• Logout
  • 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]  like the dawn, you broke the dark - valdis
    #1



    Memories wash over Solace as she flies low over the common lands in search of her daughter. Memories of harsh winter nights tempered by the glow of love and a perfect contentment. Nights of laughing and childish squabbling when their grotto had been the center of her world. 

    She couldn't place the moment when things had begun to change - when she had realized that her daughter was growing restless, discontent - that she was no longer the little girl she could tuck against her breast as the mountain winds howled between the peaks. 

    She tries to remember exactly when Valdis had grown up, and if in doing so had outgrown the blind love of her mother that most children have. She has too much time to think, as she searches meadow and field, to wonder if her treatment of her daughters had been too much like her own mother's. 

    Solace had never truly loved Tang, not after she had reached the age of thinking for herself, (not after Koadie died) she had never felt the way she felt for Warrick for her mother, nothing even close. And she wonders now, as she spots Valdis in the distance if she should have tried harder. 

    No, she decides.

    Tangerine never cherished you the way she did Svedka, the way she did Warrick. Her mother was a lover, a deep well of passion and dreams, and the intensity of her had never felt right to Solace. The unreliability, the fluid and craving nature of the painted seer had set her on edge. 

    But Valdis didn't have a father to fall back on, not the way Solace had Warrick. And she hopes that maybe she is overthinking it as usual, or that maybe there is time to discover her wrongs and right them. 

    "Valdis," The golden queen calls to her daughter as she lands, her voice giving away the concern which had been gnawing at her. Ice lingers in her mane, sparkling in dusk's light, an uncomfortable reminder of her failure in the recent quest. But as she lands she does not stop, and when she thinks of Icicle Isle all she can see is Valdis' back and the snow driving them apart. Solace pushes forward, unable to feel true relief until she held her daughter and knows for sure that she is safe. 

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



    @[Valdis] Hope it's ok that i moved things along by having Sol spot her! Sorry this got super duper rambly
    Solghostdoll2

    Reply
    #2
    And in the darkened underpass I thought,
    "Oh Satan, my chance has come at last!"


    The wings. The steady rhythm of wingbeats spurs Valdis’ memory into gear. A shudder cartwheels down the length of her spine as she realizes who it is looming above like a cloud. Even as a young adult, the girl isn’t immune to the shame that wracks her when she has disobeyed orders. Her jaws clench as she counts the bellowing flaps until they’ve stopped. The pause scratches against her nerves. With her eyes cast down, Valdis waits until mother’s footsteps, then voice, breaks the silence.

    ”Mom,” she whispers, fighting back the cough that wants to rattle her bones and betray her health. When she saw Solace last, it was when their world was shrouded by a sheet of white now. It blocked most of their vision, but they didn’t even join together for the quest at hand. Mother had Kagerus – that’s what mattered, really – and Valdis had the goofy boy, Santana. Obviously, they all survived the ordeal, but they’ve been left with residual frost coating parts of their bodies. A small reminder of their suffering. Valdis shivers when she remembers how the ocean waves – awfully frigid as they were – threatened to drag her beneath the surface and drown her. Without wings and without her fire, she was helpless.

    Without mother, she was lost.

    Never below affection, Valdis folds herself into Solace’s open embrace and glides her muzzle along the familiar edges of her shoulder. ”How are you?” Are you avoiding the plague, is what she really means but doesn’t specify in fear that Solace would remember where Valdis said she would be. The Cove was to be her retreat, but instead the girl found her way to the meadow. Instead, she found herself in the company of a hellhound being lured to Sylva. But, of course, Valdis doesn’t admit to all this. She purses her lips tightly into a thin line and takes a step back. Her blue eyes drink in the sight of her mother, reading the concern on her face, but she doesn’t mention it. A breath is slowly exhaled, groping for anything to say, any sort of diversion. ”You look pretty with frost in your hair.”


    VALDIS
    But then a strange fear gripped me and I just couldn't ask.



    @[Solace]
    Reply
    #3


    Valdis falls into her embrace and for a moment Solace allows herself to believe that all is well. For a moment she buries her muzzle in her daughter's mane, submitting to some motherly instinct as she draws the scent of her into her lungs. But too soon the young mare is moving away, and a suppressed cough is enough to send Solace's spirits crashing again.

