask about Taryn, and Peyroux, and everyone else.
But she can’t find the words. There are none in her head. All of the energy has drained out of her with the tears, leaving her exhausted and empty, thin and grey and dried up inside.
Reyan closes the door on her and lets himself into the driver’s seat, and Ari sits silent and passive in the back where he left her.
His driving isn’t kind on her back where her weight presses it against the seat. But even the pain feels somehow irrelevant, faded and far away like everything else. The world slips past outside the window. Ari’s gaze slides aimlessly over the buildings but she doesn’t see any of it, and she doesn’t think anything at all.
cw: intimate whumper, whumper pov, some creepy creatures, rayla is very high
Shogan froze on their hands and knees on the floor, chest heaving. Fuck. They needed a moment, several actually, to process what had just happened.
Rayla had almost killed them. And the whole fucking court had gone silent to watch. Shogan caught their breath, put their pants back on because they were a civilized daemon and chasing naked after someone naked was not even the least bit classy.
They forced out a hearty laugh, smiling wide even as their cheeks got hot. “That was fun, darling!” Shogan called out after her. “You almost got me! Almost!”
They crashed back onto the barstool and sighed. Rayla was...something else. She had snarled and glared but had played their game. It was amazing. Finally, after all these centuries, there was someone who challenged them without a hint of fear or obedience. Someone who played with them on her own rules.
“You just got your ass handed to you.” Al Gluz popped back up behind the bar, fixing herself another drink. Shogan smiled lazily, still thinking about Rayla. How she sounded and tasted, how her skin felt under their fingers, how she wore her scars like a shining suit of armor. Her lips too, she should've kissed them before the severed head. Oh, the sweet taste of a razorblade dipped in honey would be divine.
Rayla’s eyes were sharp as daggers, the color of human blood and just as beautiful. Shogan realized, ever so slowly as a chill ran through them, just how badly those eyes called. They’d give anything for the chance to hold that girl another time, fight with her, hurt her, love her, fuck her, whatever, as long as they were with her. Rayla was right, Mor herself couldn’t save Shogan from whatever she planned to do with them, because it was impossible to save someone who didn’t want to be saved.
“I did,” They mused. Pick a god and pray, Shogan. The way she had said their name did something to Shogan, they weren’t sure what. None of them will save you, not from me.
Without a second thought, Shogan grabbed Rayla’s dress from its puddle on the floor and ran after her. She was still bleeding, they’d dug into her sides with everything they had, plus the stab wound. There was no telling how much pain she was in, and that was before…
Shogan cursed to themself as they turned the corner and spotted Rayla. Everything she had drank had been poisoned or drugged to kill her. If she survived the night, amazing. If not, her corpse would be lovely too.
“Rayla!” They called out and grabbed her wrist.
Their touch felt like lighting on her bare wrist, and Rayla spun around in a single motion, pressed her knife to their throat.
“Don’t get familiar.” She snapped, just a bit of rage in her cool tone. She couldn’t take another second of it, not right now with the taste of a corpse fresh on her tongue. Being stripped completely bare in front of Shogan didn’t help, even if she did her best to intimidate as she locked eyes with them. “The next time you touch me without permission, you’ll lose a hand. Maybe some more body parts.”
Rayla waited for a moment, pressing the tip of her blade in enough for a thin trickle of blood to roll down their neck. Shogan feared death, and now they were at the mercy of their blade. She made them bleed, she could make them die, and Rayla made sure to give just the smallest hint of a wicked smile to let them know she meant it. For now their infatuation could be useful and she could tolerate a bit of violation, but if Shogan crossed the line Rayla promised herself she’d kill them without hesitation and feel nothing. Hopefully they knew that.
Slowly, Shogan nodded, and she let them step away. She noticed them holding up her dress. “You forgot this.” They smiled. “And you’re bleeding, darling, I could patch you up.”
“I’m fine.” She replied quickly. It was starting to hurt,but it was just blood. Just pain. Rayla would take it, that’s what she was built for.
She got dressed without saying anything, eyes focused on a stained glass window overlooking the lands of Hel. Through one of the clear panels, Rayla could make out the dim blue glow of that trench filled with helfire that seemed to crack through all of Hel. She saw the direction she had come and the footbridge that led towards the sea, but what caught her attention was the sprawling forest looming in the distance. Shogan had called it the evil forest, if she remembered correctly. It was orderless, standardless it seemed. What was bad enough to make even Shogan think twice?
"That's bullshit, darling. I'm not without my manners, I insist." Their voice held its usual blasé amusement, but she swore they seemed somewhat concerned.
"You feel bad about hurting me?" Rayla clocked her head. From what she had seen, Shogan didn't seem the type for remorse.
