"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
09-12-2017, 08:31 PM (This post was last modified: 09-12-2017, 09:05 PM by Nayl.)
I am not afraid... I was born to do this.
The scent, ever familiar, clings desperately to the soft lining of her nostrils. She follows it like a hound dog, ravenous and determined. It leads her from Nerine, across rivers, hills, and forests. The scent guides her into a place that she hasn’t seen in years, not since Magnus held the crown comfortably upon his head.
But now it’s someone that protects monsters and disregards common formalities. It’s someone she has seen once prior in Hyaline.
Offspring, she remembers.
His scent is most prominent here. It mingles alluringly with the acrid smoke of the volcano. Memories rush back to her, and she holds a steady silence for a while to relive those days. Dahmer, Lucrezia, Magnus… Their names tumble around freely, untethered, but it’s with another lungful of Offspring’s scent that she shakes away the images of the past. She calls for him then, her voice level and her expression stoic and unreadable.
Aggravation rips through her core, but still she holds an eerie calmness. He had thought to slip into Nerine as though he would be undetected. Certainly, Nayl saw him. Very little happens without her knowing, but she saw Tantalize with him and so she didn’t investigate. She duly noted their meeting before slipping back into the dunes, her eyes narrowed in mistrust. The only thing she could do then was wait, bide her time until he abandoned his unwelcomed place among the sisterhood to return home.
And here he was.
Nayl waits until he heeds her call and sates her need for the company. She stands placidly at Tephra’s gates. She dulls her spiteful edge to look at him and address him more formally than to make a fool of herself, not allowing the frustration to rise as it had in Hyaline.
”What business did you have talking to Tantalize at Nerine's border?” In most cases, she wouldn't care. Everyone has personal conversations, private agendas, but her mistrust in him is evident. It gleams in her autumn-colored eyes when they meet his. "Last we met, I found out you housed a boy that burned Hyaline. I can only wonder what would bring you to Nerine now."
You're looking at an absolute zero; I'm not the devil but I won't be your hero.
He is aware of her presence long before she is aware of his own –
He is quiet, observant, studying the distant shoreline with sharpened sight, even from many miles away. Looming near to the rumbling volcano in the very heart of the island, he had seen a flicker of movement to the southern shore – the dark and raucous sea is ravenous, lapping hungrily with each sweeping motion of the tide, and with it she is brought to the stifling humidity and tropical domicile that had become his own. Long before her voice has emerged into the thickened air, seeking him, his hefty and heavily muscled legs carry him through the shallow mire and across the golden vegetation, ensnaring around his legs before incinerating to the moist and fertile soil below from the lightest brush across his coal tinted skin.
The fire is burning brightly, flickering along the surface of his body – he does not suppress it here; he is within his domain and he felt no need to draw the flame inside of his body. He had learned to control it, to wield it, and do so, he would. The ember is low, barely rising off the scarred flesh, though it is wrapped around the girth of his behemoth form, inevitably towering over her own as he is finally upon her, with his scarlet, altogether disdainful gaze settled upon her own of steel.
She had been scathing and filled with white-hot anger upon their last meeting, and there is a touch of hesitance lingering within his steady gaze. Time had passed, as unyielding and as ruthless as it had ever been, bringing with it a change of season, among other things (the thought of Taiga and its untimely fall does come to mind; there are worse things than a burnt landscape and a wound or two).
Alas, he had eventually come to understand her position – frustration, ire, and fiercely defensive. He, too, would be furious, should Tephra be harmed – should a resident be injured by the fault of another and their recklessness. His son had been out of line; he was careless and acted with poor judgment but a monster? Hardly. He would offer no apology - despite conceding that her anger was justified, her treatment of him and her sharp jab toward his parenting was not.
He could only imagine what had brought her, and when the thinly veiled words emerge from her soft, parted lips, he can hardly stifle the amusement from gleaming within his crimson stare.
”Let me get this straight. You’ve come all of this way, to ask my intention with Tantalize?” he muses aloud, his voice rough from disuse but rich and honeyed, with laughter breaking through each word. ”You have wasted your time; my love life is hardly any of your business. I respected your border, and did not cross it - and that boy is my son. Unless you have come seeking a diplomatic meeting, or to apologize, you can take your leave.”
OFFSPRING
another zealot with the weight of the fucking world.
It’s impossible to not hear the heaviness of his footsteps against the rocky soil. While Nayl is lithe and agile, Offspring is hefty and lumbering. He undoubtedly dwarfs her, but it fazes her not when she eventually looks up at him, nonchalant and in no rush to regard his reply. A crooked grin cracks the frigidity of her face and her eyes slowly blink, amused. She doesn’t yet answer him as she revels in his taunt, thriving on the distaste that she has already soured his mouth with.
”Don’t kid yourself,” she finally quips with an idle flick of her tail, ”we both know you aren’t the Romeo type.” Her fiery eyes trace along him and take note of the low-lit flames skirting his flesh. Ruan comes to mind then and how his immediate area sparkled with ice and frost. Imagine the two of them together – fire and ice – and how a brawl between them would pan out. It would never happen, but it’s an amusing thought as her gaze levels back on his. ”I would question her taste,” she could see the mare leading a strong, successful life in Nerine, ”but I know she’s smarter than that.” Hoping is the reality, not knowing. Nayl has crossed paths with the jaguar mare a handful of times and while they seemingly compatible their relationship has yet to truly blossom as with Djinni.
