05-15-2018, 11:11 PM
hold me in this wild, wild world
'cause in your warmth I forget how cold it can be
'cause in your warmth I forget how cold it can be
In some vague way, he’s expecting a Nerinian visitor of some sort. Hestia had promised a messenger or a visit herself once she had ascertained how she felt about the current status of Loess and Sylva, and Brennen’s diplomats have been returned already a while. But today dusk has already begun to fall, and high tide is well upon them; Brennen has turned away from the shores and headed inland, to where his very pregnant queen is surely settling to rest with some assortment of their almost-yearling children around her. Usually, of a quiet evening, he’d have at least one of said children tagging along with him, but this evening he is alone.
The bay stallion is not far down one wide, well-worn path when the birds overhead who have returned to their nests and roosts for the night begin to chatter excitedly at him, and he pauses to flick an ear towards their noise and when ‘stranger’ is repeated more than once, he turns back towards the shore. He’s on high alert, but only for a moment; when it is Scorch’s form that appears on the path ahead of him he relaxes, and stops to wait for her because he is on a particularly wide section of path, which seems a nice enough place to chat.
Brennen quirks a little grin at her when she speaks his name, welcome in his eyes. If he’s surprised when she steps closer than usual and presses her face into his neck and mane, Brennen doesn’t say anything. He merely widens his stance a hair to accept her weight if she chooses to lean, and he waits. When his friend steps back he studies her face intently, but still the Ischian king says nothing; patience is something he has more than mastered, and it’s rewarded as usual when she finally speaks, offering the news of Hestia. He lets his careful shutters down now, for her, and there is honest sorrow behind his gaze now.
The pegasus did not know Hestia very well, himself, but he knows what it is to live long and lose the people you care about, and he knows Hestia meant something to Scorch. “I’m sorry about Hestia,” is the simple condolence he offers, reaching out to gently touch her shoulder. “But I can’t say I’m sorry to have you standing in her stead, with darkness on the horizon.” He’d been willing to trust Hestia because Scorch vouched for her, but how much better to have Scorch herself on the Nerinian throne? It is too bad, he contemplates not for the first time, that Scorch has Hestoni; together, she and Brennen could create quite the interesting dynasty. “As for your new heir...she’s an Nerinian princess now, no?” He himself is ambivalent towards Tephra either way, but he doesn’t think Scorch would allow any who don’t show devotion towards her cause to ascend to be heir to Nerine; Wishbone must have already shown no intention to return to her homeland.
Still. Scorch offers him more reason to extend firmer hand of friendship to Warrick if opportunity permits than the simple pledge of amity which he has established with Tephra’s diplomat Wound.
Despite the grief she must still feel, Scorch is still able to find a jibe for him, and at her words he tilts his head, eyes narrowing just a hair. “Forest fires burn flash-hot and fast, but glaciers take over the world quite slowly,” he drawls, “but both are equally destructive and powerful.” This is the normal interaction that is so markedly familiar in their friendship; Scorch appreciates his dry humor and sometimes archaically formal way of speaking, and Brennen finds some measure of affection hidden in her sharp teasing. “And anyway, I did my part to ensure I had Kings I was happy to serve, quietly behind the scenes. I didn’t need to be King as long as the Kings served the Brotherhood.” They say time heals all wounds, but for Brennen, he has found that to be not the case. Some of the fallen friends he misses he still thinks of all the time, and sometimes with increasing pain rather than decreasing. Amongst his former Kings, Errant is one such; they had butted heads over a variety of minor and major things over the course of Errant’s childhood and then his two reigns, but now with his Brotherhood around him once more Brennen misses the black magician fiercely on an almost daily basis. Somehow he had never realized that he truly loved Errant, as more than just another Brother.
He can’t bring himself, with lost friends on the mind, to tease her about her age. There will be plenty of time for that when loss is not so heavy on her shoulders; or perhaps if he is too aware of her age, he shall have to find new material. “It is good you are here, because my news is not much better. Loess has taken one of the Brothers captive, and not on friendly terms, so Ischia’s relationship with them is now firmly tanked. Sylva tried to steal another of my people, and though they failed to do so, he volunteered to allow himself to be taken on the second attempt, and is serving a pretend sentence as a captive to gather information, since they expelled my diplomats without even a polite meeting.” Thinking of his grandson alone in Ischia, Brennen’s gaze goes dark and more than a little dangerous. “If they harm him, they will pay for it.”
