"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
{ and in my dreams I've kissed your lips a thousand times }
With the ashen taste of my conversation with Maugrim fading slowly from my tongue, I find myself leaving Sylva with an avalanche of thoughts crushing what might have been my better judgement. As the tawny leaves of eternal autumn turn to a crisp new snowfall belowhoof, I swing my head eastward, then westward; but even as the scentline of one pain-in-the-ass kingdom comes and goes beneath me, I stay on a course due north-west, hoping to be home by nightfall.
Of course, in the throes of winter, the sun sets more quickly on our magical continent; and by the time I'm just reaching Loess' most northern peak, a moonless night has wrapped itself around me. It's cool breeze and inky nothingness coaxes me to complacency, reassuring me in its untrustworthy voice that it will be safe to sleep here. That, if Wolfbane though he could allow my prisoner to fail to uphold her end of the deal; that, if Lepis had the audacity to approach my child in the name of an unknown cause; that, if they wanted to kill me, they'd better fucking do it now before I beat them to it.
The ash resettles in my mouth at the thought.
Ears pinning beneath their crown of bone and skin, I close my eyes. Despite the heaviness of sleep weighing me down, a surge of agitated energy flows still in my veins, guiding me to my dreams before I can even have a second chance to reevaluate the implications of this instinctual bed-letting.
---
Are you out there, Wolfshit?
My words echo through the abyss, searching for a pirate king. My better sense screams, but her voice is entirely silenced by the brash and all-controlling nature of my current impulsiveness and rage.
Face me, if you aren't a coward.
Politics be damned.
@[Wolfbane]let me know if this is what you were imagining
09-14-2018, 11:36 AM (This post was last modified: 09-14-2018, 08:36 PM by Wolfbane.)
WOLFBANE
The intrusion of a dream-walker, at first, doesn’t bother Kagerus’s sleeping target. Perched comfortably in a stone-spire nest somewhere to the extreme west of Loess, Wolfbane hardly twitches in his restful sleep. This is her first time, after all. He wouldn’t know what to expect even if he were expecting.
So in the dream, he’s also blissfully unaware.
Wishbone the filly is knee-deep in Tephra’s tropic-like waters, trying desperately to catch a fish with her teeth. Wolfbane, though he is clearly full-grown, laughs in childlike admonishment, believing himself to be her age and humored as he always used to be when he was with Wishy. This is a memory of sorts - perhaps the day hadn’t been so perfect or the waters quite so blue - but once upon a time they’d done this and clearly, it was a bright spot in his life.
“Are you out there, Wolfshit?”
The colors of a time long past go blurry as the void sucks them clean from the air. There’s nothing, now. A darkness or loss of some sort that surrounds them both. Wolfbane is lying on his stomach, legs folded neatly beneath his body and face turned away.
“Face me, if you aren’t a coward.”
A hush overcomes him.
Wolfbane turns his head aside slowly, an eye turned sparkling emerald green pinning Kagerus to her place. “Father.” He hisses, lips curling to flash a broad view of the fangs; an unusual growl echoes inside his throat. Of course, Kagerus is not his father, (then again this isn’t reality, or maybe it’s an inverse sort of one) but all the same the dreamweaver has managed to manifest herself into the form of someone who child-Bane had loathed with every fibre of his being.
His stripes fade to a dark red.
“I’ve been waiting to kill you.” Bane rises deftly, twisting to face Kagerus. His wings snap open at his golden sides to give the impression of a horse three-times the length and he snarls, slamming both dark blue forehooves against the nothingness around them. Mightily raised above his spine, the two white wings over his back clap together and send him hovering; another gust of their wind and he’s shooting ahead with a jaw split open wide. He wants to barrel into her completely, but the muscles looping like iron coils over his shoulders and withers are prepped for a quick turn if needed.
|| The Pirate Lord of Loess ||
@[Kagerus] I'm not planning for any full dodges on his part, but here's a simple breakdown:
Using his wings for an extra boost of speed he's lunging head-on at Kag, but he's expecting a horn attack so he's ready for that counter if she uses it. Again, even if she does I'm not planning on any full dodges for him Let me know if anything needs more clarification <3
Also, for fun dreamworld's sake, he's a little different-looking but everything that's changed about him isn't anything that could physically affect Kagerus.
