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  • 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


    HEARTFIRE
    #1
    When you can be anything you want, sometimes you’d rather just be nothing at all.

    It’s that nothingness that suits the changeling nowadays, when nearly everyone has forgotten who he was or might’ve been. He’s walking, which can be discerned by the casual pace of his steps, but everything else about him is … unsettling.

    Limbs that shift, constantly. First feline, then equine, then avian or some mixture of them all. No muscle sits still underneath the patterned skin he continues to change; they ripple freely through spasms of growth and shrinkage. When he meets an obstacle in his path he never pauses to adjust his stride, rather the world and its objects remain as they are while he passes easily through them. The secrets he’s uncovered are plentiful enough for endless lifetimes, but such a prospect does little to satisfy his endless hunger.

    Wyrm has found himself on a cold trail.

    Only death remains his master - an infallible end - and in all his years of living for himself and striving for power, that one small iota of harrowing fear seems to finally be catching up. “Any day now.” The manipulator reminds himself, feeling the truth of it in his bones as he glides, wraith-like, through a quiet Forest.

    And his hope? Gone. Carried away on the wings of his grandson, the young King, as the striped pegasus had slipped out of his grasp and subsequently out of Beqanna. Or so the rumors would have it.

    But if there was one creature who knew the truth, she was sure to be around (much like himself, their kind never quit) and Wyrm was sure her curiosity might outweigh her desire to see him dead. For a moment or two. “Heartfire.” He rasps out into the empty void, finally allowing his structure to settle on the old, familiar stallion she might recognize, albeit a bit ancient and gray around the muzzle.

    Some creature, some unassuming living thing would glance at the noisy word and it’s source only to see him. Which is exactly what he needed. Exactly what she needed to find him, since he’d done them both a favor and ripped his eyes clean from their sockets years ago.

    “@[Heartfire] …”
    Reply
    #2

    She's got the devil's eyes

    She had stopped looking for him a long time ago. Perhaps sometime shortly after he shredded his own sight so thoroughly. It was clear then he hadn’t wished to be found. And so she had done him one final favor and stopped looking. It had only served to stoke the pain of betrayal anyway. And she had never been a masochist.

    Now though, she is so very nearly ready to forget. The woman who never forgets and never forgives. She should know better however. Should know that the past is never forgotten, never truly left behind. And though she had made the choice to let sleeping dogs lie, inevitably they must wake.

    She hadn’t been looking for him. Hadn’t even thought of him, truth be told. Not since she had ascended the throne, at least. But she had kept her long held habits. The ones that have her too often scouring the most curious reaches of Beqanna in search of stray bits of information. It is that habit that brings him to her attention. That ancient foible allows her eye to catch on the beast as he shifts into a familiar green form.

    She might have smiled at that once. Might have gone to him without hesitation. He had been her closest friend then, and she had cared for him far more than she would ever admit.

    She is not certain she could ever forgive him for destroying that.

    She wouldn’t have gone now, except for the way he growls her name the moment he materializes. She had made the decision to leave him in the past, but it seems the past has too many ways of rearing it’s unwelcome head. She doesn’t know what he might want from her, but she does know what she wants. Or rather, what she doesn’t want.

    She had been content to leave him to his life when he had kept himself from hers. Perhaps though, he needed reminding of why he had ripped his own eyes out to keep her from finding him. Why he was better off keeping the distance he had once so clearly craved.

    The woman who steps from the trees is poised, carefully contained. He might no longer have the ability to see her, but her steady breathing and firm step would tell a story of its own. “I always thought you might return,” she greets easily, her voice cool, impassive. Faintly dangerous. “But I never thought you would be so foolish as to ask for me when you did.”

    and they'll cut you like a weapon

    Heartfire
    Reply
    #3
    Whatever Heartfire thought of him, however much anger and pain lay boiling in that black stone of her heart, even the countless years they’d spent together (now outmatched by the years spent apart) wouldn’t be enough to change or soften Wyrm’s demeanor towards her, though she clearly deserved kindness.

    Heartfire, as he well knew, was a creature ensconced in the perpetual past-tense. Her visions could only extend from the current time backwards, as he’d seen himself many times before, but Wyrm’s head was riddled with the future. More specifically his future, which had been granted to him in the form of a burning tree those many years ago - when The Chamber still stood strong.

