Poison Lily
Disclaimer: Nope. Don't own this. Besides I think I'd use the money (for purchasing the rights) for other things. Like a library.
Author's Note: Wuya is actually a quite frightening creature, if you think about it. She's made petty during her role in the series, but one must remember what she is as she gave up what humanity she ever had. And though it seemed that Rai was not meant to be evil as he played his library of video games, we don't really know what happened. Wuya had a strange… affection for Rai in particular, being quite kind to him. Eew… Look at this, I'm so sad, super analyzing a children's show… As a final note, I warn you that this tale is not necessarily for the squeamish.
She was beautiful.
What male could not agree with that?
Her long, luxurious mane of flame red hair, silken, burning with a flame of its own, always falling about her elfin face. Slender form with nymph like legs and long narrow white hands with tiny, tiny feet always poised, just so. Enigmatic green eyes, eyes the color of emeralds, emeralds and jungle serpents set deep into that doll like face with blood red lips, traced with black marks of sorcery. Her sharp, delicate little white teeth, almost always hidden under a gently curving little smile, a twist of her painted lips, sometimes flashed in a cat's smile.
Her touch, her skin, was cold and hot, smooth as silk, textured as a reptile's flesh. But always ending with bone penetrating sensation, hot enough to burn and sear his flesh, cold to cut into his marrow, his very soul, even without the delicate trails of her claw like nails going across his skin.
Her breath was scented with frankincense, from old temples, and old, old dust, decay, the ghosts of long dead flowers. It always washed over him and seemed to come back to her, as if she tasted and knew from the very air she breathed, a living reptile. It was intoxicating, a perfume of age and ceremony and entrapment that wrapped about him in ghostly silken coils and drew him near.
She haunted his dreams, for they both had a special bond, an affinity, however long ago it had been. She was in there, ghosting about, rousing the shadows of memories he did not even know he had, memories beyond what most knew, beyond what most saw for themselves and remembered. He was her pet after all…
Whether it was her or not, whether it was her imprint on him or her true spirit traveling through the mists of the spirit to torment him in the night, he lived part of every night in the prison of his mind, unable to look away, unable to escape. He felt and saw it at once, both participant and spectator, watching, feeling, as her clawed hands traced over his face, then his neck, then his shoulder, then his chest… They left a wake of bone chilling heat, making him shudder even as he froze in place at the same time. He could hear her hissing, trilling whisper in the night in his ears, tempting him, singing to him, calling him. He could taste her, feel her crocodile glove hands on him, smell her old decaying breath washing over him, could feel her cool lips everywhere.
He had to hide it.
So he strove to, even as he shuddered at the smell of the incense at the temple, avoided the stillroom at the temple with ancient powders and tonics of long dead, dried herbs with the fervor of a madman, went through his cleaning of the older sectors with lightning speed. He kept a blank face when he heard her ghost shriek in that shrill mockery of her once rich, velvet voice. And he stifled his screams in the dark of the night.
"Why must you avoid me, Raimundo?" she sighed, pouting with all the pique of a girl only a fraction of her age. Her name purred his name, tasted and sent it out as an insidious serpent, a stream of honey saturated venom. "Why must you run from me?"
She was there, beckoning with a single hand whilst lounging on her throne. He was moved by an invisible force, shoved her direction.
"We're meant to be, my dear Wind Dragon," she purred. "Complements. Opposites even."
He turned his head away; she cupped his chin in one hand. His fists clenched. His eyes roved the room, stuck in this quilted memorydreamhallucinationnightmare, knowing he was not the witch's servant but unable to break free, unable to spit in her face truly, trapped in the workings of a distant memory that rang too close of possession. He spotted an incongruous addition to her throne room, slender, enormous black glazed urns of lilies. White and black and orange and striped red, enormous trumpets and bells stood proudly in their vases upon black and green stems with sword shaped leaves. He vaguely recalled there being none.