{ and in my dreams I've kissed your lips a thousand times }
A spot of guilt colours my cheeks the split second after I spit his name. The image of a sweet young girl splashing in a pool of innocence fades quickly after my words, and I wonder if I ought to have interrupted something so intimate in nature. I didn't recognize the girl from my quick glance of her: but the stallion I do know, and as I force myself to follow through with my next phrase, his head slowly turns to face me.
Father.
Well, shit. That's not what I was going for.
A chill runs down my spine upon witnessing the glitter of the stallion's unusually green eyes, and the sensation burrows straight to my bones upon seeing the fangs that trace the outline of his lips. But the chill turns to heat as I receive what I'd come to, adrenaline sparking across the nerve endings of my skin in heated anticipation. It doesn't matter who he thinks I look like - the fact is that we will settle things between our nation now, one way or another.
I've been waiting to kill you.
"Give it your fucking best."
The now-red-striped stallion raises his wings and, in a devastatingly powerful movement, launches himself toward me. A war cry pierces the veil of silence around us as I throw my weight back on to my hind legs, chin tucked to present my antlers to the Loessian king's forelegs, chest, and neck. I dream them to be made of metal and stone, for he approaches with such speed that their regular bone would be subject to snapping.
There's a sound of tearing and I realize that I'm breathlessly strewn along the floor of nothingness, the wind knocked out of me from Wolfbane's tackle. I taste blood in my mouth where I'd bitten my tongue, but with a grit of my teeth I surge back to my hooves, and in the next moment, two bird-feather wings of my own send me skyward.
It's my turn to charge him now - and in a show of aerial battle, I attempt to fly above the Fjord's broad back, hooves - dreamt as talons now - striking out and attempting to leave bleeding rivers in their wakes.
@[Wolfbane]
I AM LOVING THIS.
Feel free to shape shift and to god-mod and to power play a bit, Kag is willing to take damage too and I don't mind you dealing damage since this isn't a formal battle <3 <3 <3 Also I'm not worried about positioning obviously, I AM HERE FOR THE GORE AND GLORY MUAHAHA
In the real world, Wolfbane’s body jerks violently but cannot seem to rouse him. Blooming wounds take shape slowly over his chest and lower neck, while shallow rivulets of clawed skin begin to form in vertical stripes along his spine. They appear as if from nowhere, unseen to his closed eyes but felt as acutely as if he’d been awake. In the dream world, he feels them too.
A roaring sound - perhaps wind? - drowns out the once quiet void. He’s aware that metal prongs have struck him, that she, no he, no … she? That the demon has been the first to take his blood. Four and a half long years of life and only now does he truly become a man.
The beast on his back does it’s best to dig in, but Wolfbane dips away in time for the deadly claws to only pinch and mar, not irrevocably damage. Incensed, a throaty roar bellows out from his aching breast and he barrel rolls just like he’d once done in play with Lepis. He mustn’t lose the creature; skirting away can only be beneficial for a bit, and the dreamweaver is master in this realm.
He does, however, allow himself to lose control, because in all likelihood he’d had none to begin with.
Straightening out, hovering near to where Kagerus soars like two great eagles sparring over a fish, he feels a rage only seen from an outsider's perspective: it’s mad, blinding in its fury and it manifests in the shape of his fathers mighty (stolen) power, erupting from his body to encapsulate the red-striped pegasus with flickering tendrils of pale-colored flame.
Transformed into an inferno comet and still flying endlessly, his mind forgets reality altogether and from the dark nothingness volcanoes begin to sprout in random assortment. They thrust upwards into the cacophony these two have created, erupting angrily without pattern or purpose and so he’s forced to maneuver around their hellish spouts. It doesn’t stop him from glaring, or from molding the fire into bulbous projectiles which he rockets towards the manipulator.