    “A fool and a genius both tread the same the path.” He rattles out, twisting two green ears to where she stands. He seems unperturbed by the hint of acid in her tone. “Who else would I summon?” He laughs, a singularly dry sort of chuckle. Perhaps if she gave the matter some thought, it might not surprise her as to why he’d decided to give her a ‘call’.

    “You’ve seen him, spoken to him. Magnificent boy that he is. Infinitely more promising than Longclaw …” He sighs, creaking under the weight of brittle joints, “May he rest.” The manipulator hums in afterthought.

    Of course he’s speaking in context about Wolfbane, the only natural tie that could drive him to the roan mare’s clutches.

    “I knew he would come, knew he must exist at some point yet -” He rambles, seemingly wistful like a forlorn lover, “- I never could’ve guessed by my own blood. The son of my son. Our hope.” He wheezes softly, nearly forgetting the blue-eyed female who’d carried Claw and a twin in her own belly. As then is now, Heartfire had been to Wyrm like everyone else had been: a tool to further himself.

    Shame, regret, anger over his own involvement in the downfall of Bane’s father … these deflect from his mind without ever taking root. He sees himself as inscrutable to others but utterly justified in his thoughts and actions.

    “Where has he fled?” The shifter wants to know, eerily tilting the hollow sockets of his face in the direction where his once-mate now stood. “I must see him, speak to him. Wolfbane must come home.”

    @[Heartfire]
    Reply
    #4

    She's got the devil's eyes

    Only fools refuse to learn from the past. A fact Heartfire understands far better than most. Wyrm might have his attention fixed on the future, but she understands the value in knowing the past and present. Far more than what value there may be in knowing the future. It’s fickle, at best, the future. She knows enough to know how easily small, seemingly inconsequential things can change its course. She has been its orchestrator enough to know that it is far more than wishful thinking too.

    Something Wyrm had never quite understood. She hadn’t cared much then, but she sees it so clearly now.

    Time and age had done the viridian shifter no kindnesses. Had he still had eyes, she doesn’t doubt the encroaching madness would be visible for any to see. Still, he is sane enough now. For a while yet, perhaps. But she has seen it before. She knows the symptoms. For a moment even, she feels pity.

    But not enough to save him from himself.

    She stills when he speaks of their son, his words absent, almost callous. She is not certain thought of her eldest son will ever come without pain (not certain she wishes it to), but she does know she does not care for the way he speaks of him. For the cold disregard in his words.

    Only a shower of dust answers him though, the leaves and branches overhead breaking apart until they drift heavily around them. Until nothing stands in the way of sunlight as it streams down, bringing a wash of warmth and light into the clearing. A warning. The only one he would receive. “You should be kinder to our son. He cared for you more than you deserve.”

    Perhaps it’s foolish, to grant him that much even. But her eldest children would never have existed without him. Only that fact affords him any leniency. Anything else they might once have shared had been ground into dust beneath his heel long ago.

    She shouldn’t have come, she knows. Should have allowed him to stew in the knowledge of his fate. But that inability to leave well enough alone had always been a terrible fault of hers. Just as that self-assured confidence in his own immutability has always been one of his.

    “If you ever knew me at all Wyrm,” she finally responds, her voice steely beneath the soft syllables, “then you know I will not tell you that.”

    and they'll cut you like a weapon

    Heartfire
    Reply
    #5
    In the shiver of a moment leaves and branches turn to mere dust above him. Wyrm feels the sudden warmth of an exposed sun across his hide and acutely senses the layer of fine particles that drift down to coat his topline. Without sight he’s aware that Heartfire’s rage, lashing out at him in a tone like the strike of a whip, is an emotion she can now enforce with power. He can’t see what she’s done but he can picture her face so clearly in his mind - the sharp line of her dark lips, the cold glint to her striking eyes - and he knows, he just knows that the sapphire mare’s made herself into a force even he might not consider agitating.

    “I have one child left to me, and Rapture is a mother herself now.” He murmurs roughly, giving Heartfire’s final statement a moment to settle into silence. Both Longclaw and his twin sister had sprouted like weeds after their separation, leaving Wyrm to secretly marvel at their advances from afar long after he’d put the blue stallion out on his own four hooves.

    Now those days were over, like his, and he was happy to not have squandered his fertile years as his own sire had done. No two other children could have been more acceptable to him. “I was able to coerce you into meeting me one final time,” The shifter smirks, grizzled yet charming when he takes a painfully slow step in her direction. “but my dying wish is to speak with Bane.”

