"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
the secret of walking on water is knowing where the rocks lie
So many things occupied Eurwen lately - first Nev and Lilli’s disappearances, then Taiga as a whole, then finally she made her way to Pangea, only to find Lilli has it bad - too bad, as she pointed out to Ghaul. But there was a strange kindness in him that she had found, and frankly somewhat exploited - he was possessive, but those he had marked “his” (his family or his prey) there was some protectiveness. Lilli would survive one way or the other if he had a say in it, though Wen had no illusions as to think about the how of it.
She’d taken the long way home, through the Mountain and the Field, found the stranger-Nerinian, palomino girl, too. Thankfully, Eurwen has good memory, mulling over the events discussed in Pangea for a good time. So, today, when the dust had settled, she called together @[Izora Lethia] and @[Neverwhere]. She waited for them in the southern part of Nerine, occasionally stomping a hoof or nervously slashing at flies. She knew what she needed to say and do - but she wasn’t sure what the dappled mare would think.
When was the last time Lethy had left the borders of Taiga? She had always been apart of it since Aten brought her there many, many years ago. She had found solace in the shadows of the large trees and the soft pine needles that littered the ground or the soft grasses and flowers that scattered across the few open meadows tucked away.
Her mind wandered to the north shores as she made her way quickly to the meeting that Eurwen had called.
When she spotted the pink marked mare she offered a warm smile, her amethyst eyes searching out any others who may be joining them before talking. "Eurwen, it's good to see you again."
06-16-2020, 11:27 PM (This post was last modified: 06-16-2020, 11:28 PM by Neverwhere.)
Slowly, pieces come together. She's returned to Nerine, spoken to Brennen, found Ama. Some few things still lay out of reach, but when her eyes fall on the spotted form of Eurwen, another clicks into place. Neverwhere does not call as others might, she doesn't rush to greet Eurwen or the purple-eyed mare who smells of redwood sap. Her footsteps call enough attention, clipping against the bare stone peeking out from the thin layer of soil thats pads the southern edge of Nerine.
Her expression is the usual, a slight scowl where scar tissue tugs at her lips, and an ear trained back - as much because this is her normal as because it tracks the sound of a boy sleeping in the grass nearby. There is no obvious change to her demeanor, but when she is close enough that frowning muzzle touches briefly against Eurwen's agitated shoulder before turning pale eyes onto the buckskin mare. Another Taigan she doesn't know, but important enough for Eurwen to beckon her out of the fog.
What mess will the kingswood lay at her feet today, she wonders.
Neverwhere
This is the table equivalent of pajamas
@[Eurwen] - shorty short post, just moving things along lol
the secret of walking on water is knowing where the rocks lie
She waits, but not as patiently as she usually does. Neverwhere immediately notices that the air is thicker around Wen today, and the spotted mare can’t blame her. In fact, in retrospect this conversation had been a long time coming, and finally being able to speak up is something of a relief to the pink-toned Nerinian. She’s glad for Izora Lethia’s early arrival, which distracts her with small talk, and she smiles at the purple-eyed woman and chats away with her on a topic she soon forgets.
”Thank you for coming.” she smiles weakly at the almost unexpected brief touch of her shoulder, but addresses them both nonetheless. “I’ve spoken to Lilliana in Pangea,” she states matter-of-factly, ”and although her idea was to invite Leilan here as well, I think it’s important to make our decision first.” she shrugs, then looks from Neverwhere’s face to Lethy’s and finds no recognition there. ”Nev, this is Izora Lethia, the Matriarch who leads Taiga together with Lilli. Lethy, this is Neverwhere, Khaleesi of Nerine.” she adds their names and titles quickly when she realizes this, so preoccupied with her goal to waylay her message and ultimate decision-making that she had completely switched up the proper order.
