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    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]  meet me where the stolen roses grow; castile
    #1



    Solace sets out as the dawn breaks, taking to the sky and putting the rising sun at her back. She spares only a glance for the silver waters of the cove, rising in the morning breeze easily with the powerful movement of her wings. Briefly, she stops in Hyaline as she passes low between the familiar peaks, greeting Amet fondly below his wisteria tree and telling him of her plan.

    But the eastern caretaker does not linger; duty calls her westward. 

    The roar of the wind is all she can think of once she is underway again - the way it leaves her breathless as she gains even more speed, crashing against her face and drowning out all other sounds. Solace drinks in the sky, letting her glacial eyes close. She plummets, wings held tight against her topline and frost in the waves of her spiraling wake. 

    With a snap, Solace's cerulean wings unfurl again, nearly wrenching the delicate, light bones from her shoulders. She realizes that while indulging in the pleasures of the sky, she has nearly reached her destination. 

    Still a fair distances from the hills, the tri-colored queen glides far less dramatically for the remainder of her descent - giving her heart a moment to settle, pale lips parted as she gasps for heady drafts of fragrant Loessian air.

    A feather falls as she lands, framed by the mountains of Hyaline and the lazily rising sun. The brilliant hills call up memories for what seemed like another lifetime, as she calls out for king she knows only by name. Her ebony mane lies uncharacteristically tangled against her pale throat as the frost supernaturally reforms along each tendril - the only thing distinguishing her from the girl who came her half a decade ago in search of a dragon. 

    S
    olace
        we're reeling through an endless fall
    we are the ever-living ghost of what once was


    @[Castile]
    Solghostdoll2

    #2
    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 frequently reminisced of his childhood, and of his time with Solace. Somehow, even after all this time, there’s a part of his heart that she still reigns – but it’s shrinking with every passing year. Once, he found himself reflecting on her more often than not. He counted back to the times that he ruined her and when he let her slip through his fingers. They could’ve expanded their family. They could’ve still found love and adoration in their embrace, but he ruined it just as he has ruined everything else. For years, even after breathing in the weighted scent of her new lover, Castile clutched desperately to the hope that Solace would return to him, that she would remember their flights together among the clouds and their tender hugs.

    But the hope has since withered like the plants in this plagued world.

    To see her soaring to the edge of Loess strikes him as odd. Memories flash briefly across the back of his eyelids when he blinks, but his heart no longer lurches when her wings catch the sunlight. Nonetheless, he investigates with an arrogant swagger and a raised brow when he reaches her, looming like a storm cloud just as she alights. ”Solace,” he drawls as he comes to a halt, his wings folded against his sides, idle. It would amuse him to dive into their past, to remind her of their times here in Loess, but something refrains him and ties down his tongue until the idea passes like the tide.

    Muscles ripple beneath his taut skin when a nonchalant shrug rolls his shoulders. ”Fancy seeing you here,” it isn’t to necessarily see him, however, but a political matter that he has no other option than to address. It’s only a matter of time until word spreads that Loess is now within his grasp, huddled beneath his shadow. With a contemplative lick of his lips and an inclination of his baroque head, he asks, ”What brings you to my humble abode?” He expects surprise to surface and to betray the poker face she wears during interkingdom visits. Castile searches for that break in her formality as he allows the words to simmer between them even as he realizes what would truly bring her here.

    Litotes.


    castile


    @[Solace]
    #3


     
    A formidable figure Solace knows well appears in the distance, and she is as surprised as he may assume. "Castile." She replies warmly as he speaks her name, reaching forward to brush her muzzle to his briefly if he will have it. "What a pleasant surprise."

    A moment of reflection briefly clouds the orange and silver of his mismatched eyes. But she can only guess which memory her presences causes his mind to conjure, for they both seem content to let it remain unspoken. The words he had confessed to her during their last private meeting had never really left her. When you had run from Kagerus after your fist fight, she thinks with a hint of shame. Vulnerable and hurting, she had found him in the meadow.

    Those words clung to the edges of her mind whenever thoughts of him surfaced - and she had long wondered if they still applied - even if they no longer made love in the secret meadows between their kingdoms.

    'I think you underestimate how much I care for you, and always will.' He had told her, and she tries not to remember the press his lips to the curve of her jaw. 'No matter what.'

