July Catch-All (open & closed starters)

[martyrofduty]

who: Pyrrha Dve (by that name or another) & new/developing CR
what: Arrival, Fallout of Boatgate, starting Hunting, etc
when: Arrival starting ~July 8th. Going to Bone House ~July 9th. On from there
where: Beach, Bone House, Around Trench

content warnings: Usual arrival CWs (placenta, nudity, disorientation, etc), remains from boatgate at the beach, corruption levels/beasthood, alcohol consumption, messy not entirely healthy relationship dynamics. Others added as they come up.

Comments

Third time's the charm | open

[martyrofduty]

cw: placenta, nudity, usual squiddly arrival

The limbs, membranes, and identifiable features melt away from the squid, replaced by a thin layer that hides the shape within. It stays that way, slowly undulating and reshaping beneath the surface. The water washes over it, but the body sticks to the sand and stays on the beach. When it stops moving, it's the length of a tall man with the shape of legs and arms.

Fifteen seconds later, the thin placenta layer is torn apart from the inside. A dark skinned man with a light dusting of rust-colored hair and beard sits and looks around. This place is familiar, not only the idea they have been here before but something else more familiar. They turn, staring a long time at fragments of bone in unnatural configuration—a construct, not merely a skeleton. The pieces are small but many. Something happened, if not here, then at sea. Not all the bodies belong to squids or are alive. The outfits are torn, but the bodies are waterlogged, some of them bitten. They too come from the sea.

They lay back down, staring up at the sky, with a terrible feeling in the pit of their stomach, something not readily explained in words. Words? They run over that in their mind, the shape and feel, the sense it means something. Words are not as familiar as the magic in those bones or the wounds on some of the bodies. They gather more of themself with the tide.

X doesn't mark the spot | open

[martyrofduty]

cw: near nudity

Pyrrha did not rush. The robe granted her was enough, and among all the things in the welcome bag, one set stood out. It was old, well cared for, and the only part of the bag that contained something of home. Of Gideon. She also had some growth on her face. With the care of ritual and millennia of habit, she sets out the mirror, scrubs some of the soap across her face, and removes the stubble. She isn't entirely back to herself. Pyrrha cuts herself once, twice, but the cuts are gone by the time she washes all the soap away with saltwater. Clean.

Everything is gathered up and returned to the bag, safe in her grip. Her eyes close, and she sees Gideon easily. He looks the same as her. The stress weighs on her brows the same as his. Her lips rest in the same shape. Her soul aches for being alone. At last, they have that in common too.

There's only one way to learn to walk, and she's told more may have washed up with her. The razor is not much of a weapon, so she stalks and occasionally stumbles down the beach for anything that feels familiar. Time is too long and too great to know what exactly may come.

[noniad]

Ortus is not a wandering soul. He still does not care for the yawn of the sky above him, and suspects that he never will. He much prefers enclosure.

So it is uncharacteristic of him to be standing at the edge of the sea, looking out across the dizzying expanse of gleaming dark water. He wears a pair of black shorts composed of some sturdy woven cloth, with many pockets full of small and useful things, and bruises are still fading along the exposed flesh of his arms where they extend from the t-shirt he has borrowed, emblazoned with the symbols of the House Cobra Kai. His ridiculous rapier hangs from his waist, where it has always been for the past few days.

"Saint," he says, his eyes widening - and yet he does not bow, nor show the other signs of deference he ought, aside from drawing himself up a fraction of a degree more upright.

Home is where the hurt is | closed to Illarion

[martyrofduty]

CW: nothing yet. will be added as they arise.

Though Pyrrha has only been to the house once, she remembers the way there. Trench isn't so familiar that she wanders. Instead she follows their path, including going past the slushie stand without stopping. From what she saw at the beach, Pyrrha doubts John will be so mild mannered about getting shot in the face. Again. Their conversation replays, lies and all, the entire walk to the house.

It's quiet. She circles the area, checking out other approaches and keeping an eye out for anyone abnormally interested in it. The same sense of being watched prickles at her back as the first time. It's part of the neighborhood, not only John's house. Pyrrha plots an extra escape route because of that. Caution is good, but she isn't going to orbit John. She's punching through any orbits and approaching straight on.

