Open Don't Never Look Away [Tinnok]

[Razkar]

70th Day of Spring, 513AV

Bodies roiled and swirled. Men and women screamed and roared. Blood arced and painted trees, shimmering and flashing crimson and scarlet or darker, steaming arterial hues. So many weapons clashed together that the voices and thick, wet sounds of impact were barely audible. Everywhere the charnel stink of dead and dying, screams for mercy or deliverance that would not come...

And Razkar in the middle of it all, gore-clotted weapons raised in blood-slick hands, screaming his defiance and his loyalty to the shifting face above it all. Watching down. Grinning with fanged and fearsome benevolence.

An armored human shouted a curse and lunged at him, broadsword sweeping through the fetid air. The Myrian's head snapped to him with a savage grin, swaying back from the clumsy weapon, tracking it's path and hammering it even further away and to the side with a backhand blow from his gladius. Over-extended and off-balance, the human staggered, twisting to his side-

-his side a beautiful target for Razkar's ax, which swung into his ribcage from the side and bit into flesh and organ and bone.

And he could feel it. He could feel the agony of his enemy, the shock and the pain and the disbelief... the sense of failure. The Myrian paused even as battle raged around them, barely remembering to pull back his gladius tight to his chest-

-thrusting a killing blow into the human's throat-

-no, now it was a Dhani, slit eyes bugging out and black blood oozing from its nose-

-an Akalak, warrior rage dimmed by despair as the blade punched out the back of his next-

-a piratical-looking Svefra, bearded and wild and still spitting blood even as Razkar twisted the blade-

-bathed in blood, mouth open, shocked... stunned... staring down at weapons... they were too large. They seemed bigger than usual, and lighter, but...

Razkar blinked, a disturbing thought piercing his battle rage. With an effort he quelled it, then found it was... easy to quell. The sounds around him went from deafening to muted like a candle puffed from light to darkness. The corpse slumped to the ground... and only empty armor clattered to the jungle floor...

"... what is this...?"

Silence. Eerie and unnatural. The kind that simply could not exist on a battlefield. Razkar blinked and noticed it, looking up... and finding a jungle full old bloodied, armored, armed beings from every race he had met and seen staring at him. Expectantly. Eager, almost, to get back to the business of slaughtering each other.

Well, why not let them? Clearly this is a battle of most savage earnest. You could reap much here, please Myri, you ancestors, yourself-

"This is... wrong..."

Rustling. Footsteps. Careful but sure. Confident and knowing. He looked towards the sound through his haze and his uncertainty. A figure, moving between the suddenly-shadowy ranks of fighters... flitting from his view... until it stepped forwards, a terrible and beautiful as ever.

"I suppose..." he said with a wry smile "... I should not be surprised to see you, Wolf..."

[Tinnok]

She was aware of a desperate need to fight, an urge which she never really bothered resisting. In her left hand was a cutlass, its curve serrated, its handle made of bone wrapped in leather. In her right was a bastard sword, long and viciously sharp. The massive Dhani male she faced off against had her in the air by the throat, yet she tumbled nimbly to the ground after slicing apart his arm, enabling her freedom. And if he was a whimpering Charoda when both blades slid up under his ribs? So much the better.

She whipped and whirled, arms caked in gore, eyes alive with the fire of a passion that only ignited within her body when she could smell the blood and piss and fear of her enemies. And though the world shifted strangely and her blades were sometimes clubs, sometimes daggers, it mattered not what she cut down her foes with.

So when the apparitions faded, and she was left in the mass of armor, weapons and discarded skulls, the half breed somehow knew there was someone she needed to find.

The glint of her yellow eyes reflected over the strange and bloody scene. The Wolf wore a pelt from her namesake around her shoulders, the head acting as a hood over her face. Her chest was bare save for bandages that kept her breasts in check, and a strange tattered length of cloth trailed down from bony hips. Her clothing was strangely clean considering her arms and legs were crimson with the blood of the fallen. Her smile was vicious, but welcoming.

