"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 stallion uses his head to brush the thick foliage away from him, the broad, flat leaves slapping against him as he passes, wet with humidity and dampening his champagne and ivory skin. He wrinkles his nose, the sickly sweet smell of smoke permeating the air. The volcanic landscape seems to open up to him as if it remembers him fondly and Svedka finds himself surprisingly comfortable despite the many years he has been gone.
He is home now, beneath the blazing sun and the chorus of waves in the very near distance. Despite this, however, Svedka finds himself unsettled; he remembers vividly each moment prior to falling below the surface and the knowledge that he has missed years (once again having time taken from him), he cannot help the way his once fluid walk seems a bit more stiff.
An unusual choice for him, but Svedka remained rather secluded after his breach from beneath the world. Vastra had happened upon him quickly, and then his youngest brother. Their company was sweet and made his eyes sting with unshed tears in their reunion, but there is a sense of foreboding that still lurks somewhere deep in the pit of his chest, simmering there ominously.
Perhaps, the stallion thinks to himself as the foliage of the jungle breaks away into a sparser copse of palms, he is no longer meant for the frivolous and joyful lifestyle he had become so attached to. Maybe, just maybe, there is a dark cloud that intends to follow him forever. Halting at the treeline, where shadow and sunshine meet, Svedka looks out across the sparkling waters of Tephra with her blackened shoreline hammered by darkened, frothing waves.
In the far distance, miles away, a storm is brewing. It growls softly as thunder reverberates through the air and Svedka sighs.
06-22-2021, 03:56 PM (This post was last modified: 06-25-2021, 04:56 PM by Wishbone.)
Wishbone isn’t sure how long she would have spent in that empty meadow if it weren’t for the twins. Mazikeen had initially drawn the anger and sadness out of her, and then the stranger in the Forest. She’d spent the first weeks of sunlight staring into the soil, tracing the healed scars where the earth had split open and swallowed her brother. She’d thought that Svedka would return the way he left, but her hopefulness had quickly changed to uncontrolled anger when he didn’t crawl out of the ground.
Sickle and Malik keep her occupied, forcing her thoughts away from Svedka’s prolonged disappearance. She plays games with them, tells them of her adventures with her older brother, and sometimes they recreate the stories in creative ways. It’s easy for the twins to shift into the animals from the storytelling, and even easier for Sickle to mold herself into a daydream. With her adopted son and daughter, Wishbone’s concern for her brother often fades into the back of her mind.
The purple mare decides to go for a walk while the children are off playing. Her thoughts often swarm her when she’s finally alone, and they are not always pleasant. Her face is drawn tight as she walks on a trail that winds along the shoreline just inside the trees. The glowing golden scar across her chest prickles sharply as she thinks about the Curse, how he’d so casually come into Tephra. Her thoughts wander toward the magic entities, specifically the intruder alarm she suspects Hyaline has.
The sight of cloud-and-sky in the near distance scatters the thoughts from her mind. Wishbone feels her heart speed up, and her steps move to match it. “Svedka?” Her voice is hesitant but hopeful as she pushes through the jungle to reach her brother. Recognizing his build, even as he peers across the black shores, Wishbone whoops a sound of joy and rushes to reach him. “You’re back!”
06-30-2021, 11:37 AM (This post was last modified: 06-30-2021, 11:37 AM by Svedka.)
let my shadows prove the sunshine
In true Svedka style, he has come from the depths of the earth with a certain calmness that only speaks to how his entire life has been. It is in the past now, despite the deep ache that had pulsed in his chest whilst in the darkness, and so it is no longer something he needs to dwell on. There is a lurking feeling, however, as if something continues to cling to his soul despite emerging from the other side. The feeling itself, though, is not enough to drown him nor to give him any pause (it is not like the monster that had crawled out of him - not the same foreboding, hopeless feeling). It is why when Wishbone’s familiar voice permeates the humid air, that same easy smile finds his lips without hesitation, bringing light and laughter to his lips and reaches the sparkling cerulean of his eyes.
The patchworked stallion of white and honey, with the same flowing tendrils of flaxen and blue, sprints to meet his darker counterpart with a kick of his heels. Their embrace is rushed and clumsy, one of pure happiness. Svedka embraces her with a curve of his neck around hers, huffing gently into the dark tendrils of where her mane splits across his face. At this moment, all the aches of his scars and the idea of darkness simply dissipate into nothingness - as if it had never happened at all.
“Of course I’m back!” he replies with a friendly scoff as if he had always known he would return earth-side and to the blackened beaches of his home. He is perhaps as shocked as Wishbone at his return, for who could have predicted such a thing? The end is supposed to be the end, right? Surely, his luck will soon run out.
He chuffs into her salt-stained skin once more, a light kiss against her smooth cheek before taking a couple steps back to take her in. “I’m glad you’re still hanging around here,” he mentions with a softening of his brilliant grin, “It would have been difficult to search all of Beqanna for you.”
