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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]  Pink Elephant in the room - Reave
    #1

    a bright and dangerous spark

    It’s their time now.

    Their generation - hers and Reave’s, Aela and Obscene’s. Their parents did what they could, their mentors saw the diamonds in the rough, and their allies came in time through friendships or deadly interests. Now the changing of the torch is on the horizon, and soon she will take up a mantle passed down to her through generations. Cheri had thought long and hard about what she would do when that day came.

    She flew like a spear of pure wind from Loess, thrust with incredible speed and accuracy now that her ability to amplify the winds had revealed itself to her. Cheri felt a sense of elation and freedom unlike any other when she was alone in the sky, able to play with her weather manipulation while she thought about the odd impossibilities of time and how she’d come to travel through it before. Further down her list of designs she’d noted: travel through time again. It was last on the list, an uncertain possibility. Maybe it had happened just once and never again.

    Or maybe she just hadn’t pushed herself hard enough.

    Either way she focused on the task at hand instead, flying through a low-hanging cluster of icy drafts that had Nerine appearing on the distant horizon once she’d passed the range of low-growing mountains that separated the northern, windswept plains from their southern herd - her homeland, Taiga.

    “I’ll miss you too.” Her father’s voice rang bright and clear in her head, followed by a twinge of guilt as the green-winged pegasus passed over the impossibly high redwoods. Later, She told herself.

    It was on the high crevice of the dividing mountain range that she came to land and rest. Still, even in the dead heat of a fine summer season, Nerine’s peaks had a bitter chill to them. Cheri pulled her wings around her and tried not to be annoyed by how the ever-familiar glow of their light dimmed out to reveal plain, similarly-colored green wings of substantial feathers. She assumed that her blessed wings had reached their final form, that finally she’d accomplished enough good deeds to make them as permanent as any other fixture on her divine form.

    But it unnerved her how they only seemed to glow when she was in flight. She missed their comforting light, but settled for the dimmer glow of her markings in their absence. Cheri could make do.

    She was looking for signs of Reave up here, either him or his companion. (One always seemed to lead to the other.) Her business was in passing, mostly. Eventually she would take her concerns farther north to her uncle, but it seemed only right that she stop here first to … warn? Inform? Her other relatives. Chilled, the heir to the southern throne stomped eagerly at the frostbitten ground to warm herself and wait.
    Full-sized image link


    @Reave
    #2

    i am the mace, the map, the fall and the high

    This far north, in the highest reaches there is always a bite to the air. Though summer clings to the lowlands with a fierce tenacity and warms the bogs and moors, the peaks and northernmost cliffs have always resisted its pull. Despite spending his childhood in the cocooning warmth of the Taiga, Reave has never minded the chill up here.

    That may have been more surprising if Reave had not proven just how adaptable he is. He could have easily ended up in the arid deserts of the south or west and been equally content.

    Rune is the first to warn him of Cheri’s arrival. The large bird is little more than a distant speck against the clarity of the sky above. But through his eyes, Reave can see her familiar form, veridescent and black contrasting sharply with the frost-bitten ground on which she stands. He might have been surprised at her visit, but considering his recent… meddling, he can’t say that he is.

    Of course, he has been receiving a greater number of visits than usual from relations. Or almost relations. Perhaps she has come to join them in seeking the benefit of his abilities.

    He does not rush as he moves to the mountainous terrain she waits for him on. His steps are sure on the rocky ground, bright gaze lifted as he tops an uneven rise until she comes into sight. If her eye is particularly sharp today, she may have already spotted Rune against the distant sky, though Reave does not appear until some time later. But if she had wished a timely response, she would have picked lower ground.

    As it is, he wonders if she had chosen this place for its privacy. Staring at her as he nears, he begins to suspect he might have been correct in that guess.

    Smile tilting his mobile lips, he eyes her with familiar amusement (and perhaps just a bit of affection). “I’m delighted you have missed me so much you’ve decided to visit again so soon.”

    reave



    @Cheri
    #3

    a bright and dangerous spark

    There is no such thing as sand in an hourglass for them. So time becomes less of an importance and more of a novelty, able to be spent however an immortal likes. They - herself and Reave and others like them - have instead the gift of whiling away hours, days, even months on passing interests without the fear of time suddenly running out. A fact that Cheri finds is both beautiful and alarming, thanks to Chemdog’s input.