    Her children were her weakness, even though they didn't know it. 
    (Maybe it would have been better for everyone if they had of known) 

    "I've avoided sickness so far, Velk too," she replies, although she truly believed it was only a matter of time before she contracted the plague. If she was lucky, Kagerus' gift of immortality would be enough to protect her from anything worse than symptoms. "And what of you? Have you caught the fever?"  Her voice is raw with the concern she feels, the helplessness. She wishes she could sweep her up, return the young mare to Silver Cove and make her fit.  Did she not know that she could have whatever position or power she wanted if she stayed?  

    "You look pretty with frost in your hair,"  Valdis says, filling the silence as her beautifully stubborn mouth is setting again, and Solace watches helplessly as the walls go up.

    (did she get that from me or from him?)

    "I hope it doesn't last," she sighs, pretty or not she didn't like the cold on her neck, she didn't like the constant reminder of the missteps she had taken under the pressure of the grueling quest. But she lets the topic drop, her blue eyes searching Valdi's face with, for once not trying to curate every expression. 

    "After we met Castile I thought you went to Silver Cove." Her tone lacks the fire of accusation or displeasure as the gold-splashed mare steps forward again, reaching her muzzle to brush a flake of frost from the princes's cheek. "Where have you been?" Solace nearly whispers. 

    "You're too old to be told what to do, Valdis, that's not why I'm asking." Hyaline's Caretaker had better luck ruling a kingdom for a lifetime than holding her family together, she understands making up for lost time and reprimanding her nearly grown daughter won't do her any favors now. 

    "I just want you to be safe."

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


    EDIT: cause it was a mess and i forgot a piece and then had to make it a little cleaner while i was adding the forgotten bit :|
    Solghostdoll2

    Reply
    #4
    And in the darkened underpass I thought,
    "Oh Satan, my chance has come at last!"


    Valdis, unknowingly, holds her breath to hear about her mother and brother. Although she herself is infected, her gut churns fearfully for her family. To see them suffer would be an obstacle of her own – powerlessly watch them as they succumbed to the disease. It’s only a matter of time until she exhibits symptoms, too. A periodic cough is enough of a telltale sign, and the frequent nights that she shivers feverishly alone. She is sick, but also afraid to admit it to Solace who peers down at her with concern furrowing her brows. ”Ummm…” she is reduced to a child in the face of her mother, ”Maybe?” By having lied and wandered off the path, Valdis was infected. If she had been a good girl – a perfect daughter – she would have fled with the others and could have been safe within the Cove.

    But curiosity won.
    It led her astray and into harm’s way.
    But it hurts too much to say it aloud, to tell her mother that she was wrong.

    Valdis glances her eyes away from Solace’s worried gaze, and she searches the rolling hills and wilted grass for a distraction. There is so little left here, however, but it takes just a single name to pull her back from her wandering thoughts. ”Castile?” She echoes with a lifted brow. ”You mean dad?” Although an absent part in her childhood, he at least found them eventually. There’s of course a lingering bitterness when she considers everything he missed, but he could’ve avoided them for the rest of their lives. He could have fled and never met them. Surely it would be better to remain on cordial terms with him than nothing at all. ”You’re so formal around him and uptight,” it hadn’t escaped her notice during their meeting, and even their brief reunion when the contagion initially penetrated Beqanna.

    It was a reminder of what once was and what will never be.

    Questions bubble and she almost asks for more. Her mouth is agape, but it closes with further consideration. ”I’ve been here,” she confesses without a second thought, ”First the forest with Rhaegor, then here.” The reason remains an unspoken thing. Could she even provide one if prompted? Doubtful. It had been a chaotic mixture of curiosity, rebellion, and independence. As much as her family loves her, accepts her, it was a surprisingly easy choice to step off the path of expectation and forge her own way. It had consequences (a cough breaks the brief silence), but it has thus far been undoubtedly worth it. A soft grin settles across her pretty face when she meets her mother’s apprehensiveness. ”I know. I’m okay,” perhaps not entirely safe, but mostly. At least her fire has returned after placing an icicle at the faeries’ feet in the Mountain. At least she isn’t powerless. ”I made it back with the icicle,” a brief reflection seems adequate to determine her survivability, ”but the faeries are still deciding what to do with me. They liked someone else’s method more than mine and Santana’s.” Her competitive nature growled when it happened. ”But, we made it.”

    That makes her an adult now, right? A formidable individual?

    ”And I seemingly made a friend.” Santana, obviously. Little does she know how close they actually are, how the blood that boils in their veins is similar.


