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 Posted: Fri Mar 15, 2013 10:25 am
"Stand up. "You do not owe me such a tribute. You have done enough to prove yourself worthy, and I am...honored...to have been able to call you my General...and my friend."
"No. No, I know you well enough. You are...you were a good and loyal member of my court, and I have been well pleased to have known you."
"I wish you well, Imryn. Very well. Please find happiness in the world you seek."
"...I love you."
"I love you. I know you're...you're whatever you are, but I cannot keep pretending any longer, even if you are not the same Lifen. I love you, and I have loved you since we were children."
"I will always love you, even when the heart that holds that love ceases to exist."
Thoughts ran through his mind like wind, whistling through his head, alongside the never ceasing whispers, twisting and curling and pressing against his skull as though they were physically present.
For days he had sat in his living quarters, the heels of his hands against the sides of his head, as though he were attempting to stop the barrage of emotions that were now colliding inside of him, threatening to consume him.
The first day he had tried to deny it.
The second day he had been too afraid to sleep.
The third day he had been angry. Broken and shattered objects now lay on the floor of his normally pristine living quarters; ripped parchment was in scattered fragments along the bed and the floor, spilled fragrances sank into the floorboards, staining the wood darker. Various hair ornaments and other such things were thrown far and wide, and Mengyao Miao's hair fell down across his shoulders and down in his back in dark rivulets.
The grey was growing, stretching across his face, marring his skin, sinking into his very being.
He could not stay like this, not anymore. Kneeling on the floor of his temporary home, he now stood, swaying slightly on unsteady legs. Carefully he made his way across the space and made his way out of his abode, heading across the horseman encampment to the place on the other side where he knew she would be.
"Tell her."
I can't.
"Tell her."
I won't.
The flap to Lifen's tent was closed. Mengyao hesitated only a moment before he reached out, placing a hand against the canvas, closing his eyes briefly.
"Lifen, I need to speak with you."
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Posted: Sun Mar 31, 2013 1:33 pm
Incidentally, Lifen had been spending the last couple hours considering if she should go make sure that a certain horseman was alright. He hadn't been in the little town that they had built since coming here, and none of their mutual friends had seen him for almost a week, which made Lifen a little worried.
So here she was, constantly walking toward the edge of her tent, and then back to her little room, and then back to the edge of her tent, picking at her long nails again. Should she go make sure he was fine? Should she wait? It was a lot of thinking and she really was not getting anywhere.
Puffing up a little, she decided to go for it, standing straight and looking determined before the familiar voice rang out, a shadow showing over the canvas lightly, making her fright very lightly, not having expected him to show up so suddenly.
Clearing her throat, she continued to walk towards her door, lifting the fabric lightly and looking up, catching sight of a somewhat haunted looking Mengyao at her door, hair strewn everywhere, and looking tired. The grey on his face had grown, and it made her worry a little, giving her a soft ache in her chest.
"Hello Mengyao, I was just about to go find you." She admitted, giving him a little smile. "I am available to talk, yes, did you want to come in, or . . .?" She offered, standing aside so the door was open.
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Posted: Thu Apr 04, 2013 2:21 pm
Just hearing her voice, the few simple and soft words that emanated from her lips made his heart ache, made his head spin. Mengyao already felt dizzy, as though he were falling into something he could not quite identify.
She looked as she always had, with her pale, white face and her dark hair that fell over a slender neck and a short-statured, yet lovely body, with dark, dual colored eyes that always seemed to see straight through him.
I will always love you, even when the heart that holds that love ceases to exist.
He closed his eyes.
"I will...come in," said Mengyao, a little jerkily, his voice rough as he stepped inside the tent, trying to compose himself. He lifted a hand and smoothed down the stray strands of his hair, until it was sleek and dark against his shoulders, his back towards Lifen.
After a long moment of silence, he said quietly,
"I remember."
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Posted: Thu Apr 04, 2013 10:41 pm
He was acting very strangely, and it made the smaller horsewoman perk up and following him in to her tent, peeking over his shoulders this way and that as he found his way, trying to catch whatever emotion she could on his face, so she could discern what was bothering the taller horseman, to little avail.
Lightly stepping back a bit when he stopped in his steps, she waited patiently for him to talk again, lightly raising her eyebrows. When he finally spoke, her lips kind of pursed up in a pensive kind of reaction, eyebrows softly raising as she gave a thought to it. He remembered?
Remembered . . . what?
Many things had happened recently, and she couldn't entirely grasp a singlarity in everything. So in a short moment, she just tilted her head to the side.
"What do your remember, Mengyao?" She asked with a soft voice, not moving, so she wouldn't spook the poor frazzled nobleman - but the heavens knew she wished she could go pat his back and make him feel better, he looked so troubled. "Please elaborate, tell me your thoughts."
