i feel a bad moon rising - Castile

[Ivar]

 

I V A R i'll use you as a makeshift gauge of how much to give and how much to take The journey is a long one, but the two old friends fill it with familiar banter and tales of what has transpired since their last meeting. Ivar tells @[Castile] of his ventures across Beqanna, and lets slip mention of Heda and the romance between them. He was careful to avoid naming it love, for while Heda clearly feel it, Ivar is not such a simple creature.   He’s not had an example of romantic love that he can imitate, and so he is fumbling around it. Ivar knows that monarchs often choose a follower to warm their bed – Nayl had done it with Lior, Djinni with Stillwater, and he suspects Amet has done the same with Ciri. It means little, but it has spurred his devotion to the hilly kingdom, doing his best to prove his worth to Heda through whatever avenues he can.   The Army has been an excellent way to do so, and Ivar’s boast of a promotion had not been an empty one. He means to ask Heda for command of the entirty of their forces soon, as weak as they are. Some direction is better than none, and until now he has been training alone. The idea of having Castile beside him, a brother in arms, is an appealing one. The boys had sparred as children are prone to do, and while Ivar hasn’t mocked with Castile as an adult, he suspects that they might have time to do so soon. They’ll need something to occupy them during the winter, and preparation for a potential Gladiator Match seems an attainable goal.   In the west the sun is begining to sink over the mountains. They have crossed into the lowlands of Loess, the rolling hills spreading out in a seemingly endless sprawl around them. Were it not for the multitude of flora and fauna that inhabites the small kingdom Loess might be easily passed over as boring. Ivar though, with his insatiable curiosity, has been attempting to learn everything he can. He looks over at Castile, trying to assess his friends’s reaction to the land, and asks: “Would you like to meet Heda, or…” He trails off, allowing the other stallion to fill in the space if he has preferences of his own.     kelpie mimicry | dragon scales | tactile hypnosis

[Castile]

Conversation comes easily enough between them as they reminisce of their childhood, their latest adventures, and what is yet to come. They are friends that had been lost to one another for a brief while, but it’s almost as though they haven’t missed a thing. Their banter bounces to and fro, their occasional bouts of laughter seeming to carry across the hills. In the hours they travel to Loess, very little else mattered except catching up and rekindling an old friendship.

There isn’t a grand entrance at all, or a notable change in scenery, that would announce their arrival to Loess. Castile only realizes by the change in the wind and the scents carried to him for the first time. The western mountains bar the setting sun behind them, their titanic masses outlined in a hazy scarlet. An observant sweep of his eyes drinks in the new world that has swallowed him and he takes careful notice of the rocks jutting from the ground, the ferns sprouting from the cracks, and the hills that go on for miles and miles. He smiles then before looking to his left at Ivar. His mismatched gaze is soft but it contorts into something mirroring amusement when he hears the girl’s name. ”Heda? Who’s Heda?” A lopsided, boyish grin blurs the chiseled edges of his face while honing into the possibility of Ivar being tamed by a woman. While his expression speaks loudly of curiosity, his stomach churns with the idea that his two friends have already transitioned into adulthood with women at their sides. And he, the one who has known what love looks like, remains in solitude far from the warmth of a mare.

One day, he muses.

But after having asked of Heda, and bumping Ivar’s shoulder playfully, he catches a scent that he could never forget or mistake. His ears swivel forward as he hungrily drinks in the familiarity before level his mismatched gaze on his friend’s. ”I see you found Isobell, too,” he can’t even attempt to hide the protective tone in his voice, but it isn’t disapproving. He has recently reunited with his sibling, embracing her closely and gliding his muzzle along her curve of her jaw. Missing her had been an understatement; his heart was full the moment he saw her again and heard the innocence of her voice. ”Did you convince her to come to Loess as well?” This time he chuckles, not realizing that what he says is actually true.

[Ivar]

