"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
It’s the middle of the night when Lillibet awakens in the Meadow, her glowing skin glistening under a blanket of cool springtime dew. She unfurls her slender frame from beneath the sweeping oak she’d used as her headboard and stretches out her limbs in the dark shadows beneath its boughs, a frown tugging the outsides of her mouth downwards at the memory of her dream. Outside of the arbor umbrella, a full moon casts its silvered fingers across the silent Meadow and shines against the dewy, breeze-swept grasses. A yawn escapes the former Princess as she thinks on the dreamworld she’d just escaped ─ one where she’d possessed the same magic her father and brother had, but she had utilized it in a way she’d never seen either of them do so. Mangled bodies had lingered in her wake and blood had stained her sharp-toothed maw crimson.
She shudders. The power her family possesses had never caused her fear, instead, she craved it. And blood had never made her squeamish before, but the sight of it clinging to the claws of her dream-self had been so realistic that she cannot shake it now. The thought makes her restless, and Lillibet peels herself away from the oak to settle her nerves in the dark of the night.
She doesn’t intend to, but she eventually ends up in the canyon of Pangea. She is her own lightsource by no choice of her own, splashing her ethereal glow against the sand and redstone as she explores a land that is not hers to explore. The silence is comforting, and though her glow does not allow her to be anything synonymous with stealth, Lillibet does her best to not wake anyone she may happen to come across.
The one equine she does spy with her honeyed eyes is already awake ─ and he glows just as she does. At first, Lillibet thinks him to be a figment of her imagination or perhaps some leftover dream entity that has not yet fled with her waning sleepiness. But when she nears, drawn to him like a moth to flame, there’s a solidity to his amber champagne frame. They share in the light of each other’s glow for one silent moment before Lillibet remembers that she is intruding in the witching hour, and the gentleman before her may not be just that.
”Did I wake you?” the former Princess asks in a voice that’s soft with lingering sleepiness, neglecting to offer any apology for invading upon the land that had once held her mother and older brother captive.
I do not want to move mountains;
I want the mountains to see me coming
and to crumble.
Hyaline is beautiful and holds many personal revelations to him but he cannot stay there. It is not home and he is still ruthlessly determined to find those that he had been separated from when the earth had cracked beneath him. There is no doubt he will go back to the lake but for now... For now there are other questions that need answering. For a few days he shelters on the outskirts of the lake, trying to decide what his next move is. He could stay here a little while longer and rest, that was one option. Between the bridge of fire that had brought him back to the mainlands and several days of travel to even reach where he was now.. It had taken a toll. He was feeling mostly better but he didn’t push his magic too far, only simple flames for warmth as needed to let his firepower rebuild. As for Terror… He had not felt the soul in days. As alone as he felt… He had no wish to cast his net into the afterlife and see who he pulled out. Not when so many fates were left uncertain.
Being alone, truly alone, made him restless though. The drive to find those close to him made it difficult to fully sleep at night, his dreams full of endless falling and suffocation until he awoke, coughing on imaginary seawater. He still wasn’t sure how he had survived. He shouldn’t have. It is one of those nights, the moon hanging high in the sky, that spurs him into action. He’s heard enough about the region he’s found himself in to know that Pangea is nearby. He remembers Aela’s stories about the place, a land she seemed almost fond of in her own way. If something had happened to the Pampas… Maybe she was there.
It isn’t too hard to navigate when the moon is so full, setting himself on fire with his own bright golden glow. He’s sure the direction he’s picked this time is right and carefully maneuvers through the mountains until they stretch into low sandy canyons. The night seems to grow colder and he brings the flames to simmer along his backside, a comforting presence if nothing else. At first glance, when the canyons open into something wider, he’s not sure why his mother would have ever liked this place. It’s so dry and desolate. Feels empty in its own way.
Something crunches beneath his hoof and he pulls it back to see he’s crushed some coral. Strange to find remnants of the sea in this wasteland. He shudders involuntarily, recalling the dream that had spurred him here to begin with and quickly turns his feral eyes in a different direction. Trying to forget the feeling of drowning. It is the ethereal glow in the distance that soon pushes those darker thoughts away. A light that seems to come closer and closer until he realizes that it’s a horse. A girl about the same age as he from what he can tell, shining like the moon just as he blazes like the sun.
