agrippine.

𝐀𝐆𝐑𝐈𝐏𝐏𝐈𝐍𝐄.

twenty five. they/them. jockey and stablehand. portrayed by quintessa swindell. → penned by julie (twenty five, she/her, est).

It is unnerving, this easy recognition in the other’s eyes, something they’d forgotten in the last two years. Their name in people’s mouths, their image - mutable as it had been, back then - easy to place. Still, they smile, a true thing, as their words turn to the Obsidienne, to ground more familiar and commonly tread in Sylviane’s own stories than their years of artistic exploits. 

“There is a tomb,” they say, envisioning the black desert once again. “It is the tomb, if you believe the stories - where Odeline died, where her body lies. It’s not unlike this, though much more weatherbeaten.” It’s an attempt at a joke to lighten their own mood, but nonetheless it falls a bit flat. Is their yearning for that worn but well-loved structure palpable in their words? It seems that with every story they tell, they project more of their longing into the world, words painting mental imagery of the bastard landscape that had hooked its way into their heart.

“Behind it,” they continue, voice almost wistful, “the black sands stretch out for miles. At night, you lose the horizon - the darkness of the earth blurs into the darkness of the sky. There is a light that burns at all times at the tomb, like a beacon… I still am not sure how it’s maintained. I never once saw someone approach it to keep it lit, but I never saw it die.” They smile faintly and shrug. “Magic, most likely. I never wanted to ask - it didn’t feel like my place.”

“I’ve never been particularly religious,” they explain, preempting the obvious question, “and I didn’t go to the Obsidienne to commune with Odeline, like some of the pilgrims - but it was a comfort, nonetheless, the light.” They pull themself from from the memory, turning their focus back to the stranger before them, their wide eyes and rapturous look. “Are you a… devotee? I know many gain great fulfillment from visiting the tomb at the desert’s edge, and I fear my stories will not do it the justice it deserves.”

Try as they might, Agrippine can’t quite imagine it. They try to string together an image through Sylviane’s words alone, the ashen sand that stretches on and on and the way nightfall envelopes the Obsidienne. Perhaps Agrippine imagines the reverence in Sylviane’s voice, one that mirrors their own. It is a small miracle, they think, that someone can return from such a place and put it into words. There is nothing so powerful as a story; Agrippine ought to know, having lost their own. 

How, then, can they explain their longings? It is not for religion or for Odeline that Agrippine feels the stirrings of something sacred and hallowed; it is for the edge of all reason, for something that cannot be explained and not even believed, if not for a single witness. If not for Sylviane. Agrippine blinks at their question and, ever so slightly, frowns. “No, that’s… not it.” They search for an answer, as they often do. They try to take murky waters and create something solid from it, but it slips through their fingers and they are left with a look of helpless frustration.

Sidonie arrives at the Prophet’s Tomb in search of more clues and information regarding the unfortunate explosion with Amelie and Henri, but is instead greeted by a surprise: a storyteller, weaving a tale of their time in the Obsidienne, with a small crowd of people gathering around to listen. If she wanted, she could clear the area with a few sentences: In the name of Her Imperial Majesty Calandre Valance, this area is off-limits until sundown. You may return then, but no sooner, so you do not interfere with Her Majesty’s research. Val Faim has much to offer to busy yourselves with until then. But, she doesn’t necessarily want to. In fact, she wants no parts in stopping the story; rather, she wants to listen. Like Icarus to the sun, Sidonie Dupont is called to hear the beautifully woven tales of the Obsidienne. Like Icarus, she comes closer and closer without regard for whatever consequences may soon come her way. Who can forsake her burning, when she does it in the name of knowledge?

