Perhaps the awakening of the dead had mistaken her for such, while the silver mare had never really died; her bones rest in a pile beneath the thick forest but simply to rest. She had planned on reconstructing herself on her own timeline, when ready, but Beqanna had other plans and so it began; the levitation of bones, piecing together in a quick uniform fashion as ropes of muscle and connective ligaments formed easily to them. Her joints popped, the thin organs filling with blood, first the heart, traveling throughout the body to reach her brain and finally; a gasp of air. She was by definition alive but without a true purpose to be such...a curious mind like hers would soon find a reason. She shakes, dust rolling from her white pelt, fern leaves poking from beneath the dark mane into her amber eyes -- not much has changed, she was always unkept but in a way that seemed normal almost.
Prague had never been one to use her magic to find out things she could just as easily as a bystander and she thought, surely someone would know why or who opened the gates of hell (literally) -- she could feel those returning whom she knew were trouble, monsters even. She was no saint but she was no Carnage, she was just most of the time and only crazed when pushed to extreme limits to protect her sisterhood. Do they even exist anymore? she thinks and her kickstart heart has a palpitation. What would she do if they didn't? If the jungle had ceased to exist in the some decades she'd been gone. She looks about the forest and recognizes none, she feels a lump in her throat...this newly made body hasn't adjusted to feelings of anxiety, adrenaline, etc. Her mind is but some things are simply visceral in nature. "Are there any Amazonian's out here?" she says, feeling more elderly than anything - this could be an entire new world, she could be beyond expired in relevancy. She resorts to her magic, closing her honey eyes and her ears pinned back she silently requests those who would know her no matter who they were; enemy or friend. She needed to know the world she was living in now regardless of the risk that may await.
The magic that floods her veins now is too new – she can’t quite use it on purpose, she tries for a trickle and the river that flows out of her makes her nauseous and tired. But even when she isn’t trying, she’s simply more aware of what is going on; she can hear thoughts before she even knows someone is near, she can feel the power of Beqanna thrumming underneath her hooves, she thinks about wanting things and they simply come into being. A part of her hates it, despises the feeling of being out of control, even as the analytical warrior queen part thinks about how much easier her job would be (to protect her Kingdom) if she had always been this way.
She’s back in the Pampas, taking comfort from resting in her first home, when something brushes her mind. Or, rather, someone. Someone familiar – a voice she would know anywhere, even though she’s never heard it like this, silently in the back of her head. A friend, and heaven knows she hasn’t found any of those elsewhere in this spooky future yet. An unfamiliar hesitancy overwhelms her – Prague hadn’t ever come across to the land of death, and so they have no spoken in a very very long time. What if her once-friend was not pleased, with the one thing Nikkai had undertaken after she had left them? The warrior-mare has no disillusions that she would have won any awards for world’s best foster mother, though she loved Prague’s daughters as well as her own sons and had done her honest best to be whatever they needed. Certainly her efforts had been more appreciated by Piety than by Vain.
A deep, deep swell of longing and affection overpowers her uncertainty, and before she can even consider controlling herself (and maybe walking, damn it) Nikkai finds herself standing in the gloom of the winter Forest instead of her Brilliant Pampas home. She stumbles, the headache and the urge to kick her own stomach out momentarily blinding before they settle back into the now-familiar uncomfortable ache and she rights herself, casting around with dark eyes until they lock into a familiar form, and she moves that direction and desperately hopes for a friendly reception. “Hello,” she offers the single word in a voice that (to what will probably be her never-ending shame) shakes slightly. She wants to say something pithy, even goes as far as to think ‘Long time, no see’ quite loudly, but she can’t make her mouth form the words or emotions that her eyes and her heart are broadcasting like a five-alarm fire.
Nikkai
@[prague] hi this is the fastest I've written in forever
Although it is not who is approaching her, no she can feel that it is a woman (naturally) that enters without fear. This woman though picks the scab sealing the crevice in her brain that is reminded of the bay stallion and all the fun...and other times they had. Truth be told, the old man was probably the only one stubborn enough to withstand the lioness for any length of time. She feels water rush through her, the Falls. What a tumultuous time that had been in her life, living and helping in a kingdom where she didn't feel thoroughly vested but she tried, she tried so hard to placate Texas and stay by his side -- for the sake of love or something that seemed like it. As a young mare, the pursuit of being wanted was important but it never came, always too dedicated to her crown or used as a pawn to further a bloodline. The saddest part of her life, the better part of two hundred years, was that she didn't know how love felt or to love others. The closest she ever got was Berlin but finding out that he was in fact her half-sibling stunted that. She's fucked up but not quite that much. Still, even now she thinks fondly of her time in the Falls though she knows several of its true blue residents don't return the sentiment.
