put your weight on my shoulders {avalon/rook}

[rook]

➤

No news is good news, so they say. It's been three days since I met with Nolan Bishop, the landlord and nightclub owner of the apartment block where I live. I had hoped that he would offer me the job on the spot, but instead he gave me a warm smile and told me he'd think it over. I'm not sure if it was encouraging or patronising. I've been desperately trying to convince him to let me stand the door of the club and help resolve the fights and arguments that regularly break out between alcohol filled teenagers. I think he's holding back. I finally got a chance to sit down with him but he still won't give me a solid answer. He has his doubts. I'm big, yes, but so are most boys in District One. He doesn't think I would be able to cope should a fight between several muscle heads break out. Inexperience, that's all it comes down to.

Still, hearing nothing is better than being told no. I just have to be patient and hope I can scrape by on what I earn from the casual labour handed out at the train yards. They pay the first ten guys who turn up to shift crates from one carriage to another. It's not consistent work, as I'm not always first there, and the pay is down-right awful. Occasionally I'll look to local bars and restaurants to see if they need a scrubber for the night. That's even less consistent than the train yards, but the occasional shift pops up now and again. I've been tempted to gamble what I have in the lower-level casinos on the side-streets, but being an orphan with no place to go, I know what it's like to have nothing, and I don't fancy losing it all again. I can scrape by on the casual labour, for now, but it's not sustainable. I need something full-time, and sooner rather than later.

I stack up the notes on my apartment table and count what little money I have. I divide the stack into three smaller piles. Divide and conquer. I open the drawer of the table and place one stack inside. Save it for when I run low on food. The second I fold in half and slip in my back pocket. I take an envelope and split it open, slotting the third stack inside it. I lick the sides and press down on the parchment. The smell takes me back to my childhood. I take the nearest pen to my left and write on the front in big bold letters: Rent.

I quite enjoy doing little things like this. Being organised makes me feel more at ease. If I can lay everything out and know exactly where everything goes, it makes everything so much easier. I pick up the envelope and grab my jacket from the back of a chair and head outside.

The evening is still. Fingers of orange light gently caress the hills, whilst the wind tickles the trees. Most people are inside, eating or getting ready to sleep. It's a wednesday, so not many people my age will be out partying, although there are a always a few. I find myself alone for most of my walk. I take a sidepath out over a field and away from the thicket of the city. I always enjoy the journey to Catrice's house, but there's always a sense of dread that fills me. Her parents' warm smiles do not make me feel welcome. They're half-baked, like a grenade waiting to be forced down my throat.

I wonder if her fiancee will be there. The thought of him makes me uneasy too. He's an impressive build, and he's as rich as rich can get. I'm not at all jealous, I know I could probably drop him if I wanted. It's more that I don't trust him, not just with Catrice, but in general. There's more than meets the eye with him. He's a germ. So long as he makes her happy, that's all that matters, right?

I haven't seen my best friend in nearly a month. That's how often I go round to pay them the rent, but I usually see her most weeks. It's been different recently, like she's always occupied with something, even if she won't say what. It's usually rushed phonecalls or abrupt endings to conversations. I almost wonder if I've upset her somehow, but I can't think how.

I stride down the hill, as orange skies turn pastel pink, straining with every effort to stay bright. A last-ditch effort before they collapse into nightfall. I smile. I trust in the night, it's my domain. I don't mean that I'm a creature of the dark, or any of that crap that some Careers spew from their toxic mouths. I enjoy the dark, because everyone is asleep, and I can be on my own, without anyone bothering me. It's quiet, when you want it to be. Peaceful. Out here on the plains, I couldn't ask for anything more. Except maybe-

I reach the DeSaux house. It's grand, with timeless architecture that withstood the war, or at least it's been made to look that way. The front door is large and intimidating, but I approach it without hesitation, knocking sharply with the brass slab that hangs from its centre. I wait anxiously, my stomach feeling like I've eaten way too quickly. My mind is a hive of questions that I'll never ask her, so I swallow them, and keep my eyes at a level that I think hers will be.

Don't leave me in the dark, Cat.

[Avalon]

C A T R I C E

"how much
can the heart hold?"

