Blood and Rain

Sanura - 09/03/2017
Connor groaned as he picked himself up off the ground of the training ground, resisting an urge to rest his hand against the side of his ribs. The past week had been nigh intolerable. Their father had gone off on another of his ‘missions’, this time taking Kyra to assist him. With both voices of reason gone, that left him with the cool contempt of their mother, and the sadistic glee of two of his older siblings, who wasted no opportunity to try to ‘toughen him up’ for the family business of slave keeping and side-work of assassins.

“Giving up already?” His heard his brother taunt as he struggled to his feet.

“Who said I gave up?” Connor replied with a forced laugh, placing on the smirking mask before he dared to lift his head. Wiping a thin line of blood from the corner of his mouth, he readied the practice daggers for another round.

The other gave a derisive sigh at the stance. “You’ll never win if you stay on the defense.”

“Well to be fair, attacking outright pretty much sucks too,” Connor said as lightly as he could. “And hey, we’re sort of down a healer with Kyra gone. Maybe we should hold off on the whole one-sided trouncing thing until she gets back, yeah?”

There it was. That disgust. That disappointment. Never failed. “Well. Now that ‘distractions’ are out of the way, maybe we can have a heart to heart.”

Here it comes...

“Could you, just once, be useful for something, Connor?” the golden child asked in a smooth voice. “You balk at training the slaves. You sullied your blood. You are a runt. No power. No strength. Your combat can be bested by a human twit-- hell! The one god we might have offered you as a token to was just killed! Those ridiculous pranks aren’t even good for THAT anymore.”

“Gee, I love you too,” Connor said in a dry tone as he matched his brother’s circling, making sure to keep him in sight.

“You think this is a game?” his brother emphasized, as if to a small child.

“I dunno. Do I win anything if I play?” Connor asked, keeping his guard up. “Anything I’d want to win, anyway?”

“That’s the thing, little brother,” Dio scolded, eyeing him with quiet exasperation. “You play, whether you want to or not. And if you aren’t strong enough to fight-”

A sudden rush, and Connor thought he was ready for it. But next thing he knew, he was kissing the ground again, and a pain shot through his leg. He grimanced and bit back the groan of pain. Groans and weakness were like fresh blood among wolves with their lot.

“-they will simply take what they wish of you,” Dio finished as he used the moment to grab the boy by the shoulder and fish out the trinket in Connor’s pocket, a small comb to be exact. One he found and needed to return. Shoving the boy back down, he’d contemplate the comb. “Like the girl. You seem really… fond.. Of that one.”

“Leave her out of this,” Connor snapped, instantly regretting it. Wanting to take those words back. He confirmed too much. He tried never to show any amount of seriousness for anything. Because Dio was right. Anything he cared for- wanted- desired- his own flesh and blood was always eager to take and make them their own. "Give that back, Dio. 'Tis none of your concern."

“Oh?” Dio rose a brow. Finally something got a rise out of the younger Vindictious. He looked almost ready to actually show some fight. Almost. A small smile on his face as he darted in and lay a strike on his shoulder. “What will you do?”

Another strike.

“What power do you have?” Dio prompted, trying to pull a fighting instinct from the whelp in from of him. Trying to make him see the reality. To his disgust, the boy was even slower to rise. Thora was right. Their brother had been coddled too long by that ‘nanny’ of theirs. A weak link- At this rate he was likely to die before he took his share of the mantle.

Pity...

“Hell… maybe we can make her a family treasure, right brother?” he prompted again. “Share and share alike?

A flash of movement, and the boy was on his feet, blades extended as he lashed out blindly. He felt something connect. Dio stumbled back, and they both stared at each other in shock, as if trying to piece together what just happened.

Thin a thin line of red slowly appeared on Dio’s cheek, marring the perfect golden skin that his blood allowed him, the line suddenly welling heavy and spilling over to drip pregnant drops of crimson on his shirt.

Connor rose at the site of red marring the canvas of demon skin. He… did it. He actually got a strike on Dio?

But the result didn’t bring pride or achievement to the brother's face. He should be relieved. The boy could make a real blow when he set his mind on it. His expression darkened as he changed the hold on his weapon, an unusual anger rolling in the pit of his gut as he eyed the startled youth.

