In Dire Straits - no dawn, no day { Azuhel }

V I R R A

star light, star bright

Virra's eyes open slowly, tiredly, head still numb with sleep. The sight around her is unfamiliar at first, her body tightening as she panics. Where am I? The familiar deserted skyline is replaced with one full of trees, thick trunks that reach up into the heavens and block out the sky. Sunshine filters through the gaps in the leaves, dancing across the rocky floor below her, spattering patterns of lights against the bleached faces of the walls surrounding her. It's only then that she remembers. The quarry, they called this the quarry, as she drifted in and out of consciousness, dragged by the scruff of her neck deep within her new home. Alteron. She's in Alteron.

Oukoku-Kai was wrong about a lot of things, nearly every thing, but they were right at least about one thing. The Red Dragon is terrifying. Azuhel, her name is Azuhel. Azuhel with a wicked grin and honey words steeped in a strange drawl, Azuhel with wild eyes and a body that pressed a bit too close just before she stole Virra.

There's a deep set sadness in her heart, as her eyes turn to what she can see of the sky above, peering past the face of the cliffs boxing her in. She wonders what Nastasia is doing, where her ... dearest friend is. Does she even know I'm gone? A clenching pain in her chest has her asking; does she care? Though Virra would consider them close, the other woman was always elusive with her emotions, her feelings. It took so long for her to open up to someone - to Virra - and now she's gone and now Nastasia is alone, and now --

Virra doesn't realize she's hyperventilating until the staccato of her breath catches in her throat and she coughs. No ... she can't think about that right now. Virra pulls herself up, stretching the tired ache from her bones, before looking around. There are other prisoners, slaves and captives taken from wars past, probably others who have upset the current crown. She thinks she sees the Dragon in the distance, but it may be her creeping anxiety. The black chains of her fear shackle her in place until she can breathe again, shuddering and sitting with her head hung in defeat.

She's going to die here.

Azuhel was not afraid to get dirty.

She is a woman of action, a war-hungry tactician born from experiencing the field. She enjoyed the heat of the metaphorical forge. The feel of meat and the thump of a pulse between her teeth. She could orchestrate a performance of grand ideals like any other, crafting tales from ties and half-formed truths, but there is something so very exhilarating about being the actor instead of the director.

And so, it only made sense that she’d come to get Virra herself. Virra, this wolf with soft flesh and shaky demeanor and… and so very foolish…

A perfect specimen to practice a more traditionalist line of thought upon. The perfect prisoner, now serf, to teach how to worship.

And, Azuhel was in need of a priestess, wasn’t she?

So, she came to the Quarry herself, teeth saliva-slick as her muzzle spread apart to release a look of sly interest as she slid down the muck covered walls to approach the center proper. Then, with one paw before the other, she’d step onto the stone stage there, posture tall… determined…

While the abnormality of her gaze gleamed with all the cunning of the wickedly passionate.

“You. Yes you. Virra, isn’t it? I’d never forget.” Gone is the thickness of her accent, replaced by the regality of southern born nobility. She is a beast. She is a Queen. She is Lord and King. She is anything and everything, and she intends to be whatever it is Virra needs too.

So long as she can control her in the end.

“A shame you had to come here,” Her tone is conversational, she is stating a fact, nothing more and nothing less. She’d much rather have Virra at the Cathedral already, instead of toying about in the slick. “I have a purpose for you. New life, rebirth, under these very stars. Or… pain.”

She’d tilt her head for a moment, if only to wait for Virra’s initial response but no matter the answer she’d chuckle softly, amused by an inner thought, “Pain… wouldn’t you like to be free of that? No doubt the Rosa of Oukoku-Kai specialized in that. In taking and taking and taking some more. But I, the Dragon, have learned to give.”

Whether they liked it or not.