There is something about her that reminds him slightly of Liesma, something soft and sensitive but when his yellow eyes meet her honeyed ones, he senses that she isn’t perhaps as delicate as one might make her out to be. Her voice is velvety with sleep and he can’t help the small smile that pulls at the corner of his own pale glowing mouth. “Not at all.” He responds truthfully, tossing his unruly crimson forelock to the side so he can get a better look at her. “Did I wake you?” He finally asks instead, throwing the question back to her as the flames dance along his spine.
Lillibet would be pleased were she able to hear the stranger’s thoughts. That her presence reminds him of Liesma when she first approaches would have brought her mind back to the night that she'd met the star-wielder in the common lands. She’d been envious of the other woman, as she is with most other magical folk - to be able to hold the power of the stars so effortlessly seemed like a dream for a woman who could only glow. They’d spoken about Liesma’s power, about the depth of her strength and the way the stars burned. It had been magical to stand within the ring of stars her acquaintance had created, protected by the circle of light for the duration of their conversation.
The glowing stallion does not seem off-put by her sudden presence; instead, there is a gentle grin that turns up the corners of his lips. Their mutual light glows against their ivory and champagne faces and despite their unfamiliarity with each other, it feels to Lillibet like something vulnerable and intimate. The stranger’s voice is smooth as he reassures her and when the question is returned, volleyed back to her as if she was meant to be here, Lillibet realizes that she may not have encountered a resident of Pangea on this night.
Her smile matches his and her smile glints playfully as she tilts her gold-striped head to the side in query. ”You didn’t,” she offers in return as her honeyed gaze moves to the flames that lick across his speckled back. ”What are you doing here?” Lillibet presents another question to him, devoid of etiquette and lacking diplomacy just as she usually does. Oceane wouldn’t be pleased, and the young woman can nearly hear her mother’s gentle scolding that everyone should be treated with kindness until they have proven they don’t deserve it.
But who says some light prodding isn’t kind?
Her ivery tail flicks around her hinds as a shiver runs the course of her spine - Pangea was not quite as warm as the Meadow had been, and the winds of late night certainly weren’t warm as they navigated the open space of the canyon. ”Do you know where there’s a warm cave to hide in?” She’s asked it before she realizes her intentions could be mistaken, but instead of fumbling over herself she simply smiles up at the glowing man, his flames reflecting in the playful glint of her gold-flecked eyes.
I do not want to move mountains;
I want the mountains to see me coming
and to crumble.
If only he had known that the young mare before him knew his friend. It would have been a small comfort to know that Lies was alive and ok at the very least. Alas his many talents don’t extend to mind reading and so he can only note those little similarities and acknowledge the thread of worry that winds around his heart when he thinks of her. It eases slightly when the stranger tilts her head and looks at him with a rather teasing grin. One that makes his heart ease from worry into something warmer and confusing. Enough so that the flames along his back rise just as her gaze shifts to them and his soft smile turns into something more loose in his embarrassment and bewilderment.
“I could ask you the same.” He says with more confidence then he truly feels, his strange yellow eyes seeking out her own amber gaze again. Trying to understand what that sensation had been when she had looked at him so playfully. “But since you asked… I was looking for someone.” He doesn’t find her inquisitive nature rude by any means, it makes sense to wonder what someone was doing out here in the darkness by themself. He would have been curious too. In fact he is curious himself to what she was doing out here in the middle of the night and remembers that Pangea was suppose to be a sacred land according to Aela. Touched by the god Carnage who his mother admired so much. For all her high praise she had also warned him to be cautious, that looks could be deceiving in this place.
Was she what she appeared to be? Or perhaps one of those alien horses that Aela had told him bedtime stories about? He's about to throw her own question back at her again when through the haze of their mutual glows he catches the small shiver that runs along her spine and nearly chokes when she turns those gold flecked eyes to him with that question and rather suggestive smile. The flames flickering along his back flare around him like a lions mane as he tries his best to compose himself, swallowing hard as he presses his lips together to keep himself from leering stupidly at her. “I don’t.” He finally says after snapping his fiery tail against his haunches as one might do to pinch themselves. “But if you’re cold…” He pulls from the flames along his back until three small fireballs are freed and sends them to orbit around her. Just close enough to keep her warm but not to scorch her iridescent skin.