She takes a deep breath. ”As lands of the north we are currently barely a union. Both Lilliana and I figured this warrants a change,” she starts, and looks at @[Izora Lethia] sideways to catch her face briefly. What had Lilli told her before she left? ”It is her proposal to move the kingdom seat further north, temporarily. She thinks it gives you more time to heal and restore,” she adds to Nev quickly before she gets interrupted, ”It is my personal belief that such a decision must be made and hopefully agreed upon or at least carried afterwards, by all of the North, so I come to both of you first.”
She eases through the pleasantries and small talk with a gentle demeanor, her amethyst eyes moving slowly between their surroundings and her and Eurwen's small talk. When the dappled mare makes her appearance the conversations leave her mind just as easily as they did from Eurwen's.
Though she did not personally know Neverwhere she had recalled her name here and there in some of Lilli's stories - and heated ideas they had tossed around before she had been stolen. The permanent frown on the other mare temps a childish grin to grace her lips but instead she gives her a graceful bow of her head when Eurwen introduces them.
Her deep, purple eyes are pulled back to Eurwen as she begins to dive into her talk of politics. Surprise is not evident on the buckskin face when she says that her and Lilli talked of moving the kingdom seat to the Isle - it had been an idea they had thrown around on a couple occasions in heated conversation.
This conversation specifically though was not one of clashing opinions. Lethy had agreed that it would be a good move - temporarily. With the disappearance of Aten and the bullying from the south, along with whispers of happenings yet to come, they had agreed that giving Nerine some space to breath and giving all the North some protection with Leilan at the helm would be a good move.
Lethy eyes Neverwhere cautiously as the last bit of Eurwen's information sinks in. Lilli and I talked about the idea a bit before she was taken, and I agree that for now it would be a good move and it will give the North an opportunity to work as one.. the South isn't done with its games. she ended with confidence, her purple glow radiating a hue deeper.
Neverwhere has had almost a decade now of swallowing anything resembling shock or surprise, something that once grew out of the necessity but has since become a defining characteristic, so while Eurwen makes herself sick over the proclamation and Izora Lethia eyes her dubiously, the bald-faced mare remains quiet. If she also appears disapproving of the idea, well, she always looks that way, with her ears half-cocked and the scars that tug her lips into their perpetual frown.
The information washes over her in a tumble, Izora Lethia leads Taiga, now in place of Aten, in place of Pteron, in place of Lepis. The trees and fog and shadows of Taiga hide the turmoil of the land well, it appears unchanged and quiet from the outside. She does not understand the appeal of wandering blindly through trees (has done it as a matter of fact,) and yet it is a land of dreams and magic for Lilliana.
Lilli.
"Speaking of Lilliana, why hasn't she come home yet?" Neverwhere interjects this sudden concern into the conversation without acknowledging the topics at hand. Lilliana should be home by now, surely? She cares nothing for the politics of the kingdom, but the whereabouts of her first and dearest friend suddenly consume her thoughts. How long has it been? Has it been a year yet since she was stolen away for meddling with Pangea? A year since Wolfbane?
"She's in danger, Eurwen, I want her home. Now."
She has no doubt that Wolfbane will continue down the path of his own self-destruction, clawing and tearing the whole way, and she has no doubt that those claws will find their way to the red mare again. She needs to come home, to be here where Brennen can keep her safe until the cursed stallion has finally found someone willing and able to kill him. She turns to the buckskin, the creases of her frown deepening.
"I've asked Brennen to set up protections that will keep Wolfbane out of Nerine, both Magic, and through increased patrols, and there are other plans I am not a part of to control his movements. It would be smart to be very careful about who you share information with, and who you are alone with. Anyone that requires protection from him is welcome to find it here."
Her thoughts turn back to the reason that Eurwen called them here, but she does not worry as much about Lepis - whose threatening ambition has simmered quietly recently as she, too struggles against her one-time mate - and Ghaul, whose loyalties are strange, like fierce and bloody birds. It's interesting that he would come looking for her, though, that he would be hunting Wolfbane, according to Ama. Perhaps it is less interesting that one of Wolfbane's children has taken up his side - it is more surprising that only one of them seems to have been swayed to it - but she had been displeased to hear that the mare had been let to fly away after Lilliana. Pale eyes drift languidly between the two mares before her.