Some burst open in dazzling sparks against the mountainsides, exploding on impact while others fall in deadly procession where Kagerus flies. He’ll keep sending them, and he’ll keep flying, losing himself to her power while his body protests from another world far detached.
|| The Pirate Lord of Loess ||
@[Kagerus] Omg im so glad you’re loving this because I AM TOO
Kagerus is amazing, if I haven’t already said that a million times
GET REKKED SON
{ and in my dreams I've kissed your lips a thousand times }
In the real world, the dreamweaver twitches and snarls, ears shuddering to and fro though no sounds in her neck of the forest can be heard. Bruises form beneath the first layers of her skin, blood pooling and begging to be released over the mahogany and bone of her fur coat. It would make them even, to bleed, wouldn't it? It would make things right.
As Wolfbane evades the worst of the damage from my talons, a shriek looses itself from my throat, birdlike and angry. A roar of his own replies to mine, lionlike and powerful in the breadth of his chest; I snarl and snap my teeth at his show of aerial finesse, pulling a stunt I could never hope to given my inexperience with flight.
In the heat of the moment (all too literally, I'm about to find out) I loosen my grasp on the dream, giving him leeway over what shall and shall not be. When I see the stallion erupt in flames, the more sensible part of me slaps her palm to her face and groans. That's literally exactly how my grandmother's best friend Scorch wound up ugly and mutilated and hairless, by dreaming herself on fire out of pure confidence and foolishness. Quietly, I dream the Loessian king fire-proof; he'll thank me later when he wakes up with his fur still intact.
Of course, this leaves me the perfect target for the angry pegasus; and it's a moment too late when I realize he's launched flaming projectile my way. Portals open in front of me, but not quite in time; two projectiles find their mark on my breast one after the other. The flames sear off my fur, and the pain of it in my dream is magnified by the pain of it in reality. Snarling, I maneuver the portals in such a way that Wolfbane's projectiles fly back at him, adding insult to injury should they find their mark. And these projectiles I make sure to not make him impervious to.
As our volcanic battle wages on in the heavens, gravity practically nonexistent, thunder crashes - and in its wake, a thunderous voice:
"Make haste, gladiators, for your time here runs short."
Hurling a lightning bolt in Wolfbane's direction, I scream my last in defiance, knowing that the dream will shortly be over.
@[Wolfbane] I figure that kag's next post will be mostly dialogue, if you want to wrap up the fighting portion? They can stay in the dream to talk, it'll just be too weak a link to support this kind of insanity lmao.
Men. They always think they know what’s best, even in a reality of their enemies making. The rage his father so often bestowed on Bane makes the pegasus incompetent; Kagerus should’ve let him burn just so he can learn an important lesson but she doesn’t - and so he’ll owe her so much more than he realizes when this is over.
Lightning sparks around them, forking with deadly accuracy between the sharp peaks of the dream volcanoes. What had begun as something sweet now becomes a nightmare, and since Wolfbane is blindly trying to avoid the chaos around them one of Kagerus’ returned projectiles brushes along his rear, burning him fiercely and docking his tail in the process.
He only has a brief moment to kick in anger before the roar of the demon catches his attention, and then a white-hot bolt strikes him against the ribs and he’s numb with pain, spiraling down while his body screams out in terrifying agony somewhere at the edges of Loess.
The fight, the fire, the rage and red stripes … they leave him, exposing a wounded stallion who’s now prone at the bottom of whatever this cacophony has become. Bane pants, blood streaming from the exposed flesh he’s lost and still he fights to remain conscious for fear that the demon might return.
Only, when he glances around to find it he gasps, “Kagerus?!” Hardly feeling as if he’s in a dream at all.
|| The Pirate Lord of Loess ||
@[Kagerus] Sounds good they should probably hammer out the details of the Ilma x Lepis deal anyways!! Lol
{ and in my dreams I've kissed your lips a thousand times }
Kagerus?!
His voice rings out across the plains of Loess, or else, the last dregs of our dream; I'm near him now, or perhaps he is near me, both of us having teleported to a more suitable meeting-ground than his stone spire nest that he'd fallen asleep in. The forest around seems distant, reality still gathering in the midst of our questionable lucidity.
When I open my eyes, gasping and body throbbing in too many places to count (though the burns stick out quite evidently), he is there. Tail docked, spine bleeding, veins popping where the lightning struck him. I wince upon seeing that, using what dream I have left to undo the damage of that last flash; I put some mind to my chest too, but to a lesser extent than I put to his. I wonder if he can feel me manipulating the fibers of his being; but I'm too exhausted to find out.
