"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
11-15-2020, 10:05 PM (This post was last modified: 11-15-2020, 10:10 PM by Nashua.)
stars when you shine, you know how i feel oh freedom is mine
The winter wind blows bitter and cold on the Isle so it makes Nash's decision where he goes that much easier: South, where it is much warmer. He could make another trip to Taiga but he thinks that Noel might clip his wings if he asks any more questions about their upcoming arrival. (If he asks if she is doing alright, if there is anything he can do, anything more he should be doing. If there is more than one. If there are two, well, that would be fine. He knows that he will love them. He already adores them as he does their mother.)
But (the doubt chimes in his mind like a bell).
But-
it creeps up his spine like the brisk arctic air chills against it as he flies over a churning, iron-colored sea.
This is a rather idiotic stunt. It's a time of year that always makes the weather more volatile. All it takes is a sudden squall and a pegasus can get swept around and away with a rogue wind. Coming from the North, the sea spray could freeze the moment it hit the air. Weighing down fatigued wings could be another reason why so many seasoned flyers went missing during the winter months. All unnerving, uneasy thoughts for such a lengthy trip.
Nashua decides to turn his impromptu journey into a purposeful one. (Leilan had been encouraging him to make a diplomatic trip.) He glides and takes advantage of a tailwind that pushes him further south. Islandres drifts into his thoughts as the striped stallion flies over it but the destination he has in mind is a place he hasn't seen since he was a young colt. Banking to the left, Nashua spirals down to land on the pristine white sand of Ischia. He walked along and shook out his brown feathers, banishing the brine and frost that he imagined was still there.
"Hello?" Nashua called out, coming to stop near one end of the beach. The sound of the surf filled his copper ears and Nash turned his blazed face to look at the eerily quiet jungle that seemed to wait in the background. Would Aquaria remember him? "My name is Nashua and I come seeking Aquaria, Dame of Ischia." The young pegasus states, just in case there were watching eyes and ears in the jungle before him or below the waves that crashed behind him.
Torrent was a spirited colt. He enjoyed surfing the waves when they grew large on the south side of the island, breaking over the reefs that ringed the place. It was a thrill like no other to swim beneath the building breaker, to wait and wait for the perfect moment to leap from the white foamy crest. It felt like a competition, making it back to shore when it seemed like nature was hellbent on dragging him down.
It was a big one. Almost too big, if he was being honest with himself. What kind of yearling would be be though if he actually listened to caution? No, instead shoved down the niggling little voice in the back of his head that sounded an awful lot like his mother. Rolled once, and let the wave pick him up.
It was a fast trip once that happened. Scary fast. The wave was a monster, ten feet tall at least, and it rolled toward the beach like an angry god. Torrent held on as long as he could. The water was like the thinnest sheet of rippled glass before his face, showing the world in a snapshot of sunlit perfection before he felt the water shift around him. The crest was breaking. It was now or never. With a Herculean thrust of his tail, the hippocamp surged from the rolling wave as it crashed around him, white foam and blue water as far as the eye could see.
For one glorious moment, he was airborne. A creature of sky and sea and everything in between. Then reality took over with little fanfare and less grace, as he smacked the surface of the water again and spun beneath the next coming wave.
He'd seen something while he'd been above the surface. A figure on the beach. Woozily, he decided that it was probably time he was done anyway. His entire underbelly stung with the impact, and the waves just kept on coming. Halfway under his own power and halfway just letting the water do its thing, he made it back to shore, looking for the stranger as he neared.
With a nicker, he pulled himself onto the sand. It wasn't an elegant thing to watch. Somewhere between a whale beaching itself and the blubbery land strike of a seal. Still, the was no helping it until he dried. It worked. Belly on the ground, long fluked tail behind and forehand propped up on his equine legs, the buckskin yearling blinked quizzicaly up at the new face.
11-27-2020, 10:30 AM (This post was last modified: 11-27-2020, 10:46 AM by Nashua.)
stars when you shine, you know how i feel oh freedom is mine
Ischia doesn't disappoint.
Nashua stood on the beach, waiting patiently to be approached by one of the locals as Leilan had instructed. But the chestnut pegasus keeps looking around, unable to prevent the fascination that overtakes his pale face. There is so much to see: from the lush jungle to the sweet tropical scents dancing on the breeze, from the crystalline ocean that just keeps pushing waves towards the shore to various seashells dotting the sand.