"Why the flowers, Wuya?" he asked. "Thought burning bowls of green fire was proper for you."
She laughed. "Oh, Raimundo… charming as ever, my blunt little dragon." She caressed his flyaway brown hair; he shuddered inwardly, feeling as though someone were leaving trails of oil that seeped into his scalp.
"You know what a lily is, I suppose? Even one such as yourself read fairy tales after all." She plucked one of them up, a black one with streaks of violet leading into the heart in dagger shaped trails. He watched in morbid fascination.
Her breath was laden with the sweet heavy smell of the flowers, heavy and stifling and heady. It wound about him like a serpent, befuddled his mind, made everything a languid blurred world. Wuya spoke as if a world away, voice monotonous but sweet, the strumming of some Asian string instrument going and going at the same repeated rhythm… "Purity, sweetness… But also- death." She smiled and laughed again. "I am still a woman, dear sweet Raimundo… I admire flowers… I grow them, I pluck them… And I crush them." Her claw like hand crumpled the waxy black flower as green and violet flames erupted from her fist. The pitiful remains of the blossom slowly floated to the ground.
"Now, my dear Raimundo… could you be a dear and bring over one of those vases? I think a lesson is in order…"
He awoke to the smell of lily perfume in the air. He sat up immediately on his little pallet, sweating, panting, pupils dilated.
And he sneezed.
A dark haired head poked around the corner of his cubicle. Kimiko, wearing a pink kimono and an apologetic expression. "Sorry Rai. Papa forwarded a bottle of one of the newest perfumes on the market and the bottle got broken in shipping- Rai, are you all right?"
He stared at her as if she had spoken in another language altogether, eyes wide as a deer's. Scaly clawed hands traced his neck and touched his lips…all the while the pervasive languor of lilies hovered above them both, burning and blossoming.
He shook his head furiously, hair flying into his deep green eyes. "It's nothing. Just- restless."
She stared at him for a few moments. "Right. Look, I'm sorry about the smell. I'll get it away if it's really bothering you…"
"Burn it away," he whispered without realizing it. "Burn it all away."
"Rai- what's wrong?" She slowly came to his cubicle, eyes concerned as she held up a lantern, carefully crouching by his pallet and arranging the silken folds of her kimono carefully.
Black, bottomless eyes, sometimes green, sometimes red, sometimes colorless as an abyss…
He unknowingly edged away from her a little. "I- I'm allergic to perfume." He sneezed again, this time completely contrived. "Besides- I-I don't want my clothes to smell all flowery and girly!"
She huffed. "I apologized you know! Fine then. But you're going to help me!" With surprising strength, she hauled him up by an arm.
He winced, expecting talons to dig into him, the bone cutting chill/fire. But her hand was warm, and soft. He stood up, almost falling over in surprise, blanket falling from him, revealing his bare chest. He never saw much point in sleeping with the tunic; he slept in less in Rio. Kimiko stared, blue eyes suddenly widening. There was blatant admiration in there as well as flustered embarrassment, honest admiration that suddenly made him feel much better, clean instead of filthy inside. Those eyes- they were blue as the sea, bright as flames, clean as an open sky, free and clear as the heart of a flame. No darkness, no desire, no lust, no hidden evil secrets. She blushed and turned away.
"Let's get to it then," she said hurriedly.
Their job was already done for them. The windows were open, so were the doors, and it was a fairly breezy evening. Kimiko blew out onto her hands and many tiny flickering flames danced about the room, filling the air with nothing more than the scent of the fresh wood and slightly damp stone originally there, mingled with hints of Clay's favorite triple hot monstrosity of a seasoning and the smoky cinnamon smell that came with the presence of a dragon for a few hundred years. Raimundo watched her, illuminated by so many tiny lights, like stars, like spirits as her pink kimono fluttered and moved with her like the robe of some mystical hero, sleeves flapping like delicate wings of rose and powdery gold, shimmering in the uneven lights. She was beautiful. To distract himself from the sight, he took care of the rest, ushering in a new breeze to circulate air into the room, filling it with the smell of damp and chill from the outside. He found Kimiko in her little room, putting together the pieces of the perfume bottle in the box they had come in. She cursed, drawing back. Her hand dripped blood.
