11-08-2018, 12:38 PM
Agapi
There was a day back in autumn that had changed her.
A day when she had left the side of her soundly sleeping sister in the early hours of morning, and only allowed herself to look back a single time to see Nerine, the kingdom that she had always loved, become nothing more than dust in her wake; it was an incomprehensible pinprick on the horizon, shrouded in the darkness of twilight. It isn’t something that she’d thought she’d ever have the courage to do, but the truth is that Nerine had felt less and less like home with each passing day, even if it hadn’t rationally made sense in even her own eyes when more of her family than ever was coming together there at last.
Perhaps the changes were just too big for her.
Regardless of the reason, Agapi’s world had always been so stable, and that night in particular it had felt like everything beneath her feet was shifting with some colossal, cataclysmic event — and when that happened, she hadn’t known how to keep on pretending that everything was still the same.
Nothing was the same.
And now, Agapi had not been home in weeks.
Perched in the gnarled, ancient boughs of a leafless oak tree she is sleeping, restlessly, in her sparrow form. The biting winter air means that her feathers look plump and ruffled from the effort of their vain attempts to keep her sufficiently warm. She isn’t stupid. She knows that she would likely have more luck sleeping and staying warm as a horse rather than a sparrow (quite frankly, balancing on two legs is not something that comes easily to her, especially several feet above a cold, hard ground — she’d learned a few times), but something about the trees had been making her feel safer lately; as though she is invisible up here, quiet and forgotten.
And despite having wanted the opposite of that in Nerine, here in the meadow quiet and forgotten is how she has come to like it. Strange things had been happening since the first snowfall — the kinds of things that Agapi did not want to involve herself in any more than she was forced to.
Because at first it had been loud, and sudden. The first week she’d heard screaming in the thickets beyond her, sometimes crying, or wailing, or some sick, sad combination of both. It had scared her enough that she hadn’t bothered to leave the safety of the bramble, not even come nightfall, to return home to her family. The plan, initially, was to wait for things to settle down — but they didn’t. The second week she had taken to the skies to survey the meadow in a bold attempt to strategize her exit, but the view had been chilling. Wailing had become quiet sobs. Some were bleeding from their noses and eyes, some were nearly bald, all were emaciated. Agapi had made a hasty retreat back into her thicket. It wasn’t safe.
By the third week there was nearly no one left, and that in itself had stopped her in her tracks.
Home didn’t feel like an option anywhere, not with what had been happening.
So, when he comes she is still ruffled in the gnarled boughs of an old oak tree. The sound of his play obliterates what restless dreaming she had been enjoying, and Agapi cracks a single tiny eye to find him there beneath her branch under a gentle dusting of snow.
“Are you dead?” Perhaps it’s wrong to give herself away, but the safety of her perch overhead makes her bold combined with the fact that he is the only seemingly ‘living’ soul she’s seen in weeks (nevermind that he is transparent).
A day when she had left the side of her soundly sleeping sister in the early hours of morning, and only allowed herself to look back a single time to see Nerine, the kingdom that she had always loved, become nothing more than dust in her wake; it was an incomprehensible pinprick on the horizon, shrouded in the darkness of twilight. It isn’t something that she’d thought she’d ever have the courage to do, but the truth is that Nerine had felt less and less like home with each passing day, even if it hadn’t rationally made sense in even her own eyes when more of her family than ever was coming together there at last.
Perhaps the changes were just too big for her.
Regardless of the reason, Agapi’s world had always been so stable, and that night in particular it had felt like everything beneath her feet was shifting with some colossal, cataclysmic event — and when that happened, she hadn’t known how to keep on pretending that everything was still the same.
Nothing was the same.
And now, Agapi had not been home in weeks.
Perched in the gnarled, ancient boughs of a leafless oak tree she is sleeping, restlessly, in her sparrow form. The biting winter air means that her feathers look plump and ruffled from the effort of their vain attempts to keep her sufficiently warm. She isn’t stupid. She knows that she would likely have more luck sleeping and staying warm as a horse rather than a sparrow (quite frankly, balancing on two legs is not something that comes easily to her, especially several feet above a cold, hard ground — she’d learned a few times), but something about the trees had been making her feel safer lately; as though she is invisible up here, quiet and forgotten.
And despite having wanted the opposite of that in Nerine, here in the meadow quiet and forgotten is how she has come to like it. Strange things had been happening since the first snowfall — the kinds of things that Agapi did not want to involve herself in any more than she was forced to.
Because at first it had been loud, and sudden. The first week she’d heard screaming in the thickets beyond her, sometimes crying, or wailing, or some sick, sad combination of both. It had scared her enough that she hadn’t bothered to leave the safety of the bramble, not even come nightfall, to return home to her family. The plan, initially, was to wait for things to settle down — but they didn’t. The second week she had taken to the skies to survey the meadow in a bold attempt to strategize her exit, but the view had been chilling. Wailing had become quiet sobs. Some were bleeding from their noses and eyes, some were nearly bald, all were emaciated. Agapi had made a hasty retreat back into her thicket. It wasn’t safe.
By the third week there was nearly no one left, and that in itself had stopped her in her tracks.
Home didn’t feel like an option anywhere, not with what had been happening.
So, when he comes she is still ruffled in the gnarled boughs of an old oak tree. The sound of his play obliterates what restless dreaming she had been enjoying, and Agapi cracks a single tiny eye to find him there beneath her branch under a gentle dusting of snow.
“Are you dead?” Perhaps it’s wrong to give herself away, but the safety of her perch overhead makes her bold combined with the fact that he is the only seemingly ‘living’ soul she’s seen in weeks (nevermind that he is transparent).
Seize The Moment
@[Arcane]