"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
html code by Toli, design idea based on "Dovev" by Laura
Like a flower waiting to bloom.
Okay, so the kangaroos didn’t hold her attention for the full one hundred percent. Maybe it is like 75/25, since she’s obviously interested in hearing Ivar’s answer. Just to tease him, nothing more, nothing less. Or so Kylin tells herself. So perhaps it’s more like 50/50. After all, she ís a girl, and the season does some strange things to her.
And Ivar’s words just happen to flatter her. ”And you happen to count me as one of those?” Meant to tease, but there’s a slight tremor in her voice, one she cannot stop. Was it hope? A little, but also some kind of envy. With Kharon she had been his number one, well, until Father got himself involved and ruined things.
It is a good thing that Kylin cannot see his face, meant that he couldn’t see hers too. She doesn’t want him to see this, her visit to Loess was meant for her to escape all terrors of Ischia. As she takes a deep breath, she tells herself to focus on the kangaroos.
The kangaroos, and that makes her realise just in time that Ivar was talking to her again. The corners of her mouth curl up a little, shaking her head slightly. Where her life had stood still, his obviously hadn’t. ”So, seems you’ve been busy. General ánd collecting your own herd? What else have you been up to, Ivar?” This time there is amusement in her voice, only partially forced.
Soon her attention is fully on the kangaroos again. Close as they are she can see their grayish fur and the muscles that move under their skin. ”Seeing them like this.. I can almost imagine one of them kicking something to death” she mumbles softly, glancing at Ivar out of the corner of her eye. The thrill of danger doesn’t scare her away, but it does make her press closer to his side. She’s once again more excited too, smiling wider now. ”I guess we won’t be able to touch them, like the turtles” she whispers, humouring herself for thinking that.
Then, she gasps and her eyes widen. ”Oh!” she excitedly squeals, still a whisper but clearly louder than before. Both her lavender ears are forward again and she’s bouncing on the spot. ”There are babies, Ivar! See, they are there, hiding behind the bigger ones!” Kylin wants to step closer, to inspect the babies up close, but something tells her the adult ones wouldn’t really like it if she did that.
I V A R i'll use you as a makeshift gauge of how much to give and how much to take
The tremor in her voice when she asks is somehow reassuring. Ivar grins in return, nudging her shoulder affectionately. “Only if you want me to,” he replies, knowing that she is unlikely to. Kylin has always belonged in Ischia. She and the sea – they are one in Ivar’s mind. This is landlocked Loess, too far from the ocean and the island paradise that the lavender and white mare calls home. She asks what else he’s been up to and he laughs; are those things not enough to keep him busy.
“That’s all,” he says as he steps closer to the animals, “I can’t imagine having time for anything else.”
Kylin’s presence at his side is both familiar and comforting, and his listens contently as she chatters about the kangaroos around them. Ivar knows when she’s seen the babies; the excitement in her voice and body are difficult to hide. He returns a nudge to her with a soft smile, looking back at the kangaroos to get a closer look at the babies.
“They’re very little,” he agrees. With the large eyes and awkward bodies, they remind him a little of foals. “Have you ever wanted babies?” Asks the scaled stallion, rather abruptly. He doesn’t meet her gaze, but rather remains focused on the baby kangaroos.
html code by Toli, design idea based on "Dovev" by Laura
Like a flower waiting to bloom.
Her heart skips a beat and if possible, her cheeks would have been red. A part of her so desperately longs for it. To belong with someone, with him. But at the same time she doesn’t, not at all liking the plural form is his words. Kylin isn’t used to share and she doesn’t like it either. The battle within still confuses her, and thus keeps her silent.
He makes her chuckle, brightening the mood and she’s reaching to bump his shoulder – again – before she realises. ”I can’t and won’t believe that, Ivar. You and not spending time swimming? Who are you and what have you done with my Ivar?” she teases him with a grin.
There is a truth to her words though. Ivar and swimming were meant for each other. And their love for the water was one they shared, or, had he lost his connection with it? Kylin hadn’t. If not, it called to her more now her family was gone.
