The Cure - Round 1

[Beqanna Fairy]

The plagued had weakened the faeries, drained them until they were raw and barely hanging on. Though they kept answering the calls of the residents of Beqanna, it became almost impossible to do so. They divided, leaving some to deal with the everyday and the rest to keep fighting, to keep pouring magic into a land that swarmed with darkness. For once though, the residents of Beqanna came to their rescue, not the other way around. They had fought and toiled and traveled and managed to collect the seemingly useless objects that were needed for the cure. The lands of Beqanna have power though, and the things collected are more magical than some might realize. That power was no longer accessible to the horses that called this place home, but the faeries still felt it, could still channel it. After all, what were the fae but Beqanna incarnate?

The items collected lay scattered at the bottom of the mountain, waiting. Icicles, pebbles, wildflowers and seashells; all magically preserved as needed; all so very innocuous. The residents of Beqanna had all done so much already, but they weren’t finished. Not quite. Not yet. The peak of the mountain was where the true power of Beqanna was centered. The faeries, too busy keeping the plague at bay as best they can, no longer have the strength to finish the ritual for themselves. None of them appear, but they call to those that had helped so far, bringing them to the last task. Exactly what each horse hears, they do not know, except that the plea in their call is all too real. One last thing to finish, and Beqanna would be safe again. Without this, though, there would be no stopping the darkness. There would be no saving Beqanna.

Their task is clear enough, given to them in words or pictures or simply feelings by the faeries. Collect the items, climb the mountain. It sounds so simple, but it won’t be. A heavy fog rolls in, clinging low to the mountain. Though it’s unlike any normal fog, and it becomes obvious after a moment that the fog is not a fog at all, but the plague made real. The clouds of it are dark and heavy, and there will be no escaping it to complete this task. The heart of Beqanna is under attack, the place where magic is heaviest capable of the most damage.

There’s more too, some deep undercurrent of fear running up the mountain. The faeries have long since lost the fight here. The plagued victims linger on the mountain, corpses still clinging to some false vestige of life. Shadows come alive, writhing with decay and agony. The already treacherous climb up the mountain made harder still by the very thing they sought to destroy.

Would they take up the mantle and finish what they began? Or would they let Beqanna die beneath their feet? Because the plague was growing, spreading, and clearly becoming so much more.

***
Rules
- This quest is for players who participated in all 4 of the other plague quests.
- If you participated in all 4 quests but cannot enter this quest, no worries. You will still get a prize.
- This is a writing quest with no eliminations. Everyone must complete all 3 rounds in order to be eligible for the larger prizes at the end. If you don’t finish the quest, see above for people who simply can’t enter.
- Your character can maintain their traits for this quest.
- Your post should detail how you are summoned for this quest and your trip up the mountain. You will get the plague during this trip, and should play out the symptoms. You should also encounter at least one “monster” (zombie horses, scary dark things, be creative but it should make sense with the theme of plague). You end your post when you get to the top of the mountain. You can magically carry the items (meaning you don’t need to stuff them in your mouth somehow, they can just come along with you).
- Entries are due by Wednesday, April 10th at 12 noon EST. While there is no word limit, please remember more is not always better.

@Sid @Toli @SamShine @laura  @insane @phaetra @jenger @[Vanilla Custard]

[litotes]

litotes

The luck of the draw comes to him in waves.

In the beginning, it is gentle, like the wash of a calm sea upon its familiar shore. Litotes’ eyes flutter, then finally open, a sleepy glaze filtering his vision. He swallows while blinking away the exhaustion, the grass beneath his tucked legs shifting beneath his sluggish movements. The sound of his smacking lips is what eventually awakes him: a pop, pop, pop too loud for sleepy ears.

Before his now clear eyes is a thin line of smoke. The legs beneath the cremello are unsteady in their sudden rush to arise, forcing a two-step stumble into the almost viscous gray mist. Lie rears back with an upset nicker. The smell that invades his nostrils is revolting, dragging long-repressed memories of his parents burning flesh to the forefront his mind. Panic begins to set in, just before the initial rush of the fairies’ call floods his mind.

Though not entirely relaxed, the chilling sensation that passes over his spine begins to calm him. Litotes cocks his head and swivels his ears around, glimmering topaz eyes drifting to see where the saturated smoke ends. He finds that the gray does not end; in fact, it appears as if a path is being formed. Just as he realizes this, the chills he felt before return in an even stronger wave, this one accompanied by an ominous and indistinct whispering. Spit builds in the back of Lie’s mouth for the smell is growing stronger, more disgusting. He senses that it will only become more invasive if he does not heed its command.

The dew of the night squelches beneath his hooves as he takes his first hesitant steps forward. Wind blows back and forth across the rocky hills, and yet the gently swaying mist never wavers. Litotes gulps as he follows, yet another fairy wave chilling his spine. This one numbs his mind and speeds his pace, beckons him to come closer - step into the mist . . . he thinks . . . I’ll just . . . drink . . . it in . . .

All goes quiet.
All goes dark.

The Mountain is before Litotes when he comes to. There is a soreness in his legs that indicates he overexerted himself, but whatever magic came over his mind will not allow him to remember. Slowly, he shakes the confusion from his mind and brings his eyes upward to study his surroundings. The fog that surrounds him seems to suction in just as he notices its thick absoluteness. Out of the white come the resources proven to be invaluable to Beqanna: icicles, pebbles, flowers, and seashells. They spread apart and form a circle around the cremello, then suddenly fall diagonally into the shape of a neat “2” upon his back.

Shale crumbles just ahead: murk clearing to reveal the glimmer of a clean ivory rabbit. The unsettling red of its eyes instill the same distinct call of the mist, though this time there is no blackness to overtake his mind. With a small attempt to glance at the items that rest supernaturally still upon his hide, Litotes steps forward. The rabbit mirrors him: one hop forward, and so on, the two pacing through the thin path the mist allows.