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Posted: Thu Apr 04, 2013 10:58 pm
What did he remember? It was a loaded question, a question with too many answers and too little time to listen to them all, especially with the voices that rang too loudly and too strongly inside of his head.
He felt tired and sick and entirely vulnerable.
"Everything," Mengyao said quietly. "I remember everything."
He turned around, his hands tucked into his draping sleeves, and lowered his eyes until he met Lifen's, until he could hold her gaze steady.
"I remember that dream. I remember being...a king. One of the seven. I remember my kingdom, and my people, and my weapons. I remember the way things tasted, the way they smelled, the way they looked."
He closed his eyes briefly and gave the smallest shake of his head, as though listening for something, seeing the picture inside of his head. "I remember the fighting. I remember the blindness and the darkness. I remember...I remember being the real king."
Mengyao opened his eyes, staring at Lifen.
"And I remember being in love with you."
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Posted: Fri Apr 05, 2013 9:29 pm
If anything, Lifen was very patient with the man, standing with her hands lightly at her lap, trying to allow him his space, so he could think clearly - his half-strung appearances making her a little nervous for him, not to meantion the greying that was creeping across his skin at a quickening pace.
Perking when he talked again, her eyebrows rose at his first words - everything was still very broad, but as she was trying to speculate what he meant - she caught the words he was starting to say. Pensive look turned to realization, a dawning on her face, eyes widening as she thought back to the memories that she had been 'awarded' after the world had disappeared, feelings and faces she lost when she was returned back to this world.
Words that were said . . . never to be forgotten.
"Ah."
A simple word to start, a reddening of her face almost explaining further, burning from her own memory of the event, the words coming from this Mengyao's mouth - the one she had worked so hard to come back to admitting what she had said before, in the world she had left behind.
"You were a very good King, you were just, in all your actions." She said after a few minutes, looking down at her hands lightly, which were now softly nit-picking at invisible flaws, as she would normally do when she was shying.
"I . . . I do not regret the words that were said. I hope they are as true where I belong, as they were in Edric and the Tower." She stated finally, almost muttering the words like a youth, feeling rather shyed suddenly, unlike the bold Empress she was the first time she had admitted her. . . affections. "You are very dear to me, Mengyao - do you share the same feelings as you did, in your memories?"
She felt rather bold with that last question, and hoped it wouldn't bite her in the end.
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Posted: Fri Apr 05, 2013 9:39 pm
She looked the same as she always had, as she always would, even with the Insanity that ate away at her body, made her skin translucent so that he could see her very bones beneath it. Her dark hair, her pale face, the way she ducked her head to look at her robes when she did not wish to meet his eye.
The way she always carried the scent of lotus flowers with her wherever she went.
"I'm in love with you."
Mengyao had not moved from where he stood, a few feet away from her, and though the words were said quietly, he was not blushing, nor did he seem uncertain of them.
"I'm in love with you," he said again. "I've been in love with you for a very, very long time. You are, without a doubt, the only person with whom I could share these very private sentiments with, and the only person with whom I could see myself ever being with, and no matter what happens to me or to you, the very basic fact will remain that I am undeniably, irrevocably, for now and forever, in love with you."
There was a moment of ringing silence that followed this. Mengyao closed his eyes, feeling his heart constrict, feeling as though he could not properly breathe.
"But I cannot be with you."nerpin this is clearly me going to bed wheee /runs off
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Posted: Sat Apr 06, 2013 11:44 am
She felt like her ears were ringing after his barrage of words, a red flush showing her emotions and responses on her face like a glowing sign. Words she never expected him to hear - and a secret part of her started questioning how long she had been held in his mind as a favour such as this.
It was the final statement that had her thinking deeply, eyes deflecting from him, pondering so hard that her eyebrows started to furrow, mis-matched eyes flicking back and forth, as if debating deep within herself. Turning up to him again, she looked almost determined, a set look in her eyes as she broke the distance between them a bit, taking a few steps foreward, looking up.
"Why is that, that you cannot be with me, Mengyao?" She asked, giving him a soft tilt of her head.
"I do love you too, I think I came to realize this a while ago - we have been through many great and troubling events together, yet you are always willing to come back to see me with your soft little smile, something I do not see often." She murmured, feeling her boldness subside a little, looking down at her hands a little. "I do not know what I would do without you." kurotomato Who's making posts before she gets ready for work? MEEEEE.
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Posted: Sat Apr 06, 2013 12:01 pm
He'd said it, though he hadn't meant to. Mengyao took a deep breath, trying to steady himself, and although he hadn't exactly expected a response like the one Lifen gave him, the pure relief that she had not been disgusted with him was enough.
That, and she felt the same as he did made a joy that he had not ever felt before rise up in him. It was replaced almost immediately by sadness, by frustration, by anger.
"I will be with you; I promised you that," he said quietly. "But I cannot be with you in the sense of romance. We both know that I am not fit for such a thing. I do not know how to love, nor do I pretend to understand my own feelings. This...this disease that plagues me..."
