"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
She had not seen him in weeks, and her mind was constantly on him and the way she had left him. She had felt bad, and so she came back in search for the one that left behind. Gunsynd had seemed like a lost, changed individual without a direction, and yet he was searching for a purpose. To be such a wanderer—a vagabond--was no something that Epithet had ever sought for herself, and yet she could understand the lifestyle. The reckless longing to be somewhere—to matter anywhere. The change in the land had also affected the time of year. The spring that had allowed them to give birth to their babies had reverted back to winter by the Fairies’ grace—or senility, Epithet was not entirely sure—and it seemed to be going on for much longer than she had ever thought before—or remembered. And while the angel blended in almost perfectly with the grey haze that the snow left after it has been sitting on the earth for a while, her small daughter, Leola was like the blot of ink that makes a wayward stain on a piece of beautifully composed parchment. She bounded back and forth, leaping and making her mark upon the meadow as she disturbed the piles of snow, rolled back and forth in it, making piles of snow to suit her child’s play. She laughed aloud, jumping in the drifts until nothing but her little ears were exposed. “Watch me, Mumma! WATCH ME!” She plodded along through the snow, her small fuzzy ears twitching this way and that until she was able to come to a place where her footing was more sure, climbing out of her hole, before turning around and leaping right into it again. She did this repeatedly, and while she was occupied, Epithet had the time to turn around and view the meadow for Gunny, her ears flicked behind her to supervise her strange daughter’s antics. She wondered just how much of Leola was truly her, or if she was entirely her father.
What was to surprise them of spring turning into winter? The fairy would do what she wished, nature be damned. She sat upon her throne, watching them as they shed their heavy winter coats only to be bombarded with freezing wind and snow. She laughed as the new foals knew snow before their bodies could handle such elements. And she wanted their devotion. He could laugh if it weren’t so absolutely absurd.
Of course he did not care for the wellbeing of the foals, but he never claimed to. She was just a liar.
These are the thoughts that plague him when the diminutive creature hops into his view. It is difficult to see the foal behind the drifts of snow, but her pelt matches his own so she stands out at the very least. Her mother, on the other hand, blends in to the surrounding terrain and it takes the beast a moment to see her. He recognizes her - the one that had left with the two stallions. He wonders if they had found what they had longed for.
He observes them from afar, not interested enough in the woman’s story line to put himself in the line of fire of the youngster’s antics (he had little tolerance for foals). But it seems he has caught the female’s eye as she approaches him. This intrigues the male. Of course the mares that he has known… intimately tend to approach him a second time. But he knows without a doubt that this child is not his, and while that eases the typical anxiety he feels in such situations, he can’t help but wonder what her intentions are.
He wracks his brain now for a name. He is terrible with remembering such trifling details, and his thoughts have been so consumed lately with his own troubles. She is already upon him when the correct neurons connect and the word (her word) emerges from the haze of memory. “Epithet.” He says in greeting, trying to ignore the bouncing creature at her heels. “Crazy weather we’re having.”
I M J U S T A S U C K E R F O R P A I N
@[Epithet]
they are funny together
Gunsynd is currently pretending to be someone else! He is now 15hh, hybrid, flea-bitten grey with clear blue eyes and goes by the name of Ginkgo. He will not have use of his traits while he is in this form. Please play as if he is simply the other persona unless your character has some sort of mind-reading. Thanks! <3
This was the world. It had moved, and changed, and seemingly ended in a whirlwind. The snow that had piled there was eventually gone and melted, and yet Epithet and Gunsynd, together with young Leola, who was now a little older and much more sure of foot, stayed where they were and talked, moving them through the season so quickly that it was almost as if no time had passed at all—or that perhaps they had skipped the winter altogether.
Of course the weather was insane. Everything around here was insane and it was almost as if Epithet were living in a world created by her own madness. The floodgates that kept her mother’s power at bay were slowly creaking outward, knocking at the door of Epi’s mind, begging to let the dragons out. Charlemagne’s last magical gift on the world—would it become a curse? The white woman shuddered at the thought, and she turned to Gunsynd, her blue eyes upon him while hearing Leola playing with the voles behind her. “So what became of you? I came to find you later and you all but disappeared. Have you found for yourself a place of protection?”
Leola watched her mother curiously. It was almost as if her mother had an addiction to black stallions. Her own father, in and out as much as he was, was not the steady stream of affection that she longed for, and Leola watched as her fragile mother became more and more bruised by whatever it was that was plaguing her. Love for Akhil? A savior complex? It was becoming painfully obvious to the young dark girl that her mother was a broken woman, and it made Leola sad to see Epithet circling the drain. She knew nothing of power, or of magic, but as she grew and developed her senses about her, Leola began to understand that there were things about this place—and about her—that Epithet was hiding, and Leola’s mistrust of the dark stallion her mother sought to find and keep company with did not escape her mind. She appeared to be as innocent as she ever was, but in her heart, Leola was growing up—much faster than a filly ought to.
they are funny together