i am hung with graveyard flowers;

[rhinemaid]

Who: Ilde Decima and Hasi; OPEN
What: The water helps her.
Where: The Gross Tar; initially near her waterfall territory in Raven's Gate, after that various areas.
When: Givdi with Hasi; open after that through Shundi.
Notes: Specify time/place (if not Raven's Gate) if you tag in, please!
Warnings: Descriptions of LM:A-related horrors to follow in the thread with Hasi; discussion of rape & related fall out in thread with Jae.

When she finally goes down to the water, it feels so good that she hates herself for a moment sliding in, her clothes on the bank under an illusion. It soaks into her skin like she belongs there and she's glad that she got there first, that Hasi isn't there yet, because sinking into it hurts a little and it's-- not anybody's business what internal conflicts she's having. She just died. She's allowed to feel...whatever this is that she's feeling, and whatever it is she's going to feel it at the bottom of the river for a while, her tail catching light as it flicks up before she dives.

She'll surface, eventually.

Comments

[rhinemaid]

She doesn't say that things are already better in Baedal, because as true as it is she's well aware of how intrinsically horrifying that statement is when absorbed by someone who has been here long enough to be familiar with the city. Better doesn't mean good, it just means better than. It's a comparative statement. The comparisons are, often as not, not very pretty.

"I like the river," she says, finally, almost tranquilly. 'Like' is an insufficient word for her relationship with freshwater, and the Gross Tar is the first river that she's had the opportunity to...bond with, for lack of a better term. It helps in ways human language has no words for.

[fuckin_thirsty]

So he didn't get it all. It happens. There's a lot of blood in a man.

He runs his tongue over his fangs as he looks down at her, and then the water between them. After a hesitation, he rests his knee against the slick cobblestone, and maybe he isn't aware of her story, or what she's like ordinarily versus now, or what does and does not make sense, but he does know predators, and he knows territory.

"You're not gonna pull me in, are ya?" But he dips his hands into the water anyway, his sleeves having been rolled and buttoned back away from his wrists, as if water would be the worst thing to happen to his shirt.

[gramarye]

"Yeah," he agrees. Well, she's a mer-something, that makes sense, but even with the Gross Tar being, well, gross, it's not bad, just strange. He's used to living by the water -- Tel Aviv is a coastal city -- and if he can't afford one of the nice places up north by the beaches, the river in Badside will just have to do.

"You ever find anything interesting in it?" He's seen some interesting things, but has never had the means to retrieve it, and it's usually gone by the time he checks again -- things don't tend to last long before being snatched up, especially here, where people need the money.

[rhinemaid]

The water seems to rise toward his hands in a way that just isn't quite natural, which might have something to do with why she's smiling so artlessly at him like I would never, in response to that question. She's even got her hands clasped behind her back, though the impersonation of ingenuous harmlessness takes on a slightly different cast performed by a nymph hip-deep in water.

"That would be rude." Like tossing a corpse in.

[rhinemaid]

"Lots of things--" and that's even a smile, there, even if it doesn't last long at all. It stands out, in its briefness, the kind of smile that inspires patronizingly well-meaning older gentlemen to tell her that she'd be prettier if she did that more often. (She remembers saying once she was trying to appeal to a different crowd and then her father suddenly remembered somebody he wanted to introduce her to on the other side of the room.)

"Buildings. Sometimes."

[gramarye]

Let them never have to speak of Smiling More Often, his mother's constant lament when he was still living under her roof. 'You just need to meet a nice girl,' she'd say, and then pause. 'Or a nice boy,' hint hint. His family.

"Buildings, really? How deep is it?" He'll never have the opportunity to find out because he is thankfully not dumb enough to dive in there. ... okay maybe he's dumb enough but only if it would serve some practical purpose.

[fuckin_thirsty]

The weird shift of the water gets a blink, but little more. He rolls with it accordingly, and splashes his face anew, fingers working away errant smears, trickles of river water coursing down his throat and disappearing into his collar. "You don't strike me as Ms. Manners," he says, droll.