Cognizant of warding options, Pyrrha approaches the house peacefully. Yes, there's guns, a rapier, and a spear within easy reach, but that's normal for her. The guns aren't loaded with herald bullets. Politely, she knocks wondering who will answer the door and whether she will recognize them.

[unsheathedfromreality]

This is not the first time in all his centuries Illarion's played door-guard for someone the world wanted dead and dismembered. Given the circumstances, he is not in any way surprised when Iskierka alerts him there's someone heavily armed--someone neither of them recognize--examining the house before approaching it. He is wearily alert to the fact the unknown out there carries himself (themself?) like a soldier, which could mean trouble atop trouble for this tattered little household if it came to fighting.

For Trench's sake (for Augustine and Alfred's sake), the shrike's very uninterested in it coming to fighting.

He's headed for the door before the knock even sounds, silently recalling his Omen from her perch among the skeletons on the roof. He settles himself just so in the entryway, so the bulk of his out-self can be flattened to block it if that's a hostile out there. Less an act to defend his host--who could use, but is in no fit state to parse, the lessons taught by revenge--and more prevent any more would-be heroes coming to grief in the lair of a god they weren't prepared to face. But should this particular maybe-hostile fight their way past him, well--that's one way a heroic legend begins, isn't it?

He waits a count of three before opening the door. (Iskierka rematerializes on his shoulder in a swirl of smoke and Darkblood, crimson eyes gleaming.) Then he swings it wide, apparent-foolhardy; let this visitor read into the gesture, and the dead skeletal-slim elf blocking the way, what they will.

"Who are you and what are you wanting with this house?" The words are impolite. The tone's passionless, as the dead are apt to be; no offense is meant. He's merely on war footing and not bothering with pleasantries.

Getting buzzed | Closed to John Gaius

[martyrofduty]

cw: high corruption levels, alcohol consumption

Pyrrha arms herself with less alcohol than an armful of hard liquor looked like. Most of them hold less than a third their original volume that, Pyrrha prays, met Augustine's historical caliber. She also holds two glasses with one hand as she approaches the Necromancer Divine, King of the Nine Renewals, our Resurrector, the Necrolord Prime, the man who became God, the God who became squid, and the squid who became a herald or close enough to it.

"Sit down, John," Pyrrha sighs, with more exhaustion than anger. Some irritation, sure, but she's here. She's back. She's in his house, and she's taking the next shift of wasp sitting, or more delicately 'waiting on their Lord.' The office is a mess, but so is the Mithraeum after every battle there with a Resurrection Beast. This is simply... somewhere in the 1-2 herald range. "We have some catching up to do."

[necrolord]

Annabel's echo is gone, at least. Or, not gone— she thrums in his heart, a furious simmer of energy, a thunderstorm he's papered over and called contained— but she's not dogging his heels anymore. And he's doing better, you know? He's lost the wings. The chitin only bleeds back up, like an oilslick over his bones, when he's really riled.

He thinks Gideon is here, for a moment. The emotion goes sideways when he realizes it's Pyrrha, and that she recently shot him in the face.

"Interesting way to start," he says, like complaint, but he folds himself into a chair. The study's a wreck, what with one-and-a-half Heralds pacing manic circles in here for a few days straight. All his shelves of blood and bone are in disarray, all his notes are crumpled. "Look, I want to say: I'm not mad. I mean, I'm kind of impressed, honestly. Remind me not to piss you off."

Ha ha, lost cause. No one's happy with him, and he knows it. When he drums his fingers on the desktop they make the click-clack sound of bare phalanges on wood.

Mom friend override | Closed to Augustine Quinque

[martyrofduty]

cw: nothing yet. will be added as they arise.

A myriad is filled with waiting. Yes, everything happens at once when it happens. Every minute matters. That day is past, and they are back to the long slow aftermath. She let him sleep. Her mind is full of meta analysis, having been around for enough of the myriad that it doesn't slam into her unawares. Quiet coexistence, even in this state, is a comfort compared to years of solitude without conversation.

