"But the dream, the echo, slips from him as quickly as he had found it and as consciousness comes to him (a slap and not the gentle waves of oceanic tides), it dissolves entirely. His muscles relax as the cold claims him again, as the numbness sets in, and when his grey eyes open, there’s nothing but the faint after burn of a dream often trod and never remembered." --Brigade, written by Laura
i can take you there, but baby, you won't make it back
He has been so busy nesting that he nearly forgot of the changing thrones in the south. The creature who had kept Clarissa from her true home has abdicated and left someone unknown to Ghaul in his place. Now, as his wife carefully coils herself around their brood, he decides it is time to turn his attention to more political matters. The dragon gently touches his nose to each of his warm little eggs and finally to his lover’s temple before stepping back with outstretched wings. With a single flap, he is airborne. One more and he’s watching the ground shrink beneath him.
The autumn air is crisp in his lungs and he finds himself uncomfortably cold at his soaring altitude. He gives an occasional puff of fire and allows it to roll down his sides to keep him at least a little warm. The summer days in Pangea are but a distant memory, but he tries his best not to complain so much. After all, it doesn’t take too long for the ground beneath him to turn to rolling hills and Loessian bodies. But which one is Lepis, he wonders? He huffs another small plume of fire and ash as he circles the kingdom once more.
They are each entirely foreign to him so he supposes there is only one way to find out. Ghaul tucks his wings for a quick dive, stretching out his talons to prepare for a landing. He gives a brief flap of his wings to slow his descent and then he lands with a light thud on dry soil.
It has been so long since he last ventured into Loess. He had been so small, so weak in those days that he snuck along the shadows to remain hidden. How strange it is to present himself so openly to them now, he thinks. This is no time to dwell on such fond memories, however, and so he lifts his chin to give a short call for their ruler. Ghaul manages not to be demanding or impatient, but rather gentle and curious in the cry.
“Lepis, Queen of Loess,” he begins in his rasping voice. “I am Ghaul, Heir of Pangea. I think it’s time we meet and discuss the relationship between our homes.”
He offers a smile that does not come across as kind or endearing, but what expression ever does when your grin is made of pointed fangs and scar tissue lips? Still, he folds his wings and his body language manages to convey a sense of calm. There are no tricks up his sleeve for today.
Rivulets of water run down the side of Lepis’ neck as she raises her head, the dampness of her mane the last remnant of her earlier swim. The water had been hot – almost scaldingly so – and her skin still feels somewhat tender. The dun mare had not been expecting to have to socialize this afternoon, and when she shakes her head upon rising, some of the dried salt and minerals from the spring remain encrusted in her hair. Some of her homelands red dust clings to her far wing; she can feel it tickling the bicolored feathers at her shoulder, but she doesn’t shake it off despite the temptation.
She is rather public about many of her flaws, but her vanity is not one of them.
It wouldn’t have mattered anyway, the pegasus finds.
The creature who calls out for her is eyeless, but Lepis knows better than to think of him as blind. Perhaps he cannot see from eyes like her own, but she’s raised enough children with… vision issues than to trust only what she can see. She smiles at him – perhaps politely, perhaps because she likes the way ‘Lepis, Queen of Loess sounds even when spoken in an enemy’s tongue. She settles too far from him to touch without moving again, the appropriate distance for greeting a foreign diplomat from a nation with whom one is not quite at war.
Lepis had hoped the peace that seeps unfettered from her core would deter Pangeans from setting hoof in Loess with ill intent. Straia’s gift is not one she fully understands, but there have been enough subtle changes that she is certain it affects at least some small things. Has he come to take Oceane back? She swallows down the fear of that, but it is a point of pride that she need not imbue herself with any sort of false confidence to speak without a quiver in her voice when she says:
"I hope the discussion is intended to better the relationship, else I feel it might be a short one." It is a rather bold statement, coming from a mare who lacks the fangs, horns, and scales of the significantly larger stallion. They still have Rebelle, she knows, and for all her anger she has no intention of endangering the young mare. She will be polite, but she has not made it so far in life by cowering in the face of danger.
