10-07-2019, 08:51 AM
<link href="https://fonts.googleapis.com/css?family=Josefin+Sans&display=swap" rel="stylesheet"><style type="text/css">.aedan_boy_container{position:relative;z-index:1;width: 550px;background: #1f3f65;font: 12px 'Times New Roman', serif;border: 1px solid #050e49;box-shadow: 0 0 10px #050e49;}.aedan_boy_container p{margin:0;}.aedan_boy_gradient {position: absolute;z-index: 5;top: 215px;width: 550px;height: 200px;background: -moz-linear-gradient(top, rgba(31,63,101,0) 0%, rgba(31,63,101,1) 100%);background: -webkit-linear-gradient(top, rgba(31,63,101,0) 0%,rgba(31,63,101,1) 100%);background: linear-gradient(to bottom, rgba(31,63,101,0) 0%,rgba(31,63,101,1) 100%);filter: progid
XImageTransform.Microsoft.gradient( startColorstr='#001f3f65', endColorstr='#1f3f65',GradientType=0 );}.aedan_boy_message {width: 500px;position: relative;z-index: 10;margin-top: -80px;text-align:justify;padding: 10px 0px;color: #D3E0D5;border-top: 1px solid #050e49;border-bottom: 1px solid #050e49;}.aedan_boy_name {font: 66px 'Josefin Sans', sans-serif;color: #1f3f65;text-shadow:0 0 6px #fff;text-align: center;padding-top: 30px;}.aedan_boy_quote {position: absolute;z-index: 15;font: 14px 'Josefin Sans', sans-serif;color: #208ea9;letter-spacing: 2px;text-shadow: 1px 1px 2px #050e49;}.aedan_boy_quotetop {top: 310px;right: 150px;}.aedan_boy_quotebottom {bottom: 75px;right: 180px;}</style><center><div class="aedan_boy_container"><img src="https://k.nickpic.host/rpZoqY.jpg" style="width:550px;"><div class="aedan_boy_gradient"></div><p class="aedan_boy_quote aedan_boy_quotetop">i have loved the stars too fondly</p><div class="aedan_boy_message">Relief washes over him when the Princess asks only for a story. That is something he can do, and truthfully, he is happy to give her a story. She is not necessarily nice, but she isn’t mean either, and Aedan finds that he sort of likes this Princess. <font color=#208ea9> “Oh, I know a good one,”</font> he says, almost eager, hoping it’s one Pteron also knows but he thinks the older stallion probably does, and can build on where he begins. After all, there are few in Beqanna that don’t know about the Reckoning.
<font color=#208ea9> “There is a price for greed,”</font> he begins, voice a little more sober now, the cadence of his speaking slower. He has listened to his mother tell him this story so many times and he mimics the way she tells it now. <font color=#208ea9> “Where we come from, the magic of our world is controlled by faeries. Tiny, beasty little things - some more than others.”</font> He has never met one of the faeries, but his father has and many others besides. He’s heard rumors of them, including the beautiful white and purple one with a mane and tail of wysteria who is not nearly so kind as her outside might make you think. Some of them are kinder than she and some are not.
<font color=#208ea9> “Once, they gave magic out freely. It flowed through the lands and into the most loyal residents of each to help them serve. Kings and Queens, Generals and Peacemakers were all granted powers from the lands they served, and the lands themselves had magical entities. Beautiful things, like waterfalls that healed and a pool that granted you a spirit animal; and wicked things, like ever burning trees that told the future for the price of blood. But the residents took advantage, fought wars for the sake of wars and threw magic around as if it did not come from somewhere, as if it were limitless.
It is not limitless.
