Closed The sound of a breaking heart

[Raeyn]

77th of Summer 518AV

Such a deep burning rage as Raeyn had felt now, he had never know he'd ever be capable of. Like a boiling pot, inside his chest, his heart pounded so loud he felt the whistling in his ears. Steam glazed over his eyes, clouded his vision. A taste of iron on his tongue. The Inarta had no control over himself. Not anymore. The roar of Ivak's lava engulfed him, turned his thoughts to cinder and common sense to ashes.

Fists of alabaster pounded against Haneht's front door until the wood grazed his skin and left blood red grazing in the place of red gold. There was a cut on his right arm, sore and irritated and open, from havning accidentally cut himself on a shard of broken wine bottle. But it seemed he could barely feel the pain of it now. It left a smear of the Inarta's crimson life liquid on the solid wood.

A shaken, booming voice screamed for the Eypharian. "HANEHT! I'm gonna kill you, you little petch."

He didn't really know what he was doing there or what he would say if he laid eyes on Haneht. A little part of his wished the Eypharian wasn't home. A little part of his wished to never lay eyes on the kid again.

On the other door of Haneht's cottage in the Okomo estates, was drunk Raeyn in a state of disarray, swaying from one foot to the other, barely able to hold himself up. His long hair hang in tassels in front of his face, all knotted up. Booze stunk from his breath at an arm's length. Barely clothed in little more than his trousers and a shirt that hung unbuttoned, with rolled up sleeves, shoes with no socks. The alchemist had somehow managed to trek his way to the cottage at midnight, now waking the neighbourhood up with his desperate hollering.

If a breaking heart could be heard, Raeyn's heart was a cacophony of shards.

[Haneht]

♛ H A N E H T ♛ ∆ E Y P H A R I A N ∆ W/C: 525 77th, Summer 518AV Midnight

In the recent years, sleep had become more of a chore than necessity. It’s not to say that he hated it, he loved his rest as much as the next person. Just not the dreams that accompanied. Strange, to think someone so adventurous and curious dislikes dreaming, especially when he seemed perfectly fine with doing it most of the time.

Unfortunately, he dreamt. A lot. Nearly most of his nights, he went into slumber peacefully and awoke the next day with memories of another reality that had taken place in his mindscape. Most times, there was only himself, and perhaps the companionship of animals. Rarely people. These were fine - he’d always been a drifter, always enjoyed the thrill of new discoveries and adventures. It made sense that his wanderlust would shape his dreams. People, however, were different. His mind was a very private, personal thing, a world that no one can breach, no one must breach. His mind was all he had for a safe haven, and he’d much rather not see anyone’s face if he could help it. Especially, if they came from his past. So when Ahnouk’s image resurfaced too often in them for his preferences, he immediately sought to rectify it. That end, took the form of Mara, barmaid and socialite extraordinaire. Also, notably, twin sister to Raeyn.

It’s hilarious, how the male had to resort to seeking her out in the end because he miss— because he—

He supposed it hadn’t been a wise decision on his part. To bed someone and then their sister a while after. Must’ve been weird. Must be why he’d be abruptly woken in the middle of the night from a pleasant, dreamless sleep. Haneht was a surprisingly light sleeper, easily stirred from the loving grasp of slumber by a furious, indignant Inarta he’d been pursuing as of late, whose incessant harassment and loud yelling at the door had also likely woken up many of his neighbours. Poor Saiyin. She lived just a little ways down.

Stumbling out of bed with a lack of his usual grace, the dancer blinked sluggishly, corners of his little cottage coming to light, illuminated by the dim glow of Leth’s moonbeams streaming through his windows. There was a tempest outside, he could tell, but for what his selfish, sleep-addled mind could not fathom. Padding across wooden floors as quickly as his legs could carry him, he took the blanket with him to swaddle himself with, answering the door in a loose, humble yellow tunic with a neckline that exposed sharp collarbones and baggy trousers that seemed to lengthen his already stalky limbs. He was met with a seething drunk; Raeyn. A pleasant surprise, if not for the red staining his arm and battered knuckles that Haneht, in the midst of his confusion and rising concern, noticed was also on his door.

“Raeyn,” the familiar name rolled off his tongue easily.

He shed the blanket, single hand reaching out to fuss over the drunken man who’d somehow trudged his way up to Okomo Estates in the middle of the night. “What‘s wrong? Your hands, Gods, what’ve you done to yourself?”

[Raeyn]

Raeyn was not ok. Visibly not ok. His body pulsing with adrenaline to do something stupid. From beneath red hair his vision too was red, for such a searing hot rage that flowed though his veins like a torrent, had never previously been known to the young mage. Barely being able to keep himself on his feet for the copious amount of wine he had filled his gut with had offset his balance considerably, he burst though the door the moment Haneht opened it. Claw like hands going straight for the boy's throat. No cooing, nor honest, loving concern from the boy's lips, could quench the white hot steel of his tongue.