04-29-2020, 12:50 PM (This post was last modified: 04-29-2020, 12:51 PM by ghaul.)
GHAUL
i can take you there, but baby, you won't make it back
When she approaches, he turns his head to follow her movements. He admires the way her outline glows a little brighter from her bath and he wonders just what makes her so much brighter than the others. Ghaul lifts his nose and sniffs in her direction – salt, along with something earthy and almost medicinal. A thoughtful series of clicks builds in his throat before he lowers his head once more to stare at her.
A laugh echoes from the depths of his belly when she speaks and he offers a wide grin full of sharp, crooked teeth. Though he has arrived with little violence in mind, it flatters him that she thinks he might wish to darken her door so. The looming monster closes the gap between them and circles her, examining her in an almost child-like manner as he sniffs at her wings. She smells like Pteron, who had been polite enough to simply ask that he did not eat his wings. Perhaps there is some relation but he does not dwell on the matter.
He pauses when his muzzle begins to reach for her face, remembering that not all take kindly to him learning their shape. Slowly, he pulls back. “My quarrel was with your false idol, who seems to have abdicated,” he explains as he shifts his weight. “But he is gone and Clarissa now resides with me in the east. Now I seek only to learn your intent, Lepis. Why have you claimed the throne for yourself when an heir was chosen?”
And again he smiles, eager to hear what fueled her own conquest. The stars freckling his horns and cheeks dim as his focus on her grows more intense. His black tongue traces his teeth.
Lepis knows the emotion his presence elicits in her chest, and it is not one she is fond of. It is easy to forget in their civilized world that there are dangers beyond the occasional stray bear or wolf. Ghaul reminds her of this, as does the surge of adrenaline that comes with facing down a hunter. Lepis had been able to ignore it until he violated the space she’d put between them, and as he circles, her movements become increasingly more agitated. A stamp of hooves, resettling feathers, twitching tail. Pteron had not learned his patient, polite calm from his mother, that much seems clear.
Her false idol? Castile. Clarissa must then be the white dragon that Lepis had seen him with from time to time. Ghaul’s mate, Lepis knows. It would take another monster to love the creature in front of her, Lepis thinks as the horned beast finally pulls away, or even to find him attractive. There’s nothing at all appealing about the Heir of Pangea that Lepis can see, except perhaps that were his head not exaggerated by those nauseating horns, he would be a nice height. Lepis’ type is decidedly more equine, and preferably with far less dried blood around the edges of their mouth.
Her heart has not slowed its pace, not even when he’d pulled away, but her face has retained its pleasant smile until this moment. Not that Ghaul could even see it. Her action has revealed her discomfort, but she does not let it into her voice when she answers.
“Some things are more important than an uninterrupted succession.” Lepis tells him. She does not add that she was told by Castile’s chosen messenger that she was to rule as Regent, or that Castile has lost his mind, likely gone as feral as Ghaul. (That is the thing about dragons, she thinks, they are predictably unpredictable at the very worst of times.
"I have unfinished business with a former lover." She tells him. "I need a way to trap him, and keep him until he faces justice, and ruling a kingdom gives me that power." Lepis considers adding trust to her words, not enough to seem suspicious, but just enough to cause him to sway in her favor. She doesn’t, in the end. He’s dragonkind, and monsters do not always react to her emotions the way that equines do.
"However, your kingdom’s steals have made it difficult to pursue my other goals of late." Her brows raise, and there is a bit of disappointment in her voice for those unable to see. It is past time they stopped, her tone implies; she is growing tired of them. Not that she’d ever enjoyed them in the first place, of course; there is a reason she’d ended her people’s part in it as soon as she’d taken the throne. Well, tried to end it, anyway. Castile had denied her, untrustworthy as monsters so often are.
