[open] The Sweet Sting || Ghaul, Any ||

[Wolfbane]

I believe I'd die if I only could

I sure feel strange, but it sure feels good

Didn’t matter what season it was out there. Here, in Pangea, there were only two temperatures: hellfire or below freezing darkness. If you weren’t cut out for conditions here, well then the conditions would quickly cut you out.

Bane had never really come here before. The wasteland used to be a pulsing gray area on the map when he was younger, but time seemed to have softened it into the hard makings of a strong kingdom. He admired it from the vantage point of a sinister-looking goat, one as tall as a horse but made for these conditions even if fur draped down his neck to his chest. The heat of an early Autumn day reflected off his bright, white coat, and the baked ground was as cracked as his split hooves. But the heat nor the ground it baked were of concern to Wolfbane.

No; the shapeshifter had just arrived at the southern border and was momentarily biding his time. While the seconds ticked away he kept his thoughts blank and his expression… casual. It felt hard to maintain a look of neutrality, given that his nostrils were flat and shaped like a predators, and that his forefangs were kind of jutting out over his bottom lip. Either way he tried, and the result was a mildly pissed-off looking goat… thing.

The goat-thing flicked it’s bristly tail and lifted its flat nose to the wind, huffed a few times and then stopped moving altogether as something in the distance began to materialize.

For this thread:  Sex: M  ◉  Appearance: Pissed-off Goat Thing  ◉  Mood: Indifferent

@[ghaul] short N' sweet broh

[ghaul]

GHAUL

i can take you there, but baby, you won't make it back

He often surveys his home as he drifts on warm air currents high above the ground. From up here, he can see all the familiar outlines and any strange figures approaching their borders. The nesting of his eggs has made him more eager to patrol while Clarissa incubates their brood. But flight requires every muscle of his body and he finds himself growing hungry in the blistering heat of the midday sun. A black tongue lolls from his mouth briefly as he searches the wind for any interesting scents it might carry. Sometimes he is lucky enough to catch the coral deer as they nap in the shade.

But a smell he does not recognize draws him to lower elevations where he can see each outline better. He tips his wings left and searches for anything strange as he banks toward the strange goat. Wolfbane does not smell quite like a meal, per say, and yet Ghaul finds himself drawn in just the same. The hellbeast gives one last flap of his wings to slow his landing and then he alights before the fanged creature. His scales are golden in the sun while the stars across his cheeks and talons glimmer brightly. After some consideration, he offers a curious series of clicks to test this creature’s reaction.

When Anaxarete and her aliens first arrived, he had greeted them in the same manner and they quickly reached a mutual respect. He wonders if this odd thing will be the same. Slowly, so as not to startle the stranger, he tucks his wings and draws closer. Each step leaves angry lines in the dried dirt where his talons once planted themselves. Ghaul sniffs at Wolfbane and tilts his head, but he comes to a stop roughly six feet from him.

“Do you speak?” he asks, and the question is followed by a short gibbering as he tests what form of communication might work best.

@[Wolfbane] bro close your eyes bro

[Wolfbane]

I believe I'd die if I only could

I sure feel strange, but it sure feels good

This land, Pangea - it didn't seem to belong to one particular entity but a mindset, instead. Bane, watching Ghaul approach with a measure of reverent fascination for mother Nature and her curiosities, can smell the scents on the wind here like a varying bouquet of flowers. Soft things do not dwell in Pangea. They gouge their claws into the baked clay and they make this land their home, not the other way around. And Ghaul is a product of this gouging; he is something Wolfbane considers Pangea itself to have produced.

All scales and wings and talons, magnificent in his descent toward the earth, Ghaul looked medieval and terrifying, but his initial greeting took Wolfbane by surprise. The horned stallion clicked a series of broken chitters that were senseless to Wolfbane’s ears except for their similarity to some natural creatures, as if this were a normal way to greet other equines, and only then did he speak, wondering if Wolfbane could as well. “What on this earth have they been doing here?” Wyrm wondered in his thoughts, appraising the way Ghaul seemed to tilt his head intelligently from side-to-side. “I doubt the eyes were ever necessary.” His grandsire’s thoughts almost shuddered, having seen Ghaul’s perfect flight and landing.

