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Post by Willow on Jun 3, 2009 23:16:32 GMT -6
He rocked them both gently where they knelt together on the ground, pulling her fulling against him and into him, onto his lap as he sat back. He ran his fingers through her hair and he drank down her lips with a slow, intent passion. In the now, in the moment, he existed only with his Light in his arms.
When he drew just faintly away, her lips still warm against his and the proximity hardly broken, his eyes opened and the violet depths slid over her features and searched her own eyes. He searched for answers, he searched for validation, he searched for any sign of that same calming and yet over-exciting fire that was quickening in his chest. It was not a momentary feeling, not a symptom of something temporary. If Zanen, the Oracle, the Shadow of the World, if he had learned anything throughout it long, long life, it was the difference between permanence and her opposite. If anything, Zanen knew that.
He knew when his life would change forever. He knew that it had.
So he just breathed her in. He closed his eyes again and he inhaled her into his system. He wrapped his arms around her and held her close. His precious Light that he had been imprisoned for so long without. It was here now. She was here now. Here, in his arms. It was surreal, but some part of him knew for certain that it wasn't a dream or a wish or a hallucination. Zanen did not dream. He had long ago banished all dreams and fantasies from his mind. When he closed his eyes at night or during a spare moment to catch a bit of the little rest he ever needed, he did not envision a bright and happy future, did not coast through a fabricated world woven from his imagination. No. He remembered. Remembered all the bloodshed, all the lives lost. Remembered the joy in spilling the blood of his enemies because it was the only joy he would ever be able to re-experience.
Those were his dreams, or his nightmares.
Now, though.
No. He did not drift his thoughts any way other than toward the woman in his arms. He hugged her close solidly, to bring himself back down into reality. Because this here and now was really truly reality. He took her face in both hands and looked down at her, kissing at her tears gently, even with his own still fresh on his cheeks, the kissed her lips just as gently. One hand sifted back through her hair and a dreamy smile slid over his lips as he marveled int he softness of the texture. Even the thought made him want to pull her as close as he could again, but he resisted so he could look down into her eyes again, search them, find his answers.
But his heart beat with hers, and he knew them.
"Danalli...." he said softly, and his voice was still huskier than normal, "Danalli do you believe in Fate's Guidance? Do you believe in the Threads of Nature? In the true power of Dance?" [/center]
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Post by libellule on Jun 3, 2009 23:58:38 GMT -6
What did this mean now? What possible danger had she unlocked for the both of them? What did this magnificent bond cost the world? What was it about to cause? The questions screamed through the logical Danalli and she felt the deep Fear rakes its cold blooded wretched nails through her back and into the pit of her stomach. She couldn't think of her consequences. She couldn't think of the result, of the altered balance. She had to simplify her thoughts. His piping hot breath gave she the softest comforting shiver down her back as his voice promised such unrestrained adoration. Her heart had loved before, she had thought she had loved as much as she could. Her eyes opened to his and what she found in his was not mirrored. She avoided his gaze shyly at first, the fear of heartache, and the fear of a loss that would be to painful to bear burned strongly within her sweet chocolate orbs.
But Danalli knew her heart. She knew her soul. She braved her doubts and returned his gaze slowly. They answered him strongly as she softened her gaze, her slow growing love had been strengthening. His strong arms made her arms wrapped tightly around his neck as she tucked her face into the crook of his neck, kissing his there softly. Her fingers dances across the fabric of his garb, wishing longingly that she could caress his skin underneath.
"Where have you run off to," she questioned his silenced figure, nuzzling her nose into his cheek like her equine figure once had.
"I believe," she whispered beautiful to his divine husky voice, "That what I am is a beautiful and precious gift. That what I am is not common nor rare, but even more valuable. When I dance, the elements are my audience, my lovers, my guards, my protection from all things unnatural. The true power of Dance in a luscious trade of balance that I partake in with every predicted and calculated step, with every hum and sway. With every choice in any decision. That is all I know what to believe in. All I've been taught and now... I can believe in you..." She tilted her head sweetly.
He never called her by name outright. He never displayed such respect and love before. She imagined once before, many centuries ago, that he may have been open and unguarded, but those years were lost with the Raves. She was completely taken aback by his swift change that she had caused all to easily... Because it was not an easy one.
Her hands rose to his face as she lifted her head from the crook of his neck. She slid the back of her fingers across his smooth skin, the only skin she could find. It was like marble against her tanned porcelain. Even now, with his power dormant, Danalli could feel it vibrate softly through his entire frame. "With such peace," her breath murmured across his skin, reciting a phrase she'd learned so long ago from some ancient ritual Ghatreg had taught her. The name was lost to her. "Tell me of the Fates of Guidance and the Threads of Nature," she pleaded lovingly, her lips moving against his skin. Though is was not intended, the beautiful scratch in his voice sent a luscious hot jolt through her frame and her closed eyes were dazed for seconds in his warm hands.