Before he knew it, he was in there, taking her hand. She froze. "Rai- I just need a band-aid…"
He bent down and softly kissed the scratch. He could vaguely taste her blood, salt sweet, just like his own. It should have been a disappointment for suddenly he had the thought that she would have tasted sweeter, purer, like spices and honey and milk. His breath fell on it, cool and sweet as he could make it, soothing, healing.
"Rai?" She had been reaching for a tissue and a band-aid.
"Sorry," he murmured and she looked flustered. He insisted (silently) on treating the cut, cleaning it, wrapping the bandage about her finger.
She picked up the box now, taking it out of her cubicle, setting it down near one of the doorways as a reminder to dispose of the shards in the morning. He followed her. They paused before the windows that faced their sleeping rooms, hesitant, silent.
"I'm sorry," she said again, quietly. "I didn't mean for that to happen."
"Accidents happen," he said. "They always do."
They stood in silence for a few seconds more before Kimiko said softly, "You weren't just restless, Rai. You were having a nightmare."
He froze in place as the memories of the past woven into nightmares, remade into visions that were ten times more frightening, more vivid, prisons more secure, more horrifying than any jail, any cell, came back. His eyes clenched shut, his breathing became shallow.
"Oh dear, dear Raimundo… do you have a problem? Tell Wuya all about it…"
"Such flawless skin, Raimundo… flawless, flawless… You're a tribute to your country…"
"Oh, you're bleeding. Let me take care of it… don't you humans kiss it to make it better?"
"Am I not pretty, Raimundo? Am I not… beautiful?"
"Lilies, Raimundo. They're a key to my own heart, my darling. You're almost like one, you know… like… me."
"No!" His eyes burst open. He lunged forward and latched onto Kimiko, trembling. He held her close, feeling her fragile, bird frail form in his grasp, her silken black hair brushing against his cheek, holding her as if she were the rock of salvation. He took a deep breath, smelling incense, dust, decay, flowery ghosts. And lilies…
But no… Kimiko smelled of soap and delicacy. He took in deep lungfuls of air. Sweet flowers but not overpowering. Delicate, transient, fleeting, almost impossible to detect. Night jasmine and cherry blossoms and crisp lavender buried in her silken black hair, sweet and fresh and rejuvenating. Her flesh smelled like cinnamon, and ginger, and cloves and preserved oranges, her white soft flesh, easy to color pink. Delicate and fresh, spicy and crisp, they wove about the spell around Raimundo, cutting through that smoky sheath of heavy lilies and long dead things, freeing him, letting him take in a free breath of hair. Her hands were so small, so warm, so strong as her arms wrapped about him, comforting him, holding him.
"Hold me, please, don't let go," he whispered, trembling. His voice was thick, his throat heavy, caught with a lump in the back of his mouth.
She nodded; he felt it and closed his eyes again. Her hand was rubbing at the small of his back, gently, warmly. He latched onto the perfume of her hair and skin, banishing the ghosts with it, the shadows vanishing with this new torch. The shadows hissed and he was in a tomb, the fire illuminating the place for what it was. He had broken the illusions, but the monsters still remained. Monsters that hated the air, the fresh free air and longed to capture it, torment it. And they would never ever let him go.
But he forced himself back from the prison of his mind. He was not under their power anymore. He would not cower and slink back to the cell he once was in because of overwhelming terror. His hands dug in, feeling the thin silk brocade of the Fire Dragon's kimono. He almost ripped it and he vaguely heard her squeak a little at his pressure.
He forced himself to open his eyes.