Wolfbane, however, was grinning. “I can say plenty.” He rasped through his forefangs, “But I best not.” He bleated, laughing softly.

He shifted casually, in case Ghaul was curious of the transition. First his teeth and mouth, then his jaw and face re-shaped, getting bigger and boxier. His ears shrank and his legs grew; the stiff goat hair shortened and hardened. He took his inspiration from the horse in front of him and Wolfbane worked, sculpting his muscles and the shape of his bones with the power of his mind, until the finished result was something similar to Ghaul, but not exact. The scales were not a dragon’s, but made of some prehistoric animal’s scales that were still ancient and armor-plated. He kept his own eyes, but left the ram’s horns curling by his cheeks for the sake of feeling their weight. The rest, aside from those damn unique galaxy markings of his, could pass for a twin.

“Call me Wolfbane if you like.” The second Ghaul shrugged, “Names are unimportant. My interests are more… aggressive.”

For this thread:  Sex: M  ◉  Appearance: Mimicking Ghaul  ◉  Mood: Indifferent

@[ghaul]

[ghaul]

GHAUL

i can take you there, but baby, you won't make it back

Ghaul has never stopped to consider why some dark magic shaped him so cruelly while the rest of his family is beautiful. But then, he has no concept of beauty and aesthetics – there is only efficiency and weakness. This body resists the heat of summer days in the sun and the inner flame keeps away the winter nights. This is all he has ever needed to know about his own shape, he thinks.

When Bane does not respond to his clicking, he finds himself mildly disappointed. Not a hunting partner, then. But he speaks, at least, and a smile forms across Ghaul’s scar tissue lips to reveal the crooked crocodilian fangs lining his mouth. His laugh echoes Wolfbane’s in a rasping tone as he draws closer, tail flicking from side to side as he examines him. His outline changes and the warmth of his skin changes until it becomes a weaker form of his own scaling. The monster sniffs curiously as he notes the difference in their scents.

When he reaches Bane’s face, he pauses briefly to admire the curled horns so much like his own. How flattering, to see what he would look like if he had eyes with which to see the world. But do those eyes see the way a body goes cold after it screams its muffled swan songs?

“Wolfbane,” he repeats in something like a delighted snarl. “I am Ghaul, unimportant as that may be.”

Many strange creatures have come to Pangea seeking their own interests and he is not surprised that this one if the same. Pangea has no laws to muzzle its inhabitants, which draws the strongest to its ranks. Still, he is delighted to meet a new face that may share in his ravenous hunger.

“We have a reputation for being aggressive. They take my displays of strength as acts of violence,” he says with a shrug of his broad shoulder. “But what interests you, Wolfbane?”

His smile fades. It’s hard to tell, but his expression grows very serious now as he watches the other carefully. Ghaul does not take kindly to dreams or wild desires that do not align with his own. He remembers the way his own blood tasted in his mouth when Sochi ripped his face open, and he wonders if a mimic would be the same. That thick black tongue traces his sharp teeth, eager to watch the next few seconds unfold.

@[Wolfbane]

[Wolfbane]

I believe I'd die if I only could

I sure feel strange, but it sure feels good

Wolfbane enjoyed giving Ghaul something to satiate his curiosity in lieu of useless clicks. Maybe the tongue action might’ve impressed the odd, semi-draconic horse, but Bane the shifter couldn’t quite justify doing something that felt… silly? As a skinwalker he’d learned thousands of new animal languages and body cues. He’d known they existed, anyone who saw a true wild animal knew that the creature interacted with its own kind in unique ways, but he never could quite grasp the depth and intricacies of them like he could now, since he could walk in their pelts. This ‘clicking’ does not register on Bane’s radar because it’s as alien to him as the creature that produces it. He doesn’t even associate it with Fiorina (who’d been a half-breed herself) because up until meeting the knife-tailed mare, Wolfbane had no idea such a thing could exist at all.

No matter. Their world and every horse in it changed as rapidly as the seasons came and went. His little tricks and costume changes amused Ghaul in the moment, and that seemed good enough for the winged sentry here in Pangea.

