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A Castle of Silence and Bones
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002.
drown in tears and ashes
(the best reminder of better times lies in the heaviness and hellishness of current ones.)
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Lazily, Kiku makes his way about the bed. Yao sleeps with recently-dried trails of tears streaking already-pale cheeks. There is an art to the whole thing, a method to the madness.
Ludwig knows, Ludwig's people are the ones who created such an idea, after all.
An entire group, an entire race, really, of people, completely wiped out. Such a pity, his recorders and writers say. The emperor banishes them all, but the generals make sure of a 'higher' punishment. And so, their corpses continue to hang, just inches away from the palace entranceway, because it is only through these sort of actions that any sort of permanant 'learning' will be done.
Yao wakes with a start, eyes wide and filled with terror (Kiku smiles, ever so delightfully, ever so madly) when Kiku binds his two wrists together. He would have used cuffs, but then Yao might have been more bruised and scratched than necessary, and that would not be good, now would it?
The other cries out something in a foreign language, disgusting, Kiku thinks, because it is.
Indulgently, much like one would pardon a pet, he strokes Yao's tear-stained cheek, capturing lips with lips. The other is soft, pliant, weak--as always. No matter, Kiku thinks, for he is strong, and will more than make up for Yao's faults.
That is what love is meant to do in the first place, isn't it?
Yao sobs and screams and cries throughout the night; a cacophony of sorrow and regret, and the memories of even weaker days. For the love of the Emperor, Kiku cannot understand why. A name, Kiku's name, manages to slip out in between a gasp and breath. But it is the wrong name, a name that Kiku has thrown away years and years and years before.
Delicately, he smooths Yao's hair down, whispers a promise to the other, something about changing to his language or another.
In response, Yao buries himself deeper into the mattress, shoulders shaking and wordlessly mouthing weaknesses of the past.
(But, isn't that love as well?)
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