12-28-2017, 05:14 PM
Within the faint glimmer of light streaming through the entanglement of dried out vines, his glacier blue eyes fasten on movement that is far beyond where he stands, squinting as he peers out from beneath wisps of black forelock. He focuses intently on the shadow roving within the darkness, gladly welcoming the distraction. The sounds of demon yowls and their bated breath on his neck extinguish as his mind focuses on anything else but the raging storm that is his mind, the brokenness that lay within nowhere close to being mended. He quietly takes a few steps forward into the chill of autumn’s night, his blue mottled body glowing orange in the harvest moon. The pain in his ribcage subsides as he searches the depths of the darkness, curiously stepping out into the open air. His ears pitch forward, expecting the sound of brittle branches and plants breaking and snapping as the being crosses through the foliage, but hearing nothing except for the forlorned howl of night’s cold wind. At first he thinks it is perhaps Keeper - or someone like her, anyway - that has found the quiet of night to forage for food and other sources of nutrition, a nocturnal animal simply strolling upon his damp cave. But the silence it brings preturbs him, and for a moment his blood runs cold within his veins, his stomach coiling at the idea that something out in the forest seeks his flesh, just as the demons did. The stallion freezes, the whites of his eyes showing as he rolls them fearfully, trying to pry the form of the silent being as it maneuvers through the shadows, though he is unsuccessful. It is not until the being wished to be seen that he is able to make out its shape, and though fear traces through each delicate bone and each sinew and muscle in his body, he waits patiently for it to step into the moonlight so that the glow of the moon will illuminate the beast that shrouds itself in darkness. What stands before him is not at all what he expected, and though caution still fabricates through his very being, the surprise is easily shown in the widening of his blue eyes and the rising of his brows. She is other wordly - laced with cherry blossoms in great trunks that protrude from her neck and head, a white and pale figure of ethereality, dappled with soft greys and pinks that fade into the darkness of her legs and muzzle, her dark yet all encompassing eyes fastening on his. Yet, despite the regality and sheer awe that comes with her prowess, the fairy-like mare is just as cautious as he (if not more) and shies away to hide beneath the trunk of a massive tree, allowing the shadows of its branches to play finger-like patterns on her pearlescent coat. Balto is enthralled, his cool gaze following her as she leans shyly into the tree, demure in her expression as her eyes once again rise to meet him. ‘Hello,’ she had said to him, her voice twinkling like sea glass on the shorelines of the most pristine beaches, ‘are you real?’ Balto is still unsure why the angelic being before him still remains in his presence, a broken and shattered thing, dark and dull against the brilliant beauty that stands before him. When she asks him if he is real, as if she is confused with his presence within the forest, he tilts his head slightly and narrows his eyes in thought. Am I? he thinks to himself for a moment, the darkness of his lips tightening into a thin line as he presses them together. “I think so,” he whispers to her breathlessly, his robust voice nowhere near as musical as hers had been, and as he finishes saying it, he quietly and hesitantly takes a few steps towards her, his head lowering as he peers up at her from beneath his ebony forelock. “But I feel as though I may be dreaming.” Reality and fantasy have been melded together since his time in the caverns of the mountains, and he can never decipher what was real and what wasn’t - and even if the cherry blossomed woman before him is only a dream, it is the nicest dream he has had in an extremely long time, and he desperately hopes he does not wake up any time soon. once the king of beasts but now they feast on thoughts beneath his vacant crown. |
@[Nikoline]