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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


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    [open quest]  i can see the whole world down below
    #1
    Dawn breaks.

    Djinni yawns.

    Tucked against her side is a sleeping man, and she presses a soft kiss to his forehead before rising to her feet. Sand falls from her salt-encrusted mane when she shakes it out, a brief but lovely waterfall in the soft pink light. The air around the dun mare is warm and humid, as it is year round here, and Djinni inhales a deep breath of the flower-scented air. Ahead of her stretches an endless expanse of turquoise sea framed by waving palms. A tropical paradise – an endless vacation. She has been here for years.

    Djinni is bored.

    It has been too long since she did something exciting, done something to stoke the fire in her blood.

    The genie blinks her coal-black eyes and is instantly transported to the base of the Mountain. A moment later, she calls them to her with a single wish. She wants the bold, the brave, the ones that remind her of herself, the ones with a trickster’s heart. The universe responds as it always does, instantly and inexplicably. They will come, compelled towards a broad meadow near the Mountain. They wont know why they come – only that they must. The image of the meadow will sear itself into their minds whether they were awake or asleep or something else entirely, and they will be compelled to seek it out immediately.  

    The rose-gold mare stands in the same meadow. The sun rises up the far side of the mountain behind her, silhouetting her ethereal figure, and she waits with bated breath, pounding heart, and utterly serene expression.

    * * *

    Djinni has summoned horses of any age that like making mischief to a meadow at the bottom of the Mountain to participate in a quest.

    Your post should include where your character is when they receive the image of the meadow and their journey to, and arrival at, the meadow where Djinni is waiting.

    Each player may only enter one character; no other limits to entry.

    Entries are open until 11pm CST on May 31st, 2019.
    D J I N N I
    genie | rose gold tobiano dun | trickster
    Reply
    #2
    my heart is violent because it learned how to bleed at a young age
    when it is hungry I feed it with shaking hands.

    Tucked close to his mother’s side, he’s still snoozing softly when the image of the meadow reaches him in his dreams. The wind whispers through the dry grasses of Loess and they seem to call his name with promises of adventure. His black and blue eyes flutter open and he can still smell the flowers as the fog of sleep slowly eases from his mind. He lifts his gold and black head but the meadow still beckons him from across Beqanna. Listening to Starsin has never been one of Malone’s strong suits but at least this time he hesitates while he considers sneaking off again. Still, the desire to find that meadow is too great, so he gently eases from his mother’s star-dusted side and climbs onto his soft hooves.

    His wings flutter and fluff themselves before settling across his small back once more. After whispering a gentle apology to his mother, he skitters off through the grasslands of Loess, leaving behind the cacti and hot springs he’s grown so accustomed to. The soldiers of his home dutifully patrol the borders and he can see them pacing along the kingdom’s edges up ahead. Malone swallows hard and pauses, peering his dark head from behind a tree to watch their routes while he skims their mind. He recognizes Wolfbane, bright blue and yellow, as he dwells on thoughts of his own son. Maybe he’s too preoccupied to notice the little pegasus sneaking away?

    The guard finally turns and begins to scout off to the west, leaving a small gap between him and Malone’s father off to the east. The colt gathers his courage and hurries as quickly as his knobby legs will carry him toward the forest. (He had considered sneaking through Hyaline but he feared the people of the foreign kingdom might not take kindly to his trespassing.) He ducks and weaves and hurries between the trees as he imagines his father rushing after him. In truth, however, it is knowing that Ophanim would tell Starsin of his antics and not the angel boy himself that scares the child.

    He skids to a halt to check over his shoulder for any sight of the Loessian guards but he is met only with the countless trees he pass by. His chest heaves for breath as he begins to wonder why he so desperately wants to travel to this meadow. It seemed nice enough, of course, but why did he risk getting in trouble again? The sun has risen a little further over the horizon and now bleeds through the trees in dapples and splashes of color that make him shimmer and shine. The stars across his ink black patches burn quietly by comparison, content to produce their own light. Regardless of the cause, his heart begs to continue on this journey and he is quick to give in.

