[Nero's no virgin, and no fearful child. She knows what she's being prepared for with every step in the process - and while she's grateful for the food and the bath, she'd rather it all just be over with. Spectacle needs no justification beyond itself, but formalities - those grate on Nero, make her chafe.
Spectacle has substance. Ritual is empty. And even with the food being delicious and the water soothing her skin, she can't help but feel like everyone involved is going through the motions, herself included. She still doesn't know what her husband will look like, or what he'll even be doing to her. She's heard the whispers - that he might not even be human, but some manner of beast. A minotaur, a cyclops. Or something far darker, far more abstract than that. The kind of thing you'd only find in the deepest parts of the ocean.
She's not afraid, though - even as she steps into the room, even as the door shuts behind her, she isn't afraid.
... She does take a step back at those pinpricks of light, though. She can't imagine what sort of creature looks at a human like that. She wonders what it's - he's - thinking. If he can even think.]
... Are you going to sit there, my dearest? Come, embrace your wife - and dismiss these priestesses. [She's putting on a bold face, but she's still squinting into the darkness, trying to make out some sort of distinct face. Human beings like to empathize, after all. She's read enough poetry to know that. They assign human feelings, emotions, to animals. Even inanimate objects, sometimes. So she wants to find some kind of human emotion in her...
no subject
Spectacle has substance. Ritual is empty. And even with the food being delicious and the water soothing her skin, she can't help but feel like everyone involved is going through the motions, herself included. She still doesn't know what her husband will look like, or what he'll even be doing to her. She's heard the whispers - that he might not even be human, but some manner of beast. A minotaur, a cyclops. Or something far darker, far more abstract than that. The kind of thing you'd only find in the deepest parts of the ocean.
She's not afraid, though - even as she steps into the room, even as the door shuts behind her, she isn't afraid.
... She does take a step back at those pinpricks of light, though. She can't imagine what sort of creature looks at a human like that. She wonders what it's - he's - thinking. If he can even think.]
... Are you going to sit there, my dearest? Come, embrace your wife - and dismiss these priestesses. [She's putting on a bold face, but she's still squinting into the darkness, trying to make out some sort of distinct face. Human beings like to empathize, after all. She's read enough poetry to know that. They assign human feelings, emotions, to animals. Even inanimate objects, sometimes. So she wants to find some kind of human emotion in her...
Husband.]