There will be scars, Ea

[Erebor]

We are at war. There will be scars.

He is never idle.

He is a constant blur of motion, always training with one parent or the other, always pushing himself to the ultimate limit, and always in service of the Chamber. He is a man in a boy's skin, older and wiser than any almost-yearling has any right to be. And perhaps he thinks this way, perhaps he considers himself a child older than his years. Perhaps he considers himself strange. But if he does, it does not bother him because he it does not stop him from his service to the Chamber.

He is growing handsome, his black coat rippling over muscles that develop more every day. He is growing out of the awkward-colt phase of life, although his awkward stage had been blessedly almost nonexistent. He had been precocious physically as well as mentally; he wobbled very little even from the moment after birth, and he's always had a certain prepossession about him, something that allows him to be graceful where other foals contend with spindly legs and awkward bodies.

Awkward has never been for him, and it never will be.

He sets out from the Chamber early in the morning. He has been beyond the borders several times now, exploring the lands of Beqanna and learning about their inhabitants. His favorite places (outside of the Chamber) are the Field and the Meadow. These are the places where Beqanna's history gathers, where the past, present, and future collide. One can learn things, especially in the Meadow, simply by listening, no talking required.

He arrives at the Meadow as the morning light is still burning away the mist. It is beautiful like this, he thinks, with cold analytic detachment rather than with passionate appreciation. In the same way that 2+2=4, so mist +morning light=beautiful. It is the way of things, but it does not stir his soul. Very little does, apart from things related to the Chamber.

He pauses, hesitating on the fringes as he decides whom to approach. Many are still asleep at this early hour, or otherwise engaged in conversation. Erebor may be perfectly analytical, but he is also devastatingly charming, more than enough to know that waking someone up is never the right start to a conversation.

Even as he stands watching, thinking, selecting, he still seems to stand at attention. There is something subtly rigid about him, but not in a way that suggests fear – he stands straighter, moves more crisply, because he is a cadet, not because he is on any kind of high alert. He is perhaps the more handsome for it; his posture accentuates his muscles, bringing out his excellent conformation and his budding good looks. He is becoming handsome, and he knows it.

Because handsome is a tool he can use.

Erebor

Native Prince of the Chamber

warship x straia