Shogan pursed their lips. "Hurting you felt...well, it's been awhile since I had someone I didn't break. I want you to heal and not be in pain, if that's what you mean, but I'd absolutely hurt you again if you let it slide." Their eyes twinkled, and Rayla let a small smile creep over her face. It was practiced and calculated. Shogan was without a doubt deranged with a horrifying idea of love and violence. But they were fascinated with Rayla, and she could use that. Another day, another sadist wrapped around her finger. “Would you let it slide?”
Rayla chuckled a little, the sound light and airy. Shogan was her pawn now, her tool, her knife pointed at Mor’s back. “You’ll have to find out,” she said, the words cold and no nonsense.
Shogan turned their back for a moment, and Rayla took the opportunity to sit on the windowsill and look out to the land surrounding her. The forest seemed to call, as if the trees knew too that she was a foreigner, someone who did not belong. In one fluid motion, Rayla kicked through the panel, smashing an artistic depiction of Mor in all her holy glory into fragments of glass. Just as Shogan’s head turned, Rayla pushed herself out, unfurling her wings behind her before she could think twice.
Fuck.
For a moment she fell, plummeting downwards as wind slapped her in the face, pounding on her like a torrent of rain. But then she stretched her wings out as far as the aching muscles would go and the air seemed to catch her. She glided up, smiling a little. It was like walking on clouds, free and unbound by anything.
For a moment, the weight of her shoulders disappeared.
She flew in a jagged line towards the forest, each flap of her wings exhausting her further as Rayla did her best to go in a straight line. But gods below, her head pounded, her body hurt, she was sure bruises were forming on her throat form where Shogan had grabbed her, and-
Rayla barely had time to put her arms out in front of her on instinct as she slammed headfirst into a pillar above the bridge. There was a sharp crack and pain stabbed up through her wrist as she tumbled, a flailing, undignified spiral of limbs and wings.
Rayla ragdolled when she hit the bridge, closing her eyes and giving up on moving for a moment. The impact might as well have moved all her internal organs around for how she felt now- like shit.
Fuck. She wasn’t sure how long she laid there in an aching sort of purgatory as her body decided whether or not to be conscious. She opened her eyes and lifted her head a bit, spitting blood onto the worn stone.
Something poked her shoulder and she turned, fury coursing through her blood with the same determined frustration as it had every time Katara knocked her down. Even time jvar hurt her.
She was getting sick and tired of falling down. But that’s what she was built for after all, to fall and get hurt and endure all the pain the world would give her and still. Hit. back.
“Please tell me you didn’t fuck Shogan.” It was Randiel staring down at her, his voice a nasally squawk. He poked her with the stick again, her eyes finally focusing. “That was enough of a mess for one day.”
Rayla brushed him off for a moment, pressing her hands on the ground as she peeled herself up off it. She bit back a scream as blinding pain shot through her wrist again. Rayla stared at her arm, not having it in her to be alarmed at the splinter of white bone sticking out of her skin. In fact, she didn’t have enough energy left to do much else then get to a slightly more dignified sitting position and poke the bone back in place with her other hand.
At that, she screamed, the agony hot and sharp.
“Don't do that.” Randi looked down at her still, poking her forehead with his beak. “You didn’t answer my question. Or my riddles. I’m not asking for a lot. Just one question and three riddles.” Randi was harder to read, his eyes black voids and a beak instead of a mouth. His body language didn’t make much sense to her either. He swayed in the wind, hopping on the balls of his feet like a bird resting on a precarious tree branch.
Once again, Rayla brushed him off, putting all of her focus into not passing out. “What’s in the forest?”
He poked at her forehead again with the point of his beak, right between the eyes. “If through the bridge you want to be, you must answer me my riddles three.”
Rayla groaned and stood up, hissing with pain. “I don’t have time for this.” She stumbled towards the forest with a mind in tunnel vision, the place called to her and she had to know why.
Randi stopped her, stepping in front in a speedy blur and planting himself solidly in her path. He had a walking stick, maybe it was a staff, she wasn't sure. It seemed to be made of solid black wood and steel, nothing special. But still was hel, it couldn’t be that simple.
“Riddles. When the moonlight dances on the sea, who will end up on their knees? That’s up to ye.” They chirped. “Who, Rayla? Who?”
Rayla’s head was spinning, she could barely think enough to walk, let alone solve his stupid fucking riddles. And where was the Akkator? She almost missed his grating voice in her head.
“I don’t know and I don’t care. I’m going through.” She tried to power through him, but he held out his stick and pushed her back.
“Riddles, Rayla. I am the guardian of the bridge. This is my domain, yes?
She took another step, but he pushed her back all the same, a flurry of black and blue feathers that seemed to know how she’d move before she did.
“Why did Shogan call this place evil?” She said, stumbling over her words. Alcohol, drugs, poison, all of it was getting to her.
