❝

and still, comes the soft animal of his body, the world is not often kind and so we must be.oh, let him leave one less ghost in the world when he passes by— let him be one more kindness in a world grown astringent on its own devouring.( let him be tender, with his face turned up to the sun. )

❞

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lark

first look.

constantly sleep-ridden, with a liking for the simple and the familiar. he's got plenty of little habits: from the way he pillows his cheek against his palm, to the way his long ears twitch, to the way he always appears to be swallowing a yawn. warm and mellow, if only because he was raised to be affectionate.always seeking out the nearest shoulder to lean on, eyes half-lidded and a soft mouth that's angled into a wry half-smile. tired, it seems, of wayward complications; tired of anything that doesn't happen to be one of life's little wonders: the scent of coffee in the morning, songbird laughter and pillow-warmth, forehead pressed to nape of neck.( tired of war, it seems, and of those who speak of big, grandiose dreams. )

past

i. ( who were you before you named yourself? ) bruised knees, swollen cheeks, a heart that no longer wants to say goodbye—you brush your thumb underneath the flutter of your brother’s lashes and you press your forehead to his with a soft, barely-there hum. his hands clutch at your sleeves. who did this to you, you ask.he glares past you. no one, spat out, knowing that there would be nothing you could do even if you did manage to steal the name from his lips. you have no claim to anything but your own life—and his, though from the looks of things, your brother’s much too keen on seizing things by their throats to care—and your claim means nothing to those in power.your lips twitch as you exhale. does it matter? no, not when you have your brother to return home to, not when you have something to protect—and lose.ii. ( and lose him you do. )iii. you spend the months without him hurting, grief burning slow in your chest. the world chewed up your mercy and spat out an aching, bitter thing that lashes out—because the only world you have ever known ( the only thing that rings of home, that softens those long haunted days ) is gone,iv. so you make the world hurt alongside you. that’s only fair, isn’t it? that’s only just. you find some strange sort of happiness in the haunting—in twisting truths and sinking the knife of your smile into anyone who looks at you for a second too long—you wish the world had broken you instead, made you all jagged edges and blade enough to pierce your own heart, but it didn’t.maybe it was some twisted form of mercy, or maybe the world thought to make you its harbinger, but all you know is to press the poison of your mouth against the wound,v. and you make yourself the cure to this suffering. look, your ghosts haunt the hunted ( know that haunting and hunting share all letters but one ) and you—the ache, the rot, the wound—share your mercy with those who beg for it. ( there are many things worse than death, darling boy, and you make yourself the worst of them. this is your mercy. this is your hunting-song. )vi. see, war begets war, and hungry ghosts like you open your mouths wide to devour the slaughter—and this is how you are worshiped: through fear and faith. let this be known: this is only fair. this is only just: you, the knife-wound. you, the hailed saviour.vii. ( who are you when he comes home to you? ) there is blood on your gloves and you cannot touch him; he comes home and your world blooms again—stolen happiness flickering in the brother-shaped hole in your chest. you cannot touch him with your ruined hands—you will poison him, too.viii. ( how does he see you? ) he doesn’t see the streak of grief-hate-despair that lingers in your animal-bright eyes. he sees you and names you brother and all of a sudden you are there, you are home, you are unnamed as ghost.ix. you will poison him, too. ( this is the last of your mercy; you leave in the night like a shade and press a kiss to his forehead, knowing it is a kindness to leave him dreaming of your corpse. )x. you will be better than this; all this glory in the air, ripe for the taking. all this mercy—xi. all this mercy.xii. ( you are tired of it. the word mercy rots in your mouth like a stinging wound: you are tired, it seems, of most things. but still there are the little joys: the wind through your hair, the beat of the dreadwyrm's aether beneath, and the laughter that rings across the deck like a bell-song. perhaps this, too, is worth living for. )

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present

pale eyes and dark hair. a lazy, wicked curl to the curve of his mouth. messy bangs that fall into icy eyes and long, sleek ears. red marking the inner and outer corners of his eyes; a single crimson mole 'neath the tail end of his left eye. long and lean and languid; artfully graceless and constantly appearing to be half-asleep: slender fingertips hiding a soft yawn, gaze half-lidded and almost always faintly amused, and shoulders that always seek to lean on something firm.has a soft, fluffy tail that unabashedly mirrors his emotions. likes to tease and be teased, fond indulgence touching at the curve of his lips and echoed in his exhales.speaks with a slightly accented drawl, voice low and sleep-roughed. prone to using endearments rather than names; all crooked half-smiles and fleeting glances. loves slow-moving mornings; loves the way the ship rocks beneath his hands.

