Bound

by **Palla** on April 17th, 2012, 4:57 pm

Palla struggled to maintain a pleasant expression similar to the one Victor had taught her while the two men conversed. She did as she was told and kept her memories of times with Seven in the front of her mind. It distracted her from the immediate happenings. Instead, she found herself scanning the room, taking in the scents and sounds of this strange new place. Her head swam with giddy butterflies that made her way into her stomach. They’d met in an apple tree. At the time, she hadn’t understood what a two-legged was doing in a tree, anyway. He had given her an apple and his kindness, though. Where would she be without him?

The two-legged stranger offered his hand, and she placed her own in his. He turned it over, tracing a finger along her nail beds and callouses. He nodded, and Victor released her hand.

Aren’t you, Palla?

But Palla's attention had been drawn elsewhere. Deep in the pit of her stomach, something sour bubbled. Her insides felt cold and nasty, her face faded to a paler hue, giving her a sickly expression. The butterflies had been burned up, singed by the acidic solution boiling in her gut. What was wrong? She looked around, but she didn't know what exactly she should be looking for. With a slightly pained expression, she turned back to Victor for some kind of reassurance.

Seven. It had to be Seven. She was only subjected to random phases of emotion when her bondmate's mood changed. It was inexplicable, and yet it never failed. His joy spread to her, and hers to him. His pain was her pain, and hers his. Something was terribly wrong, but what?

by **Victor Lark** on April 23rd, 2012, 6:07 am

Victor saw her tense in the slaver’s hands, and he could only assume why. His fingers flared at his side, if only so that they would not show fleeting frustration in a fist. It was easy enough to stifle the urge, despite how her eyes shifted in sudden unease. He wondered if she had somehow learned what could happen in a place like this, but all he could do was try to distract her from it.

“Answer, Palla.”

“Don’t fret, friend. Quiet is fine; quiet is good.” The man was smiling, idly fondling curl of red hair. He was deep in thought, but Victor did not notice. The Ravokian’s thumb turned the ring on his finger.

“Six-hundred, then?”

“Five.” That peculiarly lithe hand moved carefully to a pair of heavy shackles, presumably more symbolic than effective. There was no way to tell, in a place like this.

“Five-fifty.”

The hand moved away, like hesitation. “Five-twenty.”

A strangely familiar noise barked suddenly above the square’s din, attracting more than one pair of eyes. Victor was no exception, but it took a second glance to recognize the white blur across the crowd. His jaw tightened. He looked back at his merchant friend, gave him one of those smiles. If he noticed how it drooped in distraction, he did not seem to care. “Deal.”

The man nodded, and his hand flew from the irons to a tiny black pin on the same table. In one eerily deft movement, he braced the kelvic by the back of the neck and pushed its sharp point into the nook of her nose, a subtle yet painful means to prevent shifting. Then, for good measure, he clasped the fetters around her little wrists. Only when her detainment was accomplished did he retrieve the money he owed for the seller’s purse.

Victor might later deny how he waited patiently for the mizas to be counted, glancing in the right direction only once. When his empty bag was sufficiently weighted, he departed hastily, wordlessly from Palla and darted through that which he dreaded most.

After what seemed like an instant, he had grasped Seven by the arm and tugged him forcefully from the man who presumed to sell him. Victor did not think to stop and appreciate the irony.

“What is the meaning of this?”

OOCIf I moved too far ahead, I'll gladly cut back. :)

by **Seven Xu** on April 29th, 2012, 3:39 am

One hand emerged from a thousand and shook Seven from his captor.

Venom clouded Seven’s wits and numbed his tongue. When he opened his mouth to speak, he winced. Words dissolved in his throat. White-lily skin had been split, oozing crimson where a decorated hand had connected with a stubborn mouth. Seven was otherwise unspoiled, save for the nagging in his shoulder—a casualty in his bird’s unguarded seizure.

“The meaning of what? That’s mine, you sod.” It wasn’t often that profits were so definitively snatched from one’s grip in public. A dry tongue lashed yellowed teeth as the slaver palmed a handful of Seven’s shirt. “I’ve already lost one today; I don’t plan on losing another.”

Seven flinched. Iron manacles rattled in the effort.

“Tell him who I am, Victor,” he implored, over a desperate stare and a slack jaw. It could not be denied that the halfblood’s color of eye often embellished whatever passions twisted his pallid face. “Tell him I’m not a slave.”

