Kavala nodded, taking some serious mental notes. She already decided what she'd start out by doing. She needed to strength train and build up her endurance. By getting up a bit early and running along the beach, that would go a long way towards helping get her body into the kind of shape she needed it to be in to become what Radris had talked about and both to prepare to carry and birth an Akalak child. Dyrid would certainly come with her, so there'd be no danger of attack until she was ready for it with the kelvic along.
The healer nodded - of course she knew... the whole of Sanctuary did. Kavala knew Hatot trained like a man obsessed - starting early and ending his day off the same way. Sometimes people joined him that worked at Sanctuary, but often he forged alone in his quest for physical and spiritual perfection. His body was sculpted and toned like all the Akalak were. But she got to witness first hand how much he acted like a weaponsmith forging a sword day in and day out working with his physique. As a woman, it was something she appreciated greatly. But when Radris wore the form, it was something that scared her. Yet another thing, she decided, she'd have to get over. Life had so many hurdles, especially here in Riverfall. It had been the same on the Grasslands as well.
"I've been meaning to talk to him about that. There's two empty rooms in the basement of Sanctuary. I'd like to turn one into a temple, but the other one we could turn into an underground training room for when the weather is really bad. Beings that I've never meditated or communed with the Gods like I should have been all along... I don't know how to go about doing either. Maybe both of you could help with that." She added, then squeaked in surprise as he grabbed her wrist. At first she thought she'd said something wrong - done something - but then she realized it was an attack.
When he suddenly rose and had her wrist, Kavala blinked in shock. Just as he suspected, she wasn't ready for it at all. Taken completely by surprise, she was halfway across the compound before she truly recognized he was taking her away. She didn't understand why, and began to struggle then, locking her heels with a
"Radris... I'm sorry.. I didn't... what are you ...." She knew it was a pathetic thing to do, and later when she was alone she'd realize how if he had been truly the enemy she'd have been hauled away before even offering any resistance. But at that point he hadn't done enough to trigger her natural defenses - the ones he so despised.
When he spun her and locked himself up behind her with her arm trapped in his and a hand captured by his other she completely froze. He knew it would happen. She was as predictable as Syna's rising in this. The position was submissive and allowed her to be fully open to his abuse. Her hair hung to one side and he could tell her eyes were wide open staring vacantly forward. One minute she'd been there, the next she was gone. Checked out. The smell of fear gone. Awareness gone. Everything vanished. Before, when he was dragging her across the Courtyard, he could smell her fear like one of her kelvics could, but now there was just nothing there. It was as if he held a corpse in his arms or a life-sized living doll. The brute in him could tell how though she was beautiful, there was no turn-on left for a would-be physical attacker. No crying. No struggling. No nothing. When she'd developed the action as a defense mechanism, the rapes had stopped. So too had the bastard that took so much pleasure etching her skin. If she didn't cry out when he coated her skin with blood, there was no pleasure left in the artwork for him.
In the place she'd been, it had been an ingenious method of self preservation. Here though, it was absolutely one of the most dangerous habits she could have.
His voice wouldn't be enough. Radris could tell already that she was nowhere near as close enough to the surface for his voice to have any effect. His tongue caused a sharp inhalation, possibly because Hatot's touch effected her like that, and partially because it was so unexpected. She swam closer to the surface, but still not breaking it. Her breath came in and was pushed out again, automatically... not even the adrenaline she was feeeling changing that. Her breath flooded into her body and then was forced out almost automatically.
More. She needed more. He ripped at her pants and they slid partially off one hip, exposing a bare curve of her thigh and part of one buttock that shimmered with scales. These were her night clothes, so they offered no resistance. Still nothing, the Konti was held firmly lifeless in his arms. Her stillness reeked of deep psychological damage, though he'd known that already. Somehow, someway she'd trained herself to retreat deep inside.
She needed something else. He added more words and ran his hand up her chest, across her breasts, and grabbed at the neckline of her tunic. Deep inside herself, Kavala heard Radris... and his words were like a lifeline. She clung to them, slowly letting them penetrate her lost consciousness. She expected pain as she followed the words backwards, upwards, trying to surface despite the ingrained habit of retreat. She fought with herself. Part of her insisted she'd rise only to feel the agony of ripping and tearing of soft feminine tissue that always accompanied unwanted and unprepared for sex. Her mind argued that she didn't need to see her own blood and feel the ultimate act of submission because by now she'd be down on the ground - on her hands and knees - being forced. But she rose anyway, ignoring the arguments which were valid in her mind, following Radris' voice. She trusted in it because something in her in that instant of complete terror recognized that he wasn't what she'd thought he was... even if her mind didn't equate the attack to being his.
She gasped, like a drowning person who finally broke free to the surface after having been pulled down by a riptide. He heard it and saw her blink, but knew she was sluggish coming back to herself. It was a terrible habit, a habit that would get her killed eventually. In the time he'd had a hold of her, he could have slit her throat and that would have been the end of her life - without a fight, without even a mild protest. She moved finally, glancing down, as if shocked she was still on her feet. And she bent forward, as if pulling away from him, but there was no technique and no force in the move. Kavala began to shake then, tried to say something, but was trembling too hard to speak. She moved as if in slow motion - as though swimming through mud. Then she made a low sound, an angry sound, and lifted a bare foot and stomped it down on his booted one. Had she had boots on and he barefoot, it would have been an intelligent move. But he could tell she was just acting on instinct, especially when the stomp landed wrong. He heard a bone snap as one of her toes landed curled against his boot - but she didn't utter a sound about it. She tested his grip, how he had her arranged, and found the only free thing besides her legs was her head. Twisting around, flexibility for her not being a problem, she uttered a soft sound of rage as she spit directly in his eyes. But she couldn't break free. He'd seen to that.
Kavala hissed softly, through teeth clenched against her shaking, and whispered a single word...
"Bastard.." through her teeth. It was a start, but one that was next to useless. He'd have to do it over and over again, and somehow break her of the 'retreat' habit. it was one that had taken weeks of intensive abuse to develop to provided her with some sort of comfort and shelter even in the worst of conditions. Under the best of conditions, it would take years to break - but they didn't have years. Such behavior was risky today - a risk that would put him or her other friends in the line of fire if they tried to protect her as she shut down. She didn't want that... she couldn't afford that because life was too precious to waste, especially on her behalf.