Suddenly, the shimmery creature stops dead still, then bursts into a flurry of terrified chittering. Litotes cries, “No, no, no, no, no -” All the pain and fear of the creature sending dagger after jagged dagger into his chest. From the blinding gloom leaps a pale lion, somehow furious and morose all at once. It looks familiar . . . like a reflection . . . and the stallion’s creeping suspicion is confirmed when it smiles a hollow mimicry of Lie’s disenchanted grin.

“You’re out of time, Litotes.”

The guttural growl sounds exactly like the stallion, except it is garbled as if spoken underwater. Blood begins to trickle from both of the white lion’s nostrils, just as the exact lines of blood begin to trail the same path down Lie’s. The rabbit’s crying continues as the symptoms of the plague worsen; yet the frightened creature sits quiveringly still, as if rooted to the earth by the statuesque stances of the reflections facing off.

Against his will, Litotes shifts into his lion form. A roar of rage screams with all the might of his lungs, a rebuttal to the extreme creak and pain of bones that do not want to change. The opposing lion changes also - changes into an exact replica of the cremello’s natural form. Fury icy like the searing winds of the Arctic cuts across his chest.

What mockery is this?

With no warning at all, the equine begins to choke on cough after cough. Litotes’ throat follows suit, and he thinks he may die here. He staggers forward a single step in his struggle to gasp, and so does the cremello opposite. A breathy squeak catches his ear, and through his heaves he sees the semi-crushed body of the white rabbit beneath the other’s hoof: bones protruding from tears in its skin like some sick puzzle desperate to be put back together. Bile builds in the back of his throat.

Something is very wrong.

When the lion finally catches his breathe and looks forward, the stallion is rushing him with a sickly grin plastered across his face. Too late, Litotes launches into a pounce, all desperate claws and confused canines. The equine that mimics his appearance so well is already rearing back, front legs flying with so much unearthly force that two kicks to the ribs send the lion’s pounce several feet backwards. He lands spine-first into a boulder he did not know was there.

There is no sound when the other appears above Litotes’ bleeding skull. It simply is, unchanged grin and hollow eyes begging the lion to fall into a similar madness. It leans into his ear and whispers, “You have to kill me.” The shifter looks up at his replica with pained eyes, but stays silent. It places the pressure of a single hoof upon his throat in response. “You have to kill me,” it repeats, this time stronger and flatter - empty.

Suddenly, the equine backs away and screams, “Kill me! Kill me! Now!” It rages until Litotes lurches upward, crimson blood dripping from a long gash beside his right eye. The silence that follows his rise is overwhelming, quickly followed by the startling arrival of a crow landing with a shuffle upon the replica’s back.

The foreboding that the avian brings forces the lion to stagger forward. A tear drips from his eye as he barely manages a leap into the equines throat, predator canines tearing at a jugular that it should be protecting. All the while, the crow watches with abyss-black eyes, seemingly seething over the blood as it spills and spills.

Finally, the reflection collapses with a gurgle and the crow cries angrily into the sky. The bird flies further up the Mountain, disappearing into the fog. Litotes follows with a sickly limp, refusing to look back at the mess. He cries silently as he reaches the top of the summit, too frightened of what the fog and magic mean to stop the tears as they come. He belly crawls across the top plateau’s grass, the items on his back now spinning in a circle just above his head.

i don't want your pity, i just want somebody near me
guess i'm a coward, i just want to feel all right

[Kagerus]

Kagerus

{ and in my dreams I've kissed your lips a thousand times }

It's dark, where we are. Time passes us by with no indication of direction or speed, a simultaneously dash and stand still. Despite the depth of the blackness within which my wife and I are encased, thoughts billow through our minds every now and again, though they do not form as they usually would within the dreamscape. One lifeform in particular plagues us, the sleepers: that of a small buckskin filly, adorned with blueness and felinity; her aura wavers the thickness of our dream, perhaps when she comes close to where she has hidden us with her illusionism, or perhaps for no reason at all other than that we the sleepers miss our daughter.

Warlight always had her brothers to take care of her. Oriash has no one.

In the midst of the darkness, a soft light pervades. Initially I believe it to be another interruption from the outside as I force time to mend the wounds wrought on Solace's womb. My physical form twitches next to my wife's, a weak attempt at shaking off that which begs wakefulness of me; when the light fades back into nothingness, I settle. The unknowable passage of time will sweep me away again soon.

Kagerus.

My whole body jolts, a bright light inserting itself painfulling into my dreamscape now; desperately I swathe Solace in what folds of dark remain, stumbling like a newborn to hooves that I have not used nor thought of in what feels like time immemorial. Breathless, the nutmeg of my eyes barely presents itself as I squint in the direction of the intruder, barely collecting myself enough to realize that I may very well have to fight the lightform. Demons have used me to portal into this reality before; what with our prolonged stay in what may as well be purgatory, I would not be surprised if a similar being tried their luck again.

Kagerus!

My head snaps forward, eyes focusing as the powerful being draws my attention to it, silencing the rambling of my mind.

Please... We are not yet finished in our fight against the plague.
A dread fills me, a feeling of doom crawling up my spine on legs of needles.
We will keep Solace safe in your absence.
My mouth falls open to cry out in protest, but no sound is made. They have already decided.
Collect the items. Climb the mountain.
My mind reaches for my wife where she lay, wrapped in shadows, not even nearly healed from the tattering of her womb. As a tear drips down from the plane of my cheek on to her blackened figure, the sensation of her dreaming soul embracing mine is the last I feel before I am wrenched away.
Good luck, Kagerus.

The feeling of solid ground beneath my hooves is as alien as walking on water.

