K'luha Haaz: The sun was still hot, but it was better beneath the overhang of a thick rock. Hidden away in the shade, she was almost unnoticable. had she not spent her life in the Sagolii, the long time with her bare back to the sun might have burnt her. Her hip was an entirely different matter however, and the more the numbness of her body faded the more painful it grew until it felt like it was going to engulf her completely.Â
After the first two laying where she had fallen, her mind had suddenly raced back to Tahj. Who would care for her if K'luha died? Somehow it spurred her to crawl across the desert's floor, each little movement causing more pain than the last, until she had finally made it under the rock for shelter. It had probably been five or six hours since he fight with K'ailia and Ul'dah still loomed ominously in the distance. While she could see the city's massive shape, she couldn't make out any details so she knew she had run a decent ways away.Â
Perhaps too far. She was in too much pain to concentrate properly on using Aether or an Aetheryte, and too far off the road to solicite help from anyway. Grasping roughly for handfuls of sand, K'luha didn't notice her own body shivering while she tried to think of a plan.
*
Twinflame: Dragging K'piru across the sand had been a strangely nostalgic experience for K'ile, even though he couldn't remember ever having done so before. It had always been K'thalen who would pull K'piru after him, K'ile only rarely trotting alongside. The movement had at first made the silence natural, but as time stretched on and they still hadn't caught up to Luha, his mind wandered and the pressure of K'piru's hand in his own grew warm.
It wasn't that he didn't have anything to say to K'piru, or that it would be difficult to begin, since he had her out here all alone anyway. But he was just so afraid to say the wrong thing and send her fleeing back into anonymity again.
He was also burdened by his concern for K'luha, but that had become a static simmering in the back of his head, easily compartmentalized. Occasionally a pang of fear would break through, when he thought they were close, and K'ile would worry that the woman had fallen into a ditch or run into a predator. He would remember the way she'd screamed when the wolves had gotten her back in Thanalan.
But as her scent aged, the fear would recede. For a woman with a broken hip, she'd made a hell of a run. K'ile was beginning to wonder if she figured out how to fly when finally the scent of the woman grew strong and did not fade.
"She's close," he said to K'piru, his hand tightening around hers. He'd grown sweaty in the sun, his palm turning clammy, but he hadn't let go of the woman's hand. Doing so strangely unthinkable. K'ile slowed their pace to a quick walk, searching the earth for clues of movement, and called out, "Luha!"
*
Antimony (K'piru): The pace K'ile had set was difficult for K'piru. Though she had traveled with some regularity for past work, it was generally on the back of a chocobo or a cart, only occasionally on foot, and even throughout her life with the tribe, she had never reached the physical endurance of the hunters. Still, she clung to the tia's hand and managed to keep alongside him.
The physical exertion kept her thoughts from dwelling on the painful reminders that seemed ever constant with the scent and presence of family, shadows that might have sent her fleeing once more in the opposite direction if she allowed them too much space.
That K'piru didn't respond when K'ile began calling for K'luha was both an artifact of her internal distraction, as well as her lack of available breath.
*
K'luha Haaz: There was a distant call. K'luha's ears flickered upwards to listen more closely. Something was calling her name. Something... or someone. Was it K'ailia? Come to say more cruel words and hurt her mother further? It seemed to be her favored activity these days. K'luha remained silent and close to the ground, her form shadowed and hidden fairly well beneath that rock. A rock that K'ile and K'piru weren't far off from.Â
It took K'luha some time before she actually recognized the voice, but even then she didn't believe it. K'ailia had said K'ile was in Ul'dah, but then why would be he out here looking for her? He had left her on her face on the floor before, K'luha thought spitefully. Her temper boiled the more she heard his voice and she wanted to hurl the rock she was hiding under at him. No, she did not want K'ile to find her. If he was going to abandon and lie to her, she wasn't going to be fooled a second time.
*
Twinflame: K'ile tracked K'luha's scent to strange marks in the dirt, Unlike the Sagolii sands, Thalan dirt was thick and heavy, with dark soil just beneath a thin layer of red dirt. He could see where K'luha had lingered, knocking a great deal of dirt aside. There were lines from fingers out to one side, the snake-like lines of a tail moving against the ground. Had she fallen?
It looked like she'd dragged herself over...
There. K'ile's ears stood up and don't that way as his gaze searched the shadowed rocks, and then his ears went flat against his hed hair. He muttered in frustration, "Luha, you..." nad pulled on the leather harness about his chest before he stood and pulled K'piru towards the rocks. "K'luha!" She had herself hidden well, as though she were playing a game.
*
Antimony (K'piru): K'piru's fingers flexed around K'ile's hand, the warmth that had built there suddenly going cold as ice as he moved them both towards the rocks. Her gaze locked forward on the shadows there, but she could only look through them blankly, suddenly terrified of even laying eyes on K'luha's form. She wanted to tear her hand from K'ile's and bolt, but her legs continued to follow him of their own volition.
Her breath came in short bursts through her nose as they neared and then stilled entirely when her eyes caught sight of the limp curve of a blonde tail and one foot poking out from behind a rough wall of stone. Her legs, too, stopped.
*
K'luha Haaz: K'luha still said nothing. She could smell them now they were so close... but they? There was definetely someone with K'ile. And it wasn't K'ailia. Someone else... someone that smelled of the city. Of Ul'dah.Â
She did not want to meet K'ile or whomever he had brought with him. Whomever was so important that he would lie and abandon her on her face in the desert was not someone K'luha wanted to ever see. Maybe she deserted that. Maybe she deserted to be dropped in the desert and abandoned, but Tahj? He had abandoned Tahj too. He wasn't there for her arrival. He wasn't there for Tahj. And Tahj had never done him any wrong. She did not deserve it.
*
Twinflame: The Tia pulled the ex-shaman around the stone, clambering carefully and making sure not to outpace K'piru. When he could finally see K'luha's form laying on the stone, could see the woman's face, he said, "Don't hide from me, Luha."
*
Antimony (K'piru): At some point after spotting the first glimpse of K'luha, K'piru had stopped consciously gripping K'ile's hand, her fingers going limp in his own, and her legs wobbled like jelly as he pulled her across the rocks. When he spoke, calling down to the injured woman, his voice sounded as though very far away, muffled by a heavy, echoing pulsing in her ears. She fell back, would let her hand fall from K'ile's if his grip allowed it, and found herself entirely incapable of looking towards the other woman, though she could practically smell her pain.
In her head, someone screamed.
*
K'luha Haaz: K'luha felt her stomach tense as she was spotted. It wasn't like she could run anyway. Although she wanted to. Less like run and more like beat the shit out of K'ile. Don't hide he said... and why wouldn't she?Â
She couldn't look towards K'ile and whoever it was.Â
"You lied to me." She hissed with a malice and anger in her voice that was rarely used.
*
Twinflame: When K'piru pulled against him, K'ile's hand instinctively tightened. He barely noticed her restraint, though, reachting as though she'd simply lost her balance and he was helping her maintain it. His attention was turned all towards Luha, and he continued towards her, closing the distance until her could crouch in front of her, "What about? I'm sorry. What are you doing out here?"
*
Antimony (K'piru): Only K'ile's strength kept K'piru moving forward - literally, as he all but dragged her across the rocks, her legs stumbling to keep her upright as her body refused to actively partake in moving her towards K'luha. Her scent was different from K'ile's but still innately familiar and, above all, a recaller of fire and ash and death. K'piru made a choking sound in the back of her throat and tried desperately to wrest her thoughts back from that brink of panic.
K'luha was hurt. Her own fears did not matter until K'luha was safe.
*
K'luha Haaz: About what? He was so goddamn oblivious. His stupidity burned angrily in Luha's throat until she finally turned her head to look at him. He was fine. Not a damn scratch on him. Perfectly, and utterly, in perfect health.Â
"You LIED to me." K'luha's voice raised in fury, her tone really empahsising the severity of the transgression. "You said you would come back in the morning. Then you said you would meet us at Drybone. You LIED to me. You LIED to Tahj! Maybe I desered the sleepless nights, the sickening worry. You didn't even take your fucking lance. Tahj didn't deserve that. She deserved to have you home and showing her around. She deserved to have you there with her while I had to come back to this shithole to deal with my cruel daughter. But you fucking LIED to me! To her! What was so important you had to lie? What was so terrible you couldn't have just told me? Did you think I was going to say no? Did you think I was going to make fun of you!? Why didn't you trust me!? Why did you LIE TO ME!?" K'luha fumed furiously, torn between shaking anger and pain.
*
Twinflame: So from the get go K'ile was absolutely convinced that there was no way in hell to answer that question honestly and live. At least not without letting K'piru in on thoughts and feelings that would send her into a whole so deep she'd probably have a phobia of red hair and blue eyes for the rest of her life.
It wasn't that he de didn't think K'luha deserved the truth. It was just... K'piru...
"Because I'm a liar," he said. "So just hate me. I won't argue. You can stab me in the neck when we're done. But first you need to let K'piru help you." K'ile looked up at the woman behind him.
His senses were so full of the scent of K'luha's anger that he hadn't noticed K'piru's fear until he looked back at her. Usually K'piru was at the top of his priority list, the head of his attention. K'luha was encroaching on that territory. Maybe K'ile shouldn't have brought K'piru. Maybe the shaman was already renewing her decision that she didn't want anything to do with him, with them.
But then, "K'piru. Don't let her scare you. She's hurting more than she shows."
*
K'luha Haaz: K'luha was ready to strangle him. Because he was a liar? That wasn't a goddamn answer. That was him trying to get out of the damn question. She had no words for a moment, only a loud and furious hiss towards K'ile... until he distracted her with the mention of K'piru.Â
She blinked for a moment. K'piru? She was... alive? And well? And here!?Â
K'luha brightened for a moment. They were just... reuniting with all sorts of lost family and it was... Luha was happy about it. She wanted them to come home sometimes. To feel welcome at home. She wanted to be able to see him when she went out of the tribe. Maybe if it was like that she and K'ailia could get along... but K'ailia was cruel to her. Judgemental. Her son wouldn't have been like that. If only... But she was getting distracted from the real issue here.
"K'piru!?" K'luha questioned, pulling herself forward and poking her head out from her hiding place to look for the shaman. She didn't sound angry, but rather somehow excited at the prospect of seeing her aunt.
*
Twinflame: K'ile looked back to K'luha solemnly, pulling K'piru forward and taking the shaman's hand in two of his own.
*
Antimony (K'piru): She couldn't handle this. She didn't know why she had thought she could. K'luha's face peeked out from around the rock, and the sight of it nearly ruined K'piru. The other woman's mouth moved, but she could not hear her voice, could hear only the screams of the dying, the burning.
A weight on her hand dragged her forward, closer, and her gaze dropped from K'luha's face to some vague point in the sand next to her. With an internally violent effort, she brought down iron walls between her thoughts and the memories and grief stirred by the presence of family, and stepped forward. She did not listen to the screams of her daughters, nor did she watch the flesh of her nunh where K'luha's would have been. Expression blank, she held out a hand towards K'luha's hip, as though gesturing towards it, and spoke flatly, "I need to see it. You're ill."
*
K'luha Haaz: K'piru looked... well it was her surely. She looked a little older and decidedly sick. K'luha slinked back a bit, wondering why it was that K'piru looked so sick. Was it her? Was this what K'ile abandoned her and Tahj for? It wouldn't be the first time, she thought bitterly. She loved her aunt dearly, but both her aunt and K'ile had shut her out painfully and frigidly after the Calamity.Â
"K'piru..." K'luha called softly, worriedly. "It's... good to see you after all these years..." Maybe that would put her more at ease? K'luha wasn't sure what would help, but K'piru could not hide the fact from K'luha that she seemed to be shattering into a million pieces.
*
Antimony (K'piru): "The wound will leak into your blood if you do not allow me to do something," K'piru elaborated, voice quiet and detached.