Pyrrha knocks on the door. Alfred answers. That it's Alfred still takes more getting used to than a snake answering. Her smile is genuine for him, and she glances into the room silently, as if to say 'I can come back later.' If she's gotten the timing wrong. She looks the same as the last time they met. Augustine— She checks out his damage. "You look like shit, friend," Pyrrha says. He isn't the only one who's been there the whole myriad anymore, the only one for whom John's shocking updates don't shock. She gives a small smile. "You also need more alcohol." She doesn't have a way to tell how long it's taken him to get them where they were.

[butnotyet]

There's a moment, when Alfred opens the door just enough for his serpentine head to stick through, that he's surprised to see Pyrrha anyway. It isn't that he didn't know she was in the house; it's that she's here, outside Augustine's room, and not still babysitting spending time with God.

«Oh! Hi, Pyrrha! Cas mentioned you were back — c'mon in —»

It's just as well that Pyrrha came by today, and not yesterday, though; Augustine finally has slept, for the first time since the morning of that ill-fated boat trip. The shrike who's been serving as Augustine's body-pillow, during Pyrrha's visit with John, excuses himself with a scarcely-intelligible murmur, there and gone again by the time Augustine is sitting at the edge of his bed, waving at his desk chair for Pyrrha. (Did he leave by the door? The door-sized window? The ... wall? Whatever. Doesn't really matter for the purposes of this conversation, anyway, does it?)

"Are you offering, or are you informing me that you've finished off the end of the current supply?" he asks her, dryly, scrubbing a hand through his hair, rubbing at his eyes — there's still more black-glitter dried blood grating on his nerves and flaking away from what is not, in fact, eyeliner, as he rubs them.

"... and do I need to be concerned, particularly, about you making a new habit of dismembering or otherwise wounding John?" is a bit drier, or maybe just more wintry, as he stretches out his right hand, flexing and extending his fingers, shaking them out, and then pointedly rubbing at the metacarpophalangeal joints, especially focusing on the third digit. "First the eyes, now this...?"

When life gives you lemons, make a slushie | Closed to Ruby Rose

[martyrofduty]

CW: Urine humor?

A house looms in the distance, unseen but felt, heavy with gravity that pulls at her bones. Questions burst out of her skin like quills, but Pyrrha continues to resist its pull. All in good time. What she needs, more than anything, is information. Most people she might seek have no known location. Pyrrha cannot count on meeting anyone fortuitously on the boardwalk, all chance. Besides a good scone, no one of interest is at the bakery. She does not have time to scour the city. They could all be dead. Pyrrha cannot wait upon ghosts.

She traces old steps toward an eye catching, impossible to ignore slushie stand. Whatever has happened in the last week(?) hasn't shuttered the business. The weather is as hot and humid as before. Something cool would be refreshing. All the better if it helps her learn what is going on.

Pyrrha approaches the stand and smiles slyly, "I'll take a pee-colored one."

[onekindsoul]

Ruby was once again manning the counter of the slushie stand when Pyrrha approaches. They had been a good sport during her little spat with the weird Necromancer guy. And she was more than a little pleased that Pyrrha still found it funny.

She gives a little snort and nods. "Right away!" And she disappears only to return with a lemon slushie and happily hands it to Pyrrha.

"You got a real kick out of that, huh?" She says as she folds her arms. "So are you new in town? Is he a friend of yours?" Pyrrha wasn't the only one with questions.

See a Kid about a Deal | Closed to Billie

[martyrofduty]

CW: References to violence, deals involving violence, with children

Pyrrha carries no more weapons than usual: sword, spear, knife, and two guns. All in all a short trip. She trusts John to Illarion's care, knowing no one, not even her, can safeproof the world around him. Or him for the world. She cannot merely sit in that house watching him every moment of every day.

For instance, she has to see a kid about a deal. So John doesn't go above and beyond his own unusual standards of late and kill a kid. A... younger kid than the kids he's already killed this month. Fucking hell.

