#v. postbellum.

[martyrar-a]

hey 12) things you said when you thought I was asleep

PROMPTS.

          they’re both curled up atop their bedrolls, only inches away from each other. if alruna twitches her leg just so, she will touch brünnh — valkyrie. val’s leg. ( she’s kept her tongue bitten, kept the name silent in her throat. the expression on her face when it tumbled out of her mouth is not one she wants repeated. there was pain, there was confusion. even worse, she was blank, like she didn’t recognize the name, all these years later. ) 

          but, her leg. knee already bent, she taps the back of val’s calf with her foot very softly. her eyes were closed last she’d seen, eyelashes fanning over her cheeks, but that does not mean she’s unconscious just yet. still, there’s no reaction, so it must be. there’s a tightness to val’s shoulders when she sleeps, she notices. it’s been so long that alruna can’t remember if it’s always been that way. she used to be looser, right? freer. less tense. all she knows is that her fingers itch to touch, to knead out the stiffness in the knobs of her spine.

          instead, she rolls over onto her back, clasping her hands over her belly. ( wandering hands, indeed. ) the words that slip out are unbidden and very, very soft.

     “ do not leave me. ” not again. never again.

[martyrar-a]

u can make it post ragnarok lol 38)things you said while holding my hand

PROMPT.

          isn’t this what it always comes down to? — battle. steel clashing, explosions overhead, streaks of blood in her hair. their hair. in their nails. in their teeth. there’s blood at her mouth, not all of it hers, but alruna thinks there may be some in her ears, too. it’s the only thing she can think of. it’s the only excuse she can accept. 

          as years pass, faces blur. voices fade, imagined and re-imagined wrong. even smells ( like falling into bed and laughing through a mouth full of her hair. ) fade. but, even so, there’s a roar not fifteen paces away, loud enough to be heard over the strike of metal, the clamor of the dead and dying and — 

     well, while we’re on the topic of the dead.

          that roar is familiar. it’s centuries old, a memory she thought she’d lost. a face she thought she’d lost. a name as familiar as her own. and she’s stuck staring, staring, staring as the din of battle crawls away from her ears — until there’s an axe swinging too close to her neck for comfort.

          alruna’s pulse pounds as she remembers herself, sword swinging. a head bounces off the ground, more blood for her mouth. she spits. — and she’s lost her. again. she’s gone. alruna whirls, a disgrace to the valkyrie name when she sheathes her sword, just for a moment. maybe there’s blood in her eyes, too, because, by odin, she sees her. she cups her hands around her mouth.

     “ brünnhilde! ” 

          there’s silver smudged under her eyes, war paint she doesn’t remember. but those are her eyes, those are her lips, that is her nose, those are her hands, gripping a sword the size of her arm. and that look, eyes wide — what is a ghost to a ghost? a hallucination to a walking dream? 

          but she has to be real, doesn’t she? alruna draws her sword again. she cuts, she slices, she leaves death at her feet — and her brünnhilde meets her halfway. stuck still in the middle of a battlefield, a hand reaching out to grip at hers, fingers held in a grasp much tighter than she intends.

     alruna vows as much as she asks: “ afterwards. ” find me.