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 Posted: Mon Apr 07, 2014 11:44 am
Her head was beginning to hurt. It was just a dull ache right now, and nothing too overwhelming, but it was coming. Tonight, or perhaps tomorrow, she would have to take that bitter concoction and sleep off the overwhelmingly painful headache. But for now she imagined that she would be okay, and was hellbent on enjoying some quiet time outside until then.
Her favourite book in hand, the patchwork made her way to the outskirts of the weeping forest, stopping just before it became off-limits to a tree that she had visited countless times before. The familiarity of this area was always comforting to her; school often changed, there was always new faces, or events, or terrors to suffer but here, on the outskirts, by her tree...it was always the same. The only thing that changed out here was the weather, and she appreciated the calm escape from chaos.
Amrita took a seat as she always did, her back to the tree and her knees against her chest with her feet tucked under her. She took a moment to make herself comfortable between smoothing the fashionably tattered bottom hem of her dress and digging her bare heels into the ground. Once she was ready, she pulled out her book again, balancing it on her knees and opening it to the marked page to continue reading.
As comfortable as she was, old habits died hard: she couldn't let her surroundings fade away around her. She didn't have the luxury of literally losing herself in a book, at least not outside. History told her again and again that she needed to be on her toes at all times, and though she was confident in herself and her abilities, she also knew better than to underestimate her enemies...and she had plenty of them. So that was why, when she heard the rustling of branches despite there being no wind, she glanced up from her book to look around.
"Who's there?" She called into the forest, not yet getting up but still looking around, weary.
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Posted: Mon Apr 07, 2014 2:33 pm
"Amrita? Dievča?"
She looked different. Bigger. More put together - a proper patchwork. But it was definitely her. It had been two years since he had talked to his friend. The retreat he'd made into the ofrest had been a lengthy one and he hadn't told anyone he was leaving. Not that there had been anyone but Amrita to really notice his disappearance. Aurel had been hard pressed to make friends with his awkward ways and ignorance on life outside of his trees.
He looked different, too. A little taller and his branches were a lot less dead. There were the starts of some blossoms on his branch 'wings' coming from his back. Still goofy and awkward and standing there like he wasn't sure how to approach. Would she be mad that he'd been gone? He didn't do well with anger.
Especially after that dream. He'd been so angry and put through so much. It felt so real.
Too real.
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Posted: Mon Apr 07, 2014 5:06 pm
Amrita turned at the sound of the voice, surprised with familiar it sounded, despite not having heard it for what felt to her like forever. She stared at him for a long while as she tried to process what - rather, who - she was seeing, her eye wide with surprise. He was taller, sure, and his branches looked a lot healthier than she remembered, but then again she's gotten bigger too, and...oddly enough had a vine in her arm. They had both changed and yet stayed the same.
"...Aurel?" She murmured quietly, the name sounding strange on her tongue due to nothing more than ill-use. "I...wow...lookit you..." Slowly, carefully, the ghoul started to rise to her feet, almost as though she wasn't sure if he was even real. Apparently she had decided that he was, because her next move was to throw herself at him in a hug.
"JACK, IT'S BEEN FOREVER!" She cried happily, squeezing him tightly against herself. "Are you back for good?"
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Posted: Mon Apr 07, 2014 5:43 pm
There she was, getting up and looking dazed and confused. So far, so good. No signs of anger. No sobbing. Nothing being thrown at his head. So far, it was going much better than it would be expected.
....Aaand then there he had arms full of ghoul. He wrapped them around her and gave a firm squeeze, smiling as he lowered his chin to rest against the top of her head. He was still taller than her.
Good. No anger. That was definitely a happy tone of voice. "It has been, yes. I am. I think. I hope." He didn't want to run into the woods again. He needed to have some form of staying power. He needed to know more and be the best that he could!
"Look at you. A proper patchwork."
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Posted: Mon Apr 07, 2014 7:43 pm
Amrita would always, always be happy to see an old friend. It meant that they didn't get captured by the Hunters or worse, joined them. It meant that they were where they belonged, in Halloween, and once more back with friends who loved them dearly.
"You have to! And if you leave again---" Amrita paused there, and frowned. "Next time you leave, tell someone!" She didn't sound too terribly annoyed, but she did swat him. She felt justified with smacking him, after all, there was two years of silence. "I was so worried!" Thankfully it was a topic she could drop - at least for now - and let go of him to back up a pace or two.
"Right?! Christof and Malodore made this body for me!" She beamed with pride and did a little spin for him, so he could see her complete form, one that was so very far from the tiny, rotting little zombie she used to be. "And you! You got taller, and your branches!" She pat one very carefully, just in case they were actually attached, and grinned.
