A/N: I've got to stop writing when I'm nervous about something. Out of the two people I've shown this to, one has asked if I have some sort of blood fetish (the answer is a resounding no, by the way), and the other one's informed me that it's not too gruesome-- for something that I write. Meh. And I was trying to tone this down, too.
I messed with the tenses a lot, and they switch around after the line break, so I might have gotten mixed up somewhere.
Blood
She didn't know why she did it, really.
Blood.
Or, if she did, she chose not to name it, preferring instead the deliberate ignorance of those who, by not labeling their actions, allow them to remain a vague, shapeless sense of guilt and not a clear accusation—because the trial is one that they could not win.
There is so much blood— staining her bed crimson and drying, rust-red, on her walls.
The others wanted to know what had happened, but how could she tell them when she couldn't even admit her guilt to herself?
She cannot look away, though she wants to. But what remains of Speedy and his lover has her staring in unbroken, horrified fascination. Through a medley of disjointed thoughts, she wonders at the fact that so much blood could come from just two bodies.
She knows, though, that it was not only anger and base, petty jealousy that led her to watch silently, almost invisible in the shadows, while her boyfriend led another woman through the Tower. It was that she didn't even consider that he might stoop so low as to cheat on her in her own bedroom, not knowing what lay, just barely contained, in the locked chest at the foot of her bed.
At first, once she gathers herself enough to think logically about what happened, she believes that they attempted something… unusual with a spell, and it went very wrong. But Speedy is no wizard and he knows—knew— it, and any sane magic user would have sensed the demonic aura around her room and gotten out of there as fast as possible. It is only then that she begins to notice the deep scratches on her furniture, the scorch marks on her carpet.
She wanted to believe that, had she guessed his intentions, she would have stopped him. She would also have castrated him, true, and probably taken the opportunity to practice some of the darker curses she knew, but she would not have let him walk right into a bloody, painful death. Not even for revenge on a betrayal of the second order (for she has also experienced betrayal of the first order, and, oddly enough, she thinks that that situation was much less painful) would she be that heartless. Or so she wanted to believe. In her darker moments, she wondered.
The pages of the book are illegible, so drenched in blood that she inadvertently tears it when she tried to turn a page, but she knows from the moment she picks it up that he is gone. From there, the rest falls together nicely, pieces fitting together cleanly, like the jigsaw puzzle of an omnipotent madman.
She couldn't think of a way to tell her friends that she had deliberately loosened the bindings that held the dragon as a sign of trust—or, rather, she couldn't think of a way to tell them that wouldn't result in being yelled at, and she simply didn't have the patience for that, after everything that has happened. So she didn't tell them. After all, they didn't ask.
The air is heavy with the stench of blood, so heavy that she cannot sense the smoke until she knows what she is looking for. She inhales, and shudders as a familiar scent hits her nostrils. Dragonfire.
They didn't ask, and she knew that they wouldn't. Perhaps they didn't think of it; perhaps they thought it would be too upsetting for her. She didn't know, but they didn't ask, and that was all that she cared about.
It is hours before she emerges from the roof, where she has been alternately meditating and wallowing in self-pity, and it will be hours more before one of her teammates comes and finds her. She will not go to them: it seems sacrilegious to leave these mutilated scraps of human flesh unattended.
She had loved Malchior for his dark wit, for his cynicism that was so like her own but somehow not, for all that he could teach her and for all that he understood about her. She hated him for his lies, and then for this.
It takes her a minute to recognize the sharp, stinging sensation behind her eyes.
She had loved Speedy for his quick smile and his lighthearted banter, for the revelation that it was possible for someone like him to be interested in her, for the way he managed to make her forget the darkness that was a part of her own identity. She hated him for the blonde, blue-eyed, giggling fool of a girl he had led into her room, knowing full well how much she valued her sanctuary.
A tear trickles down her cheek, and she makes no attempt to wipe it away.
She loved them and hated them. Shouldn't they cancel each other out? Dragon and archer, love and hate?
She makes a shallow cut in her palm, letting fresh blood mingle with the clotted liquid splashed over her room, and says a short incantation of peace and forgiveness. The intent of the spell is to put departed souls at rest: she hopes that her own roiling emotions don't imperil its effectiveness.
She weathered her friends' explosions of anger and grief with her customary, inscrutable composure. No one but her was allowed in her room: not even Robin would have been able to see such a sight and walk away undamaged. The twisted nature of the situation is such that nobody seems to quite know what to say to her (really, what could one say to a girl whose first love had just ripped her second to shreds while he was cheating on her in her own room?), so they for the most part left her alone.
She opens her mouth in shock, and the coppery scent becomes a metallic taste on her tongue. Blood pervades her every sense, and she levitates off the ground instantly. Not even the lowest of the demons will tread heedlessly on a corpse—and this entire room has become a corpse.
