i am the mace, the map, the fall and the high

He makes no attempt at secrecy as he delves into the extensive network of caves threading through Nerine’s cliff faces. There is a dark and foreboding thrill curling through the entire place, though he’s not quite sure if it is the echo of another or his own reckless heart. Either way, it draws him onward, the thrill causing his heart to bound as the rush of blood sounds in his ears.

It is the glow that catches his eye first.

Leilan had mentioned others lingering here, content to keep to themselves. Only a small part of Reave had come here because of that knowledge. The large part bursting in his chest was the long-held need for excitement. The burning desire to explore - to find that which he hadn’t known before, to feel the adrenaline of something new and possibly dangerous.

But that glow is not the same danger of the tides rising and trapping him inside. No, it is something else entirely. And, reckless youth that he is, he follows it.

With the harpy eagle still on the cliffs (the bird had refused to enter the cave), Reave has no eyes ahead of him to spoil the secrets. Instead he had only his own enhanced vision, glowing cat-like in the darkness. But as he nears, the ’Hello?’ echoing from the cave wall startles him. Moments later, a deep curiosity begins to bloom.

It seems he had found one of the elusive others that lived here. At the sound of the second hello, Reave clips around the last corner - rife with rising stalagmites and falling stalactites - that separates them.

“Hello.” His own greeting, accompanied by the dripping of water and scuff of his own footsteps, is far more bold and certain than he truly is. “Admiring the caves before the tide comes in too I take it?”

reave

i am the mace, the map, the fall and the high

If ever Reave were innocent, it had shattered the day of his birth when his mother breathed her last. At the tender age of only a few minutes old, he had known himself a murderer. Of course, the naivete of youth had lingered longer, but even that had faded far more swiftly than it should. When one sees the world as Reave does, innocence and naivety are a pipe dream of those who haven’t quite lost theirs yet.

But Reave is curious. It lies like a savage hunger in his breast, always craving more. And as the blue and red stranger rounds the corner, Reave recognizes a kindred soul. It is not a single thing he could point to, nor something easy to define. But it dances in the recklessness surrounding him, curls in the darkness of a yearning he recognizes.

The sharp blue of his eyes remain inexorably fixed on the other stallion as he closes the distance. He is so close that Reave can clearly see the defined edges of his youthful features, shadows shifting in the slow movement of the creature circling him. The sharp angles of erupting bone cast oddly against his own red and white skin, creating a strange and ominous illusion between them.

An omen not improved by the way a slow grin begins to curve across Reave’s features in response to the other’s words.

“Not physically,” Reave replies, his own head tilting to match the intriguing stranger. Perhaps he had not physically stayed to watch the waters rise (he unfortunately did not have the same surety he would survive the swelling waters), but he had seen. He hadn’t been able to help himself - not when the sea is so full of eyes. So he smiles a knowing smile, eyes alight with curious anticipation. “Have you?”

reave