Welcome to Gaia! ::

Ivan's fist connected with the sandbag, bare knuckles slicing against the bloodied canvas. The training room was cold, eerily quiet. Only the sound of his measured breaths and landing hits filled the void. Even the air in the room felt stale and unusually stagnant to him. It was how he usually liked it, how he used to enjoy it. But the stretching silence racked against his senses now. Every out-of-place creek casting his attention needily to the door. Expecting it to open. After nearly a month of sparring with the beasty, Zajka, he thought he would enjoy her blaring absence for the second day in a row.

“The. Second. Day. In. A. Row.” Each word of thought was enunciated by another heated punch thrown harder.

Just what the hell did she think she was doing to him? Leaving him to pace the training room for hours yesterday evening, then failing to come to his room last night. He’d even gone as far as to dismiss the whore his uncle sent. Not that he cared; after a couple of hours, he slept blissfully for the first time in weeks. No, he didn't; that was a lie —to himself, to anyone who dared ask.— But who in their right mind would question him? He didn’t realize how accustomed he’d grown to the weight of her against him each night. The tempo of her breathing, the warmth of her skin against his. She was soft, even after all she faced. He liked that. But when did he need that to find rest? A newfound frustration powered his following hits, the bite on his knuckles pulling a hiss from his throat.

When the door hinges finally screamed the arrival of the woman who dared to make him wait, he could not hide the icy wave of conflicting emotion that washed over him at the sight of her. Unkempt sandy hair encased the dark circles that hallowed out her eyes. Now that was rude, all that time he spent getting rid of them, just for one night to ink the space once more. As if boldly saying “Hey, I hadn’t found rest in the last evening either.” However, it was well buried beneath a scornful expression that didn’t allow Ivan a moment to feel any once of pride in her shared suffering. Like slipping down an ice slope, It took two seconds too long to regain his emotional footing. And Zajka had seen it. Their shared time together allowed her to read him the same way he’d grown to devour each slight reaction she had to him. "How dare you," She spat then bound towards him. At one point, Ivan had believed he’d witnessed her rage, unyielding but predictable. It was completely unlike the energy around her now, no, this rage made those brief moments look like the dying smoke in a fire. He could smell it in each practiced throw she sent his way. Absorbing the palpable anger wafting off her in a steady inhale that settled between his shoulder blades. He was confiden the soft woman he had settled into bed with each night was not in the room with him today.

"Was this part of your plan?" Thankfully, their sparing movements had become second nature to him after a month of this slow dance. Ivan knew every throw, dodge, and kick. Shoot he'd taught them to her. So he didn't physically trip over her words the way his mind had. A distracting uneasiness uncoiled at the pit of his stomach at their weight. Uncle Serge was careful, never in his lifetime had he heard of him misstepping. So how had she learned of his plans? What all did she know? Killing her now, and asking questions later would be his uncle's preferred method. Her sloppy moves fueled by anger could easy be dismantled... it was his only option, but the thought of it formed a deep line in his brow... He hadn't had enough time with her yet, hadn't learned all he needed to about her.

Sure, he knew her pain. How torturous it was for her to grow up in her homeland. How deeply she loved her brother and how the shine in her eyes dulled each time she looked at him. All things he was well acquainted with now. But he hadn't heard her laugh enough or had the chance to count how many creases formed around her eyes when she smiled. Not the fake one that he'd seen her fash at others when her voice was a little too high. But the bold and bright one when accompanied by a shoulder-shaking belly laugh. With his mind reeling over the possibilities, weighing and arguing the damned outcome, he missed the shift in her back leg. A grunt tore from his lips when her foot slammed down and twisted just before her hand sent heat scoring across his cheek again.

Okay, maybe she could die. Catching her wrist, she reeled back at him, the tired lines carved into her face folding beneath the size of her wrathful gaze.


"Has this always been a game to you? Using me to slither in like a snake and kill the people I love?"

