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  • Beqanna

    COTY

    Assailant -- Year 226

    QOTY

    "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


    [private]  saluted every ghost you've ever prayed to; wishbone
    #1

    that day even the sun was afraid of you and the weight you carried

    The shadows chase him today, trailing off of him like a cloak that whips around every corner. They’re driven by something dark, something brooding, and he is careful to not look too closely at it—unsure about how to try and tackle something that feels endless and yawning and impossible. It would trap him, he knows. Swallow him whole if he turned his full attention toward it. It would be impossible to avoid the darkness that he has helped banish from Beqanna but then now lives inside of him, churning and alive.

    He scowls as he walks, flinging his magic out in front of him to elongate the darkness but unable to keep the sun from shining fully on him. It is not yet twilight yet and the afternoon light peeks through, beating down through his magic, wearing a hole steadily through his power to find him. It is painful, he thinks, in a way that the day used to be a reprieve that he reveled in. Now it is as cursed as the night used to be.

    Laughing under his breath, not immune to the humor of his life, he angles his path to take him closer to the trees and then further into the belly of the forest. He had always preferred these trees, even in the years before everything, but they are a sanctuary now. The sun does not break fully through the trees of it and the cool shadows dapple across his golden hide, luring him further and further into its embrace.

    He gladly answers its call, plunging further and further into shadows as his own companion races after him, hopping from stretched darkness to the next, diving into it like a pool of water and leaping out. His fury banks softly, replaced with a desperate, sharp-edged need to outrun it, and without thinking, his pace increases its clip. He stretches out into a run, legs eating up the earth until he doesn’t feel his magic at all, or his sorrow, or his guilt—all he feels is the burning of his muscles and the salt of his sweat.

    so you saluted every ghost you've ever prayed to and then buried it where bones are buried




    @[Wishbone]
    Reply
    #2
    it's a mystery to me
    we have a greed with which we have agreed. you think you have to want more than you need; until you have it all you won't be free. and when you think more than you want, your thoughts begin to bleed.
    Wishbone cannot shake the anger that clings to her. She had stood at the smooth earth where Svedka had disappeared, waiting for Beqanna (the underworld, rather) to spit back what it had taken from her. When she realized the sun would not bring her brother with it, her rage had sparked in her core. And there it simmers, a constant fire that turns her insides hot and drags the heat onto the tip of her tongue. It’s fierce anger, with a strength that reminds Wishbone of her days in the Afterlife.

    She had worn a path into the Afterlife’s gray soil, pacing next to the line of Life and Death. This time, Wishbone can take her emotions out in much more realistic ways — she has already swum in the ocean until her body tires, ran through Tephra until her lungs screamed, considered the consequences of jumping from the volcano. Her conversation with Mazikeen had helped lessen the heat of her anger for a day, but the following day Wishbone wakes up just as restless as the day before.

    So she leaves Tephra, traveling south to the common lands. And once she reaches the Forest, she plunges herself into its darkness. Wishbone knows there is less traffic in the Forest, and perhaps this will minimize the number of unsuspecting individuals that might receive her fury. The shadows feel cool against her skin, brushing the heat of anger off her purple flanks, and Wishbone momentarily closes her eyes at the sensation. At the sound of racing hooves, her glowing amber eyes fly open again.

    It feels dangerous to race through the thick woods, and the pangare knows danger is precisely what she needs. Tossing her head, Wishbone pushes herself into a sprint, winding through the trees to reach the side of whoever was running nearby. The shadows make the stranger speckled, and they are moving so quickly that an entire world appears within the shadows on the backdrop of his skin. The sprint eats at a portion of her aggression, giving her something else to focus on. And Wishbone grits her teeth, matching the stranger’s strides and pushing her athleticism until he decides to slow down.
    credit to eliza of adoxography.


    @[firion]
    Reply
    #3

    that day even the sun was afraid of you and the weight you carried

    He comes from a family of runners.

