that which is dead may never die; any - Printable Version +- Beqanna (https://beqanna.com/forum) +-- Forum: Explore (https://beqanna.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?fid=1) +--- Forum: The Common Lands (https://beqanna.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?fid=72) +---- Forum: Meadow (https://beqanna.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?fid=3) +---- Thread: that which is dead may never die; any (/showthread.php?tid=2022) |
that which is dead may never die; any - Aletheia - 06-27-2015 what is dead may never die;
The first thing she feels is cold.
She's never been cold before. In fact, she's never really been anything before – at least, not uncomfortably so. She's simply been, existing in spite of all normal conventions, defying all expectations of what should be felt, what should be thought. But here, in this place, the cold soaks into her bones and she shivers. It is an unfamiliar reflex. Opening her eyes, she looks around. This place is both familiar and distant, like something she's seen in a dream, like a set viewed in a movie but never actually experienced. How had she come to be here? Where was her family? They were all she'd known – and she knows, somehow, that here in this place they are either missing or scattered. Even now, the memory of them is fading. As though it had all been a dream, the memories start to float away into the scattered, snowy, familiar-unfamiliar landscape. She grits her teeth. She remembers only two things with absolute certainty: the names of her mother and her father, and the land that both of them would call home, assuming either of them were alive in Beqanna. Carnage, she knows, is her father. Librette, she knows, is her mother. The Valley, she knows, is the place that they would both be found. And yet, somehow, she feels in her bones that neither of them are to be found there at all. She rises slowly, suddenly aware that she's been lying down. Snow falls from her, having obviously settled around her like a blanket while she had been...what? Asleep? Unconscious? Dreaming? The ground is cold beneath her, and everything nearby seems withered and grey. It matches her perfectly: she too is grey, although she is not withered. How old is she? She wonders idly, but has no good answer. She doesn't look old, but she is distrustful of her own appearance. She is distrustful of everything but those three facts: mother, father, home. Finally on her feet, she finds herself steadier than she'd hoped and expected. Where she had come from there hadn't been much in the way of walking. It had been a different world, an entirely different way of being. And thus far, she prefers that to this. Out there, it hadn't been cold. Not like this, anyway. But that is then, and this is here, now. And if she's here, she will continue to be here, at least until she is yanked away. And if she's going to be here, she's just going to have to get used to it. She grits her teeth, and gains a fourth certainty: her name. Aletheia. She is Aletheia, and always has been. And, perhaps, always will be. but rises again Aletheia harder and stronger RE: that which is dead may never die; any - Rhonan - 07-07-2015 He knows more of this world than she, though not by very much. Walking to him is normal, though he’s not all that good at it yet. His legs are too long, spindly and wobbly beneath him in the snow. There’s no snow in the Jungle to contend with, though he’s growing used to the underbrush. He is not used to the cold (it is always, always warm in the Jungle), but he doubts that his life will keep him in his warm home. He better get used to the cold at some point. rhonan. @[Evie] I don't even know what this is. Sorry, but not sorry, because I love your characters. RE: that which is dead may never die; any - Aletheia - 07-07-2015 what is dead may never die;
No one has taught the boy manners, but thankfully, no one has taught the girl manners either – or at least, not any kind of conventional manners. In some ways she's just as newborn as him; the world she has known is either fading, faded, or was simply a dream. She isn't sure which, but she isn't bothered by her uncertainty either.