Our home was being drained and the residents did not care. So the faeries took it all away. There was nothing left. The lands were gone and everyone awoke on a mountaintop, with their powers stripped, their homes destroyed, their crowns taken. Everyone started over. Slowly, new lands were returned to Beqanna, shaped and formed into new kingdoms without magic flowing freely through them. The residents were made to toil and work to regain their powers, to earn the right, to understand that there is a price for everything and that cost is high. To learn how to respect the land they called home.”</font>
Aedan falls silent, leaving room to Pteron to add his own spin on the story or a new story entirely if he prefers. When they are done, the Princess is as good as her word and sends them on their way through a cave, tucked into a cliff around the back of the castle. Aedan is glad he did not try to run, for it was unlikely he’d have ever found this exit on his own and instead, one of the heads of the Princess’s dragon probably would have eaten him.
They travel in silence, mostly. Aedan finds it hard to break the oppressive quiet of the dark tunnel that leads them down, down, down. Always down, he thinks. Maybe he was still inside the Sphinx, traveling ever closer to it’s stomach and he just didn’t know. Maybe soon he’d wake to his mother’s gentle nose telling him not to sleep the day away (how silly, to tell a boy of the night not to waste the day, but she does anyway).
Neither of those things happen though, and instead there is a light in the distance. It grows closer as they walk, and that same mix of fear and excitement sends shockwaves skittering through Aedan. The walls around him are clear, almost see through, and the farther they go, the more he is able to see until it is clear they are underwater.
<i>Underwater</i>.
His heart might stop for a minute. They are underwater, in a tunnel made of clear rock and he finds himself stopping to look out. The sight is unbelievable, the colors of the ocean as vivid as the jungle had been, but where the jungle was green the ocean was blue. So blue. Vast and wonderful, little fish darting around the walls and looking his way. When a much larger fish comes, it’s mouth full of rows of sharp teeth, Aedan finds his feet and begins walking again. In his hesitation to watch the fish, he has lost Pteron and is once again on his own. Foolish. But then again, maybe this magical place would not have let them stay together anyway.
Eventually the tunnel leads up, and he drags his exhausted legs wearily. Adrenaline keeps him going, but if he ever makes it home he really may sleep for days. He finally surfaces above the ocean, the light bright and blinding for a moment. When he can see again, his eyes settle on golden spires glimmering in the sunlight. A city spreads out before him, and his eyes go wide. Aedan is about to rush into the city, careless of the danger that probably waits for him, too excited to explore, when an army blocks his path forward.
Aedan comes skittering to a halt. He takes a few steps back, studying the strange creatures that surround him. Their heads are that of deer - a creature he sees plenty in Beqanna. Their hind feet are that of a birds, and their tails are long feathers that he cannot place but assume must belong to some bird that he simply hasn’t seen before.
And then it comes to him. He knows this story. It’s not one mother tells often, but she has told it. The city beneath the ocean, once guarded by creatures called Peryton. The city is not beneath the ocean, but perhaps he’s gone back in time or perhaps in this alternate universe he finds himself in the city never sunk. Regardless, it’s the only idea he has and so he has to go with it.
One of the peryton stands a little apart, looking uncomfortable. Aedan watches him closely for a moment, eyes drifting to the ground around it until he notices something off. The shadow of this peryton is human. The rest though, the rest have shadows of themselves. A boy made of the night knows that shadows show the truth. The human shadow is a traveler, far from home and lost, in need of a kill to be restored to favor. There is only one that needs to kill. The rest may want to stop him, but perhaps they don’t need to kill him.
Are they keeping him here to help their friend get his kill? Could their friend be persuaded to let him go?
He moves toward the creature slowly, inching his way as harmlessly as he can toward the one peryton, eyeing those antlers and knowing they are death if he makes the wrong move. <font color=#208ea9> “I know how you feel,”</font> he says softly, imploringly, toward the peryton. <font color=#208ea9> “I am far from home here, so I know what it’s like. I think maybe you are still you though, that to kill is to lose yourself entirely as they have.”</font> He gestures to the shadows of the others, all fully peryton. Perhaps they have been restored to favor, but they are no longer the humans they once were. <font color=#208ea9> “There is so much good you could still do, and in the end, you can find your kill somewhere along the lines as you save someone, or many someones. A worthy kill.”</font>
He pauses, hoping his plea doesn’t fall on deaf ears. <font color=#208ea9> “Please. I just want to go home.”</font> It is all he can offer, his truth, as the shadow of this peryton offers a truth to Aedan as well. He will give back what he has taken, and hope that such a price is enough.
