"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
11-23-2019, 11:17 PM (This post was last modified: 11-23-2019, 11:23 PM by Gluttony.)
Gluttony
Her heart is beating fast as she stands at the edge of the field.
It's been a few years since she made her way peacefully in to this world and began the process of acclimating to its strange rules and customs. No friends made, no acquaintances met. Instead the eagle child of glitter and fang had spent most of her time among the birds and traveling through the trees. As the months had turned into years, the unusual child had become comfortable living alongside her feathered friends. Quiet and observant, the life of an eagle had proven to be an easy one.
It had only been when the winter turned to spring for a third time that she decided it was about time that she make her equine debut. Today the air was heavy with the threat of a midday spring thunderstorm looming overhead and the partnering wind danced through the tall grasses. The blades of grass and the wildflowers among them twisted and twirled with a fierce elegance. Overhead the different species of birds attempted to glide against the gusts, though with each sudden burst the birds were pushed back a bit further.
A single green eye was tilted towards the sky as she watched them struggle and somewhere deep within her soul an itch that begged to be scratched rolled down her spine. As the itch began to spread across her entire being, feathers began to sprout and roll down her neck, taking place of the long golden hair of her mane. Taking a step foward the mare continued to watch the birds floating among the wind. With a silent nicker she closed her eyes feeling the wind travel across her back and around her legs and as the time passed small feathers began to sprout and unfurl across her body.
The sudden sound of someone close by causes her eyes to flicker open and with a quick turn of her head, the mare's gaze lands on an approaching stranger. Slow and steady the feathers began to slink back within her skin. "What do you want?," the young mare's voice is surprisingly airy as it slips between her lips. Her eye slides up and down the front of the stranger before she looks ahead and rolls her shoulders slightly. For a moment the sun pokes through the darkening clouds. With a small step forward, the white of her body sparkles in response to the suns gentle rays.
"Did you come here to fly as well?" Her voice is almost a whisper now. One would surely have to be listening carefully to understand what she had said just then. With a soft tremble that dances across her skin, the sun disappears back behind the clouds as she watches the sky with an almost desperate longing.
The life of the birds would be a difficult one to leave behind.
11-25-2019, 04:26 PM (This post was last modified: 11-25-2019, 04:27 PM by ghaul.)
do you think God stays in his heaven because he, too, lives in fear of what he has created?
He’s made so many new friends lately that he has elected to try his hand in the field. Ana had told him to recruit and grow their numbers, and he’s eager to comply. When he arrives, the air has that humid thickness that tells him a storm is building on the horizon. The rain and thunder are his only indication that it is spring aside from the lack of frigid cold. He might mourn his inability to see the bright green grasses and blooming flowers if he only knew what he was missing out on.
But he does not, and so he mourns nothing.
There is someone strange nearby, however, and he notices the way her outline changes shape. Suddenly, he can smell feathers, and he finds himself hoping for it to be followed by the scent of scales. His wings spread halfway and he slinks closer with his neck outstretched eagerly. Quick as they sprouted, the feathers are gone in an instant, and he finds himself coming to an abrupt halt. Ghaul raises his head as his wings fully extend and he lifts his head, ears turned toward her curiously. What a strange little thing, he thinks. But he likes strange, doesn’t he? He loves to collect and hoard them for himself.
The wyrm edges closer, talons sinking into the mud with each step and leaving awful gashes in the earth. What does he want? What a splendid question. When the sun peeks out and allows her skin to shimmer and glisten beautifully, it only reveals the veins within the membrane of his wings. He is an ugly thing in the light.
“I do not fly,” he responds quietly, still creeping closer to her. When the clouds regain control of the skies, the stars across his horns and cheeks resume their glittering. “Do you?”