Before the mare arrives a quick flash of her face comes to pass the old mares mind, grulla, bigger stature like herself. what is her name, what is her name she thinks to herself, ahh Nikkai. Do we like Nikkai? Does Nikkai like us, a better question. The first few days are always such a blur, a late night drinking after years of sobriety, an amnesia of sorts. She doesn't feel a distaste in her mouth, so her hello was welcomed - for now, "How has life...or death, treated you, Nikkai?" a wry grin creeps and dissipates quickly from the mares mouth. "And I suppose you're right, it has been awhile since we talked, any idea why the universe rushed me from my physical-realm vacation?" Her guard was high, even suspicious of those who seemed genuine and trustworthy. Times were different now, the magician could feel it and she wasn't sure she liked it.
It was not her favorite time of year, she thinks to herself as an icy wind whips through the bare treetops. There was nothing that could replace her beloved Jungle. If anything, she felt like she was the only one left that still care, that still felt loyal. Despite losing her mark of the Jungle, she still felt it beating in her heart. It is what keeps her together, and the panther woman knows it would never leave her.
Naga was very much alive, and continued to be since her birth. She admits to having a few close calls, though she never met her demise. Over the years she has found herself a recluse once again. Choosing to stick within the treetops of the forest. So far it was the only place she dared venture, for she knew if she were to go back to Nerine now - no one would remember who she was. She hissed aloud at the thought. If not for her, the sisterhood would have been lost with the fall of the world, they would have never been found, and she would have never lead them up the mountain to seek forgiveness. If not for that, Nerine would have never existed. She tried to keep them together, she tried to keep the sisterhood alive, but it all fell apart.
She never thought she would hear those words again...but alas, from her perch atop a tall pine, she hears a voice. Amazonians....the grey woman below speaks. Naga's green eyes widen and seem to glimmer at the sound of the word. She was about to descend from the trees, but another joins the dappled woman. A grulla mare, she says only a hello, but the grey knows her. Her words confuse the cat. Death? They couldn't have been dead....and returned? It is now the panther slinks from the trees, landing with a soft thud in the snow beneath. She pads forward, her sultry voice sends steam tendrils into the cool winter air.
"I am still here."
She shifts before them, shaking herself of her panther form into that of a compact black mare with sun faded locks. Her green eyes flash to both women, a smile tugs at the corners of her mouth. It's been so long, though she swears she had seen the grey mare before. Possibly after the jungle had been burned, but she was not too sure.
"I may not have the answers you seek about resurrection, but I can tell you what has become of Beqanna. For I was there when the Jungle was ripped out of the world - along with the other kingdoms. The name is Naga. Pleasure to meet both of you."
Her voice is formal and steady, she still prides herself on being one of the Amazon's best diplomats. If only when she had finally earned her crown, it had been the Jungle instead. But, she had to admit, it took guts to take charge of the situation the way she did - those damned bickering women, so self absorbed in their own dramas that they could not see the bigger problem. She stepped forward when no one else did. She had been fit to lead. What a great Amazonian queen she could have been. But that was all in the past, and she had to let it go. She needed to finally wake up, and live in the now.
Nikkai was a Falls creature to the bone, and Prague had been an Amazon, transplanted however temporarily into the Falls. It had been a rocky start, because the reason for her transplant had stolen Nikkai’s throne, and the warrior-queen had no love for Texas, her conqueror, and she had wanted to dislike his gray consort just as much. For all of her good traits, she is (was?) a creature prone to a less-than-sunny disposition, and she absolutely holds a grudge; but somehow time had mellowed her to the other mare and then it had turned into a friendship that she valued quite highly.
At least, she has often thought in the many years since, Texas hadn’t pushed her off a cliff. She still maintains that he is a coward, and a general asshole, but he wasn’t a murderer harbored in their midst by someone Nikkai had warned again and again, like the other asshole who had pushed her off her beloved waterfall.
“Death,” she confirms when she’s caught her breath again, emotions ebbing to leave her room to breathe and form coherent thoughts again. “Was not an experience I was exactly in a rush to have,” she forms the sentence slowly, the words falling off of her tongue in a dry sort of way that just screams ‘Is anyone?’, “But after like, the initial dying bit it was fine I guess.” What else to say? ‘I spent decades doing fucking nothing useful stuck over there and wanted to kill myself again to get away from it until it became the new normal and just as I accepted it, here I am’ seems a little dark for the reunion conversation.