Before me, a great mass looms; in the pitch black, I struggle to identify the shape of what appears to be a land-locked cloud. An uncomfortable chur beside me tells me that Panthera has been teleported here as well, and that she also dislikes our new surroundings. Twitching, a snort vibrates the air molecules around us, the scent of disease sending me two paces backward. Send me back, I beg of the spirit who deposited me here, craning my antlered head to gaze into the starless night sky. Please, I am not strong enough.

And it's true; gazing down at my figure, I glimpse flesh that clings to tightly to bones, telltales signs of muscular atrophy from how I had laid still for months now. Dirt still adorns my side, though it falls easily with a rough shake of my barrel. Nostrils flaring anxiously as the contagion spreads closer to where Panthera and I stand, I wait one last moment before submitting myself to the reality of our situation. That we won't be sent back. That we will have to scale the mountain.

Best be going, Panthera thought to me, baring her teeth in disgust. We don't have a choice.

I step forward.

Beside us, four items rise: one for each mission the faeries had sent us on previously. An icicle, a pebble, a wildflower and seashell. In the gloom, I cannot make out their specifics, nor do I try; though my last effort was wrought with hidden meaning, this quest holds none. Collect the items. Scale the mountain.

Here goes nothing.

At first, it seems as though the disease ridden cloud bears us no ill will. The items float next to us cheerily, spinning in the air as what barely constitutes as a breeze slowly churns the contagion around us. My head is bent low to see where my hooves fall beneath the thick fog; when I stumble particularly badly, Panthera darts forward, her keener predatory eyes blinking back at me once before she disappears into the gloom.

I'll scout ahead a few steps. Follow my directions.

And so I do, breathing haggard and body beginning to ache more than I would have expected despite my emancipation. Panthera's guiding voice in my mind helps to keep me upright, but it does little to stop the way the pressure increases detrimentally on the bones of my skull. Eventually the pain becomes such that I must stop where I stand, perched precariously on a steep incline as Panthera's telepathic voice gradually becomes less and less pronounced.

It's been a while, Kagerus.
The sound of my own voice coming at me from the whirling plague causes my innards to convulse, vomit churning in the place between my stomach and my throat. Weakly I call for Panthera, but no reply comes; the plague has separated us, has taken advantage of my toiling, has infiltrated my mind with an intelligence far beyond any I could have imagined at the start of this all.
Ah yes, the start... It was so easy back then, wasn't it? Moving your people to the safeland, hiding there for years as you awaited a cleansed land. Ironic, isn't it, that you would be summoned here at the last, to be infected by that which you most feared? Always like you, Kagerus, to fuck it up in the end times.
No, I mouth into the darkness, scrambling up from where I teeter. The sound of rocks tumbling down the mountainside indicate just how unstable the ledge upon which I stand is, but I pay them no mind, too caught up in the sound the voice which haunted me for so long in times long past. Memories of it haunting my every waking moment bring me to my knees, a warmth pooling there as my head bends toward the mountain. The voice needs not even speak; to myself I am detriment enough.
You fail at every turn. You failed motherhood, suicide, and love; you failed to keep your people safe, to hold your tongue, and to protect your wife. And now, you will fail as you attempt to cure the plague. There is nothing left that can fight what power I have garnered from the last breaths of the dying. Yours, too, shall be added to my arsenal.

Vaguely, I become aware of blood pooling on my knees, filling my nostrils so thickly that I choke with every breath. In my mind's eye, sunlight wavers above me as I sink to the bottom of the lake as I had once intended to. In this version of reality, Solace does not swoop in to save me; I am utterly alone with nothing but the cool water to greet my parted lips.

Beside me, the seashell spins until its shape blurs completely. Hovering close, it gleams despite the surrounding fog; and, with a gentleness, it burrows into the place between my shoulder blades. The memories it holds save me: memories of me bringing it to the top of the mountain. Memories which present themselves to me almost like a dream, one which supersedes that of my alternate reality suicide.

With a gurgling gasp, I awaken atop the mountain. The shell rests placidly in its spot in my flesh, the other three items whirling lazily about my figure. Somewhere in the fog, Panthera yells for me, and eventually finds her way to my side. Laying here, I can't say that I know what will happen next; for now, just being able to breathe is enough.

[Nocturne]

Of course he heard the call.

Nocturne had once again been on his way back to Silver Cove in the hopes of reuniting with Ember when he felt the familiar tugging deep inside, like Beqanna had latched onto his viscera, his organs, his muscles, his bones, and just pulled him back toward the Mountain so abruptly he stumbled and almost fell to the ground. He caught himself with a startled huff, snorted and shook himself to regain some sense of balance, and then yes, alright, turned to head back to the Mountain once more. To be honest, he had not expected to hear her again. They’d found the fourth ingredient, delivered the needed shells to the fairies. It was...almost a relief to hear her calling again.

To have some direction, some sense of meaning, to not feel cut adrift in an empty sea. The call was familiar, and an almost feverish wave of satisfaction washed over him at the feel of being needed by someone, especially someone so important as the world itself and the fairies who watched over her. So he scurried back, picking up the pace and letting his little legs hurry him back to the base of the mountain.

As soon as he saw the empty clearing, he knew, the first step appearing in his head as a quiet knowing, a certainty that settled in the back of his mind. Gather up the assembled ingredients, climb the Mountain once again. No fairies came to give a rousing speech or spell it out for any who gathered to help once more, but by now no speech was necessary, was it? The task lay before them plain as the daylight catching on the sparkling surface of the icicles, and he reached to gather one that called to him. It answered far more willingly than he’d expected, though he supposed that made sense - ice had listened to him somehow since he’d returned from Icicle Isle. Not just the ice, though, the other ingredients came willingly as he reached for them, following along eagerly, perhaps one more magical gift from Beqanna to aid in this vital quest.

