[ feathers and bone and blood, a gore of a mess, splattered all across the pavilion. it's not a peaceful or graceful death.
hoolay is, to say it plainly, a messy eater. he rips into taair with no finesse. claws and rips at him, long gashes down his front, exposing bone. exposing a rib cage, a still beating heart, sluggish though it may be. he licks the blood from the wounds like a deranged animal, eyes dilated and wild from the rush of bloodwine flooding his mouth.
but there's something wrong.
... Those who have no secrets... are no more than prey... cut open and waiting for death...
Enjoy the taste of my fresh blood... Hoolay. Unfortunately, I am not a man without secrets. I still have one little secret hidden up my sleeve.
taair's vision erupts with white.
the transformation is not a pleasant one. it's probably overwhelming, on top of the claw and fangs. it hurts. the flowers rip out from under his skin and bloom bright and shiny, glowing in the shaded pavilion, and it's fast - it's overwhelming. his skin is shiny and green, carapace-like, and harder to scrape through. hoolay stops, confused for a moment, but not for long. because he's drank too much of your blood, taair, and it's tainted, infected blood, ready to spread. vines start in his stomach, crawl up through his mouth and eyes, burst through with a spray of gore, writhing. it's like a tree is sprouting from inside him, fast forward time lapses - he's overwhelmed by the mara, and he's dead before he hits the ground.
but, taair - honestly, so are you.
even a mara-struck soldier cannot withstand this amount of damage. you are fading away, bits of you shimmering and dusting as you collapse. you can hear screaming, outside, you can hear guards coming to investigate, but none of that matters to you anymore.
or maybe it does? maybe the fact that the luofu will be safe from hoolay counts.
do you have any last thoughts before you die, taair? ]
[ when the gingko flowers start to overtake everything - when his vision begins to white out - it is a strange feeling of... satisfaction.
through all of the pain and misery, through horrible, wet gasps for air from a shredded throat, through the agonizing, white-out pain of a still beating heart and a cage of a different kind, something flickers like a firelight.
the infection is taking.
caris always thought that taair's little studies were a simple way to pass the time. she even let him out, the first time, because he wanted to see a site of ancient ruins - and in that first week of freedom, he saw those ruins and started to plot a revolution against himself. the histories he writes are not the papal states pretty lies, but the true history of iria - the messy, fierce history that cuts through the propaganda of the states, exposes their mistreatment of his homeland to the open air. this quiet form of revolt was all he ever had, and he's been building it, brick by tiny, precious brick, for years.
and now, here, hoolay too - he was just a baby bird. just a meal, made to be eaten. just a prey animal, meant to be hunted. just a little puppet on a string, a mouthpiece for caris' greed, for the papal states power. but taair is much smarter than either of these predators ever gave him credit for.
and more than that, they severely underestimated just how willing he is to die.
so in the moments when his vision starts to go white, when he catches the sight of flowers bursting from hoolay's skin, he closes his eyes. the mara-struck gingko weaves through his ribcage and into his veins and out from his pores, and his last thoughts are of green, rolling hills. of the vlder mountains. of the irian river from sea to sea.
taair's last thoughts, delirious from mara-struck madness and pain, are of sitting around a campfire on a rainy night, telling stories with the king's army, connecting across enemy lines. only this time... this time, there's a little girl in his lap, telling stories with her small, chubby hands, opening her mouth and letting the future flow free.
with this, he has given everything - flesh and blood included - to his country. with this, maybe, at last, he can finally rest. maybe his life could be worth something. maybe, instead of harming the people and the nation he loves so much, maybe he can save them.
in his last moments of life, a smile on his face; with one shuddering, final breath, taair thinks of home. ]
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holyspirits) wrote2025-02-16 05:05 pm
no subject
hoolay is, to say it plainly, a messy eater. he rips into taair with no finesse. claws and rips at him, long gashes down his front, exposing bone. exposing a rib cage, a still beating heart, sluggish though it may be. he licks the blood from the wounds like a deranged animal, eyes dilated and wild from the rush of bloodwine flooding his mouth.
but there's something wrong.
... Those who have no secrets... are no more than prey... cut open and waiting for death...
Enjoy the taste of my fresh blood... Hoolay. Unfortunately, I am not a man without secrets. I still have one little secret hidden up my sleeve.
taair's vision erupts with white.
the transformation is not a pleasant one. it's probably overwhelming, on top of the claw and fangs. it hurts. the flowers rip out from under his skin and bloom bright and shiny, glowing in the shaded pavilion, and it's fast - it's overwhelming. his skin is shiny and green, carapace-like, and harder to scrape through. hoolay stops, confused for a moment, but not for long. because he's drank too much of your blood, taair, and it's tainted, infected blood, ready to spread. vines start in his stomach, crawl up through his mouth and eyes, burst through with a spray of gore, writhing. it's like a tree is sprouting from inside him, fast forward time lapses - he's overwhelmed by the mara, and he's dead before he hits the ground.
but, taair - honestly, so are you.
even a mara-struck soldier cannot withstand this amount of damage. you are fading away, bits of you shimmering and dusting as you collapse. you can hear screaming, outside, you can hear guards coming to investigate, but none of that matters to you anymore.
or maybe it does? maybe the fact that the luofu will be safe from hoolay counts.
do you have any last thoughts before you die, taair? ]
no subject
through all of the pain and misery, through horrible, wet gasps for air from a shredded throat, through the agonizing, white-out pain of a still beating heart and a cage of a different kind, something flickers like a firelight.
the infection is taking.
caris always thought that taair's little studies were a simple way to pass the time. she even let him out, the first time, because he wanted to see a site of ancient ruins - and in that first week of freedom, he saw those ruins and started to plot a revolution against himself. the histories he writes are not the papal states pretty lies, but the true history of iria - the messy, fierce history that cuts through the propaganda of the states, exposes their mistreatment of his homeland to the open air. this quiet form of revolt was all he ever had, and he's been building it, brick by tiny, precious brick, for years.
and now, here, hoolay too - he was just a baby bird. just a meal, made to be eaten. just a prey animal, meant to be hunted. just a little puppet on a string, a mouthpiece for caris' greed, for the papal states power. but taair is much smarter than either of these predators ever gave him credit for.
and more than that, they severely underestimated just how willing he is to die.
so in the moments when his vision starts to go white, when he catches the sight of flowers bursting from hoolay's skin, he closes his eyes. the mara-struck gingko weaves through his ribcage and into his veins and out from his pores, and his last thoughts are of green, rolling hills. of the vlder mountains. of the irian river from sea to sea.
taair's last thoughts, delirious from mara-struck madness and pain, are of sitting around a campfire on a rainy night, telling stories with the king's army, connecting across enemy lines. only this time... this time, there's a little girl in his lap, telling stories with her small, chubby hands, opening her mouth and letting the future flow free.
with this, he has given everything - flesh and blood included - to his country. with this, maybe, at last, he can finally rest. maybe his life could be worth something. maybe, instead of harming the people and the nation he loves so much, maybe he can save them.
in his last moments of life, a smile on his face; with one shuddering, final breath, taair thinks of home. ]