Unshakeable Fear PV Persephone Barret Closed

"Terrible things can happen when you're overtired." - William Goldman, The Princess Bride.

@Selim Faust

They made a good point. Several, actually. It was too bad that those points would end discarded at Persephone’s feet, ignored with disgust, disdain, and primarily, disappointment. Their rules wouldn’t protect them, defend them from the entities that hovered in starvation, glimmer, desire. Logic couldn’t be denied like its spawn, the process to the thoughts as they carved themselves into futile words, boundaries like rubber bands. Still, a frown would rest upon the blonde’s face, hardly different from the burden carried in the hours the sun remained sparkling. Smiling was an array of confusion that wasn’t worth it until the good outweighed, the morality of that twisted and truly nonexistent. There was no good, as it did not mean bad, because it really meant nothing at all.

Silence swallowed the grounds as the young Slytherin took her final walk along them, soaking in its scenery to replay when times weren’t so dreamlike. Voices echoed behind fluttering eyes, not a song of sentiment, but merely remembrance. It would doubtlessly be difficult to recall the world beyond those cracked walls, whatever was left to rot as the door slammed itself again, so each aspect was embedded in memories. The sound of innocents claiming victim, the guilty owning up, every neutral shade between. The way the corridors twisted and turned, destinations immense, the constant beat of footsteps against the floor. Savoring it so much it left a bitter taste in her mouth, sinking into pale lips.

Tonight, as the year threatened its conclusion, the world had to be committed to memory. Imprisoned to live within Persephone until the roles were reversed once more, years disguised as sheer months. A short while before, the professors had warned against this defiance, this anarchy that haunted their nightmares like the screams of the ghosts they’d made. It wasn’t intentional to break these rules, not now when they were a grain of sand, but there was no better or worse night. Patrols would break the fog if luck declared it, the same game. Timing didn’t matter, a truth that defied something that had been lived by. It was better to live without these rules, that much was crystal clear.

White light from the moon was suppressed by the gentle fog that surrounded it, matched along the ground and waves of the nearby lake. Every pixel was saved, every sense tapped and drained to carry, and the subtle scent of old rain kept Persy grounded. Although the paths were dim without the enhancing beams as striking as usual, they were navigated as though home lied in them. Knowing when and where to step, hands occasionally grazing the rough bark of a tree or surface of a stone. The occasional breaking of quiet when a soft wave crashed, or a stick shattered. All important, all memorable, and all lifesaving.

Untidy braided hair fell over both shoulders, barely twins. Those valleys under the girl’s gaze were only shallow pools of gloom now, but Persephone appeared tired all the same. Liveliness only overtook the trance of fatigue when a silhouette came into view, hunched over itself as though deep in trenches only she could recognize. Not a word was spoken as she eased closer under the mask of darkness, the other figure a raven as it blended with the black. A slight twinkle pulled her emerald gaze, highlighted by beams that barely broke the dense fog, the glisten of a sharpened blade. Narrowed eyes overcame the approaching snake as the last steps were taken, the silhouettes resemblance to another raven uncanny. But she knew that look.

She knew it well.

A wary step back, an anxious measure of caution in those that fed their withering conscious fear, didn’t even cross her mind before the words parted from her lips, hopefully not greeting him with too much shock. At best, not enough to plunge his knife into the darkness and kill the demons that watched him suffocate. “You’re out late.” Curfew was a distant reminiscence that buried itself under the dirt they stood upon, the lingering punishment seeming to affect neither Slytherin. Breath followed that feeble suggestion into the void, as Persephone’s next words were barely over a faint whisper. “Haven’t seen you around. Funny it’s here that we meet again.” An eyebrow quirked, though perhaps this wasn’t clear in their setting. The boy was a flight risk and required that unrelenting watchful eye; regrettably, Raven was also a fight risk.