This place continues to have its idiosyncrasies. Its own versions of instantaneous travel across much smaller distances than those used in the Nine Houses. Sure enough, Pyrrha changes location, and she takes everything in immediately, just in case she's being ambushed by a nine year old, his currently blind dad, his other dad at normal vision levels, and whoever else they drum up. Like chickens in hats. She hasn't lived this long by underestimating kids.

[wapples]

He's there at the lamp, just as he said he would be. This grubby little kid, who is a whopping two feet tall and about that around as well. His Omen is at his side, a fairly average looking brown tabby cat who stares up at Pyrrha with green eyes that match her Sleeper's, and an air of critical feline judgement.

No dads, neither blind nor sighted, and no killer attack chickens wearing crocheted hats.

"Hi," he wasn't sure if she'd really come, but she had seemed pretty cool. Of course, he's making that assumption based on her willingness to commit a stabbing for him. "You're really gonna do it, huh?"

duty ˈdjuːti noun: a moral or legal obligation; a responsibility. | Closed to John Gaius*

[martyrofduty]

CW: violence, violence between friends/family/religious icons, high corruption

She could have returned nearly immediately via the lamps, but Pyrrha looks at the network and the unstoppable wave of chaos and violence promised in its most recent posts. Given her plans, she walks. It's best one of them maintains their calm, and it's not John. Walking and reading the network, with one primary text conversation that makes her need to clear her head more. Stabbing John cannot be about Oscar. It won't be. Honestly, if she gets away with shooting him in the face, Oscar should too.

Should rarely figures into this. Like daughter, like father. Two alike in temperaments and lack of self-restraint once provoked. For all the jokes and levity, steel bites at their words, most readily heard in the video. It still comes across in text. Her one comfort is that Commander Awake Remembrance of Our Valiant Dead is not here at this time. What an unholy trinity that would make.

Despite John's starring role at the top of tens of hit lists, Pyrrha gets home without anything worth calling an incident. She enters the house, nods at Illarion in all his waif-like largess, says, "Don't worry. Whatever happens next, everything—between those of us here—will be fine," and passes him. A quick sweep of the first floor doesn't reveal their emperor in waiting, their canceled god, the most wanted man in Trench.

She moves up the stairs light on her feet, with nary a squeak. The habit comes of old, unthinking. It's John. Pyrrha knocks, first, before entering John's bedroom, a measure of respect before fulfilling her promise. He lays on the bed, about as far from divine glory as she's seen him. Pyrrha looks at him, face firm and unreadable, stopped in the doorway.

She mutters a minor prayer, standing there, and crosses the room. Gently, Pyrrha cups the back of her emperor's head where he lays, her cheek against his cheek, her lips nearly touching his ear. Duty says, "With great love and respect—" After that word, her knife slips into his belly. Her forehead presses against his. She pulls it back out with the same easy grace. Her eyes close.

"You being accosted by a small child is a no win scenario," Pyrrha offers as explanation but stays close; for comfort, for punishment, for understanding.

general cw for (nonsexual) intimacy

[necrolord]

He's taken up lying on the bed, Omni in one hand, scrolling with a deep and bitter resignation. It has not been a position worthy of a God or an Emperor, but it feels right for a guy put on blast as the villain of the day. At this rate, he might make villain of the year. The glory of popularity.

He feels her come in. Pyrrha is a shape in his peripherals, and he registers the presence of her more than the knock; gives a noncommittal low hum of assent. He's not putting on airs for her; it's Pyrrha. She only saw him in those first days, those early days, but even then they were family. Long nights and colony logistics and the blur of sexy parties.

It's a surprise when she touches him.

Pyrrha doesn't do casual touch; neither does Gideon, in the moments John parses only the familiarity of his hands; but she slides her-and-Gideon's fingers through his hair, cradles his head gently. When he looks, startled, into her eyes, he sees only fond exhaustion. He catches just the glimpse before her lips are at his ear. He has gone very still.

The knife slides in sweet and easy. He breathes a faint gasp; his fingers flex and drop the phone; he lies still for her as she draws it out again.

"I— look, is this going to be a thing?" says John, but his voice is still hushed to match hers. For one fleeting moment he looks genuinely vulnerable in his confusion, skinning it over with only the weakest effort at a joke. He shifts to prop himself up onto his elbows, and it jostles them on the bed, so that she has to move with him to keep from knocking foreheads or noses together. "I just think I'd prefer a little more negotiation, personally."