"You slimy little... How petching dare you do this to me!? Who do you think you are?" Raeyn roared, slurring his words, barely making any sense. But in his drunken mind he was completely justified. Blindsided by Haneht's betrayal Raeyn was a storm of thunder and lightning.

His hand grasped at the collar of the boy's yellow tunic, leaving a great big red stain wherever they touched. Pain ripped though his shaken muscles but, numbed by alcohol that also prevented the clotting of the wound, he foolishly ignored it. If they boy put up no fight, Raeyn would push him right up against the wall, screaming bloody murder in his face. Tears of rage pooling at the corners of his eyes.

Mara had told him everything. She had also made him promise that he'd let her handle it all. But a promise made by a sober tongue meant nothing to a drunken mind.

For Raeyn simply couldn't understand how he had manage to let himself be taken for such a fool. Years he had spent considering himself above such abhorrent things as love and romance. But there he was, having let his guards down just enough to let Haneht in and leave a trail of destruction in his wake. How Reayn truly hated to admit that a little part of him had started to fall for the beautiful Eypharian. The word love even crossed his lips, only to be told he was playing both him and his sister for fools. Yes, Haneht had committed the one cardinal sin that left the Inarta barely able to look at his face. If it had been anyone else, perhaps he would have forgiven. Perhaps he wouldn't even had cared that much. After all they had made no promises to each other. But Mara, she was a different story...

Before Raeyn could even quite process what was happening, his fist once again found it's way to Haneht's cheek. The second time he had struck the boy. Though this time there was no regret behind the action.

"I wish I never met you." he sobbed, wound up like a spring toy that just couldn't stop."You so much as even look at my sister again... I'm going to kill you. Do you hear me!?"

[Haneht]

♛ H A N E H T ♛ ∆ E Y P H A R I A N ∆ W/C: 1,008 77th, Summer 518AV Midnight

He probably should've seen it coming, with the way Raeyn had screamed and pounded on his door in the dead of the night, bleeding out on his doorstep and smearing blood across the wood of his door. However, the Inarta had never seemed much of a threat to Haneht, hadn't amounted to anything more than a feisty, angry creature in the Eypharian's eyes. Even with that tight slap from before.

He should've known better, really, from all he'd seen of Raeyn. How the alchemist could go from quiet, easily-flustered and mildly-mannered to alarmingly fierce and passionate in the blink of an eye.

So when Raeyn stumbled in, barrelled at him like a bull in a China shop, he'd been caught off guard entirely, body still heavy with fatigue from having emerged fresh out of slumber. Fingers, like the talons of his race's fabled Wind Eagles, wrapped themselves around Haneht's throat like tendrils, tightening with every word that tumbled out clumsily from Raeyn's lips. Spite. Rage. Indignance. The famed Inartan temper that, despite the severity of the moment, Haneht could not help but admire and feel that it greatly suited the man. He was tempted to return the deed—wrap his own long, tapered fingers round the smaller male's neck—but the sight of him was enough of a distraction. For now.

Alarms were blaring loud in his head, tickling at his senses, and he responded to danger the way he always did. Laugh. Not nervous laughter, even - but rather, the sort that came out of amusement. It came out as a pathetic, strangled splutter, thanks to the hands pressing tightly at his throat that he did not move to resist."Raeyn, what—" A mix of a choke and grunt escaped him when his back met that wall harshly. "—are you... The words died in his throat, not by Raeyn's grip this time but by his own unwitting volition, as his eyes finally found purchase on the other's face, lit by the subtle beams of Leth's light streaming in and the dim glow of dying embers in the cottage's hearth. Tears dotted the edges of his piercing blue eyes and suddenly, the six-armed male was discomforted. No doubt, he was the reason for this beautiful creature's tears, glinting silver in Leth's luminance. Not the sort that the boy liked to see, either.

A fist struck him, caught him unawares for the second time in the season they've known each other. Stinging, striking pain found the boy and fished him out of the deep chasm he'd unknowingly begun sinking into, wrenching him out by the scruff of his collar in a vice-like grip not unlike the one his hunter had. A hard, solid punch this time, not a flimsy slap, and there was no apologetic or horrified look that could allow him to guess that the other felt sorry for his actions. Simply, because he was not.