    Eons ago, (it seems) when he was young and had stolen a brief look into the twisting flames of his future, Wyrm had been given the vision of seeing his grandson. There, in the hot glow of something he couldn’t explain, stood a stallion with bold, white wings. His skin had been golden, slashed through with iridescent stripes so blue even the heart of the fire couldn’t dim them. It made no sense, not back then.

    If she only knew how many countless hours he’d spent looking for that same stallion, coming up empty time and time again. Years of waiting, years of watching Longclaw sire child after child until - at last! - to his earnest surprise the colt of his waking dreams slid into existence. That very night he’d torn his useless eyes clean from their resting place inside his skull and vowed to wait for a sign.

    “If you won’t tell me where he is, maybe you can send him a message instead. Something to show him I’m here … something to make him visit, at least.” He barters, before a ripple of movement flicks like a shadow over his skin. He’s gone blue, the same color Longclaw sported so proudly all his life.

    @[Heartfire]
    Reply
    #6

    She's got the devil's eyes

    She had not come as a kindness to him. No, perhaps it is foolish, but she had come here today to demonstrate, at long last, she had made the right decision all those years ago. And she had, she thinks now. She may regret many things in her life, but this would not be one of them.

    She watches him, blue eyes sharp, faintly skeptical, as responds to her rebuke. He tells her things she already knows, of course, but she is curious why he might now show such concern for his remaining living child, for the numerous grandchildren he has scattered throughout Beqanna. He had not shown interest in them in a very long time. Until now. Until today, when he had growled her name into the wind.

    As he continues, she thinks he understands this is the last time she would answer him in such a way. Perhaps the last time they would ever see each other. For all his faults, she knows he does not lack intelligence. And for all their time apart, he still knows her well enough to know her limits only stretch so far. Certainly he must remember she never gives more than a single warning.

    Though she knows a great deal (information coming so easily to her with her unique abilities), she cannot read thoughts or intentions. Does not know the full story behind his fascination with their grandson. Does not trust his intentions towards the blue and gold stallion. Even the way his skin ripples from green to blue does nothing to sway her. Nothing to foster such trust.

    He’d worn such a similar color the night their children had been conceived, and for all that his skin matches the blue of their son, she too easily sees Wyrm behind it.

    The silence stretches between them after he makes his plea. He had offered her little incentive to do as he asked, and she wonders then if he truly thought she would betray her grandson so easily. Perhaps they had shared a trust between them once, but that had long since been shattered. The silence stretches so long that one could almost wonder if she would even deign to answer. Finally though, a single word breaks the silence between them. A single, heavy question. “Why?”

    and they'll cut you like a weapon

    Heartfire
    Reply
    #7
    A long silence follows in the wake of Wyrm’s words. Without eyes he studies her with his mind, patiently and silently recalling the memories they spun together, pulling the long-forgotten images from a dark, dank corner in his head.

    Heartfire was the closest thing he’d ever had to a friend. Long, long ago he’d had a half sister, but his distaste for her existence was immediate and resulted in their mutual parting of ways. After that it was the roan mare - and only the roan mare - who could coax him into the semblance of a normal, functioning horse.

    Every other living creature, right up until Epithet sparked a very brief respite from constant boredom, tested his reserve and drove the blue stallion further into hermitage. It was simple fact: Heartfire’s life eclipsed over his and those moments were near to perfection. Nothing else he could recall would ever come close to shining in the same brilliance.

    Not until he would complete the cycle, fulfill the prophecy. Not until then.

    “Because,” He sighs, turning himself at the molecular level, changing in density so that he begins to sink into the earth. He feels tired just now, so incredibly aged. “if our roles were reversed and you came to me like this - weak, I mean. You know I’m weak.” The ghostly apparition goes off track, only a head and bony hips exposed above the ground. He looks like he’s gone for a swim in the forest floor.

    “If you came to me like this and asked me the same thing, regardless of future or past, I would send the message.” Wyrm mutters.

    Her rational side might disagree, but in the quiet minutes of reflection she would come to another conclusion. She would (perhaps begrudgingly) have to admit it was possible.

    “Let him see and decide for himself. Send it Heartfire.” He sighs again, defeated.

    “Please.”