His gaze flickers, so briefly most would miss it, to the glittering wet edge of the knife. He lets it go; he returns his attention, brow scrunched in worry, to her face. He knows that she has his blood. He lets her keep it.

His tone is almost plaintive as he says: "Pyrrha, I'm not going to kill a little kid."

Safe Spaces & Savior(?) Complexes | Open at Sanctuary

[martyrofduty]

CW: ethical philosophies potentially

It's quieter, after the festival. Pyrrha returns because it's a better time to get a feel for the place, for the day to day. She's quiet, well armed but nothing at hand, in unremarkable clothing. She walks a circuit of the public spaces before returning to the courtyard with the remarkable tree. It is something, though she has no native magic her own, and her blood is not useful in that regard.

She find a quiet spot out of the way and sits, somewhere between meditation and keen situational awareness. A sanctuary it may be, but she dislikes sudden surprises. At least, in places not meant for violence.

sorry this is late | cw: mentions of loss of bodily autonomy / demonic possession horror

[creidim]

The Sanctuary is a welcome sight, especially since she and Alayne sung to Moon Presence for her blessing. The soft, white lunar flowers that bloom in the courtyard about Amaterasu's tree bring an extra amount of mental peace and stability. Luna feels steadier here; the pull of the Reckoning's wrath eases. The righteous rage in her stomach is soothed, for a time. She feels closer to Moon Presence, here amongst her flowers.

Not only that, but it soothes the frayed edges of her mind — the parts of her unravelled by horror: the experience of her body no longer being hers to control. Her fight with the 'Black-Eyed Thing' had gone poorly, ultimately. Perhaps it had been the most peaceful end physically, but she knows what it's like to have something under her skin. Something that locks up her joints and moves them for her — and she's aware, unable to stop it. She's felt a demon slam her face first into a desk, how his energy burned inside her, touched the raw part of her soul. Something wrong. No, the Self-Made God wasn't the first, but he's certainly reminded her of it.

She likes the quieter spots, too. There's even a particular one she favours, where no one can bother her. Only when she enters the courtyard to walk towards it, lost in her thoughts, she belatedly realises the spot is already taken.

"Oh." she breathes it out, apologetic. "I didn't realise someone was already here."

Maybe Gender Was the Real Monster We Hunted All Along | Closed to Kaine

[martyrofduty]

CW: Hunting (violence, killing), monster horror, discussion of gender/genderqueer experience/intersex/etc may arise

The previously busy area has rapidly emptied, but not everyone can evacuate, trapped by the battle with the beast. Pyrrha shoots it again and again and again in the wounds opened up along its shoulder. Beast blood spills on the road below it.

Somewhere around twelve bullets in twelve seconds surpasses some threshold. It roars, showing more teeth than necessary in a mouth, layers of them in sharp rows, blood not its own painting the edges. Pyrrha grins, shoots it twice in the same eye, and leads it on a chest burning chase, directly past the other person, another hunter, taking on the beast. They're on its blinder side. Pyrrha rolls away to the side as its long legs close the gap. Her off hand grabs the bone and metal stake, which stretches and extends its strengthened bone shaft to a spear, ready for the killing blow if needed.

[foulhussy]

This bastard's a tough one, barely slowing no matter how many times her blade bites into its flesh, even with that other hunter pumping it full of bullets. Kainé stays on her prey, slicing at its flanks and legs every time the Beast dares to focus on Pyrrha. She follows their wild chase easily, using the momentum to spring into the air in a perfectly calculated leap, landing on its shoulders and bringing her sword down on the back of its skull with bone-splitting force.

The Beast stumbles, corrupt blood gushing from it's cracked skull as the trauma to its mad brain finally leaves it in a twitching, bloody heap. She hops down, her boots clicking on the cobblestones. Without breaking her stride, she hacks at the base of the Beast's neck until it's writhing finally stops.

It's only then that she looks up to acknowledge the other hunter, giving them a curt nod. "Nice moves."

