"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
03-31-2020, 01:30 PM (This post was last modified: 03-31-2020, 01:30 PM by Alcinder.)
i have slipped the surly bonds of earth on laugh-silvered wings
"Pops?" Alcinder floats above the mountaintop on outstretched wings, calling for Castile with uncertainty. The yearling boy hadn't seen his father since the Dragon King since Aunt Lepis had called them all together at the heart of Loess, naming herself the new Queen. He, of course, had been jubilant for the blue-and-gold woman ─ he with no knowledge of his father's plans to present the throne to his dam, but things had seemed amiss since that day.
Admittedly, the young boy had lapsed on his diplomatic studies with Lepis and had instead taken to exploring the foothills on his own. The perpetual ache in his chest, the space where Oceane should be ─ here, home ─ ebbs and flows like the tide. He has preferred to lick this wound in private, but today he finds that he needs comfort from someone close. Someone who is not Aunt Lepis.
Failing to find the piebald dragon, Alcinder circles lower and lower until finally he lands (a bit haphazardly) upon a plateau on the mountainside. The winds are strong here, forcing his lithe body to sway each time it assaults him, but they are warmer than expected. And with the wind comes the scent of his father, prompting a small and sheepish smile from the young colt.
"Pops?" he calls again, his silvered eyes sweeping the outskirts of the plateau for the familiar, and gigantic, dragon.
and underneath the layers, I find myself asking what's left a hollowed out form, the skeleton of a ghost, the pitiful echo of what once was
For an entire year, Castile has been unable to shift into his natural self.
For an entire year, he has been unable to truly embrace his son.
The pain grips him, the ache drumming in his chest. With every wing fall from the Mountain, Castile imagines the anticipation. It seems like an eternity since he even last saw Alcinder with Lepis close at hand. They haven’t had a moment in seclusion, understanding and learning each other as father and son should.
(Soon)
Not soon enough.
Even as his life crumbles by poor decisions, there’s excitement spurring his entire flight – a face, a moment, to look forward to. Amid the chaos, there is a light at the end of the tunnel.
It’s Alcinder, tucked finally inside the confines of Loess, safe from harm. It’s the sight of him haphazardly alighting on a distant plateau.
A smile stretches across the dragon’s scaled mouth, exposing all his crocodilian teeth. His pace quickens, spearing through the clouds before banking and gradually spiraling downward. His claws crumble away an edge of the plateau when he heavily lands. A wind buffets his son from the descending momentum, but then there is a stillness that envelopes them. Castile’s mismatched eyes look down at his boy, admiring him for what he is becoming. An admiring puff of air escapes his nostrils. Out of habit, he almost reaches forward, but remembers what the faerie has restored.
Excitedly, Castile’s body minimizes and reverts into that of a horse so that he may, for the first time, truly pull Alcinder into him for a loving embrace. His eyes close and the smile on his face broadens.
If only this could last forever.
Albeit reluctantly, Castile slowly withdraws and traces the yearling with curiosity to identify what features have been inherited from him versus Oceane. Such a handsome boy. ”My son,” he says in a sweet baritone, ”How are you?” What have I missed, he doesn’t say.
i have slipped the surly bonds of earth and danced the skies on laugh-silvered wings
The sharp snap of giant leather wings unfurling drags Alcinder's attention upwards immediately. He knows that sound. He knows that familiar shadow, the one that can cover such expanses that one can only turn to the sky with a mouth fallen open in awe. It's true that the yearling has grown accustomed to the sight of his father, having only known him as this great and imposing dragon, so there is no fear as the reptile encroaches ─ there is only the pure excitement of a son seeing his father after too much time has slipped away.
Alcinder opens his own wings against the wind of Castile's landing, using the feathered appendages to right his balance when the ground beneath his hooves threatens to crumble away. The painted colt waits until he is sure the earth has ceased its quaking before he pulls his wings back into his body and makes to approach his wyvern father like so many times before.
But then he balks as dragon turns to equine, scales into fur. And for the first time, Alcinder's silver eyes gaze upon his father in his true form.
"Dad," he whispers, his ears pressed forward and eyes wide, with a mouth still ajar despite the lack of words that fall from it. He had known that he carried his father's painted pattern, that his own silver eyes had come from Castile's mismatched ones, but to see him like this (so similar, so familiar, and yet... impossibly, a stranger in this form) draws a warmth through him that he had never experienced before.
Alcinder enthusiastically submits to his father's embrace and presses his nose into the soft two-toned coat, breathing in deep. His throat tightens, having so sorely missed the embrace of a parent over these last few months, and when Castile finally pulls away, the young boy's silvered eyes betray him as tears threaten to fall.