Dio lunged forward, and Conner felt throbbing pain as the pummle of dios blade found his diaphragm, knocking the wind from him. Then the next thing he knew, he was trying to suck air from the other side of the training room, even more ribs battered and bruised- he was pretty sure his shoulder was dislocated. Dio stared down at him in rage and disgust, a master whose slave had gotten too uppity.

“Next time, finish what you start,” Dio stated flatly as he whipped out a cloth and pressed it to the already healing wound. “Clean yourself up.”

And with that, Connor was alone to process the pain- and the shock of actually landing a hit on his brother… he’d rattled Dio if even for a second. A sense of accomplishment welled in him.

Damn, he needed to get that comb back…

Still, he got that hit in!!

He groaned and picked himself up slowly, testing the soreness over one eye. Oh yeah. That one was going to leave a mark. He didn’t heal as quick as the rest of them. Trying to explain the black eye was going to be hell in class tomorrow.

Then again, he’d get to tell everyone he landed a hit on pretty-boy’s perfect face. So it wasn’t all bad.

He’d half turn to leave, noting a solid limp in his leg as he gingerly removed the guard that protected his magic-smitten wings. All in all it wasn’t the worst training session ever.

Then his blood ran cold as he saw he had an audience.

“Hey Thora,” he said in a flat, careful tone, noting the protective raging storm in her eyes. “Just.. gonna go get cleaned up.”

He rested his weight on one leg as her eyes narrowed dangerously, and he felt a sharp pain radiate from his knee as he stumbled slightly. He felt the blood drain from his face as he saw the slavers whip- her weapon of choice- gripped in her hand.

“It was just a practice,” he tried to clarify with a thin ghost of a reassuring smile as he stumbled another step back, nearly tripping on the half forgotten wing guard. “Guess I’m finally improving… huh?”

He twisted to run as the hand started to rise, only thinking of trying to get out of range. Find time to get past that possessive lovers-rage that the twins tended to have. He heard a snap followed by a sickening series of shattering sounds, and half a second later the pain of a dozen shattered wing bones hit his brain. He didn’t even know if he found the air to breathe as he fell on the second strike. By the third all thought left his mind completely.

Heartless00X - 09/03/2017
Ovan had had a drink that night, it had been an abysmal month...more a year though if he was being honest. But now they had made it official, his father and mother were separating. He knew it was coming, though he had been irked to accept the possibility, and even as Maya was away at her special school. How could they do this to them? To him? He was angry, he was young, and he had been studying combat and magical arts for a while now under the tutelage of some of the most dangerous men and women this country had ever produced...which was all kept very secret from his peers.

He had never used it much, save the time he shocked Dio, and a few bullies here and there tossed like empty boxes across the floor. The training had seemed only to serve to ensure that he would not become another fat librarian wasting away, and while he had never intended such a fate; it did seem much more palatable. He had gone for a drink, to the place he knew he could get one for free, at the Playground his family was always welcome, although his paternal half being of unwelcome outside material, and he himself therefor half a bastard already in their eyes, he had felt the pressure to leave almost immediately intermixed with the spiced choking haze of drug smoke and sexual tension.

But he had seen all he had needed to, he was told it was their safehouse, the one remaining refuge with plenty of magic and physical security. But that security only served one purpose in his eyes, because none would ever try to rob the infamous Vindictious clan, and expect to live beyond the next moon.
Upending the dark bottle, he drained the last few fingers of Kill-Devil rum and tossed the bottle errantly down an alley. Boorish behavior perhaps, but he was angry, he was depressed, and he was a youth full of energy and hormones. Bad mix with potent alcohol designed to knock a Lycan on their backside, and he had a full bottle of it flowing. Some rain was starting to come down, his nostrils flared and his chest expanded as all three of his divergent lungs drank deep of the scent and relaxing pressure the impending downpour placed upon the streets. Rain can wash away a lot of things... but could they wash away his anger?
Ovan was not given to anger, not given to rash action or violence. And he was not going to seek it now even with a head swimming in the stimulant bottle he had drained. He just wanted to go home, endure whatever lecture awaited him, then sleep off his frustration in the comfortable sheets of the family estate, itself walled away from the general populace of the A’zyrlan commoner.