The land began to scream against the horizon, as another passing day fell to burning ashes and embers along the jungle concrete. A saturated sunset emits through the long, sheer white curtains that drape past the window sill. Contorting into unknown figures of shapes and colors, the light glowed brightly among- to a room where lies and sins vanished when the light touched them even gently.


Built upon marble and stone, a kingdom damned to the rulers who suffer through one part; hatred, and the other; lust. Happiness is foreign to these walls, and albeit the appearance differs from what lies true beneath the grandeur architecture, it is all just the cover to an untold story. And though the spine remains hard, it curves unhealthy, resulting in temporary to permanent damage.


We whisper in a language taught to us by nothing more than shallow, deceit, and hunger.

"I do not love him."

"Catrice.
I've only asked from you,
Stay true-
To what we need you to do."

"Why can't you see?

It's crumbling down-
Not upon you-
But for me."

"Catrice-
Enough."

"And while it might not hurt you,

Are you the one suffering through?"

"I said enough!"


Hand raised in pent-up aggression, I can feel the icy frost travel upon my skin. Surfacing the side of my cheek, the porcelain beats of flushed red, which replaced the frost with a burn that sizzled only from the inside. A lingering sensation sent me into lips shut closed, leaving behind the thought of the known- your sky moves in the wrong direction, Catrice.


A devil, disguised as a wide grinned angel with crooked, white teeth and a hissing tongue, took our dirty sorrows and exchanged them for shiny coins. Admittance was required, and once one entered the price paid is what was dealt. Shiny coins are nothing compared to the regret faced by an arranged marriage, for when a pyre of money is what would burn me alive. Slowly and gradually, the fires of Hell have come for me, but not for you, Nikola.


Dusted by the sun that shines brightly through the cracks in the curtains. My fingertips claw at the underside of the bureau, where marks of the past etch themselves securely into the wood to live on forever. It's almost as though I could hear the desperate calls for a silent help that fail to escape between parted lips of my own. Only in the form of a tattered wooden dresser, with a cracked mirror that reflects a repeated pattern along the sliced line.

"Catrice-
Don't you know
I have all you need."

"You are nothing

But just an extra breath-"

A wide smirk and squinted eyes grow along his chiseled face, and I can instantly feel him invading every part of me. Shrinking was a natural reaction, and I couldn't help but to feel less of what I am in his presence. Standing ground against your husband was frowned upon in the eyes of my parents, especially only towards me.


As much as my family is wealthy and well-to-do, my parents had found it best to force me into marrying into one who was even remotely on the same status. It was less of a burden to take care of both me and my sister once we grew older, so marrying Nikola was apparently their only way to assure that I wouldn't depreciate in a society where high expectations and shallow personalities were of significance.

"A deep gash-"

Words catch in my throat as he wraps his masculine hands around my jawline gently. Eyes glazed and focused on his own, I can tell that he doesn't take anything seriously. Lust is his motivation, and no matter how much hatred I could show him, he fails to realize that he is neither wanted, nor needed. Pity is held for him in return of feelings that don't exist. I lift my hand and brush his away from my face, and he places it back on the other side of the wooden bureau.

"Another cut on my flesh."

My arm pushes his away from wrapping around my body, and as I do so I move towards the double door of the bedroom. Feet clicking against the carpet on heels that leave and bring prints of unwant in the rug. My delicate hand wraps around the door knob and for a second, I turn away from it. Almost hesitant, but no much so.

"You're unneeded."

It was a sudden sense of forsaken words that found their way out. Choked upon for far too long.

Turning away and out the door, I feel the grip of his hand wrap tightly around my wrist. Enough to snap and break if he pleased, although the most he did was bruising along my body.

"I own you, Catrice.
Do not forget that."

-

There's knocking upon the grand, chamber doors. Echoing and ricocheting off of the polished, marble floors. It'd been hours since Nikola had left to the Town Square, and it was finally peaceful to be with no one else but my own thoughts.


Today marks the day that Conrad said he would come, paying off his rent expenses, and even though I told him to not worry about it, perhaps he feels like he owes. Conrad has been my best friend since we were younger, my parents never particularly liked him, but I convinced them to help anyway. I couldn't leave him in dark.


My heels click along the marble floors until I halt in front of the double doors that lead to a world hidden away. It takes me no time to clutch my fingers around the handles, and open them slightly. My eyes cheerfully meet Conrad's, and his face lights up, while only the delight shined bright in my eyes.


