"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
09-16-2018, 03:03 PM (This post was last modified: 10-06-2018, 06:13 AM by Officials.)
For the most part, Ivar has ignored Kylin's eldest daughter. He ignores most of the children, really, but he has made a concerted effort to avoid dealing with her one-on-one. Kyveli is kept as safe as the rest of the island residents, of course, because he does not ill-wish her, but the piebald stallion feels no more emotional connection to the violet filly than he does to the igneous rocks that make up the southern edge of their island.
He'd not planned to change that pattern, so when the kelpie rounds a downed palm and nearly runs headfirst into the young horse, his irritated scowl is deeper than necessary.
Ivar backs away, his hooves sinking into the still-damp sand as he attempts to regain his balance. It's been months since he'd last seen the girl, he realizes, and she is much taller than he remembers. Taller than Kylin too, he sees, having just left the pinto mare dozing in a shady copse. She looks like a blend of her parents, something that puzzles Ivar even as he solves it - will eventually all the purple horses look the same?
Their incestual habits aren't something the kelpie has ever understood, and he wonders if the twisted desire is ingrained in their genetics or is simply the product of culture. Will Kyveli seek out a cousin when she is ready for romance? Perhaps an elder half-brother? It seems strange to think that someone he still remembers as a child might soon be old enough for children of her own, but the purple horse in front of him is certainly closer to maturity than infancy.
"You should watch where you're going." He says, but there is no real irritation in his voice, and even his scowl has faded. Ivar is distracted by the promise of a distant flash of lightening. Another storm, like the one that had downed this palm? He can only hope. The potential of a hurricane softens him just enough that he does not leave Kyveli's presence immediately, but rather watches the way the lightning plays off the glitter of her coat and the translucent reflection of her fish-like fins.
It's not like he's ever given a reason for avoiding her in the past, so he finds no need to think of a reason that he has decided to not avoid her on this early spring day either. It doesn't occur to him that she might wonder about his motivations. The handsome kelpie has always been able to slip out of difficult conversations after all, and he suspects that Kyveli will be just as susceptible to hypnotic suggestion as her mother should the need arise.
@[Kyveli]
I thought maybe they could use some interaction :D
The girl has grown into a fine young lady, at least, she’s starting to shed all baby fat at this age and stands taller than her mother, though shorter than her biological father, whom she only met once. He might love her, from a distance, or have completely forgotten she even exists, either way she had always been with her mother and the something Better, or honestly, since Kyp, mostly with her sister when Kylin wasn’t nursing her or looking after her, because Kyp is way more fun than mother, simply because the two share the need to explore the dancing waves. Sometimes Kyp is occupied by Ivar teaching her something or whatever, and in that case she just runs around the island or the waves on her own.
But she is starting to feel like the island doesn’t sate her curiosity much longer, looking st the inviting waves more often, and the pull of the sea makes her staring out on the waves sometimes, wondering what lies beyond the islands. She has only been on the main Ischian island twice now, once in a cove where she met a blind boy, once on the coast when she met her cousins Kove and Eifa, whom she had never seen there since. They might have moved, she wasn’t sure.
Either way, she hadn’t seen Ivy coming, so when he bumps into her and accuses her of not looking, he is entirely right - except that she wasn’t going anywhere, but standing still watching the waves dance back and forth. But she’s not prone to any repercussions, and just shrugs it off. In fact, she’s glad for the distraction, so she smiles widely and greets him cheerfully. ”Hello Ivy! What’re you doing? Anything fun today?”
Just then, a flash of lightning lights up his body just like it does hers, and she just smiles at the pretty display of the gleam on his blue and white scales. Much like the sea himself, she thinks, though she is patient enough to just await his answer to her question.
I only wanted to one time see you laughing
in the purple rain
09-23-2018, 09:24 AM (This post was last modified: 10-01-2018, 06:35 AM by kahzie.)
The violet girl is cheerful. Almost startlingly so, and for a moment Ivar scrutinizes her more closely. From her wide grin to her tall(er than Kylin) height, the ombre cuts a striking figure, and that is without her glittering purple coat. She'll draw the boys in, he thinks suddenly, and he is reminded of how he had kept Jhene in the caves of Loess to avoid that very thing.
Kylin would miss her though, the kelpie realizes, and so the risk is too high. His dashed intentions serve to deepen the scowl already on his face. It is a sharp contrast to Kyveli's smiling expression, but even an ugly scowl does nothing to tarnish his impossibly handsome face. The storm crashes behind him, illuminating the sea and casting the finned filly into stark relief.