Randi just laughed. “A question for a question? Clever. Shogan follows Mor blindly, they all do. Her court, her kingdom, her world. This forest does not. The world is black and white, yes? Sinners and saints.” Rayla was tiring of his games, even as she tried to think over his words. Maybe he was the village idiot, maybe he was the enemy of her enemy. “When a sinner kisses a sinner, she tastes death. When a saint kisses a saint, he tastes life. When a sinner kisses a saint, what does she taste?”
Rayla blinked, the metaphor hitting too close to what Shogan had her do. Randi’s eyes were pits too, but at least when she looked into them, all she sall was a black void, no sign anything was ever in the eye socket. Similar, but not the same.
“ A sinner tastes death?” she mumbled. “A saint tastes life? This is...look, I don’t have time for this.”
Randi tilted his head. “It’s a riddle, yes? Surely the girl who prides herself on her mind can handle a simple riddle. Indulge me, I’ve gotten lonely. For fourteen years I’ve been so lonely, Rayla. Just answer my riddles.” Even though he didn’t have lips, Rayla swore he pouted.
“Well I’m not. I’m getting into that forest like it or not. Move or I will take my claws, jam them right into your eye, and out the back of your skull, and then I’m going to fling you over the side of the bridge into the hellfire. And I will feel no remorse.”
She said it with such icy conviction Rayla was sure he’d step aside, but Randi just chuckled. “When poison bubbles on your lips, from what desire do you sip?”
Rayla scowled. “I. Don’t. Know.” From her throbbing wrist, Rayla willed a thin tendril of blood to snake out from her wrist and coil around the nearest overhanging tree branch. She used it to lift herself off the ground, flinging over Randi and landing in a crouch behind him on the forest floor. He turned, but did not pursue. Randiel clapped.
"Bravo, bravo, you've outsmarted me, I know when I am bested." He laughed. "I wish you the best of luck, Rayla Asarova, daughter of Evali Asarova the fire titan if the west and great Khan of the Dothras clan, the reaper, the Godslayer, the lady of blessed murder. I wish you luck to all of your many faces." He squawked.
Rayla's blood ran cold. He knew her. He knew her past, he knew what had just happened without witnessing it.
Somehow, he had information.
He had power.
Rayla hoped her face didn’t betray the pure shock, but it was futile. She tried to collect herself. “How?”
He chirped, laughing as he rested weight on his stick. “You aren’t the only one who knows things. But I like you, want some advice?” He asked. “Shogan doesn’t lie, except to themself. It doesn’t matter what they told you while they went down on you in public, Mor will always be first to them. You’re just the novel, special thing, yes? They’ll kiss Mor’s ass anytime, they’ll betray you for her, they have her back over yours. How you proceed is up to ye, but how did that severed head taste?”
Rayla blinked, taken aback. Somehow he knew, somehow he had seen it all. That had to be a power of his. She tilted her head, biting her tongue. She’d held her words back for years, she could wait another minute or two so she wouldn't sputter out words like she’d lost her mind.
“You mean they don’t love me?” She asked, her face cold.
Randi nodded. “They want you, but you won’t survive them. When they have to choose, they will choose Mor. They will abandon you, they will leave you begging and crying and they’ll say they love you and they have no choice but that’s the lie they tell themself so they can sleep at night. With or without you in their bed. “
Rayla nodded with them, a lot of pieces falling into place. There was an unmistakable bite to Randi’s words, he had lived this. Was he a lover, a friend, a one night stand? It didn’t matter. He was bitter. He was an enemy of Mor and Shogan alike, someone she could keep in her back pocket to stand against them.
“If they do that, I won’t cry.” she turned around. “I’ll hurt them worse. But they won’t do that. Because I don’t love them. They have Mor’s back. I’ll make them stick a knife in it.”
Rayla walked off into the forest, the sound of Randi’s laughter ringing in her ears. “That’ll be our little secret!” They squawked out.
The path ahead was dark. Rayla stumbled through the forest brush, dim, reddish light wafting down from gods knew what in the sky. Maybe something was getting to her head, but Rayla swore she heard something in the underbrush, whispering and scampering around as it watched her every move.
And then there were the eyes. At first, it just seemed to be two softly glowing violet orbs that blocked her path, floating in the air. Then she squinted, and realized they belonged to the outline of a creature that had no outline to speak of. The shape was frothy, jagged and ever shifting like mist. She’d met one of these creatures before in the catacombs she had been forced to mine in. Rayla watched it now just as she had then. The ones in the catacombs had jumped and climbed, agile and feline like a panther.
The one that sat before her now hadn’t taken a shape. It's just there. Watching. Staring. Its eyes did not blink.
We are the Etharii.
The voice came from all sides, echoing inside her head as it bounced off the walls of her skull.
“What?” she mumbled. “What?” The ones in the cavern hadn’t spoken, she didn’t know they could. They had moved with purpose, she’d picked up a few tricks about how to creep around in the dark as if she were a ghostly wraith in a land of solid things, but they had never spoken.
