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    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


    it's just my soul responding; luster + merry
    #1
    Djinni yawns widely, baring her ageless white teeth to the morning sky. They are sharper than usual this morning, half-shifted still from the dream she'd been having of swimming. Swimming. That would explain why she is bobbing in a lukewarm sea, her pink figure buoyed easily by virtue of her half-porpoise physiology. With a surprised snort, the genie appears instantly above the whitecapped sea, perfectly dry and equine save the broad golden wings that bear her aloft.

    Land is within a few dozen miles (once it had taken her three years on the open sea to find dry earth agile displaced n), and the lightly built mare lands easily. She could have teleported, as she had from the water, but the rose-gold genie has become less flamboyant with her magic of late. She has recently stopped wearing her crown of golden tines and has instead decorated herself with the palest of shells in her copper-gold mane.

    The warm spring wind whips at her feathered wings, and with a brief pause to consider, the genie vanishes them away, leaving her entirely bare of magic save the bit that tints her eyes a sea-glass green. It leaves her a rather large reserve to wish for something interesting to happen...and the universe complies.

    Luster breaks from the treeline in front of her, an apparition from the past that seems rather fitting given who Djinni had recently come across in the waters of the common lands. The child beside her is new, Djinni notes, small and dark and clearly related to Luster. Her son, Djinni assumes, but doesn't consider especially interesting. That is not his fault, of course, Djinni finds most things dull.

    "And what's your name?" She asks him anyway, because while she might not really care about the answer, she does care deeply about appearing to, and there is nothing in her manner that suggests that she is anything but genuinely curious. To Luster she gives a smile - that, at least, is real and almost fond - but her green eyes flick back soon to the dark-haired boy.

    @[Luster]
    @[Cimmerian]
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    #2
    He was startled when she spoke, jumping a little and bumping against Luster's legs. He wasn't sure why he hadn't noticed her. He was normally so very observant! But he sure hadn't seen her until she was right before them and he tucked himself shyly beneath Luster, peering between her forelegs with wide, soft blue eyes.

    Oh! And she was speaking to him!

    He glanced up at Momma, measuring her reaction to the stranger, but he didn't notice any alarm (didn't even know what alarm would look like). So his curious gaze slid back to the lovely woman with a hesitant but hopeful sweet smile.

    "Hullo," he murmured softly, rubbing his dark face against Luster's leg absently, lovingly. Bashfully. "I'm Cimmerian."

    Oh. He wasn't sure he was supposed to say so, and he peeked up at Momma again with a shade of doubt clouding his faded blue eyes and his smile faltering a little. Was that alright? Did he do good? Momma was the most important person in all the world, his only person, and he never wanted to disappoint her. Not even a tiny bit.
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    #3

    Luster is startled too, drawing a mask of impenetrable calm over her face just a second before Merry’s gaze tips up to her, reading her expression. She doesn’t want to alarm him. Her first instinct, her only instinct in that moment, is to absorb the dark from all the shadows around them, let them grow and swell inside her until there is enough to wield like a weapon carved from ink. To protect the boy who has found refuge in the space between her forelegs.

    But -

    She hesitates, her brow furrowing beneath the wild currents of dark forelock as the voice reaches her, draws a soft, flickering ear towards it. It strikes a chord inside her memory. “Djinni?” She asks, so soft and bewildered, so surprised to see this woman she hadn’t seen in years. Her eyes flick back over this new body - no, not a new body. She can see that more easily now that fear isn’t dulling her focus. Just a new color, soft and pink and reminding her of a hazy morning sunrise. Her mouth softens into a matching smile, something gentle that reaches up to smooth the edge out of those wild brown eyes.

    Hullo. Merry says, and her lips drop reflexively to his head, nuzzling smooth the wild downy tufts sticking up between his dark little ears. She smiles when he looks up at her, grabs the tip of one ear between her lips with a soft, amused tug. You did good, baby. Her nose brushes along the curve of his little jaw one last time, and then she’s lifting her head to find Djinni’s eyes again, her expression soft but maybe just a little wary.

    There was no way to see this woman without also seeing the ghost of someone she had loved very much.

    But she doesn’t acknowledge it, doesn’t say his name out loud or ask how he is. He hasn’t been hers to worry over in years. Instead, and with a smile that is duller now, steeped in the shadows she had called to her and set free with no purpose, she says, “Merry, this is my friend, Djinni. We used to live in the same place. There were huge trees, even bigger than ours, and all the leaves were the color of a sunset. There was a lake, too, and a cave.” Things she hadn’t meant to say out loud. Hadn’t meant to remember. Then to Djinni, “How have you been?” Just as quiet and silver as ever.

    — Luster —
    so we let our shadows fall away like dust ;


    @[Djinni]
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    #4
    She's startled them both, but Luster recovers quickly enough that the boy never knows. A good mother, Djinni decides, having experienced the same growing up. She has not doled it out though, not since her dark-haired son. Cimmerian, says the boy, giving a name that is as pleasant to the ears as Luster's. Djinni has always liked knowing names, watching the ways they change in this world where the gods do not permit repetition.