    VALDIS
    But then a strange fear gripped me and I just couldn't ask.



    @[Solace]


    An obnoxiously fast reply from me hahaha you're welcome xD
    Reply
    #5


    Solace's question is deflected carelessly - that is enough of an answer - and the fact that she had been proven right is no reward at all. But she doesn't feel anger, it is too late for that, only an acute deepening of the dread which has been haunting her since the plague struck. 

    'You mean dad,'  Valdis corrects, and Solace swallows hard. She feels like the foam on the waves, vapid and disconnected, lacking substance in the shadow of her daughter. She is tossed effortlessly away from her train of thought by this soft admonishment, too easily caught off her guard.
    (i thought you had outgrown this, Sol)

    He and She had met only twice before the conception of their twins. Before lust had bound them by blood. 

    The first time they had been children, or at least she had been. 
    (you were enchanted by him, dreaming of his handsome smile for weeks)

    The second time he had ripped her blemishless skin with his claws, perched on top of her as he battled to take control of the dragon he had been hiding.  
    (you thought it was over)

    On the third time, she had gone to confront him, and instead let him sweep her into his embrace and press himself into the untouched places of her. She had felt something very like love for him (it was love, don't change history) just for him to disappear again. 

    It had made her feel small. It had made her feel expendable. 
    (Kagerus never made you feel that way)

    But these are not things she wants to tell her oldest daughter.

    "We were never right for each other." She says instead, unsure of how to defend herself or if she should even try. But Valdis doesn't push the topic and Solace isn't about to linger there. Uptight was far from the worst thing she had been called, and she attempts to regain the control over her emotions she let sip too easily. 

    Other questions are percolating: bubbling up to the surface only to be suppressed and once again, but she respects her daughter's silence. 
    (you are foam, she is the wave) 

    Valdis continues on, telling her of her success in the quest. "Of course you did," she smiles, easily slipping back into the roll of proud mother - even if her child was a woman now. "I should have known not to worry about you," she says, and it would be hard to tell she didn't feel it. Concern for her daughter was the one thing which had drawn her out of Hyaline today.

    With that in mind, Solace hesitantly circles back to the topic which won't leave her mind.  "I'm proud of you for stepping up to help fight the plague. And I want you to think about coming home, of using some of the fire I know you have to help The Sanctuary." She pauses, gauging the reaction on her daughters face as she speaks as a Queen. "We need strength now more than ever, and you have as much as anyone I know. You could make a name for yourself, if that's what you wanted, I don't think there's anything you couldn't get if you fought for it."

    By her side her wings rustle as she shifts, a part of her hoping that Valdis will agree to leave this moment. When she speaks again her tone is softer and as motherly as it has ever been. Titles and crowns were of little value if she couldn't keep her children safe. "Velk or Kota could help you with that cough..." 

    And whatever comes next, she doesn't add out loud.

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


    @[Valdis] I know you have plans, but thought i would give her a little something to wrestle with Tongue
    Solghostdoll2

    Reply
    #6
    And in the darkened underpass I thought,
    "Oh Satan, my chance has come at last!"


    Solace’s concern is nearly tangible when she notes the occasional cough from her daughter and the evasive answer. Valdis blinks, half-expecting to be chided for her poor decision but it never comes. Reprimanding would do nothing to heal the girl of her ailments. It would be a waste of breath, really, because what’s done is done. The fever continues working its way through Valdis’ body, poisoning her bloodstream and sinking into her fatigued muscles. She desperately tries to hide it, guarding herself, behind her proud expressions and softened voice that mother knows so well. A snort quivers her nostrils, exhaling roughly in a desperate attempt to harbor her cough. The truth of her infection forges a small amount of tension as they consider the what-if’s, and although there is no sense masking her illness, Valdis doesn’t want to worry her mother even more. There is enough filling Solace’s agenda as she protects Hyaline while still maintaining a family and peace among all.

    That’s another reason why Valdis hardly responds to mother’s confession of her relationship with father. Shrugging with resignation rather than challenging or fishing for more, she simply says, ”I understand.” Although really she doesn’t. There was a residual tenderness in Castile’s eyes when he looked at Solace, but it hadn’t been mutual. Questions brewed underneath Valdis’ composed surface, but they never left the safe confines of her mind. Things happen for a reason, she tells herself before distracting herself with other matters. They will never be a truly complete and happy family. Growing up with division, Valdis doesn’t expect it to at all change. Not now, not ever.