    His spindly legs carry him further through the trees, toward the mountain looming ahead. It serves as his north star until the forest finally gives way to the open meadow. The boy breathes deep and the smell of flowers confirms that this is the place he had been searching for. Ahead of him, the rose gold woman stands tall and beautiful in the center of the meadow from his dreams. He tilts his head curiously but continues on at a more timid and reserved pace, wading through the tall grasses as carefully as he can. The spring sun bathes him in warmth without a single cloud overhead to block its rays and he wonders if he has time to take a nap here. His wings briefly fluff at the thought but he resists for now.

    Malone comes to a stop in front of the stranger and shifts his weight nervously before her. With a fifteen foot distance between them, he thought he might feel comfortable, but her presence is ethereal and he feels intimidated to be even this close.
    m a l o n e
    im first i win.
    Reply
    #3

    The soft heat of the early morning had lulled her to sleep beneath the cover of a small sapling tree skirting the playground and Pangeas border. Her mother had left her to rest as she took the the sky to take care of unfinished business not to far off, with the comfort of her being close to the watchful fairy and her father's land.

    She dozed in a conscious wake as her ever present companion picked through her tousled mane, the gesture calming in effect. Images soon began filling her mind of flowers and greenery much like those from her first glimpse of the world. A playful grin pulled at the corners of her mouth as she opened a lazy eye and turned her head towards Dexter. "We're going to go on an adventure." she said abruptly after only a moments thought. She didn't know how or why she knew this only that she simply did, and that in itself was enough to make up her mind. The idea of having a little fun after weeks of being under her mother ever present eyes pulled on her heart.

    "Come on, we can't be late." she said as she scrambled to her feet on still attached to knobby baby knees, she'd have to address that at another time. Lucky for her the grasses had take off in the recent humid weather and as she slinked away from the protection of the playground the grasses hid her with an efficiency she hadn't anticipated. she'd need to come back later and remember to thank them for sure.

    The path to Pangeas borders had been alot easier than she would have guessed, she was convinced her mother would have used her super freaky mommy senses and had known she was up to something the moment she had left, but she hadn't apparently otherwise she definately would have known. Felicitey get over here now. You k ow better than to wander off.. blah.blah.blah a silent giggle was shared between her and Dexter.

    The path along Pangea was even easier in comparison. With her wings tucked tight beside her barrel and Dexter on her back keeping her balance in place her small golden, brown tipped body melded with the colors of her birth home. The dusty ground close enough the the meadows border didn't seem to lift and move as noticeably as it did farther inland.

    Colors filled her mind as she passed the alcove of her birthing, her destination was not far off. The flowers wild as they were still grew along side similar species, colors painted like a picture easy to distinguish.

    Not long after they had passed the alcove, but long enough that her legs began to ache, Dexter tangled his little monkey fingers into her mane motioning with his free hand figures off in the distant. A lopsided grin grew ten fold as a sparkle of mischief bloomed within her, "Dexter, you make my heart happy" she sweetly praised her companion as she took off in an awkward run towards the others.

    As she closed the distance she tried to slow herself to a graceful stop. stopping was not her strong suite to say the least her execution fell short of what she had anticipated as she nearly ran into the other smaller horse. "I am SO sorry" she managed after regaining her balance. " Felicitey, reporting for some fun" she blurted towards the rose gold mare that had beckoned her here. Her amber and blue eyes darted over the boy curiously as her tail twitched in excitement, her companion staring a little more concerned.

    felicitey

    who do you think you are? collecting your jar of hearts.

    LitotesxNimueIsolde
    Untitled23-1
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    #4

    The image of a meadow suddenly appears in the stallion's head, brightly lit as the scene unfolds itself in a film-like manner, bright colours making his headache as he stumbles for a moment.
    The stallion exits his earthen dome, emerging into an array of colours, dimly lit by small rays of sunlight that bend and twist through the Sylvan canopy. The dome created of soil and rock slowly begins to crumble as Aziz takes a step away, his focus now on the meadow rather than what he had created. The stallion lifts his leg and allows it to fall back down, colliding with the earth as the dome-like structure falls in the same way, ending up as a small pile of earth.

