There is something that vibrates menacingly between the two of them. Something that Skandar has no word for, no recollection of ever feeling it before. Something familial, perhaps, like the wolves he sees hunt together in the forest, but even then he is unsure if that is the right word to describe it. It is almost as if they had both been born under the same burning sun, with the stars aligned a certain way, and that destiny sought them to meet face to face. As if, no matter what they did (what anyone did), their crossing paths would have happened the way it’s happening now.
Thinking of those wolves - the ones that he’s seen bare their teeth at each other and then lick sympathetically at the same throat; showing dominance and then huddling together to keep warm beneath snowy heaps - Skandar’s indigo lips shimmer into a snarl that reveals yellowed canines, terrible yet somehow not at all fiendish. That same rage that ignites into brilliant red beams of light from his eyes still pulses and writhes, but it has quelled somewhere in his chest for now - it is something he saves for when he needs it and with her, he doesn’t see a reason to act on all that anger. At least for now.
His sharp eyes follow her as she takes a step towards the East, narrowing, and fixating as she pauses in her movement. Fangs still protruding from his mouth, the young stallion’s ears fall flat against his neck with impatience, wondering why she is hesitating. It’s almost as if she’s reconsidering and the displeasure ripples across the dark blue and orange of his face, his eyes brightening into a shade of red-violet, burning somewhere in the back of his irises. His belly aches for the visions to come to life; to see the dragons and Magicians and strange black monsters she had conjured for him - his heart wrenches at the idea of attempting to seek out all of those things himself.
But he does not let her see the worry that grips his throat - instead, he scowls at her with a huff. They are both equally selfish (and perhaps equally vain) but Skandar recognizes the stubbornness in her pointed look at him; he would get nowhere if he refused her (and forced back to his prison in Tephra, where a life of solidarity awaits him), and nor would he get what he wants by splitting her chest open with a single swipe of his gaze across her body.
Skandar snorts and the fire in his eyes dim.
His memories are not grand - they are filled with a dark ocean on an equally dark beach, moonlit nights surrounded by tropical foliage, monstrous storms that swell on the horizon and tear the world apart with its breath. He thinks of his sister, sweet yet dangerous Leijona, and her mountain lion that he had often taken shape as so she would not feel alone when she killed for her dinner. He could take this shape, he thinks, as he is familiar with it the most and it may be frightening to her - but it would not compare to the memories she had already shared with him.
His eyes click to hers thoughtfully as the bright-burn of the lava flows come to his mind. In a blink, he turns what appears to be as black as night - but he has really become the shining obsidian that remains once the lava has cooled on Tephra’s inland grasses. Skandar’s skin then cracks, revealing an intense orange that flows like a thousand rivers across every inch of his body. Pieces of him crumble and drop to the ground, sizzling on the forest floor and disappearing once it no longer had him to support its image. He steps towards her, slow-moving like the magma that now courses through his veins. He wonders if she’ll pull away from him as the heat grows, burning the grass and debris beneath his molten hooves. “This is perhaps my only useful one,” he garbles, his jaw melting as he speaks and then reforming with each flow of lava.
They’re closer than they’ve ever been yet and the tension is palpable. The memory he uses to form himself begins to become fuzzy, unable to hold the shape for much longer. The glow of orange lava begins to darken and fizzle out, spitting wildly across his skin. The familiar rippling begins and soon he is only himself - a star-studded colt with angry eyes. He is tired and his sides heave, but his stare does not waver from her own.
“I need to make more.”
And that is where Aela fits into this picture.
skandar
@[Aela]