• Logout
  • 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


    the sound of branches breaking under your feet || any
    #1

    He’s staring into nothingness. There is the cold and there is the trees (dark, so much taller than him, stretching into oblivion with such an overwhelming silence he dare not look up into their neverending canopy) and there is nothing else. Here there is no crash of the sea, no incessant grumble of a volcano that groans with anticipation and grief; no sisters with worried eyes, nor the feeling of palpable sorrow that encases all of what once was his home (as well as his mother). He comes here for a calm place to be alone with his thoughts - or that is what he tells himself. He is only a yearling, incapable of understanding the true meaning behind what is happening beneath the hearth of the volcano, but stubbornly insists that he is much more than just the youngest son of the King - he is the warrior son, meant to take his rightful place when the sun sets on the familiar navy wings of his father.

    The moon is full - swollen and heavy with molten silver light and deep crevices of slate grey - and its light filters through the intertwining branches above the mahogany and ivory colt. He can’t feel the way the moonlight trickles across the undeveloped slope of his shoulders or the slenderness of his chest, but it gently caresses him in a way he cannot notice - tender silver dapples that attempt to kiss away the frigidity in his smoke-saturated skin. The boy inhales deeply as his slow and methodical walk brings him through overgrown roots and brambles of branches that are a near-auburn in the cool temperatures, the only sound being the soft grazing of his small hooves in the underbrush and the shuddering exhale that leaves his dark lips in a cloud of vapor.

    After a time, (he’s lost track of how long he’s been walking - it had meant to just be a short trip, but it is clear he is no longer in Tephra) the bay and white colt comes to a halt. He’s not sure why he’s suddenly decided to stop; perhaps it is because of the way that the once deafening stillness of the forest now begins to crescendo - the nonexistent wind now rises to meet him, sweeping over his distraught face with autumn’s terribly bitter bite. He shudders against the stirring breeze as it whistles through the canopy, following the sudden gust with wide eyes.

    He attempts to narrow them almost immediately (mustn’t look afraid) and then braces himself against the cold, leaning into the harshness of the cool air as the too brittle leaves from above fall to the ground in a hasty flurry. Their crisp edges flick against his shoulders and neck and back, breaking apart against his body before crumbling into pieces on the forest floor only to be stirred up again by the howling and forlorn wind -

    whose sound eerily matches the one that Warden feels inside of his chest.

    WARDEN
    i am the sword in the darkness.

    Reply
    #2
    They live in the forest —
    The deer do. Just as mother and her do. They follow the deer and she spends more time playing with fawns than foals of her own kind. Not that she knows much about what her kind is - she’s as much deer as she is horse. So she plays, follows, and of course, grows. 

    Grows lean and slim and not all that much taller. The velvet nubs on her head gain their first growth but itch terribly. She’s taken to rubbing them against this tree and that tree. It’s all to no avail though - the itching is relieved momentarily then starts up again. Sometimes it keeps her up at night long past the time even the deer graze and migrate.

    Like tonight. 
    She is wide awake and the moon is high and bright from what she can tell through the breaks in the trees. Nutkin dances along beneath the itch of growing antlers on tiny cloven feet. Moonlight manages to find her through these gaps, dappling silver-black fur that is already showing the first faint signs of going gray. 

    She moves through shadow and moonlight alike and seems unburdened by the chill in the night. It’s because she doesn’t notice it until she’s run the itchiness of her antlers right out of her mind and the sudden sharp breaths of exertion come from her in recognizable puffs. Only then does she realize that the warmth of summer is coming to a rapid close. That thought alone causes her to draw up short and lean her head to the side in a moment of pondering.

    Suddenly the wind howls. Her ears lay back against her head at the sound of it. She doesn’t like the forlorn note to it or the tantrum it throws as it rips the leaves loose from the branches. “That’s not very nice,” she mutters aloud. Not many would try to chide the wind but Nutkin was unusual. “Not nice at all.” because now she has to shake the bits of broken leaf off her fur.

    Which she was about to do but then her nostrils fluttered as she picked up on the tail end of a smell that the wind had tried to carry right by her. It didn’t belong there - smelled out of place. She gave a little indignant snort before attempting to creep up on the colt but stepped on a twig let snapped. “Oops!” she mumbled and sought refuge in some blackberry bushes just to the side, trying to blend in.

    @[Warden] ❤️
    [Image: lichenpixel-by-calcifer.png]
    let’s go be wild ones 
    Reply
    #3

    He’d easily misheard the snap of the twig as part of the rustling brambles and broken debris of the forest, his wide eyes eagerly searching the darkening forest around him as he quickly realizes he is far too alone and far too far to try to head back to Tephra. A whine of dismay perhaps would have warbled in his throat if the sound of a voice - “Oops!” - did not suddenly become out of place amongst the windy forest night. The boy snorts sharply, his exhale of breath bold and white as it propels from his black nostrils, lifting from his mouth to disappear into quickly into the air. His black-tipped ears press into the mixture of white and black of his growing mane, curving his neck in an attempt to appear more menacing than he actually was. Slender ivory legs turn him around carefully, peering into the depths of darkness with less fright now and with more purpose. The howl of the wind is forgotten as his ocean-stained eyes sweeps the forest, lifting his nostrils to sniff at the cold air that shuffles around him.

