There were herds that tried to take the emerald eyed boy in. But, most of the time, he would just pin those silver ears back at them, falling amidst the locks of dark hair, peridot eyes aggressive. He would never be one of them, not truly. Not all held the fortune of a privileged birth and noble parents that insured their child’s safety. Despite not wanting to join a herd, he has spent most of his time lingering of the edges of them. They would whisper about him, having spotted him moving the shadows with those wings tucked at his sides. He was wary of them, wary of all of them and what they had created. Herd life, herd hierarchy, it was something he had difficulty understanding. The place that everyone seemed to establish, their relationships with each other effortless, when he would have to work so hard to establish social norms. There is something inside of him, through that broken, fractured, disheveled mind that can recall herd life, and parents, but Thales hardly understands the past and memories, the images that find him sometimes in his dreams. He knows the present, knows he is here. That is enough, he decides.
The boy has walked miles, in his obsessive desire to search and search, but for what he cannot remember. He thinks he will know when he sees it. He looks mangy, skinny, underfed, but there is a rugged smile that lingers on him, even if he does not intend it to be so. The emerald eyed boy, despite his personality and haggard look, he was indeed handsome. It could be seen in those green eyes, and the curves of his face. Nature is harsh and Thales has been used as its punching bag on more than one occasion. But, somehow, he has remained. He has survived alone for this long, there is no one to say he would not continuing existing just how he lives now.
His mind is not like the others. Thoughts given to drift on another wavelength entirely, from one topic to the next, always concerned with what is in front of him and not what is hidden behind their back. Like a child that has not yet learned object permanence. His attention it would seem, is not drawn to the trees. He stands below a tall one in the forest, emerald gaze directed upwards, unblinking, unwavering. That he has this much focus in a single instant is a bit of a mystery. The leaves rustle, and it is thought that perhaps this is what has intrigued Thales so much. The way they wiggle and move and dance as he breeze teases the spaces between them. It seems this might hold his attention for some time, as short as it is. Oh, wait, no. It seems I have spoken too soon.
A snort issues from ashen nostrils then as he turns aware, seemingly walking to some where, a look of determination on his face, but, ultimately, he is going no where in particular. His silver body weaves in between the trees, he is walking…some where…some where…
T H A L E S
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@[lilliana]
@[Popinjay]
08-23-2019, 06:17 PM
(This post was last modified: 08-23-2019, 06:19 PM by Popinjay.)
She has grown, but not very tall, and she is still a wild thing, weaving between the trees almost without thinking, like she could do it blind. Each gray hoof finds it’s purchase in loam and leaf, in the world hidden from view by fog and fern, invisible. But she is not blind, her eyes are bright and clear and dark like the blackwater creek that weaves through the ravine to the north. But she is not headed that direction, today. Today she is alone and plunging deep into the Taigan forest, deeper than she has been before. Occasionally, as she passes, the yearling bites at a fern or a low-hanging branch that catches her eye. Not for any particular reason.
The light that comes through the trees is warm and golden and drips off her mist-soaked coat. Thick eyelashes are heavy with droplets of gleaming water and she blinks them away. This part of the forest looks no different than any other part of it, tall trees rising up from the earth, hiding the sky, and it would be so easy to get lost. Just trees, and trees, and trees, and ferns, and fog, and more trees. Young Popinjay rarely loses her sense of directions, but sometimes even she gets turned around, especially in unfamiliar parts of the territory. For a moment, she pauses to take her bearings.
The snort surprises her, and she answers it with one of her own and a leap to the side, landing in an almost crouch with her haunches tucked under and her front legs nearly resting on pointe, and head up, up, up. Small ears press forward to the sound of someone coming – she hadn’t expected anyone – and her dark eyes zero in on a shadow moving among the shadows. The filly snorts again, head rolling, and returns to an otherwise motionless observation, only her head turning to track the dark horseshape that is tracking through the trees. His smell comes to her, then, it doesn’t smell of Taiga, and it doesn’t smell of horse, either. Ears fall flat, then flit forward again, alert. Briefly a debate rages, the young stallion looks as if he will blow right past her without even seeing her, like he could stumble into her and never notice.
She doesn’t like to be ignored, not even by threatening strangers.
Popinjay She was not quite what you would call refined
She has hung back in the outskirts of Taiga, exploring the ancient forest and tentatively starting to understand her new surroundings. It's such a foreign concept to her, this staying in one place for so long. For someone who has no wanderlust in her veins, whose blood doesn't hum for the exhilaration and thrill of new places, Lilli just can't seem to settle in Taiga's borders. There are many, many restless nights of venturing into Hyaline (the crimson girl seems to be as much there as she is in Taiga) to slide her slender form around her golden cousin so the world doesn't seem quite so vast.
Lilli has started to learn to love Taiga for its wilderness, for the way the shadows dance and the sun breaks through the enormous trees. She has started to admire it for its ability to still be standing after.. after what? The chestnut has been trying to understand the events that have taken place in Beqanna in recent memory. She can remember her mother's words of when she had passed through this place, that the magic had ripped it raw and open, had left it wide open to the ambitions and corruption of others. Aletta hadn't felt compelled to stay and events had led her elsewhere.
But in her place stands her daughter and it is Lilli who is trying to discern the histories and politics of the different kingdoms, of the territories that dwell in each one.
She's still struggling with the top to bottom of Beqanna and her kingdoms, the rulers and their ambitions. But Lilli has learned enough to know what matters here. Taiga belongs to the kingdom of Nerine ruled by Heartfire, a name that she hears quite often. She knows that Hyaline is a territory of Pangea and Hyaline is ruled by the Primarch, Kensa. Her golden cousin speaks glowingly of her territories ruler and through Elaina, Lilli has come to have an admiration for Kensa. These are the things that Lilli knows and for now, she deems it enough.
It is one of these trips that she returns from, Elaina and Hyaline still clinging to her crimson coat. The scent of Taiga hasn't claimed her yet and the young mare hopes to slip through Taiga's borders unnoticed. She hopes and fails, her attention comes to focus on a yearling on the outlying parts of the venerable wood. The filly stands, erect and proud as Lilli's blue eyes glance further past, through the glimpses of trees and catches the sight of a silver stallion. The knowledge that is he is there, that is he is so close to one of Taiga's younger residents forbids her from moving on and so the chestnut weaves her own path through the trees to approach the duo.
Popinjay exudes spirit, something that Lilli greatly admires and she offers a soft greeting to her. It's quiet but loud enough that Thales can hear it too, enough that it shouldn't startle either of them. Lilli has never been one for stealth and today is no different.
@[Thales] @[Popinjay]
but it's all in the past, love
it's all gone with the wind
Thales has never been one much for the company of others. He fails to understand her need to belong, such a need one he cannot identify within himself and as such it does not exist for him. The green eyed, dark haired rogue is...un-socialized at best, so many of the norms of society lost upon him and truly, a part of him is too utterly lazy to try, preferring to live within his own shaded existence, by his own rules on his own time. . He is...uneasy in the presence of others, never so entirely sure how to react. Thales has been seen lashing out at strangers for simply not understanding their strange ways to him or the dynamics that was ingrained in so many others, so typical. He has not been invited here, has not been asked to stay. But neither has Thales been asked to leave, and so he takes this as he could linger around the land of Taiga for as long as he would like.
In truth, Thales was entirely focused on finding…something, or going….some where. I can no longer tell you where his mind wanders, it is foreign to even his writer. I simply narrate his actions, Thales dictates though which direction he will take. If the little girl had no issued some snort so similar to his own, he may have every well entirely missed her. But, the rogue has always been easily distracted, his attention so easy to capture, like a butterfly with a broken wing.
This is when those emerald eyes roll upon the little thing. Thales remembers, or perhaps, just innately knows from back when he had been younger. Babies are small, you are to be gentle with babies. Yes, this is something Thales knows. Be gentle with the baby. “What…do you…want?” he asks the little thing in that rough, masculine voice of his. She is small and therefore he does not simply push her away, Thales hardly the type to injure a small thing.
Like a kite in the wind, another sound causes those green eyes to slip away from the little girl and to a red head that has made her presence known to each of them. He offers them each something of a bemused expression. He looks violent, is often assumed to be so, and is entirely capable as he has proved before, but Thales so often feeds off the emotions of others and for now he is calm, soothed even by the red head’s presence. For how long that lasts remains to be seen.
His gaze drifts upwards to the tree tops of Taiga, perhaps his current companions were already boring him. “There are so…many…trees here,” he says, eyes wide, grumbled words even quieter with the position of his neck. “Have you co…unted them?” He asks. Whether or not they are listening is another matter entirely. Of course, the actual concept of counting is a concept lost upon Thales. Still, he is ambitious, that ought to count for something.
T H A L E S
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@[lilliana] @[Popinjay]
09-11-2019, 10:10 PM
(This post was last modified: 09-11-2019, 10:10 PM by ratty.)
She doesn't recognize him, doesn't recognize his scent, doesn't recognize his demeanor. Nobody so unusual has crossed Popinjay's path since she has arrived in Beqanna, and though she is wary, she is curious. Her hooves itch, and she wants to close the distance between herself and the strange stallion, but rare caution holds her back. When he speaks, her pinned ears flick forward, and at the same time catch the sound of the chestnut mare dreaming her way through the Taigan woodland.
Her intense study of him is broken and the yearling filly turns away to meet the blue-eyed gaze of... Lolly? The little bay has made no real attempt to come to know this new member of Taiga, she only knows that Wolfbane brought her home, and that the mare drifts away many nights, only to return come dawn. Although each day brings her a little closer to adulthood, Popinjay has had very little to do with them, keeping mostly to her contemporaries in the herd, Owin and Celina, and so she is uncertain how Lilly... Linny - no, what is her name? - will react to finding them here, alone.
She knows how others would react. She has been scolded for her impetuousness before, and learned very little for it.
Very little, indeed. She barely acknowledges the other mare's greeting, the very corners of her lips quirking into the slightest crooked grin. The minute that the silver stallion takes his eyes off her, she is moving, and as he studies the chestnut for a moment, then drifts away into the tree-tops, she is nearly on top of him, small head low and weaving side-to-side as though trying to push him out from the bushes and into the small clearing. Doomed to failure, her attempt at flushing him out serves mostly to bring her very close, so that there is no question about her hearing his query.
"Oh, oh, oh, I've counted lots of trees! There's at least four-hundred-and-thirty-seven trees. I think. Maybe it was four-hundred-and-thirty-eight-or-maybe-nine? How many have you counted? It gets awful hard to keep track..." A whirlwind of words flies from her lips as she attempts to draw broadside to him, near-black eyes glinting brightly as the sun peers through the canopy above, "Lillolly, Lindy-Ann, have you counted the trees?"
Popinjay She was not quite what you would call refined
@[Thales] @[lilliana]
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