"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
05-13-2018, 09:47 PM (This post was last modified: 05-13-2018, 09:47 PM by Hestoni.)
NIGHT WILL FALL AND DROWN THE SUN
WHEN A GOOD MAN GOES TO WAR
He’s stayed back from her, since her arrival, despite the heavy longing in his heart. While Scorch provides the “real-world” parenting (training their children, providing them with both wit and knowledge), he is the heart of their family. He is the shoulder they come to cry on, the face they cherish to see, the laugh they adore to hear. He is their foundation upon which they anchor their love in and build upon.
And his daughters… His aching, old heart cherishes them so deeply it brings tears to his eyes just thinking of them. Perhaps he is a biased man, leaning toward the adoration of his daughters, but he’s earned the right to do so. The gray around his nose and lips, the slight limp of his right hip, the wisdom in his brown eyes — they all speak of the lengths he has gone through and the stories he holds within his memories.
But, regardless of age or wisdom or tenderness of the heart, he’s forced himself to retreat from Vi’s presence as she is reacquainted with both her mother and Beqanna itself. Their children come and go like eternally-looping prodigal sons and daughters, singing harmonies of return and disappearance. It weighs heavily on his heart, but he treasures the fact that he can now embrace them when they do return home, rather than watch from behind Scorch’s eyes and above in the Afterlife.
The ache in his heart finally becomes unbearable. He spots his daughter from a distance, watching as she made her way slowly (carefully) through Nerine’s landscape. With a heavy sigh, the large chestnut moves to catch up with her at an easy trot, his feathered hooves thumping gently against the ground to announce his arrival. When he speaks, his voice is low and rumbling — like the beginnings of a volcano’s eruption or the growl of a distant thunderstorm — but tender and warm.
“My dear Vi… It’s me, your dad, Hestoni.” Scorch had told him about her minor amnesia (whether it had faded or lingered he isn’t sure) and so he waits, holding his breath in the depths of his large chest, for her response.
Hestoni
@[Vi] and/or @[Andromeda] / I hope this is okay! I was going to reply to your open post but Nilla beat me to it... I wanted to get something up between the two of them because Toni misses his family )):
The quiet of the wintery afternoon washed over Vi as she clumsily waded through the prickly seagrass. Milk stained eyes searched the path before her helplessly as she tried to make sense of the shadows that made up the remainder of her vision. As the ground beneath her shifted downward she stumbled slightly before catching herself, the lump in her throat thickening only momentarily before she pressed onward. Her dark ears chased the melodic songs of seabirds as they dove and spiraled above. Finding comfort in the soft thumping of their wings against the air, Vi attempted to forget the heaviness of her heart.
Her memory had slowly begun to return. Simple things like, the names of her parents and their faces had arrived to her almost immediately – giving her hope and a reason to remain. Visions of her childhood swarmed almost every waking moment and she clung to them with the hope that she could soon provide her mother with the answers she so desperately sought. Understandably, her disappearance had pained both of her parents though, before the world went dark, she’d believed them to be dead. Their revival was just as much of a shock to her as she imagined her return was for them. Though questions pressed on her from every angle, she forced them out of consideration. Choosing, instead, to focus on her gratitude for being reunited with them.
Around her unfamiliar voices and scents tormented her constantly. It was enough to send her retreating back to her comfortable corner secluded from the main population. Despite her greatest efforts she was finding it difficult to embrace the new land that Scorch seemed to loyal too. The mare even dared to refer to the queen, Hestia, as the new Khaleesi.
But it was not home.
The jungle was gone. Vi understood that, but the reality stung nonetheless. The memories she held having grown up among the towering tropical trees and the suffocating humidity made the barren land of Nerine more difficult to accept. The only comfort within it’s borders was her family’s residency there.
The gentle thudding of hooves against hard packed earth drew Vi’s pace to a halt. Turning the point of her ears towards the sound she froze in anticipation as the clump of shadows drew closer. The deep, thunderous voice that greeting her eardrums set her insides trembling.