    “I’m not afraid,” he announces into the nothingness (he is sure his voice did not quake), though he cannot be sure if he is talking about the situation at hand or the one that plagues his mind without ceasing (the volcano, his father’s blood, his mother’s fret). He felt like it must be announced to this utter blackness and solitude that he isn’t afraid, because if he speaks it perhaps it would actually become true. “I’m not afraid of you,” He repeats his phrase except with an added clause (pointedly naming the voice in the only way he could), louder this time and with more aggravation in his voice, but the nothingness does not respond. He exhales briskly, almost in frustration, as he quietly takes a few steps forward. “I heard you,” he then says into the wind, his tail flicking against his mahogany flank.

    Moments pass and though the voice he had heard seems to have no source, he figures he must find the owner for if he didn’t, he would perhaps begin thinking of ghosts and ominous demons haunting the forest - and he mustn’t think of that.

    Warden lowers his head, ears still pressed against his neck (yet less forceful now), wrinkling his nose thoughtfully. 

    “Come out, or I will hunt you down myself.”

    It’s what he would tell his father’s disease, if he had the courage to do so. Perhaps the demon who put the sickness in his father's lungs is here, searching for him next, ready to sink its teeth into him and curse him just like it had cursed his father. The boy bristles at the thought, the tension in his body now returning and replacing the youthful curiosity that had found his eyes only moments ago.

    WARDEN
    i am the sword in the darkness.



    @[Nutkin]
    Reply
    #4
    Gods it was windy tonight!

    Nutkin inadvertently rattles the blackberry bushes that she’s hiding it. Some late autumn berries remained on the tiny sprigs, looking rather enticing. She plucked a couple off and mashed them up with her teeth, letting some of the juice run out the corners of her mouth. Only some of the twigs snapped back and hit her in the face and the neck causing her to yelp and yell “Ow!”

    So much for hiding! Nutkin gives up and shoves her way gracelessly through the bushes just as the colt she had spied moments ago starts to assure the night-drenched forest that he’s not afraid. She’s just standing there and listening to him, head cocked to the side out of curiosity as he exclaims a couple more times that he’s not afraid. Might as well show herself now, she supposes since he’s certain he heard her bumbling about in the dark.

    Nutkin was about to reveal herself to him until he gets a little too arrogant and demanding. “Hunt me down? HUNT ME DOWN?!” She charges forward out of the unforgiving dark to look him dead in the face with nut-brown eyes that flash with anger. Why it’s just that silly little colt all puffed up! Still, she stamps a cloven hoof and lowers her antlered (barely grown but noticeably there) head to him, snorting.

    “Nothing hunts me down in my forest.” she promises him with an earnest quiet seriousness. Her gentle girl’s voice came out braced with a backbone of steel as she looked pointedly up at him from her lowered-head stance.


    @[Warden] ❤️ she’s being a brat lol
    [Image: lichenpixel-by-calcifer.png]
    let’s go be wild ones 
    Reply
    #5

    I am not afraid.

    The phrase continues to echo in his mind, a constant admission that despite its replication, seems to grow dimmer with each passing moment. He is sure that the wind and the blackness are coming up to meet him - to rip his hooves out from beneath him and drag him into the nothingness, to peel away each part of him that pretends to be more than just a cautious yearling, to reveal the parts of him that he knows are mushy and soft and malleable - broken, weak, small. His eyes are wide, rimmed with white and uncertainty, unable to make out any of the shapes that dance before him beside the swaying of dark tree limbs and crackling leaves.

    Whatever certainty in his stance that was shown only moments before as he shouted threats into the howling wind now diminishes, painting his face with soft edges and raw emotion. He’d learn to hide this away better as he grew, though still being just a colt he is unable to mask himself with strength and dignity like he truly wished. Too easy was it for the world to strip away his facade, especially one that somersaults with darkness and howls bitterly against his mahogany and milky-white skin.

    Just when Warden is sure that perhaps he had heard nothing at all (only his imagination, like always) and when his guard finally begins to fall, is when a figure plows through the darkness with a reared head. The yearling stumbles backward with long, white limbs, throwing his head up in fright as his eyes roll, a sharp squeal leaving his heaving chest. The monster, however, does not crash into him nor does it attempt to peel away his skin. This monster wasn’t really a monster at all.

