#veremongering

Kuras held your sleeping body. Though he did not sleep, his hands rested on your pulse, his fingertips felt the light thrumming on your neck. Your weight felt comforting. Your heart against his felt like a promise bound to be broken.

“Oh life, how fragile you are…”

Kuras contemplated not letting you go. He contemplated taking a small bite out of his own soul and feeding it to you, keeping you alive and in his arms for years to come. Unharmed, unreachable, and everlasting like the sun. Who could not use a bit of his strength? A bit of his heart? A part of his divine soul.

You were stronger than your curse, a miracle. A short-lived life of even seventy years would be such a waste for someone, no- something like you. You could be safe under him, his gaze, his warmth. Close to the hearth of his chest where he could feel your life. Can’t he do that for you? Can’t he disguise his desire to keep you alive, well, and around him under the lie of helping your curse?

Allmother, it was selfish. So incredibly selfish. His own heart ached in shame. Not because this urge of his was selfish, but because he did not care that it was. Going as far as to admit his corruption seemed to crack through him- in moments so tender, so time-bound. But how could it not? He loved humanity and you, and if he could get you to love it, if you could just stay longer-

Kuras moved his hand over your head, fingertips dancing like sparks towards your scalp. He slowly bent your head under his chin. But not before planting a kiss. He sighed shakily, containing the desire to cage you in. His arms snaked around your figure, slowly encapsulating you in a suffocating wave of heat. You only budged a little, but did not wake up. He knew better- he knows better than you. You just need to see it, be nudged to it if need be.

Kuras cannot lose you.

Leander lay on top of you on the plush mattress of his room. Skin to skin, it was already intimate enough that you were not in the spare room Leander gave you, but his. Unarmoured without his clothes or his winning smile. Your body laid sound asleep under him. Leander’s emerald eyes danced across your features, drinking your face in and engraving you into his memory.

It had occurred to him a while back that you don't need to go. You don't need to be pried out of his cold hands by death. Even now, you were being visited by the younger sibling of death; sleep. He could not truly bring himself to close his eyes around you. He let you out of his sight once and there you went, meeting the monstrosities Eridia had to offer. So what if one took you with them? To the otherworld? What if they snatched your soul away from his. The thought sent an eerie chill in his bones. He remembered death. Rotting skin feeding the earth, lilies sprouting in the soil watered by blood. Leaving mere bones in the wake. Death by his tongue sounded beautiful once. But the first taste of the once inescapable moral fear only pushed Leander further from sleep and rest. But perhaps if he had endured death, so could you. Hells, it could even be easier for you. You can contain your curse, you can endure the few incantations here and there. Rituals to rid you of mortal constraints. Bit by bit. Just like him. You would want that- Leander will do anything to ensure that you will want it. To run from death with him. Pull a few strings here and there, call in some good favors, give some ‘hopeless’ information and maybe this all could happen faster than Leander could blink.

Leander lifted himself up and planted a kiss on your neck, right where your heart pumped out your life. Your blood. You shifted in your sleep. Good, you were still alive.

Now all Leander needed was a plan.

Hushed whispers danced in Ais’ mind as he took another drag from his cigarette. Red eyes observed you as you lay asleep in his bed in the Seaspring. The eyes of the soulless watched you intently. Observing any movement. The most pristine of ears could catch your heartbeat. Listen to the different currents of blood in your veins. Perhaps out of all the monsters in the room the one watching you most intently was him. Occudeus. Followed by Ais.

What? Was he supposed to let you go into the night? The territory ahead might be his, but Eridia was not. Something could happen. Knowing the streets, something would happen. Ais leaned back, his horned head hitting the crumpling papers of wishes and notes written and long lost on the pillar within the Seaspring.

“It is inevitable.” The distorted voice powered over the many whispers.

“Death is inevitable. Unless…” Ais dragged his eyes over to the calm red waves dancing across the Seaspring. A ripple danced through.

“I’m not letting them become one of those mush-brained puppets of yours.” His voice was harsh but quiet as he whispered into the silent caves. Ais took another drag from his cigarette. He was running fast out of the cigarettes these days. They didn’t silence the voices like they used to.

“They won’t be anything when they are dead. You ‘like their shitty personality’? You think in a few years their personality will still be the same? A few decades and they will be gone. Preserve the feeling- the moment. Make them drink.”

It made so much sense. Why not? Ais shook his head. He did not want to let go of the way you made him feel the way he felt so seen, so…shamelessly himself. If only Occudeus could preserve you. Perhaps another deal would be all right. Ais bent down, scooping a handful of the red waters of the Seaspring. Small droplets fell as he made his way to his bed, where you would not even budge if he were fast enough. A few droplets fell on the cream sheets before Ais took a good look at your face. ‘Common’ sense viciously reasserted itself. He snapped, hurling the water, leaving traces of red on walls and the sheets like hints in a crime scene.

It was too early to let you sip it.

