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  • Beqanna

    COTY

    Assailant -- Year 226

    QOTY

    "But the dream, the echo, slips from him as quickly as he had found it and as consciousness comes to him (a slap and not the gentle waves of oceanic tides), it dissolves entirely. His muscles relax as the cold claims him again, as the numbness sets in, and when his grey eyes open, there’s nothing but the faint after burn of a dream often trod and never remembered." --Brigade, written by Laura


    Enough.
    #11
    Aten had been expecting that there would have been some retaliation by Gryffen and his acquaintances to try and stop Ruan in his efforts to plan a way to take back the Taiga kingdom, but he did not imagine that Beqanna herself would get involved. Upon his recent return, Aten had been given small tasks by Ruan, mostly to make sure his family was safe in addition to taking a look at the new horses in the kingdom to determine the kind of force they would be facing when one day they attempted to reclaim Ruan's home.

    The day started out relatively quiet and normal. Aten had spoken with Circinae recently and got the information he so desired, albeit even if it was just a series of names. But he knew who had done this to Taiga, and that was valuable information he could tell Ruan. He was on his way to find the gray stallion, also hoping Jinju and her colt would be there so he could check on her and make sure his friend and her family were okay.

    But as Aten galloped through the forest and through the meadows, a sudden rumbling caused the golden stallion to stumble and nearly take a spill. Through sheer luck he managed to keep on his hooves, the stallion rearing up and flaring his nostrils as he tried to understand what was going on. He'd gone through a number of the small phenomenons called 'earthquakes' when he had lived in the Falls with his dam and older brother. To this day, he thought of them as a warning to the Reckoning, and that event had been traumatic enough on his yearling self.

    Now, though a full-grown adult, those haunting memories came back to him as the shaking grew stronger. Of the panicked screams as the horses of the Falls ran to escape the coming disaster... of his dam calling out for him, his brother, and his sister before she had suddenly disappeared in the carnage... the waterfall that gave the kingdom it's name spraying out large caches of water and soaking his family and the herd as they struggled to get away without falling over the large cliff...

    A loud voice echoed over the silence that once peacefully surrounded Taiga's forests, one word that sent a chill down Aten's spine.

    'Enough'.

    The sky turned as black as the night, and Aten immediately knew that whatever disaster was coming was going to have dire consequences. An ominous feeling settled into his gut, and, without warning, the stallion suddenly felt drained of his strength. It was like it had been sucked out by a tornado, and he didn't understand, until he started looking around. As the darkened sky spread over Taiga's land, the forest trees reacted. Their leaves began to wither and drop to the ground, covering the pine needle-soaked forest floor. The green grass beneath Aten's hooves turned as brown as his eyes before the blades began to tip over, signaling that they were dying just as the forest's trees.

    And then, he felt it again. The strange rumbling beneath his hooves. More dreaded memories flashed through his mind, but something in his gut pulled the stallion's attention in the direction of the ocean, where he'd been near not too long ago in his search for Circinae. At first, he wondered if the earthquake was happening under the ocean, and, as it turned out, he was half-right.

    From this distance, he didn't see it immediately, but as the growing mountain began to rise out of the ocean and stretch up over Taiga, the dread in Aten's stomach dropped like a boulder. His ears went back, eyes wide in shock as he suddenly put it all together. This was not an earthquake trying to destroy Taiga... it was something much worse, and the bright red magma soon flowing from the ocean's surface and onto Taiga's grasslands only confirmed it.

    With a rage-filled cry over the fact that Taiga was now the next subject to this horror, just as Pangea had been, Aten very briefly considered trying to ask for mercy, to have this land spared and just have the residents expelled. The Taiga was his home and he did not want to see it destroyed, but knew he would have no chance against boiling hot lava and ocean water that would match its temperature due to exposure. So, conceding defeat, Aten turned and began galloping toward Taiga's border, intending on finding a way out despite the annoying wall that Gryffen had commissioned.

    He did not count on how fast the ocean water could flow though, nor on Carnage's involvement in this grave situation. He didn't even see the stallion and what he was doing to make the situation worse, and probably wouldn't even figure it out. All Aten knew was that, one moment, all he had to worry about was the flowing lava and ocean water flooding the Taiga, and the next, creatures made of the ocean water and lava were chasing him down.