Finally, finally, the fuel of Raeyn's burning, wrathful anger became clear to the Eypharian, who pieced together his earlier accusations and the words his impromptu guest sobbed out. Yet still, he was at a loss for words. There was nothing he could say, no flowers to give to appease him or apologise with, for Haneht was a monster incapable of guilt. Everything he touched went to ruin, and he smiled like the slimy little bastard he was, wincing at the tenderness of his sore, bruising cheek. Swiped at Raeyn's tears, ran that same, filthy hand down the curve of his jaw. The image of many a wronged, angry lover ghosted across Raeyn's figure, small and wounded and trembling with such spite for the man that Haneht would honestly be unsurprised if the other somehow managed to snap his neck. Infidelity was a sin he was often accused of, for reasons beyond his conscious understanding. He tolerated it, most days, but the way Raeyn was glaring at him, pain and angst etched into pure, pretty features and bleeding with Haneht as a sorry excuse, robbed him of all the saintly patience he had.

What an insult, brooded the elitist, like the pampered youth he was, you can't really be unfaithful if there was no faith in the first place.. It wasn't fair, this wasn't fair, Raeyn was being unfair in pointing fingers, because he'd never promised him love, never let even a hint of it brush past his lips. Everything he'd said, all the sweet whispers he'd thought out carefully. Haneht had done his part, and it was just not fair for him to be taking all the blame. Suddenly, he too felt very angry and cross, and the urges returned, no longer kept at bay by their master's affections and patience for the other. He had his pride too, and perhaps this was the worst match up of all times, two egotistical men, each with their own needs for control. Haneht was docile when he wanted to be, but times like these, his true colours were revealed. The Eypharian was anything but.

At the mention of Mara, the last of his restraints snapped, and a hand wrapped around each of Raeyn's lean, toned arms, squeezing tightly like a coiling serpent and digging claws of his own in. Mara was as much Haneht's as she was Raeyn's, and anyone else's. He couldn't just stop looking at her, not yet, he was not done, he still needed time, still wanted, still needed...

"You can't do this, Raeyn," he growled, startled by the remarkable resemblance in his voice to the man who sired him, but continued blindly ahead, actions no longer in his control with the influence of his own unconfronted emotions and lingering effects of Wild Djed exposure. "I will do what I want. You can't—you can't tell me what to do. You're being unreasonable. You're not being fair." His grip tightened further, a hint of desperation that unwittingly leaked out in his voice, and something wet and sticky that his mind barely registered as Raeyn's blood coated his fingers. "You cannot control me, Raeyn."

[Raeyn]

“Not being fair…” Raeyn repeated as if the words didn’t quite reach his ears. As if he couldn’t quite believe what he was hearing. In his mind fair had nothing to do with it.

He found his fingers pried off from the Eypharian’s clothing. In a drunken state he could do little to resist. And his mind still mulled over what Haneht had said, growing even more enraged by the second till his heart could swell no bigger with biting hatred. His own ribs wouldn’t allow for it. At the point of breaking he pulled back, enough steps to find himself out of arms reach. Swaying on the spot he stood there. Fists clenched around himself as if the touch of the other alone made him feel unclean.

“You think I want to control you? Don’t make me laugh.” An ominous, quiet hiss reverberated from him throat. “You think it’s all about you don’t you?”

Seeing about as far ahead as the tip of his own nose, thought the alcoholic haze, Raeyn would find himself wishing he could take a lot of what he said next back, come morning. But the moment had let the screws loose, released the snake from it’s cast iron cage. There was no inhibition left in him. It seeped down him fingers and onto the floor of Haneht’s cottage along with the blood from his wound.

“You mean nothing to me. You never did nor ever will. Do as you please. Fall off the edge of the mountain for all I care. But do my sister… that’s where you cross a line.” How he wished that in that moment a second Raeyn would appear beside him only to put a hand on his mouth. But such wishes were futile. “You see she actually means something to me. Not that I expect your pathetic little cold heart to understand. You think I can’t tell you what to do? Test me…”

But there was only so much Raeyn’s own heart could take. For beneath an icy shell there was heat and softness that he dared not admit to. And threatening a man he had admitted feelings for in such a way was a dagger right though those most tender parts of his heart. Feeling another heavy wave of tears press against his tear ducks Raeyn backed out of the cottage and with an angry slam of the front door he left and followed the nearest familiar alley that took him down to a familiar house. There in the garden of his late mother and loving arms of his father and sister welcomed him. Whatever else was said that night he would not remember. Drunk, but at least he was home - truly home.

[Haneht]

♛ H A N E H T ♛ ∆ E Y P H A R I A N ∆ W/C: 765 77th, Summer 518AV Midnight

Stop. Stop, just stop, please, he begged himself, but the words were lost in the turbulent sea of red clouding his mind and judgement. All his efforts in pursuing Raeyn and coaxing the man out of his prickly shell, the years he spent crafting this perfect mask for himself, in building the walls of his castle. Everything was crumbling in his grasp, sifting through his fingers like grains of sand.