With a slight swagger in his step he pulled up the hood of his short dark coat and placed his hands in the pockets while walking down the alley, deciding to take the back-way home lest he have to suffer the questions of the city guard at this time of night. He would bypass them easily should they come up to question him, but he would rather be alone for this walk. Besides, it was best to let such anger fume away in peace, and let if brush off his form as quickly as the cloud his breath produced in the now-chilled air about him.

What he had seen in that place, was not of his mind or kind, and those pinned to the walls, made to be bent over tables or such other tortuous and inherently sexually repressive devices… he shook his head as if that could physically cleans the memory from burning behind his eyes. It infuriated him; the thought of people, pan humans, or even divergent species of humanoid used in such a way. They were not themselves, and they never would be most like. Most were violated and polluted beyond ever regaining themselves. He had never been a religious person, but he believed that the soul, the very essence of those playthings had been irrevocably tainted, and that their ability to become what or who they might… had been stolen.

He was abruptly awoken from his grand reverie and cultural insight by a large man in a hardened leather armor coat that pushed him hard palm open and sent him tossed over across the mud. “Oi!” He shouted in gultural low-common, “No one I dunno gets in while the livestock is being unloaded! Family orders!”

“Family orders?” Ovan said quietly beneath his hood and lsowly got to his feet using the post of a nearby fence to anchor his ascent to his feet. “That family has been fractured for some time man-beast. Let me pass, I need no such molestation from the bouncers they hire.”

“What did you say, boy?” He great hulking man-thing produced a slender, well-used shiv of a knife, pointing it threateningly in his direction. “Maybe I should cut you up, a corpse is a better barrier than any guard anyhows…”
“Livestock…” Ovan said, with a low hanging implication of the word, his breath heavy upon the chilled air. “That’s all you think of them isn’t it?” Behind the man, Ovan could see the slaves being led in chains towards the holding pens and the conditioning pits, where they would be turned into the dead-eyed dolls of Asinine.

“Right, had enough of it. Get out!” The man bear rushed Ovan, the shiv coming out in a straight stabbing motion, the move of a practiced prisoner who had taken many a life behind the jailed cells. Without thought, Ovan’s training kicked in and a palm moved up brushing the arm across his body and away with an inward block, his other hand twisting up to grab the wrist. In a flash he traded the blocking palm for a rising forearm strike that first displaced the asailants elbow, bending it the wrong way with a snap that would have churned stomachs, the wrapping around the other way snapping it back he used the leverage to turn the knife into the mans own gut.

Ovan fell away into the rain now with a large dark red spatter across his arms and chest, and he watched the guard fall to his knees and try to call out but all that came was a wet blood choked strangled noise followed but the unceremonious plopping of his entire body face first into the mud as his lifeblood drained out of the wound.
The rain can wash many things… and as Ovan, working purely on adnrealine, began to undo the chains and cuffs before fleeing to some vacant alley where he would vomit and ensue his own panic attack about what had gone on… he thought. Does Rain Wash Away Blood?

Sanura - 09/28/2017

It hurt to breath..

It hurt to move...

Every step burned. Every accidental twitch of the mangled wings made him cry out. He could feel an eerie movement in his chest with each breath... Had he been human he'd never have gotten up from this... though had his blood been 'right' in the first place, he might not be in this--

A sound escaped him as a gashed leg caught the rough edge of a broken barrel in the ally, hand clenching against the wound until the tendons rose in his skin, panting for breath that didn't want to come properly. He needed to get a healer- no... he needed to lay low... wait for Thoras rage to quell-- no... he needed...

He needed...

He needed to find someplace... he needed out of- where did he stumble to? At some point 'away' was his only directive... he needed a street. No.. shadows.. no they all knew every... what was he going to-

He let out a sharp sound as he literally stumbled into someone, the blood and sweat and pain induced tears blinding him to the figures identity a moment as he made a hasty gesture to shove his way back- half afraid one of the two or their playthings had discovered him too soon.

Ovan
As a slightly taller and heavier body rocked into Ovan he nearly spilled over, an arm wrapping around the other figure as though one of the other guards had tracked him, in his enfeebeld and inebriated mind he nearly plunged that dagger into another warm body. But at the last moment he saw his cousins eyes.. the rain still came donw around them.