Leaving my body behind one of the open doors, I cannot let Conrad see the fresh bruises the kiss my wrists.

"Conrad!

It's uh-

So good to see you again!"

My voice pauses for but a moment, only to display in my tone what I truly feel on the inside when I see him. My eyebrows furrow and feelings genuine.

"It's been too long it seems."

| moondust |

{ credit to: zoë }

WHEN WE MEET
THE WORLD CAN'T HELP
BUT TO WATCH

[rook]

➤

My leg shakes impatiently as I wait for someone to answer the door. Night tries to settle in, but the sunken sky fights it off with desperate streaks of orange and purple, buffering against grey-black clouds and dancing in golden lines over the horizon. The breeze is cold, carrying with it the sounds of sirens from the city, where drunken teenagers party too hard and Peacekeepers do anything but keep the peace.

I'm not sure what they're celebrating. The Reaping was a few days ago, so I suppose those who are now too old are rejoicing in the fact that they won't be sent to their deaths, but then this is District One. Isn't that what most kids want? I assume for most it's all a facade, to please their rich, power-hungry parents. It sounds like the end of the world from where I'm standing, with shouts and cries howling over the hills. If it was the end of the world, I'd be right here anyway.

The door opens and golden light pours out over the cobblestones. Catrice half-emerges, her smile is faint but it still illuminates the alcove, like a flickering candlelight. She looks tired, almost withdrawn, like she's had a long day and just wants to go to bed. The last thing she wants is me right now.

"Conrad! It's uh- So good to see you again!" She says, her voice strained and ever so slightly raw. I hold my smile, but my eyes flinch. She talks to me like an aquaintence she hasn't seen in years, not a best friend. I begin to wonder what I've done wrong, if I have offended her somehow. If not me, then what's made her seem so different to usual. Almost cold in her tone. Maybe she was just surprised to see me.

Her pause is deafening. I open my mouth to fill it, but she speaks suddenly.
"It's been too long it seems."

I try to think back to the last time I saw her. More than a month. What's happened to make her seem so shrunken and hesitant? This isn't the Catrice I know. She's probably just tired, and I'm just paranoid.

"Yeah, it's been a while. How have you been?" I ask her, my hands sinking into my pockets.

How have you really been?

[Avalon]

C A T R I C E
D E S A U X

"how much
can the heart hold?"

The breeze flows gently through the only slightly open doorway, I can sense the quiet disturbance in the air, as though it was something worth hiding. Or perhaps, maybe it just wasn't something worth the mention. Seldom does a secret go past hushed voices and pursed lips, but this was one that could go without saying.


My studded eyes lock on his disturbed, golden halo. Biting the inside of my lip, almost to the point where I can taste just the iron in fresh, crimson blood. Slight hesitation in words come from my lips as I speak, and it wasn't to put Conrad to fault, nor make him feel unwanted. Fatigue and overwhelm are what showcase across my face, as bags that release beneath my unfocused eyes, and my voice that strains and comes with an unwelcoming tone.

"Yeah, it's been a while.
How have you been?"

The true answer of the question is left to uncertainty. Letting my tense guard down, I open the door even more, allowing the light to shine and illuminate even more so. Revealing a crown of diamond and gold, and silver and stone. I wrap my arms to my chest, and smile wider, hoping to remove the unwanted uncomfortable atmosphere . Although, it is clearly full of nothing genuine, only tiredness.

"I've been-

Well.

How ha-"

"Catrice-
You'll catch bugs,
Close the door."

Pursing my lips in irritation, I place my hand around the edge of the door. It is the split second where I can feel Conrad's eyes follow and make contact with the dark purple bruises around my wrists. A sigh escapes my lips and the opening becomes smaller and smaller, before I pause, then press my puckered lips to the edge of the door to think.

"Stay here.

I'll come out in about-

10 minutes."