*
K'luha Haaz: Why was she...? K'luha slunk back beneath the rock. It was so nice to see her but... there was such a frigid feeling there. Like K'piru couldn't stand to look at her. Why had K'ile forced her out here in the first place? Had he just run into her? Or had he gone looking for her? K'luha couldn't help but feel that frigid air return, just as she had felt it when K'ile returned after the Calamity.Â
"It fine... I can see you're not well K'piru. I'm sorry K'ile dragged you out here when you didn't want to see me." K'luha closed her eyes and turned her head away. This wasn't at all how she imagined... not that she had ever really imagined it. "Go ahead and go back to spend your time together." This is what K'luha assumed they were doing before whatever brought them out here. "K'ile left me with a broken hip on my one once. I assume he has no problem doing it again." This was said a bit spitefully towards K'ile but she managed to stay with a rather passive tone of voice.
*
Twinflame: "You were supposed to go back to the tribe and get it taken care of!" K'ile snapped, letting go of K'piru and reaching out to take K'luha by the arm, refusing to let the woman retreat. "You know, I'm sorry if it's inconvenient for you and you don't want to bother anyone, but you don't get to hide in a fucking hole and die! I'm tired of people doing this shit. Especially you." K'ile was not kind about grabbing pulling K'luha out of the hole. She already hated him and she was already in pain. She didn't get to hate him to death just because she was sad.
*
K'luha Haaz: "And you were supposed to meet me in the morning!" K'luha snapped back, her fury regained almost instantly. She wanted not to give him the satisfaction of know how much pain she was in, but the rough way he yanked her from beneath the rock sent her entire body racking with intense pain. K'luha screamed and tried to pull her arm back, her whole body shaking violently from the intense pain. Luha was a strong woman. One that did not cry often to pain, but this was not something she could hold back. Blubbering for a few moments with tears and shaking, she was unable to throw any sort of anger back at K'ile while she drowned in pain.
*
Antimony (K'piru): For a long moment after K'ile dropped her hand that felt more akin to a breathless eternity to K'piru, she wavered amidst the stones. The pungent, salty scent of Luha's pain served as a focal point in the chaos of her own panic, and she moved forward, dropping to the ground alongside the other woman. Her hands reached out, one resting firmly on K'luha's side, the other feeling gently at her hip.
There was no time or sense for ceremony here. Shaking fingers made to pull the other woman's waistband aside so that she could see the injured area below, all the while her features remained taught and blank. She did not reply to K'luha's words.
*
K'luha Haaz: K'luha had almost recovered enough to think again by the time she realized K'piru was kneeling next to her. This felt a little familiar, as it was K'piru who helped deliver both her children. Although, this pain was probably far more intense. When K'piru touched it even gently, K'luha screeched again and tried to squirm away from the woman.Â
Her brain couldn't even make sense of anything but the excruiating pain that seemed to rack her every muscle and force them to contract pinfully. It was probably lucky for K'luha that she had pretty much run out of her room in a pair of pantlettes and a camise. Mostly now that K'piru was moving it, there wasn't a lot of fabric to move or irritate the sight further. Although it was surely a completely mess to look at. What had started to heal had been completely broken through now, and what had been a fracture was now a clean break with bone pressing at the skin and tearing it parcially open.Â
Luha cried loudly, still trying to crawl away from K'piru's touch. She wasn't sure what she was screaming, but she thought it might be something like 'No, please dont touch it. Leave me alone.'
*
Twinflame: K'ile pulled K'luha to him, in what was a familiar gesture. But this was very different. On his knees, he pulled K'luha's shoulders onto lap. This time he took her arms and held them, tried to cross them over her chest so she couldn't get away or struggle. "I'm sorry, K'luha, but K'piru said you might die. You can't do that. What would Tahj and I do?"
*
Antimony (K'piru): The body beneath her hands twisted and writhed, a sand-colored worm of desperation. K'piru blinked at the exposed skin, its surface distended at an unnatural point, the flesh painted dark, sickly colors and surrounded by an angry red heat. The body made noises, in protest, but K'piru's hands remained certain on its form.
Broken, K'piru could tell, but as she extended her senses - first tenatively, weakly, as though afraid of some unknown backlash - towards the thin lines of the body's aether, K'piru found there was more to the story. About the bone the energy had pooled in an ugly mess, a solid, unyielding knot as though it had tried to protect itself. Scar tissue, barely formed. The wound was old, had begun to heal, but something had made it much worse since.
Outside this clinical awareness, K'piru felt faint, the screams pressed in and swayed briefly over K'luha's form before regaining herself. "I cannot treat it here," she murmured, hands hovering over the shuddering, agonized body. "In my room there is... I may be able to draw out some of the poison."
*
K'luha Haaz: K'luha struggled again K'ile, finding some comfort in his touch and at the same time not wanting to. She wanted to push him off and kick his stupid head in. How dare he try to toch her after he had lied to her. How dare he try and act like she mattered when he lied and walked away from her for over two weeks. As if he really gave a fuck if she died. She could have died where he left her from that fall. But K'ile didn't care, of this K'luha was obessively convinced. No one would have cared if she died. In fact, they all would have been happier.Â
"Liar." K'luha hissed hysterically at K'ile. "You LIED to me and dissappeared for over two weeks. You don't care. Everyone would be better off if I had just been exiled and Maka had stayed. Maka didn't raise a spoilt brat who doesn't care about her people. She didn't raise that girl to become a cruel outsider. Tahj is a good girl. And K'ailia would have been if Maka raised her. K'ailia is so cruel to me... and she doesn't even care how she hurts. She chose to walk away. I could have handled if she died, but she walked away on her own choice. It's so much worse than any death. You don't choose death. But to just walk away after all the suffering and sacrafices we made... I made... and just... not care about it... about me? I can't...." K'luha was still shaking, although for the time being she had stopped squirming. It all hurt to much.Â
"Just leave me in the damn desert again. Just drop me on the floor again and walk away for another two fucking weeks K'ile. I w-want to be with my son. I never got to hold him long enough... I want to hold him again... my son..." Burning hot tears of shame leaked now, and though they weren't actually any different from normal tears, they felt like they burned her eyes when she cried them.
*
Twinflame: Keepling Luha pinned in place, K'ile gave K'piru an empathetic look. "I think Luha's beyond reason at this point, and I don't think she's going to be doing any walking, either." He looked down at Luha and said, "I can carry you, but you need to let me. Don't struggle or you'll hurt yourself."
*
K'luha Haaz: Luha remained pitifully crying for a few long moments before she gathered enough of herself to look up at the messy head or oranges and reds that was K'ile. The idea of hurting herself seemed somehow funny in her hysteria and delirium. For a moment she thought she had freed herself and slit open her wrists, and was rather surprised when she looked at her wrists and found them fine.Â
"You lied to me." Luha repeated, still fiercely directed at K'ile. "Just shut me out and leave me behind like you always do. No one cares anymore. I don't even care anymore. I want to be with my son." K'luha seemed to go limp with her last breathy declaration but her eyes were still open, staring at the sand like she was looking at her son.
*
Antimony (K'piru): K'luha's words reached K'piru's ears distantly, and though she tried desperately to keep her focus and energy on examining the woman's wound and /not/ on the person inside the body beneath her hands, the voice still slipped past her walls to ghost through her thoughts.
She recoiled from the woman in the sand then, her own tail curling against her leg through her clothes. K'luha's words sounded with a chilling familiarity that shook an icey dread down to the base of her spine. Closing her eyes, she saw dunes shadowed by an unnatural night, felt rough fingers wrapped about her arm, her body, restraining her, holding her back. She recalled how she had wanted to throw herself to the sands, let the pitiless gaze of Azeyma decide her fate, if the goddess even cared to look.
"Take her," K'piru muttered weakly, staggering to her feet with one hand curling against her head. "Take her to my room."
*
Twinflame: The Tia nodded somberly, the red hair atop his head shivering like fire in the wind. "I'll try not to hurt you, Luha," he said, and lifted her shoulders up by his own, lay her head against his head. He put one arm under her legs, another behind her back and under her shoulder, wrapping her and holding her to him and hoping he could keep the weight on the 'good' side of her hips.
He lifted her up and said to K'piru, "Let's go."
*
K'luha Haaz: "You already hurt me more than you can ever know." K'luha replied icly, grasping at the sands like it might hold her in place when K'ile tried to pick her up. Not that it did. She just ended up with hands full of nothing as he picked her up. K'luha screeched at the movement, her body shaking again in pain. Any movement at all felt like her spine was being ripped out.Â
Luha was torn between throwing herself to hug K'ile and ripping his eyes out, and flailed painfully between hugging him to snarling and scratching at his face. All the while screeching unintellible things that occasionally came to phrases like, 'You lied' and 'You're just like K'yohko' and 'Give me my son back'.
*
Antimony (K'piru): Turning away from both K'luha and K'ile came blessedly easy for Antimony, her eyes moving up to take in the silhouette of Ul'dah rather than the twisted, broken form in K'ile's arms. She said nothing further, only began to walk slowly back towards the city.
*
Twinflame: K'ile didn't resist K'luha's thrashing any more than he had to in order to hold her still, and didn't protest more than to say, "Stop it, Luha. Everything's all right," in a rather tired voice. He turned his face away from K'luha when she reached for his face, often ducking his head behind hers. He just held her and followed behind K'piru.
*
K'luha Haaz: K'luha couldn't understand it. Especially with how little K'ile seemed to care about her pain. She wasn't talking about the physical pain either. That was something she could deal with. But why was it everyone simply didn't care about her mental anguish? Or perhaps, she just cared too much.
Eventually K'luha quieted down to simply covering her face with her hands and choking on her own sobs whenever K'ile moved too much and her hip felt like it was breaking in two and then being jamed in opposite directions.
*
Antimony (K'piru): As they passed from open desert to refugee outskirts to the busy, dirty streets of Ul'dah itself, K'luha's scent - the pain and sweat and home of it - stayed present in Antimony's senses even as rot and disease stink pressed in with the other myriad smells of civilization. She did not pause to see if K'ile followed; she didn't need to with their scents so close by, though she wasn't certain she would have waited if they hadn't.
She hastened her steps, though not by much, and immediately felt guilty about the unconscious desire to lose them in the chaos of the streets.
The Quicksand, with its broad archways and curving walls, rose into view far quicker than it had seemed to take to get to K'luha, and Antimony hardly noticed as she passed through a side door into the main tavern. A few patrons turned with curious looks, but she did not notice those either. Again she tried to keep her mind focused on the pressing, physical issue: K'luha's hip and the infection brooding within it.
Not long later, she slipped into the back halls, past the turn with its ruined door, and arrived at her own room. The simple furnishings and empty walls, which had grown familiar over the weeks she'd spent in Ul'dah, seemed suddenly almost threatening as she stepped inside, leaving the door open behind her. There were not many signs of occupancy here, save for on the circular table at the foot of the bed, where papers piled in a wild mess, untended for days. Her tail shivered along with her hands as she stepped to the bed and stooped to collect a small box.
She had spoke not a word during this brief journey, and continued to move in silence even after entering her room. Speaking even once more threatened to shatter the fragile composure she'd gathered.
*
Twinflame: K'ile walked in silence and permitted himself no deep or comlicated thoughts about the woman in his arms or the many things that she seemed to hold against him. The rightness and the wrongness of her various accusations were as evident as her weight upon his arms and the rigidness her pain evoked in her body.
He concentrated on the sense and warmth of K'luha, the way the muscle's of her back and arm felt on his skin. The way her tail haung against his hip. This while he watched K'piru walk stiffly ahead of them, her gray-brown tail swinging back and forth with an occasional shiver to to it. He watched the lilt of her ears. He watched the small number of unkempt hairs that lay over the back of her neck, stuck there by sweat.
It was a long time after K'piru had initially invited him back to her room. Now he finally arrived, but K'luha had robbed all of the comfort from what would have been a preciously rare moment. K'piru, who had once left him so far in the dark, had invited him in. But he hadn't been able to come without K'luha. Despite his attempts to leave K'luha, he couldn't.
Placing K'luha on K'piru's bed was natural and yet strangely repulsive. The latter was not a feeling he wanted to own, and so he spat it out with the words, "Here we go, Luha. We're going to take care of you."
*
K'luha Haaz: There were many raging voices in K'luha's head. In one way, she felt the same coldness K'ile and K'piru had displayed towards her before. She had never forgotten that they completely disregarded her in the wake of the Calamity, but for some reason she had thought K'ile had moved past it. In a way, she had to admit he had because she was here in the first place. Maybe he would have ignored her before. But then again, he had lied to her and abandoned her which had helped cause this problem in the first place.
