10-17-2019, 07:55 PM
(This post was last modified: 11-08-2019, 08:55 PM by Eyas.)
Daylight came earlier than usual, flooding Eyas with warmth and reminding her that summer was molting into fall. It also reminded her that nearly ten months had passed since she’d been on her own, and when the new winter came around it would make a solid year since Eyas had last seen Taiga. Now she stood in the Forest, blinking into the early sunlight, happy to see a new sun rise. It meant she’d made it another twelve hours without sleeping, which would make... twenty-four consecutive hours since she’d last had a vision.
To some, twenty-four hours without their magic might’ve been unendurable anguish. For Eyas it meant a brief moments respite. No sudden changes, no violent scenes of someone else’s past life, just one day fading into the next. She breathed a hard, gusty sigh and stretched her sore wings out from where they’d been folded through the chilly night. Where would she go from here? The bare months were on the way, and her coat was matted in heavy clumps - disguising thin ribs and bony hips.
I really should scavenge... the slender mare considered, especially if she wanted to continue evading Taiga and her parents. Her faded brown-and-black legs shifted, disturbing the already dry leaves underhoof with a faint crackling sound. If it was food she wanted, she couldn’t stay here in a small clearing, hiding out underneath the bent limbs of an ancient magnolia tree. She would have to leave the safety of these woods and head for greener pastures, literally.
At the first step, anxiety hit her.
What if I fall asleep, the insecure parts of her started showing their faces, or what if I see something while I’m trying to walk?
She remembered her earlier tumble into the river a few weeks ago and realized that event could’ve played out much, much worse. Eyas paused, completely still and exposed in the light beaming through so many brown trunks, feeling her heart drop through her chest and onto the ground when a sensation of being followed itched the back of her skull. Doe-like, her head twisted at the cheek while on either side of her forelock two black-tinted ears searched the woods.
You could look for them, She thought temptingly, just open your third eye and prod for someone’s vision. You did it with Lethy…
“NO.” Eyas answered her own thoughts loudly, disturbing the quiet peace. A few birds squawked indignantly at her and took flight, rustling to cover up the pegasus mare’s deep swallow. Stupid, stupid idiot…
She sighed.
@ Bruja
He'd roamed the forest most of the summer, only now thinking of more permanent shelter as russet leaves began to carpet the earth. To become civil once more instead of the wildling he'd allowed himself to be.
As hidden as his pale opalescence allowed him to be, the dragon stalked through brittle trees in search of food. Grasses that could certainly fill his hunger still existed, but in the early autumn chill, a taste for blood seemed more appropriate. This was what brought him to the edge of the forest, where desperation and fear hung heavy on the air.
An injured deer was his first thought, something nearing the end of its life anyway. A creature too weak to survive the winter. It would be a mercy killing, one that would result in a full belly and an easy mind. The scent, once caught, was simple enough to track. It lead him to a massive tree, still thick with evergreen leaves. The scent hung thick here.
Like a cat waiting at some small creature's burrow, he dropped to his belly in wait of his prey. The shrubbery still held on to most of its leaves so early in the season, allowing him cover. Every sense was focussed on the tree that he was certain his quarry hid by. A stumbling rustle put him on edge, every muscle tight in preparation. This anticipation was the lithe drake's most enjoyed aspect of the hunt. The moment right before the charge.
The moment never birthed its rightful outcome. A figure emerged from hiding, as the white- blue beast exploded from good cover, only to come to a tripping halt as he understood what he was seeing. No half dead deer stood before him, though the he'd not been so far off. Instead it was a little mare, skin and bone and radiating fear who shrilled at the air before he was even within sight.
She was as sorry a creature as he'd ever seen. Every ragged inch of her spoke of a long hunting, of nervous energy and not enough rest. Her eyes... As he approached, scales rustling through crisp leaves, he could see a haunted gleam. It was a look his mother got some times, when the nightmares harried her worse than usual. The look of someone not quite here and not quite gone.
Mid stride he shifted, until he looked more horse than beast, albeit scaled and ridged. His eyes maintained their hot glow as his hunger faded with concern. "Who are you shouting at?" His voice rumbled, but kept low. The fragile girl seemed one good scare away from keeling over. He'd hate to be one to do it.