"Well met Eagle."

She gave a half salute with her blade and glanced curiously around at the large array of foes, un-bothered by the fact that a good 50% of them she simply couldn't identify, voice casual when she spoke. "Looks like a war."

Her smile was that alarming mixture of Dhani and Myrian, cold and vicious, yet holding a great passion for death and all it meant. "I like the odds."

And so she placed her back to his with no more words. Everyone in the great clearing wanted to fight, the two warriors included. There was a battle to be fought, and Tinnok let out a very canine growl out of her throat as she threw out one final quip.

"Betcha I can kill more than you can, Eagle" She didn't need to hear his voice or see his face to feel the way his body shifted behind her, to know precisely what kind of expression lay upon his face. She made an exceedingly rude gesture at one of the massive blue things that stood in the crowd, whose response was to smack his genitalia. Tinnok's nose curled in disgust, ready at her companion's command.

[Razkar]

He knew, through the uncertain twisting in his deepest thoughts, that this was all wrong. Well... not necessarily wrong. Battle was battle after all, but it was... how had he got here? It was the wilds of Falyndar, that much was obvious, but he was in the Suvan Sea. Where had all these races converged from? Why had they come? Why was he alone? It was all too... convenient.

The sight of Wolf changed that uncertainty, banished it with a sudden, familiar camaraderie that he would never mistake. That sweet anticipation before every engagement. Tracking, finding and facing your enemy. The war of flesh and mind in every duel and clash of arms, and the final, bloody victory...

Cloaked in her skins and bandages, she was every inch that savage mentality. Now wolf in appearance as well as name, the halfbreed female seemed to pulse with life behind him, killing intent radiating out of her so intensely that it seemed to blind and stymie the opponents ringing them. He raised his weapons again, and as if at his bidding, the monstrous figures shifted...

"Betcha I can kill more than you can, Eagle."

A bark, harsh and dry like a twig breaking, and Razkar spat a heavy glob of saliva at the feet of a tensing Dhani, strips of chainmail across its chest and a head again taller than Razkar. Twin daggers weaved in its hands, and Razkar's eyes tracked them with steady, practiced ease.

"Later for questions and words, Tinny," he said lightly, rewarded with a quick bristling from behind him that lifted his grin another point. He slowly crossed his weapons over his chest and gave a tiny bow.

The only respect you bastards will get this day.

"For now... let us pray-"

He lunged and swung with the same move, dark body blurring towards the Dhani. The thing hissed and swiped with one dagger, only to meet his gladius in a shower of sparks, second blade already thrusting for his stomach-

-only to eviscerate naught but air, his torso twisting out of the way, ax hacking diagonally down into the trunk coiled around it. A scream of primal, reptilian rage deafened him but he saw only the red mist around each of the charging figures now, packets of meat, walking corpses.

Offerings to the Goddess-Queen. Nothing more.

His gladius thrust through the Dhani's side and he hung on grimly as it reared up, dragging him off his feet, towards it, into it-

-slamming a headbutt onto its nose, hearing a delicious snap of bone, slitted eyes glazing in pain and rage and-

-the Myrian sank his teeth (sharpened, lethal, more like fangs now and in this place, all the longer and sharper, it seemed) into its throat and ripped out a mouthful. It flailed back desperately, arterial spray yards long painting a pair of humans behind it, blinding them even as they charged.

Razkar leaped down from the flailing corpse and slashed down with his ax, splitting one's skill down to the jawline. The other was still trying to wipe the blood from his eyes when Razkar landed, bending his knees instantly and crouching low, hacking horzintally-

-taking off an exposed leg, sending the screaming, crippled human to the jungle floor-

-burying his ax in his chest with a bass clang of sharpened metal punching through mail. He ripped the blade free and screamed his hate and victory into the dying eyes, making sure that visage was what the barbarian would take with him into the next world.

Razkar's world became a roar, a rush, a beat that ran from his heart to his mind to his hands to his soul. Constant, ever-changing movement. Parries and strikes, ripostes and lunges, counters and blocks. Blows from gladius and ax and fist and knee and head and teeth and everything else, until it was like the two of them were wading through the dying and the maimed.

