Nothing's Conventional About Us

XXIII ~ Onyx

TW: Blood and violence and mentions of non-consent sexual encounters (Don't let this aesthetic deceive you)

Onyx is the colour of the darkness
That drowns your heart.
But it also smokes my vision
Every time I see you breathe.
For, I would much rather, you did not.
I would very much rather,
You rot in the onyx depths of hell.

Onyx

She slid a long, red-painted index finger over the gold threadwork of the carmine angavastram that now hung from a bedpost. Her red nail scraped against the roughness of the thread and gave off a slight scraping noise that broke the silence that otherwise thickened the air. 

She had eaten the food that Bhanumati had so lovingly sent for her, and after a few moments of drowsiness, the ichor in her veins had vehemently burnt off the sedative in it. She and her dearest friend had laughed over it, before he had called a servant to take away the utensils and cutlery, and she had feigned sleep. 

He had simply brushed two fingers against the skin of her palm in farewell and silently left. He had to get whatever little things he had brought here for show ready, and also prepare his sister for the departure. 

After all, a non-existent messenger had informed them of some non-existent family need. 

No, there would be no consequences in the distant future. Because, men do not get to question Gods. 

So, she just laid there now. Her mental link tightly shut, and the presence of that little congregation of her and her mate's energy that grew in her womb, bubbling with so much life that it made her want to smile. It felt like a child's joyous babbling. 

But she calmly traced the fine threadwork on the piece of fabric as she waited for all sounds to abandon every hallway of the guest quarters. 

She did not have to wait much longer before she felt no trace of living human energy in that wing of the palace. A smile finally curled her lips up in the corners. 

This is where humans and Gods all became alike - in the face of this thirst. Call it revenge, call it justice; she did not care. She simply cared about the darkness that littered her past. 

She cared about how she had been taken into a lair full of strange men who openly ogled her. She cared about how she had wanted to crawl out of her own skin every time he had touched even a single strand of her hair, almost affectionately tucked it back, and how menacing it had felt - to be so cornered so helpless - and how she had wanted to crawl out of her own skin. 

She cared about how he spoke of possessing her, using her, breaking in her virtue-

"Sweet, will that not be so sweet? For me to finally own you entirely? Own the most beautiful female that the universe has ever created? To have you mother my children, serve as my wife, be my consort. To have you every night, every day even-"

She blinked, and the darkness of her cage dissipated from her vision. It had been so dark, so dark, because she had lost all hope, all reason. Every time he had made her look at herself in a mirror, all she had wanted to do was rip a shard out of it and slide it across her own throat. 

She had wondered if she could somehow set herself on fire, would he still find a way to keep her alive? Heal her? And then-

She thrashed her head against the bed. The softness certainly did not hurt, but it helped the memories fade away, and for a moment she wished she had not shut her mind she sternly away from his.