Where Darkness Dwells [Svv]

[Phaedra Acacia Rin]

There was blood on her hands, frozen and glittering like a ruby when she moved. Almost like a medicine she needed to take to stay alive, she killed to feel that way. The numbness had begun to sink in again and just feeling the simplest of emotions was difficult, let alone anything complicated and worthwhile. The last time it had happened, and she had banished it…had been over a hundred years ago and was marked in every Ice Fey mind until they too passed. The stories about her from that were many, how many of them had the truth were very few. The mass genocide of her last remaining relatives was now added (for those that were old enough to remember), to the systematic killing of everyone in her household when she was just a young girl. Phaedra’s reputation was that of a dangerous psychotic Queen that not many had the gall to question.

Once in awhile she found her way to the Wastelands. This was one of those times, after killing a few people in cold blood for no other reason besides that they had gotten in her way and she was dead inside once more. Here was a place she remembered with some sort of feeling. Elation and anger. The Queen of the Ice Fey had fought here and had to retreat as well. She was still not happy about it as those days were filled with feeling alive.

Being here she knew may invite unwanted attention, if she were the type to care about such things. Death fey or any other types that felt like preying on someone who appeared lost, were welcome to come and test her mettle. She was here because she wanted to be, even if it was a random occurrence and usually after she killed someone, or something. Not always was there blood involved in her killing. She was capable of killing with her touch and enjoyed taking a life with her kiss most of all. Such a poetic way to be frozen for all eternity.

It was dark and though her eyes were not bad it was difficult for her to see too far off from where she was standing. Pale eyes peered downward anyway to inspect the clothing she had fashioned from her magic. Ice and snow were woven together to mimic clothing well enough that it would be hard to tell it was not actually fabric, unless you touched it. A diaphanous dress that fell to her bare feet was what she had made this day, and here and there it glittered red, blood droplets that seemed like they were meant to be there.

“More blood on my hands. So many dead since my first many years ago. Maybe I should have kept count.” Her voice was soft, quiet in the unending twilight. Reaching out with one hand she caressed her fingers over an old statue that was broken. “Beauty that is dead, stuck forever in this place. You were loved once, fashioned by hands that enjoyed their work. What is it like, to be loved?” She did speak to the statue, but her words were rhetorical and of course there was no answer.

“There will be war again and I plan on being in the front of it all. If only to feel alive once more.” Her silent companion just stared off. “Silence is acquiescence.”

[Svv Mrk'ss]

The shadows embraced Svv’s form lovingly, enveloping and silencing his features to nothing but stark contrasts. The Wastelands turned all wanderers into the very statues that wrought the lifeless plain, for after long enough, one forgot what it was like to feel the softness of grass, to listen to the breath of another, and to instead become like stone. Death had a way of humbling the soul, though Svv sat upon his artifice like a master painter with his canvas, taking in the harsh and churning death with a private pleasure.

The quiet of the Earth was baffling, only whispers of the destroyed and lost brushed his ears, and always in an echo of somewhere far away. There was no chorus of endless noise, the sound that kept him alert and awake and apathetic; no, here he could only bask in something much more meaningful than life: a gilded silence, an echo of what the world would be like when it would return to zero.

Inspiration to live and stay alive was few and far between, spoken of hymns of the masters, or epic romances, but no, Svv had found his fountain of life in an ending that would be true poetry. Svv had not quite found what he was looking for, had not found the beauty he would like to one day hear, but damn, he was close.

A single lucid blue iris stood out against the shadows of the Woe, peering listlessly from the darkness of his eye socket to a woman that conversed with stone. He knew her song, though it had been a requiem he had not heard in a long while. Her soul had an ancient sound to it, one that penetrated Svv’s mock serenity. Her need to feel was strong in the air, Svv breathing it in like a haze, and after many moments of remembering, and watching, finally did he speak out to the being that embraced stone so lovingly.

Svv could not see the blood on her dress, but it took only an ear for otherworldly beings for him to notice she was drenched in the sound of someone’s dying plea. He could not help but wonder how the poor soul had died, a sick humor found in it that only jovial murderers could understand.