Purpose. Nothing but purpose here. An endless army and two Children of Myri to pain the ground with blood in Her name.

Questions would indeed come later. But for now... they were free.

[Tinnok]

Not even the dreaded nickname could haunt the half breed here, for all her bristling. The blue man charged towards her, and despite the sheer masses of individuals that surrounded the two servants of Myri, a moment passed that was only the two of them. His eyes were a strange grey the color of the sea, and hers were golden orbs mimicking Syna's light.

His massive battle axe was stopped with the massive great sword the half breed found in her grasp. Clutched in both hands it weighed heavy and dense within her grasp, yet it felt like the perfect weapon for the snake. The clang of metal on metal rang through the clearing, and then as she saw shadowy forms beginning to enclose upon her position the half breed screamed, a sound filled with rage and pleasure in equal measure.

With a heft of her wiry arms and a shifting of her feet she swung the thick blade in a 360 degree arc around her person, slashing at the midsections of her shadowy foes. Strange bloody explosions of mist and gore met her eyes, defying the laws of physics and anatomy, but all she could do was grin.

"5.."

The strange blue figure, strong and tall, had not fallen for her little trick, and used her twirl as an advantage, lunging atop the half breed and pinning her to the ground. Tinnok spat in his face and he smiled wide and clever.

"You're pretty little blue man." Tinnok grinned, then her head darted to the side and teeth...not as sharp as the eagle's, dug into to cobalt flesh. She ripped out a hunk of skin and muscle, spitting it out and leaping to her feet, kneeing her stunned opponent in the jaw. As his body fell she hefted the sword backward only to pull it forward in order to slice off his head and watch it roll to join the others.

"6..."

And then the mass was on top of her. Somewhere within this world wasone of the dreams Tinnok held most dear, to become a master with all blades. As a pile of bodies, Dhani, blue men, Yukmen, and humans piled atop her, the great sword was replaced with twin katana's, gripped in either hand. Shorter and faster she used them to stab vertically up through the pile, blood spattering into her mouth as she brought both swords down in an arc towards her foes, cutting a wide swathe of space in which she leapt out and over her foes, flipping and landing spryly upon her feet.

Both katanas were posed at different angles, one foot slid and ready behind the other, the perfect battle pose.

"9..."

She heard the Eagle roar with vicious triumph, and a smile alighted upon her face that was born from a different happiness than this vicious one, what a wonderful game this was turning out to be.

[Razkar]

It wasn't enough. It still roared and screeched and scratched and clawed the insides of his soul. Unchained and unrestrained, it gorged until it vomited blood and viscera and then gorged again.

None of them tried to run. A heavy-set Isurian with a warhammer of gleaming iron swung for his head and the Myrian sidestepped to his left and swayed, thrusting the blade into the stocky man's ribcage. The Isurian grunt and coughed blood, backhanding the massive hammer for a second try-

-only for Razkar to catch it. Catch it out the the shit-reeking sky with his empty right hand.

Fear soaked the Isurian's face as he looked up into a snarling, crimson visage. All teeth and black, soulless eyes, rage and disgust and hate so thick he felt his soul congeal. And Razkar felt it too. Felt it shimmer through him like a rock in water-

The beast roared, and Razkar ripped his gladius free through the Isurian's chest in an impossible gout of pumping blood.

His screams had devolved into mindless frenzy, warrior mentality crushed and forgotten. Every death, every splash of blood across him, had stoked something more than pride and love for his Goddess-Queen. Something far darker and far older.

And more hungry.

One long, incoherent howl of animal fury ripped apart the jungle as the ranks of the shadows began to thin. They were becoming shadows, too, some distant part of Razkar realized. Features faded, became blurred masks. Even blood became more like mist and... wet sand, splahing heavily in a way liquid should not or just vanishing into the air.