A voice she recognizes, hardly louder than a whisper, calls to her. Sidonie sits soon after, taking place beside Agrippine without even realizing it’s them. Her attention is elsewhere, wrapped and entangled in the words the come from the storyteller’s lips. They weave a hopeful tale in regards to the desolate land and, when the story is over, Sidonie finds herself murmuring, “They have a way with words that even I have yet to master.” She does not bother to mask the yearning ache that colors her sentiments for both the ability to tell a tale as beautiful as the one she’s just listened to and to return to the Obsidienne, though the latter is a familiar desire she stifles yet again.  

“I don’t think I’ve ever made a trip of mine to the Obsidienne sound as beautiful as their story,” she muses. And, perhaps, that’s all it is: a story. But, perhaps not–which is why Sidonie listens, nonetheless. If she cannot go to the Obsidienne herself, she will listen to firsthand accounts of those who do; if she cannot conduct research with her own bare hands, she will gather words and tales until she can. If she cannot perform her duties as arcane advisor in conventional ways, she will do so by other means–even if those means entail incurring a mercurial Calandre’s ire. It would, at least, be more than the cold shoulders she’s received as of late.

—

There is an unnamed feeling stirring within Agrippine, and it swells like a balloon against their ribcage until it’s almost uncomfortable. When Sidonie puts the ache in their chest into words, Agrippine feels something loose and dislodge. They have a way with words that even I have yet to master. What is it like, Agrippine wonders, to know the vocabulary of the heart and its strange mechanisms? This burden that weighs them down, which tugs at their sleeve and has them sprinting when faced with the unfamiliar — what is it like to speak its language?

“Yes,” they agree, the word simple and flat but solid, resonating as Agrippine parts their lips to speak. Perhaps that’s what draws Agrippine to the stories of the Obsidienne time and time again. They’ve heard the stories a dozen times already, and still they search the city for an eager crowd and a sense of enchantment that changes the air. It’s so familiar that they can almost conjure it to life with memory alone; the air thickens and becomes substantial around Sylviane and their story, like stepping closer to listen is akin to stepping into another universe entirely. The Obsidienne is horrifying in every tale, and yet — something has Agrippine’s feet marching toward it instead of away. 

there are changes rumbling underfoot of this city, this country, this world, shattered voids carving through night and sand, ashen buildings cutting through stone and security. vaska hasn’t thought much on eternity, for there is no good outcome for him, no salvation, no matter how much vaska kneels, for guilt does not mean remorse, nor forgiveness.

it is not for knowing or uncovering the mystery that vaska’s feet find him at the tomb, nor eternal mercy, but some curiosity, some boredom. some grief, perhaps, a prayer not for his soul but for those taken. perhaps this is why his old mask is hanging from his belt, in remembrance, of calais, of those killed in its name. perhaps it’s not forgiveness from odeline that vaska seeks, but forgiveness from those whose name vaska killed in.

there is a dead air hanging around the place as vaska approaches, the settled dust and weight of time, so even the presence of the stablehand in such a place doesn’t feel odd, doesn’t stir him from his mood. they’re the one whose been hanging around sylviane, asking questions about the prophet’s birthplace. ‘ agrippine, right? ‘

he shifts, and the air comes to a piercing halt. in the distance, agrippine can almost hear a shuddering gasp and a shriek that could shatter their bones. they blink. their eyes scan over him, this stranger who has agrippine’s breath caught in their throat, a blend of horror and irritation infecting them from top to bottom.

they glimpse the mask hanging from her belt, and agrippine remembers. 

a clash of fists and teeth and weaponry. a competitiveness streak that they lost somewhere along the way, baring its teeth as a masked stranger nearly cuts their neck. and later, a crowd surrounding them. a face they have been searching for rolling to the ground. the blinding silver of a knife catching the sunlight. a masked figure seeming to smirk as they wipe the blood away and disappear. 

in present day, agrippine’s fingertips are cold. all sound falls from the world, leaving behind only the rush of blood in their ears. it’s the clearest memory they’ve had — of that very same mask taking a life in broad daylight as agrippine watched from afar. (conveniently, they forget the strange resentment and possessiveness that bubbled on their tongue; it’s easier to condemn the sins of another than to contemplate your own.)

when: 17th of maccius where: the stables who: @ofagrippine

Val Faim is a city of chaos and hunger. Adraste welcomes it, the way its streets twist and turn before her, full of masked strangers each with their own plethora of secrets and expectations. Everywhere she goes, someone is seeking something from her, and she is seeking something in return. If asked, Adraste would fervently deny seeking an escape from it, from missing the open spaces of the south or the sometimes straightforward duties of the border patrol, and she’d be lying through her teeth.