    While waiting for Reave, she thinks about the reality of death. Immortals have died before, thanks to magic. It’s possible that some day Cheri could die as well, that her mother and father could wither away. Apparently her father’s first wife had died and been reborn from a flower bud. Cheri thought it safe to say that anything was clearly possible.

    But if that were the case, then why wasn’t she reaching farther?
    Why was she wasting her gift of eternal life?

    For a moment her thoughts ceased, erased by the sound of hooves approaching. Cheri hadn’t seen the small speck of bird in the distance, or maybe she had but she’d assumed it was a regular bird and not Reave’s soul-companion. Either way the steps disturb her out of a deep contemplation, and she looks toward their source with a smile - expecting it to be Reave anyways because who else would think (or be able) to come here?

    And to her delight, the assumption is rewarded with her relative’s appearance. He looks as healthy as ever, though the sight of him always seems to draw back those years of adolescence long gone. It’s still hard to see Reave for what he was: leader of Nerine, strapping and slightly off-putting with his armor of bone. A real confident type. Nothing like the leggy colt who encouraged Cheri’s truly devious nature, lighting that fire of adventure inside of her since their first visit to Loess.

    Cheri had never told him, but Reave was the reason she chose the Southern Kingdom.

    The chestnut stallion with eyes like tempered steel had always been a favorite of hers since. “Our last conversation was so enlightening, I came back for another.” She laughed at him, now that her winged companion had finally settled near to her. Their world stretched out far below them, impossibly large and incredibly breathtaking.

    Cheri decided to cut to the heart of the matter. She was focused in the present, and even though she wanted to remain here with Reave for hours it seemed more prudent to keep her sight focused on the end goal rather than to be distracted by an offshoot of pleasantry. For a young immortal that was hard; theirs was a world made for constant distractions. But Cheri was also determined. She refused to be swayed any further; Reave was a critical factor to the success or failure of her overall design. Best to just set the bone freshly broken.

    “I’m on my way north to Uncle Nashua.” Cheri explained, curious about what the Nerinian stallion might be thinking and doing very little to disguise it. “I want you both to come South to Loess, discuss an accord between the two Kindgoms. The stars seem too fatefully aligned - you, myself, uncle Nash… ” Cheri insinuated, knowing Reave would connect the dots. He’d always been frightfully good at that. “I think we should discuss becoming one united front. The first to ever do it. I think now, more than ever, it could happen.”

    No promises. No grand scheme or worked out plan. Just them - her family - flying South to meet with herself, Oceane, and that damned Prince of the Pampas so they could talk about it.

    Which reminded her. “I think I’ve even come to terms with Obscene about our … differences.” Cheri chuckled, tossing her forelock as casually as someone would flip their hair mid-conversation. A nervous habit, perhaps. Easily overlooked. “Would you come?” Cheri asked of Reave, genuinely curious to hear his reply.
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    @Reave
    #4

    i am the mace, the map, the fall and the high

    Reave has never spent a great deal of time contemplating his own lack of mortality. He knows it exists of course. It is one of the first things he had seen when the future struck him with it’s restless claws. He knows the pain that waits for those who cannot die. Cheri had always been the more optimistic of them, a gentler spirit than he, so of course she would choose to see only the good in it.

    He does not fear it however. He has known far more strife and turmoil in his young life than most would credit him with. But then, that is what had built him into the stallion he is today. Tempered in the heat of anger and agony, his own and so many others, there is little left he could not face with an insolent grin on his lips.

    But Cheri had been a light in his childhood. She had offered him simple joy at a time when he felt at his most out of control. For that she would always have a place in his affections.

    When she laughs, he chuckles in response, amused. She had been angry and full of barbs last time they’d met. Reave finds he rather likes all the facets of her though. They keep him from boredom, and for the bone-clad stallion, boredom is perhaps the fastest way to lose his attention. “An accident, I assure you,” he quips back when the laughter subsides, blue eyes glinting with his mirth.

    He tilts his head curiously when she cuts swiftly into her true purpose here, his bright gaze turning speculative. The teasing quality slips from his features, though the grin still lingers on his lips. “You might find Nashua… distracted,” he replies easily, though his gaze has grown sharp - watchful. “Did you know his son was stolen by Hyaline?”