@Persephone Barret

Stats & Abilities:

Reducio

____ ____ ____

/40

Stamina: 5
Evasion: 10
Strength: 5
Wisdom: 7
ArcPower: 3
Accuracy: 10

____ ____ ____

@Selim Faust

It was those damned amber eyes. Pools of new honey, of sunlight, of everything that the night wasn’t, it was those stars darting from side to side that confirmed Persephone’s identification, as though that glinting blade wasn’t exclusive enough. Slits like a true emerald snake dawned in daylight, frightened, apprehensive, so many adjectives that they piled in a useless fire, sending a message. That paralysis only lasted a moment, that tired wonderment for a quality so specific, as their circumstances had changes since that tranquil first introduction. But the snake, the raven, he set himself apart this way. Never would he merge with the nameless faces in a crowd of vacancy because you couldn’t forget those eyes, they weren’t the kind to fade into slumber. After all, both encounters had taken place in the dead of a hushed night, blaring and suffocating to only those two. Whether this was more than a coincidence, a meeting of something else, she couldn’t say for sure.

Only when his frail voice, torn down from cold and collected, hissed between them did the blonde once again realize his name was a mystery. Not that it mattered more than a formality of information, a describing life behind the wall of a simple surname, because no matter that string of futile letters, the boy was Raven. Raven, adroit and judicious, a puzzle among puzzles. Raven, merely a construction of many masks that hid this paranoia, swimming in his blood, sweat, and forbidden tears, defining the authentic. This moment was more genuine than last time, and with each subtle detail being committed to a failing memory, it couldn’t be appreciated in all its worth. Worth as ammunition or dull, worn relatability. Humanity.

Under the shimmer of a beam of pale moonlight, the knife reflected in a quivering grip. It could’ve hinted at an oncoming attack, or perhaps a clatter against the rock, but there was little time to deal with that problem. There was a bigger one; he was confused. Perhaps that word didn’t convey his state properly, ripped between universes, galaxies, dimensions even where reality distorted into whatever melody was stuck replaying in his mind. That repetition was maddening, Persephone knew that, letting the moments pass and forgetting they are the limited time of life. That sea born sway side to side was alarming enough, brilliant green eyes widening as he played his game of life or death.

It wasn’t a good time to taunt the raven; he did that enough on his own. “Name is Persephone Barret,” the Slytherin answered, meticulous to enunciate through the accent. We could leave it at this daze wasn’t an unusual state of mind to deal with for her. “It’s just me. If someone else were around, trust me, we’d know by now.” Of course, she was referring explicitly to any wandering patrols, desperate to interfere with breakdowns of the mind and rules like they had little more to live for. Regardless of the content of her responses, the softness of her voice as to not break him from his trance too abruptly, a mental note was made to later remind him that there was no tenderness in this. It was simply unfair to play with the dead, to torture the persecuted; that was all.

Things weren’t proper for him, and the reasoning behind it could not be assumed with the situation so dire. Raven spoke, though not to her, his feathers white with the lack of blood. Silver light from the leering moon made him appear sicklier, farther gone than before, if possible. His blade was uncomfortably close to his head as he spoke, but not to Persy. To some other disturbance. Perhaps it was better to remain silent to this, simply look at him as though he hadn't told himself to shut up. She took a single vigilant step nearer, the tone in her reassurances cloying from even her own perspective. When he looked at her, gaze suspicious and riddled with aversion, the girl delicately nodded.

Another question, obvious in answer but clearly plaguing him with perplexity. Persy couldn’t be sure that he desired the answers she gave or intended for the silhouette she was to remain a silent spectator, but the keys wouldn’t come on their own in his condition. “Outside.” Could he even hear her, this repulsive interaction in its entirety? Or was the music far too loud? “By the water. Past curfew,” the blonde added with a tilted head. Another metallic substance from his head, a dripping crimson river, to turn to a flood if he persisted. He was numb, to the world, to the influence of her voice, to the sharp edge as it scratched along his cheek, but feeling something that no one else did, was capable of. Something discretely peculiar working itself behind those damned eyes.

One more step forward, a distance still between them, a line of safety for both. An intuition told her not to get close, self-preservation or something new, but that implied fear. She was not afraid of Raven, but rather…. “You need to put the knife down, snake. I’m all the way over here, the only person after you right now is you.” The power, the weapon, was still with him, and Persephone would not underestimate what he could do. What he would do.