He swung the ax around with one hand, cracking open skulls, smashing rib cages, splitting limbs in twain, gladius thrust and impaling and... and...

A shimmer Charoda begged up at him from the ground, and for a flash it was her again. I'sona. The face from his past that his heart had broken for, not wanting to see such a gentle, terrified creature suffer, even at the hands of his people. She was back now, blade tumbling from her hands, salt water tears leaking through-

-Razkar screamed until his throat ached and slashed her head from her shoulders.

None left... gone... all gone... no... NO... must find more... more...

"... more..."

The word slithered from his lips. It was not a voice now, it was his soul given some... some dark release. Wide eyes stared around, now entirely black, not just his onxy pupils. The world became yet more hazy, thick miasma of blood and black mist blinding him, searching... searching...

A creature with a wolf's head. Taller than him, shaggy and blood-soaked and with a curved blade in its hands.

Some voice screamed at Razkar from deep in his mind, told him this was wrong, he was wrong, he should stop before he hurt-

"No..." The same voice slithered its words again and Razkar gripped his weapons tighter. "Never... stop..."

The thing spoke to him. Words he could not hear. Could not understand. He was already running, leaping, bounding, hurling his warhammer as a distraction and tossing his gladius to his right hand, left ripping his kukri free.

His roar was a storm given voice, a daemon given form, and he flew at his friend even as the forgotten corners of his soul wept.

[Tinnok]

A tingle ran down the half breed's spine. She had the massive sword in hand again, swinging it manically, an almost childish grin on her face. The feeling tempered her smile, hands shifting to a single long sword with a handle carved from some ebony material.

She whirled and her opponent exploded in a red mist, and as she hacked and slashed, stabbed and kited, she noticed the numbers dim. The figures grew indefinite, like spectral shades in Dira's embrace. Now this did pique Tinnok's curiosity. She may have been fine with the blood and the gore, but defeating the army of enemies should not have been an easy task, even with her clearly god like skills....

She sliced and hacked and her Cutlass was back into her hand by the time the numbers sputtered, faded, and were suddenly gone completely, leaving Tinnok on a strangely muted scene of death and blood, feeling similarly empty of purpose.

And then she heard the animal call, truly inhuman, and she turned to see that it came out of the throat of her comrade. Her facade faltered. "Razkar...?"

But the black eyes that turned toward her were even more devoid of emotion than the strange horde they had faced, and the way his mouth was set with determination...

She ducked the hurled war hammer, gasping as it zinged above her head, crashing into the foliage behind.

"Eagle, what are you doing? Eagle! RAZKAR!" She screamed, but she didn't even see a flicker of recognition. What had he said? 'Later for questions and words.'

"So be it, friend." It was strange, she had never imagined fighting the Eagle out of true anger, though this time it wasn't her...but he. She slid the long sword into her left hand, a short sword appearing in her right. His intent looked to be to kill, something she did not understand, but it had to do with this place, these creatures. This was not the fun game she had believed it to be...but she would continue playing it all the same.

His roar was vicious and violent, the wrath of a rabid animal, her answering cry was one of fierce determination.

And then the Eagle and Wolf clashed. The clatter of steel upon steel rung hollow in the dark place the two of them inhabited. Tinnok gasped with the pressure and force of his attack, which literally pushed her through the corpses and earth several feet backwards before with a snarl Tinnok pushed his weapons entwined with hers up and away and kneed him in the chest.

The anger his gaze held when it locked with her golden eyes brought a terror the snake rarely felt, sending another shock down her spine as he delivered a vicious head butt that knocked her sprawling backwards.

"Jesus shyke....now I know how all those barbarians must feel." But Tinnok was no barbarian, no entity to be cowed and intimidated by a Myrian savage. She was a Myrian savage.

As he came at her again she leapt up, screaming with rage. If he wanted a fight wanted more, he would get it. She twirled 180 degrees, stabbing both of her blades backwards up and towards his chest before somersaulting forward. As she righted herself one foot swung out and around, righting her body to face the Eagle, crouched and ready for his next attack. Her eyes closed for a moment, pulling within, pushing beyond the part that knew and cared for her comrade....pulling out the Dhani.