</div><p class="aedan_boy_quote aedan_boy_quotebottom">to be fearful of the night</p><p class="aedan_boy_name">aedan</p></div></center>
XImageTransform.Microsoft.gradient( startColorstr='#001f3f65', endColorstr='#1f3f65',GradientType=0 );}.aedan_boy_message {width: 500px;position: relative;z-index: 10;margin-top: -80px;text-align:justify;padding: 10px 0px;color: #D3E0D5;border-top: 1px solid #050e49;border-bottom: 1px solid #050e49;}.aedan_boy_name {font: 66px 'Josefin Sans', sans-serif;color: #1f3f65;text-shadow:0 0 6px #fff;text-align: center;padding-top: 30px;}.aedan_boy_quote {position: absolute;z-index: 15;font: 14px 'Josefin Sans', sans-serif;color: #208ea9;letter-spacing: 2px;text-shadow: 1px 1px 2px #050e49;}.aedan_boy_quotetop {top: 310px;right: 150px;}.aedan_boy_quotebottom {bottom: 75px;right: 180px;}</style><center><div class="aedan_boy_container"><img src="https://k.nickpic.host/rpZoqY.jpg" style="width:550px;"><div class="aedan_boy_gradient"></div><p class="aedan_boy_quote aedan_boy_quotetop">i have loved the stars too fondly</p><div class="aedan_boy_message">Relief washes over him when the Princess asks only for a story. That is something he can do, and truthfully, he is happy to give her a story. She is not necessarily nice, but she isn’t mean either, and Aedan finds that he sort of likes this Princess. <font color=#208ea9> “Oh, I know a good one,”</font> he says, almost eager, hoping it’s one Pteron also knows but he thinks the older stallion probably does, and can build on where he begins. After all, there are few in Beqanna that don’t know about the Reckoning. <font color=#208ea9> “There is a price for greed,”</font> he begins, voice a little more sober now, the cadence of his speaking slower. He has listened to his mother tell him this story so many times and he mimics the way she tells it now. <font color=#208ea9> “Where we come from, the magic of our world is controlled by faeries. Tiny, beasty little things - some more than others.”</font> He has never met one of the faeries, but his father has and many others besides. He’s heard rumors of them, including the beautiful white and purple one with a mane and tail of wysteria who is not nearly so kind as her outside might make you think. Some of them are kinder than she and some are not.
<font color=#208ea9> “Once, they gave magic out freely. It flowed through the lands and into the most loyal residents of each to help them serve. Kings and Queens, Generals and Peacemakers were all granted powers from the lands they served, and the lands themselves had magical entities. Beautiful things, like waterfalls that healed and a pool that granted you a spirit animal; and wicked things, like ever burning trees that told the future for the price of blood. But the residents took advantage, fought wars for the sake of wars and threw magic around as if it did not come from somewhere, as if it were limitless.
It is not limitless.
Our home was being drained and the residents did not care. So the faeries took it all away. There was nothing left. The lands were gone and everyone awoke on a mountaintop, with their powers stripped, their homes destroyed, their crowns taken. Everyone started over. Slowly, new lands were returned to Beqanna, shaped and formed into new kingdoms without magic flowing freely through them. The residents were made to toil and work to regain their powers, to earn the right, to understand that there is a price for everything and that cost is high. To learn how to respect the land they called home.”</font>
Aedan falls silent, leaving room to Pteron to add his own spin on the story or a new story entirely if he prefers. When they are done, the Princess is as good as her word and sends them on their way through a cave, tucked into a cliff around the back of the castle. Aedan is glad he did not try to run, for it was unlikely he’d have ever found this exit on his own and instead, one of the heads of the Princess’s dragon probably would have eaten him.