    The stallion cannot resist investigating the image, it wasn't often that random images appeared in his head after all, unless he was going insane, which was highly probable at this point.
    Aziz sets off from Sylva at a fast pace, he wouldn't want to miss anything interesting going on, he quite liked peculiar occurrences in Beqanna, they caused an intrigue that needed to be satisfied.
    Travel wasn't particularly all that interesting to the male, but finding new earthly materials to work with was rather fascinating, new minerals and rock types at his fingertips, ready to create vast mountains of earth at his disposal.

    Soon enough the stallion reaches the forest, his body weaving through the tall trees that cower over him, casting a shadow over his body.
    The canopy above is thick and lets little light through, allowing smaller critters to thrive in the foliage, only showing in times of vulnerability.
    The thick smell of blossoming flowers greets the stallion as he reaches the edge of the meadow, his head poking through the thick barrage of trees as he takes a look around his surroundings.


    The stallion wanders into the meadow cautiously, looking around curiously as he spots other horses standing close "Interesting" he mutters, his eyes trailing over all the other horses as he comes close.





    Aziz

    —lost and forgotten—

    [Image: N3F7IUd.png]
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    #5

    This is Major Tom to Ground Control. I'm stepping through the door and I'm floating in a most peculiar way. And the stars look very different today. For here am I sitting in a tin can. Far above the world, Planet Earth is blue and there's nothing I can do.

    He had been off gallivanting with some of the more wilder equines of Beqanna. He had decided to make a home amongst the sinners and the rogues to get a delicious little taste of what savages do beneath pregnant pale moons. The sky was bleeding gold when Bowie had though to take a little minx beneath an elm and show her the ole in-out but a call breaks his drunken trance of euphoria.

    "Well now..." His voice is sing-song in it's flutter as the young mare looks at him with a furrowed brow. "Go on now, love." He places a nip to her pretty little rear before the bedazzled glitter and deep purple man moves towards the muster of a rather angelic voice.

    A mare of pink gold hue stands with a dreamy expression that Bowie finds rather irresistible. She is an image of heaven and he can feel his arousal attempt to distract him. Must be attempt to charm everyone? Honestly...yes, you can help when you find so much beauty in the world. The male finds a place to stand, near a gather of a few others, his long pale hair glittering in the tug of a cool spring breeze. The man is eager to hear the voice of the rose gold mare once again, craving it, needing it.


    Bowie.

    Reply
    #6

    i never said that i would be your lover
    i never said that i would be your friend
    i never said that i would take no other

    Hyaline’s primarch watches the first light of morning spill across the mirrored surface of their lake. The ledge on which she stands is grown thickly with white-trunked aspens, their leaves whispering in the brisk wind that plays across the mountain faces. Something else whispers too, and the meadow takes shape in her mind. A smile tugs at the corner of her lips, and she weaves back through the maze of close trunks to find the quiet little snow-melt creek that runs through her mountainside roost.

    She has called on Hyaline’s people to be unpredictable, creators of the kinds of little ripples that encourage oxygen to pass through the surface of still water. Today it seems she is called in turn.

    In the fetlock deep creek Kensa’s hooves grind against small smooth pebbles but the children sleeping in their grass nests do not stir. The meadow in her mind redraws itself but she resists to watch her young once sleeping a few heart beats more, safe and sound, beautiful.

    The creek agitates and she dives into it, headfirst, as though a deep hole waits right before her. Passing into the clear surface and disappearing from the small quiet meadow just as warm golden light arrives to dapple the sleepers.

    She passes through water: stream, lake, and then into the fast-flowing artery that flows alongside the meadow. 