"I missed you, Dad, I─" he laughs, letting happiness overcome anything else he is feeling in this moment, "Can you... can you stay like this? For a while? Or─" he trails off again, half-expecting his father to say that the Fairies will ask him to return to his dragon form too soon.
and underneath the layers, I find myself asking what's left a hollowed out form, the skeleton of a ghost, the pitiful echo of what once was
Castile’s heart swells as the familiar pride of his children laps at the edges of his thoughts like the rising tide. A smile blossoms across his wrinkled lips, his mismatched eyes softening in a way that is reserved solely for family. To see Alcinder like this, a developing yearling, and at eye level, spurs a greater affection in the dragon than he has portrayed in the past. It takes only seconds to see the features inherited from him and Oceane, and yet Castile cannot help to hold his son in his gaze for far longer, unable – unwilling – to look away.
Dad, Alcinder says, and the warmth of Castile’s fiery gut reaches his face, savoring the name as he always has.
But not long after the word falls, riddled with emotion, that Alcinder’s eyes nearly betray the sentimentality seeping into his every pore. It elicits another urge to pull his son close, but Castile hesitates with the following questions, weighing them deliberately even with his face still softened by the tender reunion. The magic courses in his veins; it’s there again, within his control, and offers a concise answer. ”Yes,” he finally says, a low murmur for only his son to hear. ”I can be like this; I have that power back,” much of the boy’s childhood was either in Pangea or with a draconic sire that he never saw the true face of. Now, his mother is held captive. ”I’m so sorry for your untraditional upbringing,” Castile’s sighing breath is solemn and sincere as his reflects on it. ”I hope she will return soon to Loess, to safety,” he doesn’t mention himself. The tides are changing.
He isn’t sure how much longer he will be welcome here, former King or not.
Castile reaches forward, tousling Alcinder’s forelock with his nose. ”We will make it up to you. There are still memories and adventures ahead to make up for lost time.” Beneath his forelock, Castile’s eyes brighten hopefully while his mind trails off to imagine what life may become.
i have slipped the surly bonds of earth and danced the skies on laugh-silvered wings
The moments that pass between Alcinder's question and Castile's answer are slow and straining. They tick by palpably and Alcinder, with bated breath, watches his dad expectantly. When, finally, Castile answers him with a gruff and murmured yes, the young boy breaks into a wide smile. He had never felt any sort of emptiness over the fact that his dad was a dragon, had never felt that he was missing out ─ it had all felt natural. Normal, even. It is all the young boy had known.
But this feels like an exciting change, nonetheless. He knows no concept of traditional relationships ─ instead, he has been graced with the caring, unconventional, and exciting.
As Castile apologizes, Alcinder furrows his brow and tosses his two-toned head. "It's okay, Dad," he nudges the gold band at his dad's cheek as a sigh falls from the stallion's maw. There had been a point that the young boy had tried to feel anger over the situation, but there was only sadness that gripped him on the days he remembered how much he missed his mom.
"It's not anyone's fault. And, besides, Aunt Lepis has been teaching me about politics and it... well, it sounds like these things can happen when you're related to a king." He smiles, gunmetal eyes bright in hopes that he can remove that sad glimmer from his dad's mismatched ones.
Laughter falls from the boy's lips as Castile reaches forward to tousle his forelock. Snorting with faux agitation, the painted colt sidesteps and tosses his head once more.
"How about we go on an adventure now? I've..." he pauses, grins mischievously, "Well, I've explored a little on my own, but I'm always worried that someone will notice I'm missing and then I'll get in trouble." His grin turns sheepish as he admits his escapades to his dad ─ and then hopes silently that he won't be in trouble now that he's revealed his secret.
and underneath the layers, I find myself asking what's left a hollowed out form, the skeleton of a ghost, the pitiful echo of what once was
Dad.
It’s okay, dad.
The words grip Castile, choking him with emotion for the first few seconds. His head lowers to hide how much the sentimentality affects him. For over fifteen years, he has been a father and yet he doesn’t tire of the term. Many of his children have matured and wandered off to begin their own lives. Some have pitted themselves against him, straying from their parents and taking a piece of Castile’s own heart. So, to hear Alcinder call him dad offsets the guarded façade the dragon often exhibits. A smile lifts the corners of his mouth and his heart melts the instant his son presses to his cheek. ”I can’t help to feel as though I’ve failed you thus far,” maybe he should be used to it by now because when has he been a strong father to anyone? Yet there remains an underlying ache because he Wants to be a perfect dad, but somehow always falls short.