She watches him approach, her icy eyes watching him with perfect neutrality. She is not interested, not curious, at least not in a normal equine capacity. To her, he is just another creature, just another thing that will wash over her like the tide, leaving her with inevitable shells, pockmarks and remnants of everything that is this new world of hers. The crunching of the snow beneath his hooves is impossibly loud to her ears. She can hear him in her bones, and she wonders if everything is this sharp, this raw here. She can only remember sounds that were muffled, noises muted against some kind of impossible vastness. She is not sure which she prefers. hi, and she tilts her head, regarding him with curiosity. He's so tiny, she thinks, but then realizes she has little concept of her own age. "Hi." she repeats, her voice a strange combination of lyrical and flat. She is like the voice that reads an audiobook, so perfectly bland and yet somehow enthralling. Her eyes flick over his small body, noting every detail: the way he holds himself as though almost shy, the way his bright colors distinguish him against the snow around, the way his legs and his head seem ever so slightly too large for his body. Gangly and ungainly, she decides. Had she ever been like that? Her face is smooth as she turns her head the other way and sighs. "Are you cold?" She could have asked a million things, and maybe she would have if she'd known about (or, for that matter, cared about) social graces. But she is either deliberately or accidentally ignorant, plunging forward by simply asking what's on her mind. As if to answer her own question, she shakes snow from her back with the graceful nonchalance of a bird shifting its feathers. but rises again Aletheia harder and stronger RE: that which is dead may never die; any - Rhonan - 07-08-2015 He would be surprised, if he could read minds (he cannot not, he is as normal as pretty pretty princesses come), to know she thought him shy. He wasn’t shy. At least, he didn’t think so. He had no qualms about walking around or up to strangers or anything such thing. He was simply awkward and uncertain of what he was actually supposed to do. His older sister seemed to always know just what to do, but she was busy running about trying to make herself a Queen. He couldn’t be bothered to follow her, because clearly, he was not going to be the Jungle Queen one day. rhonan. RE: that which is dead may never die; any - Aletheia - 07-12-2015 what is dead may never die;
They make quite a pair, the two of them. Clearly it takes someone with some schooling in social graces and etiquette to make a conversation really work. And equally clearly, they are both sorely lacking in that department. Perhaps it is the fault of their parents. It's hard to blame Aletheia's mother – Librette did not even know that the girl existed, had never known herself to be pregnant with her, and had certainly never seen her. And Carnage? Perhaps Aletheia had met him, but if she had, she didn't know it. But every second her memories fly further back into the past, fading into ever more dim shadows. So perhaps it is the fault of Aletheia's parents for being absent, for having her in the way they had her (which, really, means it's all Carnage's fault, as Librette had not a single ounce of input in the matter.) If she'd known that he had the advantage of at least one parent, where she had none, she wouldn't have cared. Already she is sure that her lack of parents is no disadvantage. They had created her (and yes, created is the apt term in her case), and that was enough. Standing there in the snow, she has her own kind of beauty, the kind of absent, waifish beauty that so many of the stick-thin models seem to carry. Her heritage is muddied with many breeds, but her graceful, elegant frame has survived all of that cross-breeding to leave her, well, her. She's also got the advantage of being more grown than he, which means more grown into the length of her legs and the proportions of her body. She is a pretty thing already, and once she is entirely finished growing, she'll be even more lovely. Perhaps one day she'll care, but today, she doesn't even know what lovely is. He confirms that it is cold here, and she ponders that for a moment. Had she ever felt cold before? What did it mean, really, to be cold? Was it dangerous? It certainly wasn't uncomfortable. In fact, what did it feel like to be not cold? She couldn't remember. There was simply nothingness, and then there was cold. He keeps speaking, and he talks of a home that he has, where there is warmth. She knows her home is in the Valley, although she does not know anything but the way to get there. She wonders, briefly, if the Valley is warm. She will find out, she suspects. She remembers, then, that he's spoken, and that it's usually polite to talk back when you're being talked to. And so, she fixes him with her stare of ice once more. "Why?" she skips right past (or knows nothing of) the more common, logical questions. She could've asked where that is. She could've asked how he'd come to be here, instead of there, wherever there is. But she doesn't. She asks such an oblique, open ended question that it could mean almost anything. Perhaps she's curious to see how he interprets it. Perhaps she thinks she's been perfectly clear. Perhaps she's getting used to this whole talking thing, and just isn't sure how to do it quite yet. "I don't know if it's warm where I live." she says, and it's difficult to tell whether she's talking to herself or talking to him. but rises again Aletheia harder and stronger Bahahahaha. RE: that which is dead may never die; any - Rhonan - 07-15-2015 He’s not even sure he can blame his parents either. Is it Covet’s fault for being dead? Honestly, would Covet have even cared that the boy was alive. The black stallion had a hoard of children running around. Rhonan was just another face in the crowd (even if his particular face was fucking gold). Is it even Myrina’s fault? He didn’t exactly hang around her much, and even if she yelled at him, he’d still wander off. It probably didn’t matter what his mother did. He’d still be Rhonan. He still wouldn’t care enough to understand the finer graces of this conversation thing. Why would anyone not say what came into his or her head? rhonan. |