The warm light of the mid-morning sun gives no hint of the change in seasons, and the soft breeze is thick with the scent of the summer warmed sea. Malik opens his eyes, and looks out at the Brilliant Pampas from the copse in which he has been sleeping. The trees overhead have hardly begun to change, still thick and full and barely yellowing, but there are other signs of the changing seasons; the chatter of squirrels as they fill their winter caches, and the nightly frost that has already melted away by the time the young stallion awakes.
Stepping out onto the still-wet grass and away from the shade, Malik makes his way down toward the nearby stream. He yawns and shakes his horned head in an effort to more fully wake up, but it’s not until he has plunged belly deep into the slow flowing water that he’s entirely alert.
He has been making rounds of the Pampas by night, a task that is familiar from his time spent patrolling in Hyaline. He’s not looking for anything, and the rare times he’s seen someone coming or going he’s only ever watched them from a distance. The practice has made him familiar - at least by sight - with most of the residents of the Pampas, or at least those who haven’t made an effort to not be seen.
The water has done its job, and the black stallion climbs back up the bank to shake himself partially dry. The feathers of his neck and sides point at odd angles because of the branches he’d scraped against on the climb, and the shake he gives to settle them does only half the task. He usually sleeps until well into the afternoon, but something had woken him this morning. He’d known he wouldn’t be able to fall back asleep, and as he dries in the warm sun, he ponders what to do with the day ahead of him.
Open to anyone :)
10-18-2022, 12:26 AM
(This post was last modified: 10-18-2022, 12:37 AM by Paj Sia.)
She seems to have stumbled upon a new place as she ventured off from the river lands. She seems to let out a little neigh as she sees a stallion off in the distance with curiosity that hit her. She seems to have watched him soak in the stream and shake off the water. She seems to take steps to him, but keeps herself at a good distance. "Who may you be?" Tilting her head, she seems to take a good look through her mane. Her eyes seem to spark through the mane.
She seems to be quite noticeable for a horse with white base as a coat and polka dots. "I'm Paj Sia! Can you tell me a little more about yourself? Why you reside here?" A curious lad she was.
@  Malik
The sound of a greeting causes him to raise his head, and Malik turns his bi-colored eyes toward the source of the sound. He finds the caller quickly, her pale coat with its plethora of spots easy to spot against the autumnal background as she approaches.
He does not recognize her face, and as she approaches he finds that she does not smell of the Pampas. A visitor, he wonders, or perhaps a newer resident? She seems friendly enough, approaching a strange stallion, and her smile is bright enough that one appears on his face as well.
“I’m Malik,” he answers, tilting his head curiously as he surveys her. Her coloring is eye-catching, a pattern that he has not seen frequently. Malik’s own coat is deep black, and the iridescent glow of his stripes are all but invisible on this bright fall day.
Paj Sia, she introduces herself, and then immediately asks more about him. Malik’s pleasant expression is joined by surprise at her open curiosity, but he answers readily since he’s little to hide. “My family lives here. We have since the destruction that destroyed our old home of Hyaline.” He pauses, just for a moment, and then continues: “and you, Paj Sia? What brings you to this brilliant pampas?”
@Paj Sia
She trots over to him, but still leaving some distance to not give him a fright if she was that scary. She seems to push her mane up a bit to have a good look at his deep black and iridescent glow of stripes as she seems quite curious again.
She isn’t surprised but more excited for this kind of talk as she neighs in a friendly way. “I wanted to have a little bit of an adventure! Take a look at newer places and have a little bit of fun! I’ve never been around in this part before and just ran! I didn’t think that you would just come to stumble upon a new place like this.”
She trots around in a circle as she seems happy to say this so easily and openly. “Where is your family and what happened to your home of Hyaline?” She seems to ask again with curiosity and faces him again.
@ Malik
Malik does not find the smiling mare frightening, but he does appreciate the distance that she keeps between them. It feels polite, and her innocently happy chatter reminds him of his younger sisters. She’s on an adventure, Paj Sia tells him, which explains why she’s here. And perhaps why she is so happy, as well, being new to the magical realm.
He nods at her explanation, wondering where the cheerful spotted mare had come from, and deciding to ask her once it’s his turn.
“I imagine they’re probably over that way,” he gestures, tilting his horned head toward the east. That was almost the last direction in which he’d seen his mother, and truthfully his younger sisters might be wandering anywhere in the Pampas.
“There was a storm a while back. It destroyed much of Beqanna, including my homeland of Hyaline. My mother and sisters came here, so I did as well.” This time his gaze turns toward the north, where the highest peaks of Hyaline are drowned beneath the sea.
“Where are you from, Paj Sia?” He asks when there is a break in the conversation. His expression is curious, if a little less enthusiastic than the brown and white mare. “I’ve heard of places outside Beqanna, but I’ve never been to any. I’ve always lived here.”
@ Paj Sia
10-25-2022, 10:23 PM
(This post was last modified: 10-26-2022, 12:30 AM by Paj Sia.)
She seems to be happy again for the questions answered. "I don't really know where I come from. I woke up down by a river land where the water is always flowing and fresh. The trees and grass around is beautiful and free. It is a beautiful home, but I like to see where I can go! This place is just as beautiful." She seems to trot around in a circle again and has a very bright and cheerful attitude. "I don't really know where I come from nor do I have a family or herd. I am just alone. Like I lost something and forgot it."
She doesn't seem to be all too sad, but goes just a little bit closer to him. "Can Malik show me around here? What do you do here? What can we graze on?" Her eyes spark up with curiosity as she doesn't seem to stop with her happiness. Pushing back the negativity, she doesn't seem to stick with the bad or negative emotions, but only brings out the happiness.
