awaken, dear reaper || kahinta v. perdita || day eight
Aug 1, 2020 19:42:56 GMT -5
Post by wimdy on Aug 1, 2020 19:42:56 GMT -5
Her bare feet grow sore, and eventually, the soft grit of the sand gives way to grassy earth.
Kahinta has no idea where she is anymore.
After a moment of rubbing her feet off against the ground, she squeezes her feet back into her boots, lacing them up tight and wiggling her toes inside to get comfortable. The air feels crisper, edging closer to cold as the night has ticked on, and Kahinta takes the time to unspool her cloak from her bag and settle it over her shoulders again before setting off further into the fog.
Everything feels distant. The goose under her arm wriggles a little as she starts to walk, but she hardly registers the sensation, curling it tighter against her body until it gives a quiet honk and goes still. Its head tucks against her side under the crystal ribs. Cold seeps into her little by little, but she doesn't bother to curl her cloak tighter around her. A shiver crests through her as the wind picks up a little, but she feels it as if through a glass wall, able to see but unable to connect to what's on the other side. Shock, she thinks, even hours later. Perhaps she's in shock, white turning red with each successive hit and bubbles beneath the clouds.
Onward.
The petals cling to her much the same as they had days ago, gently at first before building in number and intensity. She breathes them in, coughing at the sensation, wiping a shaky hand against her lips and coming away pink and purple and yellow, she's sure, though she cannot see it. In the dark, Kahinta can hardly see anything, so she has to put her faith in what she can see: the stars.
Something burns there, deep beneath her feet in the endless sky that stretches out all around her. For how long had Kahinta kept her eyes on the ground, unwilling or unable to look any longer to the stars for guidance, undone from the ignorance of her youth of making wishes on what gleams in the dark? And now, to walk the path of the stars into the distance, slow spiraling trail of heaven leading her assuredly to whatever hell she'd damned herself to suffer? They glitter sedately in promise, blinking out under her feet as she goes, a great and terrible wish snatched from the sky with every forward motion, every kill. She'd take, and take, until the sky was darker than it had been in the washed-out glow of the Capitol.
Focused as she is on the sky above and below, Kahinta doesn't realize how far she's walked. The wind stills slowly and then all at once, giving way to the eye of the storm, and the girl who stands across the way, bathed in starlight.
District Four. Perry? Pearl? Still nothing fits.
There's no use in running, not when they've both gone entirely still the way prey do in front of a predator, willing themselves not to be seen when it's already happened. Kahinta breathes in shallowly, hand clenching around her morning star before going loose, too tired to put up a fight in the night sky after a day with her head in the clouds. It seems it's not an uncommon feeling.
"You running from something?" The voice carries, soft in its testing, eyes sharp in a delicate face.
"I killed someone today. They were wearing white," she answers, just loud enough to cross the clearing, to give word to the bone-deep weariness that weighs down her limbs, that keeps her shoulders dropped.
"The boy I killed was wearing black. Same as Niko."
Kahinta doesn't cringe, doesn't react, despite the way she feels the sharpness of the memory press between her ribs and slip deep into her abdomen. A hand clenching tight in her shirt, at her shoulder, around to her back. The full weight of a body sagging into hers with a ragged breath, and a desperate, wet cry against the deluge of water. More red than she'd ever seen, lost to the rising waterline between the graves. A hapless idiot waving in the distance to an enemy he never should have had.
"He's still got a shot then, I think."
Her eyes draw quickly over the other girl's body, taking in the dark black of her attire, searching quickly for any injuries, any weaknesses, before looking down at herself. Inky ruin, and the gleam of constellations along her ribs. Words draw her back up out of the stars.
"I try not to dwell on ghosts."
Movement out of the corner of her eye, and Kahinta looks to see her shadow stepping forward into sight, slow movements made even slower by the heavy drift of the fog. The face never turns to look at her, moving forward until it stands closer to where another figure lurks in the shadows. Just the two of them, and their ghosts in the dark.
"They'll follow us all the same."
If she lives, how long will she spend looking in the shadows for a figure that isn't there? How long will she stare at her features in the mirror to see a face that isn't there? How long will she scrub at her hands to wash the blood from beneath her nails only to rip herself open time and time again? An eternity, in numbered days, but Kahinta would rather be haunted than let herself be buried six feet underneath the stars.
