this reckless wandering love was never ours; any

[sochi]

sochi

Sochi never thought that she would be the kind to settle down.

She never thought she would be the kind to find roots and let them sink into her soul—and yet. And yet. She finds that she has rarely wandered outside of Loess. She has spent her time wandering the borders of a home, looking after her children, and spending time with the dragons that keep to Loessian mountains. She has found a strange form of peace but with it comes a nagging sensation of wanderlust.

As the days pass, the bite of it becomes harsher—more acute.

She bristles against it.

She feels it every morning when she wakes and finally, this evening, she gives into it. She shifts into her tigress form and slips away from those who have come to know her best. She slinks to the border and then lunges forward, her powerful back legs sending her shooting into the dark. Her lungs ache with the sting of the winter air, but she doesn’t slow. The ground quickly becomes covered with snow and she feels the way that it crunches between the pads of her feet—the way it muffles the sound of her running.

When her nose twitches with the scent of prey, she dives into the shadows.

What happens next is more instinct than anything and she tracks the deer through the woods. She weaves and slinks—runs and then stalks in the shadows. Until she finds that she can come downwind toward the animal and is able to rush it. The adrenaline is overwhelming and the joy of life floods through her as her teeth bite into the neck of the animal and the copper pours out. Her mind nearly splits with it.

When her belly is full, the cream of her fur stained from the hunt, she turns her nose toward the depths of the forest and continues. She shifts back into her equine form, her chin red and her silvery eyes bright against the black of her winter coat and the shimmering iridescence of her blaze.

well, I can try to get you closer but I know you’d break your neck just to see the stars
and if we don’t dare to hold it then this reckless wandering love was never ours

[Lugosi]

The evening is a quiet one, song birds have all flown home to the safety of their humble nests, and the owls and other nocturnal hunters have awakened from their slumber. The creature begins to stir too, drawing icy air into his already cold lungs. He sits on high, within a bed of thickly woven branches lined with blood stained pine needles and ivory bones. His mind is still mulling over his reunion with his once dead grand dam, something strange was happening in Beqanna. Whatever it was, he would be there, waiting. Lurking in the shadows to claim the leftovers for himself.

The creature does not dwell on his thoughts for long. Hunger struck at his stomach like a sharp blade - it was feeding time. Black ears swivel atop an exposed ivory skull, red eyes seem to glow in the moonlight from within their shadowy sockets. A lovely morsel is heard stirring in the dense forest below, he can smell the deer’s blood coursing through its warm body before he sees it treading carefully through the glittering snow. His claws grip the edge of his nest, he looms, waits. Wings stretched over his head, ready to swoop down and claim his prize, but he is too late. He can smell something else lurking in the wood, but it is not until the tigress bursts forth from the shadows and mercilessly claims his breakfast, that he can see who it is.

She was impressive, and the creature feels a grin spread across the one side of his face that still held it’s skin. Barely. He falls with uneven grace on mismatched wings, one with inky black webbing, the other with complete lack of skin or muscle. Taloned feet crunch through the snow toward the tigress, with his first few steps, his tight skin rips over his left hip to expose the bone. Patchy chunks of hair are tossed with the cool breezes, though he does not feel the icy breath of winter on his skin like those who live. He would never feel it. He closes the distance between them, staring at what was to be his breakfast, then his gaze flickers to the cat’s face. A voice crackles within his throat.

”you are an impressive hunter, tiger...I guess I will have to find breakfast elsewhere, as tempting as you both are..”

A blood red tongue runs along exposed teeth, a dribble of old, black blood trickles from his maw to stain the ground beneath him. He snickers, followed by a small sputter before speaking once more.

”The name is Lugosi. And what might this mighty tigress call herself?.”

The side of his face that can show emotion smiles, the other is in a permanent grin. It’s not often he finds others this far into the forest. Though when he does, they are not usually lucky enough to return to the outside world. This was his self appointed shadowy corner of Beqanna. He is normally a solitary creature, yet he decides to be social tonight. His manners may not be that of a seasoned gentlemen, but this was a slight (and frankly not so great) attempt at charm. Rarely does he get visitors, and this time he intended to take advantage of it.

[Kindling]

She is, to say the least, disappointed.

Can no one just be a fucking horse anymore? Her bitterness lingers like the smoke after a drag from a cigarette hovering on your gums and tongue. It had been quite interesting to walk around Beqanna and realize nothing was what it used to be. How is she supposed to take over when the horses have suddenly inhaled a shit-ton of enhancement substances. How else have they grown so magnificently?