Of Our Own Making | Closed to John Gaius

[martyrofduty]

Lying on her back, Pyrrha closes her eyes and concentrates. It's easier than when she's working at the outpost, her attention needed to complete her work. Duty made that commitment, and he keeps it. It's easier than when she's hunting, and her senses focus on dark shadows, sounds coming to her ear, the scents of blood, and the feelings of fear and anger and everything that builds corruption. When she fights, she cannot split her attention to watch John's back when he isn't part of the fight. The one time she was distracted, her reward was a nasty scratch that knitted itself back together.

It's harder when she wants to sleep, but she hasn't focused on John for a couple hours. He could be getting killed a third time that very moment. Almost. Cinnabar gets her attention for the life-threatening murder attempts. Pyrrha had been too far away, even with lamp travel. Through her omen's eyes, she sees John whole and alive, not fighting for his life or freshly risen from the sea. Cinnabar moves like a shadow, unsubstantial, and finds no immediate threat (plenty of signs of distrust, dislike, and dismay).

Not quite sleeping, not quite awake, Pyrrha rests there, doing nothing more than watching his back, doing her duty. A step removed. A step that could mean death or vengeance. It isn't enough, but her body needs the rest.

When John reaches Gaze, when John is coming home, Pyrrha sits up, washes and shaves her face. It's carefully done with the kit that washed up with her. The blade is sharp, and she only nicks herself once—distracted by that sense of being watched, of her omen being watched. She dresses in the clothes she bought—the shirt is the replacement purchased for her, not the original—for the festival at Sanctuary, nicer than her daily wear but not so much as to stand out like a sore thumb. Her sword and her spear remain where she placed them, not carried on her person. At this moment, she is not Duty, neither God's saint nor his martyr.

Each step down the stairs feels like something more, a confirmation of her choice each time her weight shifts forward. She's near the bottom when the door opens. As Cinnabar showed her, there's a pleasant lack of holes, rips, and bloodstains on his clothes. A good sign. "Is now a good time to talk?" Pyrrha asks John.

[necrolord]

"Well, that's not ominous," John says. He shuts the door behind him, and scrubs a hand back through his hair: but he is wholly intact, today, and not even a little bit harried. His clothes are the normal amount rumpled. He looks distractible and plain; he looks like himself.

There isn't even any white bone showing through the warm dark of his skin, today. Look at him go: recovery, or something like it.

"It's not a bad time," he allows. "What did I do? Recently, that is. I should specify."

Hashbrowns Brunch | Closed to Ozpin & Daniel LaRusso

[martyrofduty]

Trench is a small place, and the Sleepers residing in it an even smaller community. That's part of the reason her first points of potential contact with the kids, both those from home and the friends they have made here, the kids that John has only just lost... comes from Oscar and his ties to them. It's not truly a surprise—he broke into John's study and had his hand melted for his foibles—but an amusing irony. Not all the way into the group, they're too suspicious of adult figures at this time, but classified with two other adults of interest and relevance. The name's ridiculous, the kind of cultural fragment that outlives its society to a phrase that loses its meaning to those who weren't there. Whether cultural history or in jokes, it's a similar state.

Pyrrha opts to take it literally.

She invites Ozpin and Daniel to brunch. Given the tensions and no desire for attempted murder to interrupt the conversation, she invites them to the Achelliac in Darcmouth, not far from the sea. There's other food and drink available, but given their bestowed group name, the hashbrowns are non-negotiable. She arrives early, taking the time to check out who is around before sitting at a table for four. The hashbrowns rest in the middle, still covered and waiting for the reveal.

The usual compliment of weapons are on her person—sword, spear, two guns, and a knife. The spear is retracted to its short form, courtesy of John, to gather less attention. Her clothes display the mark of a hunter but are otherwise plain and functional. Pyrrha sits in her chair, relaxed with nothing seeming to hold her attention as she waits. She's good at waiting.

[miyagimagic]

Did Daniel expect the invite?

Not really. After all, he only arrived earlier this month, and he only had a few days to attempt to settle in and adjust to a world that was strange beyond the wildest movies he has ever seen in his life before he was already dragged into something, spending the rest of his time trying to herd a bunch of kids who were - somehow - even harder to manage than his bunch back home.