“Not yet, but you can learn. Hand him over, boy. Victor.” That meaty, ringed hand wriggled its impatient fingers. Seven’s blood still clung to oily gold.

Those bleary eyes lolled skyward. The stench of the market had clung to Seven’s nostrils: piss, sweat, blood, and the unmistakable tang of smoke. Beyond the lamplight, the moon’s dim red grin was fixed on a canvas so black one’s eyes could not fathom its depth. Seven realized now, there was little comfort to be found in a night without stars. The sigh that escaped him seemed to take all of his effort.

by **Palla** on April 30th, 2012, 5:35 am

Palla more than lacked enough time to react as the stranger’s hand snatched her by the back of the neck. A yelp shoved its way up and out of her chest as the pin pierced her nose. Fear rose up through every fiber of her being as her wrists were bound by some strange device. It was all happening far too fast! Looking to Victor for help, for comfort, for an explanation, she sputtered a stream of confused words. Instinct drove her to force her form to change, but the painful pin in her nose ceased the transformation. As Victor turned to leave, her heart pounded until she thought it might explode right after him through her chest. When he disappeared through the crowd, tears welled up in the ducts that her animal form lacked.

Seven. Seven would save her. He had rescued her from Victor’s teasing when he stole her face. He had come to her aid in the garden maze. He had made sure she was well-fed and clothed. He had always known when she needed him. This time, she needed him more than ever. She swallowed, her anxiety pressing through her skin, making it cold and clammy.

Everything was frantic, and when neither Victor nor Seven was spewed from the sea of people, she released a blood-curdling scream and threw herself onto the ground furiously. She thrashed about like game caught in a snare. Whatever was happening was a mistake. It had to be. Victor had acquired the little coins, mizas, but for what? Seven had taught her that they were exchanged for goods, like her dress, or foods, or pretty things, or necessities. What had Victor given the man in order to earn such a bounty?

Her.

by **Victor Lark** on May 15th, 2012, 6:48 pm

Victor was nearly a head shorter than the bejeweled giant before him, but he had the pride and practiced poise to seem taller than he was. He stood his ground, face twisted in a poor mockery of fury as a hasty plan formulated in the back of his mind. Firstly, he put his hand on the thick fingers that clutched his fool’s sleeve, pulling Seven bodily from the slaver and stepping between them.

“Are you a thief, or just an unlucky liar?” He made to shove the great man, who did not budge. “The slave is mine. I would thank you for retrieving him, but I’m disgusted by your worthless lies. And you,”

He hesitated when he turned to Seven, and again to regret the hesitation. He should have struck the face of his frightened companion, should have imitated the way his uncle rewarded insolence. But Victor could not bring himself to use his ring against the man who had given it to him; instead, he shook the poor Lhavitian’s shoulder as if to chastise him. “This is the last time you run away, or else.”

And then he winked, for good measure.

“Wait,” said the man who would have bought him. “You failed to keep track of your own merchandise, and without papers your claim is null. The slave is his to sell, but you are welcome to repurchase your...” His eyes drifted knowingly to the mark on Seven’s neck. “...friend.”

Victor’a purse was heavy with the newly acquired funds that would have easily solved their problem, but he was feeling stubborn. His grip tightened on the frail arm in his hand. “If you think—”

That was when he heard the scream. The creature that produced it could only be one, and Victor wondered if Seven could tell it was her. A commotion stirred around her, and he saw he was not the only curious eye to turn in her direction. Perhaps it was not distraction enough, but it would have to do. Victor’s fingers dropped to the trembling white set beside it and, folding them together, whispered into a flushed pink ear, “Come on.”

He ran as fast and slowly has he could bear, aware of Seven’s injuries but worried less about his pain than the speed with which they could escape. As they darted like a fish and line through the sea of a stunned crowd, Victor felt a glorious shock of panic spill down his spine.

by **Seven Xu** on May 24th, 2012, 2:41 am

The inevitable tumult was as deafening as it was disorienting; a merchant’s cries of thievery rallied enough likeminded men to pursue the pair through the press. Hands surged through vicious disarray and grabbed at them. One snagged Seven by the elbow, but he was wrenched away, thrown ahead of pounding feet and forced to run when his burned leg begged he stop.

And as suddenly as it had begun the madness was behind them and pale walls of plaster and stone rose up to swallow them whole. Seven did not remember fainting, but he woke moments later, whey-faced and sweating and trying to piece together what exactly had happened. Then he remembered the scream.