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Post by Willow on Jun 5, 2009 22:11:55 GMT -6
"We are all Raves first, Zanen. This is something you already know but have yet to come to accept. It is something you will come to know just as you know the seduction of freshly spilled blood. This I promise you."
The words drifted through his mind, the voice so clear he would have thought he could turn around and Aksana would be right there bearing down at him with that grin like she always did. She'd spoken like a brute and killed like a monster, cursed like a thief and belched like a man. But when she Danced.... When she Danced she was the sky the moment before sunrise, when the whole World held its breath. She had been his mentor for over two hundred years, the only other Zephyr demon he had ever known before meeting Ciel almost a thousand years later -and the only other one that was a Rave. That promise had also been the only promise she had ever made to him. She'd been older and wiser than him, and more ruthless when it came to battle than anyone else he had ever known, and being a Rave was her life. She truly was a Rave first, even more than anyone else.
He still remembered the day that she died -death by her own hand with a grim smile on her face that very morning when the sun rose and the Raves of the World were suddenly disconnected. He remembered the heartbreak and the grief and all the bitterness that he'd nearly choked on as he held her and the life seeped slowly out of her. Oh, he remembered how he'd told her while she was dying that he would follow her, that he would kill himself and follow her back into the World or down into Hell, wherever they would end up being pulled. He remembered how she'd slapped him with more force than she should have had for a dying woman -even a dying demon- and winked at him, telling him that if he followed he really would be going to Hell and that she would be laughing from her little space of air in the World before she fully joined with everything in Oneness. He remembered her telling him that his time was not up yet, that his moment was still yet to come, that he had yet to find out what it truly meant to be a Rave.
And he remembered screaming until his voice had died and then some, until even breathing brought blood to his lips from his tattered vocal chords.
Now, though. Now he smiled and he leaned forward to gently kiss Danalli on the forehead before turning his attention to the warming sky as dawn fully embraced the sky into morning. "With such peace," he echoed with a nod, "and with such love." A deep sigh rolled from his chest and he hugged her close, then slowly began shifting so he could draw them up to a stand. "I will tell you all and more," he said, his voice still soft as he looked back down into her eyes and held their gaze as he stepped back, holding on to one of her hands. In a natural movement, he rose the hand that was still holding hers for her to spin under his arm, stepping around her to complete the motion.
He stopped then and looked from Danalli out across the world.
"I remember so much more, now," he murmured, "from before. So much more without that old pain."
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Post by libellule on Jun 7, 2009 21:59:51 GMT -6
Being with Zanen was so natural to her. It was so easy, like breathing, like her fire shooting. He was a foundation, he was a open for her to access and possibly decode her fuzzy past. Danalli's eyebrows furrowed together as she tried to remember the past decades. It disturbed her that she couldn't remember her past before Ghatreg. It was as if something was blocking her thoughts and memories. Something big was hiding from her and she was almost afraid to decode it. She closed her eyes against his soft kiss. "I wish I could remember," she whispered, the envy was bright green in her tone. He had an entire history book wrapped into the threads of his mind and she was a five sentence paragraph. Nonetheless the beauty of the day helped to ease her thoughts as she rose and twirled under his arm gracefully. A beautiful giggle fell from her lips and she looked up to him. As her own rays of sunshine gleamed brilliantly up to his eyes, the love so fueled by her joy. "Old pain?" She questioned him softly, intertwining their fingers as she pulled his arm to drape over her shoulder as she began to take a step. She only understood that Zanen was a dark creature when she met him and with no logic or idea why he was the way he was. Danalli didn't know demonic levels and kin. She'd met demons that were much more wretched and much more colorful, but she'd met kind hearted ones that were fueled by something other than bloodlust.
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Post by Willow on Oct 8, 2009 21:45:36 GMT -6
"Imagine suddenly loosing something that is so much an innate part of you that you hardly knew it was possible for it to be lost. Imagine still being able to shift as you do into your equine form, but being unable to run and all you could do was just stand still." He took a deep breath and kept them walking, kept his feet moving, his arm settled comfortably around his shoulder. "The bond between the Raves is like that freedom of your run, like and not like. More and the same. For a long time, I was stuck standing still, because Dancing without the others is like shifting without being able to move. Stagnate, painful."