Yellow eyes flashed open, black slits turning to thin lines in the depths of her golden orbs, asking for the next move.

[Razkar]

This one was much more challenging. Like an old man remembering some distant, faded memory of youth, part of Razkar's mind remembered how that would have thrilled him once. A worth adversary, able to match him in speed and skill, who could only be bought down by cunning and determination... the Goddess-Queen always had value for such-

Razkar blinked as he parried the twin thrusts from the airborne Wolf. Myri... Myri was her name... Goddess of War and... Victory... not of Rage-

He blinked and for the briefest moment his eyes snapped back to focus, white orbs around his black pupils looking almost terrified, confused. The male looked down at his bloody weapons and remembered whom he was fight-

A bellow of rage. His head snapped up, his grip tightened, his vision filled with the wolf-headed creature with two blade who kicked out at him, swaying to miss her strike, and then stood, knees bent-

Golden orbs flashed through the hollows where the canine's eyes would have been. Razkar growled and the beast growled with him, stymieing and burying and brutalizing all other thoughts.

Not now! No questions! No thinking! Only blood! Blood and death!

With a wild cry Razkar lunged forwards, aiming a heavy swipe at the wolf's legs with his gladius, knowing the fast, nimble enemy would block, thrusting with her own-

-only for his kukri to parry the lunge from the short sword, sliding down the length of the longer blade-

-to slash at her wrist and arm with the curved, chopping blade-

-making his enemy howl with pain and jerk back, the noise making Razkar's flesh tingle in sick, spastic ecstasy, manic grin reflecting it-

-until her own sword, in her right hand, flicked up from where it blocked his gladius, missing most of him thanks to his twisting dodge, but still ripping a strip of skin from his kidney to shoulder-

"Fucking snake!"

His roar was two voices in one mouth, overlapping each other and fighting for dominance. One thick and guttural, choked with battle rage, the voice Tinnok knew well. The other was... deeper. Like something that had been dug up from a pit somewhere forgotten in the earth. Old in a way that made Nuits seem like Kelvics. Old... deep... and with an immortal hunger that chilled her.

She opened her mouth and he was on her again, slashing and stabbing with both weapons, changing his tactics. He was thrusting and striking over and over, not giving her time to move, to think, to counter, driving her back-

-over the corpses, the slick, slippery blood-

-which was gone, vanished, jungle floor pristine and clear but trees shaking as if in a thunderstorm, watching down in horror at the two "friends"-

"Rip you fucking heart out!"

He lunged but overstepped, and Tinnok rolled to her right, avoiding her thrust and the horizontal sweep he tried to compensate with. She came back to her feet and Eagle was on her again, leaping high and striking down with a shattering vertical blow-

-to close to dodge or roll, both her weapons coming up in a cross to halt the gladius-

-which clanged against her own iron and stopped, but he kept coming, kept falling-

-clutching the kukri in his other hand that embedded in her thigh up to the hilt.

She howled and once again when Razkar blinked, his vision cleared. That voice... that was not an enemy. He knew it. He'd heard it. Where... Where...?

There was... There was a... a cave...

Ill-used and unconscious (or conscious? for what is this place if not one of opposites?) synapses in his mind fired, kicked into gear, crackled and woke up their cousins and neighbors and brothers and dredged up memories. The male swayed briefly on his feet as he paused, sudden frown on his face, manic and rage-choked snarl lost for an instant to confusion.

You stand over a wounded enemy, and you pause?! Strike! Strike, you fool, that you may find more!

Yellow orbs. Hated yellow orbs. But in a wolf's head? A wolf...

“Thanks for keeping me alive down there…" The words echoed through his mind from a long time ago, and he blinked, breath coming in nearly a gasp. He blinked again and saw her on the river bank, patching up his wounds, that same grief and anger in his eyes from seeing so many of their comrades die in that deep darkness-

"... Tinnok?"