He didn’t spare more thought for it, just rushed around gathering the ingredients he could find together while a thick fog formed and wrapped itself around the Mountain. He was no stranger to all sorts of weather by now, but this seemed different, dark and thick and heavy, and something about it made his spine tingle and his muscles tense. He cast a wary eye at the fog as it formed, but kept to his task until he’d gathered as many ingredients as he could. One thing at a time. Gather, then climb.

When he had everything he could collect, everything that willingly followed him, he took a steadying breath, turned to face the creepy fog, and headed up the Mountain again. With as many times as he’d climbed this way, it would make sense to think it would be easier now. Muscles becoming acclimated to the work, lungs adjusting to the change in altitude, body and mind prepared for the now-familiar journey. But yeah, not so much. He suspected it was part of the magic of the Mountain itself, each climb as much of a test to make it to the peak as the climber needed, an act of proving themselves to Beqanna or themselves, declaring they were ready to face what trials might come. Or at least, every other time it had proven so. This time?

This time was different. It wasn’t just weariness that made his limbs heavy, made his lungs heave for breath. As he stepped into the fog, it clung to him, sank into his skin. It filled his lungs and clung there too, making him cough and hack and gag. The more he climbed, the weaker he felt, and more. His skin flushed with heat that intensified with every step, abruptly shifting to chills that left him shivering and gasping. Cold hadn’t bothered him since his return from Icicle Isle, but this was...different. He frowned, slowly shaking his head, trying to shake the feeling off with the motion as he made himself keep walking. Coughing fits wracked his body, dragging him to a halt as he fought for breath, but every time it subsided, he pressed on.

His nose began to drip and he snorted, trying to clear away the fluid and spraying a red mist that made his eyes widen with fear and his heart stop for just a beat. He wiped his nose against his foreleg and blood smeared along the still moonlight-pale fur. A soft whimper escaped him, fear racing through his veins along with another wave of the fever, and he gasped and shuddered. Was this what it felt like to be sick? It was awful! And every step up the Mountain made it worse!

Still, he stumbled on. Job to do. Right? Yeah, no, he had to keep climbing. ‘Cause. Uh...something. Just had to, okay? All he could remember was the pressing need to make it to the top, and he held on tight to that thought as the plague claimed everything else. He kept holding onto that one little thought even as fear ate away at the rest of him, one step, another, as darkness wrapped around him, creeping in at the edges of his vision, bleeding into the center slowly. A soft hissing sound, the rustling of dead leaves built to sibilant whispers he could almost make out as his vision faded. He kept stumbling along, blind, exhausted, shaking with fever and dripping blood, hacking up a lung, didn’t matter. Had to make it to the top.

“Sssweet boy,” the darkness hissed as it claimed the last of his vision. “Resssst a while, won’t you? Sssso weary, sssso weak, and there is ssssso much worsssse to come.” Fingers stroked down his spine, and he squeaked and leapt forward, tripping over a rock or a root or some bump in the path, crashing to the ground with a grunt. “Good boy,” the darkness crooned, stroking his neck. He tried to scramble to his feet, but it held him pinned, pressing down on his shoulder and stroking his neck. “Ssssuch a good boy. Aren’t you lonely, ssssweet boy?” it asked, running fingers through the scruff of his baby mane. “Nobody to take care of you, nobody to love you, mussst be ssso lonely, sssweet boy.”

His heart ached in his chest, throat tightening as tears welled up in blind eyes, but he pulled his face away. Had to get up the Mountain. “Shhhh,” it hissed, petting his forehead, making his whole body go mellow. “Sssstay, jusssst a little while. We can make you feel better, don’t you want to feel better?” God, he did, wanted the fever to go away, wanted to breathe again without coughing or choking or spraying blood. He wanted to sleep, and wake up better, and never feel like this again. “Sssuch a good boy, and sssso ssstrong. For ssso long! All your lonely life with no one to hold you, no one to take care of you, no one to love you. Aren’t you tired of being sssso sssstrong?”

He gasped in a shaky breath, still fighting traitorous tears even as they trickled from the corners of his eyes. But he was, god, he was so tired, just wanted someone to hold him and tell him everything was gonna be alright. That he’d done a good job, been such a good boy, that they were proud of him for being so brave. “Ssso brave!” the darkness crooned, stroking his face as he broke, as he cried. “Sssuch a brave boy. Let ussss take care of you, sssweet boy. You’ve done sssso much, let it be our turn. Ssstay, let usss love you and make you better.”

He wanted to. God, more than anything he just wanted to let the dark wrap around him and hold him close, let it love on him and pet him and make him feel better, let it chase away the sick and the heartache and the exhaustion that was sinking into his bones with every quest, with every breath. Let it keep him safe and sound the way no one in his whole life had, not since he’d woken to life covered in his father’s blood and viscera. Alone, so alone. He’d always been alone, and now he could finally feel what it was like to have someone love him.

But there was work to do. He cried harder, knowing he had to leave, knowing he had to drag himself to his feet and stumble on. He couldn’t remember why, but he had to get to the top of the Mountain; there was no rest for his weary bones. “Ssstay,” it crooned, and he let himself have one more moment where someone loved him, where someone held him and petted him and promised it was going to be okay.

And then he thrashed and flailed and scrambled to his feet. The darkness hissed, digging vicious claws into his skin and trying to hold him, trying to keep him, gouging his shoulders as he dug in and pulled away. “Ssstay!” the darkness screeched, catching his hips with those sharp claws again. Had to climb, had to keep going, had to do something! Get to the top of the Mountain, even if he couldn’t remember why he knew it was desperately important.

More important than feeling home, feeling safe, feeling wrapped up in darkness and love.
More important than Nocturne could ever be.