It was lucky for her that they did so, because they definitely wouldn't have approved of the project that began to consume her thoughts: finding Malchior. He must have left after killing Speedy and the girl (she never did discover her name), but where could he have gone? She couldn't explain her fixation beyond that fact that he had done this for her, had make her the indirect cause of this tragedy, and she didn't know if she pitied or hated him for it.
She reaches down and gathers a handful of blood-soaked ashes before she is aware of her actions. A moment of hesitation, uncertainty, and then she pulls a clean, uncontaminated bowl from a cabinet and drops them in there.
She eyed the container warily. Five years before, this particular spell would have driven her quite literally mad, and she wasn't sure that it wouldn't do so this time, too.
A lock of red hair lies on the floor, and she closes her eyes in bone-deep sorrow.
It was a combined location and teletransportation spell that she was trying to use, and she didn't know if she could pull it off. But she would try—she scarcely felt that she had any choice in the matter.
She looks around, taking a dark, morbid sort of humor in this total and final obliteration of her romantic life. Here is what her two lovers have left her with: blood, ashes and betrayal. Always, above all, betrayal.
She fell hard when she landed, hitting a rocky floor with enough force to bruise most of her left side. She looked up and saw the dark, gaping maw of what looked to be a secluded cave. So, the stories about dragons preferring caverns for their lair were true, after all.
Death is nothing new to her, but this… this is beyond anything she has ever seen.
Her muscles ached as she rolled awkwardly to her other side and used a conveniently placed rock to pull herself upright. "Bruised and slightly dazed" wasn't the condition she would have chosen to be in for this particular task, but the same mysterious emotion that prompted her coming refused to let her leave.
She took a slow step towards the entrance, keeping one hand firmly planted on the rock to disguise the way her legs were threatening to collapse underneath her.
There was only a second of warning, and she was still facing the cave when she sensed him coming up behind her. She instinctively reached out to try to gauge his emotions, surprised by the lack of malice.
He, too, sounded surprised, his perfectly cultured British accent falling away into something harsher and more foreign.
"Raven?"
She doesn't turn to face him, and he takes a moment to appreciate the opposing implications of her inaction. She is so indifferent to him that she cannot be bothered to look at him; she trusts him enough that she feels no need to keep him constantly in her sight, to make sure that he won't attack her while her back is turned. It is more than he deserves.
He relished the feel of his claws ripping into flesh, blood spurting from severed arteries and bathing Raven's room in crimson.
"Hello, Malchior," she says evenly, and he winces openly at the icy, perfect unconcern in her voice. He would almost rather she was angry, because he can fight fire with fire, but coldness…
He could feel his flesh blaze as she began to undress in front of him, unaware of the avidly staring audience.
… He can never be cold when it comes to her.
Lust and fury seared through his veins in equal measure whenever he saw them together: his angel-goddess, and the upstart who dared to profane her with his rough touch.
"Dearest Raven, please—I—" He chokes on his own words, sheer agony apparent in his tone. He doesn't know what he wants of her. Forgiveness? Love? Hate? He thinks that nothing could be worse than this.
He schemed endlessly, as he lay unattended in that trunk, and this was nothing new. But the focus of his plots had shifted: where he had planned death, vengeance and domination before, now his desires were limited solely to her. He thought that perhaps world rule was a more achievable goal.
Maybe the tortured sound of his voice strikes a chord in her, for she looks back, arching an eyebrow as she sees that he has the appearance of a human. His heart skips a beat at the pure beauty she presents, her pale skin glowing in the twilit night. "Yes?" He can't identify the emotion in her voice, but it is there, and that is enough for him.
At first, he enjoyed being able to see her unguarded moments, knowing her more intimately than anyone else. It was only a matter of time, though, before he began wanting more: after all, what is the good in knowing someone if you are never known in return?
He finally manages to speak. "I'm… not sorry." He doesn't say this out of pride, or some desperate hope that he can convince her that he is in the right. He says it because it is the truth, and he will not lie to her. Not again.
How many times had he been forced to watch them, kissing or touching or even just talking, and realized that he could have been in the idiot's place, save for his own stupidity?
She regards him in silence, then says, with a strange emphasis to her words, "So, you think it was justified?"
He didn't know what he longed for the most: the touch of her skin or simply the pleasure of conversing with her, debating mythology and morality with someone every bit as knowledgeable as he.
"He deserved what I did to him and more." The venom in his own voice surprises him.
He had promised himself that he would keep the trust Raven had placed in him, would not force his way out of his prison. But when he heard that thrice-damned boy say, "It's my girlfriend's room—creepy, huh?", there was no power on earth that could have persuaded him to stop.
