Anger Management PV Nabi Park

Feelings. A plaguing indisposition.

A human flaw coated in silk. Praised by the weak who attempt to convince themselves into thinking such a thing is required, like air in their lungs and blood in their veins.

A bewitching idea... for those attuned to a cardiac muscle.

Carved like the blood that stained the divine wooden floor of the wedding Nabi had attended months prior. It morbidly bewitched and embedded something that should have remained still. Quiet. Dead. It roamed silently, with nothing but a loose chain that bruised and nipped at its skin.

Aching.

Nabi was lost in thought, walking by the great lake. Her mind replayed everything that had occurred in such a short span of time, the fleeting seconds that meshed together like the glass in her once starry skin of blood and jewels. The crashing sound that echoed and the screams... Her heart strained as her gray eyes narrowed, the ghost of the deeply gnawing sensation between her now pristine tissues furrowed in synchronization with her eyebrows.

A distant dream, as if untouched, never torn and exposed.

But a stranger's soul is a dark place, or so had Boram once told her.

Nabi softly exhaled, straightening out the tensing pressure she had felt on her back. How bothersome... The tip of her nose felt cold as she turned to look at the lake, it is to have such a pestering feeling. She knew better than to let some boy flood her mind, yet the wire she held for him caused her hand to ache. A low mutter would be said to the deep, murky water, attempting to drown the words of oil.

The still moment would be rudely disrupted by the sound of a pained creature, as if rippling the calm surface of the murk, Nabi turned. Crows cawed and their wings fluttered, clearly startled by the student who yelled as if he had been tortured for answers, oddly reminding her of the screams she heard through the air of iron and dust. Red like the liquid that had stained her dress, the student's robe categorized him as a Gryffindor, Of course. She would say nothing at first, simply observing the tortured animal mope and groan behind his hands. Surrounded by ink and paper, is he angry over spilled ink?, her head tilted slightly in confusion.

Well... boys were known for their lack of refinement, his action of slamming his book shut could have been at the sight of his ghastly calligraphy. Merlin knew.

Ignoring the fact that she had also been muttering moments before, Nabi watched the boy spiral into a spree of mumbled words. Oh, he might have lost his reason... The hue of the setting sun over the lake caused his brown hair to appear lighter, and she hummed softly in thought. Like a toddler eating their meal, the small bits of ink in the messy student's hair reminded her of a certain girl of red hair, who had the attitude of a cannon. The corner of her mouth tugged slightly, a hint of amusement glinting in her cold eyes when she noticed there was no quill to be found. Nabi began to move closer, her steps too calm for a child nearing a barbaric teen who could have eaten the quill in frustration for all she knew.

"Did you spill your ink?" Her monotoned voice gave no hints of comfort, no pat on the head as if to say things would be alright. Stopping right before her bar shoes could be contaminated by the ink over the grass near him, Nabi looked down at the slouched form. "Are you crying?" How feeble of you... Were all the upperclassmen this way? If they were not giving up, they were crying or pitying themselves with regret etched in every thought and memory. A stained lamb. Nabi hummed as she took in his appearance, his attire sprinkled with ink, "You do know your attire is only worsening with each second you remain near your mess, Mr..."

Crouching down, her bony hand grabbed a stick and poked the bear on his shoulder. Perhaps all boys are messy by nature... The chaos of the cabin made in fault of the boys in attendance brought sense to her conclusion.

And no amount of lavender could overrule it... perhaps.

Black birds fluttered and crooned in their hasty exodus, feathers aloft on the breeze, much like the quill which had taken flight from its owner, at his own behest. Now those birds took to skies anew, yet that quill languished atop watery depths, lost to the whim of any wave that saw to swell. Did it wonder, as its departed master, at its plight beneath that of a crow? Did it hold desire to sore, as they, above its inhibitions, and depart from dragging weight? Perhaps. Though it was the role of the wingless to endure gravity’s pull, their dreams were not governed in kind; so then, why shouldn’t they sprout wings and fly?

But where dreams could fester and grow, their nature remained intangible, and those who held them rooted to reality. The quill might float for a time, and it might dream, yet it had no wings to fly, nor arms to swim.
Lying with hands darkening eyes, Marshal had no wings to fly, nor arms to swim. How, then, ought he to reach his destination, save for to dream? The crows went where they would, but he could touch them, if only the darkness in his gaze held fast.