    Aten had seen some strange things in his time here, and had stopped questioning it long ago since there appeared to be a large number of horses in Beqanna with gifts; Ruan, Jinju, and Circinae, his friends, being three of them. But a horse with the ability to craft creatures from the very forces of Mother Nature itself? He almost couldn't comprehend that, only because of the danger he was in.

    A howl cut through the loud noise of the flooding water, Aten's ears turning to catch it. His eyes shifted in the direction it came from, seeing a large wolf, appearing to be made of water, barreling toward him with the intent to kill. It may have been the creature exposing its teeth or the murderous look in its eyes, but Aten didn't care. He knew this crafted beast would kill him if he gave it the chance.

    The creature was by itself for now, and, being made of water, Aten figured he could at least temporarily stun it if not blow it to pieces since water usually did that when his hooves made contact with it. He waited for the wolf to get closer, slowing his gait in the process. Then, when the wolf jumped, intent on sinking its watery fangs into his hindquarters, Aten slid to a stop, turned on a dime, and lashed out with his front hooves. His strike made the mark, but the wolf's body did not explode. Instead, it felt like a solid creature, like it was a real wolf instead of being made of water. Aten, confused, watched as the creature fell to the ground before beginning to get back to its paws. Before it did get back up, Aten was already off and running, not willing to risk a stupid move like that again.

    Aten decided to change tactics and headed for the trees, hearing the wolves following behind; he figured the one already chasing him was joined by a couple of buddies based on the noises he heard behind him. The golden stallion just focused on weaving back and forth through the dead trees, using what remained of his home to his advantage to escape the predators.

    The chase went on for some time before the wolves seemed to give up, and Aten allowed himself a moment of relaxation. Unfortunately, that was the last mistake he'd make today; emerging from the forest, he failed to watch where he was going. The boiling water had already caught up and was stretching across the grasslands a few feet in front of him, and he did not notice in time. Within the span of a few seconds, Aten's hooves splashed into the boiling water, kicking it up and causing a chain reaction where it made contact with the skin and fur on his barrel, and the lower portions of his legs. Due to its searing temperatures, Aten let out a cry of pain, rapidly backtracking to get his hooves out of the water.

    Once he was in the clear, the golden stallion went back and forth with his legs, trying to take the pressure off of all of them at the same time. However, since horses weren't meant to balance like that, Aten was forced to only lift one leg at a time. Also pushing him on was the knowledge that he had to get out, or either be killed by those wolves of fire and water or succumb to the searing temperatures of the boiling water flooding the forest.

    With pain in each step, Aten continued making his way to Taiga's border, his watchful eyes on the ocean water every second in order to determine if it would get in front of him again. Every so often, Aten caught glimpses of other horses outrunning the disaster, including who he thought was Loey, based on the gray coat, and Circinae, having found her own way out. The golden stallion, without any gifts himself, was left to find a weakness in the wall to escape. Some may think of him as a coward for abandoning his home, but how Aten saw it was that if he stayed here to fight Mother Nature itself, he would only prove his own stupidity. What kind of horse would he be if he allowed himself to die here when he might be able to return one day and try to help Taiga recover, to not allow another horse like Gryffen to move in and take hold of it?

    It seemed like forever, but, finally, Aten spotted something. A small hole in the wall, just big enough for a horse of his size to fit through. And considering he was one of the biggest in Taiga, anybody else after him could use it too. Pushing his body beyond its fatigue and the pain limit he was capable of, the stallion inched his way through the hole in the wall, feeling the temperature already rising from the cramped space due to the searing hot water and lava engulfing Taiga. When he was through, on the other side, the stallion continued on, spotting the river just outside Taiga's border a few feet away. This river was small, and shared between the two lands of Taiga and the Forest. Sylva lay on the other side, but it would have taken Aten took long to reach to escape the destruction.

    The golden stallion threw his body into the river, swimming toward the other side to finish his escape. The frigid waters did nothing to comfort the pain on his belly and legs; in fact, it only seemed to worsen, drawing pained gasps from each stroke of his legs as Aten swam the river's width. Once he was in the shallow area, Aten stretched out his legs and stepped out of the water, relief coursing through his system.