“So far away from your Kingdom of Ice, the Lady Phae must be in search of a muse, I dare say.” He tilted his head atop his long neck only slightly. He sat atop the wall of what once might have been a tower, sitting on a window ceil with the nature of a bird on a perch. On his back he had his violin, and his calloused hand delicately holding a bow, arms crossed over a single upturned knee.

He did not smile, though his eyes watched Phaedra with the look of a friend, with perhaps a bit of misplaced affection that was only shared with ones he perhaps respected, if not simply made curious by. Phae was a strange and abstract creature and it had been many a year since he had seen her outside the frozen walls.

[Phaedra Acacia Rin]

It wasn’t that the Queen of Ice was unobservant, but perhaps that she was never worried. It was hard to be close to her so an assassin was not something she even bothered to look for even though in the past there had been trouble with them. The fact that they died before ever getting a chance to put blade to flesh had been spread around to all courts. Phaedra may not be the most formidable of the Rulers but she was one of the hardest to kill.

It was because of her being lost in her own thoughts that she was not aware of Svv until she heard him speak. Her memory was still one of her best assets especially with the age she was at. His tone, the voice pricked her ears and something that could be mistaken for a twitch of the lips…a smile perhaps, lit upon her lips. Her body turned then and she peered to where his voice had come from, looking up much farther then she had expected. No wonder she had not known that she was not alone.

“I wander because I do. A muse? Could you perhaps inspire something in me dear Svv?” Terms of endearment were something she used when she knew a person and felt no ill will toward them. It wasn’t like she felt much toward anyone, but if she had known a person for a long time and had never wanted to kill them, that should account for something. So that was how Svv came to be called many things when they ever encountered each other. If others were ever privy to any of the meetings between the two of them, the rumors would be instantaneous. Yet there was never any touching or any type of physical demonstrations of affection. It was just not a possibility.

Her bare feet carried her to just underneath where he was perched. Tilting her head up to look at him was an odd sensation and she almost felt like falling. “My Kingdom does fine without me once in awhile. It is happening again, the great void in my mind.” Phaedra never hid the times when she completely lost it, it was just too well known to bother. Why she told Svv could be because there was a thread of trust there.

“What are you doing here then? Waiting like a crow that watches the dead? Waiting for someone to come and seek of you something?” Her hands smoothed down one forearm in turn, sloughing off the frozen blood like dry skin. Once more they were bare, pale and perfect and she chanced a glance to the ground, spying upon the mess it had made near her feet.

[Svv Mrk'ss]

It was quite the impulsive thing to come into the Fissure of Woe, where souls were fair game, and if you were taken by a fey that particularly did not like you, then, well, no one know it happened at all. Death in the FoW was common, and perhaps it was just in the nature of killers to go back to the scene of the crime. To dance to a thousand last requiems, and flirt with death a little more.

If ever there was a muse in the Immortal World, here it was to find it.

"I am afraid, it is I that always seems to seeking, my search is endless, I am afraid," he spoke thoughtfully to the Queen, finding her company always interesting. A few words from Phaedra were always almost musical, a sound he did not mind hearing in a world full of vapid noise.

"I am waiting for an old friend, actually," shadows crawled across Svv's face, revealing his black eye to be peering down, his gaze never meeting the ice fey, but instead through her, off into the nothingness of a thousand miles. He raised an eyebrow, in mild amusement. "Death has an appointment with me, but I am afraid he is being fickle. He is not a very good conversation, you see, so it is a bit of an ill-waited meeting, but a needed one none the less."

The smoke of the dying plea covered Phaedra like the very dress that draped her form. The sound like smoke, it curled and curled into itself, around the ice queen like an atmosphere that she breathed. Svv was not naive enough to think her harmless, knowing far different, even getting the rare glimpse of her in a passionate state, if ever there was one. Svv only wished he had been there to see the ice fey kill, surely a work of art in itself. How lucky the lovers of the Ice Queen were to kiss the lips of death, and breathe in that very smoke that killed so easily. It was tantalizingly unsatisfactory to have something in front Svv that he could not have, when all he wanted was a taste.