“Father…” she echoed, her voice barely rising above a whisper. His had been the voice she’d longed to hear since Scorch had brought her to Nerine. His was the comfort that she desperately needed. Feeling his warmth beside her she leaned close, resting her weight against him as a sob shook her body. “I – I’m so sorry!”
She wasn’t sure why, but the sudden need for her to apologize rose up from the depths of her and the words spilled from the velvet of her lips hardly without them meaning to. As the apology drifted between them a sudden weight felt lifted off her shoulders and she buried her face deeper into the soft of his neck.
NIGHT WILL FALL AND DROWN THE SUN
WHEN A GOOD MAN GOES TO WAR
He, too, misses the familiarity of the Jungle. When Beqanna tore its foundations apart to rebuild a new landscape, it had taken with it the birthing-thicket of ten of his children, the rivers he and Scorch would tousle in, and thousands of other memories winding between the thick foliage of their home. Nerine is oddly quiet compared to the wilderness of the Jungle (while there’s the rush of the wind and waves with the screeching of seagulls in Nerine, the Jungle provided jaguar-cries and bird-twitters and urgent waterfalls to fill the silence).
Her voice pierces through the cry of the gull pinwheeling above them, warming his heart. Her touch soothes his weary soul even further, providing a comfort to his heart that he had nearly forgotten. The love of his family had been his only peace during his time in the Afterlife (when the world was gray and hazy and unforgiving, the memories and reminders of his children and grandchildren and even great-grandchildren brought color to his days) and to finally kiss their heads in person brings him joy.
She nestles into him as gently as a kitten to a warm sun-spot. He sighs quietly, turning his face to kiss just behind her ear. “My sweet Vi,” he hums. One of his greatest sorrows in life is being unable to witness his blue-roaned daughter grow into the beautiful woman she is today. He’s fully prepared to walk with her through her life now, if she wants him there. The russet stallion craves to be an anchor for them to secure themselves upon, a lighthouse to guide them, a rock to build upon, a pillow to rest upon.
“There is no need to apologize, but I am grateful for it.” He touches another tender kiss to her face, this time against the smooth plane of her cheek. “I’m sorry for not being there for you, as you grew up.”
Bathed in his scent she is transported back in time. A filly once more she finds herself lost in the embrace of her birth home. The jungle around them hums with life, vibrant and green and humid. The air is thick with moisture, heavy in her lungs with every breath. Choking back sobs she finds the memory upon his skin as well.
Although a grown mare she feels but a small child as she leans upon the steady shoulder of her beloved father. The pain of their shared memories weighs upon them both in the heat of their reunion. It was odd to her. Before the world went dark both of her parents had surrendered to deaths untimely call. She had been utterly alone. Her siblings had spread out throughout Beqanna, some disappearing similarly to her. Everything she had known had seamlessly slipped through the cracks of reality.
But here, in this new version of her world, things were whole once more. Both her parents were alive, and the scent of her siblings was carried upon the breeze. She was no longer alone.
Hestoni’s apology is quick to fall and it reaches her ears unexpectedly. She pulled away from him, wishing so desperately that her eyes would grant her but a moment to look upon him one last time. Memories were deceitful and now, more than ever, she wanted the truth.
“Things were different back then,” she admitted with a heavy heart. With a sad smile her milky eyes found the spot where she assumed his would be. “But it would seem you and I have been granted another chance. The past is in the past and I think it is past time that I leave it behind.”
As her words faded from the soft of her lips a twinge of something deep stirred. The more her strength had returned to her the more she had come to recognize the fluttering kicks of another life inside of her. Fearful, though the realization had been, she knew that she could not avoid the truth much longer. She could not hide from the future.
“Father,” she begins tentatively. “I think I am pregnant.”
VI
lights will guide you home
@[Hestoni] We can leave this here if you want or we can continue. Either is fine with me.