"It's cold. You can stay in my tent," the girl says, and moves forward into the clearing, toward Kahinta, without another word. She watches as she sets down her things, pulling out materials and spreading them out next to the pond. Each moment, the numbness in her fingertips, in the sinew of her arms and legs and chest, grows and spreads, but it's not the cold that deadens her. It's the casual caution in throwing caution to the wind in a place where the wind picks up everything beautiful and throws it back in your face.
Kahinta pauses, watching the girl for a long moment, before she finds her voice again. "Thank you. That's… You don't have to…" Words feel insufficient thanks for the respite in the storm, so she moves forward to help instead, placing her own things nearby and taking a moment to guide her goose to sit in the top of her backpack, only the head sticking out when she zips it back up.
"If we're still gonna be murderers tomorrow, we can't freeze to death tonight," and it's so simple a thing to admit to, that they both intend to continue. They're in the top- She's not sure. It's something like the top eight, but with so many extra cannons at the start of the night, Kahinta isn't sure how everything is going to play out, nor how many people will die in the meantime. They've made it far enough that it's not just chance any longer, but choice. The ones left intend to go home.
And yet…
Was the girl from District Four a murderer yet? Kahinta had sat on the hips of another girl shrouded in white and had held her under the red waves, all desperation and uncertain certainty that hadn't been confirmed until she'd seen- Well, she hadn't seen the girl's face in the sky, couldn't stomach looking up and seeing all she hadn't known about her emblazoned in blue against the clouds. You deserved better, Dom had whispered to the waves. She had. The boy that Kahinta's companion had killed had been wearing black though, so was she really a murderer yet if the boy would be alive again the next day? Was Bette? Was Temple? Had any of their deaths mattered at all until they were final?
That familiar cold in the pit of her stomach swirls, a reminder of all the damage an impermanent death had done. Perhaps it was all the same after all.
"Did you know him? The boy you…" she asks, hands tying rope and carefully aligning seams of the tent so that when they make it rise it will stand even. There's a pause, and Kahinta looks up, blinking slowly at the silence.
"Yes." Another pause. She thinks maybe that's it, that maybe she shouldn't have tested their fragile truce, but the girl continues quietly after a moment. "He was my ally, for a day." The tightening of a rope draws the tent up, up, up until it stands, clicking into place with a carefully tied knot. "And then I threw a knife into his eye."
Unease spreads in her slowly like the cold, pressed down deep to keep it at bay, to stall out until the morning after the night and the stars have long faded, if they fade. They're not allies by any means, but is that better or worse for her odds? She can't trust her, not that she had to begin with, but it settles back into her in the span of a breath. Fatigue weighs her down, but perhaps in the morning when their kindness has run dry, or before, she can deal with adding more to her load.
With a hum, she swivels around to gather her things, petting the head of the goose softly as she gathers herself in turn. "At least it was quick, I guess," she says, contemplative in its softness. Maybe he hadn't had time to think about his dying, hadn't had time to try and scramble for purchase on life and find the hands of his killer to hold instead. Quieter still, hardly a whisper that almost gets lost to the roaring of the wind outside the eye of the storm. "I drowned her."
"Better than drowning."
Kahinta isn't sure if she means her ally's death was better in its quickness, or if she meant it for Kahinta herself being alive. It's all the same.
"Better than drowning."
They go quiet as they shuffle inside, ducked heads under the tent flaps and spreading out their cloaks to use as blankets. She takes a slow drink from the bottle of green alcohol she'd gotten out of the girl's bag on the beach, steeling herself for a night spent either sleeping so too lightly to offer any real rest or of staying awake.
"If you try to kill me while I'm sleeping, don't waste time." A request and threat, gentle but present in the temporary protection the tent offers them from the arena around them, but not each other. Never that. They've both done and seen too much to make promises of kindness that will last or end in anything other than blood spilled.
She takes another sip before stowing the alcohol away, letting the goose out of her bag and bundling it close in her arms. Beside her, her morning star, and the smoke bomb, and the glowing knife. Curling up behind the other girl, feeling the warmth of another pressed close, Kahinta closes her eyes. A shallow breath in the dark, too much stardust in her lungs to be anything resilient.