It’s almost impossible to keep still. Oh, how much she wants to reach out and move closer to the babies, but Ivar’s words about the power of an adult kicking kept her at his side. Her muzzle is dropped towards the ground though, bringing her at eye level with the babies. Behind her her purple tail sways in the gentle breeze, flopping against Ivar’s side. Kylin doesn’t realise it. How could she? Her attention was solely focussed on the babies.
Babies? Of her own? That wasn’t something that had ever crossed the lavender girl’s mind. Not until then at least. The question pulls her attention away from the babies and slowly Kylin lifts her head to look at Ivar, silently wondering where the question had come from. ”I haven’t really thought about that…” she answers.
Perhaps if Kharon had still been there, or if there had been someone else in her life. That was what Father wanted for her anyway, but Kylin still carries her twin brother in her heart. She would always, like Kali and Badden, and her parents and uncle Reilly. ”Have you?” she asks, hoping that it would explain a little from where the question had come from.
I V A R i'll use you as a makeshift gauge of how much to give and how much to take
There is almost something there, just for an instant, and then it is gone. They return to the familiar light banter that Ivar remembers, and the tension dissipates as she bumps playfully against his shoulder. She teases him, and of course it is about the water – because who was Ivar without the sea?
Something different, he has found in this year in Loess, something with more instinct and less emotion. The scaled creature has attributed these changes to maturity, to becoming a stallion and not a colt. Perhaps that is true, too, but that is not the whole of the truth. There is something else to the sea’s call, but he has ignored it for so long. He’s replaced it with fighting and with women, with mares of every shape and color, and with the projected love that he gets from Heda.
The bat-winged mare had given him something rather close to it, but the imitation was not a true substitute.
Kylin still tastes of the sea, he finds as he runs his muzzle down the length of her spine. She is focused on the kangaroos, he knows, but his question brings her attention back to him, and he meets her gaze with a soft sort of smile.
“Sometimes,” he answers truthfully. He doesn’t add the precursor to such thoughts, that they are more frequent when he is near the water, when he is feeling free. For a boy raised in the woods, Ivar has rather strong feelings about the benefits of children and the sea.
Ivar knows he has Heda – at least until the truth comes out – but that does not quell his desire for more. Isobell certianly, and if he is honest with himself, Kylin as well. He’d promised her friendship and has no intention of breaking his promise, but the appeal of seeing her round with his child or with a colt at her heels has haunted him since he’d first seen her maternal worry for the little hatchlings on the beach. She’d like it, he is sure, a safe and protected life. Its also something he cannot offer, not while in Loess. There is no sea here, only rolling hills, and he is not the faithful type that Kylin probably wants, like most mares want.
“I might have to think more, come spring.” He adds with a wry grin that does’nt quite reach his brown eyes. It’s too early in the season to be sure, but Ivar had not been lax in his attention to his queen this past fall. He’d not been lax in his attention anywhere really. The idea of the Sylvan Wraith’s consort bearing her king a pied foal is pleasant enough to make the crooked smile finally reach his eyes. The kelpie had found Thana fierce and fearless and thrilling; a sharp contrast to sweet Kylin but no less appealing.
html code by Toli, design idea based on "Dovev" by Laura
Like a flower waiting to bloom.
Focussed on the kangaroos, yes, but definitely not oblivious to Ivar’s presence, or his touch. He leaves a pleasant tingle down her spine, it make her want to press closer, so she can feel more of it. Kylin knows she wants to, but doesn’t. Using the kangaroos as an excuse.
She figured he would, why else would he ask her if she ever thought of it. Never before had she been confronted by that question. Others had never asked her – well, before Ivar then – and she hadn’t really thought of it herself either. Perhaps because she cannot see herself as an adult just yet. She isn’t like Mother, or Queen Ea. She’s just Kylin. Sweet Kylin. Thus far, she’d always lived in her brother’s shade.