But when he is absent, at least there is someone to jump in and help. In Alcinder’s case, it is Lepis.
The warmth of Castile’s face falters a split second. There is no denying that he still cares for his niece, but there’s a rising tension that plucks the familial strings between them. ”Good, good. It’s only right that a prince learns such things,” because his son – all his children – are (no, were) princes and princesses. ”Hopefully, she didn’t bore you to death with everything. Politics have some monotonous moments,” he chuckles because children want only so much to do with interkingdom affairs. Nayl often dragged her son along to meetings, but it wasn’t until a little later in life that Castile developed interest. What boys want are adventures and exploration. Unfortunately, due to the rising number of enemies, Nayl often locked Castile into the caves, unwilling to allow him straying into the arms of an aggressor. She didn’t want her own son to be used against her.
”You don’t have to ask twice,” the eagerness in Castile’s voice vividly splashes across his face, his eyes glimmering at the idea of spending time together, to make up for what they’ve lost. ”I wouldn’t have been mad,” he confesses, furrowing his brow just barely at Alcinder’s reluctance, ”and I wouldn’t tell your mother.” His voice lowers to a murmur, his face mischievous before exuberance explodes from him as though he is a colt again. Reaching forward, Castile nips his son gently before pivoting and taking off. Within seconds, his draconic wings unfurl and he playfully takes to the skies.
i have slipped the surly bonds of earth and danced the skies on laugh-silvered wings
"You're the coolest, dad."
Alcinder laughs freely as they take to the skies. The sound echoes over the foothills as they ascend ─ higher and higher, the young boy spins and barrel-rolls playfully by his father's side. He is exuberant to spend this time with Castile, to adventure and explore without fear of being lost or harmed or reprimanded.
His father's promise to keep his exploring secret from Oceane draws laughter from Alcinder's lips again. The yearling boy loves his mother dearly, and misses her with every ounce of him ─ but he already knows how protective she will be upon her return. He will tolerate it, of course, like a good son, but there will come a time that he needs more and more independence, and to know that he has his father on his side fills Alcinder with a new and thrilling sense of camaraderie.
The young boy calls into the wide open sky with his zoolingualism and before long, the father and son pair are joined by a collection of Loessian birds ─ falcons with wide wingspans and small, fluttering larks and vibrantly colored orange-breasted buntings all join together, a massive flock of birds joining Alcinder and Castile in their airborne games.
He dives and climbs with the birds, a wide grin on his face each time his silvered eyes seek out his father in the sky. "Can we go see the ocean?" he calls over the wind to his father, bolstered by the company ─ he had always wanted to fly over the sea, but had never worked up the courage to do it on his own.
and underneath the layers, I find myself asking what's left a hollowed out form, the skeleton of a ghost, the pitiful echo of what once was
Oh, to be young again.
Immortality preserves him, retaining his physical youth even as his mind ages and learns, molding with every passing year. How he yearns to be an ignorant and blissful child again soaring among the clouds with Solace and with his father. Everything was care-free then.
In this moment, he wants to be just as free, but his thoughts are heavy with remorse and uncertainty for the days to come. Still he smiles and laughs with Alcinder, but there’s a darkness creeping like fog on the edges of his mind.
You’re the coolest, dad.
Castile beams at this, his heart soaring as high as they are in the sky in relief that perhaps, finally, he is doing something right. It nearly goes unanswered until flocks of birds join their games, flying and twisting in the sky with them. ”I’m not the one cool enough to have bird friends,” Mako is the same, befriending a dove. Laughter pours from him in their exhilaration as his gaze sweeps back and forth among the fowl. ”Unless you’re just bringing me some dinner,” but of course he is joking; there’s no intention to harm their companions. Executing another barrel roll, Castile draws in a lungful of the cool, fresh air before shifting his weight and rising just above his son. The wind tousles their locks and it takes everything in the former king to not shift (there’s something invigorating about flying as a dragon). Glancing down, he just barely hears Alcinder over the roar of the wind. ”Let’s go!” There’s no hesitation, no other idea to offer. To the ocean. That’s what his boy wants to see.
With smooth, practiced movements, Castile alters their path northwest from Loess, aiming for the canal separating the Silver Cove peninsula from Taiga and Nerine. From there, the ocean is endless, extending beyond the horizon and what the eye can see. The afternoon sun blankets across their bodies, keeping them warm even at their altitude. Like a the king he once was, Castile points out the kingdoms beneath them, giving Alcinder a glimpse of geographical education before they reach their destination.
It's here, staring at the open miles of ocean, that Castile realizes how small they actually are in this world, and how peaceful it is here with only his son.