Agrippine is the solace she’d deny she needs. But she arrives at the stables and a weight is lifted from her shoulders. She’s made her share of connections in Val Faim, but Agrippine is perhaps the first she could truly call a friend. Perhaps they’re the first person she could call that in longer than she’d care to think about - Medraut and Roth are more, they’re nothing short of family - everyone else an acquaintance or an informant or a crush. But with Agrippine, she’s not a Chevalier or a trainee or a threat or a nuisance, she’s just a friend. She hadn’t realized how much she’d needed that until she found it.

“Agrippine?” She calls out as she approaches the stables. “Are you here? I snuck sweet rolls from the kitchen for us and carrots for Lune.”

In Val Faim, there is no simple thing. A story is not a story but a message in a language Agrippine has not yet learned — one of implications and innuendos, invisible strings that slips by unnoticed. An object, after all, casts a shadow; Agrippine just doesn’t know how to read them, and responds by holding the world at a distance as if that will spare them in the end.

In Val Faim, there is no simple thing, but Agrippine comes close. Adraste comes close, they are sure of it; so Agrippine holds on because they are sure of so little. What is truth but the wind against skin, the earth beneath their feet, a promise made and followed through? They don’t know much, but the few things Agrippine is confident in, they repeat to themselves like a prayer and a mantra. They have lived before they can remember. There is reason to the madness; Savatier will help them unravel the knot until Agrippine’s story is an unwound thread, easy to follow and trace. 

After two years of quiet, Val Faim is deafening. They’ve taken to walking the city, cataloguing what has changed and what has remained the same, overwhelmed by and glad for the throngs of people that wrap themselves around them. They follow whispers - of death, of explosions, of their own stories, passed from mouth to mouth - and find they all end at the same place.

The tomb is familiar, if nothing else, though it feels to them now almost two places at once - the memory of black sands overlaid upon the surrounding streets. The statue of Odeline rises like a monolith and they can almost believe, if they close their eyes and block their ears, that they will open them to find the vast expanse of nothingness. 

They do, for a moment. Nothing changes.

As they pick their way closer to the statue, they nearly miss the figure knelt on the ground. Their quiet word startles them, but they settle beside them, grateful in some odd way for the company of a stranger. “This isn’t quite how I remember it looking,” they say, trying to be diplomatic as they take in the rubble still cluttering the street. “A bit more…. rustic, no?”

Rubble and ruin, ashes and litter; this isn’t how they remember the Tomb, either. A small smile tugs at their mouth with the thought — to remember anything at all is their own secret pleasure, their private glimpse of the dawn. The tomb, then, is not so different from Agrippine themself. The wreckage of a forgotten life, the debris that they cannot decipher, the scraps of whoever they might have been once… but still, the tomb stands, just as Agrippine lives. 

“I remember as well,” they offer, relishing the very words in their mouth. I remember, a declaration that they are not lost to the void. I remember, a song of hope for Agrippine and not a confessional for Savatier. 