@[Eyes]
The heavy, rustling hoofsteps of the mysterious stallion followed Eyas’ twisting ears when she first turned to look at him approach. He crept from the shadows, languid and covered with scales that winked in the long rays of the morning sun. Feral, she thought of him, her off-putting eyes latching onto the way his expression kept its earlier edge. He may be questioning her softly now, but she had no doubt of his intentions before coming across her. The Forest whispered around them both, branches and leaves rustling while the faint twitter of unseen birds filled the silence between his query and the slender pegasus’ reply.
“Myself.” She answered finally, seeing no reason not to be honest. “Apparently I can’t be trusted.” The ragged nomad huffed, her mouth threatening to smile.
She might be half delirious from lack of sleep, half starving from months spent on Icicle Isle, and the ugliest creature inhabiting these woods but in moments of clarity like these she could still laugh at herself. Had she not, Eyas might’ve suddenly burst into exhausted tears. “I didn’t mean to scare away … breakfast.” She guessed, crossing her legs over one another in order to face the rogue male more directly. The way she said it made the blatant observation sound almost casual, though taking a better look at him anyone could guess.
He was draconic, with a creamy-opalescent coat and leathery wings. Behind his legs where a normal equid tail might’ve been a lizard’s tail sprouted instead, tufted near the tip. Eyas peered from underneath her overgrown forelock, now just a thick mat of hair and burrs, and felt no initial reason for panic. Nevermind that she’d been on the menu originally. This was Beqanna after all: what was a trip through the wilderness without coming across a dragon or two?
“Is this your neck of the woods?” Eyas wondered, glancing around.
@[Santana]
As the ragged girl spoke, Tana found himself pondering what circumstances might have lead her here. He could see no evidence of broken bones or infection, no outward signs of injury that may have stranded the little pegasus here. If it was by intention that she was here on her own, she seemed to have underestimated the work required to survive without allies.
He blinked impassively as she spoke, seeming to recover somewhat now that he was in the open. The half-frantic sound of her laughter made him tip his ears, uncertain at the pitch of her mirth. Whatever was funny, the frost tinged stallion seemed to have missed it.
After a moment, he realized the staccato patter of her words were done for the meantime. He didn't mind listening, she seemed to need the interaction quite badly. But it had clearly come to his turn in the conversation. A toothy smile tipped up the corners of his mouth as he spoke.
"You could say that. They're mine while I walk in them, anyway. Thinking of moving on soon, before the cold sets in. Have you got any place to go to before then?" The smoky rasp of his voice fell like velvet on the air, soft and encompassing. Her first words, the suggestion that she couldn't be trusted, played at the forefront of his mind.
How rare was it that someone could admit that about themselves. So rare, in fact, that he figured it likely wasn't true. Those who claimed goodness to any and all who would listen didn't tend to live up to the claim. Just as those who denied any good in themselves seemed more likely to be genuinely good souls. Going by that paradox, he figured she was probably one of the better sorts that roamed the land these days. Skittish, hungry and worn, but not intrinsicly malicious.
He nodded in the direction she'd seemingly been going prior his own approach. The full scent of late season herbage filtered from there, and while it wasn't the meat he'd originally been after, it would still do. More to the point, it would do much more for this waif he'd come across. He was hungry. She was starving.
"Deer will keep. There's pasture down there, if you'd like to join me." He hesitated before making an additional offer. "If you need help, protection, there are few who would choose to cross me. I would be willing to accompany you wherever you need to go to be safe." He shuffled his wings, unsure how his suggestion would be received. Only that he didn't feel right to leave her alone. He had stopped when he'd seen his quarry to be a horse. There were many who would not hesitate to take advantage of a singular mare who seemed to lack the strength to defend herself.
@[Eyas]
Hmm, she enjoyed the way his mind worked like a predators too. He told Eyas that these trees and subtle valleys were his, so long as he stalked among them. Hearing such a thing caused Eyas wispy smile to grow; the birds of the sky and the creatures of the earth had seen his like and others like him for years now, coming and going while hunting these woods. The Forest served a purpose in many ways and still managed to replenish herself yearly, finding a natural order. Were Santana not around to keep the wildlife in check, they would spill into the kingdoms and push other creatures or plants to extinction.
