Gale
run away with me--
lost souls and reverie
running wild and running free
Gale does not move from where he stands in the sand when Tiercel lunges toward Eyas. He does shift his body toward them, facing them with his head turned left, but it is Erne that drops between his siblings.
The osprey is large for his kind, six feet of Islandres black wings and sharp yellow eyes. Despite the fact that it was Tiercel who had attacked, the angry hawk faces Eyas, his sharp talons stretching toward her. They snap closed just above the soft skin of her nose, impressive precision even for the predatory bird. He has been practicing with Gale, preparing for the final round of the Alliance. It’s resulted in a nest of three fat offspring too, well-fed by their father’s improved hunting, and with them in mind the bird retreats to the air overhead. He circles Gale a few times, then drops to grip the brindle’s mane where it grows above his striped haunches.
Gale doesn’t know exactly what happens when Eyas’ black eyes go blacker, but he knows that he does not like it, nor the sour way she acts for a long time afterward. Nor is he pleased with Tiercel though, a lost sibling finally arrived only to attack their sister. It is him that Gale glares at while he finishes closing the distance between them. He lifts on hind leg warningly at Eyas, but does not bother to see if she’d noticed. He doesn’t expect she’ll take heed even if she had.
“I’m not dead.” Gale tells his brother. “We can’t die, you idiot. You all just rushed right ahead and buried me without waiting to see if I’d come back ‘round again like Dad and Pteron always did!” That their eldest brother had inherited Wolfbane’s regenerative healing had been no secret, but the triplets had been young enough that none of them had ever really tested their immortality when Gale had taken his little dip into the lava.
“So, yeah, sorry that took a while, but that doesn’t mean you can blame Eyas” Here he shifts back toward Eyas, pinning her with his brilliant blue glare: “And you are going to stop doing whatever shit that is with the black eyes. It creeps me out.”
In an instant, he’s gone from peaceful and nearly asleep to standing between his bickering siblings like he was a yearling again. He’d usually been able to sort things out before their parents or siblings needed to intervene, but that had been when they were children and he won by rights of being the biggest. He’s still the biggest, he realizes, and huffs out an irritated breath at Eyas and the cold fear in the back of his stomach at the sight of her black eyes.
“Let’s try this again. Did you wash up here on accident or were you looking for something?” Atop his haunches, Erne peers at Tiercel with unflinching scrutiny, his orblike eyes never blinking. After a long moment, he cocks his head and peers out at the horizon. Gale’s blue gaze is far softer, though there is no mistaking the lines of irritation around his navy mouth. Not at Tiercel, who he is elated to see again, but at these circumstances, and at the uncomfortable sensation of knowing that Erne had sized his brother up as though he were an opponent in the Alliance.
@[Eyas] @[Tiercel]
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