And K'luha was glad to see K'piru, truly she was but... her once favored aunt was so cold and disgusted by K'luha that it was hard not to feel hated. She didn't know what she had done to earn such hatred or disgust, and the only thin she could think was that K'piru was mad that K'ile had dragged her to help in the first place.Â
She felt disgusting. Her stomach coiled and flipped in her chest until she could not speak. K'luha had to close her mouth tightly, else she was afraid to vomit her own stomach out.
*
Antimony (K'piru): There was not much she could do here, Antimony thought dimly, ignoring the shuddering panic of K'piru roiling at the back of her mind. The box sat open in her lap to reveal a small collection of herbs and ointments, and a thin, carved, humanoid figure. The latter she took in one hand distractedly.
She was ill-prepared to deal with an injury as drastic as this one. Even pulling on what minor magics she knew, her best hope was to focus on drawing out the infection. Her ears flicked back, listening to the pained shifting of K'luha on the bed, and closed her eyes tightly for several seconds.
It is not K'luha, she told herself, ignoring the scent of the woman that mingled with K'ile's and persisted in sending her memories spiralling. It is an injured woman, whom you can help.
Feeling faint, Antimony stood and moved to the other woman's side. She kept her eyes on the weakly writhing body as one hand plucked a few strands of hair from its head, which she tied firmly about the figure in her hand before pressing the figure into the other woman's own hand, forcibly wrapping fingers about it. "Hold," she intoned lowly, and her voice shook but she didn't allow herself to spare that a thought.
Instead she took her attention to the hip and began to move the body on the bed in such a way that the spine and pelvis would straighten. She had not done anything of this sort in years, but the unyielding yet gentle touch came back with little effort. /Just a stranger who needs help./ One of the ointments she took from the box and, after pulling down the thin cloth of the woman's clothes, she began to slowly rub it into the skin. The air quickly filled with a sharp, pungent aroma, almost bitter. She needed ice, she thought, but there was no way she would get such a thing here. Instead, put her hands to cracked bone and battered flesh and called on things she had violently disavowed five years past.
*
Twinflame: Having taken up a stance a meter or two from the bed, K'ile's primary senses were still blunted by the strength of the odor exuded by K'piru's medicine. It was like someone shining a light in his eyes, and he put his hand over his nose in a futile gesture. He didn't need his sense of smell to know how K'luha felt, but for K'piru, things were a bit less certain. The once-shaman was enigma, and she could be feeling or thinking anything. It was strange to see her at work as a healer again.
*
Antimony (K'piru): The words that pushed through Antimony's throat came slow at first, reluctant and half-remembered. She faltered, as did her hands on the vibrantly bruised hip, at the thought that she had become a hypocrite, that even as she spoke Azeyma's name and murmured words of succor over and over again, she did not expect the so-called Warden to grant it.
The utilitarian in her silenced those thoughts as viciously as she had thrust aside her faith in the face of fire and death. Now was not the time for doubt.
Bending low over the form, strands of hair hanging into her vision, Antimony's awareness shrunk to only her hands, the flesh beneath them, and the bright, tortured lines of aether contorting their broken paths through the body she sought to heal. After the first ten minutes, she did not even think of the words she spoke; they tumbled from her lips with a trance-like steadiness. One hand moved without looking to grip K'luha's, which held the carved figure. She spoke its name in her thoughts and words, and with that name it gained a lure.
The angry, broken aether in K'luha's body stirred and, like a river, began to bend and pull away down a path of least resistance. Very deliberately, Antimony guided it, called on it, cajoled and dragged it out of where it should not be.
When the rhythmic, whispered chanting finally faded, so too had the ointment's bitter odor, along with the heat that had built dangerously between bone and blood and flesh. Antimony's body sagged, a low, shuddering exhale sapping strength from her posture as her hands fell away. Her vision blurred and she felt herself slip down until she was leaning against the edge of the bed, on her knees. She could not recall these rituals draining her in such a way, but then, she had never performed them with so little reagent, nor with so little faith. Breathing unsteadily, Antimony rested.
*
K'luha Haaz: K'luha had no real say over what was happening anymore. She couldn't fight back. She couldn't protest. She could do nothing but be a burden and stand between K'ile and K'piru's reunion. Her mind wandered back to older times, when this sort of thing had happened before. All of the times K'piru had held her hand and helped her heal, and there had been many. And she could remember Piru's face when she woke up from her coma. And again her face when she bore her first child, then lost it, then a second. All she had ever tried to be there for K'piru and failed. All the times she had tired to be there for K'ile too, and failed. And K'ailia too.Â
More than anything, K'luha wished she could just stop thinking. She was tired of feeling like a burden to everyone and everything. And yet being a burden was all she had ever known how to be in a relationship. Was Piru so disgusted with her now that her aunt could hardly stand to look at her? Maybe K'luha had thought poorly of Piru when she first left, but it was out of sadness more than any real anger. She was terribly sad that she lost her aunt. Everytime she had ever been angry it was because she was hiding a sadness.Â
There was a discomfort and a comfort the ritual held. It was something that had been done similarly before, which was far more comfortable than any sort of Gridanian healing. Yet all those thoughts of being a burden and Piru's apparent distate for Luha made her unplausibly sad. Why wouldn't K'ile trust her? Why wouldn't Piru? And for that matter, why did K'ailia not understand her mother's sadness?Â
K'luha made no noise, but staired emptily at the ceiling and let tears fall down her face; a newfound sadness plaguing her. A sadness that came with the loss of what she had thought to be her close knit family.
*
Twinflame: There wasn't a great deal of comfort in these caves that the Ul'dahn's called rooms. K'ile crouched against the wall opposite the bed where K'luha and K'piru were, watching the healing. He mostly watched K'piru's hands, her lips move with words K'ile found distant and strange. He noticed the movement of the shaman's gray ears and tail, the lean of her head, the set of her shoulders and hips.
He did not fail to notice K'luh's tears, but he did not watch them either. He did fail to notice anything about himself, for there was nothing about himself. K'ile Tia was empty of any feelings, and had no thoughts as to his own actions. What he would do with himself depended on those women, as it always had. Those women who he...
Well, that was a thought. And the way he took a breath deep enough to strain the limits of his lungs was a feeling. He ignored it, though, like Luha's tears. For now.
*
Antimony (K'piru): After a few minutes, Antimony shifted, straightening somewhat to lean back from the bed, though she remained on her knees. Unbidden, her eyes shifted to the right, to the profile of a face agonizingly familiar, but this lasted only a moment before her chest clenched, locking her breath in her lungs, and she had to turn away.
"She needs more than I... can give her," she spoke after another long pause, during which she smelled a memory of blood and burnt flesh. But no, she was in Ul'dah, and the only smells in the room were the fading bitterness of medicine and those of K'luha and K'ile. "I've taken the poison from her blood, but if it's not... allowed to heal, it will return." Her voice remained quiet, exhausted, directed down towards her lap as though her neck hadn't the strength to keep her head up. "She needs rest."
*
K'luha Haaz: For once in her life, K'luha didn't feel the immediate urge to get up and move about. She didn't want to fight against the healing process, nor did she want it to speed up. All she could do was lie still and feel numb and saddened.
*
Twinflame: The Tia stood and walked over to the bed. He put a hand on K'piru's shoulder, squeezed slightly, he hoped reassuringly. "Thank you. I'll make her rest." He looked over at K'luha and said, "Can you rest for me, Luha?"
*
K'luha Haaz: Finally a word which described her feelings came to mind. Betrayl. Yes, that was the sickening feeling that turned her stomach. Betrayed by K'ailia, and K'ile, and long ago by K'piru. Less K'piru, more K'ailia and K'ile.Â
Luha turned he head limply towards K'ile, eyes still accuistory but now hollowed with with a deeply hurt look in them. She did not answer, but she did not move either.
*
Antimony (K'piru): With a long breath, Antimony dragged herself to her feet, then wondered dimly when K'ile had gotten so near. She mumbled something, an excuse of some kind, and stepped around him towards the sink on the opposite wall. Her legs felt weak, and she leaned much of her weight on the metal dish before running the water and splashing it on her face.
*
Twinflame: K'ile met K'luha's gaze with an unaffected look. It was not one without feeling. There was concern there. But it was so strictly controlled that it did not vary. It was the same expression he'd been wearing since he'd put her down. He turned his gaze towards K'piru, but watched her half-heartedly.
This wasn't right. The feelings between all three of them were wrong. But he couldn't change what they were. He realized that he blamed K'luha for this, and that was prudent. She was being selfish, as usual. But blaming her didn't change anything, and it didn't change how K'ile felt about her or K'piru or anything else.
He said to K'piru, "If we got a room for she and I, would it be safe to move her there?"
*
Antimony (K'piru): Her ears drooped as she straightened. She could feel a few damp strands of hair sticking to her cheek and forehead, but through the numb exhaustion, she could not bring herself to fix them. Her thoughts answered K'ile's question with a 'yes', echoing that still dominant part of her that wanted to hide. "She shouldn't be moved more than necessary," she said instead.
*
Twinflame: "Maybe she should stay here for..." K'ile said, thinking over the prposition. K'luha would take more than one night to heal. Did K'piru want her around that long? Did she want her around at all? She'd only just barely agreed to spend more than five minutes with K'ile, and he was sure this hadn't been what she thought she was getting herself in to.
So instead he said, "We can figure it out. Maybe use the blanket as a cot." He was still afraid of chasing K'piru off, but maybe it was a bit late for that. If he left now, she might disappear. There was no right answer to this problem! There was no way to make this work!
He shook his head in a small display of frustration. "I don't know."
*
Antimony (K'piru): Turning back to face the rest of the room, Antimony looked to the wall behind the bed and removed her glasses to dry them distractedly with one sleeve of her dress. This was no different than the night she had readily sacrificed to help Mitari, she told herself, stifling the tremor in her hands by gripping the frame of her glasses harder. The vague blur of the room without the lenses made it easier to ignore the ache of loss in her chest.
"I can request an additional pillow and blanket from the front desk, if you wish to stay," she spoke dully. She did not bother wondering where she would sleep; she knew dreams would not be her friend after this.
*
Twinflame: K'ile shook his head, "I won't stay unless you ask me too. If you want to get a different room for yourself, I'll stay and take care of Luha."
*
Antimony (K'piru): "It is not in my budget." Which, was actually mostly true, but Antimony still wondered why she seemed to be trying to hard to... what? To keep them here? Even though she very much did not want any of the memories or feelings they stirred? There was no sense in that, especially not when even just thinking of the words K'luha had wailed brought old wounds festering to the surface. She closed her eyes, hugged herself.
*
K'luha Haaz: It was blatantly obvious she was in the way. And that K'piru wanted her anywhere but here now. And so K'luha finally spoke up.
"I can't move." She sighed loudly, hoping to draw both their attentions. "If you just put me somewhere it's not like I need taking care of. I'll just lay there. I'm sure you could throw me in a different room. Or with some help I could just Aetheryte to somewhere else if arrangements were made."
*
Twinflame: K'ile ignored K'luha, hearing her words and choosing not to respond to them. He repeated to K'piru, "I won't stay unless you ask me to." The statement felt so heavy in his mouth that they might have knocked him over, but he did not so much as sway on his feet.
*
K'luha Haaz: Really? What was even the point of going out of their way to save her when they were just going to ignore her? How was this suddenly all her fault? Wasn't K'ile the one in the wrong here? He was the one who abandoned her with no word! Why was this... suddenly all her fault?Â
K'luha gripped her hands into tight fists. She wanted to rip her stupid leg off and beat K'ile and K'piru to death with it out of sheer spite.
[12:40:40 AM] Antimony (K'piru): "You aren't going anywhere for the time being, so lie still," Antimony spoke suddenly, and with an only half-realized, unbidden vehemence at K'luha. No sooner had she let loose the words did she shrink back, looking away from the woman only to find her eyes on K'ile. She blinked at him for a second as though seeing him for the first time, and then looked hurriedly away.