"The great void," Svv repeated, tilting his head back, shadow enveloping his features once more. He knew her plight, if only to a different degree. She wanted to feel, all he wanted was silence, opposites could be mde to be the same. "Perhaps it is time to take up arms again, Lady Phae, would you say waiting for death is really all that interesting?"

[Phaedra Acacia Rin]

Her voice was soft and higher pitched, with her head tilted back to look up at him it changed it just enough that it was still hers but slightly strained. “Forever shall we search? It is the nature of things. Change is rare and only comes when we push for it so.” There was a time, when she was very young, that Phaedra had believed in fate. Now she knew that only you could shape your future and make your life truly something magnificent. Most just stood by and watched, allowing others to play them as puppets, of which she enjoyed to do. “I will not let things idle for too much longer. Change will come again, violent and swift.”

It would almost be a threat if there was any tone to it at all. Instead it was said the same as everything else, devoid of any emotion. Phaedra simply spoke the truth as she knew it and nothing more.

“I have yet to meet Death. I wonder how a meeting with one like that would go.” Giving up on looking toward where he was she let her head fall back in its natural state and rubbed a long fingered hand along the back of it, expressing a slight discomfort. “One day I too will meet Death, only because it is bound to happen. I wonder, since Death is in fact dead, could I touch them?” Now there was a tone, but only of mild curiosity. She did not speak of it much but there was always this question inside of her if there were other ways to feel besides killing. She enjoyed the senseless murder of any fey that was foolish enough to question her or get in her way, but it sometimes grew old as well.

The tall fey woman somehow managed to climb gracefully on to an outcropping that was nearby and settle herself for the time being. The manufactured clothing she wore changed with a thought and a smoothing of her hands to cling to her legs, making it easier. “Is this the place you are planning to meet this Death? Your Death seems to have a gender as well.” Normally the Ice Queen would leave away from others but Svv kept her attention for no other reason then he was not like most others. She did not always leave because she found them boring, but also because it was torture to be around the beautiful people you could not touch. After over five hundred years of wishing and wanting, she still had that dream.

Again she turned her face up toward him. Though now she was closer and did not have to strain her neck at all. “Waiting for death is like waiting for everything else. It all happens eventually. I believe in going to it yourself. Doing what you think and feel if you can feel.” She chuckled then but the sound was flat and dead. “I would gladly take up arms. Perhaps I am more eager even then any other ruler. It is a fault I have perhaps.”

Her pink tongue slipped out to lick her lips. She was thinking of something. “I should bear children, but I do not think it a possibility. Once I take up arms again I may perish. I am reckless and thrill for the battle, but there are none who could rule in my stead. I killed my entire family line. In a way I put my court in danger yet I see no way to rectify that except children.” Her delicate shoulders shrugged and she leaned back, situating herself comfortably. “I talk to you like this when it may be bad. It matters not, what is done is done.”

[Svv Mrk'ss]

"I am afraid I have little to say in the matter of children.." he trailed off, Svv being unhelpful.

Svv could not say he was a being that thought much of the future. He was an impulsive creature, unpredictable even, though upon discovering his drive, he was also very simple. Destroying things were much easier than building, but with such feats as demolishing Kingdoms and Empires, it couldn't be underestimated either. Each Kingdom had a means of surviving, else how could they be around for thousands of years? Svv did not like the idea of constance, immortality being a joke when there were such a thing as Death Feys, however, when someone died, another took their place and it went on forever. Children never stayed that way, and every hundred years, The Fissure of Woe would slowly come undone.

Though perhaps the opposite could be said as well. Svv shifted his weight, now leaning on the frame of the window to peer at Phaedra. The nature of the characters of Ice were interesting to Svv, and occasionally he wished he knew more of them. Never did he have to worry about an ice fey showing him two personalities, always cut and dry, and intricately simple. Always did the ice fey seem the most efficient, Phae a paradigm of the sort. The best problem solvers in the Immortal Kingdom.