She pushes her mane up again to look at him, tilting her head from side to side to get a good look and see his dark base color that was quite different from her white base color. At the same time, his eyes made her flicker again with curiosity of him.
@ Malik
The mystery of her arrival is intriguing, and Malik’s dark ears prick forward from the angle of his black mane. In his experience, inexplicable happenings were often the work of magic. Had she been brought here by magic, he wonders? She describes the beautiful land where she’d arrived, and he suspects it is the River.
Even as she tells him she is without family or even memory of where she’d been before, she is smiling. Malik, despite his usual composure, cannot help but smile back. Her joy is contagious it seems, even for the typically morose young stallion.
She steps closer, which he is comfortable with, and then asks for a tour.
He’s never shown anyone around the Pampas before. They’d all arrived at roughly the same time, fleeing the destruction of the rest of Beqanna, and had learned the place together. But he has shown others around Hyaline before it had sunk, and he is confident that he can do the same here, even if the place is not quite as dear to his heart as his homeland.
“I can,” he answers, and then: “I will.”
He takes a few steps forward, then glances over his shoulder (and the faint outline of his light wings) to see if she is following. “The grazing is pretty good everywhere, but is best down near the water this time of year. I’ll show you the stream first?” Though he asks, he is already leading, and trying to remember what else she’d asked in her merry spate of questions.
“I don’t do much of anything, though I suppose I should. This land isn’t quite like the old kingdoms, with tasks and jobs, but I suppose it could be eventually. I’ve been…” he pauses, unsure how to delicately bring up the fact that one of his sisters is missing and he does sometimes look for her in the lands that remain. “Distracted, I suppose. By my own thoughts.”
@ Paj Sia
She does follow along as she sees his light wings. She trots before walking along with him. Walking behind, she was very excited as she listens to him. Not having the faintest look of being scared nor afraid of this stallion that was showing her around.
She is still very happy as she keeps following him and listening. “Tasks and jobs? What would you do then? Also, it isn’t bad to be distracted by thoughts. I think it means that you must hold importance with distractions. Sometimes it will happen and sometimes not, but I think Malik has a reason for everything.”
She doesn’t see any problem with being distracted as she follows him to the stream there. She keeps walking with curiosity and and cheerfulness. “Did you need help?! I’m willing to give some time to help you if needed. I haven’t really stumbled upon many so there isn’t really much of a time for me to interact with others. Malik is the second horse for me to stumble upon.” She neighs just slightly and willing to offer her help and companionship if needed.
@ Malik
The spotted mare trots to catch up with him, then slows to walk abreast. Her cheery attitude remains as they continue. Malik points out a few good places for grazing, and a low-growing apple tree, then flicks his dark ears back to listen to her speaking.
Something about the way she speaks reminds him of the fairies, the certainty of her words paired with his slow comprehension. He chooses instead to focus on what he does understand when he answers: “Things like patrols, or escorting visitors, mock battling, accompanying diplomats on visits to other lands. But there are no other lands to visit since the destruction, and so there’s no real role for them either.” Will there ever be, he wonders?
He wishes for the ability of foresight, to know what the future will bring. Will Hyaline return? Will another land rise in its place? The history of Beqanna he’d been told is filled with destructions, but always there has been rebirth at the end of the tale. He knows about the Eclipse, the perpetual darkness that brought Monsters during his parents’ childhood.
Had it lasted this long, he wonders? Had their world gone so still and quiet?
Malik shakes his head abruptly at the direction his thoughts have gone, glancing back at the sanguine mare. Her sunny expression is warmer than the watery orb overhead, and he steps a little closer as they walk as though he might be able to absorb some of it.
Her offer of help is unexpected, but as he meets her brown eyes with his mismatched ones - one blazing orange and the other brilliant pale blue - he believes that she is genuine. Inexplicable, to be sure, so perfectly timed that he wonders if her arrival had not been arranged by Fate.
Though he is not usually so open with strangers, a slow smile begins to appear on his face as they make their final approach to the stream. He stands at the edge, black ears flicked in her direction as she admits that he’s only the second horse she’d met. “You could stay here a while,” he says as he lifts a dark hoof to paw at the water in the pebbled shallows. “This is where most of the survivors live, I think, though some remain in the common lands that didn’t drown.” He pauses for a moment, then continues. “You could help me by keeping an eye out for a sister of mine. Blue, with stripes” - here his shape shifts, transfiguring for a moment into a smaller, paler horse with eyes the opposite of his own, and then once more becomes his black body - “In any shape. Her name is Sickle.”
@ Paj Sia
She walks along and listens which she seems to keep up to her cheerful and happy attitude that never ceases to stop. She was enjoying ever part of seeing what they came across in this land that she stumbled upon. Was it really a coincidence that she ran up there?
Knowing nothing of this world, she was as simple as can be with no real power or no real strength. Just as ordinary as it gets.
She meets him eye to eye as she notices his eyes. Listening to the offer given to help him keep an eye out for his sister as she smiles along. "Thank you for showing me around! I am really happy to know that you would show me and tell me about yourself! Your eyes are also really pretty too!" She points out and smiles brightly at him with her eyes glistering.
She then goes on to nodding her head. "I will keep an eye out for her. Your sister's name sounds beautiful. I hope that I will be able to meet her too!" She trots along to the water as she then plays in it. "Hahaha! Did you want to join me?!" She laughs and turns to Malik.
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