She looks at him, the faintest trace of disbelief touching her features. "That sounds… odd, coming from you." He doesn't know what she's talking about, and it must show on his face, because she adds dryly, "Or is attempted murder better than infidelity?"
He was constantly berating himself for how he had used her, for his unnecessary cruelty. Even to the bitter end, he had lied: first to seduce her, then to harm her.
He winces. "Raven, I…"
Because it was a lie—a blasphemy, the darkest heresy ever uttered—for him to say that he didn't need her.
"… I can't explain it, and there are no excuses, but…"
He would always need her.
"… I would never—not in a thousand years—hurt you like that again." He turns away, disgusted by his own weakness. "I don't expect you to believe me."
And he would always hate himself for the acts that had sprung from his futile struggle against that need.
"How can I?" Something in her tone makes him look back. Her gaze is a mixture of defiance and honest curiosity. "You tried to kill me and my friends, taught me dark magic, lied to me about who you were, actually did kill my—teammate, if nothing else…" She trails off, and he realizes that this is possibly the longest speech he's ever heard from the reserved girl. Well, it's not like he hasn't given her plenty of material.
It wasn't the archer's betrayal he thought of as he sank serrated teeth into the already dead, but still warm, flesh.
"How can I trust you now?"
It was his own.
"You shouldn't," he tells her, feeling a tiny seedling of hope spring up in his chest despite his words. "I have nothing to… to prove what I say, but all the same…"
He fled afterwards—not out of fear of retribution, but so that he wouldn't have to see the disappointment in her eyes.
"… I—I care for you."
He didn't know what this feeling was, but he didn't like it.
"Gods help me… I think I love you."
He didn't like it one bit, and he liked the sneaking suspicion that, given a choice, he would actually keep this strange emotion even less.
He expects her to be horrified, or at least surprised, but she just looks at him calculatingly. It's unnerving.
He would never have expected her to choose the redhead; but, then, she had always been able to surprise him.
"You mean it," she murmurs, still giving him that positively eerie look. Slowly, her expression morphs into one of sorrow. "Malchior…"
He tormented himself with fantasies, fanciful daydreams of a future where they are together.
He cannot stand the compassion in her eyes. It is too close to pity, and even if he could bring himself to accept the pity of another, he doesn't want to think about what it would mean under the circumstances.
There are other fantasies, too, ones that would have brought a blush to the cheeks of Satan himself and might have proved to be quite embarrassing if he still had a physical body. As it was, they merely threatened to drive him insane, not kill him with unfulfilled lust.
He kisses her.
Sometimes he wondered what she would do if he became the paper replica of his body and tried to act out some of the dreams. Would she—no, she'd send him to the tenth ring of hell and then burn his book for good measure.
He is kissing her, and she does nothing, neither pushes him away nor responds. But her body is trembling against his, and he doesn't stop, trying to pour all of his sincerity and passion and even desperation into this one kiss.
Not even in his imagination can he stretch the truth that far.
Eventually, he pulls back, noting with a hint of smugness that she was blushing.
It could never happen.
"Raven…"
Now that all he had to do…
"No."
… Was convince himself to let her go.
Her voice is steady and sure, and he realizes with a sudden pang that whatever he may be able to do to her body, her hearts is forever beyond his grasp.
The fantasies were not his worst torment, while he was locked away.
Slowly, she steps back and draws out a long, glimmering sword. He recognizes it instantly, flinching at the memories it brings to mind. That sword had tasted his blood many times, before he was sealed into the book.
It was the hope that they might someday come true.
He feels as though the world is crumbling beneath his feet. "But… but…"
He is dependent on that hope.
"You're right; I shouldn't trust you," she says calmly, though the blood has left her face. "You've hurt me too much." Her voice slowly drains of emotion. "Go."
And that dependence will break him.
He goes. Dragon-tears fall from the sky as he flies.
He knows this, can predict it without even magic to aid him.
He never sees the answering tears on her cheeks.
But we cannot alter fate.
Yes, yes, sad ending. I'm very sorry, but I wrote this the day before my dance performance (if you've read any of my notes to other fics, you might have noticed that I really, really stress over these) and three days before my final exams, so I was just a little tense. Just a little. And sad endings are more calming than happy endings, for some reason.
I'm also very sorry that I made Speedy a bastard, and then killed him-- I didn't actually pick a character as her boyfriend until I had finished the entire thing and was going back to edit it. For the most part, Speedy annoys me a bit, but I didn't do this to him on purpose: he just seemed like a nice foil for Mal.
Hmm... I think the italicized bits in the second half are xxxHolic-influenced. Typical: I write one fic on it and then it's permanently engraved into my brain.
(And one last note: I defy Zoi to find a "funniest line ever" in this one!)