#perduxamour

[audaciious]

|| @perduxamour liked for a doodle. I got stuck on the tidbit she adopted a black cat and HAD to add it somehow.

[archaeval]

@perduxamour

[paintedxghost]

@perduxamour (♪)

Julie very nearly was able to get Verso to back down when she mentioned her murder, but he was tired. All the bottled-up irritation and anger at being forced into a continued existence, one where he had to watch his not-sister wither away and die to live in a world of make-believe, had erupted. No guilt from a murder from decades ago, one that was moot now, was going to stop it.

"I haven't been here in decades, actually." Verso snapped. "I was out on the Continent for- Wait." They were not moving past what she just said. "What do you mean that was planned?" He'd read that excerpt of her journal, of course. Once, years ago, and then again when the 33rd had found it. But... Verso had been able to convince himself that everything after his capture had been spur-of-the-moment desperation.

"You... you- I begged you to stop, and-"

[etoilesfantome]

🎁 drops in shyly

@perduxamour / askbox christmas thingy

nevermind this being a month late

[obscurd]

🍒  perduxamour

send  me  🍒  +  a  url  and  i  will  write  some  positivity  for  them.

@perduxamour literally seems like one of the sweetest souls ever and i will always absolutely support people who take a character whose only mentioned a few times in their canon and breathe such new life into it and you one hundred percent definitely do that its literally so beautiful and i love you and im gonna take a chomp outta you sorry dems the rules

[peintchanteuse-a]

⭐️ [ drops in shyly because I'm so intrigued~ ]

the older Céleste got, the more she really wrestled with wanting to bring Julie back or not, especially as Verso's mindset turned from freeing Aline from the Monolith so she could fix everything to getting her out no matter the cost to their world. Is it fair to bring her back knowing what it might do to her? Would it even be the maman that she lost or a copy like Verso is to Aline?

(Whatever she decides, or if she even has a chance to try, she still recognises that part of the Paintress' chroma that used to be her mother and steals it back.)

[peredore]

@perduxamour liked for a starter!

It wasn't fair to her. Poor Julie had suffered so much just by being in the proximity of this family tragedy. From a Canvas perspective, it was probably a year or two after Verso and Maelle (She'd demanded they think of her by that name) came to their compromise. Maelle had pleaded to Renoir not to destroy the Canvas, and Renoir had acquiesced, on the condition that she and Aline took breaks, and that they didn't visit for weeks or years at a time.

With the rules in place, and with Clea thinking it a foolish risk (but when didn't she?), all three of them had gone into the Canvas. They each took a piece of this old world to repaint. Aline took the architecture and the land. Maelle took up the work of repainting the Gestrals and Esquie, as well as her friends and the people she had known in her time as Maelle.

And Renoir?

Renoir took the rest.

Somehow, he had always been better at painting people than anything else. It was just something about their feelings and sensitivities that he innately understood. Perhaps it was his own trauma, perhaps it was simply the way he always had been. It mattered little, not to him. As the last of his swirling brush strokes came into existence, Renoir smiled as Julie, Verso's Julie, the one whom the boy had cared so deeply for, breathed again. It wasn't hard to repaint her; after all, it had been him who had taken their bodies away.

Quietly, his cane settled against the paved stone streets. He tilted his head, looking her over, then nodding. She was, truthfully, perhaps his finest work yet.

"Welcome back," he began, soft and simple. "...I imagine you'd like some answers."

[cleamaesta]

@perduxamour : "it's different for you. your family needs you." From real world Julie~

howl's moving castle II 𓇢𓆸 accepting ;;

She presses her lips together, the thin line of red — dry, slightly chapped — twists downward as the tongue dances behind teeth, uselessly, impatiently, willing for more to slip out. A word, a confession — Clea is not quite sure as to what, precisely. Perhaps it was the bittersweet familiarity in the encounter, or maybe something else entirely — something unknown to her too — that had prompted her to speak like that, and in itself, that was already too much. To assume things is not her style, and it serves nothing. Not to her, not to Julie — whose tone now carries a tinge of sincere regret, and sadness.

She leans back on the chair, her chocolat an afterthought despite its lingering warmth — persisting, enduring despite the winter's early morning air. The frigid temperature has conjured swirls of steam to rise from the delicate cup, and Clea's hands had found solace and relief as they played around the ceramic. She had spent some minutes before giving the vapors shapes and stories — the useless, childish habit of a woman used to finding order in the ephemeral too, in things that are not meant to last for long. But now, her gaze and focus are only on Julie; she drags a digit along the rim of the cup, smoothly, while intently looking at her. ❛ Believe me, my family needs me out of the house more than anything else, now. ❜

She has seen for herself what Clea's family stands for — and up close too; the surface level of its structure and of some of its dogmas, even. The rigidity, freely coexisting with the laughter; the dichotomy, bitter and ancient, of a legacy as old as time and the modernization of their craft demanding attention. She has tasted it, touched it — in Verso's presence and company as well.

❛ They need me lucid, after all, ❜ she admits, a shrug to accompany her words. ❛ And lucid, I cannot be when caged home for too long. ❜ Not anymore. Though the thought brings her a sensation akin to pain, it's better that way. It's a sign of things and people changing. Overall, it's all a small form of rebellion, one of the few she's sure to allow and keep close to her heart: safe, and utterly, only hers. She knows it cannot last forever, and that she is needed; but for a few hours a day, if possible, it's nice to feel the wind on her face and hair, or a pastry in a café, or a chatter, or even the simplest mundane scene unfolding before her eyes taking off but a single chip of the massive boulder placed upon her shoulders.

The responsibilities, the pain they carry, the choices they bring — they are all part of who she is. Art too — which has never been escapism to Clea — makes sure to remind the girl of who she is supposed to be. Of what part to play. Everything awaits her, once she's back home. ❛ It's but a moment. Then I'll be back, being needed and needing them too in turn, one way or another. I know you can understand, ❜ a corner of her mouth curls. Her gaze is a soft one — though a bit tired too.

❛ So, if I may, I wouldn't call our situations too different, ❜ she gestures for Julie to occupy the seat next to hers — a silent invitation. They used to sit much closer, even, back when she'd show the friend how to move a brush upon the delicate linen of a canvas, how to regulate the height of an easel or a buck, how to handle different kinds of oils without making a mess. Gently. But with effort. ❛ If you've been trying your best as well, then I assure you we are the same. The rest is out of our control. ❜