His claimance is what makes her smile; this large plot of unnamed earth is his personal alcove. She’s nothing more than a passing visitor. Best he keeps thinking that.
“You could say I’m open to suggestions.” The haggard-looking mare laughed, almost surprising herself at the sound. The woodland dragon nodded off in one direction, unaware that he’d brought out something in her that Icicle Isle and the bitter winter months of the previous year had taken away. That laugh sounded a bit more level-headed than the first one, making her dark eyes sparkle with some inside joke. “Well…” She started, the word and her quick burst of happiness fading out before ‘Tana began speaking again.
“That’s very kind of you.” Eyas spoke gently, a stiff breeze rippling through her matted tail. “Considering we’ve only just met.”
A pause: Eyas quickly considered the advantages to having a dragon-kin accompany her wherever she chose to go, then she contemplated the danger of having him around at all. Too risky? She wondered. But this was no colt or youngling, no green-thumb out in the Forest. He’s a stallion grown, able to decide for himself… so let him decide.
“You’re taking a chance on chivalry, sir.” The scrawny hen pegasus told him, sighing with a tired smile before she adjusted her stance and turned to look in the direction of a promised pasture. “Protecting someone like me could come at a heavy price. Or it could reap an unknown reward… I can’t promise either. Your honor would be like a bond, or a gateway for me.”
She lifted a hoof and stretched it out, let it fall again into the carpet of dry leaves and felt satisfied at the crunching sounds. “Who knows where my journey could lead me?” The fuzzy buckskin whispered. She glanced back at Santana, admiring the traits in him that were so lost on others. “Still interested in being a white knight?”
@[Santana]
She was baffling, this forest-dwelling girl. Much as she looked half starved and more than half mad, she was following their conversation easily enough. His brow raised curiously at her phrasing. It was something he might have taken as an opening in other circumstances, but this creature seemed to be thinking along entirely different paths.
He shrugged as she mulled over his offer, houghing out a sulfurous gust of air. "What's a bite to eat between strangers?" It wasn't like horses only ever grazed aside bosom friends. Not in open places like these. Out here one took companionship when it was offered, if only for a little while. You never knew when your path would be crossed again.
She seemed to put a lot into what had been a lightly spoken suggestion. He'd had no ideas of nobility when he'd said he'd travel with her, only the impulse to defend that which was defenseless. He'd always liked small things, and felt that soft and vulnerable creatures shouldn't have to change their natures just to survive. That it was his responsibility as a sharper, harder beast to protect them. And maybe she was neither soft nor vulnerable, but he had spoken anyway. Just in case.
He knew these things about himself, yet still felt heat rise in his face to have them acknowledged out loud. He rumbled somewhere deep in his chest, a sound far more dragon than horse. "You give me too much credit." His own feet shifted noisily in the leaf fall. "I'm not looking for trouble or reward, just want to get you where you'll be looked after properly. I don't want to return here only to find your corpse half frozen under a tree come spring."
His words were gruff, intentionally so. She had ideas of nobility and grandeur. His train of thought seemed much more practical. She was really in no condition to be traveling on her own, not when it looked like a good stiff wind would be all it took to blow her away. And yet she seemed insistent on venturing even further into parts unknown. What was that nonsense about his honor being her bond or gateway? He shook his head at the idea.
His multicolored gaze fixed her in it's softly glowing power. "If you aren't going to talk sense, I'm going to carry you to Loess and keep you there until you've eaten a decent meal and had a good sleep. Until you look like a horse again, not some sad, wind swept pheasant." He meant it, too. Tana was no gentleman, not really. He was not above snatching the woman up in his claws like an eagle with a fish and dropping her someplace warm for the coming winter. Not if it meant she'd survive it.
@[Eyas]
11-08-2019, 09:41 PM
(This post was last modified: 11-08-2019, 09:42 PM by Eyas.)
It struck her suddenly how naive the world outside her childhood nest could be, now that Eyas was seeing through the veil. Satana was so sure of himself and also of Eyas’ place in this world: he was a male escorting a female, they were going to get a bite to eat (hah, take that Set) and what more was there? With her black eyes trained steadily upon the draconic stallion, Eyas settled patiently underneath the loveable lashing of his tongue and remarked to herself on the wonders of a narrow mind like Tana’s. For him everything comes so easily, she had to remind herself lest her patience and genteel humor wore off, he’s so used to living life by his rules that he never considers I am the one who breaks them.