The amber champagne stranger is nonplussed by her question, and in fact fires back something akin to a challenge. Lillibet grins in response, though does nothing more to confirm or deny whether she is supposed to, or allowed to, be here. As she and Link had learned in their youth, it was always better to ask forgiveness than permission. With the flick of a fluted ear and a quiet hum in her throat, the lilac-tressed woman registers his response once he has provided it. Curiously, and with the same playfulness as before, she inquires. “Someone nocturnal?” As if in response, coyotes cackle in the inky dark distance. Lillibet’s grin falters, if only for a moment, before she turns her attention back to the speckled man before her and pushes the threat of the wild dogs from her mind.
“Who are you looking for?”
Perhaps she knows them - or of them. Admittedly, the only times she had adventured outside of Loess and Sylva were in the company of her twin. She’d never found any interest in growing her circle. The South’s disappearance had forced her hand, and now that the only home she’d ever known rests beneath the surface of the dark sea, she’s encountered more strangers than she ever would have otherwise.
Lillibet’s unintentionally suggestive question is received in a way she hadn’t expected, and in return she does nothing to hide the coquettish smirk that widens across her alabaster lips. When he’s recovered from his surprise, the champagne stranger offers her a much more comfortable solution than searching through an unknown territory in the middle of the night for a cave that may or may not hide something that could eat her. The fireballs float slowly in her direction, their flames flickering orange against her opaline coat before settling comfortably around her. Hot envy rises in the back of her throat before she forces it away and offers the stallion a bashful smile. “You’re too kind,” Lillibet offers as her thanks before flicking her lilac-accented tail in the moonlight.
“I don’t think I caught your name,” the homeless woman adds as an afterthought as she sighs comfortably in the warmth of the stranger’s magic.
I do not want to move mountains;
I want the mountains to see me coming
and to crumble.
Aela had always tried to stress that he should bow to no-one. There were those that were weak and those that were not and he should consider himself in the latter category. He still recalls the lesson she had given him when he had been younger, to find those that would be a challenge to him and best them. To always be on top as he held the gifts of the gods. The opaline stranger thinks of asking forgiveness instead of permission. He recalls that there is no such thing as forgiveness or need for permission when it comes to the likes of him and tries to embody that confidence. She presses for more information in that same playful lilt but he does not miss the way her grin momentarily falters when the coyote yips in the distance. Was she afraid? Why?
The dappled stallion doesn’t answer her question, at least not right away. Instead he studies her openly and wonders what that glint in her flecked eyes had meant. Deep down he had known his mother would have never approved of the friendship he had with Lies. She would have thought the star girl was beneath him, that friends like BoneBone were the only ones worth having. He disagrees, although he would be loathe to say such a thing to her directly. He thought the filly that could call down the stars was strong in her own way. He thinks the mare in front of him might be made of that same caliber. Or perhaps more than that for Pangea was suppose to house those that could manipulate and deceive, something he had never truly understand his mother’s praise for. It seemed the kind of terrible he had always tried to avoid, that curse that had been whispered to him when he had only been a few minutes old. There is a dark thought that maybe he was meant to come here, destined for a place that held monsters from fairy tales. Destined to be Terrible no matter what Aela had said.
He watches the lazy rotation of fire that revolves around her, sees the way the flames reflect against the gold of her eyes. She offers her thanks as he continues to try and understand his confusion when it comes to the likes of her and the corner of his mouth ticks faintly upward again when she sighs with pleasure. “I didn’t give you one.” He replies with a slight mischievous gleam in his feral gaze, similar to that of the lost Prince of the Pampas who had also left his mark on him. He eventually relents though. “It’s Fyr.” He pronounces it in the way of fire first and then the one of fear, whichever she prefers. He decides to answer her previous question as well.
“I’m looking for my mother. Or anyone from the Pampas.” He finally says and his mouth no longer curves upwards but instead turns down, the flames that circle around her now dancing in his own tawny eyes.
Lillibet does not fear danger, only her inability to deal with it in a world built on magic. The distant cackling from the coyotes remind her that she is nothing more than a blunt-toothed herbivore with an aura that shines like an alabaster angelic beacon ─ come, taste me. Not like the man before her, whose own moonlit aura is supplemented by the control he has of the flame. She knows he could press it to her skin if he wanted to, could let the flames lick at her tender skin while she writhed and begged. Lillibet is no fool ─ she knows she could not weather such an assault and contain any semblance of pride after. No, she is not above begging for her own life.