How cruel that fate saw to rend him from fantasy, in the form of irksome voice. It queried after the state of his ink, bereft of tone or persuasion. And though it could not banish the welcome darkness, it did tug at his roots, forcing the reality in which they held.
“No.” The response sounded beneath hands that remained fast. “That’s exactly where I meant to put my ink. Don’t you think it gives the grass such a nice shade?” Satire painted the words as the ink did the grass, yet their speaker aimed to curb impatience. Though a heartbeat of pain beat in his head, and though irritation flourished, it would not serve to release his suffering upon another — not again.

Subtlety, however, was a thankless endeavor, its merits discarded as the irksome voice resumed.
Abandoning the darkness he’d sought, the lion cast his gaze on the offender, revealing a snake at his side. It was no wonder, then, that her words hissed like those from a forked tongue.
“If I was,” he growled back in fractious bass, “would you leave me be and mind your own business?”
Absurd was the suggestion that tears may stain his lamentation, for such frailty he had disavowed under watch of his peers. Tears were vulnerability manifest, and therefore unfit for public view. He would have them, yes, he would let them fall; but not here. Not where another might intrude on his weakness, as this snake had done.

And it seemed she was yet unfinished with flicking her tongue. Another question, the third in as many sentences, and all fit to inflame his ire.
Why, the lion mused, did she possess the need to prod? Where had the inclination been conceived? Had he, with his verbal grievance, provoked this passion for pestering?
Whatever the source, it seemed verbal prodding was unfit to curb her ardor. Bending at the knees, she retrieved a stick from its resting place before proceeding to jab his person. Even this branch, disgraced from its mother tree, could find no peace in her presence.

Irritation already aflame within his breast, the lion felt its heat lick at those walls, touching burns left by that same fire. His hand, no longer able to provide the darkness he’d sought, now shot out to grasp the stick.
“Don’t.” A lone word, uttered clearly, a plea that she not stoke a fire to scar them both, a warning that it could not be controlled once it grew. Hazel eyes met those of gray, and steady was their gaze. He did not want this. He did not want these flames to spread. He wanted only to slide back to welcoming darkness, to dream as the floating quill, and to soar as the winged crow.

“Just leave me be.”

The tortured creature moved, and an exasperated sigh echoed as a weight strained.

Nabi's gray eyes continued to observe the Gryffindor, A lion without the ability to roar... but showed its dagger-like teeth in a pathetic attempt to scare off a child who had little to no care for such a cub. Her head tilted in thought, well perhaps not a lion... more a lamb without a cry. She hummed curtly, glancing at the inked grass before returning to the boy whose dark eyes no longer hid behind his hands.

Chords yet to be severed, barely producing a meek sound.

Her eyebrow raised, a flicker of amusement shone in her gaze as the lion warmed up a growl before the sound of her clicking her tongue filled her momentary silence, the stick still in her hand. Where is the fun in that? "To leave you to lick your wounds with self-pity?" What a waste of a lamb...

His pelt ruined, corrupt with nothing but his own darkness.

She calmly stood up, the stick rolling in her hand, while her eyes remained on him, "And you call yourself a lion?" Nabi hummed, looking down at the stick as she chipped off the bark with an eerie calmness, "Stained with ink for scars, as if words were your torment." A small sigh would be exhaled; it was not of pity, she did not care enough to feel sympathy. Oh must this lamb hope... because hope died last, right? Said to hold on til the last bark chipped off and revealed nothing but the rotten wood that hid beneath.

Nabi inspected the stick, observing the slimy dark sap that oozed from within the cracked flesh, "But words are not always a soul's affliction." But the plague of emotions, of the idea of love. Nodding to herself, she did not seem to care if the boy understood what she was saying; he did not seem to be the type to understand much of anything. "Like this useless stick, the sap sticks... a wing is not clipped, but the butterfly still clings to hope." and the lamb that hopes for a pristine pelt.

With a curt hum, she threw the stick away, its purpose no longer regarded, before looking over to him expressionlessly while her eyes remained calculating. "Are you the stick or the butterfly?" Or the lying lamb? "For I have yet to see the lion roar, Mr..."

Peace, it seemed, was never an option. Not in the oddly warped mind of this snake who coiled around its stick, hissing twisted thoughts as it continued a baseless advance.
Marshal watched it sway in hostile rhythm, as if lulling its prey to sleep with a mimed pattern. But he was no prey, and he would not be entranced; he was a lion without the desire to hunt, yet whose instincts remained. A cornered beast was more dangerous than any other, and he was beginning to feel the weight of a wall at his back.