Her head ached with a conflict of interest and need, and in the moments following her words the inn room felt very, very small. "I will--" her words cut off and she forced shaking hands to replace her glasses, the world once again slipping into focus. The physical world, at least. Her mouth opened again, and in the span of a second, she tried to say a million different things. When that failed, she tried to do another million, but even with the door so close as to be only a few short steps away from freedom, Antimony froze.
She recalled loneliness. She recalled nightmare.
"... Stay. It's not a bother," she finally managed in a weak voice.
*
Twinflame: "Alright," K'ile Tia exhaled, and felt as though some strange, steely thing slipped out of his body as he did so. He felt... better.
Even after all this, K'piru had not told him to leave, and she seemed to intend to stay as well. It was baffling to the point of unbelievable, and he almost expected to be mocked by some vision only to realize that he was dreaming. But he wasnt' asleep. Nobody was trying to recruited him into a magical flying all-male tribe, so he probably wasn't asleep.
K'ile sat down on the bed next to K'luha, leaned forward and rested his elbows on his knees, knit his fingers together. "Alright."
*
K'luha Haaz: 'Please. Something just kill me now before they start making out.' Was all the half-sarcasm K'luha had to think as she stared at the ceiling.
*
Antimony (K'piru): Air, Antimony thought and instead said, "I will see about the additional blanket," before turning to head towards the door.
*
K'luha Haaz: 'Oh good. Azeyma has some mercy left for me. Now please just let me die before I have to bear this bullshit any further.' Only half sarcastic thoughts.
*
Twinflame: K'ile exhaled and nodded, strangely relieved by K'piru's declaration of a (hopefully temporary) exit. "Alright. I'll be here." He looked at K'luha, trying quickly to form words.
*
Antimony (K'piru): Perhaps a little too quickly, Antimony disappeared through the door, shutting it quietly behind her. Once in the hall, she leaned back against the wooden door for several moments, as though it were the only thing holding her upright, and blinked at a wet blur across her vision.
*
K'luha Haaz: Well. Finally. Silence.Â
"Well. As thankful as I am for you picking me off the desert floor, which you left me on by the way. I'd like to remind you that you left me on my face. On the desert floor. With a child that you helped adopt. And a broken hip. And you left. With no weapon. With a flimsy lie. For over two weeks. And yet, everything is my fault." And K'luha left it angrily silent as she glowered up at the ceiling and hope it would toppled in and just kill everything.
*
Twinflame: K'ile didn't delay after K'piru left, igoring K'luha's rant and turning his gaze on the woman to forcefully declare, "I love you." Which was stupid to just blurt out on its own, but damn it.
*
K'luha Haaz: K'luha opened her mouth to speak. Then closed it. The opened it again. Then closed it. There was a long pause before she frowned at him and shoved a punch at his stomach.
"Then don't fucking ditch me in the middle of the fucking desert with a broken hip and vanish for two goddamn weeks! And DON'T let the way I fucking find you be K'ailia telling me we're going home together and that she saw you!" K'luha was blushing fervently and crossed her arms beneath her chest. Stupid idiot K'ile. "And you're not like K'yohko..." She added in a very hushed afterthought.
*
Twinflame: Cringing at the punch and spinning to his feet, K'ile said, "I know! I'm sorry! It's not like I planned on it. Listen." He gestured with hands, tail and ears as he spoke, walking in a circle so tight he might as well ahve been spinning, "Everyone I love dies. I promised K'thalen I'd become Nunh and take care of K'piru and her kids, but they didn't even make it back from Cartenau. I bet everything I had on K'piru," he pointed at the door, "And she left! Walked right off into the desert and left me alone in the middle of the night!"
He stopped and held up his hands to K'luha, "And I know I did the same thng to you and that's not fair, but I've been TRYING to make everyone HATE me ever since Piru left and I wasn't ready for you to screw with that so, yes, I ran away and went looking for Piru. And I don't even know why I did it!"
*
K'luha Haaz: K'luha was somewhat taken aback by his sudden confession. Simultaneous happy he was confessing to her, and furious that he was such a fucking idiot. Also somewhat angry at herself for liking his stupid ass. It was a fine ass... wait what? Off topic.
"You could have just fucking told me you needed time to yourself! Or that you were looking for K'piru! I would have stayed out of your way and wouldn't have gone fucking nuts worrying about you!" K'luha shot back, grabbing a pillow and chuking it at his face. "And you're really good and bad at making people hate you! You know that? Because I want to punch your face and kiss you at the same idiot you retard!" Luha flushed, her tail and ears frazzled that she even bothered to admit such a thing.
*
Twinflame: K'ile took the pillow to his face and caught it in his teeth. Biting down on it helped his nerves, and he gave it a feral shake before letting it drop to the floor and walking over to the bed. "Well I've just about given up on making you hate me. If you don't hate me yet I can get away with just about anything. Look." He put a hand on each of her shoulders and pushed her back down against the bed. "No moving around!"
*
K'luha Haaz: Luha snorted, half-heartedly laughing at watching him shake the pillow around in his mouth. He looked like a jackal doing that sort of thing. She remained still as he pushed her shoulders down into the bed and hovered nearby.
"My hip is broken, not my arms." K'luha retorted, her tail wiggling out from beneath her and lightly tickling K'ile's side.
*
Twinflame: Uttering a neutral huff of disreggard, K'ile dropped his body down over K'luha's and kissed her lips, hands still on her shoulders.
*
K'luha Haaz: Soooo much shit. She was going to get so much shit from everyone back home. She was already in a lot of shit with the elders for being stupid and taking the fall for things that weren't even her fault, and yet. Most of her didn't really care right now. Momentarily, at least, she just let her entire frustration with everything drop to return K'ile's kiss.
*
Twinflame: Ignoring his earlier insistence that she not move, K'ile put one hand behind her neck and let the other run down her side and behind her back, pulling her slightly up and against him as he kissed her longer. Her familiar smell mixed with the taste of her kiss, the feel of her body, each sensation magnifying the others. His senses were full of K'luha.
*
K'luha Haaz: K'ile was really good at being a hyporite. Like, really good. She would make him a medal or something for it someday and promptly beat him with it at some point. Still, K'luha was compliant and happily shifted her arms to hug his lower torso lightly. She somehow felt like she was calming down, and wondered if they had just done this stupidity earlier if it would have helped.
*
Twinflame: Letting his lips move off of hers, he lid his mouth over her cheek and tasted the dramtic flavor of her sweat and the dirt she'd in. He liked it, and lay a wet kiss on her jaw. "Hate me yet?"
*
K'luha Haaz: K'luha made a soft noise as he finally relinquished her lips, only to slobber on her cheeck and jaw. Again, she let out a soft noise, though this one was lower before sighing. "No. But we're in so much shit right now." Luha whined softly, whishing the elders would lighten up a little bit on it. She probably wouldn't be too badly punished because she had a broken hip but... she was a little worried for K'ile. Maybe if they just never had sex the elders would let them do whatever it was they did. K'luha could live with that if it was allowed.
*
Twinflame: Holding her tight against, K'ile nuzzled his face down by her neck, laying a small kiss there. "Right now? No. Right now we're just here."
*
K'luha Haaz: Luha bit her bottom lip lightly and carefully hugged him in return, mindful of her hip. Which by the way, hurt to sit up but she sure as fuck wasn't about to ruin the moment. Not this moment. It was too important.Â
"I'm... thank you. I feel... better. Much." Luha whispered softly, rubbing his back tenderly with her hands.
*
Twinflame: "Good," K'ile lifted his face and kissed K'luha's lips again, then leaned back and began to slips his arms off of her, "I'm not going to let K'piru catch us making out, though."
*
K'luha Haaz: Luha savored the last precious kiss before allowing K'ile to shuffled away. A small smile turned the corners of her lips before she glanced away.Â
"Mmm... that would really scare her away. Although... I never got to really see her after you all returned from Cartenu save for when I fell through that tent. I know she left. You told us that but... Does she hate us?" K'luha looked to K'ile with concern in her eyes. She was yes, still concerned for her aunt K'piru. Or whatever it was that she called herself these days.
*
Twinflame: "No," K'ile said, adjusting the harness on his chest. "She's afraid, actually, or at least that's how she smelled. But she's..." he froze, suddenly, as he remembered the warmth of K'piru's hug, the shivering voice with which she'd apologized. He recalled her scent, and her touch, and the taste of the air she'd breathed. He swallowed, and said, "She might run away again. I don't know what to... I keep trying to..."
*
K'luha Haaz: K'luha paused and glanced about the room. All of K'piru's things were here. And K'ile had her scent pretty much down didn't he? It wasn't as if he couldn't find her again but... if she was just going to keep running away. Luha shifted her hands and moved to grab K'ile's in reassurance.Â
"You can go after her. It's not like I'm going anywhere. Maybe two of us is just too many for her. You can go after her and sent someone from the front desk to move to to another room if you want. I love K'piru too. She's my aunt. She helped me deliver two children and recover from the first loss. I've always wanted to help her, but I don't think I can. So go after her."
*
Twinflame: He shook his head, "No. I won't." He sat on the bed next to K'luha, looking at her hand, "If she wants to run away I'll let her, because... She wouldn't be doing it if she didn't need to. She loves us, and the tribe. If there were any way for her to stay she would. So I won't chase her. I won't hurt her." He looked away from K'luha to hide the tears in his eyes. He felt sick, and a wave of cold rushed over him. "Anyway. She just went to get a blanket. She'll be back any second now."
*
K'luha Haaz: K'luha found it very... strong of K'ile to think that. He was stronger than she had thought. Stronger than he probably gave himself credit for. Part of her wanted to think something bitterly about him not ever wanting to hurt Piru but not giving a shit if he hurt herself... but the thought died before it ever happened. Piru was delicate. K'luha decided K'ile was right. If she needed to run, then she needed to run.Â
Ignoring the pain in her hip, she shifted to wrap her arms around Kile's waist and press her head lightly against his back.Â
"She'll come back then... It might take a little longer but... I think she'll come back." Luha assured him softly, leaving a soft kiss on the small of his back. She wished she could be more reassuring but, this was all she had.
*
Twinflame: K'ile accepting the reassurance coldly despite its warmth. He wasn't so sure, and he was terrified and nauseous, and he just closed his eyes and ducked his head to try and calm himself down before he started crying like an idiot. After a moment, he took a deep breath and pried K'luha off of him, turning to push her back down. "No moving this time. For real. I'll tie your ass to the bed."
*
K'luha Haaz: K'luha felt a bit disheartened that she wasn't helping him at all. Maybe he just needed to freak out. Although... Luha faintly thought if K'ile broke down and K'piru went missing she was probably going to die on the bed this time since she couldn't very well move to take care of herself.Â
"Alright..." K'luha gave in, dropping her arms in surrender. "I won't move. But you have to breathe, okay?"
*
Twinflame: He smiled, "I'm breathing. I'll be just fine."
*
K'luha Haaz: K'luha raised a brow at him, but decided trusting him and listening was the best way to decrease his stress. There was nothing else she could do now but lay still.Â
"Alright but... don't be stupid like me and run off to have a breakdown? Can you just... have it right here if you're going to have one? So I can at least try to help?" Luha pleaded, ears flattening against her head.
*
Twinflame: "I'm not going to have a breakdown," K'ile said, reaching out and putting a hand on K'luha's face. "This isn't like last time I tried to help Piru. I'm going to become Nunh for you, not her. And I need to take care of Tahj and the tribe. So I'm not going to have a breakdown."
*
K'luha Haaz: Luha smiled faintly as he pushed his hand on her face and reassured her he wouldn't. She reached a hand up to place hers own top of his hand before pulling it lightly off her face.Â
"Right well. I had things to take care of but that didn't really stop me from breaking down. And of course now I'm on bad terms with K'ailia again too. She just makes me so upset when I see her." Luha pouted for a moment before glancing back to K'ile wonder if distracting him was helping at all. "But... I'm glad you and K'piru found me. I think I'll actually be able to lay down and heal finally with K'piru's help... I'm very grateful to her..."
*
Twinflame: "You just needed that Sagolii touch," K'ile said, adding a lighter tone to his voice. "And try nto to worry so much about K'ailia. If you do that, I'll try not to worry too much about Piru, alright?"
