her mind is on other things. she watches the dark waves roll in, thinking of a time where she would have been able to see the white froth it makes. smell half-rotted seaweed cloying her throat. she misses fernando's madness more often than she'd like to admit and in moments like these, the memories make her drift. 

so she is ignorant of the way king looks upon her and it's only his rough-around-the-edges words that pull her from her thoughts. she tilts her head to the side at him and smiles, amused. 

with the hot weather, she'd worn a chemise dress over her swimwear, but the night brings a balmy chill over the beach. 

"you're not so b-" she starts, but he cuts her off with a kiss. and some of those hard, thoughtful lines disappear as she melts. she's softer, then, as she draws back and looks at him.

how is he so familiar, yet still such a stranger?

"i used to loathe the beach, you know. worked very, very hard not to get placed here for work. but when you asked me to join you tonight, i didn't think about the beach or how the sand gets everywhere or how sticky i feel afterwards. 

"i just thought oh, that sounds lovely." she leans forward. doesn't mind talking. filling those spaces. 

KING WAYLAND

☉

he lets her fill the space between them, her voice soft, contemplative. there's something there, hidden beneath it all, something he can't parse— isn't really even sure he wants to. as if inspecting what this was too closely, could bring it all crashing down.
[break][break]
"i've always wanted ta go as a kid," he says finally, laying back on the large blanket they'd rolled out in the sand for just this occasion. "begged my ma, my da, 'n always got told 'next summer', 'next summer." the lines around his eyes harden, as being creased out with anger.
[break][break]
"eventually, over the years, i stopped askin'. i could've just skipped school ta do it, but, mm, just wasn't the same i s'pose." by that point, it didn't matter. they were stains on the kitchen wall, mostly. he'd shrug, if he was in the position to do it. instead, he reaches out with a hand, placing it on freya morningstar's knee.
[break][break]
"not a fan of the beach though, eh?"
[break][break]
for some reason it brings a small smile to his face.

[attr="class","notes"]freya morningstar[break]

[attr="class","wizzcredit"]☉

he leans back and she stays seated, hunched a little forward, arms draping over her legs. her fingers idly pick at some of the grainier pieces of sand clinging to her ankles. some of her tresses slip down her shoulder when she turns her head to look at him. blue eyes absorb the information like gold. 

this might be the first time she's ever gleaned information about king's past from him, at least without the stinging bite of sarcasm. 

"i get that," she says and finally settles back. props up on her forearm, cheek resting on a cupped palm so she's eye to eye with him. she rests her other hand on his chest, tilts her knee under the weight of his. if anything, she gets wanting a family. 

"but no," she says, nose wrinkling. "never liked it much. and then those giant tentacruel raided and..." she trails off. body dashed against the rocks. months of physical therapy, intensive surgery. and lyune, still not fully recovered from bashing his head against the bluffs.

but she purses her lips and adds, "but like i said, you asking sounded lovely. and it is lovely." she flicks her gaze skyward. "forgot you can see so many stars out here."

KING WAYLAND

☉

king doesn't press her for information. whatever demons haunted her here, they were better off left in the past.
[break][break]
"mm," he says in response to her observation, the finger tips of his hand idly massaging a circle into her her thigh. "yeah, it's nice." peace was something he'd seldom experienced. as both a child, and a 'soldier' of kanto, pain had greeted him everyday. it felt alien to soak in it now; wrong somehow, with the past he leaves in his wake.
[break][break]
he expresses as much to the woman beside him.
[break][break]
"feels odd not lookin' over my shoulder all the time," he adds between silences, "not used ta it."

[attr="class","notes"]freya morningstar[break]

[attr="class","wizzcredit"]☉

she purses her lips at that. as much as she liked to claim she didn't eat with a silver spoon, she was more privileged than most. she had love. she had support. she had a steady career in front of her. and the horrors she'd seen had come upon her well into her adulthood - the apex of hoenn's unraveling.

she reaches down to grace the hand that's idly running circles along her thigh. 

"well, we're not in paradise yet." and maybe she's ignorant. maybe a fool. but she's never looked around her, expecting a blow to come from the shadows. dragons are prideful, ignorant things like that. 

"you were a turncoat," she says and the words feel...heavy as they pass her lips. almost like it's forbidden to break this trance they've lulled themselves into. 

but ignoring everything is what drove emma away. and she'll be damned if she lets history repeat itself. 

KING WAYLAND

☉

"don't think i want a paradise." and he means it. part of it is because of the person that he sees in the mirror; a disgusting excuse for a human being who'd wrought death and destructions to hundreds.
[break][break]
the other?
[break][break]
he couldn't function in it. a predator left to lull becomes dull, weak, and eventually succumbs to those things. he couldn't imagine growing old, and fat. it wasn't him. it couldn't be him. the harsh truth of it was, he'd probably not survive to thirty.
[break][break]
"i was— am, really." he says softly, eyes pinned to the sky above. he's tense, but far less than he'd expected. perhaps the inevitably of it had worn him down. perhaps he just didn't have it in him to fight.
[break][break]
"i'd told myself for years that i was forced ta it, that my friends had betrayed me without merit." king furrows his brow slightly, as if searching the night sky for an answer. "but i think he just escalated things quicker this way. i'd probably have always turned out like this. maybe they did me a favor."
[break][break]
even now he'd lost. the mother of his child, and the woman that MATIAS SILPH claims to love, knew the truth. he'd make sure of it. but still, they stuck by him. Eva Morales willingly chose a monster, and for that decision, had become one herself. she just didn't know it yet. like king, she'd know only when matias wanted her too.

