Harrowheart (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
westfallcorndog) wrote2017-05-29 10:38 pm
westfallcorndog) wrote2017-05-29 10:38 pm
Entry tags:
Might Makes...
"What a horrible day. And you're lookin' horrible, too."
Harrowheart takes his minion by the face with one hand and frowns at what he feels. Her skin is soft, but that isn't a compliment. She's turning to gelatin in the heat of the Nexus summer. It's going to take so much effort to keep her around, so much unnecessary energy to be spent on a hasty resurrection of a twice-dead body. What a waste. What. A. Waste. He's going to have to make extra trips to Azeroth and kill to store the energy he'll need, though offhandedly he wonders if he can steal enough life energy from eating raw meat to make up for what he'll lose invigorating her.
Of course, he could always give it up and let her sleep...
He snorts a sharp, cold breath and releases the ghoul as if her cheeks were boiling to the touch. Reynard's chiding disappointment fills his mind and ruins his train of thought.
Seasons... Let her die, Harrowheart.
Reynard didn't get it. This wasn't about her free will. That had nothing to do with it. He wasn't enslaving her. He beat her in fair combat – fair enough, anyway – and so he got to do whatever he wanted. He was stronger, she was weaker, and now he had the privilege of making the rules. That's just how things were, are, and probably always will be.
Still... He can see her out of the corner of his vision, her own milky eyes empty of thought or soul. Rather than order her to move he shifts himself so that he doesn't have to see her any more. Reynard was ruining it. Absolutely ruining it. She was a killer, he stopped her, and this was supposed to be his prolonged moment to gloat, to parade his trophy as a reminder. Of his prowess, he thought... But now he wasn't so sure.
You haven't killed? Reynard had asked.
Of course he had. He couldn't count how many people he had killed. The number seemed too big to even guess at with a little logic. He had done it so often that very few of his acts even registered as memories worth keeping. There was a choice throat he'd stepped on, a set of guts he'd liberated, a few particular people of great power or hubris that he'd bested... But the ones that seem to stand out most vividly were the ones who defended themselves most poorly. The very weak, the very scared... Even if their deaths were immemorable their fear is particularly well-imagined by his mind.
You haven't been a villain? he had asked.
Harrowheart's eyebrows come together. He knows the answer. Every time he laughs with Jim over a beer he knows it. When he throws an arm around Viatorus, he knows it. When he advises Adia on love, when he gives directions to strangers, when he sits with his brother on a warm night dreaming of the love of a woman, he knows it. And not just in the back of his mind. It's there, on the forefront. On the tip of his tongue. He knows it.
In frustration he spins around to see the ghoul again, but without his orders to look his way she continues to stare off.
"So what's the difference between us?" he demands.
She doesn't answer, and her silence is infuriating.
"What? What?! What is it?! You kill people. I kill people. You're evil. I'm evil. We're the same person..."
Almost. Almost the same. One thing and one thing only kept them in their places: He was stronger. That was very much a fact, not just between himself and this woman but so many men and women who had come before her. He was stronger, and so he made the rules.
So why can't he stop his hands clenching into fists when that rolls across his mind? He's positive he hates that notion in any other context. Off the battlefield, it's always wrong. Governments oppress people, and he knows that it's unjust. The rich oppress the poor, and that's caused no endless conflict between himself and his closest friends. The strong oppress the weak... And yet he thrives in that? It fills him with a sense of power. It thrills him and it fuels him and nothing feels more right.
So what is wrong, then? What he does, or what he believes in? Can a person believe in a thing and act against it? No... No, there's a word for that. Hypocrite. And that's one of the worst things a person can be, isn't it? Across every culture, there's only one true weakness: Defying your truths.
His eyes widen then as in a flash he feels the burden of a complex understanding. So much information, so much retroactive comprehension, he can hardly grasp at the threads of it before that spark already begins to fade away.
This is what Isidor means when she mentions her legacy. This is what it means to 'be a Durant.' To seize the power that you're given and use it how you please. Not to wish it away or to change what you are, but to accept reality. To be powerful. That's where her family got their servants, and that's why they keep them. That's how they've amassed an endless fortune, mansions, artifacts of magical power, even the knowledge in their own minds. That's how they lived the life his family could only dream of. And it isn't a moral quandary after all, is it? Viatorus and Isidor aren't victims of their circumstances. They aren't kind people unfortunately living the immoral lives of the rich. They are rich, they are powerful. It can't be separated from who they are or what they do. Like hawks who swoop on rabbits, they're predators. They are simply better than other people... And so they make the rules.
Reynard was right about one thing. Harrowheart didn't need to use 'justice' as an excuse to feel more powerful than others, because the facts didn't need to be excused. He is better than her, and he doesn't need to feel guilty for the truth.
When you're strong, you make the rules... And only the weak object.