    Maybe it is the last trace of her girlhood naivety she has unwittingly carried into her adult life, but she trusts him. She is loyal, and always has been, and the knots of her past do not fall loose - they can only be severed. She no longer aches for the touch of his lips to her skin as she had in bygone years, but it does not mean she no longer cares for him. Their history is as weighted as it is long, and there is so much that doesn't have to be said between them. 

    But Today, he is charming and casual and she mirrors him, not having to crack the marble facade because she had never put it on once she realized she wasn't stepping into a war zone.  "Your humble abode," she muses, letting her cerulean gaze leave him to survey what he has claimed - or been handed - it doesn't really matter how he secured the hills for a second time. "I never thought Icicle Isle suited you anyway," she adds, still unaware of his endeavors in other lands.

    "I've flown quickly this morning, maybe you could show me to one of Loess famed hot springs while we talk."  She makes a move to step forward, not heading for the heart of his kingdom but rather a dip in the land further along the Hyalineian border where the varied plant life is dense and colorful. 

    "I'm sure you can guess why I've come," she begins, "but now that I have you to myself for a moment I have a few... non-political questions for you too. Valdis came to me a few weeks ago, afraid of certain changes she was experiencing, and I wanted to see if you had ever experienced anything like she described to me."

    "So, you decide. Family matters or business first?"

    S
    olace
        we're reeling through an endless fall
    we are the ever-living ghost of what once was


    @[Castile]
    Solghostdoll2

    #4
    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
    A pleasant surprise, she admits, but Castile cannot help to question the validity of the statement. Although he accepts the soft brush of her muzzle against his, it is with great uncertainty. Muscles along his shoulders flinch, but he says and does nothing as a silence punctuates the tender gesture. He hasn’t forgotten how she phased through him to avoid his touch, or how rigid she last appeared in Hyaline in front of their children. Their eyes darted from mother to father, and Castile confessed something he probably should not have. Does it still burn in Solace’s memory, or has she forgotten everything they once shared – the laughs, the love? Underneath her observant gaze, he blinks but then follows it out across Loess’ landscape with a half-hearted grin. ”It was too cold there,” he admits with a shrug as he reflects on his brief time in Icicle Island. He had told Leilan he would be back after checking on the children, but then fate pulled him farther from the north. ”I definitely prefer the heat.” A single laugh slips out and softens the edge of his voice.

    He doesn’t immediately open his heart to Loess, however, because his life has become mostly nomadic. It is strange to be bound now (again), but it isn’t uncomfortable. He doesn’t hate it, but it’s strange. While Solace has always kept within Hyaline, and now a branch of it in the Cove, Castile explored. There was Nerine and Icicle Island, Loess, and briefly the Resort.
    Nonetheless, he is well adjusting to the crown crookedly placed on his brow.
    Is that all he needed for Solace to come to him versus the other way around?

    ”Of course,” he obliges with a nod of his head and a slow pivot of his body, ”there’s one nearby.” Together they walk, traveling through their memories as they spare glances between the landscape and themselves. Years ago, he would have tried again to hold her, to take back all he had done and beg for another chance, but his persistence has chiseled away with time. ”How are you and Kagerus?” The question comes unbidden, cutting like a knife through his thoughts. Once, it would’ve been asked with a hopefulness twisted in his voice (wishing they were turbulent and unhappy), but today it’s flat and addressed as a form of small talk until they’ve arrived to the hot spring. A pause enables him a brief opportunity to scrutinize the surrounding hills before slanting back to Solace at the mention of their daughter. His heart catches, knotting at the idea of something happening, but rather than act on emotion and impulse – as is his usual – he takes a step back and takes a calmer, more analytical approach.

    Solace provides him a choice, and now Castile’s rigidity melts as he chuckles. ”Politics. That’s one way to set the mood,” his head tilts so that his bronze forelock slides aside, re-positioning to frame his face. For a fleeting moment, he looks boyish and amused again just as he had when they first coupled and fell into each other’s embrace. ”Let me guess. You want Litotes back?” The decision is made clear to begin with kingdom matters. The topic of their children will be a balm after this. Castile almost outright gives her an answer before she begins, but elects to give her an opportunity to set an argument. With a deep sigh, he turns from her side to face her, giving Solace his undivided attention


    castile


    @[Solace]




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