He shook and sobbed and broke with every step, and the darkness screamed and hissed and swore no one would ever love him the way it would have loved him, promised he would spend his whole life alone with no one to hold him or pet him or tell him everything would be alright. It slashed at his hide, and blood trickled down his shaking body like the tears that fell unchecked from his still-blind silver eyes, but he knew. He’d always known, hadn’t he? It didn’t matter. He would always be alone, but he had a job to do. He couldn’t remember why, but Beqanna needed him to climb. And that was all there was.

He fought his way to the top step by step, the screams getting louder and more vicious, tearing away bits of his heart, gouging holes in his soul until he was sure there would be nothing left of him. He ran out of tears, ran out of everything and still kept putting one foot in front of the other, clutching tight to the thought that he had to make it to the top. And as he finally crested the peak of the Mountain once more, a guttural scream tore from his throat as he tore free of the darkness. He collapsed to the ground as he always seemed to at the end of this impossible climb, eyes slamming shut against the sudden influx of light as his vision came back to him. And the ingredients for the cure clattered to the ground beside him as he panted and heaved in desperate breaths.

He had made it. That was all that mattered.

[Eurwen]

Eurwen

the secret of walking on water
is knowing where the rocks lie

They had actually fought about it…

Looking at the Mountain now, she knows how ridiculous it was. Or maybe her father had been right all along... no - she stood with her decision, which was the she was most suited to go.

She remembers their calling so clearly. Almost weakly so, a message had been imprinted on them, echoing in their dreams as if the fairies were dying from it, weakened too by a god-created illness. All three of them had gone to the Mountain once before, had challenged the elements and monsters to help find this cure. One ingredient each, and this would probably be just as dangerous.

Her father had been so angry with the siblings saying that they wanted to go - and she in return had defied both of them, because Aodhán was far too young to risk his life, he’d barely lived yet and she’d told him he would probably be needed in the future. So far, she had been able to hide her massive migraine-like headaches from her little brother, and her final argument had been that he was too ill (after all he had that suspicious cough) and his fire-like trait would not help him climb the mountain, whereas her fae-given rock trait just might. In the end, facing the two elder horses, he’d backed down (or perhaps the idea of falling off the Mountain was more than he wanted to try and handle). Just to make sure though, she’d told several others in Nerine that he was not to leave until later that afternoon.

Their father had gone on and on about wanting to keep them safe, that he was fitter than them and would not be buffeted by the Mountain’s cold. Eurwen had repeatedly pointed out that he was the leader of the Isle now, saying he needed to be there, upon which he had retorted with her duties as heiress.
In the end, she had been angry enough to trap him between large rock pillars, and though she that knew he would get out eventually, she would be gone by then.

Shaking her head, the spotted young mare returns to the present, and focuses on the challenge before her. Climb the Mountain. Yet, it seems so ominous looming above her… then again she had come here on her own for this very reason, hadn’t she?

At least her surroundings match her element, she notices - the Mountain is made mostly out of rock and stone. And that is kind of reassuring. Perhaps she’s been given this element for this single purpose. Yes. Impenetrable as a rock, for sure.

Right, then. Looking around, she finds the icicles that her father talked about, the shells that aren’t unlike the markings on her little brother, the pebbles that she and her cousins brought, and flowers - no doubt originating from the Pampas. She takes some of each, and bundles her package into a hollow, rock-made, cube-like thing. This box is something that will protect the cure ingredients, she thinks, as well as makes it easier to carry - though she had planned to use her elemental manipulation trait to move the box, she then notices that she doesn’t have to, and prays a silent thank-you to whoever is listening.

The Mountain is dark, but the first part of her trip is relatively easy. Looks aren’t everything, she supposes. But then she is hit with the first wave of pure Plague-ness as an ominous cloud, and her headache has not only instantly returned, but now she also feels nauseous and outs her first, deep, bad cough, which hurts her chest even a few breaths after. Oops. That’s probably not the worst of it, she thinks, and she dizzily looks up to estimate how far she still must go. Only a third… it’s not looking good.

But when was anything Plague-related ever a good thing? She’ll just have to pull through like she always has, that is the purpose of this whole thing… she hopes…
Suppressing the next cough, hardly noticing her loss of mane and fur, she leaves a pink and white trail on the path she takes. Where’s she going? Up. There's nothing else she can tell you at this point.

It doesn’t take too long for her to encounter her next obstacle, this one much more physical. A chasm, the gap deeper than she ever imagined. She can see the other side, maybe she might jump it, or is it really further away? Not taking any chances today, she floats her stone box to the other side, then starts building a small bridge. Her body is protesting from fatigue, and she leans against the Mountain’s slope to steady herself while she works. But there is no other way that she knows to get her to the other side, except going down and back up another path and she’s not so sure if she can do that. Feverishly, she manipulates the stone to create a small ledge which she then hesitantly crosses.

Upon looking back, she finds that there wasn’t a gap at all. Frowning, she decides not to think about it, and continues with her box of ingredients.

Up and up, round and round, the path is rocky and chilly, but she’s glowing with feverish heat and actually - well actually, the cold is quite welcome. Perhaps she shouldn’t be happy with the cold, but here she is, secretly enjoying it anyway and it doesn’t matter any more to her as long as she can move on. She can feel which rocks are loose, preventing herself from falling; it is only because of this that she avoids being swept away by a sudden large wave of water, having felt the ground tremble just in time, even if she's nearly swept away by the watery avalanche; hiding against the Mountainside once more, she awaits the water passing by, but cannot avoid getting drenched by the spray.

Chilled to the bone, she hides with the safety the rock offers. Staring at the water, she lets all of it pass without a thought.

She blinks and darkness takes her, she is floating. One moment she had been staring at water, grounded by the rocks, and here she was... just... floating. Whatever mind trick it is, she cannot care any longer - after all she is a beautiful young girl looking like and old hag already, so what would she care if she drowns now? It’s so easy to let go. It would be… so easy... to go.

