♔ Event ♔ - Sibling Rivalry
Monoswan sat at the head of the table in the Great Hall, waiting. It was time for another motive. Time to change the game entirely. The students file in apprehensively, the days of leisure and the access to the outdoors had taken their minds off the threat of a fresh motive. But now all that stress is back, and it’s centered on the small swan. As they brace themselves to hear whatever she has in store this time, suddenly the barely established pattern is broken. Before Monoswan can make her announcement, Gosami has rushed into the room from the servant’s entrance to the kitchens.
“No, I won’t let you do this again,” Gosami is in his human form, and appears to be carrying a large staff- it’s even taller than he is, which is saying something. “Svana I don’t want to fight you, but this can’t go on! You’re making everything worse! I don’t know what that friend of yours has been telling you, but you need to stop! People are dying!”
Monoswan looked to the side at him, irritated, even disgusted. She certainly didn’t seem concerned or cowed in any way.
“I think we are far past the point where you allow or disallow any action of mine, Cadhan. Put that down. You’re not going to use it.”
Her voice was as even and unemotive as always, but somehow her tone still radiated pure contempt.
For a moment Gosami looks hesitant, like her words may have shaken him. But then his expression becomes firm again, and he shifts into a fighting stance. From the way he’s gripping the weapon now it looks like he actually knows how to use it.
“I can’t. I can’t let you… I have to try.” His voice is determined, but there’s a pleading note in it. “I’m asking you not to make me. Please, Svana, there’s still time to stop this, it’s not too late to work together!”
Monoswan didn’t sigh, or react audibly to Gosami’s plea in any way. Instead she stood up and approached him, arms folded stiffly behind her back. She stood before him and looked up, expression blank and unfathomable, and then wordlessly extended her hand, palm up.
Gosami blinks as Monoswan approaches him, holding the staff a little tighter though he makes absolutely no move to strike. When her hand reaches out, his expression fills with hope, a smile starts to pull at his lips and he instantly relaxes, letting the staff drop to his side as he reaches to take her hand.
“Thank you, sister. Thank you-”
She smiles back, sweetly, and then twists his arm roughly behind him, and reaches up, jerking him down by the neck and then slamming his face hard into the stone wall. Gosami seems stunned, though not horribly injured, until she adjusts her grip, pulls him back and slams him into it again, even harder. There’s a sickening crack, and blood splatters against the wall and down Gosami’s face. Still smiling with the exact same expression that she used to lure him in, Monoswan brings her other hand up and wraps both of them around her brother’s neck, keeping him stooped down at her eye level as she chokes him.
“If I was capable, dear brother, I would wring the life out of you right now. Make no mistake about that.”
Too stunned even to yell, the only sound Gosami makes is a choked gasp as his face is slammed into the wall- and then he’s simply staring at Monoswan, not even trying to struggle as she chokes him while blood streams down his face from his newly broken nose. The staff clatters to the floor. The hope that had sprung up a moment ago is gone, replaced with a helpless, desperate sadness. Despair is in Gosami’s eyes as he looks at his sister.
“I’m glad that you understand.”
And then she dropped him like garbage and turned back to the table, and to the class. Her face had returned to its usual neutral expression.
