[Keiranon written by the lovely Toastheaven]
After the talk with Mnostovo and Santii, Sadri had a lot to think about. The more people read the case file, the more support she was finding for her cause. No one yet had accosted her over her crimes contained within the file (and perhaps one day, very reluctantly, she would admit to Keiranon that he was right), though Mnostovo being the logical collective that it was, had brought up a number of other uncomfortable truths from her report.
She'd had chances to terminate him. More than just letting him die, that was only the most recent one. The night she'd escaped, when he'd been too drunk to enunciate the commands, he wouldn't have been able to stop her slitting his throat either. And how many nights had she whiled her time away out in the cold while he slept in a stupor before a roaring fire? Though it wasn't worth mourning those lost chances, they did bring up an interesting point: she was likely to be useless as an assassin against Mavern. Mnostovo had called her out on sentimental attachment, which made no logical sense, but perhaps it was more instinctive than that. Perhaps it was as simple as the drive she'd felt to go to Azaria in Cathal, that her drive to heal humans was stronger than her want to stop him from harming others.
But there was an ace up her sleeve. As long as she was careful, and as long as everything went to plan. This could be dealt with. She smoothed her fronds back, tightening the ponytail until the base of her fronds pulled almost painfully at her head. She'd changed, shedding the blood-marked pretty clothes and exchanging them for the heavy black wool robes she wore while training. The very same ones Mavern had forced on her. Her weapons she left in her room, going to Keiranon's door unarmed, what exactly would happen when he gave the orders she wasn't sure. She didn't want to put him in any danger.
She knocked firmly on his door, already half in the mindset for training. She was a picture of discipline. Straight back, shoulders square, expression determined. Ready to work.
Keiranon answers the door promptly, much of his foliage absent but for simple coverings over his legs and torso.
"Come in, make yourself comfortable," he offers politely, gesturing to the small sitting area off from the front door before leading the way himself. He takes a deep breath as he sits-- there was no way to know how this was going to go. The words they would be testing would no doubt be tame, for Keiranon to see the sort of reaction they'd evoke in Sadrienne more than anything else, but therin was the fear. How bad was it going to be, seeing what they did to her? It was, no doubt, going to be stressful.
He starts going over the words in his head. Hopefully he had them right, and she didn't get a command to kill him by mistake.
Sadri nods, the gesture sharp and almost impersonal, flipping back the hood with one hand as was proper for being indoors. She sits, smoothing down the fabric of her robe, closing her eyes briefly. This is going to be none too pleasant for her, and she knows that. She's been preparing herself for this for days, ever since she first gave the wretched words to him. It's necessary though. Some things shouldn't be chanced, and she needs to know that Keiranon can use them as effectively as Mavern ever did.
'You need to be forceful.' she says after a moment, opening her eyes. Her voice is soft, an element of her personality comes through that seems vulgar against her harsh presentation. 'When you say those words, I have no name. I have no opinion. I am nothing to you but a construct of matter formed to fight on your command. I am your property. You only care that I survive because training another is a hassle, because my failure to win is a poor reflection on you. Understand?'
She folds her hands in her lap, lifting her chin up, her face schooled to a perfect and practiced calm. Her empathy is a different story, it wavers about and twists upon itself, tentative crackles of electricity among the winds. Skittish and anxious, unsure of what will come next.
Keiranon's empathy rolls over her and surrounds her, pulling in to hold her together.
"Is that really necissary?" he asks, a frown on his face as his waters flow over her soothingly, "The words are just... trigger words, right? I'm not sure I can think of you like that, Sadri."
'That's the sentiment behind them. At the very least, you need to be forceful.' Sadri replies, her voice as calm as her face. 'Ruinali managed to use one. I don't know what exactly it's going to take, but they need to work.
Keiranon takes a deep breath, in and out. His empathy pulls away from her, bottling up away from her but for the cursory aura he keeps as a Dreamer. He leans forward in his seat, eyeing her. His glance is soft at first, and it slowly shuts down, growing cold and hard.
