"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
it's not perfect here between us, but even angels have their demons trapped inside this twisted circle, it ain't right but it's eternal
He had called her Capture.
One day she would understand the true weight of the word, of having such a name, and maybe she would crumble beneath that weight. To be named after a cruel twist of fate, and one that had followed such a strange un-beginning of life and death and life again. Or maybe she would bear the weight gracefully, let it turn her to stone and steel so that nothing could ever hurt her. Only time would tell.
He had called her dirty, too. She had not expected the word to sting as much as it did, but he was right. There was dirt and mud stained across the steel and emerald of her skin from when her mother had buried her alive- or at least mostly alive. When they had ushered her towards the ocean, towards the sound of waves lapping against sand and the stink of brine, she had gone obediently. Nor had she hesitated to bury herself in the water she had no reason to fear. It would not hurt her, would not drown her, could not harm her in any way unless it ever choice to deny her.
She had stayed in the waves until Kult and Kersey were certain all the dirt had gone from her skin, until the gray gleamed like cold silver and the green was bright enough to make emeralds jealous. Only then had she abandoned the sea, and with so much reluctance because the waves felt safe and she loved the way they cradled her close like no one else would ever want to. They had told her to pull the water from her skin, to let it fall away and so she did. Rivulets of ocean water had run like tears between her ribs until there was nothing left.
They told her to stay and she could hear them drift away without another word, could hear the crunch and sift of sand beneath their feet. Loneliness found her immediately and she could feel it settle like a cold stone in her delicate chest. Uncertainty found her next, she knew it by the way it seemed to want to crush her. They had not told her what to wait for, only to do so, and so she would. But the knot in her belly seemed to tighten and twist with each passing second and it was reflexive when she called the water to her. It wove towards her in the shape of a dozen pythons, and even though she could not see them, she could imagine their glittering, iridescent beauty.
02-07-2016, 09:24 AM (This post was last modified: 02-07-2016, 07:46 PM by Kirin.)
And she'll always get the best of me, the worst is yet to come All the misery was necessary when we're deep in love
Come, Kult had said.
The simplicity of his speech had always been an endearing quality to Kirin. Whether the boy had ever intended it to be he didn't know. He never bothered to ask either, for he didn't wholly care about the intentions. The fading bay had lead him towards the sea, snaking his way to where they could both peer down from the cliffs at the child below. Capture, he spoke again and with that he left. No further explanation given, none needed.
The lavender stallion leaves his roost, pressing from the rocky ledge and clutching at the skies. The soft light of dawn playing prettily on his shining feathers, giving them vibrance and shadow where none had been before. Kirin would spend hours preening, taking care to tend to the soft plumes that made him frighteningly bird-like. He adored his wings, they were always his favorite trait and he could not help but feel partial to those that had them.
Brisk sea air carries him down from the cliffs like an old friend, presenting him to the earth like a gift. Touching him to the sands gently as he tucks his wings to his sides and approaches the girl on foot. From here he can smell that it is a girl child, one that is freshly washed, smelling too much of the sea already for something so new to his world. But before he reaches her, he has cause to stop. Aquatic serpents bend around the child, coiling along her body in delicate twists, securing her like a shield. He only smirks then, for this was no ordinary gift.
His siblings had brought him something traited, something useful.
"My, my aren't we a special little one." He breathes, cloaking his voice in satin. The rising sun displayed unique patterns of silver and emerald, though the light also brought attention to the eyes. Cloudy, blue, sightless. He frowned, was it too much to ask for perfection? Though he supposed that little defect could be overlooked, indeed the girl would be useful regardless of her unseeing eyes.
"Welcome to the Cove Capture, you can call me Kirin." Strokes of mulled wine and smoke leaking from his lips, already bent on enticement. Gain their trust first, make them warm and welcome- then use them. Oh, but he was such a good user, sooner or later they always begged for it. His face spread to a wicked grin, pressing a feathered tip into the snake shaped water.
it's not perfect here between us, but even angels have their demons trapped inside this twisted circle, it ain't right but it's eternal
She cannot see him come to her, cannot trace his path through the sky against the endless aching blue with wings spread wide from the imperial purple of his shoulders. In fact she does not hear him either- or at least cannot discern the rustle of the feathers on his wings from the rustle of feather on the white and silver wings of a gull. One day she would learn, and probably very soon, but in her newness, in her inexperience, she is raw and vulnerable before him. She does hear when his feet touch the sand though, when the sediment hisses with contact and so she turns to him, her face delicate and silver and entirely beautiful in its uncertainty.