*
 K'luha Haaz: "Deal." K'luha nodded. That was something she could really get behind. If Piru was alive after five years then, she was okay. She could manage on her own right? That's what K'luha was trying to convince herself of at least.
After the first two laying where she had fallen, her mind had suddenly raced back to Tahj. Who would care for her if K'luha died? Somehow it spurred her to crawl across the desert's floor, each little movement causing more pain than the last, until she had finally made it under the rock for shelter. It had probably been five or six hours since he fight with K'ailia and Ul'dah still loomed ominously in the distance. While she could see the city's massive shape, she couldn't make out any details so she knew she had run a decent ways away.Â
Perhaps too far. She was in too much pain to concentrate properly on using Aether or an Aetheryte, and too far off the road to solicite help from anyway. Grasping roughly for handfuls of sand, K'luha didn't notice her own body shivering while she tried to think of a plan.
*
Twinflame: Dragging K'piru across the sand had been a strangely nostalgic experience for K'ile, even though he couldn't remember ever having done so before. It had always been K'thalen who would pull K'piru after him, K'ile only rarely trotting alongside. The movement had at first made the silence natural, but as time stretched on and they still hadn't caught up to Luha, his mind wandered and the pressure of K'piru's hand in his own grew warm.
It wasn't that he didn't have anything to say to K'piru, or that it would be difficult to begin, since he had her out here all alone anyway. But he was just so afraid to say the wrong thing and send her fleeing back into anonymity again.
He was also burdened by his concern for K'luha, but that had become a static simmering in the back of his head, easily compartmentalized. Occasionally a pang of fear would break through, when he thought they were close, and K'ile would worry that the woman had fallen into a ditch or run into a predator. He would remember the way she'd screamed when the wolves had gotten her back in Thanalan.
But as her scent aged, the fear would recede. For a woman with a broken hip, she'd made a hell of a run. K'ile was beginning to wonder if she figured out how to fly when finally the scent of the woman grew strong and did not fade.
"She's close," he said to K'piru, his hand tightening around hers. He'd grown sweaty in the sun, his palm turning clammy, but he hadn't let go of the woman's hand. Doing so strangely unthinkable. K'ile slowed their pace to a quick walk, searching the earth for clues of movement, and called out, "Luha!"
*
Antimony (K'piru): The pace K'ile had set was difficult for K'piru. Though she had traveled with some regularity for past work, it was generally on the back of a chocobo or a cart, only occasionally on foot, and even throughout her life with the tribe, she had never reached the physical endurance of the hunters. Still, she clung to the tia's hand and managed to keep alongside him.
The physical exertion kept her thoughts from dwelling on the painful reminders that seemed ever constant with the scent and presence of family, shadows that might have sent her fleeing once more in the opposite direction if she allowed them too much space.
That K'piru didn't respond when K'ile began calling for K'luha was both an artifact of her internal distraction, as well as her lack of available breath.
*
K'luha Haaz: There was a distant call. K'luha's ears flickered upwards to listen more closely. Something was calling her name. Something... or someone. Was it K'ailia? Come to say more cruel words and hurt her mother further? It seemed to be her favored activity these days. K'luha remained silent and close to the ground, her form shadowed and hidden fairly well beneath that rock. A rock that K'ile and K'piru weren't far off from.Â
It took K'luha some time before she actually recognized the voice, but even then she didn't believe it. K'ailia had said K'ile was in Ul'dah, but then why would be he out here looking for her? He had left her on her face on the floor before, K'luha thought spitefully. Her temper boiled the more she heard his voice and she wanted to hurl the rock she was hiding under at him. No, she did not want K'ile to find her. If he was going to abandon and lie to her, she wasn't going to be fooled a second time.
*
Twinflame: K'ile tracked K'luha's scent to strange marks in the dirt, Unlike the Sagolii sands, Thalan dirt was thick and heavy, with dark soil just beneath a thin layer of red dirt. He could see where K'luha had lingered, knocking a great deal of dirt aside. There were lines from fingers out to one side, the snake-like lines of a tail moving against the ground. Had she fallen?
It looked like she'd dragged herself over...
There. K'ile's ears stood up and don't that way as his gaze searched the shadowed rocks, and then his ears went flat against his hed hair. He muttered in frustration, "Luha, you..." nad pulled on the leather harness about his chest before he stood and pulled K'piru towards the rocks. "K'luha!" She had herself hidden well, as though she were playing a game.
*
Antimony (K'piru): K'piru's fingers flexed around K'ile's hand, the warmth that had built there suddenly going cold as ice as he moved them both towards the rocks. Her gaze locked forward on the shadows there, but she could only look through them blankly, suddenly terrified of even laying eyes on K'luha's form. She wanted to tear her hand from K'ile's and bolt, but her legs continued to follow him of their own volition.
Her breath came in short bursts through her nose as they neared and then stilled entirely when her eyes caught sight of the limp curve of a blonde tail and one foot poking out from behind a rough wall of stone. Her legs, too, stopped.
*
K'luha Haaz: K'luha still said nothing. She could smell them now they were so close... but they? There was definetely someone with K'ile. And it wasn't K'ailia. Someone else... someone that smelled of the city. Of Ul'dah.Â
She did not want to meet K'ile or whomever he had brought with him. Whomever was so important that he would lie and abandon her on her face in the desert was not someone K'luha wanted to ever see. Maybe she deserted that. Maybe she deserted to be dropped in the desert and abandoned, but Tahj? He had abandoned Tahj too. He wasn't there for her arrival. He wasn't there for Tahj. And Tahj had never done him any wrong. She did not deserve it.
*
Twinflame: The Tia pulled the ex-shaman around the stone, clambering carefully and making sure not to outpace K'piru. When he could finally see K'luha's form laying on the stone, could see the woman's face, he said, "Don't hide from me, Luha."
*
Antimony (K'piru): At some point after spotting the first glimpse of K'luha, K'piru had stopped consciously gripping K'ile's hand, her fingers going limp in his own, and her legs wobbled like jelly as he pulled her across the rocks. When he spoke, calling down to the injured woman, his voice sounded as though very far away, muffled by a heavy, echoing pulsing in her ears. She fell back, would let her hand fall from K'ile's if his grip allowed it, and found herself entirely incapable of looking towards the other woman, though she could practically smell her pain.
In her head, someone screamed.
*
K'luha Haaz: K'luha felt her stomach tense as she was spotted. It wasn't like she could run anyway. Although she wanted to. Less like run and more like beat the shit out of K'ile. Don't hide he said... and why wouldn't she?Â
She couldn't look towards K'ile and whoever it was.Â
"You lied to me." She hissed with a malice and anger in her voice that was rarely used.
*
Twinflame: When K'piru pulled against him, K'ile's hand instinctively tightened. He barely noticed her restraint, though, reachting as though she'd simply lost her balance and he was helping her maintain it. His attention was turned all towards Luha, and he continued towards her, closing the distance until her could crouch in front of her, "What about? I'm sorry. What are you doing out here?"
*
Antimony (K'piru): Only K'ile's strength kept K'piru moving forward - literally, as he all but dragged her across the rocks, her legs stumbling to keep her upright as her body refused to actively partake in moving her towards K'luha. Her scent was different from K'ile's but still innately familiar and, above all, a recaller of fire and ash and death. K'piru made a choking sound in the back of her throat and tried desperately to wrest her thoughts back from that brink of panic.
K'luha was hurt. Her own fears did not matter until K'luha was safe.
*
K'luha Haaz: About what? He was so goddamn oblivious. His stupidity burned angrily in Luha's throat until she finally turned her head to look at him. He was fine. Not a damn scratch on him. Perfectly, and utterly, in perfect health.Â
"You LIED to me." K'luha's voice raised in fury, her tone really empahsising the severity of the transgression. "You said you would come back in the morning. Then you said you would meet us at Drybone. You LIED to me. You LIED to Tahj! Maybe I desered the sleepless nights, the sickening worry. You didn't even take your fucking lance. Tahj didn't deserve that. She deserved to have you home and showing her around. She deserved to have you there with her while I had to come back to this shithole to deal with my cruel daughter. But you fucking LIED to me! To her! What was so important you had to lie? What was so terrible you couldn't have just told me? Did you think I was going to say no? Did you think I was going to make fun of you!? Why didn't you trust me!? Why did you LIE TO ME!?" K'luha fumed furiously, torn between shaking anger and pain.
*
Twinflame: So from the get go K'ile was absolutely convinced that there was no way in hell to answer that question honestly and live. At least not without letting K'piru in on thoughts and feelings that would send her into a whole so deep she'd probably have a phobia of red hair and blue eyes for the rest of her life.
It wasn't that he de didn't think K'luha deserved the truth. It was just... K'piru...
"Because I'm a liar," he said. "So just hate me. I won't argue. You can stab me in the neck when we're done. But first you need to let K'piru help you." K'ile looked up at the woman behind him.
His senses were so full of the scent of K'luha's anger that he hadn't noticed K'piru's fear until he looked back at her. Usually K'piru was at the top of his priority list, the head of his attention. K'luha was encroaching on that territory. Maybe K'ile shouldn't have brought K'piru. Maybe the shaman was already renewing her decision that she didn't want anything to do with him, with them.
But then, "K'piru. Don't let her scare you. She's hurting more than she shows."
*
K'luha Haaz: K'luha was ready to strangle him. Because he was a liar? That wasn't a goddamn answer. That was him trying to get out of the damn question. She had no words for a moment, only a loud and furious hiss towards K'ile... until he distracted her with the mention of K'piru.Â
She blinked for a moment. K'piru? She was... alive? And well? And here!?Â
K'luha brightened for a moment. They were just... reuniting with all sorts of lost family and it was... Luha was happy about it. She wanted them to come home sometimes. To feel welcome at home. She wanted to be able to see him when she went out of the tribe. Maybe if it was like that she and K'ailia could get along... but K'ailia was cruel to her. Judgemental. Her son wouldn't have been like that. If only... But she was getting distracted from the real issue here.
"K'piru!?" K'luha questioned, pulling herself forward and poking her head out from her hiding place to look for the shaman. She didn't sound angry, but rather somehow excited at the prospect of seeing her aunt.
*
Twinflame: K'ile looked back to K'luha solemnly, pulling K'piru forward and taking the shaman's hand in two of his own.
*
Antimony (K'piru): She couldn't handle this. She didn't know why she had thought she could. K'luha's face peeked out from around the rock, and the sight of it nearly ruined K'piru. The other woman's mouth moved, but she could not hear her voice, could hear only the screams of the dying, the burning.
A weight on her hand dragged her forward, closer, and her gaze dropped from K'luha's face to some vague point in the sand next to her. With an internally violent effort, she brought down iron walls between her thoughts and the memories and grief stirred by the presence of family, and stepped forward. She did not listen to the screams of her daughters, nor did she watch the flesh of her nunh where K'luha's would have been. Expression blank, she held out a hand towards K'luha's hip, as though gesturing towards it, and spoke flatly, "I need to see it. You're ill."
*
K'luha Haaz: K'piru looked... well it was her surely. She looked a little older and decidedly sick. K'luha slinked back a bit, wondering why it was that K'piru looked so sick. Was it her? Was this what K'ile abandoned her and Tahj for? It wouldn't be the first time, she thought bitterly. She loved her aunt dearly, but both her aunt and K'ile had shut her out painfully and frigidly after the Calamity.Â
"K'piru..." K'luha called softly, worriedly. "It's... good to see you after all these years..." Maybe that would put her more at ease? K'luha wasn't sure what would help, but K'piru could not hide the fact from K'luha that she seemed to be shattering into a million pieces.
*
Antimony (K'piru): "The wound will leak into your blood if you do not allow me to do something," K'piru elaborated, voice quiet and detached.
*
K'luha Haaz: Why was she...? K'luha slunk back beneath the rock. It was so nice to see her but... there was such a frigid feeling there. Like K'piru couldn't stand to look at her. Why had K'ile forced her out here in the first place? Had he just run into her? Or had he gone looking for her? K'luha couldn't help but feel that frigid air return, just as she had felt it when K'ile returned after the Calamity.Â
"It fine... I can see you're not well K'piru. I'm sorry K'ile dragged you out here when you didn't want to see me." K'luha closed her eyes and turned her head away. This wasn't at all how she imagined... not that she had ever really imagined it. "Go ahead and go back to spend your time together." This is what K'luha assumed they were doing before whatever brought them out here. "K'ile left me with a broken hip on my one once. I assume he has no problem doing it again." This was said a bit spitefully towards K'ile but she managed to stay with a rather passive tone of voice.