There will be no good hunting today, the kelpie knows. Kylin prefers the safety of the shore on rough days like these, and he is still weary from his encounter with the spotted mare. She had put up more of a fight than he'd imagined she would, and the hunter is not well-rested enough for another struggle. Not with a young horse early his height, at least, and certainly not on land.
So with Kyveli firmly thought of as not prey, the salt-stained stallion does his best to give her a smile (and because of what he is it will come off charming and endearing and alluring). "I was going to go for a swim." He says truthfully. With any luck she'll run back to her mother and prepare to hide out from the storm.
The glittering amethyst filly doesn't care about the frowns she receives - she's used to them by now. Ivar always seems puzzled by her appearance, or perhaps he is just jealous of the time she steels from her mother every now or then. She tries not to, at least not too often - it's more fun to play with Kypria or with Tana and Raul, but she hasn't seen the latter two in a while. Wonders if they've moved. And again wonders what the rest of the world is like.
But Ivy manages a smile, and Kyvi thinks he's quite the charmer even if he's way too old. He says he is going to swim, and this piques her interest (like everything would have). "That means you'll change, yeah? Can I watch?" she asks him immediately.
I only wanted to one time see you laughing
in the purple rain
@[Ivar] sorry she is such easy prey. Um, now would be a good time to tell you that she isn't immortal any more :/
The salt air brushes against the pair of them, bringing with it the zing of ozone and the still-distant peals of thunder. It calls to Ivar in a primal way, but the summons are interrupted by the eager questions of the purple filly. He doesn't scowl - but it is a close thing. INstead he huffs out a single (perhaps thoughtful?) breath and looks over his pied shoulder at the roiling ocean.
"Your mother wouldn't like it." Ivar tells her, tracing the white-capped ridges of the swelling waves with his golden eyes. "She'd say that it's not safe for you to be out on the water with a storm coming. " And out on the water she'd have to be to see the transformation - he has no desire to flop about like a seal.
Ivar is careful with his words. He hasn't told Kyveli 'no' outright, only reminded her that her mother would not approve. Her mother is not here, of course; Ivar had left her dozing on the beach after their most recent romp in the waves. When he turns back to meet Kyveli's violet eyes, it is with a quirked brow that makes the dare and danger that lies beneath his words all the more clear. "But I don't mind."
She's a young girl - of course she doesn't mind the danger. She chuckles a little when Ivy tells her that her mother wouldn't like it; when did Kylin ever like Kyvi going out and about on her own at all? "I won't have to go too far. And at least I won't be alone." she says, a hundred percent sure that he can help her, and will safe her, if it's really needed. But she doesn't really see the danger as a real threat, to be honest. And is completely unaware of Ivar's own danger, himself.
Her eyes gleam and her mouth grins wide when he tells her he wouldn't mind as much as Kylin. That's about enough permission she needs, and she quickly runs away from the beach. When she has to jump over a wave, she giggles in delight. "Oh look, it's dancing with me!"
I only wanted to one time see you laughing
in the purple rain
The kelpie breathes deeply, and the humid air hisses past serrated teeth before he releases it in a long sigh. He had wanted to head to the mainland where finding prey is simple and uncomplicated. They are blissfully unaware there, all too willing to celebrate the coming of summer with a quick swim alongside a handsome stranger. The hunger growls low in his belly, but Ivar pushes it down as he tilts his head away from the growing thunderclouds and looks back at Kyveli.
She is grinning and darting for the water, and the kelpie's glittering golden eyes follow her. She traverses the choppy water with a giggle, and the piebald stallion shakes his head before wading farther into the water. When it is up to his chest he gathers his hindquarters under him and leaps forward. He shifts in an instant, white-socked hind limbs shrinking to clawed appendages, and his spine and haired tail growing into a single powerful hind fin.
He slaps the surface with it as he dives beneath the blue water, and there is a faint grin on his handsome features. He spins beneath the water and swims ahead, surfacing a few yards ahead of the ombre filly.
"How far out have you been?" Ivar asks her above the splash of waves and between the peals of thunder. He knows that Kylin doesn't leave the islands - he wouldn't let her - but he is not certain if the nearly grown Kyveli has ventured out on her own. "Have you been to the mainland?"
