Khymarah's House, Vienda
They were ugly, she knew they were ugly, it was sort of the point. Perhaps after all this time the scar tissue could still be coaxed into some semblance of normality by a skilled Living Conversationalist, the damaged and twisted flesh something that the body could be convinced to remedy. An excellent healer could probably do it but she would never ask, she would never show them. They were her shame to bear, her reminders of her weakness and her failure, and how she needed to be better. They were a horrible scourge on her otherwise flawless skin as if all of her weakness of character had burst out like pressured magma, the chaotic heat escaping only to solidify in grotesque shapes on the surface.
When she saw it, she found that Khymarah's shock didn't come as a surprise to her but her sadness did. It was far more disconcerting to see her react as she did, the tears coming to the artist's gaze as she reached out unthinkingly towards the damage. Drezda flinched at the unexpected touch, onyx eyes pools of shocked incomprehension as she turned them on the Bastian.
She didn't understand. The Hoxian really didn't understand at all. Confusion rippled out from her, her field humming with it even as she sat quite rigidly, eyeing the other warily, uncertainly. She found her hand grasped, the other truly looking as if she was on the verge of tears, the flash of guilt through her aura only adding to the strangeness of this little conundrum.
Why did the redhead feel guilty? Pity could be expected maybe but... guilt? She hadn't done it, she hadn't etched the marks into the diplomat's skin or asked her to do so. She hadn't forced a particular upbringing on her, hadn't made her a failure within said upbringing or made her feel like a lost cause. There was no reason to feel bad when she had had nothing to do with it. Surely, she didn't feel guilty because she felt somehow responsible, as if by knowing she could have stopped Drezda from doing it. How would she have helped? What could she have done?
"You didn't know, you weren't supposed to know. Nobody was, that was the point," she explained with a shrug, treating it with unimaginable nonchalance now that the secret was out. What else was she meant to do? This was what she was, really what she was and it was strangely nice not to have to hide it. Even her parents didn't know what she'd done to herself and they thought she was so good, so in control. They'd be very disappointed if they learned the truth, especially as those scars... they wouldn't like to pass her over to a husband like that. Not that she fucking wanted one but that sort of thing would matter to them, the shame of having said husband turn around to complain about deceit, the hiding of the fact that his wife was imperfect.
So imperfect.
But Khymarah didn't seem to mind. She wasn't repulsed, that was clear, not when her first reaction had been to reach out and touch the scars. That was... the last thing she'd expected. It was a rather tender, caring gesture in truth and the diplomat felt the warmth move up the skin of her throat, colouring everything in its vertical path.
The Bastian seemed to like the imperfection but then she was an artist, wasn't she? They liked the weird, the unusual, the different. The best of them took their inspiration from the abnormality of the world, the things that broke the mould and challenged the monotony that you grew so accustomed to throwing your eye over without seeing. So of course she enjoyed the mess that was Drezda with that artistic soul of hers but it was an aesthetic thing, an abstract interest. She'd get over it when she wasn't sitting in a studio in a working mindset. When she had the chance to think about her as a person who she could potentially have a romantic relationship with then Khymarah would be revolted; she'd realise that the Hoxian was a walking disaster who was best avoided.
And the fact that she wanted to paint the diplomat just seemed to confirm everything that she thought. She wasn't an art piece, she wasn't. It made her horribly teary, too confused and overwhelmed to know what was going on, what she was meant to think or believe. However, the redhead was genuine, always genuine and her expression now was so sweet and tender and understanding and Drezda wanted to trust her, to believe her on a level that went beyond the artistic.
The light touch of fingertips on her cheeks made her eyes flutter shut, the woman finding herself so weary. Why was she fighting again? How long had she been doing so? She didn't even know. Couldn't she just let go for a moment?
Something in her field relaxed, a soft acquiescence as the artist leaned in and brought their lips together, gentle and unimaginably sweet. When she relaxed a little, the mingling of their fields wasn't awful, wasn't something that made her panic this time. It had just been so long before and she hadn't expected the other woman to make her feel like that either. But there weren't any lies here, not this time, not from her and it was liberating and so, so wrong. She didn't know this woman well enough to have dropped her barriers. Where was rhakor? Where the fuck was it?!
But damnit, she wanted this! She wanted this enough that it had plagued her and taken seed in her heart. She'd poured it all out to Rosmilda and that wasn't something that should have happened, not unless it really mattered to her. Clearly it mattered a lot.
It was why she gave in, just for a little while, fingers blindly seeking the other's shoulders, moving up from the nape of her neck to tangle in the roots of her sublime red locks just in time for the Bastian to draw back. Damn her! Just- She didn't want to think right now, she really didn't. The poetry was certainly distracting but... it wasn't the right sort of distraction. She didn't need or want the complimentary words that she dropped in verse, no matter how lovely they were.
"I don't-" She paused, biting her lip, onyx eyes narrowing slightly. The grasp of her fingers in Khy's hair tightened a bit, the diplomat intending to give a tug, firm but not to hard to make her tilt her head up. The idea was to expose the pale white throat so that she could press her lips to it, to move them under her jaw. It was the height of stupidity really but she needed some control, even if it involved a little carnality.
"Is that what you want? Really?" she asked, voice a sultry purr in the artist's ear, roughened by the tears she'd so recently shed and more still lingered in her gaze. "I don't even know if you're any good," she added with a breathy laugh.