*
Twinflame: "You were supposed to go back to the tribe and get it taken care of!" K'ile snapped, letting go of K'piru and reaching out to take K'luha by the arm, refusing to let the woman retreat. "You know, I'm sorry if it's inconvenient for you and you don't want to bother anyone, but you don't get to hide in a fucking hole and die! I'm tired of people doing this shit. Especially you." K'ile was not kind about grabbing pulling K'luha out of the hole. She already hated him and she was already in pain. She didn't get to hate him to death just because she was sad.
*
K'luha Haaz: "And you were supposed to meet me in the morning!" K'luha snapped back, her fury regained almost instantly. She wanted not to give him the satisfaction of know how much pain she was in, but the rough way he yanked her from beneath the rock sent her entire body racking with intense pain. K'luha screamed and tried to pull her arm back, her whole body shaking violently from the intense pain. Luha was a strong woman. One that did not cry often to pain, but this was not something she could hold back. Blubbering for a few moments with tears and shaking, she was unable to throw any sort of anger back at K'ile while she drowned in pain.
*
Antimony (K'piru): For a long moment after K'ile dropped her hand that felt more akin to a breathless eternity to K'piru, she wavered amidst the stones. The pungent, salty scent of Luha's pain served as a focal point in the chaos of her own panic, and she moved forward, dropping to the ground alongside the other woman. Her hands reached out, one resting firmly on K'luha's side, the other feeling gently at her hip.
There was no time or sense for ceremony here. Shaking fingers made to pull the other woman's waistband aside so that she could see the injured area below, all the while her features remained taught and blank. She did not reply to K'luha's words.
*
K'luha Haaz: K'luha had almost recovered enough to think again by the time she realized K'piru was kneeling next to her. This felt a little familiar, as it was K'piru who helped deliver both her children. Although, this pain was probably far more intense. When K'piru touched it even gently, K'luha screeched again and tried to squirm away from the woman.Â
Her brain couldn't even make sense of anything but the excruiating pain that seemed to rack her every muscle and force them to contract pinfully. It was probably lucky for K'luha that she had pretty much run out of her room in a pair of pantlettes and a camise. Mostly now that K'piru was moving it, there wasn't a lot of fabric to move or irritate the sight further. Although it was surely a completely mess to look at. What had started to heal had been completely broken through now, and what had been a fracture was now a clean break with bone pressing at the skin and tearing it parcially open.Â
Luha cried loudly, still trying to crawl away from K'piru's touch. She wasn't sure what she was screaming, but she thought it might be something like 'No, please dont touch it. Leave me alone.'
*
Twinflame: K'ile pulled K'luha to him, in what was a familiar gesture. But this was very different. On his knees, he pulled K'luha's shoulders onto lap. This time he took her arms and held them, tried to cross them over her chest so she couldn't get away or struggle. "I'm sorry, K'luha, but K'piru said you might die. You can't do that. What would Tahj and I do?"
*
Antimony (K'piru): The body beneath her hands twisted and writhed, a sand-colored worm of desperation. K'piru blinked at the exposed skin, its surface distended at an unnatural point, the flesh painted dark, sickly colors and surrounded by an angry red heat. The body made noises, in protest, but K'piru's hands remained certain on its form.
Broken, K'piru could tell, but as she extended her senses - first tenatively, weakly, as though afraid of some unknown backlash - towards the thin lines of the body's aether, K'piru found there was more to the story. About the bone the energy had pooled in an ugly mess, a solid, unyielding knot as though it had tried to protect itself. Scar tissue, barely formed. The wound was old, had begun to heal, but something had made it much worse since.
Outside this clinical awareness, K'piru felt faint, the screams pressed in and swayed briefly over K'luha's form before regaining herself. "I cannot treat it here," she murmured, hands hovering over the shuddering, agonized body. "In my room there is... I may be able to draw out some of the poison."
*
K'luha Haaz: K'luha struggled again K'ile, finding some comfort in his touch and at the same time not wanting to. She wanted to push him off and kick his stupid head in. How dare he try to toch her after he had lied to her. How dare he try and act like she mattered when he lied and walked away from her for over two weeks. As if he really gave a fuck if she died. She could have died where he left her from that fall. But K'ile didn't care, of this K'luha was obessively convinced. No one would have cared if she died. In fact, they all would have been happier.Â
"Liar." K'luha hissed hysterically at K'ile. "You LIED to me and dissappeared for over two weeks. You don't care. Everyone would be better off if I had just been exiled and Maka had stayed. Maka didn't raise a spoilt brat who doesn't care about her people. She didn't raise that girl to become a cruel outsider. Tahj is a good girl. And K'ailia would have been if Maka raised her. K'ailia is so cruel to me... and she doesn't even care how she hurts. She chose to walk away. I could have handled if she died, but she walked away on her own choice. It's so much worse than any death. You don't choose death. But to just walk away after all the suffering and sacrafices we made... I made... and just... not care about it... about me? I can't...." K'luha was still shaking, although for the time being she had stopped squirming. It all hurt to much.Â
"Just leave me in the damn desert again. Just drop me on the floor again and walk away for another two fucking weeks K'ile. I w-want to be with my son. I never got to hold him long enough... I want to hold him again... my son..." Burning hot tears of shame leaked now, and though they weren't actually any different from normal tears, they felt like they burned her eyes when she cried them.
*
Twinflame: Keepling Luha pinned in place, K'ile gave K'piru an empathetic look. "I think Luha's beyond reason at this point, and I don't think she's going to be doing any walking, either." He looked down at Luha and said, "I can carry you, but you need to let me. Don't struggle or you'll hurt yourself."
*
K'luha Haaz: Luha remained pitifully crying for a few long moments before she gathered enough of herself to look up at the messy head or oranges and reds that was K'ile. The idea of hurting herself seemed somehow funny in her hysteria and delirium. For a moment she thought she had freed herself and slit open her wrists, and was rather surprised when she looked at her wrists and found them fine.Â
"You lied to me." Luha repeated, still fiercely directed at K'ile. "Just shut me out and leave me behind like you always do. No one cares anymore. I don't even care anymore. I want to be with my son." K'luha seemed to go limp with her last breathy declaration but her eyes were still open, staring at the sand like she was looking at her son.
*
Antimony (K'piru): K'luha's words reached K'piru's ears distantly, and though she tried desperately to keep her focus and energy on examining the woman's wound and /not/ on the person inside the body beneath her hands, the voice still slipped past her walls to ghost through her thoughts.
She recoiled from the woman in the sand then, her own tail curling against her leg through her clothes. K'luha's words sounded with a chilling familiarity that shook an icey dread down to the base of her spine. Closing her eyes, she saw dunes shadowed by an unnatural night, felt rough fingers wrapped about her arm, her body, restraining her, holding her back. She recalled how she had wanted to throw herself to the sands, let the pitiless gaze of Azeyma decide her fate, if the goddess even cared to look.
"Take her," K'piru muttered weakly, staggering to her feet with one hand curling against her head. "Take her to my room."
*
Twinflame: The Tia nodded somberly, the red hair atop his head shivering like fire in the wind. "I'll try not to hurt you, Luha," he said, and lifted her shoulders up by his own, lay her head against his head. He put one arm under her legs, another behind her back and under her shoulder, wrapping her and holding her to him and hoping he could keep the weight on the 'good' side of her hips.
He lifted her up and said to K'piru, "Let's go."
*
K'luha Haaz: "You already hurt me more than you can ever know." K'luha replied icly, grasping at the sands like it might hold her in place when K'ile tried to pick her up. Not that it did. She just ended up with hands full of nothing as he picked her up. K'luha screeched at the movement, her body shaking again in pain. Any movement at all felt like her spine was being ripped out.Â
Luha was torn between throwing herself to hug K'ile and ripping his eyes out, and flailed painfully between hugging him to snarling and scratching at his face. All the while screeching unintellible things that occasionally came to phrases like, 'You lied' and 'You're just like K'yohko' and 'Give me my son back'.
*
Antimony (K'piru): Turning away from both K'luha and K'ile came blessedly easy for Antimony, her eyes moving up to take in the silhouette of Ul'dah rather than the twisted, broken form in K'ile's arms. She said nothing further, only began to walk slowly back towards the city.
*
Twinflame: K'ile didn't resist K'luha's thrashing any more than he had to in order to hold her still, and didn't protest more than to say, "Stop it, Luha. Everything's all right," in a rather tired voice. He turned his face away from K'luha when she reached for his face, often ducking his head behind hers. He just held her and followed behind K'piru.
*
K'luha Haaz: K'luha couldn't understand it. Especially with how little K'ile seemed to care about her pain. She wasn't talking about the physical pain either. That was something she could deal with. But why was it everyone simply didn't care about her mental anguish? Or perhaps, she just cared too much.
Eventually K'luha quieted down to simply covering her face with her hands and choking on her own sobs whenever K'ile moved too much and her hip felt like it was breaking in two and then being jamed in opposite directions.
*
Antimony (K'piru): As they passed from open desert to refugee outskirts to the busy, dirty streets of Ul'dah itself, K'luha's scent - the pain and sweat and home of it - stayed present in Antimony's senses even as rot and disease stink pressed in with the other myriad smells of civilization. She did not pause to see if K'ile followed; she didn't need to with their scents so close by, though she wasn't certain she would have waited if they hadn't.
She hastened her steps, though not by much, and immediately felt guilty about the unconscious desire to lose them in the chaos of the streets.
The Quicksand, with its broad archways and curving walls, rose into view far quicker than it had seemed to take to get to K'luha, and Antimony hardly noticed as she passed through a side door into the main tavern. A few patrons turned with curious looks, but she did not notice those either. Again she tried to keep her mind focused on the pressing, physical issue: K'luha's hip and the infection brooding within it.
Not long later, she slipped into the back halls, past the turn with its ruined door, and arrived at her own room. The simple furnishings and empty walls, which had grown familiar over the weeks she'd spent in Ul'dah, seemed suddenly almost threatening as she stepped inside, leaving the door open behind her. There were not many signs of occupancy here, save for on the circular table at the foot of the bed, where papers piled in a wild mess, untended for days. Her tail shivered along with her hands as she stepped to the bed and stooped to collect a small box.
She had spoke not a word during this brief journey, and continued to move in silence even after entering her room. Speaking even once more threatened to shatter the fragile composure she'd gathered.
*
Twinflame: K'ile walked in silence and permitted himself no deep or comlicated thoughts about the woman in his arms or the many things that she seemed to hold against him. The rightness and the wrongness of her various accusations were as evident as her weight upon his arms and the rigidness her pain evoked in her body.
He concentrated on the sense and warmth of K'luha, the way the muscle's of her back and arm felt on his skin. The way her tail haung against his hip. This while he watched K'piru walk stiffly ahead of them, her gray-brown tail swinging back and forth with an occasional shiver to to it. He watched the lilt of her ears. He watched the small number of unkempt hairs that lay over the back of her neck, stuck there by sweat.
It was a long time after K'piru had initially invited him back to her room. Now he finally arrived, but K'luha had robbed all of the comfort from what would have been a preciously rare moment. K'piru, who had once left him so far in the dark, had invited him in. But he hadn't been able to come without K'luha. Despite his attempts to leave K'luha, he couldn't.
Placing K'luha on K'piru's bed was natural and yet strangely repulsive. The latter was not a feeling he wanted to own, and so he spat it out with the words, "Here we go, Luha. We're going to take care of you."
*
K'luha Haaz: There were many raging voices in K'luha's head. In one way, she felt the same coldness K'ile and K'piru had displayed towards her before. She had never forgotten that they completely disregarded her in the wake of the Calamity, but for some reason she had thought K'ile had moved past it. In a way, she had to admit he had because she was here in the first place. Maybe he would have ignored her before. But then again, he had lied to her and abandoned her which had helped cause this problem in the first place.
