el’s so lucky with her dainty little one drop nosebleeds mine are violent and visceral and make me throw up bc i could taste blood in my mouth its a whole scene
i think sasukes reaction to realizing hes completely in love with naruto was absolutely throwing up like the moment tobi teleported him away from narutos whole "im really glad i met you" speech he was physically nauseous
Entire story here, there’s a continuation of sorts here
I know this isn’t the next chapter of To Soar With Vultures, but I was thinking about Rayla’s first murder so I wrote that instead. Sorry for taking so long, this was kind of a heavy concept
CW: minor whumpee (oc is 15), whumpee forced to kill someone, death threats of a family member, dehumanization, long term imprisonment, magic whump, burning whump, graphic description of a burned corpse, murderer feeling very little remorse, vomiting, collars, non con (non sexual) touch, referenced death of a family member, begging
IF I MISSED ANYTHING IN THIS CONTENT WARNING LET ME KNOW, I DID MY BEST TO COVER ALL BASES BUT THIS IS FAIRLY HEAVY
The boy trembled in the center of the room, little more than a heap on the floor. His cheeks glistened, wet with his own tears.
Rayla made a point not to look at him, instead angling her head down to stare at her own feet. Things went over easier that way, when she was already submissive. Plus, it wasn’t like she had anything to gain from staring at the boy, she’d seen hopelessness and pain enough times to know what it looked like.
Sinking a hand into her hair, Jvar grabbed a fistful and yanked, forcing Rayla to look up. He stared down his nose at her, opal toned eyes drilling into her skull.
"If there's anything left upstairs," He casually flicked her forehead, prompting a slight flinch from Rayla and nothing more. "You should listen. Remember your brother? What's his name... I haven't used it in so long?"
A slow exhale floated off Rayla's lips as she pressed her fingertips into her thighs to keep still. Calm. Silent. Clenching her hands into fists and screaming until her throat bled wasn't an option, no matter how much she wanted it to be.
A few tears gently rolled down her cheeks, betraying no noise.
You should slit his throat for that
For once, the Akkator had a point.
Slowly, a curt smile crept across her tormentor's face." Ah yes, Rhyan. Poor Rhyan." The feigned comfort in his voice oozed disdain. How dare he? She could endure. She could take the pain. It'd make her stronger... Rhyan not so much.
Of course, Jvar let his true colors slip back out with another sharp tug on her hair. "Like a good little bitch, you're going to do what I say. Harm me, disobey me, try to kill me?" He waved his free hand over her eyes to check if she was watching. That was supposed to be good, that was supposed to make her feel better. She had tricked him. She was winning.
But no victory could change the image seared into her mind. Rhyan was just a kid, round faced and wide eyed as the day he'd been taken from her ten years ago. He'd be older now, fourteen to her fifteen, but that didn't change that when Rayla closed her eyes, he was still a toddler. Sobbing for his mother. His sister.
After all these years in some dungeon of Jvar's, would he ever remember her name?
"His life ends just like that."
The snap of Jvar's fingers brought her back to the present. Rayla had focused her gaze just past his shoulder on the wall behind him, avoiding the king's eye. Stone bricks were easier to look at, they didn't stare down her helpless brother while he was beaten, starved, and gods only knew what else.
No, Rayla. I don't know. He could be dead, he could be suffering, and I don't know.
Rayla hung her head with the Akkator's reminder, the sweet tone of the God's words meaning nothing. No comfort would change the facts. It wasn't like Jvar exaggerated. One word from that bastard and Rhyan died. And if the bastard died?
Nobody would find her brother, at least not before he starved to death, alone and forsaken. Just like nobody would find her.
One day, child, you will slay Jvar Vetrecini.
But not today.
Jvar fiddled with something in his hands, and one second Rayla’s neck carried its familiar weight, then it just...didn’t. The collar that’d remained clamped around her neck for years fell to the ground, clattering against the stone.
For a moment, the room was empty save for the ringing of the metal, round and round it spun. Finally, after a moment that lasted years, it went completely still.
Jvar spat out his order with such practiced ease that Rayla didn’t need to look to imagine the way he tilted his chin and pursed his lips. “Now kill him.”
Rayla hesitated for a moment, gently stepping forward. Him. The boy didn’t even get a name. Rayla took another step, inching closer to her prey. He instantly leaned back, balancing her out in this morbid dance. No, not a dance. A slaughter.
“Wait.” Jvar held up a hand in her peripheral vision, much in the way one would command a dog. “Not like that.” He took her forearm in a rough grip, reaching for a knife left out. Rayla whined, trying to breathe through the pain as he sliced a vertical line down her wrist, splitting open a wound gushing blood.