“Not yet.”

Vere had envisioned it all already; the day he breaks out of the collar; back to the days when he was properly revered as a God, and not as a hunting dog for the Senobium; the wanton carnage he wished to release onto the city, only to then take you away from Eridia. He the God, and you, his first follower after freedom. Vere brushed his fur as he stared into the mirror, far too satiated with himself after finding you passed out in an alley. Bleeding. It excited him, he took your body in, patched you up, you would be oh so grateful when you woke up. By the time Vere was done stitching your flesh back together, his hands were the same color as his hair. Vere leaned over to the mirror, patting the blood on his fingers to his lips, leaving a red tint that was just his color. Oh you were just made for him weren’t you?

Vere washed his hands off, took you to a clean place like his bed, and started his nightly routine as if you were not laid unconscious in his bed.

The cold metal of the collar clinked as he turned his head, immediately setting him off. His face soured in irritation and ears flickered. He had to look divine by the time you woke up. You had to see for yourself just how easy it was for him to heal you, to care for you, just as he had you believe he could tear the muscle off of anything's bones. You believed in Vere’s destruction, then you could believe in Vere’s creation as well, the very reason why the tomes spoke of people's love for him. Perhaps you could learn to love and fear as they did, only from a closer proximity this time.

He could use these chains for something else. For someone else. Perhaps after he is freed, he could bind you instead. The very chains that bound him to the Senobium, now binding you to him. To provide him with your unwavering loyalty, love, and devotion. Vere would promise to be generous with you. You could be all his but have your free time, just like he does with the Senobium now. Untouchable for the prying hands of many…except time. For now. Vere put his brush down as he looked into his own eyes in the mirror. With the chains, no one could take you but death. And if Vere was anything, it was long-lived. Going back to being alone so soon after merely seventy years if you were lucky…no. That would not do.

Vere picked up his sketchbook and a charcoal pencil, sitting down across the bed as he started drawing soft shapes, intentional lines. Small ways to memorize you. Preserve you. Sketching with heavy thoughts.

Now who in his list of ‘friendly favors’ had the skill to immortally bind you to him…

It’s rather fortunate that you forgot to close the blinds of your room for the night. A pair of eyes looked over your sleeping figure, as you were comfortably nestled between your sheets and the pillows. Talon-like fingers scratched on the glass as a beast crouches, perched on your windowsill. Silent yet observant. Grotesque tar-colored wings blocked the light trying to enter your room.

The eerily extended limbs rested on the glass, as Mhin took a small breath fogging their vision from the outside. The monster had small bird like screeches in their head; they couldn’t tell what it was trying to say. But they could feel it. It was all instinct, after all. Like the time they grabbed you last minute before you got mauled by a soulless. Or that one time Senobium clerics seemed to be on your tail. The bird-like monster cocked its head to the side, little white strands of hair fell into the watery eyes of something not quite beast, yet not quite Mhin either. Absurdly wide pupils observed your figure in the dark. The little muscle movements you made, the tossing and turning in your sheets, the disturbed facial expression you were making from a possible nightmare. The instincts were screaming at Mhin now:

”Death! Death! They will get caught. Inevitable. Danger! Danger!” It wasn’t coherent, but it surely was loud. It rang inside Mhins’ head, disoriented from the sheer pain throughout their body and the sudden alarm. Oh gods, the instinct was right again, it was inevitable. Death is inevitable. You were more a foreigner to Eridia than them, you almost died four times, you are getting close to them…Your death is inevitable…

Unless Mhin can do something about it. Could they turn you to a beast too? Would you live longer if you were, if you shared this curse? To share this pain with someone. Mhin would never wish the way their bones warped themselves every night, the way their skin ripped every time the hair on their body turned into feathers sticky in their own blood. Nor would they ever wish for this creature to be in your head; Their ear piercing screeches to boggle your mind, hurl you into a state of panic and disorientation. But a part of them wanted to be seen. To be understood. Were you already not searching for a cure with them?…Your searches had been fruitless so far… weren't they?

Perhaps the smartest thing to do would be to not let you out of their sight. Keep you company wherever, watch over you in your sleep, guard you from a distance… But oh, how Mhin yearned to be close to you despite the danger. To get under your skin. To live and to keep you for themselves. The beast screeched inside their head. “Take! Fly away! Safe! Take! Hide away!”

The glass cracked a little- Mhin leaned too hard when watching over you. A shard stuck on their absurdly long, sharp fingers. Glass piercing through a mix of skin and feathers. Suddenly erupting into a screech, Mhin flew away.

Mhin could only hope you did not see them.

With the way your current research on a cure was going, perhaps they could start looking into ways to share the curse.

A/N: ts pmo tumblr didn’t let me post my internet is shit UGH anyway have fun pookies I rlly wanted to add an Opeli(my mc) version of this but ig that will have to wait. Anywayyyyuh comments and feedback are appreciated!!! 💜✨🌕