It was nothing like the Isle. Nothing like their grey tumultuous seas or their isolated landscape. Nothing like their jagged still-scorch-marked coast or the still-recovering flora and fauna. Nashua lost himself for a moment, noting the differences between the two lands and recalling his first visit to Ischia. What had ever happened to Velkan? And Eugene and Egwene? Did they still live here?
He is glancing out over the water when something first draws his green eyes. They narrow trying to make out the aquatic that leaps out over a rather impressive wave. The sunlight glistening over the water makes it hard for Nash to interpret what he sees at first - probably just another finned creature that claims the depths of the mysterious sea home. His brow furrows, trying to see if he could spot it again.
The (seal? dolphin? walrus? porpoise?) doesn't make a repeat showing. At least, not where he looks out. Pulling itself towards him and then somehow stopping below his hooves. Nashua blinks and then lifts his head while taking a step back. There was a tail where his hindquarters should but the front end of the dunskin colt was definitely equid, the back-half was another question entirely. There was something about his face though - something familiar - that Nash couldn't quite place.
Pulling his wings up, Nashua studies the colt before the brief shock (as he still looks at the tail, the teeth) is overcome by a warm yet impish smile.
"I come on a top-secret mission from the Isle," he says, finally lowering his blazed face a little so that the boy could better hear him. Pricking his ears forward, Nashua then vanishes fully from sight and flickers back into view, still holding that wildfire grin, "can I trust you?"
and since you’re the only one that matters,---------------- ----------------tell me: who do i run to?
Torrent is old enough that Aquaria lets him out of her sight more often than not, but Pteron is over-attentive to a fault. He watches the golden colt from a vantage point just inside the trees. His original purpose had been just to make sure the boy was safe in these high waves, but he ends up simply admiring the nereid as he masters the sea with nothing more than the strength of his own body. It is hard to believe sometimes that he has contributed to creatures as marvelous as his children, and Pteron is eager to praise the boy’s feats when he sees Torrent coming into shore.
The reason for that becomes clear as soon as Pteron steps onto the beach. The chestnut stallion had been hidden from Pteron by greenery, and he looks to have recently landed. That he does not rush closer to protect Torrent is indicative of his own personal growth as much as his trust in the boy, and he arrives just as the winged stranger bends down to whisper conspiratorially to the finned yearling.
When the pegasus disappears into nothingness, Pteron pauses mid-step. He has not met this man, but he knows in that instant who he must be. Nashua (not Yanhua; he assumes this from the mention of the Icicle Island), his younger brother. There are a great many memories that sprout from this realization, but he settles on the happy ones, and offers a quiet smile to the pair of them, and then a curiously encouraging raise of his brow to Torrent, a silent suggesting that he take up the visitor on his offer of trust.
The spring wind pulls at the blue-green hair of his long tail, pulling it from where it clings damply to his pale legs, and rustles the feathers of his wings. Like Nashua, Pteron wears stripes, though his are limited to the bold of his dun points and covered by the pied white markings that hardly stand out from the cremello of his coat.
The sea-bound colt is quick to answer the winged man's smile with a cautious one of his own. Ma was adamant that he not talk to strangers. Not after what happened Before. She talked to strangers all the time though, said it was her job to get to know the island's visitors. And he felt he was getting old enough to sort out the kelpies from the kinder folk that made their way onto the beach.
Second thoughts made themselves known when the gleaming chestnut vanished in a moment, drawing a gasp of surprise. Then a "huh" of curiosity. This wasn't the first horse he'd met who could vanish and reappear at will. In fact... The boy's deep-sea eyes drifted from the empty space that had held the mysterious stallion, caught on the familiar face of his sire for a split second before the stranger, (Nashua, had he said?) reappeared, grinning wildly.
The gold-faced colt nodded dumbly. He could feel the uncomfortable prickling in his hindquarters that meant he was nearly dry enough to turn back. It distracted him a moment, made him reach back to scrape at his hip with still pointed teeth. Shifting was always itchy.
Glancing back up at the stallion, he nodded again, looking from the darker coated stallion to the pale one who remained in the background. "I s'pose so. Whatcha need help with?" He asked, head tilted awkwardly high to keep eye contact. It was important though. That was the whole reason they were here, Ma had said. To help visitors with their troubles, in any way they could. To offer respite, relaxation and refuge to those who needed it.
He grunted under his breath a moment, suddenly hyper aware of every grain of sand beneath his haunches. The itching intensified to an almost unbearable pitch, pain lancing down his back as the fleshy tail that served him so well under water split down its middle, reconfigured itself until a pair of perfectly ordinary legs took its place.
