06-27-2018, 09:17 PM
"Cleric," I repeat, tasting the title with genuine interest. "I like it. Certainly sounds better than captive and much less responsibility than queen." It is easier than I'd expected to mention the past so casually. The words slip from between my dark lips without hesitation, though the smile in my blue grey eyes is a half-second behind the one on my mouth. Easier, but not truly simple.
There is a glint of long teeth behind his teasing smile, and I feel a brief quiver of fear course down my spine. More alarming is the subsequent heat that follows. An effect of the season, I remind myself. Nothing to waste time fretting over. Nothing to give me a reason to trace the slope of his neck to where the muscles join with the feathered base of his wings, marveling at the contrast of brilliant blue to palomino gold. Nothing to think about too much.
He has turned away by now, giving me uninterrupted time to observe him from my position a half-pace behind. I've slipped into the position without thinking about it at all. It doesn't feel as odd as I'd expected it to - this following a stallion that is not Arthas. I'd thought it would feel strange, unfamiliar, even wrong. But the only thing I feel is happy.
I listen as he speaks, my blue-rimmed ears tilting toward him even as my gaze watches the surrounding scenery. Sell us to the highest bidder, he says. My head tilts curiously, the webbing of my striped brow wrinkling in interest. Wolfbane speaks of gifts, of power - not of bodies. I would give him either if he asked, of course, and give them willingly. But it is nice to be asked.
It makes me happy.
It's easy enough to use those gifts he speaks of. The winged stallion won't know she's doing it; such is the result of a year of constant and never-ending practice. All around them, she reaches. An intangible presence, Lepis races across the ground and through the flora, touching each particle of the world around her. (That part she is unaware of - she is only cognizant of the sensation of reaching another mind.) Into the mind of any conscious being in range, she presses the emotion of distrust.
Eavesdroppers will find themselves doubting the necessity of listening to the pair of them, and followers will doubt the path they had taken. In her own way, she is ensuring complete privacy for her confession that goes deeper than the security provided by her blue eyes, ears, and flaring nostrils.
"My mother always taught me to never use my powers for Evil," I tell him. My tone is serious, but there is a wrinkle at the corner of my eye that suggest I am only a moment away from a grin. "I could never make anyone sad or scared." Only Wofbane will feel the emotions that contradict every word I say. Those feeling-laden words are accentuated by my own method of conversation - a millisecond of heartbreaking depression and of utmost terror.
"But I'll do whatever Loess needs to be happy." That last is stronger than the others, and she does her best to make it longer lasting than the others. There is nothing in my sweet scarred face to suggest that I is anything but innocent of this emotional manipulation. The penultimate poker face, if you will. The single upside to spending six months terrified that each breath would be my last.
The manipulation of my power - far more variety at one time than I have ever attempted before - is glorious but short-lived. The securing of privacy and the rapid-fire shift between three vastly different emotions has drained me faster than I expected. My tightly held internal barriers quake and rattle, unsettled by this similarity between my own genuine emotion and the emotion I portray. In an unexpected moment of weakness I reach out and brush my muzzle against the stallion's nearby side. The humidity has beaded moisture along his golden skin, and the unexpected dampness manages to fight its way to my conscious mind.
"Oh, uh, you had a bug." The excuse sounds flimsy even to my ears, but I am sapped dry. There is no well of emotional potential behind me, ready to be formed into impressed, excited, intrigued. There is no control to the way he reacts, and it terrifies me.
@[Wolfbane]
um im sorry i wrote you a novella
There is a glint of long teeth behind his teasing smile, and I feel a brief quiver of fear course down my spine. More alarming is the subsequent heat that follows. An effect of the season, I remind myself. Nothing to waste time fretting over. Nothing to give me a reason to trace the slope of his neck to where the muscles join with the feathered base of his wings, marveling at the contrast of brilliant blue to palomino gold. Nothing to think about too much.
He has turned away by now, giving me uninterrupted time to observe him from my position a half-pace behind. I've slipped into the position without thinking about it at all. It doesn't feel as odd as I'd expected it to - this following a stallion that is not Arthas. I'd thought it would feel strange, unfamiliar, even wrong. But the only thing I feel is happy.
I listen as he speaks, my blue-rimmed ears tilting toward him even as my gaze watches the surrounding scenery. Sell us to the highest bidder, he says. My head tilts curiously, the webbing of my striped brow wrinkling in interest. Wolfbane speaks of gifts, of power - not of bodies. I would give him either if he asked, of course, and give them willingly. But it is nice to be asked.
It makes me happy.
It's easy enough to use those gifts he speaks of. The winged stallion won't know she's doing it; such is the result of a year of constant and never-ending practice. All around them, she reaches. An intangible presence, Lepis races across the ground and through the flora, touching each particle of the world around her. (That part she is unaware of - she is only cognizant of the sensation of reaching another mind.) Into the mind of any conscious being in range, she presses the emotion of distrust.
Eavesdroppers will find themselves doubting the necessity of listening to the pair of them, and followers will doubt the path they had taken. In her own way, she is ensuring complete privacy for her confession that goes deeper than the security provided by her blue eyes, ears, and flaring nostrils.
"My mother always taught me to never use my powers for Evil," I tell him. My tone is serious, but there is a wrinkle at the corner of my eye that suggest I am only a moment away from a grin. "I could never make anyone sad or scared." Only Wofbane will feel the emotions that contradict every word I say. Those feeling-laden words are accentuated by my own method of conversation - a millisecond of heartbreaking depression and of utmost terror.
"But I'll do whatever Loess needs to be happy." That last is stronger than the others, and she does her best to make it longer lasting than the others. There is nothing in my sweet scarred face to suggest that I is anything but innocent of this emotional manipulation. The penultimate poker face, if you will. The single upside to spending six months terrified that each breath would be my last.
The manipulation of my power - far more variety at one time than I have ever attempted before - is glorious but short-lived. The securing of privacy and the rapid-fire shift between three vastly different emotions has drained me faster than I expected. My tightly held internal barriers quake and rattle, unsettled by this similarity between my own genuine emotion and the emotion I portray. In an unexpected moment of weakness I reach out and brush my muzzle against the stallion's nearby side. The humidity has beaded moisture along his golden skin, and the unexpected dampness manages to fight its way to my conscious mind.
"Oh, uh, you had a bug." The excuse sounds flimsy even to my ears, but I am sapped dry. There is no well of emotional potential behind me, ready to be formed into impressed, excited, intrigued. There is no control to the way he reacts, and it terrifies me.
@[Wolfbane]
um im sorry i wrote you a novella
