you've been talking with your fists | oceane

[Gale]

Gale run away with me-- lost souls and reverie running wild and running free   The winds are not in his favor. This is a good thing, Gale decides. A flight around the northern point of Tephra will be dangerous, but it will also give him the shortest journey to the heartland of Beqanna. If he wants to reach Loess before dark, it’s a risk he must take. Some time later, he lands on a beach. This is the no man’s land between Tephra and Taiga, a line of forest that he travels down until the tropical trees to his right are replaced by Sylvan orange. These are Southern lands, he knows, and he breathes a faint sigh. He feels a twinge of trepidation when the land begins to rise beneath his hooves. Some time ago, the scent of ash had reached his blue nostrils. With it was the smell of rain, a spring afternoon thunderstorm that has done its part to aid in the regrowth of the kingdom. This is a kingdom of bare stone and rock, and as he looks down at it from the first crest high enough, Gale finds that the destruction is not so terrible as he had thought. It is not relief he feels, but something like it. The pegasus pulls his snow white wings more tightly against his sides (and the coming night chill), and waits for the distant aerial speck that he suspects to be a sentry to spot him standing politely at the edge of their kingdom. @[Oceane]

[Oceane]

a little white light in a
sea gone black

≋

Some time has passed since the burning of Loess. Some, but not enough. Her heart still aches at the destruction despite the new birth of springtime. It still aches at the absence of Lepis.

She suspects, however, that this particular ache will be around for quite some time. And she has not yet learned to feel it in all of its stabbing, searing entirety. She feels it in small waves - enough to draw forth a sob from ajar lips before she thrusts the emotion back down inside of her. It has hindered her from addressing her kingdom like a Queen should.

She knows this is something that needs to be remedied, but another distraction has arrived and as her golden eyes alight upon the form, Oceane tilts her flight feathers and turns in his direction. She recognizes him vaguely - and then, as she descends upon the spot he has politely halted, the opaline woman realizes who it is.

“Blue,” she says with a tight smile that is miles away from reaching her darkened eyes. She has landed unceremoniously, closes the gap between them so all that lingers is a respectable distance between two acquaintances. The last she had seen the stallion was on the shores of the Resort - and that seems like lifetimes ago. “You've come a long way from your shores. How have you been?”

@[Gale]
“”

n | r

[Gale]

Gale run away with me-- lost souls and reverie running wild and running free Closing his eyes, Gale breathes in the smell of the summer air. It is full of scents he has no name for, of horses he does not know and plants he’s never seen. His memories of this place are solely visions, he cannot recall the taste of a prickly pear or the smell of the blue orchids that bloom beside the saltiest spring. By the time he opens his eyes again, the distant speck has grown near enough to recognize as a pegasus. Gale remains still, allowing the other horse to close the space between them. “Oceane!” He says, just as she greets him with ‘Blue’. The enthusiasm in his voice is not a match for her own more somber tone, and the bright smile that has flashed to life on the brindle stallion’s face is replaced by the same hesitance that had been present prior to recognizing the opaline woman. There are shadows in her eyes, shadows that do not match the easy pleasantries of a meeting between acquaintances. They match his own, and he responds with a quiet: “Better than you’ve been of late, I hear.” He means the kindom as well, which he looks out at for a long moment, and then meets her amber eyes again. It has occurred to Gale just now, that Oceane used the name he had chosen, and that she does not know who he is. Who his family is. Who’d they’d been. “I chose the name Blue,” Gale says. “It turns out I have a real one, and that it’s Gale.” Had Lepis mentioned him, he wonders? Had she told the purple blue mare of her lost son? @[Oceane]

[Oceane]

a little white light in a
sea gone black

≋

The stallion is so cheerful upon recognizing the pearlescent woman and in that moment Oceane wishes so terribly that she could match his tone. Truly, she would have, were the corners of her mouth and the muscle of her heart not weighed down by a hundred thousand stones. Blue had offered her kindness upon their first meeting in the Field even after she had nearly brushed him away - a product of what had been her recent history, but she has softened since those days - and then kindness again upon her arrival to his shores. He had never asked for anything in return, and here she is again, soured.

He makes mention of the scorched foothills and she joins him in peering over the nearby land. Spring had been kind; it had rid them of the scent of smoke and had carried away the ash in its excessive rains. It had brought new life, though not enough to begin to mask the destruction. Oceane is hopeful for the coming year.