After a few breaths, the yearling hauled himself upward. His neck wore a thick, bushy brown mane now, with a matching tail behind him. There was no sign now that he had ever been anything but an ordinary colt, with legs for running and a smile that was perhaps just a hair weary. "Come on over, Da, I can see you." He called over the new comer's shoulder to where Pteron lingered in the greenery. He knew Ma would have something or other to say about it being rude to lurk.
12-05-2020, 08:19 PM (This post was last modified: 12-05-2020, 08:25 PM by Nashua.)
stars when you shine, you know how i feel oh freedom is mine
Nashua had come to Ischia for a few reasons. Noel's swelling sides had given him plenty to think about. Nash had pledged his allegiance to Leilan and the Isle shortly before his second birthday and the young pegasus had never minded taking up residence there. There were warmer, easier places in Beqanna where life wasn't as barren or harsh but Nashua hadn't minded.
But it was one thing for an adolescent colt to scrape out a living there. It was an entirely different one to ask the mother of his children to endure it. And the chestnut pegasus couldn't see any foal thriving in that place (except for those who carried the ice and snow in their veins, perhaps the blood kin of the Freyr). Duty kept him bound to the Isle (and loyalty, he owes much to the King of the North); family moored him to the mainland.
He hopes he never has to choose but the thought of how he will maintain his responsibilities as Hersir and his impending fatherhood leaves him troubled. Nash hopes to forge them both into the same thing one day. Perhaps, one of his children will follow him to the Land of the Dancing Lights.
Thoughts for another day, he supposes as he stares down at fin-tailed Torrent.
The colt peers up at Nashua and the Hersir takes a small step back, allowing the yearling a better glance. The smile on his face softens and turns a touch rueful. He doubts his 'top-secret' information will be anything that will interest the dunskin. But before he can answer, the boy is rising on four legs and Nashua looks unabashedly impressed at the youth. (Shifters often leave him uneasy but this is Aquaria's son, a brother to Cormorant.) Nash had blinked and the tail was replaced with hindlegs, a change that came as swift as any wave along this shore.
Lifting his blazed head and turning it slightly to look behind him, Nashua sees the striped pegasus. Da, Torrent called him. If Nash had any doubts of who the older stallion was, his olive-green eyes answer any question still lingering in the back of his mind. It's a shade of green that Nashua hasn't seen in years and yet looking at Pteron, he is struck by how vividly he still remembers it. It makes him realize that both horses are probably waiting for him to reply.
Giving his brother a swift nod, he makes a motion to sidestep to better see him and @[Torrent].
"@[Pteron]?" Nash asks, because he and Tiercel are the only brothers that he hasn't met yet. Tiercel, he had been told by Gale, had wandered off some years ago. Glancing down to the yearling again, Nashua explains: "There are some changes taking place in the North and we thought your mother would like to hear of them." His bright green eyes look up to glance at Pteron, "and the Freyr would like news of Ischia. How it's been faring," Nash states.
"And I'd like a drink of fresh water," he finally finishes, realizing how dry his mouth had become. His mouth twitches in a playful grin, "please."
and since you’re the only one that matters,---------------- ----------------tell me: who do i run to?
Pteron is watching Nashua while his son regains his terrestrial shape, and when he glances back again to meet the boy’s eyes, he finds that Torrent’s sunmarked face is higher than it had been earlier. The stallion smiles, pleased as ever by the capabilities of his youngest son, and barely refrains from leaning over to rustle the boy’s forelock. He’s not a baby any more, Pteron reminds himself. The pegasus still must remind himself that Halcyon is a father himself now and not the small orange puffling he’d once been, but he is much improved with practiced years of fatherhood.
There has been a long pause, and only when the blue-haired stallion realizes it does he look back at Nashua, just in time for the other to ask confirmation of his identity. Pteron gives it with a nod, his olive eyes warm and bright. He listens as the golden horse speaks, and is struck once more by the quick way time seems to pass outside of Ischia. Much as his children feel forever young, so to have his siblings, and yet this is an adult here for his kingdom, and not a boy on an adventure. The smile on Pteron’s face soften slightly, in reminiscence rather than sadness, but perks up again at the other’s request for a drink.
“Why don’t you show your uncle to the stream,” Pteron suggests, “and I’ll see if I can find your mother?” He phrases it carefully, trusting Torrent with this task though remaining half-wary of this sibling-stranger. Gale had met him, Pteron knows, and had not seen anything worth warning the eldest brother about. Still, Pteron is cautious, and he slips into his own invisibility. He will go to find Aquaria as he had said, but the rapid disappearance does leave the possibility that he remains to supervise.
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