"I don't makes promises," she whispers, voice fragile and wavering. They deserved better. They all deserved better. She asks a question she doesn't want the answer to, but needs to hear. "What's your name?"
"Perdita. And who are you?"
"Kahinta."
Kahinta has no idea where she is anymore.
After a moment of rubbing her feet off against the ground, she squeezes her feet back into her boots, lacing them up tight and wiggling her toes inside to get comfortable. The air feels crisper, edging closer to cold as the night has ticked on, and Kahinta takes the time to unspool her cloak from her bag and settle it over her shoulders again before setting off further into the fog.
Everything feels distant. The goose under her arm wriggles a little as she starts to walk, but she hardly registers the sensation, curling it tighter against her body until it gives a quiet honk and goes still. Its head tucks against her side under the crystal ribs. Cold seeps into her little by little, but she doesn't bother to curl her cloak tighter around her. A shiver crests through her as the wind picks up a little, but she feels it as if through a glass wall, able to see but unable to connect to what's on the other side. Shock, she thinks, even hours later. Perhaps she's in shock, white turning red with each successive hit and bubbles beneath the clouds.
Onward.
The petals cling to her much the same as they had days ago, gently at first before building in number and intensity. She breathes them in, coughing at the sensation, wiping a shaky hand against her lips and coming away pink and purple and yellow, she's sure, though she cannot see it. In the dark, Kahinta can hardly see anything, so she has to put her faith in what she can see: the stars.
Something burns there, deep beneath her feet in the endless sky that stretches out all around her. For how long had Kahinta kept her eyes on the ground, unwilling or unable to look any longer to the stars for guidance, undone from the ignorance of her youth of making wishes on what gleams in the dark? And now, to walk the path of the stars into the distance, slow spiraling trail of heaven leading her assuredly to whatever hell she'd damned herself to suffer? They glitter sedately in promise, blinking out under her feet as she goes, a great and terrible wish snatched from the sky with every forward motion, every kill. She'd take, and take, until the sky was darker than it had been in the washed-out glow of the Capitol.
Focused as she is on the sky above and below, Kahinta doesn't realize how far she's walked. The wind stills slowly and then all at once, giving way to the eye of the storm, and the girl who stands across the way, bathed in starlight.
District Four. Perry? Pearl? Still nothing fits.
There's no use in running, not when they've both gone entirely still the way prey do in front of a predator, willing themselves not to be seen when it's already happened. Kahinta breathes in shallowly, hand clenching around her morning star before going loose, too tired to put up a fight in the night sky after a day with her head in the clouds. It seems it's not an uncommon feeling.
"You running from something?" The voice carries, soft in its testing, eyes sharp in a delicate face.
"I killed someone today. They were wearing white," she answers, just loud enough to cross the clearing, to give word to the bone-deep weariness that weighs down her limbs, that keeps her shoulders dropped.
"The boy I killed was wearing black. Same as Niko."
Kahinta doesn't cringe, doesn't react, despite the way she feels the sharpness of the memory press between her ribs and slip deep into her abdomen. A hand clenching tight in her shirt, at her shoulder, around to her back. The full weight of a body sagging into hers with a ragged breath, and a desperate, wet cry against the deluge of water. More red than she'd ever seen, lost to the rising waterline between the graves. A hapless idiot waving in the distance to an enemy he never should have had.
"He's still got a shot then, I think."
Her eyes draw quickly over the other girl's body, taking in the dark black of her attire, searching quickly for any injuries, any weaknesses, before looking down at herself. Inky ruin, and the gleam of constellations along her ribs. Words draw her back up out of the stars.
"I try not to dwell on ghosts."
Movement out of the corner of her eye, and Kahinta looks to see her shadow stepping forward into sight, slow movements made even slower by the heavy drift of the fog. The face never turns to look at her, moving forward until it stands closer to where another figure lurks in the shadows. Just the two of them, and their ghosts in the dark.
"They'll follow us all the same."
If she lives, how long will she spend looking in the shadows for a figure that isn't there? How long will she stare at her features in the mirror to see a face that isn't there? How long will she scrub at her hands to wash the blood from beneath her nails only to rip herself open time and time again? An eternity, in numbered days, but Kahinta would rather be haunted than let herself be buried six feet underneath the stars.