Agrippine recognizes them from the times they’ve lingered behind crowds, ears perked for their stories. Sylviane, they think. An artist, they recall. Their expression falls to one of reverence, as if in the presence of another prophet like Odeline. For isn’t anyone with a story of forbidden and sacred things a prophet, preaching what should not exist yet still inspires some dark almost-memory, cutting through you the way only truth does —

THE SEVENTH OF FIACRE AT THE LION’S MANE. CLOSED FOR @ofagrippine

Liane cradles unspoken secrets within the palm of her hand like a child bottles a handful of fireflies that wink and glitter in the night sky, sweet whispers wafting through the evening wind, obscured by faceless shadows and wisps of silver light from the glow of the crescent moon. There’s a horrific sort of intimacy in poking and prodding, in dismembering as if one were a marionette made of wood, and as she sits at a corner table, half hidden by the silk of her hair, there’s an overwhelming desire to sever little Agrippine in two, to slink around the curve of their throat and constrict until an ample amount of answers spill forth like an endless stream of honey.

She has shadowed Agrippine for quite some time now, covertly meddling in their private affairs and picking apart their midnight wanderings with her teeth. In truth, there was little to be found, or rather, little that held enough weight to capture her interest. Liane Touissant is nothing if not patient, and though she knows the length of the wait will certainly be worth the reward, she hardly sees any point in prolonging the inevitable, so she settles into a stool next to Agrippine, eyes sharper than shattered glass as she takes note of the sweetness of their face.

They possess all of the characteristics of a woodland creature, skittish, hesitant, and wide-eyed. Agrippine looks as though they should be nestled between lush lands of green and the snapping of branches and twigs, but the forest is home to predators and prey alike, and there’s this deep-rooted desire to peel back flesh and bone and sink her teeth into the red of their heart. Warm, rich, and deliciously red, like a pool of strawberry jam. “Aren’t you a sight for sore eyes.” Her words are decadently dark but a hint of sweetness simmers beneath as she gifts them a once-over.

“Agrippine, isn’t it?” Liane leans forward and tilts her head to the right, accompanied by a falsified smile. “Yes, well, I’ve heard all about you. It has become quite difficult to stroll down the cobblestone road without whispers regarding your skill echoing in my ear like a swarm of honeybees.” With ease, Liane places the hairpin upon the wooden table, gliding her fingertips over the engraved name with purpose, slow and deliberate. “But our greatest achievements aren’t without consequence, are they?” She murmurs in a hushed tone, a crinkle forming between the dip of her brows.

A pint of ale lies cupped in their hands, conveniently forgotten as Agrippine’s gaze sweeps idly from corner to corner of the Mane. The easy chatter of patrons as they discuss their days, the boisterous laughter that punctuates the air; the mundanity of it all is comforting. How they’ve come to expect this each evening, how they could close their eyes and picture every stool and table placed in the Mane as one can conjure the image of home. It’s not the same as peace, nor is it a release from the burdens that shackle Agrippine by the day, but it’s enough. Sitting with a barely-sipped cup, quietly watching the world pass by — they’re pacified. They’re contented. 

Enter: a stranger who shatters the glass with only her words. Agrippine physically recoils, jerking back at the sound of their name. The drink in their hand spills, and Agrippine rights its balance before all of it pours out, but the damage is done. The counter is getting sticky with beer, and Agrippine wipes it away with their sleeve hastily.

He watches as Agrippine finds their way around their words; unsteady, unsure - colt-like, if you will - if the horse metaphors weren’t already beaten to death when it came to Agrippine.

Beaten to death as you would, you know, beat a dead horse.

Régis speaks over their soft words with no qualms - “Believe me, it’s as much a surprise for me as it is for you - but I’m feeling like indulging in an act of charity tonight,” - not quite catching their ‘No, thank you,’ but more likely not caring. “Besides, you’re not entirely bad to look at. Hasn’t anyone ever told you what a pretty little thing you are, Agrippine?”

There is the sharp tapping of the conductor’s baton. The orchestra raises their instruments for the next song. Régis gives up on convincing of a traditional sort and moves to just do as he pleases. He allows himself to step into their space and lets his hand slip around their waist, all but steering them towards the center of the clustered couples. He turns sharply once he hits his position and strings Agrippine along like a marionette, ready to pull them this way and that.