She spoke of him licking his wounds, but she knew nothing of him or the lacerations that caused him pain. How could she? This stranger, his junior, a herald of another house. The teasings of her tongue suggested her knowledge to rival infinity, though her immature stature revealed otherwise. Wizened words did not make a sage, and he saw through her facade. Bereft of experience or reason to put stock in her babbling, the boy discarded it easily. Whoever she thought she was, she was wrong to assume he cared.

Her scales tightened about the stick, stripping its bark with their friction even as she watched him, pupils like empty slits that followed his every move. Again she hissed, insulting his claim to the mascot of his house and stating her own supposition of omniscience once more. Truly, she thought herself all-knowing; that much was clear. But where her narcissistic visions assumed a goddess to stand, he saw only a girl with a stick, countenance clouded with venom, her cruel words coated in the same.
He had done nothing to warrant her ire, yet she had come with something resembling vengeance, and discounted his pleas to stop.

Marshal was no fool. He grasped the meaning of her words — or a vague sense at the least. But the pounding in his ears lent little room toward contemplating riddles, and what was more, he possessed no motivation to try. She had not earned the expense of his energy, save the flames in his breast that fed on her words like kindling.
Now she spoke of ink, of words, and of torment. Yes, it was clear she knew something of torment, for holding a conversation with her was agony.
”What are you even trying to say?” He would shake his head, as though attempting to fling her poisonous prose from his mind. ”I have no interest for talking in riddles. Either leave or talk like a normal person.”

Still she accosted her stick, that branch whose tragic fate had been unearned.
”But words are not always a soul’s affliction,” the girl went on, heedless once more of his warning.
Your words are certainly my soul’s affliction, he groused within.
Again she continued. It seemed the delusion in this snake’s mind contained endless dialogue. Might she ever grow weary, or perhaps empty her stock of vague archetypes? Marshal was rather uninterested in the patience required to find out.
Each word pounded against the wall he’d carefully erected; dust flew and stones crumbled as ichor eroded the structure. What the attacker failed to understand, however, was that this wall had not been constructed with mere intent to keep something out, but also to contain something within. If this assault went on, and this wall fell, she would find herself face to face with a beast she needn’t have released.

Perhaps by grace, the stick’s suffering finally came to an end when it was discarded to the grass, where it lay furthermore in peace. How he envied it.
Another question was posed, seemingly with intent to illicit response, unlike the condescending rhetoric of before. With this question came bonds, lines within which he was expected to play; but he had neither agreed to, nor cared to entertain this game.
His response was a low rumble, born as a growl at his throat’s base. ”I’m not a stick or a butterfly. I’m just a guy who wants to be left alone, and you’re a little loose in the head.” Though his legs twitched, he remained seated, rejecting instinct. The girl’s query after his name would fall flat, unanswered. ”I don’t want to do this, so I’ll tell you one more time; go away, or I’ll teach you how myself.” Hazel eyes locked onto hers like a vice, a promise evident in their unwavering set.

Normality. The facade of control.

The attempt to silence the clash of chains, the whispered ripple from a still lake.

A lamb's paradise.

Or a fool's attempt at sanity.

But the fire of deception can only live for so long before causing a burn. The scarred creature stood, links groaning while it watched. Whispered.

"I’m not a stick or a butterfly." The lamb bleated. Of course... It would hope. Live with a pelt overgrown enough to be blind. Too matted with self-deception to notice the maggots that moved through the decayed cracks.

A lying lamb. A dying lamb.

She would let out a small hum before tilting her head in thought, her gaze on him shifting over to the ground beside him. His presence momentarily disregarded, "Of ruin a lamb will bleed...", naively, "scared of the darkness it grew upon itself." While waiting to be sheared, forsaken from the torture, it seemed to have fallen into contentment.

Innocence turned dark like the wings of a damned angel.

"Like a normal person?" she echoed, returning her attention to the unappeased boy. Some creatures give up at the first sign of their demise, "content with the limitation of their own desires?" How... humbly idiotic, "A lion roams to live, not to find its grave." Leaning down, she would ignore his warning, gray blank eyes boring into the tensed creature "But you are no lion. You're just an animal that lacks knowledge of its place in the food chain society calls a hierarchy..."

Nabi's shoulders would move stiffly, unused to the movement of shrugging, "You are just an ink-stained lamb attempting to roar." As if aiming to shear, she spoke calmly, inspecting where the crack began, "Who here is a little loose in the head, a self-deceived fool, or the person speaking in riddles?" Before beginning to clip away at the cracks, "For only one will stay roaming the world's labyrinth in circles for all eternity."