♡ strangely competent, when it comes to matters of academia and research. he says that he's learned what he could from sleeping on piles of textbooks—from osmosis, even. has hundreds of contingency plans, but only puts them into play if the situation becomes too complicated for him to willingly want to handle. otherwise, he's terribly easygoing.♡ has hyperthymesia, but only for things and not for people. tends to recall people not by their appearance, but by voices and little habits, if he knows them well enough. otherwise, he's rather forgetful.♡ learned to heal because he had to, through sheer force of will and intensive practice, not because he had any talent for it; his healing magick is often seen as unwieldy but delicate to the trained eye, a butcher's knife used as precisely as one would use a needle.♡ currently an advisor to the dreadwyrm crew, a group of skypirates crazy for the unbreakable dawn, and he is certain of it: that they can be more than just things that break against the horizon. that despite everything, they are enough. there, where the sky meets earth and sea—there is where his heart begins to beat. ( it's not repentance that drives him; it's hope. )

unlocked

you knew exactly why they—garlemald, empire of hollow metal gods—did not kill you: your use to them alive was more than your worth while dead, so you kept your head down and turned your shaking heart to the side. morals had no place in the laboratory; morals would only cause your hands to shake and you could not let that happen. ( more pain for your subjects, more marks on your dossier. )you knew, vaguely, that your brother had aspirations of rising above his station: everything other was marked as a second-class citizen and your darling brother had always kept his eyes on the skylight—one day, he'd vowed to you, soft and terrible away from the mountain range of your youth, we'll have power.power enough to be free, you murmured to him, because you have had enough of power and the odd dark that kissed at your fingertips and made you feel like a god. he tossed his head back, still so wild and bright with sun, and laughed.he left you, that day. you thought he was taken—but he left. he left you in the clutches of this arrogant empire and you'd soon learn that the only things you could ever count on are your own two hands and the steady beat of your heart.and when he came home to you, you wept. you pressed a kiss to his forehead, drugged his wine, and pressed your thumbs against his trachea—you could have killed him. you would have killed him, for the way his loss changed you—made you desperate with grief and tender in the worst of ways,but you will be better than this. you love him, and that is mercy enough. so you close your eyes, destroy all the research that'd brought you to this point, and steal away into the night.you don't look back.

likes

the sunlight that filters in through half-closed windows; sweetness that lingers on the tongue & teeth; the dream-like state of waking; early morning birdsong & the warmth of a pillow; curling into a nest of blankets on the tallest point of the ship

dislikes

morning dewdrops that dampen hair; raised voices & bluster; the act of waking up & the routine that follows after; inconvenience & inconvenient actions; strange complications & stranger foes

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for those with aethersight,his aether feels like how the moon would taste when placed against a mouth—silver and soothing and edged with a crescent-sliver blade of shadow.contrary to his state of passivity, his aether is constantly in a state of motion; it's almost playful, even, but only when he's ( as usual ) relaxed and sleepy.

if you require healing in the moment,then you may find him pressing his palms against your shoulders, the silvery weight of his aether burrowing under your skin; stay still and you will realize that he only seeks to help— that through a miracle or sheer force of will, what is broken is now threading anew. if you seek to run, then the needle-point edge of his butcher's knife may carve astray, leading to worse wounds and apologies.

if you require a job to be done,before he was picked up by the dreadwyrm crew, he took up various jobs and honed his skills there. at one point in time, he may have even worked for you.after all, it is only now that he can freely laze around; from hunting to strange, esoteric research objectives, he's done them all.

if you are familiar with crime,the way he goes about things may be too-familiar to you; the methodology behind his approach is vaguely reminiscent of illegal research processes,especially with his casual ease when handling criminal matters—or cases beyond the law.

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