She has debated a journey to the Mountain, but the stories she has heard of the fairies remind her of Nau-Aib's arithmancers, and the opaline woman is unsure of whether that is a similarity she wants to delve into just yet.

“Gale,” she repeats as she turns her honey-colored eyes back to the brindle stallion. There is a familiarity behind the name; she knows she has heard it before but can't quite place where. Perhaps, she thinks, she is mistaken. “That sounds like a story I would like to hear sometime,” she tries her hand at a warmth that she knows would be genuine in any other circumstances.

But it's so hard to drudge up the energy when Lepis -

Lepis.

A quiet gasp falls from her maw at the realization. Her eyes collide with his and for a long moment she simply stares as her golden eyes well with tears.

“You are Lepis' boy,” she whispers through her tightening throat, but can't muster much else before she's forced to clench her teeth lest a sob find its way from within her.

@[Gale]
“”

n | r

[Gale]

Gale run away with me-- lost souls and reverie running wild and running free Gale. She says it without recognition, and for a moment he thinks that perhaps he has avoided the murkiest depths of this interaction. Oceane sounds a little warmer even, and Gale thinks no less of her for the possibility it is feigned. The ways to deal with grief are myriad, after all. His own genuine happiness is evident of that. But he is empathetic too, and not totally unobservant. So when, after a long look over the sharp red canyons, he meets her gaze again, Gale knows that she’s already heard that particular story. At least, she’s heard the beginning of it, the tale that culminates his death during the second year his life. (He doesn’t know that Lepis has more recent stories of him, of how she had watched him die on the rocks of Taiga when Wolfbane had worn his shape or how he’d appeared in front of her only to be accused of being once more his father disguised.) There have been a great many additions to his story since then, but none include rebuilding a relationship with his parents. Lepis and Wolfbane are characters in a story to him, characters that he had avoided thinking of as real until the very last possible moment. These eyes saw them for the first time mere seconds before they died. Perhaps he, Oceane, and Eyas had even crossed paths in the air over Loess during the burning. The smoke had been too much for him to make much out, but he knows there had been other winged creatures in the flame-filled air over these very canyons. “Boy?!” He replies. “I was so sure reaching double digits would mean I’d finally get to graze in the grown-ups field.” The brindle continues with a lighthearted smile. He is not sure how to handle Oceane’s sadness, so he defaults to the teasing and distraction that is effective for his sister Eyas. Of course, it’s not worked especially well recently, but Gale’s social skills are not at all aided by his regenerative healing, and he’s always been rather awkward.  @[Oceane]

[Oceane]

a little white light in a
sea gone black

≋

Gale's age and the experiences he has lived have certainly earned him recognition of his maturity - his age, even, is likely closer to Oceane's than to that of foalhood, but in the context of mother and child it feels almost unnatural for the Loessian Queen to consider him an adult. Furthermore, in the context of the warm reunion he had never been able to share with his mother, now would never be able to share with his mother, Oceane can only look upon the cerulean man with the sadness a surrogate mother may look upon a heartbroken child.

“O-of course,” she mutters as her amber eyes watch his before moving to the playful curve of his lips that accompanies his jest. How she will hate to rend that from him, how she now dreads it, despite knowing that she must tell him.

That burden, now, is hers.

“Gale, I...” Oceane falters, the tightness of her throat hampering her ability to simply spill the news from her quivering jaw. She inhales slowly and deeply, clears her throat, and shifts her weight and wings, but then she finds no other way to delay the inevitable and returns her heartbroken gaze to her very first Beqannan acquaintance. “Lepis passed away, Gale. In the fire.”

Her voice cracks and for the first time since she had found the remnants of Lepis' charred wing, she allows herself to cry. In front of Soran and Altum, even, she had forced stoicism, but that facade feels more tiring and futile than anything else in this moment.

“She was trying to protect Loess, as she always did.”