“Ghaul,” Wyrm’s whispery thoughts permeated Bane’s mind, repeating the name, “a truly fitting title.” Lupei and Longclaw agreed. Wolfbane tilted his head this-way and that-way, just as pleased with the inspection as his inspector was with the change. It felt refreshing to be around a true patron, and his similarly twisted lips broke apart into a tilted, toothy grin at the warmonger’s history. “They will die. You will not. These misplaced accusations of violence will be re-written in the history you make for yourself,” Bane chuckled, but the noise was more like stones rumbling, “as destiny’s chosen victor.”

He couldn’t be sure of it, but there was an intuitive 'awareness' beginning to grow in his thoughts. Almost a strange camaraderie towards the blunt, tawny male. An understanding of sorts.

“Vengeance.” Wolfbane answered Ghaul's question readily enough, and the conviction behind the one-word statement was unusually deep in its delivery - as if that single word had been delivered by four mouths instead of just one. He’d noticed that Ghaul’s creepy grin had faded, but that seriousness did little to dampen his own spirits. In fact, his smile grew wider the more he spoke. “I have many enemies who would like to see me as a caged animal, whereas I would prefer to see them repay their debts in blood. I don’t necessarily need or want Pangea’s help in this matter.” He paused, delivering the statement as neutrally as he could behind a sinister set of teeth, “but the … leverage a kingdom provides would make the path to victory, for myself, just a tad less difficult.” He explained.

As a nomad of Beqanna, Wolfbane had been stripped of the ability to ‘officially’ act in his own self-interest - he couldn’t battle like he used to, or snatch less-fortunate horses. He felt himself restrained by having no restraints at all, and Pangea (along with his new acquaintance Ghaul) had lately become the most desirable and welcoming of Kingdoms.

“Give me rank and refuge, Ghaul of Pangea, and in return my ‘services’ are yours to call upon.” The manipulator bargained, and his skin rippled faintly again as he shifted from a weak imitation of Ghaul back into the old body of the hairy goat.

For this thread:  Sex: M  ◉  Appearance: Pissed-off Goat Thing  ◉  Mood: Enlightened

@[ghaul]

[ghaul]

GHAUL

i can take you there, but baby, you won't make it back

Ghaul watches the outline of Wolfbane’s face as he speaks. Sometimes his head rotates and tilts as he considers him. The shifter does not fully grasp his plans or the divinity in his blood, but he is beginning to – like eyes adjusting to the dark. The monster does not elaborate but rather lets the other continue with his own path.

Vengeance. The word is foreign to him and yet it sounds delightful. It reminds him of things like sacrifice or penance, things he knows very well. Wolfbane refers to himself as a caged animal and a thin wisp of smoke is exhaled from the corners of Ghaul’s mouth. Others had tried to restrain or muzzle him and each of them had failed spectacularly. A deep, gravel-filled laugh rumbles from his lungs as his smile returns. Perhaps he should explain his purpose after all.

“Pangea’s purpose, my purpose is to burn this world to the ground,” he says, slowly stretching his wings wide. “Loess and Nerine will be the kindling, and I will throw the weak upon the pyre. Only the strong and the worthy will survive, just as the ashes of a forest give life to the next.”

The crooked teeth all remain bared in his smile as he shares his dream. He wonders if Wolfbane would force women and children he has never met – and perhaps some he has – to face the flame. They are all necessary sacrifices, just as Bible had been.

“You may stay within our borders. Our laws are few: never disturb our hunts and destroy the lands of anyone who seeks to capture you,” he states with a lasting grin. He recalls torching a small forest in Nerine when they had managed to lure him into their lands. The dead pines and scorched branches had made a suitable nest during his time there. A soft crooning in the distance catches his attention as his small ears perk and his head turns in the direction of the call. Ghaul lifts his chin and gives short chittering in response before turning back to Wolfbane.

“My fledglings are ready for their first hunt, so I must leave you. The only kingdom we do not harm is Tephra, but you are free to destroy all others,” he explains as he briefly admires his goat friend. He takes a few steps back and then he takes a running leap off the cliff on which they stand. With a flap of his wings, he glides off toward the pacing young dragons patiently awaiting his return to them.

@[Wolfbane] I figured we could end this here. Since this also took place prior to ghaul meeting lepis, he said both nerine and loess are a-okay to terrorize.