"No matter what zeal we may hold towards our mistress of War, it seems we are incapable of doing so. Perpetually suspended, I should say," Svv, for once, let a lick of irritation touch his features as he looked to one side. He grew quiet, for a moment, the usual optimist seeming to lose hope. This, however, was short-lived. Svv let a thought raise his brow, and he peered downward toward the icy landscape carved below.

Unable to actually see the frost touch the stone, or the mistress that sat upon her self-made throne, he seemed inspired by it none the less. Yes, a muse, he had found one.

"..Would you say the problem behind the Fissure, is that it opens up a passage of Death? All of us must bow to our Lord and Masters one day, must bend to the will of our deaths, but why must they outnumber the slaves?" Svv's eyes lit up with a small spark that was often seen in the thoughtful fey, but not quite to this degree. He went on. "..us speaking now gives way to the idea that perhaps they grow fat upon their pedestals, and are sick of gorging. It would be a time to save them misery, and perhaps close their mouths, one mouth, I mean.." The thought curled and ended, the Dark Fey peering down at her. He crossed his arms and leaned forward upon his knees. This was simply an idea, he conveyed, not growing excited, but at the same time, not letting it go either. The success highly depended on conversations such as this.

He did not and would not say it overtly. Svv peered off toward the North horizon then, as though distracted by a thought, but was in fact making a point. Abaddon's Mouth lie in the distance, open and spewing the Death Fey like a fountain from the Underworld. Perhaps it was time to think about closing it for good.

[Phaedra Acacia Rin]

There had been no expecting of him to say much regarding children. Mostly a musing out loud and idle curiosity if he had anything to say about it at all. It would be a means to an end but honestly her body would probably kill any child that could even have the chance of being conceived. Perhaps she would research for someone whom could withstand her body temperature, whether they liked each other or not. Someone that she could conceive a child with that would rule when she died, because she had no illusions of living forever with the way she treated death.

Shaking her head to clear her mind of those odd thoughts she looked back up to Svv once more, her lips pursed. “All it takes is one person to push for war to happen. One person to set things in motion. Everything else falls in to place easily enough. Besides, now all that is left are other fey and I have so wanted to test my strength against others in a battle for the ages.” She seemed to stop then and wonder to herself. Fighting other fey, even others with the same alliance as her own, would be grand. While the Fire and Ice fey were technically on the same side there was no denying how much hatred passed between both courts. There was the Dark as well though she cared more for them if her ways of behaving could be considered caring that is.

His voice brought her back from her dark thoughts and she smiled up at him once more, her eyes reflecting nothing however. “Why bow to anyone? I will never bow. Plus, everything can be killed, anything. Even they can, there has to be a way.” Closing the mouth, one specific mouth. It could be done; anything could be done giving the right amount of power and determination. She was proof of that even if in her own mind, by her past actions and current standing in her own court.

“Some beings really do need to shut up, forever. I grow tired of listening to their idle chatter.” This was her way of acknowledging his words, telling him she understood exactly what he was talking about. Phaedra agreed and would probably start looking into ways to accomplish said goal rather soon. Without that greedy mouth being open things would be more fun for all.

Standing she reached out toward him. Not to really touch him and maybe she wasn’t even sure why but she did it anyway because she felt the need to. Her fingers never reached him but her cold did. “I believe it shall come to pass, this eternal silence of the greedy mouth.” Her hands were brought together then and she weaved them back and forth, creating something. Bringing hands to her face she blew upon whatever it was and then outstretched the same hand as before toward Svv.

“This is for you, a gift and perhaps a promise. I will help you if you are interested in what you say, if not then it is merely a gift.” In her hand lay a small perfectly shaped rose, a calling card she had and her own personal signature. If he went on with his plan then it was a way he could call her to help him, like she signed something. If not, it was just a beautiful piece of work that would never melt.

[Svv Mrk'ss]

The nature of frost on a dying land was an appealing one, knowing that Earth Weavers were long trying to rebuild their kingdoms, there had been no effort to change what had all ready been done on the side of the dark. If one was to undo the Fissure of Woe, why not be them? Taking responsibility as their right as creators, as masters, as murderers.