Nayl is simply slow to trust.
”And I have no reason to apologize. I haven’t trespassed into Tephra although it did cross my mind, admittedly.” A shrug ripples through her lean shoulders, unable to subdue her honesty. At one point in time, she was welcomed here with open arms. Magnus had befriended her and she was beginning to let Dahmer tread closer toward her miniscule perimeter of trust – something more than an acquaintance, but not yet a friend – but the leadership in Tephra changed again and again. Their leadership is turbulent, unreliable, short-lived. A calculating stare at Offspring leads her wondering how soon he will leave, too. Before or after her reign one day finds its end? ”Now, without bullshit, what would bring you to Nerine’s borders after our last meeting in Hyaline?” They both know it wasn’t for a tropical vacation with a dearly beloved.
You're looking at an absolute zero; I'm not the devil but I won't be your hero.
”You know nothing of me,” he muses softly, his voice rife with amusement. ”and yet you are foolish enough to think that you do.”
He had been scorned by love, and spurned by lust, but he had lived far longer than most – he had loved, he had lost, and the heat of his mouth had found more than a willing neck to lavish a fervent kiss upon or wither to firmly grip between his teeth. Beneath the stoicism and feigned indifference of his iron composure, there is a heart, beating low and steady – it craved and yearned for what nearly all inevitably do. He is not immune, nor is she.
Her gaze is heavy upon the flickering flame that touches his skin, subtle and faint, crackling from the white-hot heat as it simmers across the surface of his puckered scarring. She may be thinking of another, of fire and ice mingling (he knew ice intimately; it had once had the same hold on him that the fire now had), but he cannot know what is on her mind and her blatant gawking seems to him to be something else altogether. He cannot discern the purpose of her unabashed stare, but it has lingered too long and he can hardly suppress the wry smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. Her wit is sharp, and it lures laughter from the burning hearth of his chest as her candor becomes bitter and acrid, laced with cyanide and arsenic.
”I was not aware that you were her mother,” he says carefully, the glowering ember of his burning eyes boring into the gilded outline of her own, mischief meeting with resolution. ”or perhaps it is not that you are concerned at all for her well-being, or her judgment. That is an excuse.“ His breath is warm across her cheek; he does not touch – but he is close enough to her that the heat of his fire is hot across her skin, reminding him of the roiling and endless sea that lay behind her. The impish gleam does return, and with it, a low chuckle, reverberating from the tightness of his chest.
”Perhaps, rather, you have come for a different reason. There is more than enough of me to go around, Nayl,” and the sardonic smile has returned, tugging at the corner of his whiskered mouth, as laughter soon echoes within the thick, humid air, stirred only by the ocean breeze sweeping inland. ”alas, you are sorely mistaken. I came only to see her, and it did not have anything to do with Hyaline, or territory politics – but since you are here ..”
The humor is gone, and the fire has returned, alight across the broad spread of his chest, thick with muscle – shifting, twisting, as his weight is moved from one set of legs to the other. He had been there since the beginning – the volcanic island was a part of him, as fervent and as hot as the fire inside of him, and though there had been a change in leadership, the underbelly of it had been unwavering. Unchanged. It had thrived, with a strong and formidable military and peacekeeping branch, while the newly developed guard is built and carved from the ground up.
Tephra had been tumultuous, but it had been withstanding, and had the numbers to show for it.
Nerine could not say the same.
”You should be made aware that an alliance has been struck between myself and Amet. Your hold is slipping, Nayl,” he muses thoughtfully, studying the hardened features of her face. ”and your empty empire is crumbling. Tephra will stand alongside Hyaline, through whatever storm. It is the least that I can offer in the wake of what has happened,” he pauses, quiet for a moment. ”and he is wise beyond his years.”
And then, the fire is a blistering inferno, burning hotly within the intensity of his stare.
”Your mistrust and arrogance will be your downfall.”
OFFSPRING
another zealot with the weight of the fucking world.
”I know enough,” she quips with her fiery eyes holding steadily onto his own, unwavering, unabashed. She doesn’t indulge him, however, or enlist the information that she has tucked away into the secured crevices of her mind. Some may be rumors, others actual truths that she has obtained, some even mere opinions. Although she constantly thirsts for information, Nayl doesn’t grope for more about him. There is not much else that could entice her about him except why he left Beqanna only to return for a crown.
He craves power, like her.
She is comfortable with the ensuing silence, breathing quietly in its midst before looking beyond him into the mouth of Tephra where the volcano towers. High above, there is smoke, and deep in its bosom there is molten lava. What no one – not even infamous Offspring – can see is how her mind longs to thread fingers through Tephra. She could so easily bring them destruction, perhaps even Hyaline now since her grip has receded on the lost boy. It holds her interest for a long while, her gaze contemplative, her heart pounding in her chest with lust and temptation. Could she create a titan from these things much like she had from the sand in Nerine? Could she bring life into something so powerful and destructive? Beneath her groping fingertips the lava stirs within the volcano, clawing the walls of its cage.