And K'luha was glad to see K'piru, truly she was but... her once favored aunt was so cold and disgusted by K'luha that it was hard not to feel hated. She didn't know what she had done to earn such hatred or disgust, and the only thin she could think was that K'piru was mad that K'ile had dragged her to help in the first place.Â
She felt disgusting. Her stomach coiled and flipped in her chest until she could not speak. K'luha had to close her mouth tightly, else she was afraid to vomit her own stomach out.
*
Antimony (K'piru): There was not much she could do here, Antimony thought dimly, ignoring the shuddering panic of K'piru roiling at the back of her mind. The box sat open in her lap to reveal a small collection of herbs and ointments, and a thin, carved, humanoid figure. The latter she took in one hand distractedly.
She was ill-prepared to deal with an injury as drastic as this one. Even pulling on what minor magics she knew, her best hope was to focus on drawing out the infection. Her ears flicked back, listening to the pained shifting of K'luha on the bed, and closed her eyes tightly for several seconds.
It is not K'luha, she told herself, ignoring the scent of the woman that mingled with K'ile's and persisted in sending her memories spiralling. It is an injured woman, whom you can help.
Feeling faint, Antimony stood and moved to the other woman's side. She kept her eyes on the weakly writhing body as one hand plucked a few strands of hair from its head, which she tied firmly about the figure in her hand before pressing the figure into the other woman's own hand, forcibly wrapping fingers about it. "Hold," she intoned lowly, and her voice shook but she didn't allow herself to spare that a thought.
Instead she took her attention to the hip and began to move the body on the bed in such a way that the spine and pelvis would straighten. She had not done anything of this sort in years, but the unyielding yet gentle touch came back with little effort. /Just a stranger who needs help./ One of the ointments she took from the box and, after pulling down the thin cloth of the woman's clothes, she began to slowly rub it into the skin. The air quickly filled with a sharp, pungent aroma, almost bitter. She needed ice, she thought, but there was no way she would get such a thing here. Instead, put her hands to cracked bone and battered flesh and called on things she had violently disavowed five years past.
*
Twinflame: Having taken up a stance a meter or two from the bed, K'ile's primary senses were still blunted by the strength of the odor exuded by K'piru's medicine. It was like someone shining a light in his eyes, and he put his hand over his nose in a futile gesture. He didn't need his sense of smell to know how K'luha felt, but for K'piru, things were a bit less certain. The once-shaman was enigma, and she could be feeling or thinking anything. It was strange to see her at work as a healer again.
*
Antimony (K'piru): The words that pushed through Antimony's throat came slow at first, reluctant and half-remembered. She faltered, as did her hands on the vibrantly bruised hip, at the thought that she had become a hypocrite, that even as she spoke Azeyma's name and murmured words of succor over and over again, she did not expect the so-called Warden to grant it.
The utilitarian in her silenced those thoughts as viciously as she had thrust aside her faith in the face of fire and death. Now was not the time for doubt.
Bending low over the form, strands of hair hanging into her vision, Antimony's awareness shrunk to only her hands, the flesh beneath them, and the bright, tortured lines of aether contorting their broken paths through the body she sought to heal. After the first ten minutes, she did not even think of the words she spoke; they tumbled from her lips with a trance-like steadiness. One hand moved without looking to grip K'luha's, which held the carved figure. She spoke its name in her thoughts and words, and with that name it gained a lure.
The angry, broken aether in K'luha's body stirred and, like a river, began to bend and pull away down a path of least resistance. Very deliberately, Antimony guided it, called on it, cajoled and dragged it out of where it should not be.
When the rhythmic, whispered chanting finally faded, so too had the ointment's bitter odor, along with the heat that had built dangerously between bone and blood and flesh. Antimony's body sagged, a low, shuddering exhale sapping strength from her posture as her hands fell away. Her vision blurred and she felt herself slip down until she was leaning against the edge of the bed, on her knees. She could not recall these rituals draining her in such a way, but then, she had never performed them with so little reagent, nor with so little faith. Breathing unsteadily, Antimony rested.
*
K'luha Haaz: K'luha had no real say over what was happening anymore. She couldn't fight back. She couldn't protest. She could do nothing but be a burden and stand between K'ile and K'piru's reunion. Her mind wandered back to older times, when this sort of thing had happened before. All of the times K'piru had held her hand and helped her heal, and there had been many. And she could remember Piru's face when she woke up from her coma. And again her face when she bore her first child, then lost it, then a second. All she had ever tried to be there for K'piru and failed. All the times she had tired to be there for K'ile too, and failed. And K'ailia too.Â
More than anything, K'luha wished she could just stop thinking. She was tired of feeling like a burden to everyone and everything. And yet being a burden was all she had ever known how to be in a relationship. Was Piru so disgusted with her now that her aunt could hardly stand to look at her? Maybe K'luha had thought poorly of Piru when she first left, but it was out of sadness more than any real anger. She was terribly sad that she lost her aunt. Everytime she had ever been angry it was because she was hiding a sadness.Â
There was a discomfort and a comfort the ritual held. It was something that had been done similarly before, which was far more comfortable than any sort of Gridanian healing. Yet all those thoughts of being a burden and Piru's apparent distate for Luha made her unplausibly sad. Why wouldn't K'ile trust her? Why wouldn't Piru? And for that matter, why did K'ailia not understand her mother's sadness?Â
K'luha made no noise, but staired emptily at the ceiling and let tears fall down her face; a newfound sadness plaguing her. A sadness that came with the loss of what she had thought to be her close knit family.
*
Twinflame: There wasn't a great deal of comfort in these caves that the Ul'dahn's called rooms. K'ile crouched against the wall opposite the bed where K'luha and K'piru were, watching the healing. He mostly watched K'piru's hands, her lips move with words K'ile found distant and strange. He noticed the movement of the shaman's gray ears and tail, the lean of her head, the set of her shoulders and hips.
He did not fail to notice K'luh's tears, but he did not watch them either. He did fail to notice anything about himself, for there was nothing about himself. K'ile Tia was empty of any feelings, and had no thoughts as to his own actions. What he would do with himself depended on those women, as it always had. Those women who he...
Well, that was a thought. And the way he took a breath deep enough to strain the limits of his lungs was a feeling. He ignored it, though, like Luha's tears. For now.
*
Antimony (K'piru): After a few minutes, Antimony shifted, straightening somewhat to lean back from the bed, though she remained on her knees. Unbidden, her eyes shifted to the right, to the profile of a face agonizingly familiar, but this lasted only a moment before her chest clenched, locking her breath in her lungs, and she had to turn away.
"She needs more than I... can give her," she spoke after another long pause, during which she smelled a memory of blood and burnt flesh. But no, she was in Ul'dah, and the only smells in the room were the fading bitterness of medicine and those of K'luha and K'ile. "I've taken the poison from her blood, but if it's not... allowed to heal, it will return." Her voice remained quiet, exhausted, directed down towards her lap as though her neck hadn't the strength to keep her head up. "She needs rest."
*
K'luha Haaz: For once in her life, K'luha didn't feel the immediate urge to get up and move about. She didn't want to fight against the healing process, nor did she want it to speed up. All she could do was lie still and feel numb and saddened.
*
Twinflame: The Tia stood and walked over to the bed. He put a hand on K'piru's shoulder, squeezed slightly, he hoped reassuringly. "Thank you. I'll make her rest." He looked over at K'luha and said, "Can you rest for me, Luha?"
*
K'luha Haaz: Finally a word which described her feelings came to mind. Betrayl. Yes, that was the sickening feeling that turned her stomach. Betrayed by K'ailia, and K'ile, and long ago by K'piru. Less K'piru, more K'ailia and K'ile.Â
Luha turned he head limply towards K'ile, eyes still accuistory but now hollowed with with a deeply hurt look in them. She did not answer, but she did not move either.
*
Antimony (K'piru): With a long breath, Antimony dragged herself to her feet, then wondered dimly when K'ile had gotten so near. She mumbled something, an excuse of some kind, and stepped around him towards the sink on the opposite wall. Her legs felt weak, and she leaned much of her weight on the metal dish before running the water and splashing it on her face.
*
Twinflame: K'ile met K'luha's gaze with an unaffected look. It was not one without feeling. There was concern there. But it was so strictly controlled that it did not vary. It was the same expression he'd been wearing since he'd put her down. He turned his gaze towards K'piru, but watched her half-heartedly.
This wasn't right. The feelings between all three of them were wrong. But he couldn't change what they were. He realized that he blamed K'luha for this, and that was prudent. She was being selfish, as usual. But blaming her didn't change anything, and it didn't change how K'ile felt about her or K'piru or anything else.
He said to K'piru, "If we got a room for she and I, would it be safe to move her there?"
*
Antimony (K'piru): Her ears drooped as she straightened. She could feel a few damp strands of hair sticking to her cheek and forehead, but through the numb exhaustion, she could not bring herself to fix them. Her thoughts answered K'ile's question with a 'yes', echoing that still dominant part of her that wanted to hide. "She shouldn't be moved more than necessary," she said instead.
*
Twinflame: "Maybe she should stay here for..." K'ile said, thinking over the prposition. K'luha would take more than one night to heal. Did K'piru want her around that long? Did she want her around at all? She'd only just barely agreed to spend more than five minutes with K'ile, and he was sure this hadn't been what she thought she was getting herself in to.
So instead he said, "We can figure it out. Maybe use the blanket as a cot." He was still afraid of chasing K'piru off, but maybe it was a bit late for that. If he left now, she might disappear. There was no right answer to this problem! There was no way to make this work!
He shook his head in a small display of frustration. "I don't know."
*
Antimony (K'piru): Turning back to face the rest of the room, Antimony looked to the wall behind the bed and removed her glasses to dry them distractedly with one sleeve of her dress. This was no different than the night she had readily sacrificed to help Mitari, she told herself, stifling the tremor in her hands by gripping the frame of her glasses harder. The vague blur of the room without the lenses made it easier to ignore the ache of loss in her chest.
"I can request an additional pillow and blanket from the front desk, if you wish to stay," she spoke dully. She did not bother wondering where she would sleep; she knew dreams would not be her friend after this.
*
Twinflame: K'ile shook his head, "I won't stay unless you ask me too. If you want to get a different room for yourself, I'll stay and take care of Luha."
*
Antimony (K'piru): "It is not in my budget." Which, was actually mostly true, but Antimony still wondered why she seemed to be trying to hard to... what? To keep them here? Even though she very much did not want any of the memories or feelings they stirred? There was no sense in that, especially not when even just thinking of the words K'luha had wailed brought old wounds festering to the surface. She closed her eyes, hugged herself.
*
K'luha Haaz: It was blatantly obvious she was in the way. And that K'piru wanted her anywhere but here now. And so K'luha finally spoke up.
"I can't move." She sighed loudly, hoping to draw both their attentions. "If you just put me somewhere it's not like I need taking care of. I'll just lay there. I'm sure you could throw me in a different room. Or with some help I could just Aetheryte to somewhere else if arrangements were made."
*
Twinflame: K'ile ignored K'luha, hearing her words and choosing not to respond to them. He repeated to K'piru, "I won't stay unless you ask me to." The statement felt so heavy in his mouth that they might have knocked him over, but he did not so much as sway on his feet.
*
K'luha Haaz: Really? What was even the point of going out of their way to save her when they were just going to ignore her? How was this suddenly all her fault? Wasn't K'ile the one in the wrong here? He was the one who abandoned her with no word! Why was this... suddenly all her fault?Â
K'luha gripped her hands into tight fists. She wanted to rip her stupid leg off and beat K'ile and K'piru to death with it out of sheer spite.
[12:40:40 AM] Antimony (K'piru): "You aren't going anywhere for the time being, so lie still," Antimony spoke suddenly, and with an only half-realized, unbidden vehemence at K'luha. No sooner had she let loose the words did she shrink back, looking away from the woman only to find her eyes on K'ile. She blinked at him for a second as though seeing him for the first time, and then looked hurriedly away.
Her head ached with a conflict of interest and need, and in the moments following her words the inn room felt very, very small. "I will--" her words cut off and she forced shaking hands to replace her glasses, the world once again slipping into focus. The physical world, at least. Her mouth opened again, and in the span of a second, she tried to say a million different things. When that failed, she tried to do another million, but even with the door so close as to be only a few short steps away from freedom, Antimony froze.