Death had the right idea of wanting such precious souls of Rulers, thinking of Phaedra's. If he were a Death Fey, he could easily see why her's would be sought, and being greedy, Svv couldn't imagine the idea of Sylvias greeting her. For once, a sense of territory fringed on Svv's apathetic nature, and knew that if indeed Phaedra were to die, he would take pleasure and keeping her away from the Underworld. A silent promise he made to Mother Frost that she should have her daughter, all of this, in return for a rose.

He peered at her, unseeing, listening to the artisan at work. He leaned over the edge, seeming to float from his place upon the tower, invisible wings saving him from the harsh consequences of gravity. He touched off, leaning forward, his eyes unwavering, he peered at her gift. A voice dwelled within, quiet, not yet used. And he realized it was music he recognized, a mocking of the original, but knew it to be Phaedra's. A communication device. "Interesting," he breathed.

Without thinking, he slowly reached up a wood-like hand, fingers spreading and then mid-thought, his hand hesitated above her's, realizing the danger there. Past dark lashes, he savored the intrigue, a single blue and black eye lingering there, the touch of skin that was out of reach for Svv, yet here he was, mere inches away.

Slowly, ever so slowly, Svv let his hand drop to her's, wrapping his musician's fingers around the deceivingly delicate looking pedals. In his gentleness, he let his skin touch her's, savoring the feeling of frost clinging to his fingernails and cracks in his flesh. Svv inhaled through his teeth. While most would pull away when the frost bite set in, he simply took his time, drawing his fist over her's, leisurely, he brought the rose to him, placing it in his clothes.

His feet finally touched ground with the lightness of a feather, first his right bare-foot and then the other. He stood up straight before the Ice Queen. The Sound Fey curled his blackened fingers at his side, taking in the pain with relish, pleased, he tilted his head.

"Hope you do not mind, I stole a touch," he bowed to her, rising again. Svv was not known for giving apologies, this not being one. "..I dare say, I look forward to this dance of woe. I want to hear your thoughts, and let us not wait another decade in between. Until our next eve, Queen of Ice?" His voice laced with pleasantries, he gave another short bow in goodbye, an dramatic gesture, he placed one hand behind his back to add to the effect. Without her seeing, he let his mischievousness touch his lips with a smile.

Svv had found his small fix, in the heat of something better. The Untouchable could not help but leave this meeting feeling optimistic.

[Phaedra Acacia Rin]

Everything about him was very different from any other fey she knew. It was also the reason why she had not tried to kill him and kept communicating with him from time to time. He was far from boring and intrigued her because of his oddities. Her pale eyes watched his hand, emotionless and unfeeling as she always was. Would he brave it and actually touch her skin, or just take what it was that she offered and come close enough to try but not.

Currently Svv was closer to her then anyone had been in ages, except perhaps those of her own court who could handle the cold at times, and even then only for so long. It was interesting to her, to see him up close, and she allowed herself the time to study his face. He was definitely attractive, though most fey were, but he had a look different from the others. He was rougher around the edges and had flaws that he did not try to hide with vanity and pretentiousness. Thoughts entered her mind then, and she decided if there was ever a chance it would be with him…first. Then who knows how many others after. But she had something that needed to be accomplished and it would be, no matter how many had to suffer because of it.

Then she felt it. His skin had touched her own and her cruel eyes came back to her and widened in surprise. Head tilting just barely she looked to him, a spark of curiosity in everything she was, but still her voice remained silent. It was not the time to speak and she was not one for talking much anyway.

“So you did. I never mind if one is brave enough to touch, it is they who suffer.” Her hand dropped back to her side and she nodded to him. “It will be sooner then you think dear Svv, much sooner.” Though he hid his look she let the hungry sadistic grin split her lips as she looked to him. “Now I go, things must be set in motion. Nothing happens with just talk.”

Phaedra fairly glided past him, her footfalls silent even with her stature. There was no looking back, but she need not anyway. This meeting had caused many things to happen and others that would be very soon. One pebble at a time until the avalanche consumes us all.