The bay stallion is not far down one wide, well-worn path when the birds overhead who have returned to their nests and roosts for the night begin to chatter excitedly at him, and he pauses to flick an ear towards their noise and when ‘stranger’ is repeated more than once, he turns back towards the shore. He’s on high alert, but only for a moment; when it is Scorch’s form that appears on the path ahead of him he relaxes, and stops to wait for her because he is on a particularly wide section of path, which seems a nice enough place to chat.
Brennen quirks a little grin at her when she speaks his name, welcome in his eyes. If he’s surprised when she steps closer than usual and presses her face into his neck and mane, Brennen doesn’t say anything. He merely widens his stance a hair to accept her weight if she chooses to lean, and he waits. When his friend steps back he studies her face intently, but still the Ischian king says nothing; patience is something he has more than mastered, and it’s rewarded as usual when she finally speaks, offering the news of Hestia. He lets his careful shutters down now, for her, and there is honest sorrow behind his gaze now.
The pegasus did not know Hestia very well, himself, but he knows what it is to live long and lose the people you care about, and he knows Hestia meant something to Scorch. “I’m sorry about Hestia,” is the simple condolence he offers, reaching out to gently touch her shoulder. “But I can’t say I’m sorry to have you standing in her stead, with darkness on the horizon.” He’d been willing to trust Hestia because Scorch vouched for her, but how much better to have Scorch herself on the Nerinian throne? It is too bad, he contemplates not for the first time, that Scorch has Hestoni; together, she and Brennen could create quite the interesting dynasty. “As for your new heir...she’s an Nerinian princess now, no?” He himself is ambivalent towards Tephra either way, but he doesn’t think Scorch would allow any who don’t show devotion towards her cause to ascend to be heir to Nerine; Wishbone must have already shown no intention to return to her homeland.
Still. Scorch offers him more reason to extend firmer hand of friendship to Warrick if opportunity permits than the simple pledge of amity which he has established with Tephra’s diplomat Wound.
Despite the grief she must still feel, Scorch is still able to find a jibe for him, and at her words he tilts his head, eyes narrowing just a hair. “Forest fires burn flash-hot and fast, but glaciers take over the world quite slowly,” he drawls, “but both are equally destructive and powerful.” This is the normal interaction that is so markedly familiar in their friendship; Scorch appreciates his dry humor and sometimes archaically formal way of speaking, and Brennen finds some measure of affection hidden in her sharp teasing. “And anyway, I did my part to ensure I had Kings I was happy to serve, quietly behind the scenes. I didn’t need to be King as long as the Kings served the Brotherhood.” They say time heals all wounds, but for Brennen, he has found that to be not the case. Some of the fallen friends he misses he still thinks of all the time, and sometimes with increasing pain rather than decreasing. Amongst his former Kings, Errant is one such; they had butted heads over a variety of minor and major things over the course of Errant’s childhood and then his two reigns, but now with his Brotherhood around him once more Brennen misses the black magician fiercely on an almost daily basis. Somehow he had never realized that he truly loved Errant, as more than just another Brother.
He can’t bring himself, with lost friends on the mind, to tease her about her age. There will be plenty of time for that when loss is not so heavy on her shoulders; or perhaps if he is too aware of her age, he shall have to find new material. “It is good you are here, because my news is not much better. Loess has taken one of the Brothers captive, and not on friendly terms, so Ischia’s relationship with them is now firmly tanked. Sylva tried to steal another of my people, and though they failed to do so, he volunteered to allow himself to be taken on the second attempt, and is serving a pretend sentence as a captive to gather information, since they expelled my diplomats without even a polite meeting.” Thinking of his grandson alone in Ischia, Brennen’s gaze goes dark and more than a little dangerous. “If they harm him, they will pay for it.”
hold me in this wild, wild world
and in your heat I feel how cold it can get
and in your heat I feel how cold it can get
BRENNEN