    He doubts she had heard. But if she wanted to visit his brother in the north, she should know that at least. If his mate’s memories had been any indication, he is in quite a state. Not that Reave would know of course. Nash hadn’t bothered to visit him in person yet either. If he had, he might have found out just how much information Reave has managed to collect on their cursed relation.

    When she mentions Obscene, Reave’s lips twitch. He doesn’t mention he had paid him a visit however. He doubts she would be pleased to know she is a large part of the reason he had. Instead he teases, “Is that the reason you haven’t tried chewing my head off again?”

    Suppressing his laugh into a huff, he shifts restlessly. Though she might think her nervous habits inconsequential, Reave sees the emotion behind them easily enough. Enough to know that this request means far more to her than she is letting on. Enough to know she would most certainly not be as appreciative of the intrigues he had been stirring with Aela as he is.

    Still, he would be a fool to miss this opportunity. And Reave likes to think he is not a fool. “I’ll come,” he agrees.

    reave



    @Cheri
    #5
    At the summit clearing there was an unparalleled view of Nerine. Cheri could glance once at Reave and see his familiar smile, then turn her head a fraction of an inch to get a glimpse of the beauty and delicate balance spread out far below them. “How resonate.” She thought of it all: of Reave and his presence beside her, of Nerine and her landscape. From up here, everything was so tiny and out-of-focus. Cheri wondered what she and her similarly-aged uncle must look like to something out there - past the stars she could never quite touch.

    “I hadn’t heard.” Cheri seemed to read his thoughts. Or maybe Reave was simply incredibly perceptive. He always had been, and he always had a way of pointing Cheri exactly down the right path when she stalled at crossroads.

    “I’m sure you know about my missing parents, then.” She reflected, trading one tragedy for another.

    “Poor Nashua…” The female pegasus inhaled sharply, wondering which of his children might’ve been the unlucky target, or why. What purpose did Hyaline see in taking a youngling by force? And Noel… gods, her aunt must be living in hell on earth.

    “Hyaline,” Cheri thought of the place. A mountainous kingdom to the East, home to the nefarious ‘Gale’ that Obscene had warned her about. The wilderness there had also been the home of an alliance contender - actually the Queen as well, she recalled. Mazikeen had been ruling the eastern sect since Cheri had come to Loess and started her apprenticeship. The lines of it all were still a bit disconnected to Cheri, how or why they came together in order to strangle the North she couldn’t yet understand, but as the noose tightened around them she rejected the idea of standing by and watching her family hang one-by-one.

    If that meant proposing drastic changes, so be it. At least by this point, Oceane and Reave seemed open to a little radicalism. She could only hope Nashua would accept her help, because Cheri was planning on asking the same of him.

    “Oh please,” she jumped back into their conversation, “as if I could ever pose a dangerous threat to anyone.” Her feathers ruffled, and the sound of her dignified laugh was the only parry she needed against the Guardian’s sharp jokes. He could tease her all he liked; Reave’s meddling had been the answer to a monster problem. Cheri almost felt indebted to him now.

    “Soon, then.” She thought of a date for the occasion. “After breeding season? Clear heads make the best of any situation, I suppose.” Cheri smiled briefly. The irony of such a statement never lost itself to her.


    @Reave
    #6

    i am the mace, the map, the fall and the high

    There is something in the wild harshness of Nerine that suits him well. Though he is accustomed to such expansive views of the north (made even more expansive through Rune’s eyes), there is a freshness in her perspective that makes him appreciate it once again. All the lands here have beauty in them of course, but there is something so austere about this peninsula that so few seem to see past.

    It is both jarring and intense, so much like him. He finds he rather enjoys the reactions.

    As the conversation grows serious, Reave watches her closely, curious as much about her reaction as the news she might impart. That her parents are missing is not news to him, as she has surmised. Indeed, the fact that both had disappeared along with Nashua’s only shapeshifting son had stirred a huge amount of curiosity in him. Curiosity and suspicion. He is absolutely certain it is not a coincidence.

    “They are playing the long game,” he replies mildly as she muses on the eastern kingdom. Reave may be young and unproven, but they had given him a scent to follow. And as he follows it, he finds himself drawing deeper into the intrigues of this continent. Drawing deeper into chaos.