@Persephone Barret

Stats & Abilities:

Reducio

____ ____ ____

/40

Stamina: 5
Evasion: 10
Strength: 5
Wisdom: 7
ArcPower: 3
Accuracy: 10

____ ____ ____

@Selim Faust

It was a new kind of feeling. Something that couldn’t be described perfectly, embodied in the scent of a brand-new book that is six years old, a quick wisp of hair that was colored by the sunshine, aged dull and faded. A memory, one that had never been lived but was dead from the very beginning, yet each detail was clear, the subtle feeling of a thumb tracing circles on the back of your hand. Raven strode the line between his various realities, the one owned by the silhouettes that towered by several feet, and the one with those same figures, disguised by their loving faces and gentle smiles. Masked by their matching blood, thicker than water. No matter how important that was, the ropes crying to be severed, the torture that fell upon him, whatever he was seeing tread in the shadowy night, Persephone did not envy it. It brought about that new kind of feeling.

When Raven looked at her, she was not who he saw. His eyes glowed luxurious under the influence of silvery moonlight, yet they had never burned so black. Whatever held him in that world, it was stronger than the density of blood and water, stronger than the scars, but weaker than the chains that were so kindly shackled around the blonde’s wrists. The widening of his eyes, the way he seemed to move otherworldly while remaining rigid in intense hysterics, it was something that wasn’t born in the lapsing waves of an otherwise silent night. It wasn’t molded from a sharp blade always conveniently nearby; it was years and years before that. His bronze gaze was sealed in that hellish purgatory, and there was little Persephone could do to drag him from its fiends.

But those thoughts, they too were relatively new. Contrary to what people saw in her, what stoic expressions were stitched upon her skin, eternally trapped in disappointment, the girl had a heart. Buried under dried cement, hidden by an opaque wall thicker than damned blood, but it was there. It was merely weakened, splintered, perhaps wishing for its own existence to shrivel into oblivion and only beat to the sound of static, but occasionally, Persephone could hear its whimpers in her ears. Muffled by its containment, choked by all the neglect. It had to be related to first year closing in so little time, time that felt surreal. Though, tonight wasn’t the worst time to be overcome, the boy experiencing that feigned tide of tending would likely let this wash away with his delusions. She could remind him just how shallow her heart was later. Now, there were bigger issues.

As her gaze was pulled back to the steady ooze of blood, staining his skin with its deep cherry red, part of his soul locked with a single piece of his mind, a slice of the puzzle led astray. Something in her words restored him, brought the truth into both realities where every lie prevailed under its sugar-coated poison. The two met eyes, the two finest diamonds of emerald and amber, the repressed moon and stars leaving the slightest coat of shine on his, a spark of life, of recognition. Brought back from his waning breath, depression into the stillness of a corpse with a heaving chest and little more, all by words spoken from the pale lips of the universe’s most callous person. It was embarrassing, almost, to watch him reanimate with no hardening glare, no snide remark. But there was nothing she could say that would drag him down further, as from rock bottom, there is only up to go. You couldn’t kill something with no lingering pulse.

There was no untouched skin to carve a new scar.

Just as he was reconnected with loose grips, it was as though the world resumed its own life. The clouds that had collapsed over the moon in the exhaustion of his battle withdrew once more, leaving them cast in the sinister grey lighting of a nightmare. Instead of adding tension, the rising waves of the lake showered relief over Persephone, whose lips fell agape at the sight of existence, movement. The knife he’d clutched so desperately, defending himself from the demons that were closer than he could ever have imagined, it fell to the ground with a shattering clatter, breaking their repose and contrasting tension into a thousand fragments. Raven followed it, would’ve followed it straight back into the depths of hell he crawled from had the ground not been there to cease that journey, to tie him to this reality, the wrong reality.

Persephone kneeled with a quick head shake to stifle his concerns, feeling vaguely absorbed in the same recollections that suffocated the raven in their burden. He stared down, searching for the answers to all the world’s questions where only soil was, so his eyes couldn’t be met as Persephone watched, choosing her words carefully. “Rarely do people dream of things they haven’t seen.” Her voice was barely over a whisper, wishing to not pull him into the reality that was truly much harsher than the one he left; here, things were real. You couldn’t wake up twice, escape twice, for death was not so evadible. “You’re not losing your mind, snake. What’s taking it from you?” There was something in her voice, an undertone, a near inaudible highlight. The big E word.