And he wants to reach out and trace the angles of her face as he has done so often to others, but he retrains himself. Instead he listens closely for her answer as his chest tightens at the anxiety surrounding it. He has seen little heat signatures in the skies and he has wondered what it’s like. Sometimes he stands on the cliffs of Pangea and spreads his wings so he can imagine he’s flying while the wind blows over his face. But how could a blind thing ever hope to soar?
“I am Ghaul, from Pangea. You are who?” he asks with a tilt of his head as he attempts a smile, though the expression is full of crooked fangs and scarred lips.
11-26-2019, 09:12 PM (This post was last modified: 11-26-2019, 11:32 PM by Gluttony.)
Gluttony
For a moment the wind picks up, pressing against her side as it dances around them and with a blink of surprise she realizes in that moment what exactly she is seeing. With a solid green eye, the palomino and white mare slowly takes in the other’s unique features and for a moment her lips twist in thought. Taking a gentle step towards the other, she studies him. While there are so many features she could take note on, it’s the galaxy markings along his face and horns that catch her attention most of all. These are what make him beautiful to her.
Standing still she lets him inch closer. She is lost in the colors of his galaxies. As the wind continues to twist and twirl the scent of rain pairs with it and a soft mist begins to fill the surrounding empty space. Her skin trembles in response and for a moment her breath becomes caught in her throat. He does not fly? How could that be? Her mind is racing as she tries to understand how that could be. How one could have wings, but unable to use them for the exact thing their destined for.
She couldn’t fathom not being to fly alongside the birds of prey that had become her family. What would it be like to never float through the sky? ”I do fly,” she responds gently with a sort of sadness, ”but only when I am in my other form.” She doesn’t elaborate. Her mind shifts to the memories of floating through the clouds as an Eagle and an eye momentarily shifts to look at the sky above. ”It is one of the best feelings. You are so free and nothing happening in the world below matters.” Slowly her eye travels down to traces the lines of his wings and for a moment she feels a fleeting sadness for the creature that cannot fly.
Stepping forward she walks past his head towards his left side. Unlike him, she doesn't even attempt to restrain herself and inching forward her soft velvet nose bumps against his wing. It clearly is alive. She can feel the warmth from them. With soft breaths she traces her nose against the bone before turning her head back towards his and letting her eye meet the horn sitting on the same side she was on. "Why don't you use your wings?" She has no idea that she may be treading on thin ice with this question, let alone that she may be pushing a limit by so boldly touching the dragon that had come to say hello. So far, she had yet to understand that boundaries existed. Or maybe it was that she just didn't care.
"Ghaul," his introduction is only half heard, but she tastes his name across her lips in thought. "That's an interesting name. I like it." She is matter of fact as she finally decides that she is going to attempt to make this other equine a friend. He may not be the most eye catching thing, but she isn't the type to realize it. What an interesting pair they must make here in this open space. A glittering golden mare conversing with a dragon being of darkness. "I'm Gluttony!," she is eager in her introduction of herself. "What is pan.. Pan-geel?" The pronunciation is lost on her as she had only been half listening before. His wings and shimmering galaxies had her memorized.
The birds were admittedly so plain compared to this.
@[ghaul] hi. this is a cough medicine post. pls forgive.
do you think God stays in his heaven because he, too, lives in fear of what he has created?
He hates the rain, he thinks as he tries to find the outline of her face somewhere in her heat signature. A part of him wonders what everyone looks like – his friends, his prey, his Clarissa. Are they as beautiful as they feel beneath his lips? What do they see that he cannot? A slow exhale breathes from his nose when she says she can fly and he feels a flash of jealousy thunder across his heart. If she had wings, he would consider ripping them to shreds so they would be equally disadvantaged.
But she hasn’t got them, it seems, and so he keeps his teeth to himself.
For now.
Other form. The words linger and echo across his mind as he keeps his ears turned in her direction for a while as he considers what she says. Ghaul is only ever himself but he knows Clarissa and Sochi can change their shape as they please. Sometimes he wonders if that makes them stronger or weaker but he can’t quite pin down an answer despite his best efforts. “I am only ever this,” he says almost to himself, tilting his head. But isn’t he free already? No one commands him; no one would dare.