“I doubt you’re as bad at this as you think you are,” Régis continues, sounding plenty like he has just earned himself front row seats to a particularly bloody tourney. Idle hands become the Devil’s playthings and on this evening it is more than likely to come at the cost of Agrippine’s misfortune.

—

A pretty little thing? Agippine bites the inside of their cheek as irritation flares their nostrils. “No, they haven’t,” they answer plainly. No one has ever told Agrippine much of themself at all, which is precisely the whole point of their frequent visits to Savatier’s library or aimless wandering through Val Faim. They would give anything to hear stories of who they were before — might even dance with Régis, but Régis knows nothing of Agrippine’s past. He would have boasted of it long before if he had an inkling of their loss.

Agrippine digs their heels deeper into the floor of the ballroom. They will deny Régis tonight, if only because they get the impression that he is used to dance partners swooning into his arms after being called a pretty little thing.

As if he’s read their mind, Régis takes Agrippine into one arm and sweeps them away. Their feet trip over themselves, and Agrippine’s hand darts to Régis’ at their waist. “I never said I was bad at dancing,” they feel compelled to point out, though they’re certain they will be. 

After a few desperate attempts to wriggle out of his grip, Agrippine surrenders. What Régis wants, Régis gets; at least for one song. They shift their weight uneasily, from one foot to the other. “I’ve just... never done it before,” Agrippine tacks on, voice dropping to a low mumble by the end. Or maybe they have, and don’t remember — but is there a difference if they find themself searching Régis’ eyes for reassurance that he knows what to do as the music swells and the orchestra begins?

relief washes over him in a balming current. good, that they are not in pain, that they don’t remember pain during these bursts of memories that already engulf them in wildfire burning. if agrippine were to be overcome with physical agony during these moments, his helplessness heightened and no answer for respite, he thinks–he would be ruined. 

already, it is a small tragedy that all he can do is listen and offer a familiar touch to tether them with all the might and meaning he can muster–with all that he has left that couldn’t save odeline–and, somehow, he’s only wondered only once why he’s so insistent on giving agrippine everything and taking nothing. no, this isn’t properly true; he is taking something. purpose, perhaps, if he wanted to be grand about it. but to be needed feels smaller, selfish, a great deal more human and less noble. 

says nothing as they speak, but pulls them closer, shields their line of sight from the rest of the celebration, the remnants of the execution, with the broad of his silhouette. damn the fucking empress, boasting an execution as a spectacle, no regard for who she was harming by doing so. and for what? to send a warning to her detractors? mind, he’s seen brutality at every stage. the world nearly a thousand years ago was a far more merciless place with no one to tame it, and now in this age, now that the beasts of yore have been eradicated, now that calandre’s legacy boasts of bringing in a reign of peace and prosperity decorated with shining wealth while evoking old world severity leaves a vile taste on his tongue.

“you shouldn’t have seen it. none of us should have.” brows creased in sympathy for them, in fury towards calandre, he squeezes their palm. their memories are bloody and cruel–perhaps they were too, once. but it’s clear their memories torture them now, that who they once were and who they’ve become are not conflicted, but separate. “do not put yourself through anguish, agrippine. even if you regain anything from it.” he breathes in deeply. “i’d rather you be whole and without recollection than broken in remembrance. i wouldn’t be able to stand it.”