“I...“ Words lumped themselves together in his throat, and his mind flailed helplessly, trying to conjure up something, anything, but he was drawing blanks. So he laughed, bitter and angry, hands twitching and reaching for Raeyn ever so slightly. If he snapped his neck, Raeyn would shut up. “And you always want control.” Stated the boy, manner-of-factly, and suddenly he was very much aware of his senses. The pain in his swelling cheek, the blood crusting beneath his nails and still drying on the hand that had dug into Raeyn’s wound, the creeping chill coming in like an uninvited houseguest through his open front door.

Eyes trailed the drops of blood that rolled down pale arms, like paint splatters on wood. This hadn’t been what he pictured when he thought the Inarta would look good in blood and gold. This was not the red he liked to see, and something about that angered the Eypharian, yet also doused the fire raging in him. He faltered, arms lowering in reflection of his guard.

Haneht shouldn’t have.

Raeyn’s next words hit him harder than any blow would, drove a knife at where it hurt, into a wound that was still scabbing over, still in the midst of mending itself. One shaky step back, followed by another before his back hit the same wall he hadn’t even realised he’d stepped forwards from. Not meaning anything to Raeyn had stung, somewhat, but it was something he’d been expecting from yet another jilted lover. With the string of broken hearts that trailed after him, he’d heard more than his fair share of angry, hateful vows and curses. It was the alchemist waving his sister around him—a boy who knew all too well what it was like to have one, to have three, four, three again, and then two—that pushed the knife in to the very hilt. The kind of pain he hated the most.

Eyes narrowing and brows furrowing, he forced himself forward again, off the walls and all but snarling, fueled by nothing but mulish obstinance and typical Eypharian pride. “You’re full of shit,” gods, he hated swearing, “Pretending you care for Mara! You just want to control her too. So she can’t leave you. So you feel wanted and loved.” The other’s face blurred in his eyes, now hot and burning and misting up with tears of their own that the youth swallowed down. Haneht did not cry. No one, in his family, cried. Not in front of anyone. Thhat was all he could muster out before his throat tightened, and Raeyn was gone, out the door before the boy could inflict any more damage. Disappeared down the dirt path and out of Okomo Estates to that stupid apartment and his stupid chicken, stupid mutt to cry to his sister.

Trembling hands picked up the nearest object and hurled it at the wall. Then the next. And the next. And still, it wasn’t enough. Something made of glass shattered, and fabric tore. The painted rock his neighbour had given him on the day of the Midsummer’s Festival went sailing out the windows, and he screeched and knocked everything over, overturning his chair with a kick. Glass shards and fragments of animal bone littered the floor, and still it wasn’t enough. He drove his fists into the wall, over and over until there were stains of his own, knuckles split and fresh and smarting. It took his gold bracelet, the one he loved and treasured so dearly, flying into the hearth to calm him down, and immediately he scrambled over to pick it out, treading over shattered glass that dug and cut into his bare feet. Burnt himself, he did, a light red mark already forming where still-glowing embers had seared his skin, but at this point nothing seemed to register anymore.

Finally exhausted, he slid down against a wall, strength gone with his dissipating anger, gleaming gold bracelet cradled against his lips with ten fingers like a precious prayer, remaining arms encasing him in a protective cocoon. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry,” quivering lips brushed against the cooling metal as Arumenic rolled off his tongue, and there he remained.

E N D

[Madeira Dusk]

Grades Awarded!

Don't forget to edit/delete your grade request!

Raeyn

Skills

• Intimidation: 2xp
• Unarmed Combat: 1xp
• Rhetoric: 1xp
• Observation: 1xp

Lores

• Lore of uncontrollable rage
• Intimidation: drunken threats
• Intimidation: physical aggression
• Haneht: betrayed Raeyn
• Haneht: unfaithful
• Unarmed Combat: drunken punching
• Haneht: not sorry for what he has done

Awards & Retribution
-Bruised knuckles and one hell of a hangover

Notes
It's so cool to see this prickly pinecone losing control of his vulnerable heart! I'm learning a lot about how insecure Raeyn really is. I look forward to seeing more of this really complicated relationship and what it'll do to our favorite hothead

Haneht

Skills

• Observation: 2xp
• Socialization: 1xp
• Logic: 1xp
• Intimidation: 1xp
• Rhetoric: 2xp

Lores

• Lore of restless dreaming
• Raeyn: emotionally unstable
• Raeyn: drunk and angry
• Lore of laughing in the face of danger!
• Intimidation: restraining hold
• Raeyn: controlling and unreasonable

Awards & Retribution
It's unclear what's been wrecked, but indeed something was damaged. If Haneht has destroyed or lost anything make sure to note it in his ledger.

Notes
You write mental distress better than anybody I've ever seen! When Haneht was being choked and accused and his immediate reaction was to laugh I felt that in my soul. You're great at showing us how entitled and childish and really quite damaged he is just by the way he interacts with himself in his own head. This is an awesome story!