The transformation is quick, and she nearly missed it. But something retains her, and she doesn’t want to ask him to go back and forth in and out of the water, so instead she watches the tail splash the surface when he dives, and giggles. Then, rushes forward to meet him since he is moving fast below the surface, and when he comes out to question her, she smiles again.
”I was going to, with Tana and Raul, but we didn’t want to take Kypria all the way.” she admits. ”I’ve been trying to make a walk around the main island but there’s always something getting in the way of that. Maybe we can go now?” Ah, as if it was her own idea. She makes a longing glance to the rest of the Beqannan world, she can see it from here, and she remembers the boys mentioned the river and a playground. And lots of other horses. Could she go there, live there, even just visit for a day?
I only wanted to one time see you laughing
in the purple rain
Disclaimer: this post contains a (briefly) attempted murder.
He must drift nearer to hear Kyveli over the frothing sea and the claps of thunder, and he drifts vertically in the water with only his neck and shoulders above the surface. Quick flicks of his finned tail keep him afloat and near enough to hear her answer, followed by a request to walk around the main island.
"It's not very interesting over there," He tells her, glancing to the east with his golden eyes. There are too many residents there, Ivar thinks, though the Krakens have grown blessedly silent over the last few months. The reformed Bachelors are too close for comfort, but Kylin refuses to leave Ischia. It is a problem that often grates on Ivar, but he has not yet used hypnosis to force her to relocate. He has some boundaries (though whether they are a result of empathy or simply survival instinct one cannot say) and he must admit that the tropical beaches are an excellent hunting ground.
For a moment, Kyveli looks past him, to the rise of the main land of Beqanna behind Ivar. The kelpie does not follow her line of sight, but rather traces the exposed line of her throat not five feet above him. It would take only an instant, and he'd have her in his jaws. There'd be no time for her to even be frightened, and the darkness would take her.
He doesn't realize he has acted until he can taste the warmth of her pulse against his tongue and feel the sea closing over them. The kelpie instinct is usually not this strong in the summer season, but it seems that some prey is too tempting to resist.
For a long moment he considers keeping her. Perhaps she has inherited her mother's immortal life, and he delights at the idea of a second everlasting possession. She'll be an adult in a few years, and though he's known her since she was a child she is no child of his. The kelpie is vehemently opposed to the habits of the Covelings but does not recognize Kyveli as a blood relation. She is prey, unprotected by the near-equine fondness he has for her mother.
Her blood flavors the salt water, a coppery tang that has him tightening the crocodilian grasp on her neck without thinking. Only when she strikes him does he shake himself from his reverie, ducking away from the hoof that had caused no real damage and swimming up to break the surface.
"Breathe." He tells her, and it is a command as well, his neck below hers in the water, keeping her head afloat. "There was a wave you didn't see." he adds. "It knocked you under and I had to pull you back up again. You know this." The last sentence seals his hypnosis. Kelpies are unable to create memroies, but Ivar has found that the mind of prey is malleable. They often conjure up explanations of their own to fit the narrative Ivar spins them, and he expects this to be no different.
"Perhaps your mother was right, and you are too young to go out on your own." Kylin has said no such thing, but Ivar lies as easily as he breathes.
She's only twice set foot on the larger island, and even if Better Ivy thinks it's not that interesting, to her it's new territory and she decides that she will visit it at some point; but perhaps not now. The mainland is also a great option, and she would want to go explore there too, she wants to see it despite anyone telling her -
Shock and disbelief overwhelm her young mind, then pain, in her neck, in her lungs. From a deep-rooted en honestly, well-buried, instinct, she kicks against the waves and struggles against the grip on her neck the kelpie now holds. But apparently, her hoof kicks him, somewhere in all the tangled mess, and she's brought up to the surface.
She coughs, and cries when the salt stings into her wound, but Ivar is with her, below, telling her to breathe, and that she does. If in a weird splashy-coughy kind of way, she breathes. There's blood, but the kelpie's hold on her mind is steadfast, and in her confusion, she accepts his tale of a wave crashing over her, and that he had to pull her back up. He talks about her mother, and suddenly that's all she wants.
She whines. "I wanna go ho-ome," she sniffs, coughs, head shaking, tears in her eyes as she floats in the water with her foster father, who's holding her protectively as if he hadn't just tried to kill her, but she's lucky - under the influence of his hypnosis, she doesn't know. "I wanna go to mom-maa."
I only wanted to one time see you laughing
in the purple rain