She watches Ghaul in front of her, blue-grey eyes darting occasionally to the brightly colored talons, the ridge of thick scales along his neck, and the odd protrusions at the end of his leathery wings. Perhaps Clarissa is blind too, she thinks.
04-29-2020, 05:01 PM (This post was last modified: 04-29-2020, 05:02 PM by ghaul.)
GHAUL
i can take you there, but baby, you won't make it back
He can’t help the way his instincts respond to each nervous movement, the way his gaze grows intense and his talons paw eagerly at the soil beneath him. She is a prey animal, at the end of the day, and he will always be a predator. But she does not shy away or snap her teeth at him as others have. He can appreciate the bold face she puts on as she remains perfectly in place with her head held high. There is some strength to her worth salvaging.
“True. I was in line to inherit my father’s throne when Anaxarete demanded it,” he explains as his body language relaxes. His wings rest a little looser across his back and his claws cease their excited twitching. “But I was too young. My fire did not burn bright enough to set my enemies ablaze.”
She continues, then, and his small ears turn forward to listen closely to her intentions. His expression grows more thoughtful as his brow furrows behind those curled horns and he considers her words for a while. Initially, he does not speak as he picks the explanation apart for himself. He always intended for Pangea to be his starting point that would let him destroy the rest of this world. It never seemed like a weapon for him, but rather a place to grow until he was strong enough. But her plans interest him just the same.
“And what does facing justice mean, for him? Do you want to see him burn for what he’s done?” he asks, his large head tilting as a smile smears across his jagged mouth. The constellations across his face grow bright once more as he edges just a step closer to her. “You see, I think a great number of people deserve to turn to ash – for their weakness, for their crimes. Then, their deaths will foster a greater tomorrow. Our children will have a world built by only the worthy.”
His wings begin to stretch wide as he carries on until they cast a long shadow over her.
“Only the strong and the clever may survive. Offer your realm as kindling, and I will throw your enemies on the pyre. Lepis, pledge fealty and I will destroy even the memory of those who have wronged you.”
And then Ghaul waits, his focus trained entirely on the outline of her face.
The slowing of the creature across from her provides Lepis little comfort. His talons no longer tear into the red earth, his wings no longer hover so stiff in the air at his sides. (Her own are tense and slightly unfurled, a feathered and not-insignificant enhancement of her diminutive size). Ghaul speaks of Anaxarete and of being too young for his father’s throne. He is Litotes son, Lepis realizes, but she sees nothing of the golden lion in the monster in front of her. So he’d gotten his looks from his mother then, whoever she was. Not the Hyaline queen, Lepis thinks, but the details she might have once known have faded into the blur of the past.
They’re pushed away farther still by the creature’s questions. They’re questions she has not asked herself, but for good reason.
The right thing to do would be to allow the entirety of Beqanna to pass judgement and choose his sentence. And the only sentence he deserves – or will deserve by the time he is caught – is surely death.
Magicians cannot cure him, minds with knowledge are out of reach. The penalty for the Curse is death, and the penalty of the Curse is the soul of the executioner. That is how it’s always been. She has told Oceane that she will be the executioner, leaving death at her own hand an unspoken promise. That she fears she might fail when the time comes is a secret Lepis admits not even to herself.
As he speaks, Lepis steadies her breathing. Slowly, her jittering hooves still, and though her wings are still angled for quick flight she shifts her weight so that she is not so immediately poised to leap upward. The ease in her posture is not natural, but her mind is clear when she answers. "I have always set my own fires, Ghaul of Pangea. And I no longer have the stomach for fealty that I once did. I do not trust you to know my family from my foe, nor to be the judge of crime and weakness." Her words are firm, as is the set of her navy mouth and the flared lines of her own wings that has mirrored the dragon’s.