And with that, I close the door, hoping to hear no more of my parents voices, urging me to stop communicating with Conrad. To them, he is nothing more than low social class trash, a bug to be caught and roam the house. There have been many times where I've defended him, and each time they try to bring me down.

| moondust |

{ credit to: zoë }

WHEN WE MEET
THE WORLD CAN'T HELP
BUT TO WATCH

[rook]

➤

The faint light strains until it can no longer hold back the purpleblack reservoir, and seemingly all at once the sky is drowned in night. Stars prickle in the sky, faint and yet full of unbelievable energy. I am stronger than the daylight. I can hold back this tidal wave inside of me, because I know that letting it all go will do far more harm than good. Sometimes it's better to bottle things away, and let life keep moving on without/around you. I slowly inhale, letting the cold early-winter air fill my lungs and sit there as I wait for her to open her parsed lips and talk to me.

"I've been... Well." She says with obvious hesitation in her voice. She's not been well. I've known her long enough to know when she's lying to be civil, or because there's something she doesn't want me to know. Stop it, Conrad. I wish she would just be honest with me, is all. Her family is so rich, and posh, and prim, and proper. I feel like sometimes she holds herself in too high standards, like she doesn't want the world to see how damaged she really is. What she doesn't realize is that I don't care about any of that. I just want to know how she is. How she really is.

"How ha-" She turns it onto me, but before she can finish her sentence she's cut off at the root by a shrill noise that can only be her mother.
"Catrice. You'll catch bugs, close the door." She knows it's me. The word bug plays over in my head. I don't flinch. I've had a lot worse from people I care about a lot more. The DeSaux's have done me an enormous favor, but I doubt that either of Catrice's parents wanted to help someone as common as me. Only I'm not common, am I? Not many poor people in District One.

Catrice pulls back to shoot a glare at her mother that I can only admire. I wouldn't have the balls to even make eye-contact with that vulture. She's so shrill and harsh, and judgemental on everyone below her status. I haven't spoken to her father much, but I imagine he's much the same. My parents were the opposite. Humble, honest, open, caring. They weren't perfect, but they tried the best they could to be good people. They weren't from District One, we came from Three when I was just a kid. Maybe that's why they didn't get soaked up in this whole superior mentality that people in One seem to be obsessed with. Status, class, position with society. It doesn't fucking matter, none of it does. We all bleed the same blood.
When she turns away from me, my eyes rest on her neck. Her jawline is like calligraphy, drawn so perfectly. I drink her up, because I don't get many opportunities to admire her. Not in a creepy way or anything, just like- I don't know.

What's that on her wrists? At first I think it's the light, but when I tilt my head slightly I see they're marked. Deep purple, like the galaxies above us, only not beautiful but horrible. I feel wrath in my throat, raw and dry. Her eyes meet mine, parrying them to the ground. He did this to her. That bastard. I know know what or how or why, but he's hurt her. My shoulders twitch, but I swallow the blistering anger that brewed from speculation. He thinks can do anything he wants to her body? Like she's a toy?

"Stay here. I'll come out in about-" She interrupts me before I can react, "10 minutes."

And just like that, she's gone. The marks on her wrists, gone. Her elegantly drawn jawline, gone. She leaves me in the cold, but she'll be back. I want to smile at the thought of her coming outside and being able to talk to me without her parents leaning on her back, but I'm angry and afraid. Afraid of what he's done to her, and what he can do to her. It's not my business. It's not my business. I shouldn't ask. It's not my business.

[Avalon]

C A T R I C E
D E S A U X

Days consisted of half eaten vanilla bean buttercream cakes, and tea that was left out cold. Sitting upon the silken sheets of a bed made for pure royalty, I read a book that was worn dry and sun-dusted with a leather back and handwritten scripture. The sacred rights of a human being.

Article. XVII
Section IV
"...There are two kinds of pride, both good and bad. 'Good pride' represents our dignity and self-respect. 'Bad pride' is the deadly sin of superiority that reeks of conceit and arrogance..."

Words darkened out upon the pages, forcing the ones left to reveal themselves for their true meanings. Beneath the sheer canopy of a bed fit for a queen, I felt the sensation of the day drift along as the sun set. Hues of pink, purple, blues, and oranges, soft like the dying sun, knocked against the window shutters upon my window frame. The sun had died down once upon a time ago, though the striking spectacle remains.


Marking down minute for minute, my eyes wander across the room, from clock to book, back to the window. Closed shutters had separated me from the world- separated me from Conrad- and the darkness settled when the light flickered off. Opening the shutters from the inside to the out, the light from where Conrad stood illuminated through my window.