His words pull a soft chuckle from her lips, and with a small grin she turns to look at him slightly amused. ”Why spring? Would seeing babies spark your own desire to have one?” she asks, her white and lavender head tilting a little to the side as she studies his face.
It would be a lie to say she wasn’t interested in Ivar. When they had met they both were children, innocent in their games and thoughts. And back then Kharon had been her whole world. Kylin cannot ignore that things are different, but admitting it to herself was a whole different story. Plus she doesn’t exactly know what was there to admit to herself. That she cared for Ivar? That was obvious. Even though they didn’t live on the same land and breathed the same air, thus far he was the only one who hadn’t turned his back on her.
She stops not too far away from a couple of kangaroos, but in such way that she’s respecting their personal space. She really didn’t want to get kicked by one of them. The smile hasn’t left her lips in a while, both ears forward as she studies the creatures with their babies up close. ”So you’ll stay in Loess for now? Will you be able to visit Ischia some time again?” And play with me in and on the water?
I V A R i'll use you as a makeshift gauge of how much to give and how much to take
Kylin is gentle and devoid of suspicion, her inquiry about springtime brings a soft smile to Ivar’s white scales. The lavender and white mare has been a constant in his life since he was a child, and yet she still breathes, living proof of Westermarck’s theory. With his head resting across her withers, Ivar breathes in the familiar salty scent of the ocean that is all but embedded into her skin. Kylin smells of freedom, of a life in the sun and the surf. The stallion is reluctant to let her go, but he knows she wants to see the other animals.
A life with only parrots – that he finds hard to imagine.
“I’ll stay here,” he tells her. “But I want to see Ischia again soon. We had a visit from someone you might have seen recently. Do you know a mare named Circinae?” The green mare’s time here is weighing on his mind; Ivar is unable to keep it at bay. There are far more concerns than he’d ever imagined; he is starting to see why Heda had seemed relieved.
html code by Toli, design idea based on "Dovev" by Laura
Like a flower waiting to bloom.
She finds herself leaning into him, comforted by the close proximity and the presence of someone that cares for her. It makes her able to forget the loneliness and despair that held her in their grasps. Not only the kangaroos are a great distraction, but Ivar is too.
Kylin is not able to hide her disappointment when he tells her that he will stay in Loess. She doesn’t know what it is that keeps him here, but it sure must be good if he was willing to stay even if that meant he would live in a place that lacked big amounts of water. She bends her neck ever so slightly, got glance back at him from the place where he has himself across her withers, and all she can do is nod.
It’s only after he finishes speaking that she shifts her gaze back to the kangaroos in front of them, but she looks without really seeing them. ”Circinae..” she mumbles softly, repeating the name of the mare that had recently turned her world upside down. ”She recently came to Ischia, together with a whole lot of others, and now she calls herself Ischia’s Keeper. She and her companions told me that Queen Ea is long gone…”
There was only so much she could’ve done. Even though she had said Ea’s name, even added her title as Queen in front of it, but they had all brushed it aside. It was hard to forget the softness and sometimes even pity in their eyes. Like they knew something Kylin didn’t. And they had come to take advantage of it.
”They asked for my help, or Circinae did..” The lavender and white girl doesn’t finish, there was nothing to finish. Ischia was her home, hers, and nobody would take it from her, but that didn’t make her feel comfortable with the presence of strangers. She’d fled from their meeting at the beach, back into the jungle of Ischia, simply because Kylin didn’t know how to deal with the situation.
I V A R i'll use you as a makeshift gauge of how much to give and how much to take
Her disappointment stings more than he’d expected.
The intimacy they share is borne from years of friendship rather than a quick concoction of pheromones, and Ivar cannot meet her quiet gaze for long. She knows that he belongs in the sea, and that Loess has no satisfactory water. Still, he cannot explain to her why he stays (why he keeps Heda) without revealing the rest of his nature.
