#the poison drips and gems from his fangs and tears

[kokomini9]

can't trust the words behind the fangs 🐍🎭 a doodle with my take on his mask :3c

[yzareenxiv]

FFXIV Write 2020 Prompt 5: Matter of Fact

*A possibility. Some years in the future, though fewer than you might think.*

It was approaching dusk and Zareen stood in front of her tall, full-length mirror and gazed at herself. The hunting had been plentiful the last few moons and she was as sleek a huntress as any that had strode across the face of this star. At least, she was if one didn't look too terribly closely.

The truth lay in small, subtle, terrible details.

Her skin had taken on a strange quality, like smooth carved wood. When she pressed her darkened fingertips against her cheekbones, the skin did not give. It did not go pale at the pressure, it did not flush when she withdrew her touch. She could still feel it, but her skin had all the plasticity of a statue.

Her hair, on the other hand, swayed constantly in a breeze that didn't exist, shadowy tendrils curling around her hips and thighs, her shoulders, her cheeks. She watched them unblinking as the tendrils sought, in their blind eagerness, something to devour.

Her tail had gotten longer, stronger, able to wrap around the throat or the legs or the arms and hold her prey in place. Fangs were larger, sharper, sliding down from her gums and dripping with a paralytic venom. When that change had occurred, she had bitten her tongue and been unable to speak for a week. The memory made her briefly smile, despite herself, and she watched the expression in the mirror with sad eyes. Her smile was never quite right these days. It always held a predatory curve to it, a warning of her true nature that was just as clear as a poison frog's vibrant colors, a quality that made even her dearest friends occasionally give her worried (or worse, fearful) glances.

Danger! Stay away!

The sadness in her eyes lingered as she looked down, lifting her hands. She'd been forced to start filing down her claws, the vicious hooks there growing too long for her to safely touch her family, her loved ones. The skin of her hands had darkened to black, the color fading back to brown just between her wrists and elbows. Her claws were crystalline and when she filed them they gave off sparks.

She had chosen to wear simple jewelry today, the gold sparkling at her throat, at her wrists, at her ankles, in her ears, against the dark tendrils of her hair. Gemstones were bright and glittering, set in the gold. Her eyes fell on them and she brushed dark fingertips across one of the more simple bracelets she wore. Leather, not gold, with a golden wire wrapped around a simple crystal that pulsed steadily. She hesitated, hesitated, then slowly undid the leather knot by slicing a claw through it. Lifting the crystal to her lips, she pressed a kiss to it and for a moment those sad eyes closed and she swayed.

She could feel the hollowness inside her. The hunger, clawing at her very soul. The unnatural silence that greeted her ears when her eyes were closed and she was focused entirely on her body. When her eyes opened again, she set the crystal bracelet in her jewelry chest, giving it pride of place amongst the gems. Her fingers trailed across it, painfully reluctant to let it go. Taking a deep breath, she forced her hand to her side once more and looked back into the mirror.

He was coming. Time was running out.

Her hands lifted to her head, her hair, and though she could not see them she unerringly grasped the chains dotted with glamor prisms and drew them off her curling horns. They, too, were crystalline now, and in their depths a fire flickered and burned, glowing softly against the opalescence of her dark hair. They were beautiful, in their own way, but they were one of the final bellwethers that the time had come.

Zareen's eyes lowered from her horns and her gaze met itself, reflected. Black. Black and black and black with the thinnest rim of gold, like the limbal ring of an Au Ra.

There was a soft ticking sound and she looked at the bracelet she still wore- the clockwork gems were slowly rotating, their fire growing dark, burning out, one by one.

She would have enough time to say goodbye.

Her self-reflection complete, Zareen turned from the mirror and gathered aether to herself, flinging herself into the River to travel until she reached the exact point where they were meant to meet. A high place along a cliff, a flat and grassy plain that looked out over the Steppes under a glorious sunset that was just beginning.

Ayanga was standing, his back painfully straight, tears on his cheeks. He didn't look over to her as she walked up to his side and shoulderbumped him lightly, that long tail wrapping around his in a gesture of comfort that she had no control over. His arm wrapped around her shoulders in turn- a gesture repeated so many times over the years that it was automatic.

"It's time, then." He said, and it was not a question, even though he looked down at her to confirm it.

"It is. I sent the girls to Tolemeh. Everehthing else is done." Her accent was less pronounced now, the Eorzean tongue only slightly colored by that long ago and far away island that had been her home.

"I love you, sister."

"I love you, too, brotheh."

The strike was swift. Almost unseen; the aetherial katana piercing the place that had once held her heart, the organ now crafted from dark crystal. Zareen, the Jaguar, the Sin Eater, looked down then looked up into his eyes. She touched fingertips that were already beginning to fade away to his cheek and said softly. "Don't cry. We'll find each otheh again, across the Rivah." The words were full of conviction, not an ounce of doubt, the conclusion forgone and a matter of fact. They would find each other again.

Ayanga held her as her body faded into swirls and flashes of aether, fire and shadow and storm. When the final spark burst and faded away, it drew his gaze upwards to the stars.

((Tagging @talesfromthegameff14 and @ala-mhinyan for mentions))