"You're gonna be a right old tree soon~"
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Posted: Mon Apr 07, 2014 8:21 pm
Oof! "Sorry, Dievča. I just..." He looked kind of helpless for a moment and indicated behind him to the school. "I could not. Too many people. Too much at once." For someone who lived in essential isolation it had been a lot to take in.
Aurel stepped back and let her spin around, that grin returning to his face. "You kept your skull, I see. You said you did not like it, if I remember right. Could they not fix it?" Given the fact she had everything else changed it was a surprising thing to still see. A reassurance that it had been Amrita, at least?
"Time tends to make organic things taller, yes." He looked toward his branches, "It is nearing the time for Spring in the human world. This is not the most annoying time for these. They will soon fall off and make messes. And then it will be a trail of sneezes."
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Posted: Wed Apr 09, 2014 7:58 am
"I understand that," She did, she really, truly did. "But don't go disappearing without saying something, or leaving a note, or anything!" Amrita puffed out her cheek, but that was the end of her nagging on that particular subject; after all, it wasn't like they could go back and change anything. It happened, it was fixed, and there was the present to look after now.
"I did!" She reached up to touch the cold bone, absently tracing the scar along the eyesocket. Her gaze had dropped sheepishly to the floor as he reminded her how, once upon a time, she didn't like having it, because it made her feel incomplete. "I...asked them not to." She admitted, almost a perfect picture of the shy ghoul she used to be. The moment she was able to change the subject - or at least focus on something else - she did.
"I'll make sure a gnome follows you with a dust pan when you start molting." Amrita grinned, and backed up to take a seat against the tree again, as she had when Aurel arrived. "Come on, Sit! Like old times, yeah?" A backwards hand pat the space beside her. "We have a lot to catch up on!" A lot of terrible things, but some good, too. "Where did you go? What were you doing?"
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Posted: Wed Apr 09, 2014 8:23 pm
Aurel couldn't help but raise a brow at the shy. He would have said something, too, if he hadn't been distracted by the subject change and her bringing gnomes into it. He scowled. "No. No gnomes. They are loud and give me headaches."
Not only that, the caused more trouble than he did. And that was a problem, thank you! Aurel lumbered over and plopped down heavily beside Amrita, slipping an arm around her and giving her a squeeze. Personal space issue had not yet gone away, apparently. "I went back to the forest my Elder left me. Played many tricks. Almost got burned to a crisp by a wildfire that took out a quarter of the forest. Decided I needed to come back here. To learn more. What about you?"
Aurel indicated to her, "You have obviously had much happen."
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Posted: Thu Apr 10, 2014 11:44 am
"I make no promises." Amrita grinned, teasing her old friend a little too easily. She hadn't expected him to loop his arm around her almost immediately after sitting, and the touch made her tense for a moment. Touch was still a sense she was getting used to again; she had no reason to hate it anymore. No more reason to push people away. Besides, this was Aurel. Aurel wouldn't hurt her. So she relaxed, and slowly leaned against him.
"Eugh, fires. I'm sorry." Amrita, despite being undead, shivered in horror. Fire was still one of the things she was more than terrified of. "Who is looking after the forest while you're gone?"
"...Aaaand...that's an understatement. I don't even know where to start..." Her voice softened and her gaze lowered. "A lot of really, really terrible things happened while you were gone." She admitted, resorting to fidgeting by playing with the end of her long braid.
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Posted: Sun Apr 13, 2014 1:43 pm
The Leshy settled against the tree with his friend leaning against him, rather comforted by the touch of another person. It had been a long time. Trees were terrible at cuddling. "Ah, the forest can guard itself. I do not have anyone to watch it while I am away. Leshy do not enjoy other Leshy in our territory. It was lucky that Elder did not kill me when I first appeared in his forest." Aurel snorted. "He kept threatening."
Old bugger was as crotchety as they came but never harmed a piece of moss on his head.
Oh no. Terrible things? His look of contentment changed to one of concern, tilting his head downward to look at his friend who was so nervously playing with her hair. "Terrible how? Are you alright?" She looked whole but looks could be deceiving.
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Posted: Sun Apr 13, 2014 7:54 pm
"Oh, that's neat!" Amrita chimed; she liked forests, but didn't quite know how they worked. She wondered, briefly, if her constant visiting of them was causing a disturbance for their protectors. It was something she thought of asking when she remembered, but the conversation right now was centred very obviously back on herself. It was uncomfortable, and she immediately regretted her decision to indulge his question. She should have just said that nothing had changed, as untrue and unfair as it was.
"I'm...I'm okay, for the most part." That much she could admit. "But everything else...there have been so many attacks, and a group has made themselves known as Halloween's Enemy. They've done..." She paused, tensing for a moment before forcing herself to relax. "They've done terrible things to us, to me...and I've done terrible things because of them." She explained vaguely, somewhere between proud and ashamed of her actions.