"I can heal you if you want." The offer is gruff, laced with the exhaustion which leadens my bones and threatens to pull me out of the dream completely.
"But - thanks for the fight. You put up a good one. And I needed it." It's as if I'm speaking to a ghost, my eyes glazed over and barely present; but their depths clear after a moment, as my mind travels to my step daughter, the question of her safety reviving me. I square my shoulders, peer through the haze of the dying dream, and find Wolfbane's gaze.
"I want Valdis back, Wolfbane. Your Lepis has made a mess of our kingdoms' relationship but I'm willing to pin that on the kingdom she rules now. I'm tired. Let this fruitless drama die." A harsh laugh escapes me. "Let's just be neighbours again."
He thinks of how absurd he was to assume her as a demon, but for some reason he enjoys the idea of continuing to label her Dreamweaver.
Kagerus can command the duality of pure existence, no mere feat. She can puncture the most intimate and sacred of places - one’s unsuspecting and detached conscious - and to Wolfbane, that’s a much heavier blow than the raw wounds her gilded horns had left in his chest. I can heal you … The mahogany overo tells him, and Bane only nods. “What a risk to come here, to expose herself.” He contemplates, avoiding her gaze as she continues to speak.
This had been a hate crime, then. All due to his lovely Cleric and still, the Lord can’t find a reason as to why he shouldn’t bear the brunt of those actions. He’d take this every night for the rest of his life if it meant that no one else under his command should be harmed.
“Not neighbors, allies.” He offers gruffly in response, managing to gather blue-striped legs beneath him so that Bane can rise and squarely meet Hyaline’s Queen eye to eye. “Valdis is on her way; apparently she and Lepis have familial ties on the filly’s fathers side … but that’s beyond the point. She’ll be back. Reunions shouldn’t bring negative results, I’ve made that clear to our favorite diplomat.” He chuckles himself, groaning afterwards from the effort.
“A year’s worth of the peace you want, that’s what I can give you. I’ll speak to Arthas so he’s informed. For all the trouble we’ve put you through, I think Loess can be more than flexible.” The brute sighs, shimmering eyelids weighing heavily over his vision. “Consider our borders open… or go back to ignoring us… your choice.” He mumbles, thick head lowering from exhaustion.
|| The Pirate Lord of Loess ||
@[Kagerus] Feel free to reply IC or just message me via discord, whatever with her answer
{ and in my dreams I've kissed your lips a thousand times }
Not neighbours, allies.
He speaks the words as he stands, and I glance away from the mess that we've made of each other as we now stand breast to breast. I inhale to reply but am beat to it by Lord Wolfbane as he elaborates of my step-daughter's whereabouts and well being. It's good information to know so I seal my lips for the time being, perking my ears to consider that which he has to say.
Intriguingly, the heavy set creature also goes on to detail the nuances of our nations' new relationship. I offer no interjection yet, figuring that if he's finally willing to meet Hyaline's demands - not that there were many beyond "maybe don't attack our members and children without provocation" - I won't step in and fuck that up for all of us. After all, that would make tonight's efforts for naught; and Solace would be grievously angry with me considering that she'd not approved of this plan at all in the first place. Or at least, that's how she let on.
"I won't say no to peace, Wolfbane. And I hope that the peace can continue beyond that which Loess owes Hyaline. If not, I understand - you have your ways, and we have ours."
Exhausted, my eyes flutter closed; and in the darkness that ensues, two things occur: his wounds heal over, and I find myself awake in Hyaline.
@[Wolfbane] feel free to have him healed to the extent that he desires! Lovely doing diplomacy with you
![[Image: kag]](https://78.media.tumblr.com/2e8039018ce4dff6112c167ec23e886a/tumblr_p72zjit7wC1s5a0qvo1_100.png)
Let me know if anything needs more clarification <3![[Image: Wolfbane2.png]](https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/601918740845559818/696502662816071770/Wolfbane2.png)
![[Image: 3bCHvj.png]](https://img.nickpic.host/3bCHvj.png)