"... Lasir," he says, though there's a waver in his empathy as he utters it, low and flat. It's his heart wrenching, just a little bit, behind the mask of distaste he wears on his tongue.
The reaction is almost instant, Sadrienne is out of the chair and lying with her palms flat on the ground and her head turned to one side as the last echo of the word disappears from the air. There is nothing clumsy or haphazard about the pose, the line of her back is dead straight, her legs held parallel and her toes pointed outward. Her expression is still calm, but eerily so now, she can't feel Keiranon's empathy. She appears to have no empathy of her own, the wind little more than the shallowest breath acknowledging her existence. She waits, silent and empty-eyed, for the next command.
His eyes widen somewhat as she moves, and it's unnatural. He can't feel her anymore, all but Soundless, and her eyes-- it was worse than the other night when she tried to play at emotionlessness.
Keiranon takes a moment to take it in, to settle, to accept it. This was what that Mavern did to her. This is what he made her. He would un-make him, the bladesman thinks, in good time. But now, there was a job to do. He stands, and pads towards the back rooms.
She stands in one fluid movement, her steps even and measured as she walks toward him, her expression doesn't change. If she can think and feel for herself beneath that control, it doesn't show. The commands are simple yet, though. She is still looking ahead when she stops, and waits.
He leads her to a room that he seems to be using to store gear and some equipment; His leathers purchased from Divinity's Reach hang on the wall, a collection of knives and a pair of swords sit in a pair of racks. He's set up a pull-up bar in an alcove, a bench with weights set beside them across the room.
"Aemit," he barks, gesturing to the bench, and then heading to a cabinet and pulling out a coil of vine-rope. He throws it to her. "Lygrit sket, kiri-esk. KIRI-ESK."
She wastes no time, catching the vine rope and sitting herself on the bench. Her hands work the rope expertly, weaving it about her ankles to restrain those first before lashing herself to the bench and coiling it about herself. She works fast anyway, but at the command to work faster she does. It doesn't seem to bother her that she's tying herself up on a bench, nor does it seem awkward that she -is- tying herself up. Rather, the movements seem over-practiced, something she has done over-and-over at one time. Sadrienne moves to test the tightness of the bonds and the strength of her knots, and finding it acceptably difficult to move, she stops moving.
Keiranon's brows knit together. This was... too strange, and slightly alarming. But he presses on, trying to think of other words he can test in this context.
"Release sket, das-myre." After a moment of struggle he allows her a "Balkanash," and sets to cutting the ropes himself with one of the knives from a rack. He takes the opportunity to get a good look at her, and the emptiness present. Chilling.
She struggles against the ties, obedient to the last. They're tied well and she won't escape without weapon or magic, but she throws herself against them all the same until the stop command is given and she stops to sit straight again as Keiranon cuts the ropes from around her. As he studies her she simply stares ahead, seeing him or not seeing him, it's hard to tell.
Keiranon steps back and takes a moment to think. Time to test something else. Something new. Something that must be tested, but he will likely regret.
"Gaskaro an. Kari-esk." He tenses, prepared for the onslaught. At least with the specification of slowness, it might not be so terrible.
She stands, darting quickly to one side to grab a knife, and advances on him. The blade moves fast in her hand whilst in the air, but if it touches him she will drag it slowly, trying to dig a deliberate painful line through him. Attack and slow are commands that only come together for one purpose: torture.
He backs up again, an arm snapping up to try catching her knife wrist. The speed was unexpected, and he misses, the knife dragging along his palm and drawing sap spilling down his hand. He grabs for the wrist with his other hand, cradling his injury as best he can. The word for stop. The word for stop shit what was it fuck his hand hurt.
She doesn't stop. The job isn't done, and she's not been told to. Her knife hand is still trying to move, but the other reaches for his already injured hand and tries to twist it at the wrist, a foot snaking out to try and hook him at the ankles and upset his balance.
