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Clare’s eyes are bloodshot, gold of her irises bright against the black of the pupil.
She grips her wrists with her shaking fingers, willing herself to calm down.
guts blood hungry hungry flesh blood -
“Clare! Clare, are you okay?” Raki’s weak voice comes from the closed door. He’s barely able to stand these days; "it hurts,” he says, “all over”, but still he smiles.
Clare breathes, in, out, inhale, exhale, remembering Teresa’s soft arms and tight hugs, Miria, heading over to the north, laughing Helen against the setting sun, young Raki, vulnerable and excitable and sure, and watches her eyes shift from golden to silver. She’s got this.
She will see Raki off first, she’s strong.
"I’m coming. Just spaced out.”
For Irene, it’s slow. She doesn’t notice anything out of the ordinary for long, long years her abstinence from yoki use has given her. Her eyes are grey, her veins are almost invisible beneath her paper-dry skin, her hands don’t shake. Then, when a stray yoma pack comes near her house and she promptly disposes of them, sword almost invisible as she cuts them in halves and quarters and so on, something happens.
She wants to use yoki. terribly so; sharp claws are enveloping her lungs
let me out let me out let
Irene scratches her arm, hard, not enough to draw blood, but there are white stripes running down her arm, turning pink and red; the pain anchors her. Irene shuts the voice out, locking it behind the cage of her ribs and closes her eyes, tightly gripping her sword.
Well, she thinks. Here it begins.
Helen smiles, sharp. Her hand in Deneve’s is cold, the card on her lap is black, marked with a familiar symbol.
“I thought Miria would last longer, you know.”
Deneve shakes her head. Dietrich, who’s given them the card, is long gone, her back straight, posture looking painful with the careful neutrality of it. Miria has affected them all and Dietrich admires her fiercely, young and passionate and honest.
It must’ve been hard for her, giving Deneve her black card.
“She’s offensive type,” Deneve says, stiff, “and she’s still angry.”
Helen remembers Tabitha, corners of her lips smeared with red, asking for Miria’s hand. Remembers the organization: men in black, invisible chains binding her wrists. Feels the monster’s blood circling her human veins.
“She was headed to Pieta, come to think of it. We’d better get going.”
Helen looks at Deneve’s eyebrows furrowing as she nods and tries to keep herself from wondering when will she have to trade Deneve’s kisses, burning hot, for her blade.
Yuma, Cynthia thinks, as she watches her fuss around their tiny house, is a survivor. She grows and adapts, so she doesn’t shrink into herself at the open hostility of their neighbours, who are still afraid of the claymores. It’s no wonder, of course. They can kill the entire population of this village without so much as a blink of an eye, after all, though the lack of gratefulness for their job, which is much more affordable now since they all don’t need much money, gets to her sometimes. Cynthia shares it with Yuma, quiet anger working its way to the undertones of her soft voice.
“They can’t really help it,” Yuma shrugs in response. “Besides, there are all sorts of rumours going on about us. Give it time; they’ll get used to us, or their children will.”
“Or their grandchildren, or their great-grandchildren,” Cynthia continues, mostly to make Yuma laugh. Her mission is accomplished and her anger fades to the background. Yuma’s laughter is therapeutic; Cynthia leans in to plant a chaste kiss on her lips, thin and soft, to feel them stretching in a smile.
She doesn’t know her eyes flash gold behind her eyelids for a brief second as they kiss.