The girl leaned forward on that single knee ever-so-slightly, observing for the smallest shift in position, if his hand reached for that sharpened blade. There was no certain answer who would suffer if they met once again. “Regardless…” she followed up with a quiet sigh, as though belittling her previous manner. “…they aren’t here now.” They, not it. There were some truths in life that summoned more dread than any creative imagination could construct. Blood was thicker than water.

@Persephone Barret

Stats & Abilities:

Reducio

____ ____ ____

/40

Stamina: 5
Evasion: 10
Strength: 5
Wisdom: 7
ArcPower: 3
Accuracy: 10

____ ____ ____

@Selim Faust

He didn’t know; how could he? Not a soul knew, knew the way emerald eyes were known to turn to stained glass, the way that glass was so familiar in its touch and presence, the way that same shimmer in the gaze of another opened a door, one best to remain firmly closed. That new thing, born out of some ingrained trust in ropes of relatability, it assisted in melting a stone to liquid, scalding and to harden once again when the moon was replaced with its lover. There was so much wrong with the way Persephone stared at the raven now, not in pity or concern for the broken wing at his side, not in disdain for the crimes he committed with his back turned. Not in anything so extreme as affection or wonder, but something so deeply unrecognizable. Something locked behind that door.

The truth to her words wasn’t lost upon him, that assurance of reality intertwined in the deceit of even our darkest nightmares, that was exhibited when his breath met a wall, opaque and as unbreakable as what bound her to that loop of confusion. For a short time, a spear remained plunged through his lungs, blocking all airways, confining him to the silence of those memorable picture-books. Flipping through the images that haunted him, appeared at the foot of his bed when even persistent snoring had faded into the subtle hum of a refrigerator, it strengthened a look of horror, true shock. When his lips parted, the waves were hushed to listen to the much-anticipated voice, only to be disappointed when they clamped tightly shut again. Maintain your silence then, watch as everything else gets louder. As he folded over on himself, head clutched firmly as to keep it attached, she recognized that Raven was still lost somewhere.

She would not be able to find him until he found himself.

Using the word ‘they’ rather than ‘it’ had been a tactful approach, one executed in complete certainty. Nothing could do damage like the action of another person, family, friend, whatever label they bestowed upon themselves to bring a golden light on deeds of blackness. Animals weren’t so vicious as humans, killing to survive and thrive in a world based on the order of a chain, a chain of command. Where a raven fell on such a hierarchy, it was not a place ideal for those who hoped. People did things for feeling, for sensation, pleasure or pain or some mix of the two that rose above both, people did things barbarically. Only another human, close and loving, could bring another to its knees, nails digging into skin just for a place to sleep. Just for a place to feel safe.

Even in his laugh, there was no life. It was the chuckle of a corpse. From the body of a skeleton. Following it, words that only confirmed Persy’s lingering theory, adorned it in decorations oddly similar to what she referred to as home. He would see them soon, their love inescapable and imprisoning. He could never avoid them for a long, true of air, water, and family. A pale hand, glinting in the moonlight as it continued to strain through the clouds brought to life by his breath, brushed away tears. A sign of weakness, sure, but a reminder of life. Unless they came from Persephone, of course, in which they were only a sign of ‘crybaby’.

With a single step forward, the blonde kneeled down, leveling their gaze as his rotted away in a death solely brought by years of anguish. “In a way, you can never escape them.” Way to be comforting, brilliant little girl. “It’s their blood that makes you. Better to just defy them.” She took a quiet breath, right hand playing with a nearby rock to remain grounded, tied to the world she was in now. “If defiance is a death sentence, that’s still probably better than the alternative.” Fuck the big E word. It was intoxicating.