    @[Heartfire]
    Reply
    #8

    She's got the devil's eyes

    Once, long ago, they had shared something between them. Even she could not deny that. And perhaps that is what had made it worse, what had made their inevitable break as harsh and painful as it had been. Heartfire does not trust easily, and once lost, there is no regaining it.

    He had tossed it away so easily though. She wonders then, had a moment’s foolishness been worth all that to him? She can see with her own eyes that life has not been so kind to him as it had her since they’d parted ways. Perhaps it is only now, after so many years, he has learned to regret.

    Still, if he did, it had come far too late.

    Shifting idly, Heartfire considers Wyrm openly. She had never been shy with her gaze, but knowing he cannot see her is freeing, in a way. She might never truly release her careful control, but he would never know if even a hint of her thoughts or emotions ever spilled onto her features. Would never know what she did not deliberately share with him. He might have believed he was saving himself from her by tearing his own eyes from his skull, but truthfully, it is an act that had freed her far more than it ever freed him.

    She listens as he makes his plea, seemingly unmoved by the way he speaks, unperturbed by the way he begins to sink into the ground, disappearing until only his bony torso and head rise above the earth. She finds herself staring down at him, curious what he thought this particular display might accomplish. If he had thought it might demonstrate his own weakness, he was very wrong in his assumptions. If anything, it showed her more of his capabilities than he might have cared to impart.

    Still, she considers his plea carefully. It had not truly answered the question she had posed. He hadn’t told her why he wished it, only that it was the last wish of a dying man. She holds her skepticism close, but she had learned a great deal of their grandson these last several years. And she knows the gold and blue stallion holds no great love for his grandfather. Knows he would never lower his guard before him.

    It is only that knowledge that convinces her to do as he asks, not the half-hearted plea he had made. If anything, Wolfbane deserved to have his say before the green shifter as well. And Heartfire would rather have some control of such a situation rather than none. Wyrm might have changed, but he had not changed that much. He would find another way to locate Wolfbane if she did not help him.

    “Very well,” she finally clips out, though he must know it is not without caveats. “But understand that I will be who you answer to if your intentions prove less than pure.” And make no mistake, she would be watching.

    and they'll cut you like a weapon

    Heartfire
    Reply
    #9
    Just the sound of her begrudging acceptance is all Wyrm needs to flash a withered, toothy smile. Once he might’ve been considered attractive; handsome by anyone’s standards here in Beqanna. Now his body seemed to match the ugly hidden away inside. A grin only served to enhance the already unusually creepy habits he took with him wherever Wyrm went.

    Not to be mistaken for ill intentions, the shape-shifter twists his lips again and goes back to adopting his trademark stoicism. Heartfire could hardly stand him as-is, he couldn’t see a reason to irritate her further by acting like a giddy colt. “You have nothing at all to concern yourself with.” The shimmering blue stallion murmured shakily, stepping out from his sunken position and back up to stand topside again, “But be my guest, watch us all you like little eavesdropper.” He taunts her mildly.

    Shifting his legs and schooling his face, Wyrm comes to stand with three hooves firmly squared and one hind leg stretched ever so slightly back. He tilts his head, angles his face away so that only a single eyeless socket could be observed by the female overseer, and readies himself like a famous individual prepping to have their photo taken.

    This is probably the most fun he’s had in … ages.

    For a moment he holds his breath and the Forest seems to grow quiet around the two of them. He remembers waking up so long ago, his shifting stripped bare and only immortality to keep him going. He remembers seeing Heartfire then - the first horse he’d come across after the reckoning - and how he’d known that it was her, it would always be her that suited him best.

    He sighs, the moment ends, and with a soft grunt the old beast relaxes again. “I’m aware that you’ve … moved on. With your life and your descendants.” Wyrm rumbles, “Were I a younger horse …” He muses blindly, knowing now that if he stepped in close to brush his mouth across her cheek she might just take his throat in exchange.

    No, best to leave on a good note. “I owe you one.” The shifter says finally, hunching his back to sprout two brown-barred wings. Feathers peel up and fluff out from his chest and belly, his tail shrinks away and folds itself into more stiff plumage, bits and pieces of his body alter and mold themselves like clay. The iridescent male changes into a common barn owl. “See you never!” The smaller creature trills, a joke within a joke as his eyebrows lift over haunting, empty eyeholes.

    Wyrm takes flight, a silent and soft exit like his entrance, soaring right through the trunks and branches which would stop any regular traveler. He never looks back; he only sees what lies ahead.

    @[Heartfire]
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