His attention is split, trying to think of the word. He -used- it already, for fuck sakes, but the adrenaline has begun, and they were anything but instinct yet. His hand tucks in and his shoulder comes out to knock into her, knife hand lofting up to allow it, but he's taken down by the feet, pulling her down with him.
She lands with the knife still in hand, her hand still caught in his, and the fall doesn't take her by surprise. If she's surprised by the hit to her shoulder, it doesn't show, she simply keeps going. She attacks on multiple fronts, the elbow of her free arm aimed for his gut while the knife hand still struggles to get free of his grasp, ultimately she wants to pin him to the floor where she can drag out the process of killing him for as long as absolutely possible.
He wheezes at the hit, but at least like this he has a moment to think. Think, think--
"BALKANASH," he shouts, finally recalling after a long game of struggling, losing and quickly catching hold of her again. The knife comes close more than once, a tiny line of sap on his throat where he almost lost the game.
And so he lies. And pants, chest heaving, and his mind reels to catch up with him.
She stops on command, the knife drops from her fingers, and she stands. Her breath is fast from the exertion, but it slows quickly. Sadri is in damn good shape, the obsessive amount of training she does shows, but the way she fights under command is different. It's smoother, it doesn't hold back, it doesn't -think-. She wipes Keiranon's sap from her fingers onto the thick black wool of her robes.
"Hrin-an," he pants, holding his slit hand up. His sap has flowed down his wrist, flecked across the foliage over his chest. That determined that, then. The state she was in, even attacking someone she held terribly dear wouldn't break it. What did that asshole -do- to her?
Obediently she kneels, pressing her hand against his to heal the cut. It's done without empathy, she all but forces the wound to close over. What little finesse she has picked up since coming to the Inflorescence is gone. The act of healing seems to wake something in her though, a flicker of herself cracking through the deep layers of conditioning. It brushes up against him, a small, still empty wind.
This was enough. As his wound closes with a wince at the lack of gentleness, as perhaps the evidence of her hurting him disappears, his empathy reaches out and crashes over her like a warm wave, surrounding her and pulling at her, urging her to come back. His arms wrap around her, pull her tight down to him. Wake up, Sadri, wake up. That was enough.
It takes a while. She sits in his arms, stiff as a board, even as his empathy calls to her. What has escaped goes to him, it tries to tease out more from the crack in her mindset, but it's the time elapsed since the last command that ultimately erodes the walls and allows her to come back.
When she looks at him, finally herself again, it's with wide-eyed horror. The words choke in her throat, and she pushes herself away from him, desperately seeking the injured hand, the cut across his throat, a pained sob escaping her. She was in there the whole time, watching her own hand turn against him. His sap is on her clothes. She shakes her head, moving backward. No. No no no. Her empathy crackles, loud and full of hurt and anger at herself. She puts her hands to her mouth, staring. An apology is not enough. Nothing will be enough.
And she's frightened. Terrified. She's a danger to those she loves. What could be worse?
He doesn't allow her to push away, holding her tightly to him even as she tries to separate. A hand goes to the back of her head, cradling it, and he hushes to her as his empathy laps at her feet, gentle and accepting.
"It's alright, Sadri, it's alright," he hushes to her, rocking her gently, "I did it to myself, remember. It was me. It was all me."
She shrinks under his touch, she feels disgusting, and still tries to escape him. But she won't fight too hard, she doesn't dare. Sadri won't risk anything that might hurt him further, her mind turning over every moment and every action she had taken against him. Breath wheezes in and out of her, strangled by a a need to cry that is so overwhelming she can't. There's nothing okay about this, and Ruinali's words echo back to her. The fault lies with her. The knife was in her hands. No one else drew a weapon against Keiranon, only she did.
'Let me go. Let me go.' she tries to slip out, the wind of her empathy howling a pitiful tune. 'I need to go. Let me go.'