I V A R i'll use you as a makeshift gauge of how much to give and how much to take Together, they look out over the rolling hills of Loess. It is not so grand a place as Nerine or Sylva, but he has grown to love it. He knows these rocks and ridges as well as he does the length of his pale nose. If at times he longs for morewater and less land, it is a desire that he can quell at the bottom of a spring, hushing it in the darkness. Heda needs him here, the stallion knows. There were a few others when he’d arrived, a handful of shady figures on the edges of the kingdom, but they have remained just that. The life that has come to Loess is the past few months have been of Ivar’s doing –his recruits, his visitors, his own activity. Ivar tells himself that everything changed with the visit of the wraith, but the truth is that the quiet queen has become more withdrawn even before that. He does not know much of the history of this small kingdom, but he wonders if it has always been so still. All the more reason to revive it, he reasons with an optimistic smile. “The Queen,” he tells Castile, “she and I are…” He trails off with a somewhat less open smile. What label can he give them? She’s professed her love – if not verbally then most certainly through her magic – but he remains in something of a limbo. He stands beside her during the daylight, but night leaves him free to pursue more challenging prey. Heda is a soft resting place to return to when he’s washed himself clean of the scent of blood and other women. Ivar does no consider it deception (how can it be, when it is only natural?) but he suspects that it is something about which the buckskin pegasus would prefer to remain in the dark. He’s is keeping her safe, after all. That’s all he’s doing. Fortunately for the black and white Ivar, Castile seems distracted. His is scenting the air, and for a moment Ivar is puzzled. Then he realizes –yes: Isobell – a moment before Castile says her name. Castile is the only reason he knows the young princess at all. She reminds him of his friend frequently, but she is no longer the child he had once known, and the thoughts he has of her are far more mature as well. “For a visit,” he tells Castile, “I’m sure she’s somewhere out there.” Ivar gestures to the west. Isobell has no interest in leaving Nerine permanently, Ivar knows, and he’s made no effort to try to convince her otherwise. The protectiveness in his friend’s voice does not go unnoticed, but as it is neither directed nor disapproving of him, he does not bristle at the sound. “Do you want to go look for her?” kelpie mimicry | dragon scales | tactile hypnosis

[Castile]

Castile is still drinking in the scenery and weighing it against both Hyaline and Nerine. A great part of him longs for the background noise of the ocean, the deep caverns, and the black sand. It brings a slew of memories from his childhood with both parents, Isobell, and a few other foals his age. Such a wonderful time it had been before mother urged him to Hyaline. While he enjoyed the emerald hills reaching for miles in every direction, it didn’t quite call to him. Loess, he imagines, will be the same.

Although his travels aren’t as extensive as Ivar’s, it seems as though Castile loosely tethers himself to a single place. There is no sense of belonging anywhere, at least not yet. It doesn’t bother him, not really, but he considers how both Ivar and Amet have settled themselves down with both women and kingdoms. Castile, on the other hand, is the outlier.

But he musters the imagination to picture himself here - at least for a few years – with Ivar remaining his companion just as when they were children. Nostalgia sinks its nails into him, clouding his thoughts briefly until Ivar’s hesitation makes Castile blink then raise a brow. ”Alright there, Casanova,” he chuckles, ”she’s off limits. I hear ya.” Not that he is hungrily seeking the attention and warmth of a woman. Solitude has mostly suited him during his months of practicing his shifting. It’s only recently when he sees others coupled together that suddenly he considers the prospect. Otherwise, he has been rather content.

Besides, he has his sister that he can devote his attention to.

With a flick of his ear, he hears her name spoken curiously from Ivar. ”Oh, Issy,” he murmurs aloud but more to himself as he mulls over the prospect of joining her with Ivar in tow. A feeble smile wavers, but then he declines with a slow shake of his head. ”No, I will find her later.” He is unaware how intimate Ivar and Isobell have been as of late; all he considers is Ivar’s eyes watching how closely Castile would embrace his sister. Their familial conversations would be terser, less loving with wandering eyes. ”How did you end up here in Loess? How’s your mother doing?”

[Ivar]

I V A R i'll use you as a makeshift gauge of how much to give and how much to take There are few others he might confide it – Castile is one of them. Kylin is another, and his father. He’s seen neither in nearly a year now, and Castile is the first to ask him how he has wound up here. Everyone else has simply as accepted it with no questions as to his motivation. “There’s no ocean here,” he tells the winged stallion. “I…I lost someone when the sea swallowed Taiga.” His voice is surprisingly even, Ivar finds, perhaps time does heal wounds after all. “Loess was the farthest from the ocean I could get without going home to Sylva.” He’d remembered that fact when he finally surfaced three weeks after the Flood, that and that a friendly mare named Heda was living there after her own earlier departure from the redwood kingdom. The two of them have not discussed the sunken kingdom, but Ivar knows that is for the best. Heda is a soft thing, easily saddened and burdened by her own empathy. Best to keep her protected, he knows, and his devotion to that task has distracted him from his own grief. “I hear she’s gone back to Nerine,” the scaled stallion adds, the change in topic acting as a release of pressure he hadn’t really known he’d been feeling. “I’m sure she’s fine.” The rumors are that they’d disappeared only hours before the Red-Eyed Wraith had come to seize the place, that they’d had prior warning. Ivar knows that it was far more likely his mother’s uncanny ability to be on the winning side of fate. kelpie mimicry | dragon scales | tactile hypnosis