    The river releases the sabino mare and she steps out onto the swath of green that spreads out from its edge and into the shadow of the mountain. Dripping, Kensa lopes into the meadow, looking for the place that matches the sketch in her mind. Sunrise shimmers on her skin, the blond cords of her half-dried mane blowing across her face when she stops before a woman she does not know. Kensa’s topaz eyes are intense, eager, and she greets the stranger with and open and friendly incline of her head. 
     

    kensa
    love is madness
    Reply
    #7
    He is napping in the heart of Loess, away from his friends and his brother and trying so very hard not to feel alone when the dream of the meadow and the rose-gold trickster invades his mind. Grunting quietly, he opens his eyes and sits up, feeling a compulsion in his legs that is hard to ignore. Climbing slowly to his hooves and stifling a yawn, he turns to the southeast and sets off, and unlike his brother he doesn’t have to worry about the guards stopping him and demanding he stay with his parents.

    He’s not a little prince, you see; he isn’t important to the higher-ups in Loess, and he kind of just... exists here. It makes sneaking off to do mischievous things so much easier, but some days he wishes that he had parents who cared as much about him as Malone’s do. Sure, they share a father, but Malone is born of love and not lust, and therefore his existence means so much more to the Loessians than Meraxes.

    Golden hooves bound over the border of Loess and into the forest that skirts it, and he is light on his hooves as he travels. His nose picks up a hint of his brother on the wind though, and he pauses, confused. Wasn’t Malone just seriously hurt not too long ago? Why would he be slinking off into the forest where he could get lost? The vision of the meadow flashes again in his mind and he sets off again with a grumble – he'll worry about his little brother later. Starsin will probably tell him that it’s his fault Malone snuck off, anyways. Whatever.

    As the trees thin he sees the Mountain ahead, and he slows, suddenly filled with awe. He emerges from the trees slowly into the meadow that he had dreamt of, and he looks around to see the other horses gathering, with the rose-gold mare at the center of it all. A small figure is already near her hooves and he gasps as he recognizes his brother, bounding forward to brush his nose against Malone’s feathery wings. “Shouldn’t you be at home resting, brother?” he gently scolds, then looks up to Djinni. “Hi, I’m Meraxes,” he adds quietly, unsure of if he’s supposed to speak or not.
    Reply
    #8
    Torryn had been awake for hours when the image of the meadow came to him in the early morning.

    It took longer for daylight to break through the trees of the thick forest that he lived in, and so even when the sky first began to brighten, it was hours later before the sun was high enough to penetrate the darkness. It had become a habit for him to wake up long before the sun did, and this was when he would slip away. Perhaps this was how his mother’s wanderlust chose to display itself. Even though he only knew the Briseis that stayed in Taiga — the Briseis that was tethered so fiercely to his father, and their family — he had grown on the stories of her travels. They were fascinating, but he never felt the urge to act.

    Early morning, however, when his parents and his siblings still slept, is when he would carefully steal away from the shadow-nest crafted by his father. The rare moment that everyone was asleep was the only chance he had to himself. With an entire tribe of shadowed siblings, he was the outcast in more ways than one, even if his parents didn’t see him like that. He loved all of his brothers and sisters, but it didn’t change the fact that he was the only one that didn’t look like them (with the blue roan coat, when everyone else was black as the shadows they controlled), and that he couldn’t do any of the things they could. Misfit was similar to himself, but he was so close to Haunt that he might as well have been just like the rest of the shadow-kids.

    He is at the edge of Taiga when the image of a meadow invades his mind, and he cannot ignore the intense feeling of needing to go that becomes so deeply embedded in his veins. He wonders if this is what his mother had meant; how that need to leave had been like an instinct that just seemed wrong to ignore. He glances back in the direction that would take him back to his family, and then looks again to the border.

    And for the first time in his year of life, he decides to cross it.

    He has no idea where he actually needs to go, but the picture of the meadow is so fervent that it serves as a guiding star of sorts. It pushes and pulls him in different directions, across rocky paths and winding streams, through groves of trees and over sloping hills. He tries to take it all in, but anytime he is tempted to stop, that same image continues to beckon him.