And then she falls to the ground and wakes, her passing out her wake-up call.

How long has she been out? She’s cold to the bone, and staring at… ice. A glacier maybe? Was it ever water that she’s seen or is she still hallucinating, like with the cliff-side that had not been? Fevers… she’s never had any before, in her life. The migraines seem not too much trouble in hindsight. Now, she shows all the symptoms of the Plague at once, and she can’t do anything else but move, go up, climb this huge rock of a mountain.

She must be nearly there. She must be. But her dull eyes can’t see much beyond just another slope and the newfound wall of ice. It shows her a mirror image, suddenly she sees. It's quite clear in fact. This Plague had caught up with her finally. It’s going to get her, it’s going to take her down, it’s going to prevent her from healing anybody else, she's not strong enough to help a fairy… and her reflection, the image of the Plague, stares at her with a menacing grin.

It moves.

All of a sudden, nothing else matters in the world. Here she is, at the end of her life, staring at her moving Plague reflection. It is all that is evil about her - here she will be stopped. All her past fears are present in her mind at once, all the nasty bits and pieces of her insecurities shown to her in an ice-cold mirror. As if her whole life flashes past like it might at one’s life ending, but only the bad parts, she relives how she’s never good or bold enough to live up to her sisters’ standards, never big or strong enough to follow them on their adventures. She watches as she never shows any ability at all to her parents and family who have such things indeed, how she is useless and cannot help or heal anyone, nearly drowns in the canal because she is not strong enough to swim. She never greets anyone first at the border of Nerine, she did not succeed in recruiting anyone from the Field, in fact, when a new recruit showed himself in Nerine he almost up and left again because she could not handle the situation. She failed her mother in running away to help the fairies, she failed herself in not returning quickly enough. In fact, she caught the Plague in the meantime. How sad is this little life of hers? How worthless is she? What could she possibly be worth, if all she does is wrong. Wrong. Not even her rock ability has proved useful for the kingdom.

And in her deepest, darkest, self-loathing fear, she turns around to leave. But right there on the path behind her, a small stone box is waiting for her, bringing her a single moment of clarity between Plague-ridden thoughts. No. She may be worth nothing to the world or to herself or even to others, but she will at least finish this one task. One task is all she needs to complete. Up the Mountain. Bring the ingredients.

The girl’s confidence is everything but rock-solid, but she’s hard enough on herself to not give in now.

With a heavy heart and an absent mind, she walks the rest of the way, plague-ridden but somehow steady. After conquering rocks, dreams, water and ice on her way, she has nothing else left but to hold on to this one thought.

Collect the items, climb the mountain.

[Ten]

It’s terribly easy to dismiss time when time is so little an object. For the boy of pale gold and silver, time has never held the same meaning it might to others his age. Not when Mother blindly stumbles through it, so easily forgetting little things such as when and where they are. He isn’t entirely sure what she had sought, only knowing that night and day seemed to have no rhyme nor reason and childhood could not be counted.

So it is in this strange manner he ends up here, today. On this day of all days.

Of course, he has no clue of the day. No clue that in the reality of time he should be no more than a weanling. But mother paid no mind to such things, had traveled to and fro with him enough times now that on this, the most auspicious of days, he is a lean yearling just beginning to grow out of the gangly awkwardness of youth.

Why is it such an auspicious day, one might ask? Well, for starters, it is the day his mother left him behind. Quite by accident, as she would later insist, but nevertheless it is true. Unfortunately it is not the first time she has so inadvertently misplaced her children, nor would it be the last. And, as though that were not sufficient, it is the day he finds himself called to the mountain.

At first it is simply a strange tug. A whisper in his ear that tempts him close, tantalizing a boy beset by endless curiosity. A mystery, as it were. Stories of plague and bravery and healing.

You see, poor Ten here has been rather sheltered, for all that he has lived an odd life. This is his first encounter with the reality of the plague that has so ravaged these lands. And rather than know fear, he instead is beset by a wicked curiosity, for to him, plague is little more than an abstract word.

Too quickly however, he finds the truth of these dangerous whispers, but by the time he understands, it is far far too late for the young boy. But fortunately (or unfortunately, depending on how one might look at it), he is as stubbornly determined as he is foolishly brave, and with a such a quest between his teeth, he is not about to give up, even if he does not quite fully understand it yet.

--

Counterintuitive though it may be, finding the odd little bits and pieces he needs to ferry up the mountain is actually the simple part. Icicles and pebbles and flowers and shells complete his odd little posey, and with a satisfied little snort, he steps rather jauntily towards the winding, treacherous path leading upwards. Now, any sensible equine might find a trail with such a dark and foreboding presence hovering over it alarming. But no one has ever accused Ten of such sensibility. Perhaps it is the fallacy of youth, or perhaps it is simply Ten’s nature. Either way, it sends him forward with far more bravery than he likely should have.

So it happens that as he begins the ascent and dark fingers of plague reach out to ravage the boy, he realizes that perhaps he has bitten off more than he can chew. Still, returning down the mountain is not an option, even when his breath begins to rasp in his lungs and chills grip his skin. The farther he climbs, the more thickly his breath comes, and soon he begins to cough. A rattling cough that sounds as terrible as it feels.

Regrettably for the poor, naive Ten, this is not even the worst of it.

At first he barely even notices the whispers. Indeed, one could almost mistake them for the gentle call that had drawn him to the mountain to begin with. Almost.

But it soon becomes apparent this is something much more sinister and much less benevolent. Darkness stains every haunted whisper, sparking fevered imaginations the drag him to a trembling halt. How long he stands there within the smog of plague and gripping fingers of nightmare that tug him under, it is impossible to say. The battle he fights is not a visible one. It does not scuff the earth or draw blood from flesh.

No, it is far more subtle than that. And far more dangerous.