Her eyes were wide but knowing in the moonlit darkness as he guiltily relaxed his grip, drew a little away from her until his hands were on her narrow waist, not entwined so tightly around her entire body. She knew what it was that plagued him. But she did not speak, for fear of inviting the horror back with its true name. She knew it, saw it in him and did not condemn him. Anger was in her, the anger that drove her the most, took her so far in training in the offensive, the passion of one of the most dangerous elements. Anger for him.
The fire blazed back. She offered it to him, offering her strength, her help, help unasked for but freely offered, promising to still hold them together as tightly as they were entwined earlier. They could stand together, spiritually. She was with him to fight, offering the power but letting him face the demons on his own. He could feel it within him, chasing away the shadows, warming him, burning away that venomous, insidious sensation that tormented him, the touch that made him squirm and scream and whimper, of hands and fingers and lips and eyes.
"Kimiko," he whispered as it came back, a black shadow roaring as it banded together, leapt at him to overwhelm him, to pull him back again, but damage him so much he would never find the courage to get out again and keep him for the sick pleasure of the demons. It was roaring in his ears, as he was pulled back to that dark and twisted place with the stench of lilies live and dead from the sheer devastating power it emanated. He shuddered and his soul screamed as he felt those scaly cold/burning fingers on him, those cold dead lips leaving a burning moniker all over him, covering him with filth inside and out…
"Purify me."
And he kissed her desperately.
The kiss was anything but tender and sweet and chaste. No. It couldn't be. Not as he screamed and screamed and screamed from the inside, as his most private parts were violated in a rape that was beyond anything physical or spiritual or mental. No, as much as he wished it, as much as it should have been poetic to have a chaste soft kiss to counteract the brutal lust tainted shadow within him, he couldn't. The kiss was bruising in its force, even as he pulled her close once again, crushing her against him.
She tasted of mint and sweet strawberries, like tea with cinnamon and honey, cool and sweet and lingering, even as her mouth was warm. She kissed him back with equal fervor however, and that dispelled his guilt. She kissed him and offered all that she had, freely, unwillingly, because she was just that generous in her heart, sincere and passionate and burning in every emotion she had, unable to deceive, unable to conspire.
No, this wasn't Wuya. Wuya would never have let him take charge, be the giver, the dominant. She would not have even allowed him to be an equal. It was always her game, her lesson, her passion. His pleasure was a sick way of satisfying herself.
He kissed her even as the shadows came at him screaming, raging, furious. He would have stood armed, stood his ground. He would have attacked with the strength he had been given. But instead… he lost himself.
It no longer mattered. All that mattered was being here with this beautiful girl in his arms, his to kiss and hold and cherish and protect and respect and tease, kissing her sweet lips, feeling her trembling in his arms like a just-caught bird. It was all he wanted, all he knew, and all he ever wanted to know.
And so, it was a surprise when he stopped enough to realize that… the shadow was gone.
To his credit, he did not stop kissing her in shock. But he molded his lips softly against hers, became gentler but no less passionate, for that was what she was, passion incarnate. He could give her no less than that because he was hers, always, and she was his. It took another moment to realize that the sudden warmth on his face, sudden trails of fire that seemed to go down his cheeks, were tears. He was crying.
It seemed like an eternity had passed from when he had lunged himself at her, kissing her in a near rape itself, and he realized that he was free, he was purged, purified, cleaned by fire and compassion and… love. But really, it was only a few moments in the real world which had gone on without regard for the two, as they parted for air, that precious thing that became all too annoying for lovers.
"Rai…" she whispered. He loved how she said it. Softly, sweetly, delicately, quickly. She didn't let syllables get in the way, didn't tack anything on. Her hands touched his face, wiped those tears away. "You're crying…"
"So I am," he whispered. "So I am." And he kissed her again.
And he didn't care about the faintest lingering ghost of lily perfume on her hands, even as a sweet new wind blew it all away.
Happy? They actually kiss now.