Chapter Text
Rumi traced one of the patterns on her left forearm with a fingernail, the feeling soothing and the mark responded in turn, fading slowly like a stain drying to nothingness before pulsing back with a lavender glow.
She was grateful for the opportunity to finally expose her arms on stage. Years of long sleeves, high-necked collars and the resultant sweat-fests she experienced at every practice, let alone performance, made her thankful whenever she recalled what her secret had forced her to wear. How the clothing used to cling to her skin, drenched in sweat, the red flush that climbed her neck and cheeks in heat.
Now, her girlfriends called her ‘beautiful’ and ‘exotic’ – but despite their voiced admiration Rumi couldn’t help the sinking shame of who she was, of what she was still hiding.
Her patterns were one thing to accept, and Mira and Zoey had- but that wasn’t truly all of her. No, all of her was everything that she still kept tucked away, muzzled like the feral animal beneath that no one had ever seen but Rumi herself and Celine in her absolute darkest moments. When the anger burst out of her with lengthening fingernails that extended into razor-sharp claws, in the golden glow to the one eye that allowed her to see soft spots: a human weakness where a strategically placed bite or puncture would hurt the most. And the connection that fury brought – the echo of lost souls reaching out to her roiling rage that joined their voices with hers. Sometimes, it was hard to resist that pull.
Now, her fans from around the world admired her unique ‘tattoos,’ so they thought, and the press and media wondered aloud either why she either covered them up for so long or suddenly thought to decorate her body with them. Some organizations reproached her, claiming that as a role model to so many young girls, she shouldn’t be promoting full-body body modification, especially not in tattoos that looked so cult-like. Most, however, praised the artistry and marveled at how light they were on her skin, noting that it must have been an exceptionally talented artist who placed them there. At least, Rumi considered, only demons and other Hunters like her friends could observe their color changes and glow, lest she look like a glorified mood-ring to any old human off the street.
As she took her place on the dark stage, the audience drowned in shadows before her, she swallowed down the thick lump of unease that formed in her throat, tried to bury the lifelong teachings to always, always, conceal.
She should be used to it by now, really, now that they were already on their tenth show of this new tour. The fans screamed like always, the media sung their praises, and Rumi came up with her cover story to give when on interviews and was inevitably asked about her patterns. But the churning pit of anxiety still swirled in her gut and made her breaths come quickly in her chest at the idea of her true self in the spotlight for all to see.
With that thought, three spotlights loudly thudded on, one after the other after the other, on each of the girls. They followed Mira and Zoey in a beam of light against the pitch-black stage as the two began to saunter towards Rumi in the middle, who tested out the current state of the honmoon with a single, drawn-out note.
“Oohhhhh….”
It rippled blue at the edges, beginning its descent over the stage, but needed more power to continue its journey into the audience and out past the arena.
The girls looked at each other, giving a confirmatory nod, and began their show.
“We were fire in the pouring rain”
Voices melded together in harmony. Hair whipped back and forth as they moved their bodies to the lyrics.
“Laughing loud, dancing through the pain”
One, two, and – three, four and- Rumi chanted in her head as her feet tapped out the moves they’d practiced hundreds if not thousands of times over the past few months.
“Now I’m talking to your ghost at 2 am
Scrolling back just to feel again”
Ten shows into this year’s tour, Rumi, Mira and Zoey performed through muscle memory, barely needing to think about their motions or the more difficult notes to hit. They melded together like raindrops hitting the churning waves of the ocean, their voices blending to become one whole, their motions entirely in sync with their lyrics.
“Your hoodie’s still hanging by the door
Like it's waiting for you to come back for more”
But the echo in this empty space…”
“…Only answers with your silent face”
They reached out to the honmoon with that line, reaching down into their souls and pulling forth the power within them, scattering it across the stage and down into the audience. The first wave was always an assessment of the strength of the ley lines against the demon world and Gwi-Ma, setting the tone for the work that needed to be done ahead.
“You said love, then walked away
Left your words in yesterday”
The ripples of the honmoon flared to life, surging forward in swells of pinks and blues. It continued outward, pulsing with their words, the girls following with their eyes to see how far its reach would go, the strength of its protection.
Until…
What?
Rumi struggled to contain her gasp and control her facial expression as somewhere high up in a balcony on stage right a small part of the expanding lines of the honmoon just…
Vanished.
It was almost imperceptible, just a little blip that shouldn’t have been there, but she knew what she was looking for.
And that certainly wasn’t it.
A quick glance over at Mira and Zoey, whose expressions mirrored her own after tearing their gazes away from the same balcony, silently communicated ‘yeah, I saw it too.’
They carried on with their show, minds reeling underneath as they processed the sight they had never seen before.
“Now my heart’s a song you never played
Just a note you let fade
You were here, then you were gone”
The bright lights on the stage prevented them from seeing what or who was extinguishing that part of the honmoon. Could it be a demon? But demons didn’t, no, couldn’t, obscure the honmoon like that. The honmoon reacted to a demon with a flare of light. Not…an absence of one.
“Like a dream that didn’t last too long”
This was a setback. How would they strengthen and intensify the honmoon if the rings couldn’t be completed? Would it still hold in the other areas the powerful bands did cover?
“What the fuck was that?” Mira whispered to Rumi off-mic as Zoey sauntered forward with her lines.
“Now I’m chasing what we used to be
You're an echo in the silence haunting me”
Rumi shrugged, eyebrows raised to express confusion herself. They only had one chance to get to the bottom of it before their first song was over and they broke for their intro.