“Do things matter when you’re on the ground?” he mutters as his head rolls to tilt in the opposite direction. He has yet to face the consequences of anything he has done and so the goings on of the world mean so very little to him for now. When he was young, he used to care whether or not Castile found him sneaking around Loess, but these days he feels insurmountable. Even without flight, he is a mountain that the wind cannot bring to heel. The thought draws a strange sort of grin across his lips and crooked crocodile teeth.
Gluttony is moving, suddenly, and he perks to attention when she draws closer to him. Her nose touches his wing and it reflexively twitches beneath the soft flesh of her face before settling once more. He swallows hard, unused to being the one examined in this way. The blur of pale yellow that forms her core returns to his head and he is uneasy when she asks her next question. His parents did not have the wings to teach him and so his go unused, he thinks.
“I never learned how,” he whispers with a hint of a growl framing his words. The admission makes him feel weak and a fire begins to burn within him as he considers his answer for a while. She says she likes his name, though, and he thinks maybe she isn’t a threat to his ego after all. “Come to Pangea and teach me. I will spare you from the fire.”
But then comes her question. What is Pangea? His grin spreads into a full smile with embers spilling between his teeth.
“Pangea is the beginning, the kindling where I was born. All will burn before our kingdom.”
ghaul
@[Gluttony] he thought about biting her but resisted both times. progress.
Unlike the unusual stranger before her, she quite liked the rain. The way the gentle drizzle frosted across her coat was almost refreshing. With the occasional twist of her muscles she continued to watch the other's face closely. For a while she became lost in the galaxies across his rough features. 'Do things matter when you're on the ground?' His question lingers between them and for a while she considers it. With a glance towards the sky and then directing an eye towards the ground she rolls her right shoulder in a slight shrug as she shifts her weight. "The only thing that seems to matter is one day reaching the sky again," she sighs dreamily. "I have never really cared about what's happening down... here."
Her lips twist into a large smile as her eye bounces back up to meet his face and for a moment she dances on the tips of her hooves as his head swings towards her and she moves a few steps forward. As a young filly she has never cared who or what caught her in anything she tried to do. She had always been bold in her desire to fly and follow the path of the birds and never let anyone stop her. It had only, as expected, become even worse when she discovered her natural ability to change into a bird of prey. She thinks of the way the wind flows between her feathers up there in the sky when suddenly his crocodile smile peels her attention away from her own thoughts. With a soft blink and widening of the eyes, the glittering mare takes a closer step forward, a bright green eye closely inspecting the pointy teeth that sat between the stallions lips.
He truly was an interesting creature and if she were being honest, had anything less boring come to greet her, she probably wouldn't have been able to be convinced to stay on the ground where she should consider to herself to truly belong. She continues to watch the way his lips twist and turn as he speaks, her eyes unblinking as she studies the teeth of the true predator before her. It's when he says that he doesn't know how to fly that breaks his own unintended spell and for a moment her heart drops. "You... Don't know how?," a sort of sadness trails along her words and her brows raise in slight concern. A winged being without flight? How could one live and be truly happy?
'Come to pangea and teach me. I will spare you from the fire. Pangea is the beginning, the kindling where I was born. All will burn before our kingdom.'
It's an offer she can't refuse. "Of course I will!" her acceptance of his offer is instantaneous and his eerie warning of what may be coming is lost on her. For now, her one true goal is to make sure this being reaches his full potential when it comes to flight. She also is able to easily take note that he corrects her without mocking her and for a moment she is most pleased by the way he ignores her simple mispronunciation of his home. With a careful precision she speaks up as she bounces on her hooves a bit too eagerly, "Is Pangea close? Will you lead me there?"
@[ghaul] oh hi. i wrote a post. she is going in a weird direction personality wise and i have no intention of stopping it, so bare with me LOL