The knowledge Prague seeks is the puzzle Nikkai has been trying to solve as well. She’s trying to decide how to even explain what she does know, but the sound of something dropping from a nearby tree makes her pivot, reacting to the threat physically by preparing to flee – or more likely in her case, to fight – the good old non-magic old fashioned way that had always been in her skill set. Her muscles nearly quiver with tension as the black cat creeps close, and becomes a horse in one smooth motion. The cat-mare speaks of the things that had happened here, things Nikkai had watched from afar as she kept track of her family. She remembers the event Naga speaks of – it had been the beginning, of the grulla’s acceptance of death. When there was no more Waterfall, there was no more need to return to it.
Still uncertain of the stranger, Nikkai blows out a jittery breath and sidles slightly closer to Prague, a more-than-casually-wary eye on the black mare. “Someone was messing with things they shouldn’t have been,” She says, lashing her dark tail back and forth across her own hocks and haunches. “They weakened the veil between life and death by going back and forth too many times, and then someone on the dead size tore a huge hole in what was left. Anyone can come out of death now.” She can feel it, the torn-to-shreds veil. It pulses alongside the magic she doesn’t know how to use. It makes her itchy, and she shakes her head and adds darkly, “Some of those who have crossed back over probably should have stayed dead.”
Nikkai
@[prague] @[Naga]
RE: a touch of wicked | any - Celeana - 11-08-2019
She has watched idly by as the world changed, lands rising up from the ashes while others fell into the inky depths of the sea. They all had lost something at some point but it had begun to become almost a fact of life here in Beqanna. Queens and kings cycled around the helms of kingdoms, disease sprawled throughout the lands, but through it all they survived.
She survived.
Like all the residents of beqanna Celeana was not a victim of the land but a survivor. Her heart and mind had hardened by the cruel whims of the land but she will never forget who she was, she was an amazonian. She longed for the jungle, for the sweet warm embrace of her homeland gracing her lungs with the sweet musk of earth and fauna nothing had ever been sweeter in life. That is until she had met her first love, a gorgeous inky Nerinian Queen who absorbed every ounce of Celeana's adoring affection. Their love was sweet, and long but was soon washed away by the treacherous tides of Nerine. Now faded and lost.
She had left Nerine for what seems like eons ago, the world has changed since then and the speckled maiden has allowed herself to adapt. Shed has lived absently within the dank depths of the forest for a while now, lurking within the shadows waiting to be called, to have a calling that she could fight for. It has been a long wait, and her mind has grown feral immersed in her more beastly nature. She has become more feline than horse as of late, the forests harsh winter has not treated her well this year.
The porcelain lioness slinks through the frosted undergrowth, ice crunching beneath webbed paws, the wind whisking through her snow riddled pelt when her pink nares catch a familiar scent. Could it be? Naga?....Naga?! Her heart begins to race thundering in her ears, it had been so long since she had seen her lover, her mate. Her verdant gaze flickers as her senses guide her forwards, her pace rising faster and faster, kicking up snow in her wake.
Finally she slows her step, when she spots a trio of equine, her body shifts it feels strange and odd it had been so long since she had shifted into her appaloosa form. "Naga" She expels, bright viridian eyes running along every inch of the small statured temptress. As she tucks herself beside Naga, brushing her muzzle gently against her shoulder in a gentle affection. Her mind racing with so many questions, did she still love her? Where had she been all these years? How has she been?
There was so much needed to be caught up on, so much that Celeana felt like she had missed. But her attention wavers to the two mares before her, they both seem familiar with each other, perhaps old friends? She assumes, she a waits a moment or two before realizing it was rude for her to simply barge in without any introduction , with honey sweet vocals she emits, "Hello I'm Celeana. It's nice to meet both of you." A friendly smile forms upon her pale lips.
She tries to follow the conversation, she hadn't know the dead were miraculously coming back to life. Perhaps she had been alone to long in the forest to follow up with current happening of Beqanna. "The dead coming back to life... well that's something." She adds. Celeana knows little, and is usually not one for words she had always been more brawn than brains.
Where the Wild Things Are
Don't mind if I jump in! lol
@[Naga] @[Nikkai] @[prague]
The silver lioness mulls the memories around, or tries to of what all had happened in the realm of the Falls during Nikkai's time. Ahh, yes. Core, we remember him, the mind says to her and while she knows just exactly how unearthing it was she must admit at some point, she was drawn to him. A moth to a flame if you will - some sinister creatures bring out the sinister in oneself. At least those who are easily swayed. Prague had always ruled with an iron fist, a sense of moral and aimed to seek out truth. Away from the throne, she was tempid at best - she could turn cold very quickly and proverbially (or I guess literally) boil over with scalding heat the next. Luckily for Beqanna, there was nothing she was attached to, nothing she loved, nothing she had a reason to fight for.