We are the Etharii.
It was louder this time, and part of Rayla, however begrudging, wanted the Akkator’s voice back in her head. It was better than whatever this thing was, rattling around in her bones like an infection.
We can hear him. He screams. For you cannot.
Her head was spinning, eyes glazing over as she almost fell down. Her body was crashing, fuck.
The creature, the etharii as it had called itself, moved towards her. More accurately, it walked to her and stepped circles around her, eyes never blinking. Maybe the violet eyes weren’t actually eyes, the windows to an ever shifting soul.
You cannot hear him. But do you hear the rest? Do you hear the screams? Do you hear the fallen?
For the first time in a long time, Rayla had no idea what was going on as the etharii crept closer. Closer. Closer still.
Do you hear the screams, Rayla Asarova? Do you hear the wails and shrieks and moans?
“Of...of the dead?” She pondered aloud. Normally she could always hear the faint voices, even though her ears had learned to dampen them. But now they were quiet. She had heard the voice of the severed head. But no more. Why not? “Or...the Akkator?” He had disappeared.
He is gone from you. He does not belong in her kingdom.
It had to be some drug she'd been slipped or something she had drank. The akkator couldn't just vanish, could he?
Rayla laid down on the forest floor, the dirt cool and surprisingly soothing. The air wasn’t locked underground, it blew in the wind, like it had in...Cressedia, all those years ago. The sky was pitch black here, choked out by trees that oddly, didn’t seem to blow in the wind at all. Were they here at all?
“Why? Why can’t I hear, why is he gone?” Rayla’s voice was like a faint moan on the wind, hoarse and barely there. Her heart didn’t beat, barely there. She was emancipated and cold, barely there.
But at least her scars were real. Rayla ran her hands over her bare arms, feeling every bit of scar tissue. It was all real, a reminder of what she had survived, of what Jvar had done to her. He’d pay for all of it.
There are no souls in the air here. We have devoured them. We are the etharii.
Devoured the souls of daemons like Mor had wished to do to her. They were hungry like Mor, probably made by her too.
“Go hungry then.” Rayla snapped back. The air tasted sweeter here, and for just a moment, she was calm, peaceful and content alone in the dark. The only way it could have been better was if Rhyan was with her, if he were here to enjoy the freedom. What had Jvar molded him into, how had he been tortured, had whatever dungeon Jvar kept him in stifled out every last bit of life?
Rayla didn’t have another moment to consider the answers before her silence was disrupted by the crunching of leaves and aggressive shouts.
“You just let her through!” She recognized the voice, it was Shogan, a twinge of panic replacing their velvety tone. “They’ll tear her up, eat her alive!”
The etharii moved closer, more of them slipping out from the shadows. They came in all shapes and sizes, some like mist, others many limbed with slimy tongues, and still others sleek and feline as they prowled in a circle around her, growling. All had the same glowing, violet eyes.
“Fuck..” Even trying to be quiet, Shogan was loud. Rayla turned her head, still on the ground, body too heavy for her to stand. Randiel was beside them, taloned hands buried somewhere in the feathery cloak of wings that draped down his back or the flowing black of his clothes. His head was tilted, he bobbed along to the wind, swaying as the trees did not. Rayla wouldn’t have been surprised if he felt just as calmed by this place as her.
Shogan took another step closer, claws out. “Get up and run to us! Get out of here before the etharii kill you!” They growled, and she just had to laugh.
They would do no such thing, even if they wanted to. The way the creatures circles around her–eyes and fangs bared at Shogan–seemed protective. As she had learned from the daemons, if something wanted to eat her, the fangs would be aimed at her. The etharii in the catacombs under Jvar’s prison had shown her many things, not just how to move silently and climb on crevices in the walls.They always operated as one. They would circle an area like vultures, all sleep together, all hunt a daemon together.
Now they spoke as one, spoke to her. Maybe she was part of the pack to them now, something that they would protect and stay beside.
The daemon second shall not harm you. You will be cared for.
Rayla didn’t even have time to protest that she had Shogan under control, wrapped around her finger even, before she was scooped up, nothing more than a helpless ball carried off by a pack of etharii through the woods. They moved so fast that Shogan soon became nothing more than a shouting blur as they tried and failed to run after her, screaming. Screaming as if they were being killed, as if losing their new toy was agonizing.
Gods below, they were easy to manipulate, even as the etharii dropped her into a cave, Rayla couldn’t help but smile at the fact that Shogan wanted her that much.
Rayla looked up, and realized she was alone in a dark, surprisingly warm cave with nothing but shadowy creatures surrounding her.
They all seemed to touch her at once, and Rayla relaxed into the fur and mist and soft skin holding her, pulling her tight like she was one of their own.