"But," she continues, just before the silence is too long, an artist at the skill of conversation: "Help me build the pyre for my own revenge, and in return I will not stop your blaze when it comes, or shelter the unworthy from its fires. "
i can take you there, but baby, you won't make it back
Ghaul has never stopped to wonder why he is so different from his father – a pale, handsome lion with a soft smile. Nor is he at all like his mother. Instead, some dark thread of magic twisted him cruelly into the monstrosity that he is today. This has been his shape since before he drew his first breaths, though, and he does not care enough to dwell on why anyone looks any kind of way. He is Ghaul, devourer of empires, and she is Lepis, executioner of Loess. It is for him to accept and do nothing else.
His mind revolves entirely around her vengeance, however, and he watches her wings dare to match his own. The gesture brings a smile to his face that he does not mind to bear. The meek and the cowardly disgust him and inspire his wrath, but the brave ones like her bring a warmth to his heart. In short, he thinks it is a joy to carry on conversations with her. He reserves his compliments for perhaps another day when she speaks, though.
The smile across his face dims with the corners remaining curled upward as he listens. There is no greater judge of the weak than one who has clawed his way up from weakness himself. A harsh winter had sought to end him the moment he slipped into the blood-drenched snow and yet he prevailed by the virtue of his own fire. But. But, she makes an offer, and he issues a quick series of clicks as he considers her words carefully. Loess would yield to him in the only way that mattered, it seemed. The clicking ceases and he gives a slow nod.
“I will spare that which has already burned. Tephra, the Isle, and much of Nerine will not be subject to my wrath,” he explains carefully, laying out his plan for the first time aloud. “You may take refuge there or in the East, which I will also leave untouched. My homeland does not suit the weak, and that which does find its way there is torn out, root and stem.”
And then his smile fades as his thoughts drift to his end of the bargain. His wings reach their full extent as his tail whips back and forth anxiously. Ghaul wonders what sort of prey would drive a lover to turn on her partner and take up a crown just to snuff out their life.
“Rebelle will finish out her sentence in Pangea and be returned to Loess. After, we will begin an armistice until both of our needs are satisfied,” he muses aloud, pausing briefly in case she objects. “Now tell me, who is that you desire to punish? Should I hunt them down now or wait for your signal?”
Contrary to the warming of the dragon’s heart, Lepis remains on guard, the proximity to danger making her more than wary. She is quiet as he considers her answer, and her blue-grey eyes find the edges of the stars around his horns with careful consideration.
The thought of Loess burning like the northern island is a cold spear in her heart, and yet the cool consideration in her eyes does not change, nor does her body language betray her. It is not worth the effort to extinguish through projection though, not when her attention is better used elsewhere. Losing Loess would pain her, but not so badly as the loss of her family. And her family is already in danger, hunted by a creature no less fearsome than Ghaul, and one who she fears (is that the right emotion? It must be, but it has been years since she had looked closer).
The fire that Ghaul speaks of is not an immediate danger, it seems, and so Lepis breathes a quiet sigh that reveals none of the relief she feels.
"Wolfbane," Lepis tells him, and her voice does not catch. There’s no emotion in it at all, truthfully, a common thing when she speaks of the thing that wears her husband like a second skin. "And I will let you know when I am ready." A two-for-one deal, the blue-haired woman thinks as she inhales a lungful of cool autumn air, and a far better ending to this conversation that she could have ever hoped for.
Lepis is not entirely sure how she will manage it, of course, but if there is anyone she trusts, it is Lepis. She’s the only one that can do this, after all. She’s the only one capable. And If she can use Wolfbane to rid herself of Ghaul before the dragon can burn her home down? All the better.
"And if you happen to run across Castile," she adds, sounding pensive and almost careful of how she phrases it: "I think his ashes might make for fertile soil." The pied former monarch is fireproof, Lepis knows, and while she cannot find it in her to wish him dead, the thought of a few scorch marks at (by proxy at least) her hand, almost makes her smile. "His crimes are…" - her wings have settled back at her sides, shielding the child she does not yet realize she carries - "…many."
