Before the Darkness, Asena was rarely without decoration. Today, she wears only her own skin, and the tail that she drapes across her back for warmth is a dull and faded purple that is far less eye-catching than her typical snowy white plume. (It still matches, she assures herself, she’d given herself that at least). It had been a strange – and sudden – adjustment, and it is one that the young woman still struggles with. Her fathers had asked that she stay home, or rather: Asena is sure that they would have if she’d gone home. But she hasn’t, not since the darkness began.
It has been terrifying, and somehow wonderous all at the same time.
Possessed of an immortal heart, the ability turn herself invisible, a body that heals itself in the blink of an eye, and her father’s illusionism, Asena is remarkably well suited for a life alone in the darkness.
She’s seen the monsters from far closer than she’d wanted, but they have never once seen the flower-covered purple mare. The first one had smelled her, before she’d remembered to cast the illusion of scent, and the third one had heard her breathing, forcing her to cast the auditory illusion of hoofbeats running quickly to the eat. These days of darkness have honed her abilities far more quickly than her soft life in Ischia had, and Asena is feeling rather proud and capable when she finally comes across another living creature.
Asena remains visible, and allows her tail to fall away, her head raising so she might better see the pied stranger. That is about all she can see in the darkness – that her same age companion is some dark color with white – and Asena huffs quietly to herself, attempting to puzzle through the issue before Folklore sidles closer, close enough to speak.
As she does, Asena spins her magic into the air around them, a very softly glowing orb not unlike the moon – were the moon the size of her hoof and the same perfectly purple shade of her skin. It casts them both in soft light, and she is careful to share the illusion of light only with her companion. Any others will see them only in darkness, and hear only the now-slightly-louder chatter of the water between them.
The purple light reveals Folklore’s worried expression, a marked contrast to Asena’s curious interest in this stranger. The dun girl knows to be wary of the monsters, but the same abilities that make her fearless against the monsters work equally well with unknown horses. Just slightly less cautious, obviously. Though the other appears to be a near match to Asena in age, something about the question she’d asked, or perhaps that she had asked it of Asena and would trust her answer, reminds the young Ischian of her own siblings.
“The monsters took it,” she answers, retelling the story that she’s pieced together from her own observations and quick conversations with strangers. “Or I guess, they’re keeping it hidden? It happened after the Alliance, and the monsters have been everywhere since.” Everywhere including here, she does not say, though the quick way she’d fallen silent and looked out to the north make it clear she’s seen something. Not a something that comes nearer, though, and after a moment she looks back at the other girl, who is covered in a rather striking nebula of stars. “I like your stars,” Asena tells her admiringly, “Would you mind if I tried them on?” Hopeful for assent, the purple and flowered expanse of her sides become instead a canvas of stars, each of them glowing faintly.
@[Folklore]
A S E N A
will I remember to put a quote here before i post?
probably not