"You're fine, it's fine," he assures her, keeping her with him as well as he can. Running away wouldn't help her, make her feel better. She would wallow, he knows she would, and it would help no one. So he keeps her close, keeps her with him. He wouldn't turn away from her, not even after this. His empathy sings softly, like the singing of sirens beneath the waves. "This was good. I needed to know."
'It's not fine.' she's shaking, the fear of being controlled catching up with her as well. Her mind is playing the glint of the knife cutting into him on a loop, and with each repeat she feels worse. Ordered or not, it doesn't matter. She did it. She could have done something other than sit and watch, anything. Then, the knowledge that Mavern is out there somewhere. Mavern, who can control her the same way, and who has no qualms about using her to eliminate those who are inconvenient.
'Can I go home now? I want to go home.'
"I'll take you home," he says quietly, pressing a tender kiss to her forehead and standing, lifting her from his lap and easing her into a stand before him. His touch is always with her in some capacity however, as much as a hand on her arm before it curls and pulls around her shoulders. "Do you want me to stay? I'm not sure I like the idea of you holing up on your own, like this," he asks, brows furrowing in deep concern.
It's clear enough that she finds his touch uncomfortable, wherever it is she tries to shrink away. Only knowing that he will fight to maintain the contact stops her from trying to remove it, so she tries to make herself as small as possible and minimise the space for contact.
'No. Don't stay.' she says, though just a few hours earlier she wouldn't have cared, would have been open to the idea if he asked to. Would have sprawled across him to sleep, because nothing makes a better pillow than a good friend. Now she can't stand the idea of it. The prospect of curling in beside Scamall makes her feel just as sick, she doesn't trust herself.
'I just need to sleep it off.' she murmurs, folding her arms around herself. 'That's all.'
He pulls his arm away carefully, as though it were spines he was digging into her. She wasn't going to soften to him, her hurt went too deep. "No one here knows how to do this to you. And when Mavern comes? I'll be b-wording the fuck out of you to make sure he -never- has a chance to make you do a thing. You have no idea how much I want to see that asshole filled with holes, right now. I will never, -ever- let him use you like this, do you understand me? Never."
She rubs at her arm, looking around anywhere but at his face. His words are a slight reassurance against the raging fear, at least they've confirmed that it works. It doesn't do anything to assuage the guilt, but nothing will. She blinks, the first of a few tears slipping down the ridges of her cheeks.
'I need you to do one more thing. When we face him.'
He tentatively reaches to wipe her tears away. Should she shy, however, his hand would retract with a frown. "Anything."
She shies away from his hand, shaking her head. She doesn't want to be touched, especially by him. It feels wrong.
'I need you to order me to kill him.' she says, softly. Shakily. 'Otherwise I might not do it.'
"Are you sure that's a good idea? Remember the revenge talk, from before," he offers, hesitantly, "I realize you have every right to it, but... I just want to make sure -you're- sure it's something you feel you can handle."
He frowns, stepping away from her to lead the way out. His empathy bubbles in on itself, a touch guilty and hurt that he made her feel this way, as necissary as it was.
'I've had the chance so many times and regretted not doing it. If I don't, one of you will.' she replies, trying to keep her voice level. 'It's not about revenge. If I wanted revenge, I'd have him captured and string him up for days while I slowly harvested each organ to see how many I could remove before he couldn't function anymore.' the scenario doesn't come from anything she's overly thought of, she's always had a bent for spouting creative and brutal sounding punishments.
'It won't be easy for me. It goes against my nature to harm humans. Especially those I was, for better or worse, allied with. It's going to hurt, and I won't be happy afterwards, but it'll be over.' she pulls at the woollen robes, rubbing the rough fabric between thumb and forefinger. 'He won't be able to take anyone else. That's what I want.'
"I'll do it, if it looks like no one else has the opportunity," he says, looking over his shoulder as he puts on boots, at the very least to take her home, "But only then. Alright? I don't want to have to command you to do anything unless I have to."
'Okay.' she nods, that will have to be enough. There's nothing more she can ask of him, especially not now. She allows herself to be walked home, shutting herself in with only the briefest of goodnights.