    Not because they were particularly athletic—although his stride is wide and he eats up the earth with a gathering speed—but because they were always chased. Chased by their own bad decisions. By the ache of their heart. By their hunger. By their own demons. The thought makes his lips twist into a wry smile.

    He was the demon now.

    There was no outrunning him.

    But it doesn’t matter. He runs anyway. Runs as his lungs burn and his muscles protest. He could ease that, he thinks. Could relax his body intentionally, but he likes the pain. Likes the bite of it as it grips him. Likes the way that it sharpens his focus. Makes each and every step intentional. He would not take that away from himself for the sake of something easy. He did not run like this for the ease of it.

    When he hears the twin sound of footsteps that begin to match his own, he exhales sharply but does not veer off course. He pulls back slightly and then plunges forward, shadows nipping at his heels and sweat beginning to work a froth under his tangled mane. He sends the darkness toward her as they go. Lets it explode off of him in reaching tendrils, reaching for her in the space between them. It is a needy touch.

    A demanding one.

    They whip toward her and writhe around her legs. Race up her back.

    He grins into the wind that picks up and lets his magic wind down the shadows toward her too. Gifts her with more speed. More endurance. Even more than she was naturally blessed with.

    He presses onward, the exhaustion not yet outpacing all that he was running from.

    He pushes his magic into her once more.

    Keep up, he thinks as he grits his teeth. Don’t stop now.

    so you saluted every ghost you've ever prayed to and then buried it where bones are buried




    @[Wishbone]
    Reply
    #4
    it's a mystery to me
    we have a greed with which we have agreed. you think you have to want more than you need; until you have it all you won't be free. and when you think more than you want, your thoughts begin to bleed.
    She comes from a family of fighters.

    It’s not because they’re fond of war — though the body she wears now suggests that she’s bred for it, with thickly-coiled muscles and straight lines — but because they’ve had to learn how to fight for what is good in their lives. Her mother, her father, her brothers, and maybe even her lost twin girls. They all have things they’re trying to protect in this world. They also have things they’re trying to destroy.

    The ferocity of her family comes naturally to Wishbone. She fell easily into the path of a fighter at a young age, perhaps too easily. Ambition and determination and obstinacy — they have been friends of hers from the moment of her first breath. They scarred her knees on the black volcanic rock when she tried to climb the monument before her first birthday. They taught her many lessons when she called herself Khaleesi before she was ready. They drowned her in the northern ocean, they wore holes into the Afterlife’s soil, they made her dig for Svedka’s body until she couldn’t move another inch.

    Ambition and determination and obstinacy — they push her to increase her stride and match the stranger’s, the one born from a family of runners.

    One of her dark ears twists toward the stranger as they race, and she watches from the corner of her eye as the shadows spring toward her like living things. Wishbone has seen the shadows move like this before, during the eclipse and with far darker intentions, but something in the patterns of the shadows suggests they are different. They charge across her skin, whisper against her heels, and wind up her back. Her skin prickles at the sensation, at the potential for danger, but her lips crack in a reckless smile.

    Wishbone feels the effects of the sprint in the way her muscles burn and her skin foams with sweat. She doesn’t shy away from the feeling but pushes into it. Her pent-up anger feeds her, giving her exhaustion a purpose, and she tosses her head with shadows twisting across her ears. Her legs beg her to slow down, but suddenly there’s a white-hot burst of speed and energy. She uses it to increase her stride, to put herself slightly ahead of the stranger, and she mentally pulls herself closer to the thing providing the extra resources.

    More, her body seems to say to the shadows, give me more and see how long we can go.
    credit to eliza of adoxography.


    @[firion]
    Reply
    #5

    that day even the sun was afraid of you and the weight you carried

    It’s exhilarating to have someone surge next to him—to not be in this race alone. It stirs something in him, something primal and reaching, and he growls under his breath in reaction to it, feeling the way that his muscles strain and his breath grows ragged. Firion can practically feel her own anger, her own dark emotions looming over them like a storm cloud. He recognizes them. Sees them reflected back.