Special, he calls her and she can feel her body soften with the praise. As the nervousness bleeds from her, so do the serpents. Each one hits the ground and bursts into a cloud of mist frozen in time for a long moment until both Capture and Kirin are shrouded in it. It is in this way that she traces the shape of his face and the curve of the smile across his mouth. She follows the mist, tracing the outline of his body where it breaks apart the water so that she can picture him like a strange silhouette in the blackness of her mind. There is no color, no purple or bright, but there a varying shades of black and she had made him the most beautiful shade of all.
She gasps quietly, a sound like wind rushing over stones, and the mist thickens around his wings. Capture had not known a winged horse before. At once she pulls the mist from him, leaves his skin as cool and dry as it had been before. Instead she calls the water to her shoulders and coaxes it awkwardly into the same shape she had felt at his withers. Two glittering, iridescent wings shimmered above her as she tried to remember the shape of each individual feather. For a thoughtful moment she stayed that way, but then with a sigh the water-wings burst and rained down around them. She was careful not to let it touch them.
Dirty. She remembered the word suddenly and flinched, wondering with a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach if she had broken a rule.
The sound of his voice coaxes her face to lift towards him again and those unseeing eyes disappear for a moment behind the uncertain flutter of dark eyelashes. “Kirin.” She repeats and her voice is an impossibly small sound, like the tolling of a tiny, silver bell. A tremulous sigh leaves her lips as she reaches her nose across the empty space between them. “Even birds must be jealous of you.”
02-21-2016, 10:31 AM (This post was last modified: 02-21-2016, 05:49 PM by Kirin.)
And she'll always get the best of me, the worst is yet to come All the misery was necessary when we're deep in love
Mists and ghosts of water magic he touches, the serpents dissipating into the air before he can penetrate them. The water separating, leaving behind a veil of wet mist, that neither warms nor hides him. The trickles of moisture litter the air and fall in tiny crystal droplets against their skin, his anger not yet found as he looks around curiously at the display- delighting in the child’s mastery. It was so hard to hone gifts he could not assist them with, it was not as simple as a flying lesson on ripe ocean breezes.
The gentle relinquish of air pulls him back from his thoughts, back towards herself and the coo that she makes. Droplets of saline clinging heavily against the soft plumes of lilac that he so fiercely coveted, weighing them down in manner that he doesn’t necessarily care for.
As soon as his lips begin to droop, the wetness is whisked away, drawn from his body and returning him to his dry and pristine state. Well, that was better, that was quite smart he thought, because he hadn’t a chance to explain his distaste for unwanted filth. The sand was so terribly difficult to rid from his pillowy wings once it was wet.
Gently the water curls and forms wings of their own around the girls mottled frame, bending and flexing as deft as any wing before they too disappear. Kirin only smiles, fluttering his own set, fluffing them against the breeze and parading them like a fine showpiece. He side-steps a missed splatter, tilting his ears towards the daintiest of sounds. The supple sounds that formed his name when she repeats it, for memory or practice he doesn’t know. They said she had been left to die and the words could just simply be a reason to speak at all.
She could not see the untamed smile that flew up his cheeks at her next lilt, the compliment puffing him up and tingling down his spine. “Is it wise to envy one’s own brethren? I suppose in way I am more like them than you might believe, and altogether different in others.” Riddles and webbing woven from a calculated mind, hinting and hiding his nature in one go.
“Tell me does the sea too resent such a lovely little mermaid?” He reaches to touch her muzzle with his own, lipping gently her tiny nose. This gift he would keep, hold high on his shelf of things just like he did the icy beauty Wayra. He would have time to earn her love and trust, but what better time to begin?