—

it doesn’t make sense, agrippine knows, but the thought comes to them anyways. they hope that, in the memories lost to them, savatier is tucked between a handful of moments, and that — should their memories slip away from them again — savatier will be this for them always. an anchor to their present, he gravity that brings their terror back to the earth and lets the dust settle. with a gentle pull of their hand and a subtle motion to refocus their gaze, savatier wraps agrippine in a world where they are unharmed and untouchable. he becomes the tether to their peace. their hopes.

agrippine’s hand squeezes back — once, twice, three times… their breath evens out as they count the times they tighten their grip on savatier. when they reach seven, agrippine’s heart has calmed and a relieved smile comes to their lips with ease. “thank you,” they say reverently. will they ever understand it? will they ever thank him enough for it?

perhaps val faim worships a girl-made-prophet, but there is something holy in this, too: someone to hold your hand and wait for the dark to recede. in kindness without question, even when you are horrified by your own shadow. they try to tell savatier this. they try to pool the words together and fish it out of their throat: you are so good to me, how are you so good to me, how will i ever give to you what you give to me?

they choke on the enormity of it, their gratitude, their affection for him. instead, agrippine steps closer and gently touches their forehead to his chest. “thank you,” they repeat, knowing he will understand.

The voice at his back was vastly different from the one that prowled in his memory, yet it still stirred his recognition; and as he turned with its tug, the momentum of his body seemed to lurch reality and recollection into a jarring collision. For even though he and his companion were standing apart from one another in civil stillness, he could see himself bearing down on them with vicious force, forearm lodged against the frail column of their neck as he gnashed his teeth around threats and demands. Even though their words were spilling forth in a tentative trickle, so carefully posed and cautiously uttered, he could hear that very same tongue pave their outpour as each one of his accusations was repelled with cutthroat confidence. Even though they had called him Zhenya and he knew to call them Agrippine, he could only perceive the two of them through the slivers of their tattered false names; not as notable ambassador and renowned jockey, but as dutiful defender and pernicious enemy.

Torn between latching onto the past and banishing it in favor of the present, as he often was when in Agrippine’s company, Zhenya remained quiet; inscrutable and still. He lingered in his conflict for a long, obstinate moment, toying with the impulse to sneer at Agrippine in scornful greeting. He soon quelled it, however, expelling his disdain along a calming current that tumbled through his nose in a sharp, resolute sigh. After all, self-indulgence was never a suitable reason to let his mask slip, nor was it ever worth the repercussions it wrought.

Silently, he observed them, offering no response another than a contained hike of his brow when they described his actions as noble; as if they, of all people, could possibly have a grasp on the notion. If they did, they wouldn’t continue to cower behind their pretenses and futile claims of denial despite their constant dismantlement at Zhenya’s hands. “Thank you. I’m certain anyone in my place would have done the same.” He said with a curt shrug. It surprised him when they swiftly set out to take their leave, and for a moment, he considered allowing it – but then he detected an opportunity. Instinctively, he seized it. “Why did you approach me?” Why do you do it, time and time again, when I only ever scorn and reproach you? “You may leave if you wish. I simply couldn’t help but ask.”

Certainty — they envy him for the feeling. Doubt makes a home of their bones, tugging Agrippine this way and that. Only when they race against the clock, wind whipping their cheeks, does Agrippine glimpse a taste of it. When velocity outpaces terror. When they move too fast to stop and notice that the world is sinister and cruel. They’re not so certain that anyone in Zhenya’s place would have done the same. The Empress had the choice, did she not? She chose the sword and the blade. She called for bloodspill before the masses with chin raised high and eyes glimmering proudly.

Agrippine shivers. No, they are not so certain as Zhenya. Not in life, and not in the Empress.

Absorbed as they are in their thoughts, it takes Agrippine a moment to hear his question. Their nose wrinkles and their brows knit together when it at last registers. “I’m sorry, you don’t wish to speak with me. I won’t approach you again.” 

It is not an answer to his question, but the truth of it is too complex for their vocabulary. Zhenya is the only person who seems as unnerved by Agrippine as they are unnerved by the world. Zhenya is perhaps the only person unnerved by Agrippine in the slightest, without greed and without arrogant curiosity. They could try to explain it to Zhenya, but it takes a certain genius to see the heart of things.

The heart of this: that Agrippine thinks Zhenya might understand what it means to chase every breath with anticipation of losing it; of viewing the world through the lens of those who do not trust the ground on which they walk.