"Heartfire once threatened to destroy Lepis for suggesting the kingdom seat should be moved, you know."
the secret of walking on water is knowing where the rocks lie
There had been little she could do for Lilliana at that point, but Neverwhere in her moment of worry only achieves to rub it in. For Eurwen, that doesn’t seem very fair of her - to ignore the very thing the chestnut mare asked them to do; form a union and make a decision about her request. Still, the pink-dotted mare ignores her queen’s rudeness - she’s used to it and brushes it aside in favour of their shared worry. ”Lilli was heavily pregnant when I spoke with her. When Ghaul interrupted us, I mentioned to him to take better care of her, since he seemed to enjoy her playing his… games.” she shakes her crest, ridding herself of the face he contorted and instead looking to Nev and Lethy. ”The child may have delayed her, but I can ask my sister to go looking, or my father.” The words come out smoother than she expects them to - my sister, as if she didn’t know any better and all this was normal.
None of it was, of course - Brennen, Wolfbane, Lilliana still missing. As Neverwhere tells it, Eurwen nods once - then if the child was Wolfbane’s Lilli might be in danger, and if it wasn’t… it’d be even worse, when he found out. Best not to let him find out then. ”Then I’ll ask them both, and will be out there myself.” She half expects the silver dappled mare to cut the meeting short at that, her muscles already tensed to move - but then the khaleesi drops a too-casual, too-threatening comment for Eurwen’s taste.
Ears flatten down her wind-entangled mane, and her suddenly stone-hard pools of darkness find her queen’s bald face. ”You’d compare me to Lepis? You think I’m more loyal to Loess than the north?” A mild tremor flows outward like a ripple through Nerine’s rocky floors as Eurwen’s body tenses, her muscles scream for more action - it remembers the fight it once put up against a monster in the Silver Cove, the fight that led her to her rock-based abilities. That is an offense she will not stand for - to think she doesn’t have Nerine’s best interest at heart! - and Neverwhere’d best be sure to know it.
While she may be staring between the ground they encompassed and the faces of the two mares she is in meeting with her thoughts are swimming between Lilli, and the boys, and the new babe that was not born under the protection of the north. Her eyes crease on the edges and the corners of her mouth drop into a frown.
It is when Neverwhere mentions Heartfire's threat to Lepis that her attention is drawn full force back to the conversation at hand. She had heard Eurwen talk of sending her sister or father, or both to find Lilli and that had eased the tension for now, but when the pink spotted mare flattens her ears and Lethy feels the ground beneath her tremble she quickly sends out tendrils of her own magic, peace, to the group and the land itself.
Her amethyst eyes and her silky voice harden, "You're loyalties are not in question, Eurwen. Lepis was selfish, involving lands that had no business with the North for her own gains and ambitions. The isle is apart of us, alliances already made. As for Heartfire, as far as I can tell she was not called to this meeting, nor did she show up on her own whim. her deep, purple gaze settles on Neverwhere. Her own face mimicking the hard lines to the North Queens.
You are khaleesi of the North, are you not? You do not strike me as someone who let's others speak for you, or decide what you think is best. We are not asking for a permanent move of the throne, only a temporary. And we are asking you. she shifts her weight finding a sure foot amongst Neridian ground while she continues to let her gift of peace pour from her and into herself.
07-03-2020, 10:17 PM (This post was last modified: 07-03-2020, 10:18 PM by Neverwhere.)
Hey all you cool cats and kittens
Eurwen mentions a sister and that brings an ear forward curiously. Ah, but entire seasons have passed since Neverwhere has walked Nerine, anything might have changed in that time. The spotted mare's children have grown, the ward the two mares shared with Lilli, has, too - though perhaps not a great deal, the silvered mare considers, remembering the bejeweled girl's diminutive height. Height is not such an important thing when you can create a tornado, though, nor when you can make the ground shiver.