"Come on," he says, nodding his head in another direction as he begins to walk, and his minion shambles with him. "Let's get you fixed up..."
Harrowheart takes his minion by the face with one hand and frowns at what he feels. Her skin is soft, but that isn't a compliment. She's turning to gelatin in the heat of the Nexus summer. It's going to take so much effort to keep her around, so much unnecessary energy to be spent on a hasty resurrection of a twice-dead body. What a waste. What. A. Waste. He's going to have to make extra trips to Azeroth and kill to store the energy he'll need, though offhandedly he wonders if he can steal enough life energy from eating raw meat to make up for what he'll lose invigorating her.
Of course, he could always give it up and let her sleep...
He snorts a sharp, cold breath and releases the ghoul as if her cheeks were boiling to the touch. Reynard's chiding disappointment fills his mind and ruins his train of thought.
Seasons... Let her die, Harrowheart.
Reynard didn't get it. This wasn't about her free will. That had nothing to do with it. He wasn't enslaving her. He beat her in fair combat – fair enough, anyway – and so he got to do whatever he wanted. He was stronger, she was weaker, and now he had the privilege of making the rules. That's just how things were, are, and probably always will be.
Still... He can see her out of the corner of his vision, her own milky eyes empty of thought or soul. Rather than order her to move he shifts himself so that he doesn't have to see her any more. Reynard was ruining it. Absolutely ruining it. She was a killer, he stopped her, and this was supposed to be his prolonged moment to gloat, to parade his trophy as a reminder. Of his prowess, he thought... But now he wasn't so sure.
You haven't killed? Reynard had asked.
Of course he had. He couldn't count how many people he had killed. The number seemed too big to even guess at with a little logic. He had done it so often that very few of his acts even registered as memories worth keeping. There was a choice throat he'd stepped on, a set of guts he'd liberated, a few particular people of great power or hubris that he'd bested... But the ones that seem to stand out most vividly were the ones who defended themselves most poorly. The very weak, the very scared... Even if their deaths were immemorable their fear is particularly well-imagined by his mind.
You haven't been a villain? he had asked.
Harrowheart's eyebrows come together. He knows the answer. Every time he laughs with Jim over a beer he knows it. When he throws an arm around Viatorus, he knows it. When he advises Adia on love, when he gives directions to strangers, when he sits with his brother on a warm night dreaming of the love of a woman, he knows it. And not just in the back of his mind. It's there, on the forefront. On the tip of his tongue. He knows it.
In frustration he spins around to see the ghoul again, but without his orders to look his way she continues to stare off.
"So what's the difference between us?" he demands.
She doesn't answer, and her silence is infuriating.
"What? What?! What is it?! You kill people. I kill people. You're evil. I'm evil. We're the same person..."
Almost. Almost the same. One thing and one thing only kept them in their places: He was stronger. That was very much a fact, not just between himself and this woman but so many men and women who had come before her. He was stronger, and so he made the rules.
So why can't he stop his hands clenching into fists when that rolls across his mind? He's positive he hates that notion in any other context. Off the battlefield, it's always wrong. Governments oppress people, and he knows that it's unjust. The rich oppress the poor, and that's caused no endless conflict between himself and his closest friends. The strong oppress the weak... And yet he thrives in that? It fills him with a sense of power. It thrills him and it fuels him and nothing feels more right.
So what is wrong, then? What he does, or what he believes in? Can a person believe in a thing and act against it? No... No, there's a word for that. Hypocrite. And that's one of the worst things a person can be, isn't it? Across every culture, there's only one true weakness: Defying your truths.
His eyes widen then as in a flash he feels the burden of a complex understanding. So much information, so much retroactive comprehension, he can hardly grasp at the threads of it before that spark already begins to fade away.
This is what Isidor means when she mentions her legacy. This is what it means to 'be a Durant.' To seize the power that you're given and use it how you please. Not to wish it away or to change what you are, but to accept reality. To be powerful. That's where her family got their servants, and that's why they keep them. That's how they've amassed an endless fortune, mansions, artifacts of magical power, even the knowledge in their own minds. That's how they lived the life his family could only dream of. And it isn't a moral quandary after all, is it? Viatorus and Isidor aren't victims of their circumstances. They aren't kind people unfortunately living the immoral lives of the rich. They are rich, they are powerful. It can't be separated from who they are or what they do. Like hawks who swoop on rabbits, they're predators. They are simply better than other people... And so they make the rules.
Reynard was right about one thing. Harrowheart didn't need to use 'justice' as an excuse to feel more powerful than others, because the facts didn't need to be excused. He is better than her, and he doesn't need to feel guilty for the truth.
When you're strong, you make the rules... And only the weak object.
"Come on," he says, nodding his head in another direction as he begins to walk, and his minion shambles with him. "Let's get you fixed up..."