    Because he feels them too.

    The sorrow, the loss, the endless fury.

    Thunder crackles over them, lashing out across the sky from clouds that hadn’t been there but a second before. He grits his teeth as he weaves and between one step and another, he shifts—his body racing forward as a cheetah this time. His stride grows even longer, haunches launching him forward as his body collapses on itself and then stretches out. His magic reaches out to her once more with the shadows, that demonic energy that crackles between them as he gives her the temporary power to shift too, if she wants.

    There’s something swelling him, a pressure building that he knows he can’t ignore. He can’t outrun this. Can’t just close his eyes to it. If he doesn’t release this pent up energy here and now, it’s not going to just be the earth trampled beneath his feet. There won’t be anywhere for him to hide from the destruction that he will let loose. So he runs. He leaps forward, body pushing past the point of exhaustion, and he sinks his teeth into this stranger who runs next to him—who flies forward with just as much desperation as he.

    Come on, his voice laces through her mind, his lips not moving. We’re not done yet.

    so you saluted every ghost you've ever prayed to and then buried it where bones are buried



    @[Wishbone]
    Reply
    #6
    it's a mystery to me
    we have a greed with which we have agreed. you think you have to want more than you need; until you have it all you won't be free. and when you think more than you want, your thoughts begin to bleed.
    Wishbone can’t remember a time she’s felt someone reflect her emotions so deeply. There have been many times she’s shared kindred spirits — with Svedka and their thirst for adventure, with Lilliana and their broken relationships, with Mazikeen and their stubborn fierceness. Yet the race with this stranger feels different than anything else; with each stride, Wishbone feels her emotions draw closer to a place where they meet with the stranger’s.

    These emotions (sorrow and loss and endless fury) are both familiar and uncontrollable to her. They run through her like old friends, as if they call her home, and yet she feels entirely undone by their power. It isn’t often that Wishbone feels this way — more often than not she is rather optimistic and fiercely independent. Yet there are times where she is pulled toward the darker emotions and they whisper in her ears, telling her that she could stay with them longer.

    Wishbone feels herself falling into her anger now, using it to push her agility and endurance further to match the stranger. Thunder rumbles overhead, and it is never without lightning. A white rod of light crackles across the sky, illuminating the stranger as he shifts from a horse into a cheetah. The dark energy crackles toward her again, this time with different intentions, and Wishbone tosses her head to welcome it.

    Her body molds itself to mimic his, and she’s launching herself into a faster speed before she’s even completely shifted. Wishbone feels disoriented by the shift for a moment, unfamiliar with this magic and the new senses that come with a new body. But the cheetah body knows what to do, and she falls into the new rhythm of running within a few strides.

    Despite the new level of speed she’s reached, Wishbone can tell her energy is fading. She can be as stubborn as she wants and tempt Death and Desire to her heart’s content, but there are times she cannot refuse the way her body cries out. Her soft oval ears press tightly against her feline skull, a visible sign of her determination to continue. And just when she thinks one more step might end her, the stranger’s teeth find her.

    Wishbone lets out a growl, but it isn’t one of pain. It’s a challenge, a noise of relief, a scream of anger. His voice echos in her mind, sending a chill down her spine. Her glowing amber eyes flash in the darkness, but she continues running. Her long legs adjust between one stride and the next, pushing him so he will slam into a wide-trunked tree. Her haunches bunch to stop her momentum, but her unfamiliarity as a cheetah makes her pitch sideways, rolling through the leaves.

    She throws herself onto her paws quickly and spins, facing the stranger with a snarl already on her lips. This is what she was bred to do; she comes from a family of fighters. The darkness billows inside her, making her amber eyes glow even brighter. Wishbone twitches her feline tail, a challenge pressing to the forefront of her mind. This stranger is capable beyond her knowledge, she’s noticed, and she suspects he can hear her when she thinks, Show me what you can do.
    credit to eliza of adoxography.


    @firion
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