[rhinemaid]

"Deep enough." The smaller, more lingering smile that happens here is actually a little worrying, like a light coming on in an otherwise dark building, the flare of a match and teeth behind it. "Someplaces deeper than others."

A moment later, "My parts are near the waterfalls. The pools before. Not as deep."

[rhinemaid]

"I never made it to finishing school," she concedes; she was enrolled, though. Switzerland. It's one of many things that seems slightly at odds with the life she's ended up living, when she gives it much thought. The incongruity is something she sometimes perversely enjoys-- little lady, little monster. The two things can be true.

She has always been, as noted, more of an and than an or.

[gramarye]

Ilde is always vaguely (or not so vaguely) unsettling; possibly this should bother him a lot more than it does, but in the ringing in his ears when he's somewhere totally silent, he still hears a child screaming, lately her voice always blending into one that he feels like he should know and doesn't.

He'll take unsettled, over that.

"By the harbour? I've never been up there, I think." Once or twice he's been close to the area for work, but -- that's all. It should bother him more that he hasn't been able to work his way out of this part of the city. He looks so painfully out of place here -- not because he's beautiful (he's hardly the only one) but because he looks like such a soft target.

[rhinemaid]

"We live there." Maybe it should be 'I'; Sonja isn't back yet and Ilde doesn't know if she will be. It isn't, though, it is we and it will be we no matter how long she is or is not the only one responsible for the house, because it's their house. Sonja's house. And words matter, words mean things, and 'I' means acceptance and 'we' means waiting and she will wait for as long as it takes. "Raven's Gate."

They've moved once since arrival, but not far from where they started and always near the river. She likes the idea of living in Mafaton, but doing so indefinitely would probably make her sick - it's just not close enough.

"Do you live here?"

[fuckin_thirsty]

Water droplets run off the ends of long fingers with a flick of his hands to discard wetness, silvery beads that get quickly swallowed by the black river. Deacon sniffs, twists a little where he's perched to see if his ears are deceiving him in that he doesn't hear any approach. When he sees he still has some privacy, save for the girl with the tail, he relaxes back to look at her again.

His plan for the body is to leave it exposed on the cobblestone. Give the Militia something to do (and wonder why it was dunked in the river) and find a new hunting ground for a while. Thus, Deacon ignores it.

"Good little girls don't make friends with monsters anyway. How's yours?"

[gramarye]

He pulls a bit of a face and then does some strange, half-shrug gesture like he's not entirely sure. "Ah -- well, for now, I guess. I'm sort of between places." That sounds much nicer than 'homeless,' which is occasionally as literal as people assume it to be; he's finding himself having to make choices between food, shelter, and medication, and, well, two of those are more vital than the other.

He would like for things to at least sound nice right now if they can't just be that way.

[rhinemaid]

"Possessive." She sounds fond, if a little more abstractly than usual; it suits her for Ivan to be her monster. He'd asked her what she wanted to call their relationship and she'd settled on 'mine', it's not as though she doesn't have that self-same streak a mile wide. It felt good, coming back to that. To Ivan knowing that there should be water. (To he'd hit harder if it were about her and she shouldn't be quantifying value that way, but she does, so there's that.) "Preoccupied."

Ilde isn't always the most talkative of girls in the first place - admittedly, that changes in a heartbeat when she's been drinking - but she is, just at the moment, a little more stacatto. It's like a series of afterthoughts.

Veerdi evening; the fork in the river between Bonetown and Griss Twist

[wontturntofoam]

Shrieky was still a little reluctant about straying too far from the Valhalla Inn, but once he'd heard that there was a large body of water running through the city, the chances of him not finding it had quickly dwindled to nothing. He sat at the waters edge, one leg dangling over the side and submerged in the Gross Tar, the wetness plastering the cloth of his trouser leg against his skin.