Even now, filtered with rage and the burning sensation that prickled across his cheekbone, he couldn’t decide if this voice was better suited to be spat across enemy lines or between silken sheets. Ivan would willingly throw himself into both scenarios, though he always envisioned the latter happening first.

Schooling his features into neutrality, he narrowed his eyes. Uninterested in the turn this conversation took. Poor little Zajka, throwing a tantrum. She knew nothing of his uncle's plans for her country; no, this was nothing more than a full-blown hissy fit because the feud with her damned match stick of a brother Enzo would never end in death. Yanking her to the side and off balance, Ivan used the momentum to twist her arm behind her back and pull it up as far as it could go without breaking. Locking her small frame against his chest, he spoke through clenched teeth. “ Be more specific, Zajka. How can I tell who on my list is one of your many loved ones? ” A cold, practiced malice slipped into his tone as he feigned ignorance to fan her flames. Ivan knew rage, but not the fiery kind that sent heat coursing through the body, clouding the mind and judgment like hers that quickly lost control. His was slow-moving and calculated in revenge; it was cold and the type that was bone-deep and unavoidable.

If this is how she wanted to look at him, for promising to issue the final judgment to her brother. He would be the person she wanted him to be.

Dragging her wrist further up until he'd managed to urge her onto her toes to release the pain. His foot swept out, knocking her feet out from under her and throwing her to the ground. His lips rolled back, baring his teeth at her. " My country does not have Snakes Zajak. It is the creatures that roam your lands. Do not mistake my kind for yours."

OOC: He says this... as he is actively doing snake s**t lol

For a split second, everything felt normal to Ivan. As though this were just a repeat of any other evening with Zajka. It was the usual push and pull of their child's play spar, with only the warm-up skipped– Honestly, a pity. He enjoyed the warm-up.– But today, Zajka burned anew. Alight in a carnal rage that narrowly concealed how much more haggard she looked beneath it, as if she’d not slept since History. There were fumes of remorse and nausea coming off her in waves, lingering in the air between each blow. Threatening her brother had edged her into a familiar rampage she sought to feed into their age-old rivalry. The thought of inching her so dangerously close to that searing pain some part of her craved to inflict. On him. On her family. Maybe even on the world.

As quick as he got her down, Zajka was up again, showboating her ceaseless need to fix what should be felt with dancing flames. Did she seek refuge from all pain this way? There was something to be said about a woman who demanded to be witnessed remaining habitually upright. "Do not play stupid with me." She sneered, the venomous words like a demand–no, a proclamation. That this little bunny knew better. Ivan didn’t warrant a response. Since he could beg to differ, this game he played was far from stupid. He’d gathered from the very moment they met, when that hysterical laughter thundered from her chest, and rattled his with the cold bite of iron– That this funkazen zajka would burn brightest when she was angry. And doing so would be her downfall. She would illuminate every dark, hidden corner in Funkazan so Surge could snuff it out.



The jab to his stomach tickled, peppering a breathy chuckle from his split lips. While she’d gotten stronger, the force of her arms was nothing compared to the power in her legs. The ones that wrapped around him effortlessly in the middle of the night. It was a wonder if they would get that chance again.

The pissed gaze that clashed against his, told him no. " Or is this more of your little game? Do you want me to admit how much I know so that you can use it against me?" There was no physical dagger this time, but the spear her words sent to his chest might as well have been. Staring down into hatred, he found himself unable to twist the deadened admission into a lie. "This is how war works." There he left a testing bite, a glittering lure hung low for her to bite. And bite Zahra did. A wild frenzy dragged her body back against his. It took seconds to snare her in their predictable hold. But once again, Zajka reminded him that she wasn't her normal self this evening; she jerked forward, a pop radiating through his fingers that loosened his hold. When she whirled back to face him, her arm twisted at an odd angle, disjointed.

Was she ******** stupid?! "I'm not stupid." The unprompted answer to his unspoken question curled his lips into a frown, and he tsked, as though he were talking to a child. "No. импульсивный." The mock successfully veiled any shock in his tone, but did she have to take such sickening measures just to free herself? Did his touch disgust her that much?

