02-16-2025, 09:53 PM
I L I A N A
She doesn’t live here, but the closeness she feels with the Chamber is so deeply planted that nothing can uproot it. Even if her father’s heartbeat no longer pulses beneath the soil, the stories are something that she has carried with her always, with such a vibrant clarity that they may as well be her own memories. She has always admired her father; it was difficult not to. She has witnessed the way others regarded him—the stoic, battle-worn king—and she cannot help but wonder what Beqanna must have been like in its golden age, when he ruled.
Unlike her parents, she never felt the same pull toward kingdoms or politics, but that did not stop her from haunting the lands they had once ruled. Today, she finds herself in the Chamber. It is easy to go unnoticed; silence clings to Beqanna like a shroud. Though she does not fully trust the peace, the usual tension she carries has eased. The hush that has settled over this place does not seem eager to break.
Typically she chose to be in her panther form, finding it easier to slip unnoticed that way. But lately it hadn’t mattered much, and today when she wanders the Chamber it is entirely equine, save for those blush-colored rosettes that glint when the sunlight catches them just right. The kingdom looked just as it had the last time she was here, which is somehow simultaneously frustrating and reassuring.
Then, sparks rise from the treetops. Smoke unfurls into the sky.
She stops, head tilting slightly. It seems unlikely to have started on its own. But fear does not stir within her—only curiosity, and perhaps even a small thrill. She moves toward the glow bleeding through the trees, the scent of smoke threading through the leaves, until she finds him: a stallion standing before a tree wreathed in flame.
She steps from the shadows, the firelight flickering in her rose-gold eyes. “Well,” she says, a small smile subtly softening at the corner of her lips. “You have my attention.”
Unlike her parents, she never felt the same pull toward kingdoms or politics, but that did not stop her from haunting the lands they had once ruled. Today, she finds herself in the Chamber. It is easy to go unnoticed; silence clings to Beqanna like a shroud. Though she does not fully trust the peace, the usual tension she carries has eased. The hush that has settled over this place does not seem eager to break.
Typically she chose to be in her panther form, finding it easier to slip unnoticed that way. But lately it hadn’t mattered much, and today when she wanders the Chamber it is entirely equine, save for those blush-colored rosettes that glint when the sunlight catches them just right. The kingdom looked just as it had the last time she was here, which is somehow simultaneously frustrating and reassuring.
Then, sparks rise from the treetops. Smoke unfurls into the sky.
She stops, head tilting slightly. It seems unlikely to have started on its own. But fear does not stir within her—only curiosity, and perhaps even a small thrill. She moves toward the glow bleeding through the trees, the scent of smoke threading through the leaves, until she finds him: a stallion standing before a tree wreathed in flame.
She steps from the shadows, the firelight flickering in her rose-gold eyes. “Well,” she says, a small smile subtly softening at the corner of her lips. “You have my attention.”
-- the shadow is mine, and so is the valley
@Chemdog