I have not been dead that long.

Wings are like assholes now, everyone has them, her unfiltered thoughts continue keeping her company while she weaves through fallen trees and dead branches. She is a pale old queen, died and re-woken by her own hatred to how she left.

No one remembered her because she didn’t leave a memorable nightmare. Kindling vanished at the most ungodly time, after her rein of terror and before she became a name again. She had the most opportunistic time to leave a taste on everyone’s mouths for years to come, and she let her flame burn out faster than a match in a black out.
She would learn this time. She has learned. Pull your grenade at the top of the mountain to cause an avalanche, not at the bottom hidden amongst the pine trees and fallen boulders.

It is through her deepened plot-like thoughts that the magnetic colour of cream and orange violently disrupts the otherwise gray-scale landscape before her, only yards ahead. She is at first hesitant, not fearful, but aware. See, our little deer has no fear anymore. Once you no longer fear death, you do not have much left to be fearful of.

However, how pitiful to come back from the dead only to be slaughtered by an over-sized kitten.

Black charcoal branches reach out to poke her as she quietly follows the predator on track. The tiger has since left her sight, but the fresh paw prints double the size of Kindling’s own left enough of a trail to wander along. Her ears are pointed forward, her head drawn down as she slowly trots the path to death.

Now, if she killed a tiger that had been prowling Beqanna’s forest for quite sometime, that would be quite the heroic effort on her part. What an easy way to find trust in the hearts of those who haven’t yet learned her. A shortcut to loyalty.

They would all eventually burn in hell. Kindling knows, she has seen it.

When will our bird ever learn there is no shortcuts in loyalty?

She stops, observing what she has stumbled upon now… What the fuck has happened in my absence. The stinging scent of blood nips at her nostrils, a perfume she had longed to wear. Above the carcass, a midnight coat with vibrant blue striping her face.

And this electric mare is not alone.

The smell of death is harsher found than the smell of blood, and he is a cursed concoction of it all. To most equines, he would be the epitome of nightmares. A devil risen again, but Kindling knows better. They all look like that, broken and beaten and a little torn up. She is no different, though clearly rising did her more justice than him. She isn’t nearly as dead appearing, though her eyes are a tad faded and her scars aren’t hidden from prying eyes. Beaten and battered surely, but in comparison to him she looks more alive than he has in decades.

“A few washes, the smell should come out” she walks from the shadowy darkness, her ghost-like coat illuminating in the soft light cast by the moon.

“My, my, what a beautiful girl. You are quite impressive, kitten,” She looks back to the midnight female, her envy for shifting still nagging at the back of her mind. “Yes, please tell us your name. Do you suit it?”

She looks back to the dead man walking, “quite the name you have. Ancient scripture inspired, I presume?”

“How rude of me,” a small laugh escapes her lips before adding, “Kindling, by the way.”

[sochi]

sochi

Sochi had not assumed that she would have company of any kind.

It was the middle of night after all, in the dead of winter, and she had not heard the breaths of many others when focused on the hunt—so imagine her surprise when she is joined by not one, but two. There is something like a flash of annoyance that crosses her features, but it’s gone before it can fully settle there, leaving her face carefully blank, the neutrality painted there in broad strokes.

She angles her head toward the first, her nose wrinkling at the scent of old blood. There is not much that she fears anymore—she has seen too much to be easily flappable—but the predator in her naturally dislikes the heavy scent of death on him. Not because she fears death so much as the fact that there is nothing to hunt when the animal is already dead. There is no challenge, no need.

“Be faster next time,” she quips lightly to his concern about needing to find breakfast elsewhere, rolling her scarred shoulder lightly. Her mouth pulls down slightly at the label of mighty tigress, but her silvery eyes quickly shift to the next to join them, feeling a bite of annoyance at how much she talks.

“Sochi,” she finally offers, if only to stop them from asking her questions. Reaching down, her rubs her chin against her leg, leaving a smear of blood against the black although it does not stand out so starkly as the tattooed crimson tiger slashes that run across her chest. She could ask more questions, she knows. She could be diplomatic or kind or simply engaging, but none of these things have ever interested her.

Instead she straightens, studying them both with an unblinking, mercurial stare. Either they would be interesting enough to capture her attention or she would leave—it was simple for her.

well, I can try to get you closer but I know you’d break your neck just to see the stars
and if we don’t dare to hold it then this reckless wandering love was never ours