    "It's nice to meet you, Cimmerian."

    There is no longer a tightness to her eyes at the thought; she remembers Sylva as only the woods. There is an advantage in wishing after all, an advantage that she hadn't had the last time she had crossed paths with the blue mare. But the world has changed again and Djinni has changed with it. There are caves in Nerine, after all, and a lake in Hyaline; they aren't features exclusive to the autumnal woods.

    "I've been alright." She says, because while she is frequently deceptive she rarely lies outright. "I've moved back to Nerine, though." Djinni assumes Luster knows this is where she comes from - where they had come from - so she doesn't elaborate. For Merry though, she adds:  "It's got grey cliffs so tall they disappear in the fog sometimes, and rock piles that are good for playing king-of-the-mountain on." She remembers this, but isn't sure why. She's wished away most of the memories of her son, after all, him and anything that reminds her of him.

    "And you?" She asks Luster, glancing down again at the dark haired boy. Staying busy, she assumes, and wonders idly where the boy's father might be. There had been a time before when Djinni had looked for a child in Luster's belly, but there hadn't been one then. Things have changed for Luster too, it seems.
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    #5

    He glanced around happily the moment things got brighter, when Luster pulled the darkness of nearby shadows to herself. Was she going to show the nice lady some magic now!? He loved when she showed him magic. He loved magic. All kinds! He wished he could have some of his own one day, but he knows sometimes kids don't get magic like their mommies. So that was okay, too. He still loved to learn everything he could about it.

    Momma smiled down at him when he checked to make sure he didn't do a bad thing by telling the lady his name. So, good. He did good. And he smiled and rubbed his face on her leg again, nuzzling her back when she touched him and then played in his soft hair.

    The pinkish woman said it was nice to meet him, and then Momma introduced her as Djinni. Then he only stayed quiet and let them talk together, snuggling against Luster's leg and watching the conversation with rapt attention. A place with trees even bigger than theirs! That was surprising because their trees seemed so big. And a lake, and a cave.

    Wow, he loved that they talked to him too! Djinni told him about the place she lived in with cliffs that vanish and big piles of rocks.

    "Wow!" he blurted out, then shrank back in between Luster's legs with a little blush and merry blue eyes. It really was cool though. He'd never seen real cliffs before, but he knew what they were. And he could hardly imagine what piles of rocks would look like. All their rocks were all spread out.

    Then he hushed and just watched them talk more, looking from one to the other as they did with a happy smile.

    [ Cimmerian ]

    try to make a fire burn again

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    #6

    Luster had not known that Nerine had ever been home to Djinni (or Stillwater, for that matter), but it is easy enough to deduce it from the way she says back. You can’t go back to a place you’ve never been, after all. She thinks often of returning to Sylva, to the sunset trees and the lake with the stars trapped inside its glimmering surface. To the cave with damp, earthy walls and the musk of a man she could have loved. Does love, in some fragile, broken way. But she knows things would never be the same as they were, not like before when she trusted him so blindly with her heart.

    It would be so different now.
    She knows better.

    (She doesn’t, never learns.)

    “Why did you leave?” She asks quietly when Djinni has finished describing her home for Merry who seems absolutely taken by the idea of it. She smiles, touches her lips to that spot between his ears and stays, breathing in the scent of his skin for the way it soothes the wounds that appear, caught in the sharp edges of a heart broken and wedged back together. It seems so odd that she, they, would leave it, but hadn’t she left also? First to Ischia (and she winces, feels suddenly jagged inside), and then to Taiga when the echo of her loneliness in that cave was too loud to bear.

    But as it always is, that same question is returned to her and she bristles against it, a frown tugging at her brow. There is not a single piece of her that wants to open up to Djinni - to anyone - not a single piece of her that understands this wretched ache in her chest or the way her bones have grown sharper beneath her skin. Except Djinni is looking down at Merry now, not Luster, and it is an out so easy she takes it without thinking. “He is my brother,” she offers by way of explanation, soft and reserved because it is true she has always wanted to be a mother, feel the weight of life growing in her belly, “mine though, whether he likes it or not.” She grins in a tired way, tired but true, flips his forelock over his eyes in one deft motion. “I love him more than anything.”  

    Then she’s whuffling against his forehead, blowing aside those dark, silk hairs again. Finding his eyes so blue and soft blinking up at her from beneath even darker lashes. “Mmaybe if we ask her really nicely, Djinni will take us on an adventure to see her rock piles. You look like just the sort of fellow made for being king of the mountain.” She glances up at the rose woman with a softness in her expression that hadn’t been there a moment ago, a fondness that’s snuck quietly into the dark of those earthy brown eyes. “Wouldn’t you agree?”

    — Luster —
    so we let our shadows fall away like dust ;


    @[Djinni]
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