She recalled loneliness. She recalled nightmare.
"... Stay. It's not a bother," she finally managed in a weak voice.
*
Twinflame: "Alright," K'ile Tia exhaled, and felt as though some strange, steely thing slipped out of his body as he did so. He felt... better.
Even after all this, K'piru had not told him to leave, and she seemed to intend to stay as well. It was baffling to the point of unbelievable, and he almost expected to be mocked by some vision only to realize that he was dreaming. But he wasnt' asleep. Nobody was trying to recruited him into a magical flying all-male tribe, so he probably wasn't asleep.
K'ile sat down on the bed next to K'luha, leaned forward and rested his elbows on his knees, knit his fingers together. "Alright."
*
K'luha Haaz: 'Please. Something just kill me now before they start making out.' Was all the half-sarcasm K'luha had to think as she stared at the ceiling.
*
Antimony (K'piru): Air, Antimony thought and instead said, "I will see about the additional blanket," before turning to head towards the door.
*
K'luha Haaz: 'Oh good. Azeyma has some mercy left for me. Now please just let me die before I have to bear this bullshit any further.' Only half sarcastic thoughts.
*
Twinflame: K'ile exhaled and nodded, strangely relieved by K'piru's declaration of a (hopefully temporary) exit. "Alright. I'll be here." He looked at K'luha, trying quickly to form words.
*
Antimony (K'piru): Perhaps a little too quickly, Antimony disappeared through the door, shutting it quietly behind her. Once in the hall, she leaned back against the wooden door for several moments, as though it were the only thing holding her upright, and blinked at a wet blur across her vision.
*
K'luha Haaz: Well. Finally. Silence.Â
"Well. As thankful as I am for you picking me off the desert floor, which you left me on by the way. I'd like to remind you that you left me on my face. On the desert floor. With a child that you helped adopt. And a broken hip. And you left. With no weapon. With a flimsy lie. For over two weeks. And yet, everything is my fault." And K'luha left it angrily silent as she glowered up at the ceiling and hope it would toppled in and just kill everything.
*
Twinflame: K'ile didn't delay after K'piru left, igoring K'luha's rant and turning his gaze on the woman to forcefully declare, "I love you." Which was stupid to just blurt out on its own, but damn it.
*
K'luha Haaz: K'luha opened her mouth to speak. Then closed it. The opened it again. Then closed it. There was a long pause before she frowned at him and shoved a punch at his stomach.
"Then don't fucking ditch me in the middle of the fucking desert with a broken hip and vanish for two goddamn weeks! And DON'T let the way I fucking find you be K'ailia telling me we're going home together and that she saw you!" K'luha was blushing fervently and crossed her arms beneath her chest. Stupid idiot K'ile. "And you're not like K'yohko..." She added in a very hushed afterthought.
*
Twinflame: Cringing at the punch and spinning to his feet, K'ile said, "I know! I'm sorry! It's not like I planned on it. Listen." He gestured with hands, tail and ears as he spoke, walking in a circle so tight he might as well ahve been spinning, "Everyone I love dies. I promised K'thalen I'd become Nunh and take care of K'piru and her kids, but they didn't even make it back from Cartenau. I bet everything I had on K'piru," he pointed at the door, "And she left! Walked right off into the desert and left me alone in the middle of the night!"
He stopped and held up his hands to K'luha, "And I know I did the same thng to you and that's not fair, but I've been TRYING to make everyone HATE me ever since Piru left and I wasn't ready for you to screw with that so, yes, I ran away and went looking for Piru. And I don't even know why I did it!"
*
K'luha Haaz: K'luha was somewhat taken aback by his sudden confession. Simultaneous happy he was confessing to her, and furious that he was such a fucking idiot. Also somewhat angry at herself for liking his stupid ass. It was a fine ass... wait what? Off topic.
"You could have just fucking told me you needed time to yourself! Or that you were looking for K'piru! I would have stayed out of your way and wouldn't have gone fucking nuts worrying about you!" K'luha shot back, grabbing a pillow and chuking it at his face. "And you're really good and bad at making people hate you! You know that? Because I want to punch your face and kiss you at the same idiot you retard!" Luha flushed, her tail and ears frazzled that she even bothered to admit such a thing.
*
Twinflame: K'ile took the pillow to his face and caught it in his teeth. Biting down on it helped his nerves, and he gave it a feral shake before letting it drop to the floor and walking over to the bed. "Well I've just about given up on making you hate me. If you don't hate me yet I can get away with just about anything. Look." He put a hand on each of her shoulders and pushed her back down against the bed. "No moving around!"
*
K'luha Haaz: Luha snorted, half-heartedly laughing at watching him shake the pillow around in his mouth. He looked like a jackal doing that sort of thing. She remained still as he pushed her shoulders down into the bed and hovered nearby.
"My hip is broken, not my arms." K'luha retorted, her tail wiggling out from beneath her and lightly tickling K'ile's side.
*
Twinflame: Uttering a neutral huff of disreggard, K'ile dropped his body down over K'luha's and kissed her lips, hands still on her shoulders.
*
K'luha Haaz: Soooo much shit. She was going to get so much shit from everyone back home. She was already in a lot of shit with the elders for being stupid and taking the fall for things that weren't even her fault, and yet. Most of her didn't really care right now. Momentarily, at least, she just let her entire frustration with everything drop to return K'ile's kiss.
*
Twinflame: Ignoring his earlier insistence that she not move, K'ile put one hand behind her neck and let the other run down her side and behind her back, pulling her slightly up and against him as he kissed her longer. Her familiar smell mixed with the taste of her kiss, the feel of her body, each sensation magnifying the others. His senses were full of K'luha.
*
K'luha Haaz: K'ile was really good at being a hyporite. Like, really good. She would make him a medal or something for it someday and promptly beat him with it at some point. Still, K'luha was compliant and happily shifted her arms to hug his lower torso lightly. She somehow felt like she was calming down, and wondered if they had just done this stupidity earlier if it would have helped.
*
Twinflame: Letting his lips move off of hers, he lid his mouth over her cheek and tasted the dramtic flavor of her sweat and the dirt she'd in. He liked it, and lay a wet kiss on her jaw. "Hate me yet?"
*
K'luha Haaz: K'luha made a soft noise as he finally relinquished her lips, only to slobber on her cheeck and jaw. Again, she let out a soft noise, though this one was lower before sighing. "No. But we're in so much shit right now." Luha whined softly, whishing the elders would lighten up a little bit on it. She probably wouldn't be too badly punished because she had a broken hip but... she was a little worried for K'ile. Maybe if they just never had sex the elders would let them do whatever it was they did. K'luha could live with that if it was allowed.
*
Twinflame: Holding her tight against, K'ile nuzzled his face down by her neck, laying a small kiss there. "Right now? No. Right now we're just here."
*
K'luha Haaz: Luha bit her bottom lip lightly and carefully hugged him in return, mindful of her hip. Which by the way, hurt to sit up but she sure as fuck wasn't about to ruin the moment. Not this moment. It was too important.Â
"I'm... thank you. I feel... better. Much." Luha whispered softly, rubbing his back tenderly with her hands.
*
Twinflame: "Good," K'ile lifted his face and kissed K'luha's lips again, then leaned back and began to slips his arms off of her, "I'm not going to let K'piru catch us making out, though."
*
K'luha Haaz: Luha savored the last precious kiss before allowing K'ile to shuffled away. A small smile turned the corners of her lips before she glanced away.Â
"Mmm... that would really scare her away. Although... I never got to really see her after you all returned from Cartenu save for when I fell through that tent. I know she left. You told us that but... Does she hate us?" K'luha looked to K'ile with concern in her eyes. She was yes, still concerned for her aunt K'piru. Or whatever it was that she called herself these days.
*
Twinflame: "No," K'ile said, adjusting the harness on his chest. "She's afraid, actually, or at least that's how she smelled. But she's..." he froze, suddenly, as he remembered the warmth of K'piru's hug, the shivering voice with which she'd apologized. He recalled her scent, and her touch, and the taste of the air she'd breathed. He swallowed, and said, "She might run away again. I don't know what to... I keep trying to..."
*
K'luha Haaz: K'luha paused and glanced about the room. All of K'piru's things were here. And K'ile had her scent pretty much down didn't he? It wasn't as if he couldn't find her again but... if she was just going to keep running away. Luha shifted her hands and moved to grab K'ile's in reassurance.Â
"You can go after her. It's not like I'm going anywhere. Maybe two of us is just too many for her. You can go after her and sent someone from the front desk to move to to another room if you want. I love K'piru too. She's my aunt. She helped me deliver two children and recover from the first loss. I've always wanted to help her, but I don't think I can. So go after her."
*
Twinflame: He shook his head, "No. I won't." He sat on the bed next to K'luha, looking at her hand, "If she wants to run away I'll let her, because... She wouldn't be doing it if she didn't need to. She loves us, and the tribe. If there were any way for her to stay she would. So I won't chase her. I won't hurt her." He looked away from K'luha to hide the tears in his eyes. He felt sick, and a wave of cold rushed over him. "Anyway. She just went to get a blanket. She'll be back any second now."
*
K'luha Haaz: K'luha found it very... strong of K'ile to think that. He was stronger than she had thought. Stronger than he probably gave himself credit for. Part of her wanted to think something bitterly about him not ever wanting to hurt Piru but not giving a shit if he hurt herself... but the thought died before it ever happened. Piru was delicate. K'luha decided K'ile was right. If she needed to run, then she needed to run.Â
Ignoring the pain in her hip, she shifted to wrap her arms around Kile's waist and press her head lightly against his back.Â
"She'll come back then... It might take a little longer but... I think she'll come back." Luha assured him softly, leaving a soft kiss on the small of his back. She wished she could be more reassuring but, this was all she had.
*
Twinflame: K'ile accepting the reassurance coldly despite its warmth. He wasn't so sure, and he was terrified and nauseous, and he just closed his eyes and ducked his head to try and calm himself down before he started crying like an idiot. After a moment, he took a deep breath and pried K'luha off of him, turning to push her back down. "No moving this time. For real. I'll tie your ass to the bed."
*
K'luha Haaz: K'luha felt a bit disheartened that she wasn't helping him at all. Maybe he just needed to freak out. Although... Luha faintly thought if K'ile broke down and K'piru went missing she was probably going to die on the bed this time since she couldn't very well move to take care of herself.Â
"Alright..." K'luha gave in, dropping her arms in surrender. "I won't move. But you have to breathe, okay?"
*
Twinflame: He smiled, "I'm breathing. I'll be just fine."
*
K'luha Haaz: K'luha raised a brow at him, but decided trusting him and listening was the best way to decrease his stress. There was nothing else she could do now but lay still.Â
"Alright but... don't be stupid like me and run off to have a breakdown? Can you just... have it right here if you're going to have one? So I can at least try to help?" Luha pleaded, ears flattening against her head.
*
Twinflame: "I'm not going to have a breakdown," K'ile said, reaching out and putting a hand on K'luha's face. "This isn't like last time I tried to help Piru. I'm going to become Nunh for you, not her. And I need to take care of Tahj and the tribe. So I'm not going to have a breakdown."
*
K'luha Haaz: Luha smiled faintly as he pushed his hand on her face and reassured her he wouldn't. She reached a hand up to place hers own top of his hand before pulling it lightly off her face.Â
"Right well. I had things to take care of but that didn't really stop me from breaking down. And of course now I'm on bad terms with K'ailia again too. She just makes me so upset when I see her." Luha pouted for a moment before glancing back to K'ile wonder if distracting him was helping at all. "But... I'm glad you and K'piru found me. I think I'll actually be able to lay down and heal finally with K'piru's help... I'm very grateful to her..."
*
Twinflame: "You just needed that Sagolii touch," K'ile said, adding a lighter tone to his voice. "And try nto to worry so much about K'ailia. If you do that, I'll try not to worry too much about Piru, alright?"
*
 K'luha Haaz: "Deal." K'luha nodded. That was something she could really get behind. If Piru was alive after five years then, she was okay. She could manage on her own right? That's what K'luha was trying to convince herself of at least.
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