Away from the glare of the bright spotlights upon them, she had to get higher up - above the people watching in order to figure out who or what was waiting up there for them. Could it actually be a demon? She didn’t know if she’d even be able to recognize one at a quick glance- some could heavily transform their appearance, after all, enough that the person next to them wouldn’t notice their other-ness. Even Rumi herself had hid her true self from her best friends for years.
Onto the ring it was, then.
Rumi hopped up onto the hoop as it swung by her, her nails clicking on the metal as she tightened her grip. There used to be a time, when the group first formed, that she was afraid of heights. It took weeks of practice for her to get used to being swung high above the stage and audience, finding deep red gouges from where her fingernails had dug into her palms as she clutched the ring in terror. The times that she had fallen off? Well, she tried not to think about those, though Zoey and especially Mira just loved to bring up those disasters, absolutely howling with laughter anytime anyone got just a tiny bit clumsy onstage.
“I still see you in the little things
Coffee cups, late-night movie scenes
And I wonder if you feel it too
Or if I'm the only one missing you”
But the aerial trick wasn’t just for the aesthetics of their performance. No – it actually gave Rumi the chance to scatter the honmoon farther, allowing it to permeate deeper and reach as far as their energy could extend.
She only swung over the audience once. Just one shot.
She had to time it right.
“I reach out, but you're out of range
We were close, now everything's changed
And the memories that I can't erase
Still pretend you're in this place”
Stage left……center…… zooming by too fast to catch more than a passing glimpse of the blur of faces she passed. Stage right approaching……
“Now I’m chasing what we used to be
You're an echo in the silence haunting me”
Rumi cast their joint power outward, letting it radiate as far as she could reach, the beams of light unfurling shimmering lines of blue and pink, just in time to hit the balcony as she passed. Success.
“You were here, then you were gone
Like a dream that didn’t last too long”
The streams of light shone, reflecting in the audience’s eyes. Except for one person, whose simple presence seemed to cancel out the line of the honmoon passing over her, the passage of the light undeniably just sputtering out as it passed over her, though it continued to spread unaffected to either side like nothing had ever happened.
Her ice-blue eyes met dark brown ones as Rumi swung overhead.
Besides being of an even lighter complexion than the rest of the Scandinavians in attendance at the Arendelle Performance Center, the woman looked, well…..certainly not demonic. Her hair was so light blonde it was almost white, her features delicate, and…..
And nothing. The hoop that Rumi swung on passed by so quickly that her eyes didn’t have any more time to take anything else in. Damn it.
She lightly jumped off the ring as it swung past the stage, her mind racing with thoughts so much that she didn’t even think about sticking the landing and needed to take a few more steps than usual forward to carry her momentum. Zoey grabbed her hand before she could tumble forward, swinging her around to face the crowd as if she had planned it that way. Rumi silently thanked her, appreciating her friends’ thoughtfulness and how they seemed to just get her at times, the way no one else could. They were there, just like now, to catch her as she stumbled and make it look like it was the most natural thing in the world.
And maybe it was, she supposed. None of them had had a true family, the kind everyone else always seemed to have. The mother and father who led and guided with warm hugs and kind words. The siblings to tease and play and take your side against your parents’. The extended family that formed a net of support wherever you went, no matter what was needed.
So they formed that support for each other, no questions asked.
“Maybe someday we’ll meet again
In a city where the past won’t win
But until then, I’ll hold on tight
To the sound of you in quiet nights”
They finished out their set like usual, waiting in anticipation for some sort of signal or attack that a demon was in attendance. Kept their steps tighter, their power ready at hand to summon blades, their eyes tracking and hunting out in the audience.
But nothing.
They left the stage in a rush to finally be able to speak, trying to get words in in-between Bobby’s never-ending chatter and haste to get them backstage for the VIP meetups for some fundraiser raffle for charity.
“There are 3 winners you have to meet with, girls- each spent hundreds and the first one thousands to meet with you so stay sharp please and I promise you’ll be rewarded with all the rotting on the couch time you can handle when it’s over, okay?”
Mira merely grunted in response, yanking Rumi over by the elbow to whisper. “What did you see?!”
“Nothing,” Rumi answered, disheartened that she didn’t have more to share as Zoey frowned at the news, taking her hand in concern.
“Oh, and one more thing!” Bobby added, halting the girls in their tracks to the meet-and-greet area. “The first one’s a philanthropist, head of PR as well as non-profits for, like, the entire city. She and her older sister are the heirs of the tycoon who practically built Arendelle, or something like that, it doesn’t really matter.” He waved his hand in the air to offset his words with nonchalance. “Just that they pretty much literally own this stadium and anything of note in the entire city so be nice, please.”
The girls quickly nodded, waving Bobby away as they bent their heads together to continue their discussion in private. “What do you mean nothing? Like no one was there? Or it wasn’t a demon?”
“Just this way girls,” Bobby shoved them through a backstage door, trying to keep an eye on where the stadium employee was directing him while trying to corral his distracted squad. “Please, just a quick selfie and autograph and then you can go, c’mon.”
“No, there was someone there,” Rumi clarified. “But I really couldn't see much in the millisecond I had up there. Just her-”
They squeezed through into another room, Bobby handing each of them a sharpie for autographs and running out, calling “Five minutes!” after them.
“-eyes,” Rumi finished, pulling up short as she came face to face with the same icy- blue gaze as she had seen up in the balcony.