But that's exactly what makes the unexpected invite kind of nice. It's not like Daniel has had no contact with other adults at all ever since arriving, but the kids took up so much of his time that he's kind of overdue to spend part of his day with people who aren't teenagers.

Even if they're people who have to share a.. dubious group chat classification.

When Daniel shows up, he is very visibly unarmed. It's not like he's going to wander around in his karate gi - the only clothes from home he showed up with - so he's managed to procure a Trench-style suit, since he figures he might as well look well put together for a meeting with potential new acquaintances. The golden crescent moon-shaped necklace that the Reckoning has been handing out as a Blessed Day gift hangs around his neck, like a small accent on the otherwise black outfit.

As he spots Pyrrha, he gives a polite nod of his head before moving to take a chair himself, totally unsuspecting of the covered pile on the middle of the table.

"I hope I'm not too late," he offers. Daniel looks a little tired, but there's a tiny, amicable smile on his face all the same. "I'm still trying to find my way around this place."

A Bond & A Bullet

[martyrofduty]

CW: references to body horror, wedding crashing, murder/death, The Reckoning

As they will perform the bond, as represents the partnership she wants, they prepare for the ritual together. From Lumenwood, a red rose and two white roses, selected together. From Crenshaw, a wide shallow bowl, simply and nearly plain. From their home, ashes swept up between their hands. Trench has taken them, and they claim it and themselves.

Not one to leave anything to chance, Pyrrha rests that night in the house's doorway, her eyes near closed while Cinnabar forms a warm guarded circle around their vessel. The moon is a slim sliver in the sky, reflecting in the silver. It's a warm night, and she is used to waiting. Though she is tired, Pyrrha waits and waits, the way she has become so good at it. Patient and steady and firm. She accepts comfort from John but only John that night. This ritual is theirs, between them and the Doorway.

The day passes, as it must, though Cinnabar stays with their supplies for the bond the whole time. They never leave her care, and she protects them mindfully. When the time comes, they walk together away from the house toward the lighthouse overlooking the ocean. Though their bond is between them, a private matter, it is also public, a claiming of each other and the ritual. All of Trench may know what they are doing. Pyrrha feeds the eternal flame a bullet of her blood, a measure of respect for the place they've chosen.

Though her eyes are warm brown with red heat speckled throughout, her gaze pierces out of them—proud, warm, approving, and demanding. It's an act that continues even after it is done, a statement that never finishes being said. She holds up her hand, though they have not prepared the paste they'll use. "I would like symmetry," Pyrrha says, simple firm words. He can lay his claim on her where he wishes, for the bond they've agreed to, and she will do the same.

cw: minor mood alteration by the July event

[necrolord]

Now that they're here, now that they're doing this, some of the King Undying has fallen away and some of John has come up in his place: he looks by turns awkward and excited and pleased. It renders him younger as he chats with her on the walk, cracking jokes about vows and rings and ceremony, about having forgotten his white dress and his bouquet to throw. For all the talk, he's left behind the grand white robe he'd been given last January, the one filigreed with the bones of something he can't quite place.

They look uncommonly like people, not God and Saint, on the path to the lighthouse. Only once does he look back to the house that has Augustine in it, the shape of his mouth uncertain. Then he goes on.

The tension is back in his shoulders by the time they reach the water. He looks out upon it for a long, long time. The sea does not acknowledge him; it only churns down below, implacable and steady, the tide coming in.

John turns back to her, and for a moment they just look at each other— her wearing Gideon's body, Gideon's eyes, but having caught him in an intensity that he knows down to his bones. It's all Pyrrha Dve. Something in him burns under her gaze, and it's— it hurts, it's hot as hell, he's missed her. He's missed her so much for so fucking long.

God unbuttons his shirt such that he can ease out the unmarked brown stretch of his shoulder, and he nods for her to do the same.

"You think our officiant will make a speech?" he says, and the set of his shoulders belies tension, but it's meant as invitation and excuse. The Doorway isn't known to be chatty, so it'll be up to them.