    Looking back, seeing he'd escaped the destruction, Aten all but collapsed, rolling onto his right side to take the pressure off his injured stomach. His teeth clenched together as he dealt with the pain, knowing that all he could do for now was ride it out. He had no knowledge of medicine or healing abilities, and he doubted any other were nearby to help him. So, for now, he rested, every so often lifting his head to look at Taiga's border and see if anybody else could escape the disaster like he had. Whenever he did glance up, he hoped especially to see Ruan, Jinju, Ander, Polaris, or Circinae, the horses he had come to consider his close friends. He would've gone to search for him, but given the wolves had chased him and how he had been injured by the water, he wouldn't have lasted.

    So now, he could only hope they made it out too. After looking for a few minutes, Aten laid his head down, his nostrils flaring with each breath as the skin around the burn marks began turning a raw red, darkening the base of the fur around each mark in the process.
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    #12
    THANA.
    (as black as your soul)
      There is a frigidity clutching to the remnants of dusk as the sun, somewhere beyond the dense copse of deciduous trees, rises into the morning sky – and though dawn has descended upon much of the world around them, there is still a dark shadow lingering with the haze of a low-lying fog. The sunlight has yet to touch the woodland floor, and she is at ease with it. Quietly, her slender figure has weaved itself past each winding branch and over each dry, bristling bush lining the once forbidden border, delighted by the mist enveloping her.

      The tranquility of daybreak is no more, as the ground beneath her rumbles and stirs. The sky is blackened, as if sheathed and kept from the pale light of day, and there is such little illumination in the darkness of Her shadow that she is forced to pause for a moment, to allow her eyes to adjust to it. Her heart is roused from its complacency, thundering roughly within her rib cage as her two-toned gaze darts to and fro. All the while, the dense woodland withers and dies, pine needles falling all around her as if each were a twisted, twirling snowflake, draping itself over the slope of her spine.

      Enough, a voice murmurs to her, and then - run! The ground is not only moving, it is changing - and with each passing moment,  Taiga becomes more unrecognizable, while weak and brittle pine trees sway and fall all around her. When the soil sifts beneath her weight, she is awakened, and with quiet prowess, her heavy equine body is shifted into that of a lithe, agile canine, draped in black. A deep, guttural howl emerging from the tightness of her throat, meeting the call of the wraith that had brought her here; to the one that she would follow to whatever end.

      She does not wait for his response – she is surging toward the border, her long and languid legs carrying her swiftly through the dark copse of shaking, wavering trees. A flush of boiling seawater mixed with roiling magma heaves itself up onto the distant shoreline, and she has no choice but to flee towards the southern border. She can taste his scent, enveloping her in its entirely – but he is elsewhere; little else but an echo and with each rumbling quake, the landscape is enveloping her, threatening to steal the breath within her lungs and the beating heart inside of her chest.

      She cannot to go him, much as she yearns to – but when she is left heaving, panting, before the great bramble wall that had been forged by Deimos’ own craft and skill, a wave of white hot rage emerges within her. Oh, such irony that the wall would be her undoing! But oh, no – not today. Not today.

      The slender, wolfish form is soon shed once more for her lissome equine skin, and she is searching for a way out – a way under? No, it would take too much time – there were wolves of scalding magma, of unmistakable darkness not far behind her; she could not wait. Breathlessly, and desperately, she tugs at the tightly wound bramble with her thoughts, urging it apart, longing to break away the tightly knit branches left behind as Deimos, somewhere far off, escaped with his own life.

      With a deep and jarring cry of anger, her gaze settles upon a tall and towering oak – one of the last remaining, standing erect despite the Earth twisting and turning beneath it – willfully tearing it from its deeply settled roots, slamming it upright against the wall carved of wood and sharply jutting thorns. With a soft breath, she is once more the wolf, as her deft and graceful paws grip the trunk of the oak, effectively climbing her way out and over the wall – leaping to the soft and supple soil below, pausing only a moment to catch her breath before leaping and bounding through the darkness of the woodland, and far away from the Hell that had been her own.
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