@[Gale]
“”

n | r

[Gale]

Gale run away with me-- lost souls and reverie running wild and running free Oceane’s confirmation of Lepis’ death extinguishes a flicker of hope in Gale’s chest that the brindle stallion hadn’t even been aware of. Fate had already interrupted the bond that he should have shared with his mother, and his own decision to keep his distance had only furthered that. Best to not get attached, he’d though. Yet he feels cold, suddenly, in a way he had not anticipated. It is as though some part of his body he had never thought much about is suddenly gone, and he is somehow less without it. There is little time for him to process his own reaction though, not before Oceane’s smiling façade crumples in front of him. Gale takes a step forward, attempting to raise her chin up if she would let him. In his eyes is the empathy that he cannot escape, even without the true magic of it in his veins. He doesn’t mean it to cheer her, and instead takes another step forward so he might wrap his head over hers in an embrace. The opalescent mare seems smaller than she had when they first met, and it takes Gale a moment to remember that he’d not quite been grown when he had last seen the queen in front of him, and it is him that is larger. Larger, but not yet wiser, it seems, not yet incapable of hurt. How many centuries must one live to achieve that feat, Gale wonders? “I wish I had known her better,”, he says quietly. “From what little I do know though, I think she’d enjoyed being remembered that way. As trying to protect Loess, I mean.” @[Oceane]

[Oceane]

a little white light in a
sea gone black

≋

“I'm so sorry, Gale,” the woman's voice breaks as he reaches out to raise her quivering chin. She allows the touch, leans into it even, in hopes that it will allow them to share the burden of this mourning. She is silent for a time, with full knowledge that there are no words she can string together that will help heal the sadness that grips them both tight.

There's no escaping this type of anguish.

She concentrates on the warmth of the blue stallion as they embrace - she attempts to find comfort and solace in it, but still the sobs threaten to rise in her throat. She has not yet allowed herself the opportunity to grieve unbridled, not until now, and finally she allows a singular gasping sob to fall from her heaving chest as it presses against Gale.

His words, his kind words about the mother and relationship he must be grieving for, draw tears from her amber eyes and they spill generally across her opaline face.

“She would,” Oceane agrees through her tight throat, that Lepis would want to be remembered in that way. A slow sigh, accompanied by a hiccup, is pushed forcefully from Oceane's lips, and then, with another wave of grief: “She was my best friend.”

@[Gale]
“”

n | r

[Gale]

Gale run away with me-- lost souls and reverie running wild and running free   Oceane voices the apologetic sentiment he feels, yet some part of Gale remains aware that the blame for the loss lies with neither blue horse.  His chest is hollow and there is a painful weight on his heart, but it is not the weight of guilt or fault. Articulating this is beyond Gale’s capabilities, so he is quiet for a time instead. The opalescent mare sobs and gasps against him, and he brings his wings up to better embrace her, a curtain of warmth against the fall chill. Unable to see the tears, he can smell their ocean-like saltiness in air and averts his gaze to save her dignity. The brindle pegasus is far from socially graceful, but he does try to be thoughtful. Her best friend, Oceane says after a soft hiccup, and Gale nods to show he’s heard. Her loss is deeper than his, Gale thinks, he’d only lost a mare he has a handful of memories of. A gust of wind brings the scent of autumn leaves and old burning, a heavy reminder of the fire that had damaged the land as well as their family. “Do you want to talk about her?” He asks, “Or would you rather tell me what you have been up to since you and Isobell visited all those years ago?” @[Oceane] <3

[Oceane]

a little white light in a
sea gone black

≋

Oceane embraces Gale as she rides the wave of grief and then, as it ebbs into a dull pain in the hollow of her chest, she finds strength enough to pull away from him. She knows it will be back later, will strike her with the ferocity of a tidal wave, but for now it's sufficient enough to quell the sharpness of it by sharing in the misery with the brindled man.

She murmurs a quiet thank you in acknowledgment of the way his wings had wrapped around her and then, upon clearing her throat almost self-consciously, is pleased when the King of Islandres gives her the opportunity to turn her mind to something new. “Isobell,” Oceane thinks fondly of the mare and it shows in the gentle, if not sad, curve of her lips. “It's been so long since I saw last her.” It's a day for melancholy, she supposes.

“Well... quite a lot has happened, truly. Not only with the title I now hold, but I have two sons - Alcinder and Altum. And they're both grown!” she finds herself grinning at the end, bemused to think of all that had changed since Gale had given her a tour of his beautiful island. “Alcinder is quite taken with Icicle Isle, but Altum has remained here with me. For now, at least.”

There had been a time in her past the pearlescent mare would have never believed it possible she would feel comfortable raising children. Not after Nau-Aib. But here she is now, her past life long forgotten, with nothing but hope for her future and that of her children.

“And what about you, Bl- Gale?” She smiles sheepishly, “What have I missed out on since then?”

@[Gale]
“”

n | r