Someday, he was sure it would. When the information his uncle required made itself present. So there was something to be expected in this reaction. She lunged, and Ivan blocked her next string of blows with practiced ease, wondering if by then she would have better control of her anger. Had she realized he only struck once for every third strike of hers? Catching the kick she sent him Ivan bent her sideways, edging her ever closer into pain, before releasing. Her shriek vomited into the room, tasting like anguish and frustration. But Ivan didn’t think it came from his actions, no. He was beginning to believe it was from how desperately she wanted him to hurt her. The idea wasn’t foreign to him, but if this were what she wanted, Ivan would continue willfully depriving her of it. For what was the point of causing pain when she was only going to cheat it?

The flicker of determination in her responding expression could have rattled the floorboards, and when her lips pulled back to expel a snarl, Ivan thought they might have. "You will not take my brother from me. Either of them."

Irritation prickled over his skin. She was being ******** laughable. As if he would choose what she wished over his own family's retribution.

“ I will-” He started, but shock snared his words. From one breath to the next, she was gone. Quicker than a blink. “Where had she–?” Ivan searched, head on a swivel. And, very briefly, the thought that maybe his sanity had snapped. The quiet slap of bare feet across the mat was the only indication it hadn't—then pain seared up Ivan’s spine. He bit down on a grunt the fresh wounds on his back demanded as retribution, and reached for the culprit that wasn't there instead. Hot air slipped through his fingers. Invisible, she could turn ******** invisible. it was the only thing that made any ******** sense. Well, color him gods damn surprised. Briefly, the image of Zahra choking to death in a pool of her own blood floated charitably across the forefront of Ivan's mind, followed by the possibility of strangling her. All the things he wanted to do as soon as he got her hands on her.

Then, finally something useful sounded."Enzo told me everything.” The void of nothingness around him gritted, and Ivan stiffened. Following it's trail around him slowly. If that b*****d had actually “told her everything”, then she would understand– she would know the hatred he felt. “ I have lost enough siblings. I will not lose another."

The pins dancing over his skin plunged through a soft spot, one he hadn't realized formed.

“So you understand the pain of losing a sibling–” His voice cracked. The anger Ivan worked day in and day out to numb himself to over the loss of his own siblings flooded through him in a rush, draining him of his cooler senses and igniting his pain like a burst, a throb of grief that swallowed the room in ice. “And yet you deny me the appeasement of ridding the world of their murderer?” It was sharp and unopened, jagged like the ice cicle knives that tore up from the ground to match the ones he felt coursing through his limbs.

Gleaming eyes caught the smallest plume of vapor curling from lips he could no longer see, yet still somehow taste. “Blood for Blood Zajka. It is elementery principle.” He bit at it. The air in the room pulled tight around her form, the smallest movement yanking the wind taught like a rubber band. Ivan snapped at it. His hand following like a beacon to catch her neck in a bruising hold just to get her to stop <********> moving around him. “ to decimate my brother– a town, for no other reason than the loss of a comrade on the battlefield.” With that, he threw her to the ground and followed the momentum down, trapping her beneath him.

Balancing over her form, he glared down at his own reflection in the cracking ice. “You give me this Zajka” He said, voice low with what some might have called a plea, if one could believe the Hyouden prince was capable of pleading. But without Zajka's form, it was Viktor staring back at him. “You give me Enzo–” his reflection echoed the words back to him, like the orders that circled in his head.

But it wasn't his brother he was looking at, Viktor was gone. Somewhere, he knew, his brother was scattered to the wind instead of properly honored in his family's hall, and it was the fault of someone who bore the same name, the same loyalties, the same blood as the hidden vixon in his hold. But he couldn't kill her. Because of Serge.

Yeah.. Serge. Not for any other reason.

“If you can not, then tell me why I should prioritize your family's safety over mine.” He finally asked in a huff that sent vapor pooling from his lips, twisting with hers. Although it may not have been phrased appropriately, Ivan was asking sincerely. For once, he was tired of fighting. The man was still healing from beating her brothers a**, for Red's sake. Give him a break.