It was only Razkar's voice, this time, but the poison of the killing copse had taken them both. Bellowing with rage and pain, kukri still jammed in her leg but her rage numbing her as well as any tonic, his enemy flashed towards him.

[Tinnok]

A great rage alighted in the abmination then as a tear of crimson appeared in her flesh. The insult should not have struck her the way it did, should not have sunk into the core of her being like a leaded weight. But it was because it was him saying it. A pure blood, just like all the pure bloods before him....just like all the ones after.

She grimaced, but the pain was not so great, not the physical part at least. Her body gyrated and spun, but whie she was fast, he was powerful, deadly, and mean.

The kukri buried itself into her flesh and she howled with pain and anguish. Just as memories from his past flooded the Eagle's mind, so too did words from hers.

He saw pain and camraderie, she saw what she had always seen on a training field some time ago...when they had first met. "Don't worry, snake shit. You won't die today. I can promise you that."Oh yes, it had not hurt so much then, but to think that he still felt the same way after all this time....that he had never truly seen anything else. The Dhani within hissed angrily at her for her weakness. You really thought he cared for you? Utterly pathetic Myrian.

So by the time the white's of his eyes showed, she could no longer identify the confusion, the sympathy. Whatever had consumed him seemed to siphon into her body like a sponge, and she barely felt the blade as she rose from the ground.

"Filthy pure blood...let the jungle be cleansed of your rot." And it was her turn to show no quarter.

Her body practically hummed with the energy of her attacks. He had drawn her blood and now it was her turn. Her face didn't see shock in his face as he struggled to compose, didn't care if she saw any regret in his eyes. Steel flashed menacingly, both swords sweeping in parallel strikes horizontally above his chest. His weapons came to block and TInnok dropped the arm with the shortsword punching him square in the gut and leaping up to deliver a vicious kick to his solar plexus, breath snarling out of her throat.

"Should have known you pure bloods were all the same....and an idiotic male no less..." A part of her blanched at the comment, but it was sequestered and hidden within the roiling Dhani presence, which had unfurled in a great transformation that showed itself every way but physicality.

He parried and block every single blow, but she saught his blood. Twirling again she feinted, letting him block her long sword only to curve the shorter blade under his raised arms, gouging a wound beneath his pectorals and above his stomach, grinning sadistically as he let out a moan of pain.

"A taste of what it feels like, pig."" And her assault only continued.

[Razkar]

"Filthy pure blood...let the jungle be cleansed of your rot."

Razkar's mind was torn, and it slowed his body. In this place, that was a fatal misstep. Her enemy came on with a fury he had not seen in years, rage and anguish from some deep, buried place given life and form and joyous release.

With every strike he parried, she looked more and more like a snake. The wolf's head seemed to dissolve around her, falling apart, rotting enough for decades over sparse chimes. Scales sprouted across her skin, and even her legs seemed closer together... joining.

Dhani. The Ancient Enemy. A vast and familiar swell of hatred rose in him, generations of Shorn Skulls clamoring beyond the veil for the blood, scalp, meat and bones of the beast. But something else, something clawing at the back of his skull, something from chimes ago when the field was choked with fresh, willing soon-to-be corpses.

This is wrong. This is-

He grunted, forced back by the punch and kick, entire torso now aflame with both blows. Her twin swords were devious and fast in her hands, and a rage that matched his own was driving her forwards, forwards-

Before, he could have matched her, forced her back. But now that pitch-black, ravenous purpose had been shaken in his mind, in his eyes, as they changed with every blink, warring inside his skull. Two voices. One faraway and not his own, the other... was that him?

"Should have known you pure bloods were all the same....and an idiotic male no less..."

Her voice changed. Became a hissing, hateful sibilant of the Dhani. A pure Dhani, not some half-and-half abomination. The wolf-head finally fell away-

-revealing golden eyes that burned and a forked tongue in a Myrian head, wide and roaring-

"Wolf!"