He struggled for a moment, swallowed, and continued. "That plagues both of us. You have the strength to fight it."
Mengyao's voice grew softer. "I do not. And I cannot let you be with me when there is no positive end in sight for me."
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Posted: Sat Apr 06, 2013 12:27 pm
Lifen couldn't help but look down at her hands, holding them out when he was talking, peering at the paled skin they held. It was a constant reminder of the shared plague that they were saddled with since the island. Clasping them, she looked up to him with a soft, yet determined look, going to grab his own hands from his sleeves, peering at them with a frown.
"You are correct, we are both plagued with the same disease. I am, too, wrought with barrages of voices when I am alone, or when things get rough, but it does not mean that we are not allowed the company of someone, or able to have any sort of romantic connections." She stated boldly, looking down at his hands she continued to talk, her eyebrows furrowed lightly again as she read his hands.
"I am going nowhere, nor am I going to let something like this get in the way of my aspirations and desires, or will I let this control you." A stubborn nod, before turning up to him again, holding his darkened hands, peering up at his grey-strewn face.
"I will just have to be the strength you need to fight this, also. I have taken much worse on, I am sure you remember. It is not easy being your empress, Mengyao." She allowed a smirk to show on her face, a strange look for one such as her. "So do not turn me away for something like this, since we both seem to have the same feelings." She finished, hoping that it was sound enough for him to understand. This was her dearest friend, and someone who seemed to have swept her from her feet when she wasn't even looking - she wasn't going to allow something like this ruin any future.
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Posted: Sat Apr 06, 2013 1:01 pm
What she was saying could not possibly be true. This infliction he had, this disease...it would eat him alive, devour him. He had already let it consume him once, he could have no idea as to when it would consume him a second time, or a third, or a fourth.
"I cannot..." Mengyao started in frustration, and then stopped, closing his eyes and shaking his head.
"No. I can't. I cannot put you in the sort of danger that I know will come of this. I have already hurt you once, there is no telling what I could do to you again."
He couldn't look at her.
"No. No I cannot let you be with me, not when I am...what I am."
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Posted: Sat Apr 06, 2013 1:51 pm
"Anyone could have been taken over then, Mengyao. Even me." She quipped softly when he started to blame himself. "I did not take it to heart, I just decided to get you back, because I care for you."
She didn't want to give up on this sudden change of heart, but she wouldn't force his hand on anything.
"I know you are battling some strong demons, but, I am not giving up on you, ever. If something happens, I will drag you back in one piece again. I've done it twice now, and nothing will stop that. I cherish you too much to lose you to any of this." With this affirmation, she gave him a stern look, a promise written in gold and red.
Giving a little tug, she pulled him down to hug him softly, a simple interaction. "You are entitled to having friends, even with something like this, you are not weak, Mengyao, okay?" She finished as she loosened the hug to allow him to stand straight again.
kurotomato CODING IS TOO HARD ON A TABLET.
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Posted: Sun Apr 07, 2013 7:07 am
He didn't want to hear this because it made things too easy, too simple. And life was not about the simplicities, but the complexities, and this was not something that he thought he could handle.
But Lifen's arms around his shoulders made him freeze, Mengyao automatically stiffening, his eyes widening. A light red dusted across his cheeks, and for a moment he didn't move, as though he was too afraid - or perhaps too surprised to do much more.
It can't possibly be that simple.
As Lifen pulled back, Mengyao caught her wrists, pulling her forward again, his expression almost angry, his actions not entirely his own. Her jerked her towards him, and with a pained, frustrated sort of growl, kissed her, his arms around her waist, lifting her off her feet so that neither one would have to strain to reach the other.
It went on for several moments until he broke away abruptly, shaking his head and backing away.
"No. No, I cannot do this to you, no."
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Posted: Sun Apr 07, 2013 1:20 pm
A soft sound escaped from her when he picked her up, a little uncertain noise from her feet dangling from the ground. It was a feeling she still was uncomfortable with, but it made the next action easier on the two of them, height issues non-withstanding.
Sinking in to the soft kiss, she closed her eyes, knowing she was possibly a shade of red only see in her eye colour, naturally - but as quickly as he swept her up, the interaction was gone, and he was back to retreating in to himself, a movement that made her kind of scrinch her face up lightly and take the steps that seperated them, right up to him again.
"I am glad to see you are still the same old stubborn Mengyao Miao that I know." She admitted, still feeling a little flush as she pulled him on his collar again to bring him down to her height once more, leaning in to kiss his forehead, before leaving him to stand again. "I cannot force you to accept me, but I wish you would reconsider your stance. I . . do love you, more than anyone, and wish to stay with you, as a friend - maybe more, someday." She decided, giving him a little nod.
"You are the most important thing to me, and I will not give you up so easily, hm?"
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