"It's cold. You can stay in my tent," the girl says, and moves forward into the clearing, toward Kahinta, without another word. She watches as she sets down her things, pulling out materials and spreading them out next to the pond. Each moment, the numbness in her fingertips, in the sinew of her arms and legs and chest, grows and spreads, but it's not the cold that deadens her. It's the casual caution in throwing caution to the wind in a place where the wind picks up everything beautiful and throws it back in your face.
Kahinta pauses, watching the girl for a long moment, before she finds her voice again. "Thank you. That's… You don't have to…" Words feel insufficient thanks for the respite in the storm, so she moves forward to help instead, placing her own things nearby and taking a moment to guide her goose to sit in the top of her backpack, only the head sticking out when she zips it back up.
"If we're still gonna be murderers tomorrow, we can't freeze to death tonight," and it's so simple a thing to admit to, that they both intend to continue. They're in the top- She's not sure. It's something like the top eight, but with so many extra cannons at the start of the night, Kahinta isn't sure how everything is going to play out, nor how many people will die in the meantime. They've made it far enough that it's not just chance any longer, but choice. The ones left intend to go home.
And yet…
Was the girl from District Four a murderer yet? Kahinta had sat on the hips of another girl shrouded in white and had held her under the red waves, all desperation and uncertain certainty that hadn't been confirmed until she'd seen- Well, she hadn't seen the girl's face in the sky, couldn't stomach looking up and seeing all she hadn't known about her emblazoned in blue against the clouds. You deserved better, Dom had whispered to the waves. She had. The boy that Kahinta's companion had killed had been wearing black though, so was she really a murderer yet if the boy would be alive again the next day? Was Bette? Was Temple? Had any of their deaths mattered at all until they were final?
That familiar cold in the pit of her stomach swirls, a reminder of all the damage an impermanent death had done. Perhaps it was all the same after all.
"Did you know him? The boy you…" she asks, hands tying rope and carefully aligning seams of the tent so that when they make it rise it will stand even. There's a pause, and Kahinta looks up, blinking slowly at the silence.
"Yes." Another pause. She thinks maybe that's it, that maybe she shouldn't have tested their fragile truce, but the girl continues quietly after a moment. "He was my ally, for a day." The tightening of a rope draws the tent up, up, up until it stands, clicking into place with a carefully tied knot. "And then I threw a knife into his eye."
Unease spreads in her slowly like the cold, pressed down deep to keep it at bay, to stall out until the morning after the night and the stars have long faded, if they fade. They're not allies by any means, but is that better or worse for her odds? She can't trust her, not that she had to begin with, but it settles back into her in the span of a breath. Fatigue weighs her down, but perhaps in the morning when their kindness has run dry, or before, she can deal with adding more to her load.
With a hum, she swivels around to gather her things, petting the head of the goose softly as she gathers herself in turn. "At least it was quick, I guess," she says, contemplative in its softness. Maybe he hadn't had time to think about his dying, hadn't had time to try and scramble for purchase on life and find the hands of his killer to hold instead. Quieter still, hardly a whisper that almost gets lost to the roaring of the wind outside the eye of the storm. "I drowned her."
"Better than drowning."
Kahinta isn't sure if she means her ally's death was better in its quickness, or if she meant it for Kahinta herself being alive. It's all the same.
"Better than drowning."
They go quiet as they shuffle inside, ducked heads under the tent flaps and spreading out their cloaks to use as blankets. She takes a slow drink from the bottle of green alcohol she'd gotten out of the girl's bag on the beach, steeling herself for a night spent either sleeping so too lightly to offer any real rest or of staying awake.
"If you try to kill me while I'm sleeping, don't waste time." A request and threat, gentle but present in the temporary protection the tent offers them from the arena around them, but not each other. Never that. They've both done and seen too much to make promises of kindness that will last or end in anything other than blood spilled.
She takes another sip before stowing the alcohol away, letting the goose out of her bag and bundling it close in her arms. Beside her, her morning star, and the smoke bomb, and the glowing knife. Curling up behind the other girl, feeling the warmth of another pressed close, Kahinta closes her eyes. A shallow breath in the dark, too much stardust in her lungs to be anything resilient.
"I don't makes promises," she whispers, voice fragile and wavering. They deserved better. They all deserved better. She asks a question she doesn't want the answer to, but needs to hear. "What's your name?"
"Perdita. And who are you?"
"Kahinta."