To look closer at the Slytherin boy sharpened the lines of age and valleys of shadows one could see from afar. More than mere anguish, the creases in face, under those honey-colored eyes and along his forehead, it was born on by living the suffering of many lives before your first ended. It was something Raven could chance when their eyes met, understand how quickly its sickness spread, the damage those things could do, the way her voice was lined in experience. Experiences that hadn’t ended, hadn’t yet began to their fullest. It was only a second, so brief, but there was another glint upon the green. “You’re not weak, you know. You’ve made it this far.” A logical part of Persephone justified the change of tone, suppressed the loathing that boiled beneath it, not aimed at Raven. There was no point in killing the dead, and these memories would fade when his next nightmare began, as they both knew it would.

@Persephone Barret

Stats & Abilities:

Reducio

____ ____ ____

/40

Stamina: 5
Evasion: 10
Strength: 5
Wisdom: 7
ArcPower: 3
Accuracy: 10

____ ____ ____

@Selim Faust

The particular strain to his laugh, the way it wasn’t really a laugh but more a violent sob masked in hungered humor, it twisted Persephone’s demeanor like a stab in the stomach with a braided blade. Born of relatability, or pity for the pathetic way he made silvery moonlight a dusky grey, or frustration for how their dimension warped around the injured raven, made the truth so false and painfully vice versa. Some would push a smile to the boy’s lips with frail string, find comfort in signs of reassurance, one silent cry where a chest didn’t heave; she was not them. A strong part of her, the one screaming beside him in agony underneath hush, wished he wouldn’t stalk that humor. That amusement. Wished it would fall into a void with the rest. Persy hadn’t meant to be funny.

A beating heart didn’t make someone alive, that thought wouldn’t cease its chant in Persy’s head. It was hardly a surrender, the sour sight before her, much closer in appearance to the apprehension of a battle before it began. He did not yet crawl on his knees, beg for salvation, or desire reprimand for the crimes he’d committed, rather pondering over what those crimes could be. Letting dreams bite him ruthlessly without knowing if they were premonitions. Yet, the boy was undeniably tired. His eyes had fallen far back into his face, ever glowing but as though they burned on the fuel of spite. Whatever lead up to this fight had been bad. She knew bad, bad could be understood.

Calling himself a tool brought her eyebrows up. Of all the interpretations, none of them seemed ideal for the conversation they were having, a word he’d heard before. Perhaps not identified with. The way his head shook sent a swift shiver down her spine; he bred the night cold. Each word slightly more disturbing than the last, said with a bit more force, a bit more drag. Recondition, tear down, build up, pain. Things she could just barely grasp, things that could tilt the girl’s head at that humanly angle that said I am empathetic to what you are feeling. But that was weak, that was open, Persephone was torn at a seam of being real and sticking to her façade which felt like home. Real where no one could see. Except him, and that was an issue.

“Reconditioning is death in a way. Many deaths and many lives. M—” The young blonde swallowed her words fast, wary of the waters she tested, fighting against a storm and swirling into worse. Mere words wouldn’t change the process, wouldn’t soothe the ache in old wounds, wouldn’t paint his any scars the exact color of his flesh and smooth them to invisibility. “There is a person beneath the building blocks that has to be remembered.” The cut between each word, click of the tongue as a knife behind her teeth, it may not settle now. That was alright; they were words to be ingrained as his memory was.

His eyes peeled open, glued with misery as an adhesive, awakened by her foreign reassurances, a voice even Persephone couldn’t recognize. It was nothing but the raw truth, the weak would quiver where he stood now, would have reached their point of breakability ages ago. No matter when the violence came into play, it seemed his doomed battle started at birth. Under the sun, he functioned, made eye-contact, thrived even. Weak had never been a loyal adjective. Raven was strong. Those words were too draped in fake sugar to say aloud. Just answer him. Persephone met his gaze reluctantly once more, eyes begging to flicker back to the moonlit ground they sat on. “Fear doesn’t always mean weakness. In your case, self-preservation perhaps. And you’re still here now; that takes strength. Some…” Persy’s voice trailed away in a haze amongst the fog. “Most wouldn’t have gotten this far.”

Those waters stirred uncomfortably, threatening her, daring the blonde to torture them yet again, watch as they fell from beneath her and filled her lungs with burden as though their power was unknown. Underestimated, but far from it. The guard had not fallen victim to this moment.

“Do you…do you want a… pat on the back or something?”