He shook his head slightly and his violet eyes took on a faraway look as memories visited him of those long years before he had managed to be able to grow a little bit numb. Just a little bit, never completely, because a Rave could never go completely numb, that would be against the nature of who and what they were. "Danalli, I have a feeling," he began softly, tasting that feeling from his gut to his heart to his tongue, letting it develop before he put it into words completely. There was something coming. Somehow, he and Danalli were brought together. These things happened for a reason. She was the sun to his shadow, light to his darkness. Together they were a pair, a partnership. Together, they made a whole.
"Something it coming, and I'm going to face it." He paused and looked down at her, stepping back and gently placing a hand on each of her arms. "Will you stand with me, whatever it is? Something...something is coming and it's coming fast. But it isn't something that needs to be welcomed or defeated. It isn't something that can be greeted warmly or fought with weapons. It's something else. I'm not sure what, but I can speculate and..." there was a pause and a small crack of a smile on his face, a little glimmer of the original Zanen, perhaps his actual personality, shining through "..and frankly I don't really want to be parted from you, and I'm allowed to be blunt about it because..." He shook his head. How did you describe something like what had just happened. It was like being grounded for a thousand years and suddenly being not only able to fly again, but in the air, flying, soaring right away. A part of him was in shock, and another part of him was just relishing in the connectivity again. The rest of him was back.
He wasn't just a demon anymore, Oracle or no. He was really Zanen.
And suddenly he understood, just like that, what Aksana had really meant when she said that they were all Raves first. It was like he hadn't really existed completely until that part of him had returned. And now it was back. And Danalli. The part of him that was Rave, that was him in entirety, was back, and along with that part of him had come Danalli. No, Danalli had brought that part of him back, and now he had her as well.
And he found himself not wanting to ever let go.
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Post by libellule on Jul 18, 2010 8:22:55 GMT -6
A chuckle slid past her lips. "If there is one thing I know very well, Zanen, it is being lost in a world I seem to subconsciously know so very well," there was a pained expression on her face as she chewed her lip to stop it from trembling. "There is a pain of mine that is much worse than that. Much more empty and much stronger. To stand still during a change is nothing compared to not being able to remember how you learned that change or how you came to know how to run. "I am sentences compared to your library because," she looked up at him with frustrated eyes as she paused as if trying to push past the blockage in her memories, "I remember nothing before one very recent incident in my life... "You may be free to dance but I don't believe I'm quite freed just yet." She closed her eyes as he spoke "Perhaps... This thing, whatever it may be, was triggered by us and it could be a threat or a blessing. Quite honestly I don't feel like I should worry. But I will be prepared.
Danalli placed both her palms on his cheeks as he faced her and asked her.
The magnitude of her gaze and the connection with his eyes was so powerful she barely noticed her tears sliding down her cheeks again. She caressed his beautiful skin and as he smiled she could barely breathe from the beauty. "Zanen..." It was a barely a whisper but the emotions that filled the word were louder than thunder. "Zanen I will always be by your side. It seems surreal that you and I... This change within me has connected me to you, has bonded me to you. I'm yours. And I..." her voice cracked as her body shook. She took a minute to breathe. "And I have never been so certain about something in my life. I don't ever want to be alone ever again. If Death stood between me and you... I promise you. I would win. " The severity of her tone led to the imagination that she almost had a plan if that circumstance was ever brought up.
"We are in this together now, Love. And I have a feeling that we have many conflicts and battles to fight to protect this... love. Let me tell you something now and don't you dare forget." She reached for his gorgeous locks, entangling her fingers in them before she pulled him to her once again. She kissed him, passionately, but she didn't just kiss him.
Oh no, Danali connected every single feeling and every single emotion she'd ever known to feel about Zanen. It ranged from spite and loathe from the first time she'd met him with the stable boy to the way she silently observed him and admired him from afar to now when her entire soul and heart was open to his extended arms. She wanted him to know and feel everything. She wanted him to know her love and its entirety. She wanted him to believe and know that she believed they truly were whole. She barely pulled away as she whispered across his lips. "Did you get that?"
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...'Hush. Don't speak. Don't you do this to me!' Her high panicked voice cracked as he laid, bloodstained, in her arms. The white garb she wore had been stained with his blood. He had been protecting her against soldiers when the demons showed up. That didn't go over as well as he'd hoped... They were gaining. 'Danalli' he sputtered again, 'let me speak.' '..., no you have to save your energy we need to keep movin-' 'No,' he fought against her grip and stumbled to stand, his sword in hand. They were on the horizon and the fear in her stomach had never been so strong. He could tell. 'You're going to keep moving...' 'I will not leave you!' She was always such a stubborn thing. It looked as though he'd have to do this the hard way...
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Danalli turned her head coughed softly as she hid the sharp breath she took in as the painful memory passed. She closed her eyes to the warmth of his lips once again.
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