The red glow of Pseu's eyes rested on her sibling's features as she went on with her heart throb, though she could sense Algos' fangs on her heart all too easily, and though she let her sibling have a taste, it was a simple act to exert pushback on her desires, giving a soft sigh as she wordlessly rejected her sibling's attempt at extracting pain from her heart, suddenly giving her nose a firm poke, as if to physically convey her rejection,
"There's no need for that, Algos. Guzzling away on other's pain isn't always the solution to ease it. Just asking for an escalation issue, there. I've made peace with my demons, but you're free to hug and hold me close, those are always nice."
She would then move to hold Algos' nose in a soft pinch between her fingers, an unamused expression lying on her face, "I can smell your greedy boorish hunger from a mile away, no hiding that from me. Gods, transition between life and death must've scrambled you right on up, didn't it?"
The woman sighed, giving her a pat on the head, thinking for a moment, before getting up, walking to a bookcase, and grabbing a book, "Running my mouth on and on in explanation wouldn't do too well, so let me put it in a way I feel would be better communicated; I'm going to tell you a story."
She came back over to Algos, plopped down next to her and opened the book, which was full of blank lavender pages, "Yes I know it's blank, i'm just being cute, play along. Ahem.."
"So a very, very very very, long time ago, in a distant land, a woman lived away in a little cabin all on her own because she was getting exhausted of dealing with all manner of shit in life."
She innocently batted her eyelashes at Algos, as she continued her story, flipping the page,
"She wanted to start over, have some time to herself for once, but this cabin became very lonely after some time living in it, so soon this lovely young lady went out and made familiars out of some masked fellows, the name escapes me but they were plenty charming. But alas, it wasn't the same. It took some time for her to realize what she truly wanted; A child."
Pseu's words turned from cheeky in tone, to a far more solemn, nostalgic one, her head tilting to the side as she flipped the imaginary story's page,
"So, she went on to have one. Her own little secret creation within her secret little hideaway, a precious little boy. She adored that little bundle of crying, fuss, and vomit. He was her entire world, from his dark locks to his golden eyes to his chubby feet."
A lump in her throat would form as she seemed almost hesitant to touch the next page, but she moved to flip it anyway,
"Five, precious long years with the little hellspawn was all she got. There was a human settlement nearby, but she never took notice. They weren't important to her, so why bother paying them any mind? Well, they certainly paid her plenty of mind. So much mind that they set fire to the fields her home rested on as they slept."
She almost crushed the next page between her fingers, but she regained composure, breathing in and out as she flipped the page,
"...She had no interest in preserving her home. She could always make another one, more remote. As long as she had her familiars and most importantly her little son, everything else could be replaced. But.. He wasn't in bed. Little rat had a habit of sneaking out to look at the moon. So, she ran outside, looking for her boy, but he was nowhere to be found. She called, she screamed, she bawled as the flames came all the closer."
Her tone slowly became monotonous as she moved on to the next page, but she initially was silent, still, before her lips parted,
"She found him. Impaled on a spear. Paraded around like a prize. Apparently they didn't take too kindly to beings they couldn't understand, and saw us little more than beasts to be slain before they could become a threat. Unfortunately for them, their ignorance left them unprepared for the wrath they brought to their door."
She looked at Algos with a blank expression, "You're a smart girl, you have a good idea of what happened next. Moving on."
She skipped the page she glossed over, moving on to some other part,
"She never found the body. She was wrought with grief. She hid herself away, never speaking to her family, her friends, nobody. She drowned herself in all manner of substances of her own creation to keep her mind away from reality. But no amount of shit shoved down her throat could make her forget how she felt having that little child."
She kept flipping, page through page, almost endlessly as she spoke, "She tried having another one. It died in the womb. She tried over, and over, and over, and over again. Having that feeling back turned from a longing into an obsession. But each and every little creature she tried to birth, died. She steadily lost her mind, she swore she saw her dead children and heard their little voices behind her, telling her awful things, nothings that she knew she deserved."
Pseu would sigh softly, her very being feeling all the heavier for speaking any of this to another being, much less a member of her family, but she continued,
"Life was a dreary blur, of wishes that would never come true. One day, out of... Mercy? Self hatred? Don't know, something, I decided it was enough. Created a drink that would slow my healing to a complete halt, sliced open my vitals, and let myself bleed out and choke on my own fluids, hearing the voices of screaming children roar in my ears as life left me. I didn't expect anything to come afterwards."
She flipped, and flipped, and flipped, until she hit the second to last page of the book, stopping it with her thumb. Her expression softened as she touched this page, far less dreary or sad, rather she stared at it with a quiet look of love,
"I'm certain you understand what this page stands for, so I suppose i'll leave it at that."
She would shut the book, resting it on her lap as she would then look at Algos, retaining that softness to her gaze, "Don't treat your current self as an eternal state of being. To stagnate is to rot and die. Mana only got to her present state because she kept buckling down and mired herself in her own rut of insanity. I can't force you, but all I expect is this - Don't make the same fuck ups she, I, and likely many others have done. I expect the same of Calypso, which is why I stressed it into her stupid head not to, even if she might not be adhering completely to it right now."