[private] but its wonderful to see that it never phased you

[Tarian]

Blood - where Tarian was from - was everything to the Legacy clan.

Their lineage as much as their familial history was studied as closely as any other topic (if not more). There had been lessons for herbs and plants that could aid in healing (which had helped him later on in life, as a soldier). There had been etiquette lessons and Tarian considered it an accomplishment that he had learned how to stifle a yawn. Battle tactics and strategy had interested him from the very beginning; but the history of the Guardians of the past?

If Tarian ever held an expression that could be described as rapt, it would be during those lectures that his grandfather Valerio gave to him and Liam and Maximus.  They were to be future Guardians and to navigate all the ways the wind might guide them towards destiny, they needed to know where those past winds had blown from. So there were stories: tales of Rahown and how his fierce pride had blinded him from reconciling with his wandering son, who ventured so far that he ended up shirking the responsibilities placed on his shoulders from birth. The fables about Legado and how it was the Wind spoke to him, murmuring of a sacred place that could keep his family safe when danger had left them nowhere else to turn. They learned of Ichiro and how he earned the moniker the Fierce, going after whatever means necessary to keep his family safe from a demon crafted from the darkest and deepest parts of winter: Maverick.

And though Valerio never spoke of himself, it didn't take long for his grandsons to learn about his role in the War of Windskeep. That it had been his chest that he offered to Frostbane, his heart that had been spliced through by an ice spear to spare his sisters and nieces, an offering to save Windskeep. That it had been Valerio who died that day and Valerio who rose soon afterward to defeat ice demon and his armies. (And it had been the whisper of that story that taught them all that Magic always had a price - the price paid at Windskeep meant there was very little of it to spare for Paraiso.)

So as Tarian listens with a casually flicked ear towards @[Cheri], that she has such a gap in her family history is as strange to him as Beqanna herself can sometimes be. He's hoping for a familiar name, but the one she gives him is like a swift kick to the gut. The silver pegasus stops and turns his silver head to glance down at the crystal-and-gem mare, searching for any kind of knowing in her gaze as he looks at her again. The name she gives - Lilliana - is common. And Tarian even reminds himself that he met another Ruth out in the Field, who had ironically palomino like the aunt that he recalled from his foalhood days in Paraiso.

Guardian of the Redwoods, the younger pegasi tells him.

A title that he has heard nowhere else than Paradise.

Memories flood his mind and the most recent one he has is of a man - Lepis' husband - spitting out her name like a vice before the flames had razed everything. There are too many gaps and too many assumptions for naturally-circumspect Tarian to make. His mind is spinning and his dark nostrils flare as he scrutinizes the dark girl, looking for a familiar trace of the mare that she may (or may not) be speaking of. "Have they always called themselves that?" He asks when they finally move off again, Tarian deciding that it was best if he look ahead.

He's glad of her next words, because they are far easier to be sure of.

"Good," he swiftly tells her and then starts to veer in that direction with a purpose-filled stride. Tarian put his mind in finding a little clearing nearby, one not far from the hot springs. "Where I come from," he starts to explain to the mare following behind him, "the West Wind was the bringer of Spring, of new beginnings." Fitting, he thought, for his young companion who pleasantly teased him about making too much noise. "If you had chosen East, I might have worried."

holy wow you got a novel