    The very thought of it fuels him like little else can. What Cheri envisions as a noose, Reave sees only as a catalyst. Others had seen the triumvirate of brothers on the seats of the North and imagined they sought to clinch their power, but Reave knows better. He is much, much more than that.

    Reave laughs at her demural, bright gaze jumping to hers. Though it is tempered by humor, there is flint in his stare. “You are much more than you give yourself credit for,” he replies. “You’re cutting yourself off at the knees to keep yourself humble.” His eyes glitter behind the glow of his mask. “Don’t.”

    It doesn’t even occur to him that she might consider this further meddling. As far as he is concerned, he sees only a woman trying to make herself less than she is, and he won’t stand for it. Reave has never been a jealous enough creature to keep those he cares for from their true potential.

    Lifting his head, he tosses his forelock from his eyes before offering Cheri a grin. “It’s not my head you should be worrying about.” He laughs again before agreeing. “I’ll be there.”

    reave



    @Cheri
    #7
    “It’s always about the game.” She thought in agreement. Nothing had ever been more true or more clear to the young immortal keeping company with her magical relative. Without the game to fulfill their neverending hours what was there but cataclysmic events? If she and the others were not making moves, making enemies, f*cking lovers or producing children, then what was there to an existence that kept on going? Cheri feared they would never would be satisfied with it all. She still hesitated to acknowledge the real and honest depths of her own hunger for what it might reveal.

    And, as if reading her thoughts, Reave seemed to have the most correct answer to her self-depreciating joke.

    The truth of what he said resounded deep in the hollows of Cheri’s inner-being. She had suspected herself capable of waking sulmbering titans lately, and had only rejected the intuitive feeling to avoid becoming the same narcissistic complex she disliked in other horses. The feeling lingered anyways, always humming like a sort of white noise at the edges of her awareness. Even dead asleep she could feel it, this rare flower in the darkness waiting for a bit of light to bloom. Reave had caught onto it immediately. Again, she thought perhaps he’d already known for some time.

    “On the contrary, I’m starting to think it is your head I should be the most worried about.” She admitted, crafting a particularly sardonic smile for him to enjoy. A twitch of her lips and it vanished quickly, replaced by the smooth, captivating expression she favored most.

    “Tell me cousin,” she asked affectionately, “why did you say ‘yes’ to it all?”

    Cheri’s head tilted and the wind tugged her hair into a state of fanciful disarray. She wanted to know why Reave had agreed to be the Guardian of Nerine when she’d always expected a different outcome from him. Not that the seat of newly found power didn’t suit him; Cheri thought of Reave as a mythic barbarian - deadly clever and equally as strong when put to a physical test. He embodied the spirit of a conqueror, would most likely become a part of this world’s lore, but that wasn’t why Cheri had chosen to pivot when it seemed like their business might’ve otherwise been concluded.

    She wanted to know more. To try and understand if her uncle in Nerine meant to place himself on the board, or if he intended larger things like she might. Cheri had gone to Loess because of his early involvement, but very little of Reave’s (or any other horse’s) input had soaked into her personal decision to become Heir of the Southern Kingdom. That was something the green-winged pegasus liked to keep tucked away, something she considered rather personal.

    She wondered if Reave felt similarly.


    @Reave
    #8

    i am the mace, the map, the fall and the high

    Though Cheri houses a gentler spirit than Reave can claim, they are unmistakeably related in their desire for more. She might pretend otherwise, but the bone-clad stallion can see the truth beneath far more clearly than she might have cared for. There is longing tangled deep in that restraint, a hunger seated deep in her very soul.

    It is that which had attracted him when they were children, and it is that which keeps him intrigued now.

    She says nothing in response to his sharp reprimand, but Reave can see the understanding she doesn’t speak. There is a deep well in his cousin - one she had barely begun to tap into. Perhaps she wishes to avoid digging too deep lest she become a selfish creature, but Reave has no such compunctions. He is undeniably a selfish creature, one who has never hesitated to plunder the richest depths of his own abilities. And he would not hesitate in helping her to find her own.

    He laughs when she smoothly turns his words back on him, blue eyes gleaming with appreciative mirth. “Don’t worry, I’m quite capable of looking after it,” he quips, grin widening to an almost dangerous degree. But then, he already has a very good idea of the pitfalls awaiting them. This visit with Loess could be just what he needs to settle all the pieces into place.