But that is not to say she lets on to her thoughts, or that she feels intimidated by her new midnight meet-up. She is aware, but confident, as the balls of fire encircle her just as Liesma’s stars had done all those months ago. She still carries with her the arrogance of a princess despite her golden forest home having long-settled beneath the ocean waves, and it’s with that demeanor that she tilts her head playfully to the side as the man disregards her first question. A fake pout finds her lips but for only a moment until it transforms into a smirk the likes of which matches her companion’s.
Fyr. He gifts her two pronunciations, a curious perk of his name, and Lillibet tests them both. “Which do you prefer? Fire or Fear?” Her second question is whispered intimately, audible only in the light of their shared glow, before her own smirk widens. All around them there is silence save for the occasional reminder from the coyotes that they were there, in the distance, to greet anyone who wandered too far from civilization. Periodically, their calls are joined by a howling wind that reminds Lillibet of her luck at finding a fire-wielder on this chilly night.
Fyr reverts to her previous question, catching Lillibet off-guard at the mention of the Pampas. Oceane had spoken often of Obscene and Aela in the presence of her children while preparing to abdicate and leave her crown in the charge of Cheri, though she’d never had the luck of meeting them herself. She wonders if Fyr is related to them, or if his mother is someone who’d simply called the Pampas home beneath the reign of the Fae Prince. “I’m from the South,” she treads lightly, neglecting to provide her own name in the absence of Fyr’s query, “though not from the Pampas. But I haven’t seen many from the kingdom since the quake.” Most notably, her own family. But neither had she seen Cheri, Tarian, or Manny. None of those who’d made up the South as she had known it.
Another shiver rocks the ivory and gold woman, this time fueled by the reminder of the lives that had likely been lost beneath the waves.
I do not want to move mountains;
I want the mountains to see me coming
and to crumble.
It would be a lie to say he had never thought about what exactly his flames could do to another. They never burned him, just a pleasant warm tingle on his skin wherever they touched or arose. For others though… He still remembers the mouse he had frightened within his ring of fire, the bird he had accidentally lit aflame as a child. Those interactions had left him with a tightness in his chest, a feeling of shame that crashed in waves long after the incidents were done. It had been enough to keep him from practicing with his friends, even if they wanted him to. Even when the dark thoughts had crossed his mind, just to see what would happen. Just to know what exactly he could do.
The flames flicker close to her skin and all he would have to do is simply blink and then she would be a living pyre. It was as simple as breathing. Yet there would be no lovely pout on her lips, no sly glint in her eye if she was consumed. So he does not, once more ignoring those terrible thoughts that hide in the darkness of his mind. Instead he matches her conspiratorial whisper, leaning in slightly as his voice caresses her cheek. “Depends on what mood I’m in.” He says before pulling back, the yellow of his eyes looking even more strange and unnatural with the refraction from his orbiting inferno.
There is every intention to steal her name, to coax it from her the way she had done to him. It’s forgotten the moment their conversation steers towards who he is looking for. The playfulness dies when she states she is from the South. That she had not found many that had once called it home. He hesitates for a moment. Hesitates and then begins to tell her what had happened to him when the earth had split apart beneath him. How his world had gone from beautiful fields of flowers to endless darkness. What it had felt like to drown. He tells her of washing up on the Isle and meeting Leilan and Nashua. The bridge of fire that eventually brought him back to the mainland. Discovering Hyaline and the angel who lived there. He’s not sure how it all comes out but he supposes it’s easy to tell her his story because she is from the South. She’s the only one he has found so far, only a Southerner could possibly understand.
“My mother lived in Pangea once, I thought maybe she had come here.” He finally says after a long pause. “Her name was Aela.” The words have barely left him before he looks stricken, realizing that he had referred to her in the past tense. As if she wasn’t alive anymore.
Stoked by the flames of both dangerous fire and delicious fear, Lillibet finds she quite enjoys the close proximity to her newest companion as he leans in close to volley her whisper. His scent is a heady, drawing her nostrils to flutter and flare.
Depends on what mood I’m in.
Her heart rate increases nearly instantaneously, though her immediate reaction is to roll her gold-flecked eyes playfully before settling back on the moonlit man with a tilt of her head. “My parents used to tell me not to play with Fire, so I think I’d like to play with Fear.” Her voice is innocent and lilting as she attempts as best she can to keep intimacy from seeping in, a faux veil to shroud the words she’s whispered to him.