“Palla,” he rasped, scraping elbows over a dirt-riddled floor in a weary attempt to rise. Every part of him hurt. His fingers and toes throbbed; his starving lungs heaved air heavy with damp musk; his stomach churned and his heart threatened to leap into his throat. Seven doubled over himself to peel a heated boot and wet sock from his aching foot. Beneath, the shining pink latticework of scars was no worse for wear from their escape. He clenched his toes and his teeth.

Seven turned to the face beside him and beyond. The dark hovel that surrounded them was sickeningly reminiscent of one they’d spent spring’s beginnings in. But it was quiet. They’d lost the crowd. Seven could not recall when. The whites of his eyes flared around rings of glossy red, and fearful realization bled over his spent countenance.

“You sold her, didn’t you?” If he meant to thank Victor, the sentiment had been swallowed by mounting frustration and the nagging fear in his gut. Shaking hands reached for the warm folds of a clean shirt; his nails dug into the soft flesh of olive forearms beneath. “Tell me it was a mistake.”

by **Victor Lark** on June 6th, 2012, 3:12 am

He did not let go.

When Seven stumbled, it was all Victor could do not to meet the ground with him. Underestimating the force of the grief that felled him, Victor tugged forward at the hand that refused to follow. But then he looked back, heard his fool say that name. Suddenly those trembling white fingers were too slippery to hold.

Victor remained standing, unable to submit to the pitiful display at his feet—for stubbornness and incapacity both. His hands perched impatience on his hips. When the question was finally posed, his responding sigh stank of denial. And yet...

“I don’t— You donnot understand.” He leaned against the nearest wall, eyes craning in the general direction of the market, the commotion. It seemed they were lost to the slavers for now, but they lingered too close to make it fact. And they were not lost to Palla, to the bond that went deeper than the mark on their necks. As he let his head rest against the hard stone behind it, his hand went to the coin purse at his side.

No, there was no use bringing up the benefits of the money, no matter how abundant they were. There were plenty of other reasons to name, if he could sort them out. When he spoke again, his voice was smoother for the thought in the pause. “You donnot need her, Seven. You’re wasting your time trying to teach her.” He tried to push some anger into the words, but they were only a little louder. “But she’ll never really learn. She’ll never be real. You don’t see it now, but you will, when she’s gone.”

He offered his hand again. “Come on.”

by **Seven Xu** on June 7th, 2012, 4:53 pm

Seven’s trembling fingers had drawn up his trouser leg and were tracing slow lines across numb scars. It reminded him of old iron savaged by rust, but painted all shades between white and pink. They were horrible to look upon, and he often flinched when curious hands—that had so diligently peeled back burnt flesh so long ago—tried to explore them. He let linen drop to his bare ankle again and looked up with an open mouth, as if seeing the hand hanging in the darkness for the first time. The corners of his mouth twitched.

“I think I do understand.”

White tangled around greasy and calloused olive. Their hands had always fit together so well. The thought fetched a fleeting smile, but it flattened as soon as he reminded himself to close his mouth. Seven grunted as he pulled and pushed himself to his feet, still clinging to his bird as a shoe without a sock slid back over his throbbing heel.

“The woman,” soles scuffled over old rushes and a damp floor, “the animal. The one you killed. She was yours, but you couldn’t—”

He made himself look Victor in the eyes.

“You couldn’t feel it. So you hurt her.” Frustration mounted in his voice, balled in his throat and made his words tremble. His face twisted beneath a curtain of sweat-matted white, as pristine as summer clouds in the oily blackness that surrounded them. “But she never gave you what you wanted.”

Did Palla satisfy you, when you sold her?

Seven didn’t say the words, but he could already feel the knot in his gut loosening. He could not have them both, he realized, as he dug his hard nails against the palm of his bird’s hand to urge him through a short hall, in the hopes that the underground would favor their swift retreat with a stairway, some hidden door, nestled deep in thick shadow where human eyes could not see; anything to get them away further and faster, to flee from his grief, to quell the churning in his stomach and the bile in his throat.

You’re leaving her, Seven, you bastard. You’re leaving her there, as you left them. The words came thick from his throat and awkward over a swelling lip. He stumbled and nearly choked on them.

“I dearly hope you realize what you’ve done.”

by **Mirage** on July 30th, 2012, 12:05 am

The Truth Within the Reality

Seven :

Victor Lark :

The Truth Hidden by a Mirage :