    When she continues, Reave tilts his head curiously, wondering briefly what had inspired her to ask that question. Until he realizes that perhaps she doesn’t know the true story of how he had risen to become the Guardian of Nerine. He recalls the day with a sharp clarity. He had said yes, it’s true, but there had never really been a question. He had been there that day with the intent to do almost precisely what he had done.

    He had always been a player in this game, even then.

    Smile still at the corners of his lips, he peers at Cheri with a keen intensity. “Because it is what I wanted to do,” he replies with an impish artifice. Still, it is as much the truth as any other answer he might give. “I could just as easily ask you why you said ‘yes’.”

    reave



    @Cheri
    #9
    Curiosity did plague her whenever Cheri got to thinking about Reave’s head and what went on inside it. He’d always been an acute and quick learner, unafraid to live his youth as intelligently and boldly as a horse many years his senior while Cheri spent hers under a gauze of dreamy perfection - right up until the Eclipse. She blinked and the first memory that came to mind behind her dark lids was of the mountain.

    They’d been there together at the very end of the world. Along with her mother, sister, and a whole slew of others, Reave had been called by the fairies to try and return the sun. Every horse who came was given a choice to try and save the magic entities in order to restore balance or serve as bait for the monsters. They’d made opposite choices, and Cheri died because of it.

    “I said yes because I could.” She told him. Because she just as easily could’ve said no and chosen another path. “When I awoke the day after it was like an awareness dawned on me. My world expanded tenfold and my eyes set themselves on a higher destination.”

    Obscene called her spoiled. Cheri had thought that some divine justice was involved, actually. That she was preternaturally inclined towards being lucky, or that maybe she could manifest the desired outcome by simply believing it would come to pass. Sometimes she caught herself wondering if somewhere out there, beyond the void of the blue-domed sky, something had caught her mortal spirit wandering between the rifts of this world and poured itself into her flesh. Anything was possible.

    “I might as well do something with it all.” Cheri claimed passively. Her smile declared that she was, in fact, very motivated indeed. But so far she’d wasted enough of her coz’s valuable time. He’d committed to her meeting and it was important she go south to Taiga for a visit before night fell. Her twin Reynard hadn’t checked in and there was still the matter of her youngest siblings - Saturnelle, Wit, and baby Cerf - to attend to before she made the extensive journey to Icicle Isle.

    “Thank you for your help, Reave.” Cheri told him sincerely. She hated the notion of goodbye with anyone else, but her family especially. “Winter couldn’t come quickly enough.”


    @Reave
    #10

    i am the mace, the map, the fall and the high

    He would never forget the treacherous journey that had brought Rune into his life. When the monsters had opened their jaws to tear him into pieces, he thought his life would be brought to a close then and there. He hadn’t had the future rolling through his head yet, and so he had imagined that to be his end.

    In a way, it had been. They had swallowed him and spit him out again a different creature. A piece of his soul had been torn away, only brought back in the form of a harpy eagle through the kindness of Beqanna’s gods. At first he hadn’t quite understood what it was that had been stolen from him, but as time had passed, he had come to realize just how much the bird serves as his only guide to morality.

    If Rune should ever disappear and leave the Guardian with no one to guide him, he doubts the world would like what he could become. And he would never be able to blame it on a curse that cannot claim him.

    The futures are there, lying in wait like a spider. But what choices were the ones that would pluck the threads to bring it closer? Rune wants to know far more than he does, but it is a secret he would never share with the world. He hadn’t lied when he said it wasn’t his head that needed looking after. She should be far more concerned for the bird that never leaves his side.

    For once, his features are serious as he considers Cheri’s words. He can understand them far better than she likely realizes. He too had woken with that burning need inside his soul. And he too had made strides to satiate it. But where she had spread her wings to release her light to draw the world to her, Reave had crept through the shadows to steal it. Living up to the name his mother had bestowed upon him at birth.

    But he says nothing.

    She thanks him, and Reave grins. “Don’t thank me just yet, Cheri,” he replies, humor suffusing his features. Then he nods her off before turning to leave the peaks she’d brought him to. “I’ll see you soon.”

    reave



    @Cheri




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