she who tames tempests ♟ eulalie, day four

A crackle of energy settles in the palm of her hand.

She remembers that moment, Tsiuri's shadow passing her by. The girl's fingers had trembled as if about to reach out. Their eyes met once more, a smear of fresh blood across a tanned cheek. For the first time in her short life, outside of a television screen, Eulalie has witnessed a person die. And she is not the cause. She's not even a factor. A blonde body is crumpled against the dark soil, an echo of Eulalie's own self. A possibility.

Cannon fire hides the sound of her racing heart, standing in place and not rushing to move as all the others clear the space and retreat into the woods to regroup. Or to break at the seams. She trusts that Tsiuri will honor her request and wait for her, but she allows herself this time to process. In spite of her arrogant bravado, she is not the deadliest thing in this arena. Perhaps she should have invested that impromptu training into herself.

The spiders disappear into the shadows, the night stretches on for miles in all directions, and only the distant sound of large wings breaks the silence. She closes her eyes, and she listens. If she cannot be dangerous on her own, with flesh and axe and conviction, she will find a way to even the odds. Strange dreams and knights made of stone be damned, Eulalie refuses to believe that fables and bedtime stories are truer than fiction.

The Games are real. Muttations and simulated environments are, too.

All that she can trust is the tangible. She grips her weapon, securing her bag across her shoulder. And she sets off in the direction of the sound, knowing that either an end or a beginning waits for her in the pitch dark. Tsiuri will find her in the labyrinth, if their reunion is meant to be. Like a huntress, Eulalie pushes through the tangle of branches and briar thickets, deeper and deeper still into the wilds.

Eventually she comes across the beast perched atop a tall boulder. Sleek and terrible, wings spread wide as if preening. Pale moonlight slips between the canopy, pink scales shimmering like a mystical fire. This creature is as magnificent as it is terrifying, a dragon conjured from the page of a fairy tale. It exhales a plume of smoke, tendrils of an exhale reaching from the dark leaves above. It is as real as she is.

Dropping her bag and weapon to the forest floor with a soft thud, Eulalie meets the gaze of the creature as it turns to face her. Terrible fangs shining like daggers, emerald eyes piercing through the dim light. Her heart pangs with fear, but her feet dig into the earth and she squares her shoulders. She is tired of feeling like a coward. Maybe she's not Cordelia Blake, and maybe she's not the scariest tribute in this arena. She's sure as Hell not a princess, or a warrior.

She is Eulalie Blake.

And she charges forward with a courage capable of taming wyverns with her bare hands.