But Offspring – damn him – sinks his nails into her and she blinks slowly before looking at him again. ”Don’t flatter yourself, Offy,” she chides, but even with the truthfulness of it, there is a sudden spark of humor. It’s a dull flame in her voice. The corner of her mouth quirks. It brightens her face for a single heartbeat before she shakes her head as their conversation swerves into a territory she had eluded. Although listening, Nayl almost appears disinterested. What dribbles from his lips – nails on a chalkboard - is all known information. He is picking at a wound that has already scabbed over and begun to heal. It doesn’t hurt her as much as she anticipated, but maybe that’s because she isn’t the monster Beqanna has made her to be.
”Tell me something I don’t know,” there is a reciprocated touch of venom when she answers him, hating how comfortable and happy he is to present the news. Nayl turns so that she is perpendicular to him, not having forgotten the hot breath he fanned across her neck moments prior. She is exposed to him, unafraid, as she peers toward the horizon, then to the volcano (still how it tempts her), then to Offpsring back over her shoulder. ”I’m happy you think Nerine is weak because you couldn’t be more wrong,” a coy smile crawls across her velvet lips, ”but also, I’m not as hungry as you may think, Offy.” Again, she uses an almost-derogatory form of his name, luring him, toying him. ”I easily take what I want, if I want it. That’s how I stole Nerine for myself, but I realize nothing lasts forever,” except my lifespan she doesn’t add.
She pivots now, drawing toward him with the agile ease of a jungle cat the sisterhood once lived among. Their eyes meet, their breaths synchronize. ”You have a son you could not control – but you lead a kingdom, so go figure – and he brought destruction to Hyaline. I was there and helped restore some life to the land because I cared. Sylva? I’ve told Djinni to come home to Nerine because she was exhausted of ruling. Amet found his big boy pants so I let him and Hyaline go.” An airy chuckle, one that almost doesn’t seem to fit in the conversation, churns in her throat. ”If I wanted to keep Hyaline, you should know that I would, and very well could.” There is a gleam in her autumn eyes. ”And you coming near my home? When I see you, I also see your reckless son, and the last thing I want to see is destruction finding my home and my family – all of them.” There is almost no space between them and yet she still inches forward, lifting her head toward his. ”So, excuse the fuck out of me if I actually give a shit.”
She moves to the side again, letting her mind reel.
You're afraid, like I make my deals with the devil. You've been at it for years, but couldn't reach the next level.
He is tired.
Weary, worn, and tired.
His patience has grown thin – vile, scathing words fall from her parted lips, but he can hardly discern it from the hateful way her eyes bore into his own, vehemence simmering within the core of her iris and the very same emerges to the surface of his skin. A flicker of fire tracing the coiled muscle and rigid bone of his physique; outlining the burning ember in his stare. Her words are empty, meaningless - a ploy to coax the fire from within, to rouse him, to stir the anger that has festered so deeply and for so long within the tightening hearth of his chest. He had already grown tired of her long before she had come.
”I have ruled over many more than you, for much longer than you.” He utters, his voice rough, deepened with the agitation roiling like the hungry and ravenous sea, and he can very nearly feel the rumbling of the volcano quiver and shake the foundation of his core, rattling him and urging him to the very same frothing, magma-laced explosion he knew he was capable of being. Her words cut, delving in between proverbial material of his being, of his existence, reaching for his thrumming, raggedly beating heart – seeking to cut out a piece of her own keeping; for her own satisfaction.
She cannot take what he no longer has.
”You rule nothing, and no one – Nerine is nothing of what was promised when the world changed – the sisterhood is gone, and with it, so is your power.” He growls, stepping closer to her, the warmth of his breath brushing across her cheek. He does not say that his own power is slipping - it is not, for what power has he had but the trust and fellowship of the Tephrans? But the drive to be all that he once was is fading with each passing day. He rules nothing, and no one – he is a protector, a quiet presence (is he?) – a presence that is waning just as hers is, like the setting sun over the distant horizon, caressing he and Nayl in a splendor of scarlet and bronze, glittering in the dangerous fire of their burning gaze.
Weary, worn, and tired - the flame reaches for her cheek, scalding and hot, while the fire crawls the length of his muscled legs, reaching for the dry and brittle vegetation surrounding them, encircling her and rising – hotter and hotter; a blazing inferno ensnaring her closer to him, where she cannot escape the heat of his flesh and the fire in his eye.
”Speak of my son again, and I will destroy you,” he mutters as the fire traverses the marred surface of his skin, entangling itself into the tangled, matted mess of his mane, framing his scathing glare in a fiery, blistering blaze. ”I will destroy you, and all that you hold close to you – that is where you and I are the same, Queen Nayl of Nerine,” he breathes, his burning lips close to the crest of her ear, where the Queen imprisoned with fire will hear truth. ”I will let nothing stand in my way.”
OFFSPRING
keep wishing you were me and i'll keep making you have to.
@[Nayl] - HAVE AT IT! Anything but death, obviously - beat him up; let's do this. >:)