Instantly Jvar stepped away, dropping her arm as if it burned. Did it disgust him to touch her? Rayla looked back to see him leaning against the far wall, arms crossed, lips melded in a scowl.
He tilted his head and sighed. “You truly are that dense, aren’t you?” A low chuckle fell from his lips, one she’d heard a million times. “Tell me, do you remember your mother?”
Yes. Her mother was always there, lingering in the back of her head. When Rayla closed her eyes to sleep, she’d be there, her body hanging from a tree, innards haphazardly spilled as she swayed in the wind. Sometime she’d still hear that stupid fucking war cry, the last words of a woman who’d died for nothing.
Sic Syrum Merkhad. Until death do us part.
Jvar ran a hand through the crown of his hair, smoothing over the grey strands outnumbering the black. “You aren’t going to, dogs can't really talk can they?”
Rayla let her eyes fall. Evali was right, afterall. Someone had to die, someone always had to die, that wasn’t ever going to have to change. Maybe though, this time, someone else could be the victim.
Jvar kept going, more to himself than to his little doll. “I’ll spare myself the breath, then. Burn him alive.”
I’m so sorry, Rayla. Her eyes widened ever so slightly, an unnoticeable reaction to the old god’s gentleness. Why did he speak as if she was still a feebleminded child, hadn’t she suffered too much to be nothing more than that?
All she had to do now was nothing, and this would end. The boy would live, at least another moment longer. Then, hopefully, if the world was kind, Jvar would just assume she did not have the power he thought she did, and Rhyan would be safe. Everything would be alright, then, wrapped up with a neat little bow.
Only the world was not kind. All those fairy tales of good, loving kings and happy homes were just stories, the kind of tale to tell a crying child to put to bed. Sure, they could be comforting, but the world didn’t work like that. Good people just didn’t live that long.
“Please...please…” The boy looked up at her now, tears rolling like blood. Did he want to live or die? That was the worst part, wasn’t it? In some sick way, death was better than Jvar, not that Rayla was out to do a good deed.
With a soft exhale, Rayla reached out her hand, willing the blood to pool in her palm. At the touch, the boy shrieked another plea.
“I want my mom...please...please let me go to her...please…” He just kept going, whispering faster and faster until his begging became unintelligible mumbling. His voice cracked with each word, his spirit breaking like glass. The blood pooled on his scalp, mingling with his tears in an inky wet mess on his face.
Maybe she could say she was sorry, that she wished it could be different, that it wasn’t her fault or her choice. She could always lie.
Jvar could give her this choice again, ten times, a hundred times, or a thousand times, and not once would the outcome change. It was Rhyan’s broken, mangled body lying lifeless before her, or it was this boy’s. That was it, just a rock and a hard place.
An eerie calm settled over Rayla, every muscle going still as she waited for the Akkator to try and stop her.
It’ll be easier if you don’t look him in the eye.
Rayla sucked in a breath, squeezed her hand a little tighter on his skull, and forced the helfire out. Her blood bubbled as it heated up, a shimmering blue and orange color, infinitely mesmerizing to see for the first time.
The boy wailed, sorrow and pain tearing from his mouth while his head collapsed under her fingertips, nothing but melted flesh and bone. The death didn’t come quick, even as she watched his eyes, waiting for life to leave them.
On and on he screamed, the acrid scent of flesh bubbling and boiling smacking Rayla in the nose. Her hand burned cold, an icy chill wrapping around her form. The helfire died out just as quickly as it’d begun, leaving the boy’s face gone.
For a moment, Rayla stayed still, hand anchored in the puddle of soupy remains that had once been a skull and a brain, a pair of eyes and a nose. She stared forward, perfectly motionless.
You can let go, it’s over
What was left of the body crumpled to the ground in a heap, putrid liquid oozing out onto the floor around it. Calling it the boy, or even the boy’s body wasn’t fair.
That wasn’t even a body, bodies looked like people. The abomination before her didn’t have a face, just a little bit of skull at the end of the neck for thick, boiling fluid to spill out of, staining everything it touched.
Rayla fell to her knees, vomiting up the feeble contents of her stomach in a watery mess, adding to the existing pool of gore. It all smelled like rot and sickness, a foul mix of everything that made up a body splayed out on the floor in front of her.
Rayla could only hear the faint closing of the door behind her, probably Jvar leaving her alone with this mess. She gagged again, crawled away from the worst of it, and collapsed.
It’s done, it’s over, it’s okay
At least Rhyan was safe for a little while longer, his life traded for someone whose name Rayla didn’t even know. The boy’s name didn't matter, not to her exhausted, sickened brain. Besides the smell, it was just a murder, and people died all the time.
Jvar hadn’t even given her a chance to look him in the eye after, to fantasize about it being him instead, every detail about his face boiled into mush.
One day it can be him, just try not to think about that boy too much