    Her life has always been different from the triplets, from the brood Solace has created with Kagerus. It has always been there, that invisible wall, and it pushed against Valdis throughout her childhood. It didn’t falter her love for the family, not at all, but it opened her eyes to see beyond Hyaline and the family she was more or less adopted into. She and Velk are the outliers. It’s only right – perhaps expected – that she steps off their path to create one of her own because she isn’t one of them.

    She isn’t a full-blooded Hyaline princess.
    Half of her is a rogue.

    Nonetheless, Valdis manages to smear a grin across her lips when her sapphire eyes lift to her mother’s. ”I know,” she murmurs even as she questions the validity of it, ”you and Hyaline have always given me what I wanted and needed.” Love, a home, warmth, family. In the way her statement breaks, there is a teetering pause that cradles a heavy ‘but.’ Formulating the words during her hesitation, Valdis glances quickly away toward the distant horizon before she can search Solace’s face again, mustering the bravery to admit her decisions. She almost confesses how out of place she has always felt, but that would only upset mother. It wouldn’t be a balm for the truth – it would be a knife.

    ”There was this guy,” she bites her lip because it isn’t a dreamy fairytale. Valdis is well aware of the dangers (or at least wary of the potential) and it excites her more than anything else has thus far in life. Sinner has opened up a door of opportunity for her. With a dark charm, he has lured her into his spider web and has sunken his teeth into her. Deciding to be upfront, she finally confesses, ”I’m going to Sylva.” A simple and matter-of-fact answer spoken from the lips of a young adult and not a child, yet it still hurts to defy mother’s hopes and wishes. ”Velk,” she mutters her twin’s name with a weighted sigh, both angry and hurt toward the space between them. ”I don’t see him anymore.” It would be strange to find him and demand (because she wouldn’t ask her own brother – what good is having a twin when you don’t even fight for dominance?) for his help to heal the sickness branching through her. ”It’s okay. I’ll manage,” admittedly, she doesn’t know how. She doesn’t know of any healers and the quest wasn’t enough to take away her symptoms, but mother doesn’t need to know that. ”There’s someone in Sylva that can help once I’m there,” a rose-tinted lie curtained behind a plastic smile.


    VALDIS
    But then a strange fear gripped me and I just couldn't ask.



    @[Solace]


    Well, that ended up a novel lmao
    Reply
    #7

    A weighted pause is broken by words every mother awaits with fear, and it is then that Solace knows, truly knows, that Valdis is no longer hers to keep. 

    "There was this guy..."

    A brow rises as she tames her critical interest, presenting instead something closer to playful curiosity. "... and he asked you to follow him to Sylvia," she concludes, her tone cool yet interested. She should have known that the excitement an admirer brought would be more than enough to lull the princess (all of her children were full-blooded royalty) away from The East. 

    While her younger children had grown up amid a throng of fillies and colts, the older two had been isolated by their age. Often time's Svedka had been the closest thing they had to a peer. 

    Solace realizes how little she knows of that quiet kingdom, how inwardly focused her gaze has been these last few years. But she only nods when Valdes states her intentions (no, she doesn't ask; she doesn't hint) but it is just another little defiance which soothes Solace into believing the girl can take care of herself. But the distance growing between her two firstborn hadn't slipped past her, but hearing it said allowed is still painful. "All relationships ebb and flow," the mother suggests softly, "give him time, he is someone you don't want to lose." But she leaves it at that, her own twin's absence a tender abscess on her heart. 

    Valdis proves just how well she knows Solace with her next words; the gold-splashed mare believes the lie she crafts for her mother's benefit easily. Somewhat appeases, Solace sighs. Although the situation was less than ideal this was the natural order of things and she isn't sure she would stop it even if she could. 

    "Well, as much as I would like to keep you a hostage in Silver Cove forever," she begins, finding it easier to take on a teasing tone now that she is resigned to this outcome, "I want the best for you and I don't think that is it. But if a mother's blessing carries any weight, you have mine." She says - a little more seriously but still tender - as she moves forward to tuck her little girl under her chin, for possibly the last time. "Stir things up, Valdis," she huffs, with a light laugh lifting the threads of her daughters mane. "I wouldn't expect anything less."

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


    @[Valdis] well this embarrassingly late :|
    Feel free to consider this a closer if that suits her! Sol will probably come visit Sylva sooner or later
    Solghostdoll2

    Reply




    Users browsing this thread: 1 Guest(s)