Not wanting her to rush into a stupid answer, Ivan caught her jaw, giving her ample opportunity to ponder it. His thumb took liberty to slide over the familiar pout of her lip, but did not linger out of worry she might go feral and bite him. His hand fell to trace the dip of her collarbone, the curve of her shoulder, and a line to where he caught her slender wrist. He held it, not to inflict pain, almost as if he just wanted to keep her there. As if he could keep her. Perhaps long enough to witness her bleed back into existence. To prove she was just as ruthless as her brother and maybe just as hard-hearted and cold as himself.



OOC: импульсивный - Impulsive

”He is what I have left.”

Her answer was quick, the words so heavy they hardly had a chance to form before falling out of the air completely. All she had left. she says. Once again, he and Zarah stood on opposite ends of a coin. Both fighting to defend the same thing. Ivan was determined to wipe out any lingering threat to his older brother, while Zajka begged him not to take what was left of hers. The tremble in her grasp was only a prelude to how desperately she wanted him to release. Not her, though; it was like she were asking him to release what had been long chisled into his icy bones.

There was nothing for him to say. Ivan wanted to, tried to, stay stoic. Firm in his decision and in the choices that drove his purpose in life. And he might have been able to, had the woman who haunted his dreams not materialized back into existence. Her eyes wide, fighting to hold the overflow of pain that drenched the words leaving her lips. ”The fire–I don’t know how many were lost. Dozens? I can’t- The bodies seemed endless. Endless and tiny. I couldn’t save them. I wasn’t-”

She wasn’t what. Fast enough? Strong enough? Why did those weaknesses intertwine so seamlessly with his own? A clarifying question hardly had a chance to form on his tongue in the common language when her body began to tremble. Ivan stiffened, for a second thinking it might have been his fault. Like he’d made the room so cold that not even her burning stubbornness could fend it off. But the sob of choking emotion that tore from her made him realize it was the admission, or what was left of it.

”For six years, I have been bound to the firestarter. Enzo was one of the few I could save. Don’t make me lose him too.”

Ivan didn’t say anything as the weight of more secrets settled onto his shoulders. Struggling not to internalize the vital information in that statement. To not file away her gaping vulnerability for the likes of Serge. An icy stare only softened for her in the smallest form of submission, in recognition. Taking note of her expression, flickering between fear, relief, and sorrowful pleading. Leading Ivan to wonder: What did she fear more? The fire starter, or losing her brother? Did she even consider the third threat looming over her? The one who would tell his uncle of her horrors, of a threat so powerful, even Funkazan trembled when recalling it.

It was plain to see now that Enzo was nearly a soot stain compared to this fire starter. “ Fine.” He grunted, and in doing so, pain ruptured through his torso. The stitches in his side sprang free from the force he’d been using to hold himself over her. And red god’s it ******** hurt. Ivan released his hold and dropped down onto one elbow. Once he crumbled to Zajka’s side, he flopped onto his back.

Alright, he surmised internally, his head thudding against the mat on a sharp intake of breath. “ My hands will not take Enzo from you.” Not unless he were provoked into it, though verbalizing that out loud was harder. “ If it will stop you from crying.” The edge in his voice could easily be paired with irritation as though the sound of her whines and whoas bothered him. Yet knowing how much he hated seeing it on her face was the true spark behind it. Before his stitches snapped, he’d considered coveting her in his small circle of things to fight for. Things to protect… That couldn’t happen. Not when he knew he had to destroy her.


But if he couldn't ******** her, kill her, or control her. What else was left?


With his adrenaline wearing thin, Ivan could feel every overworked nerve screaming at full force with each breath. He found himself craving the comforting heat he had been denied the night before. He pressed onto his side. The squelch of his wound muffled when he opened his mouth to make a demand. To tell her she needed to be in his room tonight so he could utilize her heat. Somehow, what she said about it taking the pain away rang true.