His father had killed his mother both times they’d coupled. Only her own supernatural nature had saved her; the mares that Ivar has drowned beneath the sea will rot there – they could not be saved. He wants to do the same to Kylin. He is the offspring of a monster and a monster himself, but here – on dry land – he can forget that. The call of the sea is quieter from a distance. He can sate it with other pleasures, with sex instead of blood, with moans instead of screams.
He could keep Kylin here, he reasons as she speaks. She had made him promise to not use his hypnosis against her, but did she mean it? Surely she’d be happier here, with him. Ivar has already decided it, is stretching out his muzzle to command her with a kiss – and then he stops.
The memory of a snow and shadow figure bobbing on the waves is suddenly stark in his mind. He had tried to keep her, too. It had not ended well. He does not want Kylin to end up the same. He shakes his head – fortunately at a suitable time in the conversation – to clear the image and his intention. It takes the stallion a moment to come back to the conversation, but what the lavender mare is saying is important for several reasons, and his dark ears flick forward.
“Do you want to help them?” He asks, no sign on his white face of the internal battle roiled only moment ago. He seems only curious, a little concerned about Kylin’s comfort. The islands have only ever been occupied by her family, he imagines to have them filled with strangers must be a strange thing. To Ivar, the solution would be simple (slaughter them) but diplomacy is more complex than the kelpie would like it to be.
kelpie mimicry | dragon scales | tactile hypnosis minimal grullo tobiano king of loess
html code by Toli, design idea based on "Dovev" by Laura
Like a flower waiting to bloom.
All she knows is that Ivar likes water, just like she does. She had witnessed him holding his breath longer than he should be able to, so he could look at the bottom of Hyaline’s lake. He also was the one who had learned her to swim, how to not be afraid of deep pools and the wild sea. This Ivar, the one living in Loess, isn’t the Ivar she had gotten to know.
But does she know him at all?
She sighs softly, for now just enjoying his proximity and attention. Kylin didn’t need anything more to trouble her, and it isn’t like she had the right to question him. Her gaze is focussed ahead, but she doesn’t really see. Did she want to help them? She didn’t know, but she was afraid of the consequences if she would tell Circinae no.
”I don’t know..” she honestly tells him and her words are followed by another deep sigh. She’d lived her whole life in Ischia and she didn’t want to part from the island, knowing that she wasn’t as strong as Ivar. Kylin couldn’t live without the sea. ”They just came and changed everything. It makes me feel like a stranger in my own home.”
To some of them she was the stranger. It had been impossible to miss how Circinae had brought her family to Ischia. Not exactly a traditional couple, but who was Kylin to know of that. She’d been angry at her Father for telling her she couldn’t love her brother like that. Children too. And the sight of the girl made Kylin miss her baby sister Kali only more. ”What.. what if they don’t want me?”
Her hazel eyes slowly move to meet Ivar’s gaze again. She would say that she would’ve never felt this lost, but she knows that isn’t true. Though nothing special, she cannot say her life had been calm and only good. Her family had had a whole lot of issues and Kylin was no stranger to them.
I V A R i'll use you as a makeshift gauge of how much to give and how much to take
The hazel of her eyes is familiar, the green and brown swirls in a pattern unique only to Kylin. For a long while he’s quiet, only his ears flickering to her words. Ivar has always chosen the changes in his world; Kylin never seems to get that luxury. Her father had chosen to move her from Hyaline, and then her family had left without warning. Now newcomers have come to her home, their intention unknown. Nothing he says can soothe this, but he does run the sleek scales of his muzzle against her shoulder. The repetitive motion feels calming, and least to Ivar, the equine version of a pat on the back.
“You’re not though,” he replies when she says she feels like a stranger. “It doesn’t matter if they don’t want you – and they will want you. Ischia was your home before they came; they can’t make you leave.”
They might try, he supposes, but what are friends for if not to discretely murder the people that are mean to you?
“If they give you any trouble, just let me know, alright?”
kelpie mimicry | dragon scales | tactile hypnosis minimal grullo tobiano king of loess
