• 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


    trippin on the constellations we see [ANY]
    #1

    infinity overhead


    and i whisper, are you listening?


    liquid concrete under our feet





    Hello darkness my old friend.

    Fog. Smoke and mirrors. It had enveloped her for weeks...months...years. Parts of the past rang solid in her head, others seemed like mere illusions. Wisps of an idea or memory that she couldn't separate between fact and fiction. It had been like this for so long now, she merely accepted it. Besides, she didn't really want to remember. The love she had lost. The power and respect she had inspired from so many. The name of the predator that had made her lose it all when it had seemed she would spin the trauma to her advantage. Instead she just disappeared. Like her mother had. Like her father had when he buckled under the pressure to rule a frozen wasteland. She had failed as well.

    It didn't sting as much as it might have done to others. The guilt didn't weigh heavy on her shoulders. Disappointment? A bit but then again... The memories couldn't materialize the way she thought they would. She was either a therapists dream or nightmare, having buried so much deep down. Why deal with it when you can simply forget it? So forget it she did and as she forgot about Beqanna, Beqanna forgot about her. So why was she standing here at her birthplace, hanging beneath the burnt foliage of a tree that had been scorched by summers heat?

    Closing her golden eyes as she breathed in the familiarity of the place... The boy of stone that had roamed this meadow as her only company and broke her heart on top of it. The place where she had returned (always returning here in rebirth) only to forge into the tangled green of the jungle to find her destiny. She had a purpose there once. It had been lost when she had been swallowed by the vines, the shame of what Lion had done eating at her proud heart and even larger ego. For months they would spot jaguar spots and think she had returned only to be disappointed when the actual large cat showed itself. Then they would see spots but turn their back, knowing better. That was her fault and she owned it. Another rose to the occasion and succeeded where she had not and life moved on. She was ok with that. It’s why she had come back.

    As the soft grasses brushed against her hocks, she breathed deeply and shifted ever so slightly so that her jaguar dappled spots glistened golden in the sun across the rest of her dark body. There were a few more scars that showed where life had led her but other than that, she looked much the same. Ageless in a sense as it seemed life went on pause when she left only to have the clock start ticking the moment her hooves hit the dirt of her homeland. The minutes passed and she simply waited, knowing how this place had served her in the past and trusting it completely with her future.


    Tantalize

    The Jaguar of Fire & Brimstone

    Reply
    #2
    so you wanna play with magic?
    Darkness. Fog. Smoke and mirrors. Some horses lose themselves forever in these, disappearing when the world becomes too much, sinking into them like an ocean only to resurface some years later, spat out like a drowned sailor onto the shore.

    But not Camrynn. Camrynn's whole world is smoke and mirrors, but it's more than that. She is the mistress of the mirrors, the one who started the fire that caused the smoke, the one who beckons the darkness. This is her world, her oyster, and they all walk within it at her leisure.

    And in this world, her world, her oyster, nothing much slips past her. Not the noise of the squirrels in the trees, or the soft rustle of the breeze through the grass, and most certainly not the inevitable ticking of destiny that heralds the return of one of Beqanna's own.

    Nestled comfortably within the warm sands of the Deserts, Camrynn spies on the girl in the meadow without shame. She flicks through memories both personal and communal, laying Tantalize's life bare for her to examine. With Camrynn, there is no privacy. Nothing is sacred. She can open any mind like a book, reading it or rewriting it at her leisure. It is hard to stay out of minds when you wield that kind of power.

    With a thought she decides to go pay the girl a visit.

    She has recently taken to appearing off in the distance and walking over to new horses,  but she can't be bothered with that today. And so she simply appears next to Tantalize, with no fanfare. One moment she is not there, and the next she is – as relaxed as can be, as though she'd been waiting there all along.

    Camrynn is a magnificent mare by any definition. Decently tall, she is curvy and lean in all the right places. She's pure black, with no markings and no scars, and a black mane and tail that fall long, straight, and free of tangles. Across her chest a gold crook and flail reflect the summer light, shining brightly. On her left cheek, a trail of diamonds and gemstones drapes across the flat expanse of bone like a necklace. And her eyes – today they are a bright blue, as blue as the sky that shines down on the meadow.

    "Well, welcome back." she greets with a smile, her tone casual. Her voice is uncommonly smooth and pleasant, like honey, chocolate, velvet. She could add so much more, explain the power that lies behind her secret smile, explain all the things that she is and all the reasons that she's here. But instead, she settles for the first and simplest of all the secrets she knows. "I'm Camrynn."
     
    CAMRYNN
    co-queen of the deserts, magical, mother of badassery
    Reply
    #3

    infinity overhead


    and i whisper, are you listening?


    liquid concrete under our feet





    Someone had been rifling through her mind as if it was a cabinet filled with index cards, their own personal library reference. This personal collection filled with diaries that told the darkest of secrets and shame and the greatest of triumphs. It was not a vault she would have gladly opened or invited someone over to take even the littlest peek. And yet it had been desecrated without her knowledge, only the littlest flick of her ears indicated that something had bothered her, as if a gnat had been buzzing above her head. It came and went and was forgotten.