--

Such a worthless boy, it whispers, digging invisible, gangrenous fingers deep.

Your mother could not wait to leave you.

You are nothing but a stupid, whimpering burden.

Do you hear that rattle in your chest? That is all you are to this world. Phlegm to spit onto the ground.

“No,” he whispers back, though no sound leaves his throat. “You lie!”

Did it though? Did it lie? With such terrible insidiousness, it saps every bit of confidence he has and replaces it with self doubt. A plague of the mind as much as it is of the body.

You will never make it. You are weak. No one wants you. This world does not want you. Lay down on this mountainside. Death suits you so much better anyway.

He tries to shake his head, but his body refuses to move. Sweat gathers on his neck, darkening his flank and causing his skin to itch fiercely. Invisible, taunting spiders crawl along his nerve endings, his breath rattling with each inhale as the prospect of death lingers so heavily before him.

It is that (only that awful prospect of dying) which stirs a fierce protest within his soul. One that even such a ghastly beast could not defeat.

“No!” he shouts, the words bursting from his lips. He has barely lived. Has not seen enough of the wonders he knows this world holds. He has too much he wants to do still. He could not, would not, die. Not yet. Not today.

As though that single word is the key to his shackles, the hold on him shatters, freeing him from plague’s deadly grip. He shoots forward, as though his body is a rubber band held taught and suddenly released, letting his instinctive need to flee claim him. He can feel the poisonous fingers stretching, reaching, trying to reclaim it’s prize. But for all his foolish bravery, Ten is a clever boy who learns quickly enough to know he must not stop lest he admit defeat.

He climbs upwards, eager hooves scrabbling against hard stone and loose gravel. He stumbles time and again, until his legs are weary and his knees and cannons scraped and bloody. But still he persists. His lungs scream inside his chest, his breath little more than hacking gasps, but still he refuses to give in. When he finally reaches the top, blood stains his lips and sweat foams on his skin, but he is triumphant.

His lungs might rattle dangerously inside his chest and his limbs might tremble with weakness, but he had not let that foul fog win. Not today. Not ever

TEN

[sochi]

Sochi

darling, you're wild-eyed, empty, and tongue-tied
maybe you need me or maybe you don't

It makes sense, in a way, that she would be the one to hear the call.

She had heard it in the beginning, had felt that pull in her belly that had driven her to Pangea and to the throat of a stallion whose name she still does not know. She had not fought it, had not even tried to pretend that she would. She had simply turned her attention to the southern kingdom and let it pull her toward it, let it capture her attention like a thread snagging on a thorn. She had felt it wash over her, let it pull her under, and when she had emerged from it, she had been made anew in the blood and disease.

Now she is something different entirely.

She is not the sweet, mild-mannered girl of her childhood.

She is not the confused, conflicted girl of early adulthood.

And she is not the callous, blood-thirsty tiger who had emerged from Carnage’s quest.

She is a mother and a soldier and she no longer cares about the labels she has spent so long wearing. She just wants to be free in the space of her own mind and perhaps that is why she answers this call. Perhaps that is why she unfolds her legs and lifts herself to her feet, shifting into her equine form and turning her silvery eyes to the horizon. The trip from Loess to the mountain does not take long, and she has been conditioned for such things for so long now. She barely recognizes how the time has passed.

When she arrives, others have come and gone already, but the items remain.

Icicles still magically preserved. Pebbles so innocuous. Wildflowers blooming. Seashells scattered.

She knows, in her heart, that these are the items she needs to take up the mountain, that these are the items that must be transferred and so she nods, watching as they rise and attach themselves to her orbit as if in some kind of gravitational pull. She doesn’t question it. After all, she has seen stranger things.

Instead she just tucks her chin in closer and makes her way into the fog, letting it split apart around her and then drawing her further into the belly of what is to come. Soon, the grey that blankets around her becomes thicker, the edges of it swirling around her legs and up her sides. The faint light of day goes spotty and then snuffs out completely. Feeling the faint edge of instinct, Sochi’s lips peel back against her teeth into a snarl and before she can draw her next breath, she becomes a tiger.

And when the air does come, she feels it rattling in her lungs.

She no longer remains invincible to the plague she helped bring to Beqanna. It is reminiscent of when it had first slipped into her veins, when it had been an echo of what was to come, but so much worse. She coughs and blood splatters onto the ground. She coughs and some of the hair on her hip sloughs off.

She coughs and the air rattles in her lungs and then transforms—

and she laughs.

Blood stains her ivory feline teeth and although fatigue shadows her eyes, she still drags herself forward, surrounded by the halo of items from the base of the mountain. She is not surprised when she begins to see the sickly faint glow emerging through the darkness. It is only right that the clock be turned back in this way. Out of the shadows, she sees two horses emerge. The first, just a mare. The second, the same monstrous undead creature she had fought at the bottom of the ocean. Both have her silver eyes.

Sochi does not hesitate. Even though the illness shakes within her, crippling her, squeezing the very air from her throat, she doesn’t stop. She simply launches forward on shaky legs with her mouth open. She reaches the mare first and feels her throat crush in her mouth even as she feels the other sink teeth into her back. She screams—in rage, in pain, in understanding—and bites down harder.

Her skin splits open and blood pours down the ivory and orange of her legs. She swipes with her claws and both of them—the mare in between her teeth and the undead monster beneath her claws—turn to dust. They turn to dust and she is left with nothing but ash on her tongue and blood pooling by her feet.

When she rises this time, it takes more effort than she anticipated.

But she still rises.

She rises and drags herself forward, coughing and wheezing and dripping with blood, further up the mountain—and she doesn’t stop until she crests the final peak.