But it’s the mention of the South, including his parents and her own, that finally dampens the implications in their discourse. Lillibet’s playful grin is replaced by a sullen frown, the wide-eyed brow arch pushed aside by a furrow at the center of her forehead. Fyr opens up to her in the heart of darkness, spilling the tale of his rebirth in the tumultuous sea and his subsequent waterlogged landing at Icicle Isle. She recognizes Leilan’s name from her mother’s stories ─ he had always been a friend to her, one she could depend on no matter the circumstances. He was someone safe, Oceane had said, to ask for help if she ever needed it. Fyr’s story is living proof of that.
She continues to listen with unfaltering attention as he describes the bridge of fire, envisioning in awe such a structure built purely on magic and faith. And then his story rounds off to a near-close in Hyaline. She knows no angel, though she is reminded of Bolder, his silvered eyes, and the way he can shift his body whenever the whim strikes. Perhaps he could be an angel, if he set his mind to it.
Lillibet hardly notices that Fyr has spoken about Aela as if she is gone from the world, at least not until his face falls. But when it does, her own heart drops and she takes a tentative step toward the fire-wielder, their matching ethereal glows mingling as the bygone Sylvan princess catches herself ─ to reach out and comfort him with touch, or not? Her heart aches for him and the trauma he has endured, but also for herself and her own family. She has lived the stages of grief and knows what it feels like to have your heart gripped tight by the hand of something so impossible it does not feel real. How could the South and all who lived in it be gone? How could Oceane, Ledger, and Link have been lost to the sea when they were all so capable of saving themselves?
How could Aela?
“I know of Aela,” she finally responds, making sure to utilize the present tense for both of their sakes, “My parents are Ledger and Oceane.” She considers comforting him with warm words of hope, ones that speak of a certainty that everyone missing is okay, that Oceane, Ledger, Link, and Aela are all alive and well. But no such words are comforting, this she has come to know.
Grief does not find comfort in false hopes.
“I will help you look,” she whispers into his ear, for that is all she can do.
I do not want to move mountains;
I want the mountains to see me coming
and to crumble.
01-28-2022, 04:30 PM (This post was last modified: 01-28-2022, 04:44 PM by Fyr.)
I'll settle for the ghost of you.
There is no denying he likes the way she rolls her eyes just as much as he enjoys her quick wit. He has never met a girl like her before. Mysterious, intriguing, clever. The parts of her that remind him of Lies and Aela make her almost familiar but then there are those other pieces of her that are new and foreign. Like this flirtatious banter which she brings out so easily in him despite never doing such a thing before. He smirks at her response and if it wasn’t for his own reluctance regarding what (or who) he might dredge up from the otherworld… He would test that theory. One day he will.
For now, his gleaming saffron eyes flicker with approval and perhaps she might catch the spark of an unspoken promise there. Perhaps she might not.
She proves to be a good listener, something else to add to her many redeeming qualities. She is quiet as he speaks and when she shifts as if to move closer to him, he finds himself regretfully that she ultimately does not. When he wraps up his story, when he is struck with sudden despair over his choice of words, she is quick to retrieve him before he falls into complete melancholy. Immediately he perks up when she says she knows of Aela. It takes him a second to recall where he has heard the names of her parents before. “I know who you are.” He finally says, looking at her with renewed interest. Not her name, but what she was. He had heard of Oceane in the times when he would eavesdrop on the conversations between his mother and the Prince as any self-respecting child would do. He had always wondered what it would be like to meet a proper Queen and now he stands before her daughter, a Princess if he assumes correctly. He thinks of asking about her own family but hesitates, the flames dancing along his shoulders flaring with uncertainty. Surely she wouldn’t be here on her own if her family was whole.
Her whispered promise makes him hold her gold flecked gaze with quiet intensity before he tilts his head slightly at her. “What would a Princess ask in return for such help?” He asks her softly, trying to pull back some of that playfulness they had so easily fallen into earlier despite the darkness of their situation. “Plus… I can’t accept your help if I don’t even know your name.” He manages a faint smile, thinking that it couldn’t be just luck that had brought two glowing orphans of the fallen South together in the middle of the night.