    She was curious to look at, though in the dark and the groaning wind, any nice face would appear sinister. Gathering his feet beneath him and shuffling them a bit embarrassingly, the colt stretches his neck towards her cautiously. “I thought you were something else,” something dangerous,he admits softly, his brow furrowing in slight confusion as his dark blue eyes gently rove over the nubs of the antlers on her forehead and the graying of her face. Warden’s dark tail flicks at his haunch, bobbing his head slightly as the wind continues to pull through them mercilessly. “This is your forest?”

    -- warden

    Reply
    #6
    Wind howls; rages; moans. 
    All around them. Even above them. Rattling leaves and clacking branches. There might be a wolf’s song or two in there, or even a bear’s grumbling growl. But she cannot hear any of it above the wind in the trees. 

    She doesn’t hear the squeal he gives in fright. The wind snatches it away and screams in her ears instead. Loud enough for her to give an angry shake of her head that sends the straggling fluff of her silvery mane flying. Not once does she take her eyes off of him.

    Nutkin can see that his knees are just as knobby as her own. That his build is similar to hers in youth alone. He is flashy and flighty, and she thought she ought to have been the one to choose flight. Her face gives in easily to a pouting frown as she tries to figure out why she never ran from him. 

    He stretches his neck out towards her and she finds her chin tucking snug against her breast. She shouldn’t be out here alone with him as the wind rattled the trees all around them. There is a sort of quiet to the maddening vortex of noise that Nutkin finds, still looking at him - still with her frowning pout. But his confession and confusion are her undoing.

    The fight goes out of her. 
    She may come off as brave, but deep down she knew she wasn’t. 

    “Something else...” she murmurs before eying him quizzically with a tilt to her head. “Like what?” there was something he wasn’t saying - something he kept back to himself that she wanted to know. She could menace him with her budding antlers like the bucks bother the does. But she’s curious - too curious.

    Just what had he thought she was?
    Or could be?
    A monster? How absurd!

    Tail-flicks and head-bobs aside, she stares at him but her posture is less menacing and more friendly in its lean towards him like he has a gravitational pull that sucks her in. It could have been the blue of his eyes, so unlike anything she’s ever seen. “Yes.” she responds easily and without thinking. Part of what she said was truth as much as lie - it was her forest and it wasn’t. Nutkin could lay no more claim to the ancient trees and roaring wind than she could the skins they wore. But she said it anyway as if that alone would make it true. 

    Besides, who was he to question it?


    @[Warden] ❤️
    [Image: lichenpixel-by-calcifer.png]
    let’s go be wild ones 
    Reply
    #7

    He trembles like the scattering, ripped leaves that shudder from their branches, cascading down and spiraling into the oblivion of the dark and foreboding forest (dark and foreboding is all he can see and feel, wrapped up in this tempest of howling winds that tear at him). He somehow continues to remain upright in the midst of chaotic throes, the trees themselves beginning to bend wildly out of shape with the consistent press of tireless wind, tearing its icy and humid fingers through the obsidian color of his short mane and tail without mercy. The brightness of his bald face is stark against the deep green and blackness of the world around them, shrouded by ebony as well as encompassed with the gentle expression of flickering doubt.

    Where is the monster? (There’s always one, somewhere, lurking. If it is not her, then...)

    His deep cobalt gaze refocuses, deciding that studying the details of her face would keep his mind occupied on elsewhere things for the time being. The young boy snorts softly, though the sound of it is lost on the ever-strengthening wind so she would only have seen the deep flare of alabaster nostrils. The slate-gray of her eyes that never wandered from his own take him on without hesitancy - he notices the bit of a frown that finds the silver of her lips and he finds that the expression makes him feel guilty, as if she had been expecting something else (much as he had been himself).

    She withdraws from him - taken aback and suddenly ponderous, no longer with a lowered head to threaten him.

    Like what?

    How does she not know of all the things lurking in the dark? Even now, he can feel eyes on him; the same darkness that dripped its poison into his father’s lungs surges around them, causing him to shift his weight uncomfortably. He cannot answer that question - not here, where shadow and evil and dark magic can find them, spoil them, make them go rotten from the inside out, just like father.

    He doesn’t answer her first question and part of him breathes a sigh of relief - perhaps she wouldn’t notice his lack of an answer, especially when her gaze lowers quite seriously and she leans in a bit secretively towards him.

    Yes.

    It’s worse than he’s imagined. Of course he doesn’t question it. Why would she lie?

    His voice suddenly changes as he inhales deeply, stepping forward and raising his head so that is posture is a bit more authoritative instead of submissive and unsure. “We can’t stay here,” Warden tells her, the darkness of his eyes flickering from hers to the howling of the forest. He can already smell the spring-time storm on the wind (damp and wet and sinister) and they are not safe.

    Will he ever be?

    -- warden



    @[Nutkin] <3
    Reply




    Users browsing this thread: 3 Guest(s)