Until she stands, again as a horse, with teeth clenched and silvery eyes fierce,

ready for whatever is to come.

playing the slow rooms, howling at half moons
if you are a Queen then, honey, I am a wolf

[wonder]

Wonder

She knows this weight in her chest the moment it wakes her, knows the way it grips so desperately at the silk of the soul so unraveled inside her. Her breath is a sharp exhale as her muscles contract suddenly, as shivers race across her skin and along her beautiful spine. I can’t, she wants to whisper, wants to curl into herself more tightly, please don’t ask that of me. But the feeling doesn’t leave her. It settles with the weight of a dozen stones into the pit of her small belly. So she rises as she fights back a sob, blinking and then regretting it immediately as the memories of a small girl dead and crumpled in the grass brand themselves against the insides of her dark eyelids. That’s what happened last time you asked this of me, she reminds the weight in her chest, the mission gifted to her like a dream remembered.

A child left for dead by a girl who thought she made the right choice.

By the time she reaches the mountain, following a path that makes her hurt inside from its familiarity, the wretched bone plates thrust through her skin have left new lines of angry pink welts all damp and beaded with blood. It spills in tears over the dull chestnut of her skin, leaving tracks that match the near-dried ones beneath those faded teal eyes. She is struck almost immediately by the strange fog, though it isn’t until she’s close enough to step inside that she can feel something is amiss. Weather isn’t like this, it doesn’t think and it doesn’t feel, it isn’t something she’s ever been afraid of. But this is different, it is wrong and ugly and she can feel the wicked intent the moment she disappears inside it to where the items lay. She touches each one warily, those gentle eyes flashing at shadows and the movement of air churning the fog nearby, and as she does the items stir as if woken by something inside her, her intent to help, to do good.

They drift along behind her, an icicle, a flower, a pebble, and a shell, and she watches them only for as long as it takes to be certain they won’t fall suddenly inanimate again and be lost to her. She treks slowly up a mountain that blinds her with fog, tripping over stones and roots and finding her path suddenly blocked by sheer walls of rock that force her to double back. The air is so thin up here, so cold and damp that it doesn’t take long for her lungs to start burning with coughs that seem too stubborn to stop. She wheezes, takes a break, starts and coughs again, wiping something hot and wet on her foreleg without looking to see that brilliant shade of red she leaves behind. She thinks it’s only sweat.

It isn’t until the sweating starts in earnest that she wonders if something might be amiss - and maybe it isn’t sense at all but rather the manifestation of the inexplicable dark dread clutching with sharp fingers at her heart. She stops again, drops her head with another wet cough to check that the items are still behind her, and notices for the first time the blood smeared brightly across her foreleg where she’d been wiping at her nose. She tries to gasp, but the effort is too much for lungs now strangled by the plague, and instead she trips to her knees, coughing and wheezing and blinking back confused tears.

She looks around again, and there is a new hint of something desperate in her eyes as she lurches back to her feet again, braced until the coughing subsides and the tears stop gathering in the wells of such ocean eyes. It is in that moment that she realizes what she thought were shadows and updrafts of air swirling in the thick glaze of fog are actually shapes she just barely recognizes. Mostly equine, but ruined by rot and blood and bone that juts out with shreds of flesh waving at her like flags. Horses that clamor towards her as if suddenly woken by the act of her recognizing what they are. As if they required her fear to animate them.

She cries out and bolts past them, falling and stumbling until her knees are full of blood and bruises and she is certain there will be scars that never heal. But they don’t seem able to follow her. They lack the intensity of life, have earned a slowness in death, in flayed skin and rotted muscle, in bones broken. They just amble past and try to touch her as she hurries past, covering them in the hot flecks of blood that fall from her wheezing lips.

She thinks she must be dying.
That this is why they chose her.

She thinks she must be there, must be so close to the top, can almost see sky through a thin gap in the fog ahead of her before it thickens again and steals the world from her eyes. She steps forward, sweating at her neck and her shoulders and her hips, shivering at the impossible cold of being so high up, at the fear that knots and coils in the pit of her belly. She just wants to be home. But it’s close, and it’s so important, she reminds herself with a whisper thought, unable to say the words aloud lest her lungs shred like tissue in her chest, it’s okay. To die for this, for those she loves and those she’s never had the chance to.

She takes another step forward, and then something dead steps out into her path, something so wrong it makes her cry out in surprised horror. It is the child from the last quest, the brittle little baby girl she had left dying in the grass with the promise of, i’ll be back, i’ll save you, a promise she had been unable to keep. “I’m so sorry,” she wheezes, and there are tears mixed with the blood falling freely down her cheeks, “oh god, i’m so sorry.” And she can’t stop crying, can’t catch her breath, can’t look away from this thing rattling closer and gnashing a mouth full of broken, missing teeth. It’s the eyes that catch her gaze though, they aren’t what she remembers. These are black and flat, void like a night without stars.

This thing isn’t the girl, not anymore. Whatever ruinous thing that had filled Wonder with fear now filled, quite literally, the body of a memory more lethal than any blade. She lowers her head in warning, the sharp points of her antlers bared to the child-beast as it launched at her suddenly, throwing itself down the path. Every instinct in her screams not to hurt her, to find a way to protect this baby when she hadn’t been able to protect her before. But there is nothing to protect anymore. So she thrusts hard with her antlers, remember the lesson of the fairies that some things are worth fighting for, but she still cries out at the internal agony that rips through her heart as the child-corpse connects and is impaled, sliding off the tines of her antlers and into a heap on the ground.

She is as Wonder remembers now. Soft and sad and very real, very still and unbreathing at her feet. Almost peaceful in this second death, if not for the way the plague had eaten away at her. She reaches down to brush her nose over the girls neck and there are tears in her eyes, ragged sobs muted by wheezing. Then she steps carefully over the body with the items in tow behind her, and steps through the fog to the peak of the mountain with her head hung low and teal eyes so flat and broken.

i am brambles but i am tangled in your love