What he would like to do, really, is just slip away from the bank and swim out into the water, then on as far as he can possibly go until he's exhausted. That's not really an option for him now, of course. He's fully aware that the ability to walk comes at the cost of the ability to swim as he used too, and that henceforward, plunging out into dark waters of unknown depth and danger is likely to end with him drowning.

So he resists the desire, instead contenting himself with keeping to the bank, trailing his leg through the water, and staring out into the darkness.

veerdi night. possibly. time is hard.

[boomvox]

Jae hasn't heard from Ilde in a while, and hasn't seen her on the network either - not that he's been being very social himself, since that broadcast. (He wasn't as traumatized by it as some other people were, but it didn't put him in the mood to bounce around and say hi to strangers.) But that guy, who network research showed knows Ilde, is from her world - that asshole - is back? And Megan's acting weird, and -

- a million other things, that he should ignore, but come eveningtime, he's across the street from his apartment building, halfway through way too many cocktails in a quiet bar. Texting.

Hey pretty lady. What's happening lately?

The part of the river nearest to Flyside; Sukkardi evening

[studious_snake]

Nagas tended to like the water. Even if they weren't in it, they liked to be near it. That was what brought Jay out to the river that morning, staring into the water, almost hoping to see a fish swim close enough to the surface that he could snatch it up and swallow it should he so choose. However, when he saw something much larger than the fish he was picturing swimming below the surface, Jay went to the edge, kneeling down and staring deep into the water, trying to figure out what it was.

[rhinemaid]

The text back takes a little while - she has to decide whether or not she really feels like this, and sometimes she just feels bad about Jae knowing much about her world. It seems like some kind of cruelty and he understands too much to avoid realizing some things.

But.

I just got back this week.

[boomvox]

He doesn't know if he even expects a reply. He should probably stop bothering Ilde (that's what it feels like, bothering, maybe he should bother Hasibe or Six instead, but they're - well, miles beyond him, really). But there's not really anyone he's casually friendly with, and while he might not be there completely with Ilde, he feels like at least she probably understands if he has a fit of hating the silence.

It's a shitty thing to understand.

- He feels even worse when he gets her reply.

So it's probably a bad time.

[norea]

Hasi, Huan, and a bottle of champagne (light stuff for fairies with limited alcohol tolerance) come tripping down to the river. Ilde is underwater, but she senses her presence and location, so she leans against a concrete block near the riverbank to wait for her friend to surface. Huan peers thoughtfully at the water itself, as though debating the merits of dipping a paw in. He's a breed that's excellent in cold weather, so that's no deterrent.

[rhinemaid]

Not all humans - and at first glimpse, that's all she thinks he is - come so close to the river-water. There are reasons for it, lots of different reasons, but they all mean that people dipping their bodyparts in the water is a little unusual. Enough that Ilde's natural curiosity surpasses her lack of interest in winning friends and influencing people; she swims towards him, knifelike in the water.

She stays under the water, for the moment, but she watches him from beneath it - near enough to be seen - watching to see if he does anything else.

[rhinemaid]

Ilde doesn't quite surface at first - she comes into Huan's view first, looking back up at him from underneath and tilting her head, half-smiling reflexively. She's fond of Hasi's dog.

She moves back from him a bit before she does come up, though, pushing herself to the surface until she's hip-deep in the water, smoothing her hair back over her shoulders and swallowing before she says, "Hello."

[rhinemaid]

A face takes shape under the water, eventually, coming close enough to be made out as she stares back up at him. The expression is easy to read, for once:

Dude, what?

She flicks her fingers up toward him, as if to suggest he is about to fall in if he doesn't mind himself.

[rhinemaid]

Not that anyone's around currently to appreciate it, but there's something a little bit charming about a naiad resting her elbows on a rock to text. How very post-modern. She'd appreciate it more herself if she were in a different frame of mind.

I can't hide in the house forever anyway.

[boomvox]

He'd probably be a little wigged out, but that's Jae's issue, not Ilde's. He frowns at her response.

Are you hiding from that asshole? He didn't really live with you, did he?