    The blue roan colt crests the top of a knoll, and there he sees the pink mare, and a small gathering of horses. For a moment, he feels a flinch of uncertainty, but he pushes it aside as he approaches the group, casting the others a brief glance. He is drawn to her, though, like a magnet, and even though he says nothing, his dark brown eyes are locked to her face in anticipation of what she would tell them.
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    #9
    Soleil rarely strays from her parents’ sides. As a naturally sweet and quiet girl, she is often overwhelmed by the constant waves of magic she can hardly control. There are far too many nights she spends tossing and turning because others have wandered too close to where she is sleeping: their thoughts crowd her mind and set off her anxieties.

    When the vision of the meadow presses gently into her mind, she stops her diligent digging at the damp soil and listens. Little ears flick back and forth, but still she finds no noise to the accompany the invasion. Odd that the faded burble of chirping birds was there a moment and then gone . . . Soleil shakes her head and squeaks. Sure, she can paint infinite pictures in her head of the thoughts of others, but to have a sensation of reading thoughts without any actual thoughts. . . The babe blinks, dazed; then, steps in the direction her gut pulls.

    The thoughts of Lynx and Fox fade into the chaos of the physical universe - Soleil so enraptured that she does not notice when their telepathic murmurs are entirely gone.

    A meadow, covered in wildflowers and interrupted by a small gathering, is where the blue roan filly arrives. Her steps are quiet, and her open face is covered in awe. The group’s leader is a color she has yet to discover, shiny in the way only gold can be. The rosey sheen of Djinni’s coat sparkles beneath the sun, a gentle delight the filly discovers.

    Her patience is deep, and her mind wide open, accepting what thoughts may pass.
    Reply
    #10
    Djinni is not idle as she waits for them to arrive.

    She slides through a myriad of shapes and silhouettes. She has her favorites – a flaxen pony, a coal black destrier, a tawny hotblood – but she tries new things, stretching the limits of her strength with nearly impossible sizes. Shapeshifting is a vital component of her mischief, and as each quester arrives, she takes a moment to mimic them all in greeting.

    First is Malone, quite small and here entirely alone. He comes near despite his nerves, confused but still obedient to her wish.

    Second is Felicitey, no older than the first boy, bold and sweet. There is no fear in her at all, and Djinni smiles.

    Third is cautious Aziz, who lingers at the edge of the meadow before drawing near.

    Fourth comes a glittering male, bright enough that the genie contemplates adding Bowie’s permanent shimmer to her own appearance.

    Fifth is Kensa, appearing from the stream like a nymph, and the water loving Djinni admires her method of travel.

    Sixth is an older boy who fusses over the first. The genie, with her many siblings, appreciates Meraxes’ concern and returns his greeting with a smile.

    Seventh is another child, quiet in a way that reminds her of dawn shadows driven away by the sun.  

    Last is a girl with enough awe on her face to satiate Djinni.

    The genie has always appreciated having the appropriate amount of deference shown, and the eight horses who have arrived to fulfill her wish have done just this. Shifting back at last to her own small form, the black eyed mare finally speaks aloud.

    “Welcome.” She says, “and thank you.”

    ---

    There is no time for you to ask what she might be thanking you for. Instead, the world around you disappears and you find yourself swallowed by complete emptiness. It is dark and silent and cold, a place where there has only been and ever will be: nothing. The moment you first wonder if you’ll be trapped there forever, you are freed. Your vision returns, and you find yourself exactly where you were before receiving the vision of the meadow.

    A need rises in you, loud and impossible to ignore.

    Deceive.

    You feel driven by the need for deception, the urge to lie and mislead. Will you give in? To whom will you lie, and about what? Or are you able to fight off the desire, finding that deception is contrary to your nature?

    ---
    - Your character is back home (or wherever they were before being summoned)
    - You have been overcome with the desire to verbally deceive at least one other horse (can be another character or an NPC)
    - your post should end with your character falling asleep at the end of the day
    - The deadline to reply to this quest is Sunday, June 9th at 11 pm CST
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