When she finally came to, when her surroundings bled back into consciousness, stark and sharp against a curtain of darkness, it was to pure chaos that she awoke. Inky lashes fluttered wildly against pale, porcelain cheeks while glowing green eyes blinked away the haze. There was a clammy weight resting in her palm, though resting might be an understatement given the numbness that she felt, a slight sting at the back of her hand, nails cutting through skin. She did not turn to the one responsible however, an echoing bellow about constant vigilance ringing in ears that felt like that had been packed with cotton. Her gaze darted back and forth, cataloging all that she could see as her senses expanded, listing everything that she could not.
Fire, there was the glow of it, flickering against the looming shadow; and the smell of it, a rich and heady scent of smoke and charred wood. Blood, it streaked across wooden plats that lacked the black marks of char and the railings of the ship she had managed to find herself upon. The scent of it settled upon the air, cloying and thick, a sweetness mixed with iron that coated the back of her tongue. All too familiar to her, sadly. Fear bordering on terror, acrid and sharp, off-putting. There was something vile clinging to the air as well, something rotted and old, like molded and festering flesh.
She swallowed back the bile, her nose wrinkling delicately.
There were screams.
They rent the stifled air like the crack of whips, zinging along her spine and leaving a tingle in her fingers; some bellows of anger and defiance, some wails of despair and terror, pained and choked off as the oxygen left in the lungs gave way. For some they might be distracting, horrifying and freezing a person in place as they glanced wildly for the source. But she had long grown used to the cry of fear, the scream of those not long for the world. Her eyes glinting in the firelight as she peered up, they narrowed upon the swirling of shadows that blanketed them, blocking out all chance of even a flicker of sunlight. Her gaze was hard as she leaned slightly over the railing of the ship, assessing the seemingly pulsing mass of darkness, only to widen at the lack of water that should have kept the very ship she was on afloat. The shadows writhed, a far off flash reminding her of a lightning storm and without conscious thought, her free hand inched out with the intent to touch.
There was something about the darkness...
With a harsh yank to her occupied hand, face met floor, and she groaned lowly while reaching for the throbbing spot at her temple.
"Are you mad?!"
She gritted her teeth, her head turning to the side as she met the incredulous glare of a dark haired girl -the one still with her hand clutched in her own- with her lips parting, a scathing retort caught on her tongue...
And then the body slammed down mere inches in front of her, accompanied by a sickening crack as both of the legs bent and crumpled, the awkward angles betraying the obvious breaks.
Her words died in her throat.
It twitched jerkily, fingers quivering and a thick neck snapping side to side as the chest convulsed, halfway caved in from the right side. Blood sprayed from open lips, frozen that way in an agonized scream that would never be heard. She flinched lightly as the spray coated the left side of her face, staining smooth skin and silken snowy strands alike. For one brief moment, she considered reverting back to that desperate bid to save an already lost soul she might have chanced once upon a time, but with another spray of crimson that dotted along the cream blouse resting upon her shoulders, she resigned herself to witness death once more. Glittering green eyes swept along the beaten form, stalling on the obvious marks left behind by claw and fang. They were creature-given, there wasn't a doubt about that, sharp enough to shred muscle and cleave through bone. Gaping holes where chunks of flesh had been ripped away, leaving a grim view of organ and tissue below.
Honestly, when the screech ripped through the shadows, overtaking the screams of the fearful and gurgling cries of the dying, she didn't even want to look. But war had taught her much, years on the run even more, and it was better to know she supposed, than it was to remain willfully ignorant. Still, when she caught just one glimpse of the creature that terrorized the shadows, a part of her wished she had not.
The other part, nearly wanted to laugh.
Hysterically.
Like a grotesque halfbreed, the vile beast looked the part of a being that was five parts overgrown bat, three parts dementor, and two parts dragon. And that was offensive to dragons.
Her lip curled in revulsion, that horrid stench one she now recognized clung to the rotted and mottled gray flesh of the beast. It opened a maw full of jagged teeth and roared as it flew across the deck, massive talons sinking into the stomach and shoulder of a tall girl with long black locks before lifting her into the air. She screamed in defiance, it was the cry of a warrior as she twisted in the creature's grip, crimson streams from her stomach where talon met skin flooding down to the deck like a red wave as fire, actual burning flames, gathered in her hands and shot out, blazing across grayed flesh that bubbled and burned. The girl cackled madly while the animal howled in pain, tossing fireballs about without care of where they might land.
Man and beast alike, suffered her wrath.
It was short lived, however, as the animal in question slammed her body against the railing once, twice, thrice. Her neck cracked and the flames sputtered, dying in her hands while her last breath was drawn.
The green eyed girl blinked...then cursed.
"Bloody fucking hell, Thanatos, you had best be fucking joking!"