They travel in silence, mostly. Aedan finds it hard to break the oppressive quiet of the dark tunnel that leads them down, down, down. Always down, he thinks. Maybe he was still inside the Sphinx, traveling ever closer to it’s stomach and he just didn’t know. Maybe soon he’d wake to his mother’s gentle nose telling him not to sleep the day away (how silly, to tell a boy of the night not to waste the day, but she does anyway).
Neither of those things happen though, and instead there is a light in the distance. It grows closer as they walk, and that same mix of fear and excitement sends shockwaves skittering through Aedan. The walls around him are clear, almost see through, and the farther they go, the more he is able to see until it is clear they are underwater.
<i>Underwater</i>.
His heart might stop for a minute. They are underwater, in a tunnel made of clear rock and he finds himself stopping to look out. The sight is unbelievable, the colors of the ocean as vivid as the jungle had been, but where the jungle was green the ocean was blue. So blue. Vast and wonderful, little fish darting around the walls and looking his way. When a much larger fish comes, it’s mouth full of rows of sharp teeth, Aedan finds his feet and begins walking again. In his hesitation to watch the fish, he has lost Pteron and is once again on his own. Foolish. But then again, maybe this magical place would not have let them stay together anyway.
Eventually the tunnel leads up, and he drags his exhausted legs wearily. Adrenaline keeps him going, but if he ever makes it home he really may sleep for days. He finally surfaces above the ocean, the light bright and blinding for a moment. When he can see again, his eyes settle on golden spires glimmering in the sunlight. A city spreads out before him, and his eyes go wide. Aedan is about to rush into the city, careless of the danger that probably waits for him, too excited to explore, when an army blocks his path forward.
Aedan comes skittering to a halt. He takes a few steps back, studying the strange creatures that surround him. Their heads are that of deer - a creature he sees plenty in Beqanna. Their hind feet are that of a birds, and their tails are long feathers that he cannot place but assume must belong to some bird that he simply hasn’t seen before.
And then it comes to him. He knows this story. It’s not one mother tells often, but she has told it. The city beneath the ocean, once guarded by creatures called Peryton. The city is not beneath the ocean, but perhaps he’s gone back in time or perhaps in this alternate universe he finds himself in the city never sunk. Regardless, it’s the only idea he has and so he has to go with it.
One of the peryton stands a little apart, looking uncomfortable. Aedan watches him closely for a moment, eyes drifting to the ground around it until he notices something off. The shadow of this peryton is human. The rest though, the rest have shadows of themselves. A boy made of the night knows that shadows show the truth. The human shadow is a traveler, far from home and lost, in need of a kill to be restored to favor. There is only one that needs to kill. The rest may want to stop him, but perhaps they don’t need to kill him.
Are they keeping him here to help their friend get his kill? Could their friend be persuaded to let him go?
He moves toward the creature slowly, inching his way as harmlessly as he can toward the one peryton, eyeing those antlers and knowing they are death if he makes the wrong move. <font color=#208ea9> “I know how you feel,”</font> he says softly, imploringly, toward the peryton. <font color=#208ea9> “I am far from home here, so I know what it’s like. I think maybe you are still you though, that to kill is to lose yourself entirely as they have.”</font> He gestures to the shadows of the others, all fully peryton. Perhaps they have been restored to favor, but they are no longer the humans they once were. <font color=#208ea9> “There is so much good you could still do, and in the end, you can find your kill somewhere along the lines as you save someone, or many someones. A worthy kill.”</font>
He pauses, hoping his plea doesn’t fall on deaf ears. <font color=#208ea9> “Please. I just want to go home.”</font> It is all he can offer, his truth, as the shadow of this peryton offers a truth to Aedan as well. He will give back what he has taken, and hope that such a price is enough.
</div><p class="aedan_boy_quote aedan_boy_quotebottom">to be fearful of the night</p><p class="aedan_boy_name">aedan</p></div></center>
Use of mild power playing is allowed; no injuries without permission