    She hadn’t heard the black mare’s approach. She was just there, as if she had been standing there all afternoon and Liz was the one to interrupt on her peaceful musings. Her sudden appearance was taken in stride, as was her appearance, for Beqanna was known for it’s interesting inhabitants. Average horses were simply not the norm. What was odd was this strangers greeting. Welcome back…. Golden eyes narrow on the unfamiliar face. Do I know you? She thinks. With narrowed eyes and furtive gaze, Liz has resting bitch face on without even realizing it. Camrynn, it’s not a name that’s known to her tongue. It’s new. She’s new. New faces can mean new things to follow.

    ”I’m Tantalize” Her voice is not sweet nor is it gruff. It just simply is. A voice that hasn’t yet decided just what expression it wants to take. The question of how do you know me would usually follow but she knows enough of this world and how it’s magic works, how legacy passes on forever. So she simply forces herself to relax as she eyes this glittering creature before her.

    Sand clings to Camrynn’s hooves and she should be able to place where this mare came from and yet she can’t recall any of the other places that she should know by heart. The jungle. The meadow. It’s all she allows herself to remember. Scanning the meadow once more, unknowingly searching for familiar faces or bodies, she mutters softly to this new companion. ”Not much has changed has it?” Except that statement was wrong, it had changed and yet not changed and they both knew this yet one was still striving to comprehend it.


    Tantalize

    The Jaguar of Fire & Brimstone

    Reply
    #4
    so you wanna play with magic?
    Nothing has changed, Tantalize says, and Camrynn smiles.

    Camrynn smiles because Camrynn is change. Chaos ebbs and flows around her, eddying like so many whirlpools. She marches through it, cutting like a knife through butter, a single fixed point in a chaotic galaxy. But perhaps not single – no, there are others like her (but none quite like her), others who force the world (the universe, the entirety of existence) to spin within their orbit. They are the magicians, the points of light in the darkness, the posts that hold the world afloat. This – all of this – is theirs to manipulate as they will.

    Oh Tantalize, no secret is safe. Hide your dreams, your diary in the deepest depths of your mind. Bury your mental filing cabinets and burn the index cards – if Camrynn wants them (and she does), she will always find them (always, always, always).

    "Tantalize." she tastes the name on her lips, deciding to reply to the mare's greeting before diving into her second comment. Coming from Camrynn's lips, it sounds like the most innocent sin. She grins, a Cheshire-cat smile. "A pleasure." and she means it, really she does – because it's always a pleasure. She might know you more intimately than you know yourself, she might turn you inside out in her mind, on her whim, but dammit, she'll always enjoy it.

    She's not cruel, although it may seem quite the contrary. She's a seeker of knowledge, more the mad scientist archetype than anything else. She pushes the boundaries of logic, reason, morality, everything in pursuit of knowing more. She has always been this way: how far can she push it? How far can she go? What are the limits of her magic? What are the limits of others' magic? This is her quest, to learn and understand, to unfold the world.

    She sighs. "Yes, same old same old." Her voice is light, playful. She looks out across the horizon of the meadow, briefly tempted to fade it into nothingness, or into everythingness, or into Tantalize's jungle. But she lets it remain. "Same old Beqanna…where, as you say, nothing has changed, and yet-" she pauses abruptly, her voice almost catching with the suddenness of it. She looks back to her companion. "And yet, everything's changed." her voice is softer now, almost gentle. Her smile is softer too.

    And it's true, the words she speaks. It's true because Beqanna is chaos, because Beqanna is in a constant state of tearing itself apart. There is nothing that is constant in Beqanna, but the lack of consistency. Even the magicians come and go, blowing in and out like so many leaves on the breeze. But at least in the inconsistency, the incredible strangeness there is a rhythm and a logic.

    After all, doesn't expecting the unexpected make the unexpected…expected?
    CAMRYNN
    co-queen of the deserts, magical, mother of badassery
    Reply
    #5

    tantalize

    infinity overhead

    and i whisper, are you listening?

    The jaguar mare doesn’t mind the way Camrynn says her name, she rather enjoys it. It’s said the way it was meant to be said, reminds her of the seductive and powerful equine she had once been. Once. So long ago. She is pulled back though, pulled back from her moment of reveling in the glory days, by the mare’s response to her wistful comment. A scrutinizing gaze is casted on her, eyes of gold doing a double take as if she has missed something. It was if she had plucked the words right out of mouth, out of her mind.

    A moment of silence before she breaks her gaze, looking back out to the horizon. Shrugging it off as coincidence, maybe this mare just simply got her. ”Yes. Yes it has.” A hoof plays lightly in the dirt, blackened tail snapping agitatedly against her haunches before she makes eye contact again. ”You have lived here long?” How much does she want to reveal to this dark lady? How badly does she want the answers that she seeks?
    Reply




    Users browsing this thread: 1 Guest(s)