IT'S NOT POWER THAT MAKES YOU THE STRONGEST
Nikkai was a Falls creature to the bone, and Prague had been an Amazon, transplanted however temporarily into the Falls. It had been a rocky start, because the reason for her transplant had stolen Nikkai’s throne, and the warrior-queen had no love for Texas, her conqueror, and she had wanted to dislike his gray consort just as much. For all of her good traits, she is (was?) a creature prone to a less-than-sunny disposition, and she absolutely holds a grudge; but somehow time had mellowed her to the other mare and then it had turned into a friendship that she valued quite highly.
At least, she has often thought in the many years since, Texas hadn’t pushed her off a cliff. She still maintains that he is a coward, and a general asshole, but he wasn’t a murderer harbored in their midst by someone Nikkai had warned again and again, like the other asshole who had pushed her off her beloved waterfall.
“Death,” she confirms when she’s caught her breath again, emotions ebbing to leave her room to breathe and form coherent thoughts again. “Was not an experience I was exactly in a rush to have,” she forms the sentence slowly, the words falling off of her tongue in a dry sort of way that just screams ‘Is anyone?’, “But after like, the initial dying bit it was fine I guess.” What else to say? ‘I spent decades doing fucking nothing useful stuck over there and wanted to kill myself again to get away from it until it became the new normal and just as I accepted it, here I am’ seems a little dark for the reunion conversation.
The knowledge Prague seeks is the puzzle Nikkai has been trying to solve as well. She’s trying to decide how to even explain what she does know, but the sound of something dropping from a nearby tree makes her pivot, reacting to the threat physically by preparing to flee – or more likely in her case, to fight – the good old non-magic old fashioned way that had always been in her skill set. Her muscles nearly quiver with tension as the black cat creeps close, and becomes a horse in one smooth motion. The cat-mare speaks of the things that had happened here, things Nikkai had watched from afar as she kept track of her family. She remembers the event Naga speaks of – it had been the beginning, of the grulla’s acceptance of death. When there was no more Waterfall, there was no more need to return to it.
Still uncertain of the stranger, Nikkai blows out a jittery breath and sidles slightly closer to Prague, a more-than-casually-wary eye on the black mare. “Someone was messing with things they shouldn’t have been,” She says, lashing her dark tail back and forth across her own hocks and haunches. “They weakened the veil between life and death by going back and forth too many times, and then someone on the dead size tore a huge hole in what was left. Anyone can come out of death now.” She can feel it, the torn-to-shreds veil. It pulses alongside the magic she doesn’t know how to use. It makes her itchy, and she shakes her head and adds darkly, “Some of those who have crossed back over probably should have stayed dead.”
At least, she has often thought in the many years since, Texas hadn’t pushed her off a cliff. She still maintains that he is a coward, and a general asshole, but he wasn’t a murderer harbored in their midst by someone Nikkai had warned again and again, like the other asshole who had pushed her off her beloved waterfall.
“Death,” she confirms when she’s caught her breath again, emotions ebbing to leave her room to breathe and form coherent thoughts again. “Was not an experience I was exactly in a rush to have,” she forms the sentence slowly, the words falling off of her tongue in a dry sort of way that just screams ‘Is anyone?’, “But after like, the initial dying bit it was fine I guess.” What else to say? ‘I spent decades doing fucking nothing useful stuck over there and wanted to kill myself again to get away from it until it became the new normal and just as I accepted it, here I am’ seems a little dark for the reunion conversation.
The knowledge Prague seeks is the puzzle Nikkai has been trying to solve as well. She’s trying to decide how to even explain what she does know, but the sound of something dropping from a nearby tree makes her pivot, reacting to the threat physically by preparing to flee – or more likely in her case, to fight – the good old non-magic old fashioned way that had always been in her skill set. Her muscles nearly quiver with tension as the black cat creeps close, and becomes a horse in one smooth motion. The cat-mare speaks of the things that had happened here, things Nikkai had watched from afar as she kept track of her family. She remembers the event Naga speaks of – it had been the beginning, of the grulla’s acceptance of death. When there was no more Waterfall, there was no more need to return to it.
Still uncertain of the stranger, Nikkai blows out a jittery breath and sidles slightly closer to Prague, a more-than-casually-wary eye on the black mare. “Someone was messing with things they shouldn’t have been,” She says, lashing her dark tail back and forth across her own hocks and haunches. “They weakened the veil between life and death by going back and forth too many times, and then someone on the dead size tore a huge hole in what was left. Anyone can come out of death now.” She can feel it, the torn-to-shreds veil. It pulses alongside the magic she doesn’t know how to use. It makes her itchy, and she shakes her head and adds darkly, “Some of those who have crossed back over probably should have stayed dead.”
Nikkai
@[prague] @[Naga]