Yet.
Suddenly she is shook from her daze while thinking of the past in the grulla's presence, she feels another feline shifter approaching that seems somewhat familiar. Come on, old bat you better get quicker at recall. they hiss at her, her ears pinning back with frustration. Getting older has made these frequent transitions harder, longer to recover from. Luckily, the green eyed mare approaches and Prague begins to feel something along her chest ignite, a white hot burn -- her tattoo, while it remained mostly invisible to the untrained eye the lion claw marks steam beneath the hair, the smell of the alabaster hair singed and the small cloud of smoke circulating the already thick winter air. "I remember, Naga, it is good to see you. I did my best to save the jungle but I was but one person -- I went to the Chamber and fought with the dragons and demons. I remember the burning of my world and the physical epitaph of my life. Has it gotten better or worse? Tell me all," she says in a distant way, if it was possible for the mare to cry a small tear would have shed but there was no time for that. The past, what was - she was no longer a Queen, an Alliance contender, a nobody really and she had accepted that. Before she can ask of new happenings in this world, Nikkai talks about the awakening of the dead. Immediately she thinks of Carnage and Covet, oh how she loathed them both and those that set the Jungle on fire. Perhaps she'd meet them again, perhaps she would even the score. She takes it all in, the weight of just how terrible this could be (but good, too!) and her forelegs shake, quiver with excitement. The first adrenaline rush to pass through her body in years but it is quickly halted when a third party arrives - someone she does not know, a young spotted mare that can shift as well. She doesn't sense any reason to be on guard but as one of the first feline shifters, she feels it's appropriate.
From a thick neck and robust hip stature she shifts in an instant to a large (twice the normal size, really) silver lioness who lowers her front shoulders, stretching out her razor sharp claws and even sharper teeth as her mouth gapes, hyperextending through a yawn. She swipes ice up from the ground swiftly, a scant amount lodging itself in the smokey black surrounding her ears and snout. A haughty growl letting out, "Nice to meet you, I figured I'd join the party," she says, brushing up against Nikkai and Naga with a welcome, her tail flipping casually as she herself scales the nearest tree. Her paw hangs down, neck extended on the branch. "You know this means trouble, Nikkai, the souls who passed peacefully don't want to return to this world. Only the ones of evil intent or who had malicious intents behind their murders; like yours," she says matter-of-factly, licking the ice from her paw now. "After all, it stirred me from a long slumber."
There is a wide chasm of history between when she last walked the land of the living, and now. Some of the gaps are easy to fill – sometimes she was aware of life, if lacking the ability to affect it. Other gaps are a mystery. Nikkai was not there when Prague went to fight dragons. Her descendants had been, but Nikkai had been dead. Still, it had been one of those things she ‘tuned in’ to from afar – the danger to the Falls had been quite strong; one of her great-great grandchildren had died protecting another. When Nikkai had lost the Falls, even from death, Prague had lost her Jungle. She can feel the surge of feelings from Prague at the thought of some of whom might rise from the dead and she shares it, or at least some of it. More of the dread than any sense of enthusiasm.
Another stranger emerges from the dark trees, rushing forward to greet the black mare with obvious relief. She introduces herself, after a moment, and it occurs to Nikkai that she hadn’t responded to Naga’s introduction a few moments ago, either. Brown eyes flicker briefly to Prague, but her friend seems unconcerned by the black mare she knows or the paler one who comes to join them. Perhaps others would take longer to ascertain if decades and death apart have changed a person, but Nikkai was never one for head over heart, and her loyalty is unwavering. Relaxing slightly back into a more casual stance, she looks at the duo standing close. “Nikkai,” she murmurs it like an offering, even as the mare beside her becomes something else entirely.
She can’t help but smile a little as Prague-the-lioness brushes against her, and proceeds to climb up to a branch overhead. It would be easy to feel left out, in this gathering of mares who all have a predatory second form, but the grulla mare accepts it now philosophically as the cost of hanging out with Jungle women, even displaced ones. “I definitely know this means trouble,” she agrees dryly, “I wasn’t exactly clamoring to get back here either,” she pauses to add honestly, “At least not anymore. But since we’re here, I guess we can’t ignore it. I guess I’d rather be here to fight potential evils, than there to watch them happen.” She lifts her face upwards to the lioness in the tree; “Though I suppose we need more information.”
