an affair of honour { areto vs. julian }
Aug 10, 2021 20:24:39 GMT -5
Post by calla on Aug 10, 2021 20:24:39 GMT -5
Avriel leads her away from the water like a child. His arms stay around her, even though she isn't fighting back anymore, but it feels less and less like a cage the more they walk.
Areto stays shock-still. Silent. Catatonic. Her shoulder aches and her head is spinning but everything else is quiet and empty. She should be doing the rites, but she can't make herself move. She's just taken a life and she should feel devastated, but she can't even lift her head from her chest. Avriel wipes the blood from her hands and her face and she stares at what's left under her nails.
She sees Ariel in the grime and it makes something else in her shatter. She can still picture the disbelief that had been in Mauve's eyes when the spear'd gone through her, and that's something Areto tries desperately not to think about. There's a guilt there that she refuses to look at. She can't face it. Even thinking of Love makes her do nothing but slightly clench her fists.
The sky stays dark, so it's hard to tell how much time passes. It could've been hours, but it could've been minutes too. The air is heavy and eventually Avriel gives up on trying to get her to talk.
"Ask your gods to keep them safe." He had asked of her. But she's not sure she can. Her fingertips drift across the surface of the water, but all she feels is the chill. The breeze moves her hair, but she doesn't hear the whisper of it. She feels off-kilter. She doesn't feel right.
The first explosion makes her jump.
She scrambles at first, mistaking it for a canon, but then the light hits her eyes and she looks up and the sky is exploding.
There's screaming and crashing and the sound of giant waves crashing against each other and she's suddenly six years old again hiding in her mother's bed during a thunderstorm. She's suddenly standing on a pontoon in the middle of a tsunami. She's suddenly got her spear through Mauve's stomach and Ariel is lying on the ground alone.
She sits with her head between knees, hands over her ears, when the noise doesn't stop. Avriel is saying something when she glances up at his touch, but there's no sound, just his lips moving and a cold panic starts to tighten around her. Areto surges forward and grabs onto his shirt white-knuckled, making herself small against his chest. She presses her face into the shadow of him and shakes so hard that she's sure he can hear her bones rattle from it.
She only falls asleep when she passes out from exhaustion.
And when her eyes finally crack open again, she assumes that barely any time has past. It's still dark, but the noise has stopped, and she's colder than she was before. Her head is foggy and her body feels weird from her panic.
She sits up, and suddenly feels very wrong.
The announcement interrupts her thoughts, but her hands still reach up to her face. She runs her fingers along the edge of the mask, once and then twice and then three times, but it doesn't budge. The fireworks echo in her ears, and her breath comes shorter and she can feel the warmth of it gather right in front of her, stuck in the fabric against her mouth and she jerks so quickly that her back thuds against something solid.
Her hand flies back and there's wooden panelling there, she's up against some type of building but she can't hear the water anymore and it's harder to see, it's even harder to talk, she can'-
"Avriel?"
Then again, more panicked.
And again.
It doesn't matter if the other tributes hear her, her voice sounds too loud in the mask but it doesn't matter.
She runs her hands along the ground for her spear, everything is blurred from film across her eyes, but she's just lost Ariel, she can't lose him too.
Something snaps nearby and Areto freezes. She stills and crouches and strains her ears against the quiet scuffling sound.
"...Avriel?"