"ye can ask me whatever ye want. i'll answer honestly."

[attr="class","notes"]freya morningstar[break]

[attr="class","wizzcredit"]☉

maybe that is what drives them together - their shared desire to die aflame, still-beating hearts pumping with redemption/revenge. these selfish, glorious deaths will inevitably come - the world is falling apart around them. the film over the sky is a mockery. the stars have never felt this far away. 

her gaze flickers up and there is a question there: why? why answer her? why trust her? why divulge secrets to her? there is something here - she knows that. but it is not a childhood bond strengthened over years of heartache; it is not loyalty out of shared duty and unrequited love.

when he looks at her, he sees a dragoness. he sees her claws and her scars and her appetite for violence. the part of herself that wasn't fit for the council. the part of herself that wasn't fit for emma, or alexander. and maybe that is why it scares her so. 

"i was naïve when i was on the council. and even after that. the league has just as much blood on its hands as rocket." the last word is mumbled and she winces. 

"your past is your past. i only wished to bring it up to tell you as much." she offers a smile. "and to know whom my dragons need devour if your past comes back to haunt you."

KING WAYLAND

☉

in the same way he sees her as sharp claws, and flashing teeth, she looks at him more than the monster in human flesh. around freya, the fiend that lurks in the cornerstones of his mind are quiet.
[break][break]
that still doesn't mean they don't scratch at the walls of their prison, though.
[break][break]
he's quiet, not adding his own affirmations to lay at the league's feet. he could, but the anger that would come with it would ruin a pleasant night.
[break][break]
instead, he gives her something he'd given precious few.
[break][break]
"matias," he says simply, eyes still lingering in the void above, "MATIAS SILPH is the person i will kill, or die trying."

[attr="class","notes"]freya morningstar[break]

[attr="class","wizzcredit"]☉

her breaths are deep, almost relaxing, and it is in this tranquility that she bares her teeth. 

that she raises her fingers over his eyes, touching brows, his cheeks, lips near his ear. ah, a silph. giver of a poison she'd begged for. a poison she'd squandered. are they all the same, then?

she asks herself if she is content - if not a sword for silph, then a sword for wayland. a dragon knows fury and loyalty, bloodlust and vengeance. her days of politicking councilwoman are long gone. dead and dashed against the rocks over a year ago, despite alexander claiming otherwise.

"then to fire, he shall succumb," she whispers. 

KING WAYLAND

☉

a smile tugs at his lips and, despite the pretense, it still looks like it'd belong to a pyroar more than a human.
[break][break]
"thank you, little dragon," he says with a small chuckle, "but he is mine. i can't let anyone else claim my prize."
[break][break]
the pads of his fingers stop their mindless circling and instead tap her skin lightly, as if in thought.
[break][break]
"and what of you? sootopolis still rests with rocket."

[attr="class","notes"]freya morningstar[break]

[attr="class","wizzcredit"]☉

her fingers fall, gracing his lips, feeling that smirk resting there. and then, as he speaks, she lays her arms over his own, twining them together. lifting his weight, ever softly, she moves their hands in tandem, and breathes, "if his blade strikes down his foes, it is still the wielder who cut them down." but nonetheless, there is an intoxication to vengeance. on she knows all too well. 

she tenses at the mention of her home and that ache crawls within her. "those dens are centuries old. my dragons will return. or we will die trying." 

she does not tell him of her dreams, of wandering through that Other place and calling for the god who bathed her in fire. or her intent to return to sootopolis with it at her stead.

KING WAYLAND

☉

he embraces her, and their intertwined presence. with the waves lapping at the shore, and the warm sand beneath their blanket, he's content, admittedly. a dangerous, foreign feeling.
[break][break]
"and we'll help you." it comes easily, this truth, because what good was he if he didn't fight? it was the one thing he was good at — damn good at — and he'd rise to the challenge.
[break][break]
or die trying, too.

[attr="class","notes"]freya morningstar[break]

[attr="class","wizzcredit"]☉

why he would help her is beyond her, though it shouldn't be. not with the way he fits against her, with this ease in which they've come together. they may not know, in detail, the others' history, but they know enough. feel enough. 

as wild as it is to allow herself to trust, she finds herself doing just that. tucking her head against his chest and listening to the thrumming of his heart. he embraces her and she squeezes back. 

and after a while of listening to the seaside crash against the shore, she smiles. tilts her chin up at him. "how do you feel about a midnight swim?"

KING WAYLAND

☉