The barked word smacked her across the face but whatever recognition there was vanished in a moment. The world around them was... aflame. Dark fire. Shimmering like thick mist, rolling over all but where their feet danced and their arms swung. Shadowy, distant figures watched with fanged mouths from the darkness... approving...

She came on, this Dhani that was not a Dhani, he was sure, and finally she broke through his defense. His mind was not solely on his hands, trying to remember, to think, struggling to regain control-

-as his arms were widened, stretched, chest exposed-

"A taste of what it feels like, pig."

-and he fell back, grunting and gasping, slash opened deep in his chest. He felt blood ooze out and pressure on his lungs, every breath stabbing into his pectoral muscles like fresh blades-

-and still she came on, for he was still alive, and she wanted naught but his head.

Razkar's gladius slashed up, kukri right behind it, the first smashing aside her longer sword, the second knocking away her shorter one, twisting as he blocked, her lunge moving her past him-

-driving his knee upwards into her stomach-

-doubling her over as his left arm bent downwards, elbow smashing into her back-

Not all there. Not all focused. Leaving gaps. Foolish. Foolish and dead.

-and he screamed when her short sword backhanded and exploded through his right shin like an arrow through paper. The male went down to one knee and howled like a wounded tiger, trees blowing away around him as his pain made this dark world shudder.

As she turned he butted down towards her again, but she was wise to him, jerking her head back, rearing back for a thrust with her long sword-

-only for his kukri to stab straight upwards, through her lower arm...

Another howl. Another spray of blood. Two figures kneeling on the ground, hateful glares burning between them. Each with a hand on a weapon buried in the other's flesh, not risking letting go. The other hand on a longer weapon, raised, determined to end the other, petch it, even if they both had to die-

Something desperate flashed in his mind. Some memory. Some feeling bereft of hate and violence and the red, ravenous mist. Something that forced his lips back from a snarl and made him jump of a cliff.

"My love... is lucky to have... such a loyal friend..."

It was the desperate, inane firing memory of a dying mind, or something close to it. The world around them fractured anew, choir of shadowy figures roaring their disapproval as the Dhani's face contorted in sheer confusion, hands stayed... but so did the Myrian's...

Golden orbs glowed... but dimmed a fraction... and with each passing moment, the fog cleared from Razkar's mind. Something close to rationality passed through him, a shuddering breath giving him some peace, some balance...

"... I said those words," he rasped, eyes still hard, but... amenable. "I... I said them to you... didn't I?"

[Tinnok]

The snake moaned in pain, panting and heaving upon the ground. She was furious at him, and her rage seemed only to grow when he mentioned her, yet something about the words set her boiling temper onto a simmer. THe Dhani lashed and coiled, but yellow eyes glanced down to the arm that held the short sword in his body, seeing what were normally the faint shimmer of scales...giant and olive green, her hands monstrous and clawed. Yellow eyes widened, the Dhani glowered in triumph and the Myrian cowered in hate and self loathing.

He spoke, slowly, painfully, and her eyes met his, some sick fire dying in those large orbs. Her fingers released the blade, and her scaled lips quivered, voice coming out as barely a whisper.

"If you hadn't notice, Eagle, I don't have many friends I can talk to."

Pain and regret, confusion and sorrow. Flickers of shadows surrounded them, spectral watchers from other lands and times far past. The Dhani's eyes closed, but when they opened again her body was still mishapen, not whole Dhani...a personification of what she had always felt herself to be, what others had always looked at her like she was.

She recoiled from him then, his own blade pulling out of her leg, yet the wolf barely felt any pain compared the strange throbbing in her chest. Like a snake was coiled around her heart and lungs, squeezing and squeezing until their was nothing left.

"Eagle..." She rasped. "I'm so sorry." His own discrepencies seemed forgotten, all she could see were scales, her vision shifted and blurred. She was disgusting, he was the pure ilk of Myri...her a bastard of Siku, yet she had wanted his throat out, to grip his beating heart. Even now the memory of it made the coils loosen, and she curled into herself there in the strange dark clearing.

What were they those two monsters? One born of blood, the other of despair.