The earth rumbles with a whine and crack of rock scraping rock, but the cool expression on her face doesn't shift despite the tremors of Eurwen's anger underfoot. When the world is still again, she considers the subject of bringing Lilliana quite settled and leaves it entirely as both mares in front of her hiss and scold. Both mares take the remembrance as a stinging slight, Neverwhere only grins at the pair of them and settles her weight back casually on her left hind. The manufactured sense of peace that drifts over her tastes bitter on her tongue, forced and false, the way Lepis' searing anger had cracked in her skull at Wherewolf's birth. Her ears flick back, warding that rosy magic away.
"Yes, I am," she says quietly, turning her gaze to the buckskin mare that addresses her as Khaleesi, "and it does not seem to me that Lepis' selfishness as you call it has hurt you very dearly, Matriarch. Nothing she has done had any effect on your rise to power."
Politics. The smile turns to a sneer on her lips, baring teeth, disgusted. It always comes to that. Castile, Lepis, both bad actors because their ambitions threatened an imaginary line in the ground. The dappled queen is unimpressed with patriotism.
"It doesn't matter to me where the kingdom seat is, but don't pretend your idea is so different than hers, just because you don't want the crown yourself, just because you didn't invoke Loess."
What is the point of moving it, again and again, each time some threat strums its fingers across the Taigan shadows, each time Ghaul arrives with words of burning, each time Lilliana baits the East or Lepis rises again on the horizon with threats of indomitable peace?
"Do what you need to do to feel safe. But temporarily? Perhaps next week then it can be Taiga, and Ischia in a month What is the point of a temporary move, Eurwen? Every time you move the seat, you will cause confusion and division within the kingdom. Every time you move it, the scavengers will come. Move it once and be done."
the secret of walking on water is knowing where the rocks lie
Still not fully content, Eurwen’s dark eyes shoot from glaring at Neverwhere to Lethy when the latter claims her loyalty is not in question. To her, it had seemed very much so that it had - not for Lethia maybe, but with the silver dapple she wasn’t so sure. Izora seems to try and want to suss the situation, but it seems the bald-faced mare doesn’t quite agree with what she says. She doesn’t have to, but really, the tone isn’t something Eurwen can swallow so easily.
She does have a point though - frequent changes are no good. ”The point, Neverwhere, was to spare you the politics you obviously don’t like, so that you can focus on keeping Wherewolf safe - and perhaps Lilli and her child too, once we find them.” Eurwen’s tone is still not friendly, and a certain edge can’t be helped, but at least she isn’t so obviously enraged any more. Courtesy to the strange feeling of peace she feels. ”But you’re right. I’m done with being fearful. We’ll move it indefinitely then - Taiga and the Isle are no longer your added concern.” At this point, she starts to believe that maybe they should have agreed with Lepis - if only to help Neverwhere off an extra duty she had never wanted. So obviously hadn’t wanted that her subjects were wondering when, not if, it would blow in their faces. But no, it would have been suicide back then - Lepis would have forced both kingdoms together no doubt, whether the north and south were that compatible or not - or so the spotted mare believes. And since Lethy and Lilli proposed that her father take the lead now - well, so be it. Perhaps it was the better choice after all, ironically as it might have sounded to Eurwen the first time.
She turns away from the dappled mare, eyeing Izora Lethia. ”Anything I should tell my dad? Besides that he should go and find Lilliana?” She wasn’t about to tell him about the shared decision that she just made, without the chestnut home safely - and besides, they should all decide it together, as leaders of the lands of Nerine - Eurwen was not in the position to make the final call.
@[Izora Lethia] @[Neverwhere] We can end this one if you like or add something that she should tell Leilan (that visit will be OOC since I don’t fancy a thread with myself). She’s leaving the meeting to update him on politics and ask him to find Lilli, so anything you add in here now he will know. Perhaps he can be asked for a meeting with the territory leaders later idk.