She’d given him fair enough warning, said warning rolled right off his scaled hide like most attacks would. She’d tried her best to explain but no explanation would make it past his thick skull and if did, the bony pegasus mare doubted he would take it to heart.
They move on from pleasantries - had she offended him? Good - and dive past formalities. The harder Santana’s tone got, the more still and calm Eyas seemed to grow. “You mistake me sir,” came her first response, carefully spoken through closed teeth until it became a soft hiss, “for someone who gives a shit.” The quiet little mare remarked, angling her head and quirking her mouth into a soft grin.
Her knobbed knees bent and led her closer to where he waited. “Let me give you a more direct edict, since polite conversation seems beneath you.” There inside her tone wavered an unspoken threat; she held the look he gave her and returned it with one that began to gleam dangerously. Gently, she made the connection and let her manipulation wash over him - that peaceful wave of white serenity, a moment where he would feel like all train of thought was lost. “You won’t be taking me anywhere.” She told him casually while the trees around them suddenly burst into life, breaking apart into countless blackbirds that fluttered apart from each other soundlessly, leaving the forest around them bare and completely exposed.
They appeared to be alone now, the two of them, facing off in a barren wasteland that had once been Beqanna.
“And I’m not some windswept pheasant.” The caked and matted fur fell away, revealing a gleaming mare colored like bone and etched with ebony markings. She flared her wings above her head, but all the while her concentration remained and the blackness of her eyes began to leak out into the white sclera, pooling like dangerous ink until it blotted out everything. Something deep within her shifted and woke, pushed on by her anger while it grasped hungrily for Santana’s soul.
“My name is Eyas.” Her lowered voice echoed around them in the emptiness, and if ‘Tana made to move away now he would find that task incredibly hard. Her own limbs felt lighter somehow, as if she floated in the air.
“You’d do well to remember that, little lizard.” Her words came out like tempered iron and the willpower she imposed upon Santana should’ve been a very physical, very uncomfortable thing. No soul enjoys losing it’s independence, but Eyas fought dirty and clutched even harder to what life force she could find in him until, exhaling, she released and withdrew back into her own skin.
Panting yet grinning through a clenched jaw, Eyas trembled at what she’d awoken. New power, the black rim of light just like Heartfire’s bright blue, and it was there inside of her for the taking if she wanted. “Now where were we? You mentioned a meal?” The mare blinked, her eyes returning to their previous state of normalcy and the horrible, matted fur growing in again... just like the Forest that immediately came back into view around them.
@[Santana] let me know if this is terrible
► Powerplay Me : Powers (any)
The first scent of danger came too late. He should have known better, he really should. But just as it did with his mother, the change in temper came on with little outward warning. One moment he was about ready to lift up the slight girl, to haul her someplace safer than this. The next, he realized that perhaps the danger wasn't quite what he thought it was.
There was not much that scared the dragon. Santana was scared by a bit more, and women who turned on him made the list. He took a step back, too little too late. The great beast who shared his body reared its head, observed with wary concentration as Santana recoiled from her biting tone. His mind slipped, tripped into her grasp. The beast within snarled at the invasion, a low earth-quakimg rumble as it felt the bonds Santana had worked so hard to place weaken.
Santana watched in sullen silence as her power gripped him, spun his mind into her own. The creature she revealed herself as was beautiful in the way that vipers were. A predator as surely as the dragon itself was. She plunged sharp nailed claws into the very core of his being, the soft white ghost of him. It would have been effective, if she had done it properly. He could not speak in this state, could hardly breath. It was the feeling of being stretched and crushed simultaneously.
She spoke, ringing in his head and drowning out any other thought but the ones she placed on him.
Enough!
Eyas clutched Santana's soul. The dragon reared, triumphant. Minds fought in their own way, and none were any the wiser as his body threw off the contained shape of the stallion. Scaled, clawed, fire and ice, the dragon rose to the front of him, took over more thoroughly than it ever had before. Why not, when there was no other voice to rein it in?
They returned. Or tried to. When Eyas released the illusion on Tana's mind, it was not a horse who stood in the field. A gleaming drake had taken his place, grinning toothily at the pegasus mare where she stood.