“ Zajka. If you have enemies outside of me. You bring them to me.”

Well s**t. His brows furrowed, lips pressing into a tight line.

That wasn’t supposed to come out. Had he not just told himself he couldn’t protect her? He was already beat to s**t. As if he could handle snuffing out a fire starter in this condition… What was he, the sultan? It wouldn’t be an easy one to get to, but if it relieved the fear in her eyes, the way the sight of it wrung the void in his chest, It would be worth it. No?

“ I am supposed to be only threat to you.”


OOC:

“Ivan.”

Why did she have to say his name like that? By the might of the Red god, he wished the cursed effect it had on him would end. When her lips shaped it, it sounded like a prayer sent to a deity he knew he could never witness. A whispering plea to the Funkazan gods when it should have been bitter, cold and rotten. Like he was. When was the last time someone said his name like that? Its sound lured his eyes to the side, first to trace the way her fingers curled in protectively over her chest, then to watch the tempo of her every breath slow like that of a fire dying.

That was all he was destined to be to her, right? An icy wind meant to smother her light. It would be best if he reminded her of that.

Yet her barking laughter in response only cut through the tension that tightened his tone. By the time his icy stare snapped up to read her expression, she was moving, pressing him onto his back. Ivan blamed the little resistance that met that warm hand on exhaustion--weakness brought on by … copious and copious amounts of blood loss.

His expression remained stony despite his discomfort, as he inspected her shadowed features from this new angle. She didn’t look nearly as smug as she had each time she landed a maneuver that resulted in a similar position. Those looked proud, laced in triumph over gaining the upper hand. Now her eyebrows twisted, a need creasing between her brows while he tried and failed not to melt beneath the warmth of her fingers tracing along his skin, easing away the tension in his shoulders.

“The gods know you are the greatest threat to me.”

Then why, stupid Zajka, do they abandon you to a decrepit such as me? It was a question he wouldn’t risk asking. Not while her breath danced tantalizingly along his skin, drawing out a cold sigh that was swallowed by her tenderly slow kiss. He was bewitched, chasing after her lips like a moth to flame when she pulled away from him too quickly. But it was her quiet appreciation that he drank down. Slow and warm in his realization of just how addicted, how willing he had become beneath the feel of her lips tracing along his neck, in the warming heat of her tongue and teeth as they tasted him. Ivan decided then what he would do, how he would rip the gods from their perch in the sky and crush them like beetles beneath his feet if they dared to try and take this– no her– from him.

Arching his neck to grant her more access to the skin she worshiped, her plea into his ear never felt more alluring. “Please Ivan, let me seal your side. I want to touch you.” A smile curled the corner of his lips at the plea, one hand threading into the slick tangle of sandy hair at the base of her neck, drawing her lips back to his. This time, he kissed her gently, slow and melted the same way she had done to him moments prior. Something about the softness behind it was a sensation he had never been granted with anyone else and now craved more than any liquor he could ingest.

“Any more than a seal, my Zajka,” His breath of agreeance gave beneath a teasing groan. “And I will truly know the depths of your violent wishes to penetrate me.” At least then one of them might get some enjoyment. And while she may struggle to let her hands explore while balancing above him, Ivan had free rein to explore this pretty little cage she trapped him in.

The hand free of her hair traced up the back of her supporting arm, two fingers slipping over the curve of her chest and down to the exposed skin at her midriff. Signing his name on her skin with icy fingers in a trail of gooseflesh.

“Should we advance our training into weaponry?” Already, he had borne witness to the force he was creating. A healer with the ability to strike down any threat to her and hers would be unstoppable. Did Uncle Serge realize just what beast he was having his nephew mold? Serge’s plan to sap information was melting down into a necessary evil that pooled beneath the icy grasp at the back of his mind.

Ivan would make sure she was prepared, ready to uncurl and strike back the moment he stabbed her. But such lessons could stay frozen in the near future, for now, he would be selfish. Give in to the yearning them that had grown too taught to bear.



OOC: