"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
12-27-2018, 11:48 PM (This post was last modified: 12-27-2018, 11:56 PM by naia.)
it's a guarantee that he won't forget me. my body little, my soul heavy.
The bitter taste of Naia’s first encounter with her father coats her tongue, casts out any chance of pleasantries. The roan girl can sense her mood souring as the seconds pass, the consuming need to expel her nasty vitriol onto another sickening every corner of her usually busy mind. The typical quiet thoughts she dims to stay more aware are now sirens of red letters doing laps around her brain
I wanting to fucking escape.
Anger is new: hot, unknown, a bright white branded spear leaving searing marks across her body. In movement, she is tense - one careful step, then the next, and so on . . . though even that intense focus will not chase away the pain. She does not understand this - this poison she unknowingly swallowed the day she met those ill-fated leaders in the Meadow.
What had started this spiral? Perhaps she resents her mother for never introducing her to her father, for never telling her much about him; perhaps it is the teenage angst finally setting in, the lack of socialization keeping it from her for so long. There is a fury stirring, a vexation marinating in a tightly wrapped container full of isolation and repressed loneliness. For now she does not fear it (though she certainly should), she only chases it as it runs rampant, perpetually incapable of catching it.
In her daze, Naia does not notice where she is wandering. There were whisperings of a celebration happening in Island Resort (a destination she had set but decided against halfway through her journey); it seems she has wandered into it without thinking. Snow begins to flutter from the sky as she hesitantly steps into the twinkling light, delicate white flakes catching on her eyelashes.
She looks beautiful: wondrous and wide-eyed as she stares into the night sky (no outward indication of the suffering within). Her chin is turned all the way upward, vulnerable and child-like and so unlike her (perhaps she needs this - the enrapturement of such graceful scenery). Naia waits, the shadows of the sparkling orbs above waving back and forth over her slowly roaning chestnut body, enchanted for just the second.
Naia
to explain because i forgot to work this into the post: she's hovering near the entrance of the party, i imagine there's plenty of people chatting/wandering around just ahead. open to literally anyone milling about at the party : )
The prospect of a gathering – a party? – in his home was highly welcomed.
There is little he can do except stand readily and wait for arrivals to clutter the shore. His molten eyes sweep back and forth across the beach as the waves crash against the sand in a relaxing metronome. The lull of the island is a lullaby rocking him nearly into a sleep until newer, unfamiliar voices, bounce from the tide and dance with the tropical wind.
As foreigners trickle in, Tiphon makes attempt to address them individually, seizing the opportunities to meet those that wander outside of his reach. With purposeful steps, he closes the distance between him and the first arrival. She comes alone, her lips pursed tightly shut despite the cacophony surrounding them. ”Hello,” he is amiable by nature, his expression brightened by the looming cause of celebration. What aura surrounds him delicately illuminates the soft edges of her face. ”Welcome to the Island Resort. My name is Tiphon,” his wings stretch out briefly, almost like a curtain before he tucks them neatly against his sides. ”If you don’t mind my asking, where are you from?” What lands there are now, beyond Ischia and here, escape his notice. His memory, Wallace confirmed, has been cleansed of so much – too much.
But despite his hospitality bleeding through, Tiphon takes note of a hinting solemnity shadowing her eyes. Concern nearly touches his lips, almost escapes him, but he burrows it for now, biding his time while trying to ignite a smile from her first.
it's a guarantee that he won't forget me. my body little, my soul heavy.
Snow continues to fall on her lashes, lights continue to glimmer in the reflection of her eyes. Naia stares like she has never seen the world before, palm trees and impossibly white sand and glittering orbs so foreign to her. A smile, so pure and child-like it might break a spectator’s heart, passes somberly over her lips. Ahead the crowd mingles in distant murmurs, but to the girl the entire world goes silent: it is just her, the gray clouds, and a peace she cannot name.
A tingling starts at the tip of her nose and travels lazily down her spine, to the base of her tail, then passing over her skin in an almost overwhelming wave. Naia drops her head slowly, wide eyes casting over the roan fur turned black and gold. The coffee color of her eyes grows into a complete circle each as she studies the gold spots and velvet black. She does not understand, perhaps she never will (how strange the magic of Beqanna will always be), but a tiny tear drips down the side of her face.
A change of scenery, snow that soothes (or suppresses) the heat of anger, the solitude of a life she realizes she has yet to live: she does not understand and she wants to scream, to run, to be as far away from who she is as possible.
“. . . name is Tiphon.”
Naia snaps to attention, the damp track of her single tear suddenly ending at the edge of her cheek, the clear drop leaving a finally hole in the snow. The beauty of Tiphon is what she notices first, usually neutral gaze now caught off-guard and wandering freely over his countenance. Her breathe catches in her throat, a mixture of surprise and embarrassment. He continues to speak, kindly and questioning. On any other night the appaloosa may have glared coldly and turned away, but the fury and change battling and blooming in her chest leaves her at a quiet and naive loss.
The swirling of her gaze drops to the snow, an abashed smile stretching hesitantly across her lips. Where is she from? She certainly feels like an alien.
“I suppose you can say I am from Nerine,” she replies, drawing her head back to its full height retaining what dignity she feels she has left. “Though I would think I am its newest resident.” Her lips turn wry now, the bitter flavor of a large family she knows nothing of swirling on her tongue.
“My name is Naia. Are you from here?”
The confusion, fear, and pain from moments before still linger in the back of her mind, threatening to flood over at any moment. A party - her first ever one, for whatever that means - is no place for a breakdown. For now, she will continue to suppress.
Naia
@[Tiphon] i hope you don't mind, i was really eager to give naia her coat change, and i thought her little existential crisis would be the perfect time :~p