"It's...it's a very long story."
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Posted: Mon Apr 14, 2014 11:02 am
Aurel felt the ghoul beside him tense and his arm tightened a little around her in a feeble attempt to try and help her relax and show that he was there. An enemy of Halloween did not sound too good. This was his place and they were threatening his people. An unfamiliar territorial feeling bubbled up inside of him at the thought of anyone who did not belong coming into his world. The Leshy grit his teeth, however. They were not there now. Getting hulk rage would do literally nothing to help the situation. Or Amrita.
"Amrita - that...is how the world works. The cycle of life. Terrible things happen because they have to." Aurel began, trying to think of how to put it in a way that didn't sound too strange. "If you do a terrible thing because you have to in order to survive, it does not make you terrible."
He placed a hand on Amrita's head and pet at her hair, "I have nothing but time but if you do not want to talk about it I will not make you." There were still some things that he didn't like to talk about, too.
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Posted: Tue Apr 15, 2014 1:20 pm
"I guess, but...when does it go from necessary to excessive?" Amrita asked, her voice just above a grumble. Though it was somewhat nice to hear that her actions, if they were a result of their actions, were justifiable. Then again, she realized, her question remained the same; when did it go from that to excessive? She had gone overboard several times, she knew that much, and had the scars to prove it.
"Oh." She muttered in pleasant surprise as he started to pet her hair, and for a moment she was still. It had been a while since anyone had done such a thing to her, and she realized in this moment just how much she missed it. The ghoul let out a slow sigh and relaxed, closing her eye to just enjoy the touch.
"No, I have to tell you. You should know, so you're prepared." Amrita took a deep breath, and began to tell the story of what he had missed; she told him about the Hunters and their wrong-doings - and that they had been pretty scarce lately, but she didn't trust them anyway - then about the Horsemen, whose islands had fallen and now resided in the Lost Clans reserve outside of Amityville, who were typically quiet but still around, and then of the Kingdoms and the Legacies, as far as she understood and knew. Her knowledge wasn't complete and it was rather broken at best, and she admitted that after the Kingdoms her memory wasn't quite the same.
She omitted a lot about herself and played down the rest. She would never tell him of the true horrors she had personally inflicted, or how her role as the Queen of Revenge continued to follow her to this day. Though she did explain the horror she felt from the tag the Hunters had put on her, she did say that she had seen a professor and that it had been removed. That piece of information was pretty important, if only because she wanted him to know about her crippling headaches and the medicine needed to soothe the pain, and how some days out of the week she will be unreliable, but she wasn't sure if there was a pattern to it yet. It was worth it, she insisted, because it meant that the Hunters couldn't use her any more, though her core would always be damaged because of it.
It was a long, long story, and she tried to answer any questions he had as best as she could.
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Posted: Tue Apr 15, 2014 1:43 pm
Aurel did not know how to answer Amrita's question. The question of excessive was not something that he was familiar with and while he wanted to tell her that anything done in order to survive failed to hit the excessive mark, he wasn't too sure himself. Instead, he just continued to pet quietly at her head since she seemed to enjoy it. It was cathartic to him, as well.
Throughout Amrita's stories he was quiet, contemplative. Some of the things she told him were terrible. Some of them were unbelievable but he knew that she would never lie to him. There was so much he missed in his years hiding away in his forest. Aurel felt almost guilty that he had not been there to live through them like his classmates had. There was something stubborn in him that told him he should have been no matter what. Guilt was not a feeling the Leshy was familiar with, nor one that he particularly liked.
The pain that his friend experienced was more troubling than all of it. If there was one thing that he hated was people - the few people - he cared for being hurt in any way possible. It made him angry. He had many questions - mainly things he needed to look out for, things he could do to help. In the end, all he did was give her a tight squeeze and fight down the urge to go looking for whoever had hurt his friend.
"I am glad to be back. I will not let anything hurt you, Dievča." He would try his damnedest.
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Posted: Tue Apr 15, 2014 2:02 pm
The laugh Amrita gave at those words was surprisingly cold and terribly bitter.
"I'm sorry." She shook her head a moment after, wiping her face with a hand. "It's inevitable. It's like I have a bullseye painted on me." Bad things just kept happening to her, though she had downplayed the severity of a lot of the instances...and never once got into the whole separate issue of her relationship problems. "But there's a bigger one on the school itself, and that's the one you need to look out for. I'm an Alumni now, I can handle whatever they throw at me." But that didn't mean she wasn't tired of it. All she wanted to do was sleep, potentially forever.
"What does that mean, anyway? Dievca?" She smoothed her hand along some of his leaves, welcome for the distraction. To date, Aurel was the only person who called her by a nickname that wasn't immediately corrected to Amrita.
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