The topside of a floral canopy, decorated with vines upon a white painted, sturdy, wooden lattice board. Stepping foot, and climbing down to the ground where a knight awaited for his queen, patiently. It was a forbidden, forsaken love that was ruled by the tyranny and disapproval of a vicious, greedy king. He wanted all that was never his, a foolish spine he is made to be.


Silence was no new face, and there was an obvious hesitation in the ambiance. Marked by the words unspoken, it didn't clearly tread within my mind, but the look that was painted across his face was one of concern and consideration. Eyes drawing to and fro it was an indication that the water colored wrists, I held deep into my pockets, were spilling over the fabric. A moment to collect thought scattered across the night sky in no specific constellation, though, maybe it was just one unknown. I skip the awkward talk, and move to the point, there was no room for small talk, when a question of "who did this" was set on the table.

"Conrad-

I... I can explain.

It's nothing serious."

It was lies set in place of the truth. Of course something was wrong, but the will to admit and raise the worrisome, was not something I could stand for. Denial was an option that was a companion from the start, and to leave Conrad concerned for my safety was not something I intended.

{ credit to: zoë }

WHEN WE MEET
THE WORLD CAN'T HELP
BUT TO WATCH

[rook]

➤

"It's nothing serious."

Her words are thin, hanging in the cold air. She stands a spectre on haunted ground. Generations of De Saux's have lived and died here, probably buried here in the forecourt. I look at her, and she is the triumph of generations. Each beautiful mutation in her family lineage has led to her perfection. I'm probably standing on hundreds of her name, decades of history maybe even stretching before the wars, and yet here I stand the first of my kind.

I am a prototype. My father was a bastard child and my mother abandoned at birth, meaning I have no history, no lineage. I am the first. I am raw and alive - a survivor in an environment where I don't belong. I see fountains of gold and diamond towers, I am washed over by hoards of snobbish aristocrats on a daily basis - shunned, talked down to, laughed at. I don't belong here, but the fact of the matter is that I am here, and I'm not letting anyone tell me that I shouldn't be.

Nothing serious is a milky lie that I refuse to swallow. The thing is with Nothing serious is that you don't need to tell someone when it's nothing serious. If it really was nothing serious then I wouldn't have given it a second thought, and neither would she. It's serious. She has bruises on her skin in places she shouldn't. Those aren't accidental. They're forceful, like someone has aggressively restrained her, like someone made her do something she didn't want to do.

It's none of your business, it's none of your business.

But it should be. She's my friend, and her delusional disrespectful self-centred fiancé is throwing her about like a rag doll. Like a toy. She's so much more, and so much stronger than that, but what can she do? He is a behemoth of a man, pure bred, nurtured from birth, raised to be nothing else but a Career. He's too old now, but he's still built like an ox, and had more money than he can account for. What can she do?

What can I do?

I look at my weathered hands. They are tired and tested, but they ball into fists at the thought of him laying his meat-hook hands on her skin, pulling and grabbing at it like she's a piece of meat. The thought of him naked and her naked, and her afraid. Fuck. I can't even fucking think about it.

What do I do?

Confront him? There's no way that won't end violently. I am a good brawler, but if it comes to that then he'll try and kill me, and I don't know if I have it within me to kill someone. Even if I did, I would be arrested and I would never ever see Catrice again. Stupid thing is, if he kills me then everything carries on as normal. Some people have so much money that they're above the law.

What should I do?

Nothing. There's nothing I can do. I can't stop him, I can't save her. She has to save herself, or live a life where she fears him coming home from work every day because of what he'll do to her, or what he'll make her do.

I'm so lost. She saved my life, and yet I can't save hers. I've never had anyone in my life who I care about as much as I care about her, and it kills me that I am so fucking powerless.

"Catrice you have to start being honest with me," I say, my eyes meeting hers, "I may be from the gutter, but I'm not stupid."

I'm angry now, and I shouldn't be, because I'm not very good at swallowing my anger. My chest feels tight, and sweat pricks the back of my neck. I start breathing through my mouth, but my abdomen still burns with the thought of him on her, and her struggling, and him restraining her.

"He's hurting you."

So what should I do?