Little Eyas. He called you pheasant? How appropriate.
Clawed feet gouged the earth as he slunk forward, no trace of the stallion remaining in his glowing eyes. His hot breath lifted stringy tendrils of her mane, one claw lifted to stroke her hollow cheek. It trailed down her neck, parting her coat with a razor's edge only to settle at the base of her throat in a loose grip.
I suppose I should thank you. As reward for releasing me, I'll give you a head start. Fly away little pheasant, or be my next meal.
The voice was not Santana's. It was the sound of rockslides and crackling embers that only happened to form words. There was no soul behind them, only slavering, mindless hunger. The great beast was freed.
@[Eyas]
Well well, the young mare thinks, blinking in the sight of what’s left crouching before her. Had she not already given him the manifestation of a good spanking with her powers, Eyas might’ve been more surprised to see a dragon’s thorny paw reaching out toward her exposed neck. But she knew of his abilities, had felt them as she brushed her own magic overtop the delectable shape of his soul. If she were stronger the dragon wouldn’t have broken through but ‘Tana is her first (how special of him!) Her first to try and possess. She’d expected nothing to happen but this is certainly more than she bargained for.
Still, even with his gleaming rows of ancient teeth and the rancid stench of sulfur on his breath, the weak pegasus hen refuses to tremble or break under the captivating allure of her enemies eyes. “How amusing.” She sounded bored, tilting her head underneath the pressure of Santana’s grip. He no longer threatened Eyas but Sabra; where the one mare had been the other took her place, eyeing her son with disbelief and a constant sadness. A wound bloomed over her shoulder, ripping open silently, pouring forth dark streams of crimson blood. “You would hurt me again? Have you learned nothing?” The bluish horse accused him, as real to the touch as anything he could see.
In her thoughts, Eyas convinced herself to remain steady and focused. He’s still unpracticed, she told herself, aware of his father’s blood and the similarities of their mythical shape-shifting. Santana will tire out, he has to, just keep him going, she gritted her teeth, barely able to keep from shaking anymore. She was exhausted, starving. ‘Tana’s claws seemed to cut the wind out of her throat.
“Kill me then,” Sabra’s expression shattered into a stream of anguished tears, “break my heart again.”
@[Santana]
► Powerplay Me : Powers (any)
The dragon's mouth twisted into a jagged grin as the pathetic little creature threw her tricks at him again. He could smell the tang of her fear rolling from the bony frame, delicious. His eyes did not care what shape she took, the heat signature remained the same. A thin little mare, more bone than flesh. Almost to small to be bothered with.
Her illusions drew blood on the skin of the mare she portrayed, but the scent of iron was absent. Another falsehood. His paw tightened around the delicate curve of her throat, a rumble of dark laughter filling the air.
You should have taken my offer, little liar
He could feel her blood throbbing within his grip. It was a strong, pulsing thing, at odds with the weak appearance of the mind bender it fed. He wanted to taste it.
Snake fast, the dragon lunged. The primordial teeth that lined his maw sank into the shoulders of the winged mare, slicing into what little muscle was there with hunger. Her pleading voice had been nothing more than the squeals of a trapped animal to him, serving only to increase the prey drive within. His teeth scraped against bone, salty-warm blood spilling onto his tongue. A little more pressure and the bones would snap as easily as brittle twigs beneath his feet.
To tear her head from the shoulders would be a simple action. A quick, vicious jerking from his current grip while the claws at his feet held the body in place. Easy, so easy. And yet the dragon found he could not make that final motion that would end the life of the creature he held. He snarled, disgusted with the remnants of mercy Santana had ingrained on their shared brain.
There was a jolting movement, but it was not to part the neck from the shoulders, or the wings from their sockets. It was the thrusting of a blood stained form, thrown forcefully away. Blood stained the white of his reptilian snout as the dragon's fiery eyes burned into her where she landed.
Consider this a reprieve, pheasant. Pray we do not meet again
Half word, half rockslide, his speech was brief before the broad wings snapped out. As proud as the blue-tinted mare's own illusionary display had been, his matched it. Better, it was real. Let this not be a sight she would soon forget. He was beautiful and terrible. He was gone. The aftermath lay bleeding in his wake.
@[Eyas]
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