"Connor?" He sputtered out, then his eyes began to register the damage, the pain his cousin must be in, "The Hells?" He gasped and helped Connor down, "Stay still..." He may have been a touch drunk but he still knew some basic medicae, and he reached into his back pocket to pull out a small healing potion which he uncoked and began to run over the wounds, "This isn't gonna be enough... what happened!?"

Connor:
"O..Ovan?" he rasped as he registered the figure he was grappling with, a small shock of relief hitting him as his cousin started to urge him down. He writhed as the movement jostled the ruined wings, every nerve aflame with the pain unique to a hollow-boned and nerve rich agony. His breath came in shallow heaves as he finally came down to rest, raw and wounded what looked like head to foot with numerous gashes.

"Damn-" he hissed sharply, not even halfway attempting to heed the advise to stillness as he felt the first splash of the potion, though he groaned low in his throat as the numbness followed by the weak tingling of the additives started to do their work- what little they could.

He blinked at the question and a small sound that could have been an echo of a laugh escaped him, if the ghostly smile trembled slightly in mockery of the sad state he must look. "I finally hit him.... Thora d- " a faint triumphant huff, and a sharp groan as his hand rose to steady the broken ribs in his side. "Thora didn't... take well to it."

Ovan
He heard him, and he processed it, "Yeah, Thora has always been protective of the creature that is eventually supposed to impregnate her." He growled and managed to seal up the most immediate wounds. "This isn't good. Come on, Connor. I need you to move with me."

He knew it was gonna pain him but he couldn't heal this much damage on his own, so with one arm around his hip careful not to crease the wings he supported his cousin through the alleys, "Well it might delight you to know, I killed one of their slavers tonight... And I think... I may be out of the family loop as it were..."

Connor:
"Gods no... no moving.." he complained, but he didn't fight his cousin as they helped him back up. He leaned heavily on his cousin, the better of the two arms reaching around Ovan's shoulders to steady himself.

The voice was a welcome distraction. While it didn't fully distract from the pain, it did help help keep his mind off enough of it to will one foot in front of the other.

"You got one?" he asked, surprised even in the haze of pain. "Nev... never... liked those... bastards anyway. Goo- gah!... Good f-for you..."

He squeezed the arm around his cousins shoulder in a mix of consolation and congratulation at his ... fall from grace as it were. If it could be called that. They were exposed early to a lot of ugly- but killing someone had to be harWarrantedguy. Warrented or not."

"... and now you gone and ruined your good shirt..." he said weakly as he gave a nod at his blood smearing the expencive fabrics, trying to assure and lighten in the way Connor did. A small joke. "Hell of a ....night... to be a Vind- dammit!" a soft hiss through his teeth interrupted the thought.

Ovan
"My shirt doens't equal my blood cousins life..." He smiled and took him around another corner and softrly led him to sit against a wall as he pounded on the door, "We aren't Vindictious..." He said softly, "Not anymore, I can't be." The apothecary opened the door in a midnight gown and was aghast, "Vindictious! I will pay the tab, take him in and heal him, NOW!"

His bark got the older male moving and his assistants woke up and helped to drag Connor inside and onto a table as they were adminstering to him, Ovan just stood nearby, his body soaked in the rain, "Slavers. As soon as they took on slavers I knew I couldn't be a Vindictious."

Connor
He groaned as he was lowered, risen, carried, dragged, poked, prodded and other things he lost track of. But still, the pain finally started to ebb to a mostly tolerable haze of a two by four rather than the twenty or so lashings from a psychopath- not that he had been conscious to count all of them-

He turned his head as his cousin started to talk again. Slavers huh... "That was a long time back.." was his cousin thinking of ex-communicating himself for that long?

He tensed as he felt a small pull in the back of his mind, the pain and exhaustion giving him the irrational idea to ram the heel of his hand against the side of his skull as if to physically jar the attempt to trace or talk to him via the connection. It took effort, but he managed to shut his mind out. He'd been carefully doing it for years at some level, afterall, not that he'd ever let on the fact. He held the hand to his now throbbing skull, quickly questioning and regretting whatever rationale he'd had for it in that split second. "Looking for me.."

"Can't say... I blame you. I don't... want any p-part of it either." At least he could breath enough to speak. "Never... fit... I never fit there... Never measured up... Never... wanted to... It felt like... I'd...."

A fragile smile crossed the bruised face as he regarded his cousin. "... I don't... want to... disappear... in their shadow..."