Pink was clinging to Rune’s fuzzy baby coat, making him look way more festive and also way more girly than his grullo fluff looked on its own. And that was fine and all. Rune didn’t mind looking festive and girly. Some of his best friends were girls, after all! Well, okay. All of his best friends were girls. But the pink sand was soooooo itchy! He snorted, shaking his head as he tried to get sand out of his nostrils to no avail. And it creeped and crawled along his skin, driving him absolutely bonkers ‘til he just had to stop, drop, and roll. He flailed his legs about in the air, squirming and wriggling and scratching the itchiest of spots on his back…and when he got up, there was even more pink clinging to him.
And also his silvery mane stuck straight up. Well boo. Rune was pretty sure Ellie thought it was cute when his hair stood up like that, but it tickled and tingled and it meant he got zapped a lot, and none of that was all that fun, really. Well. The tickling did make him giggle sometimes. And the tingling felt a little bit like the charge in the air right before lightning lit up the sky and thunder shook the earth and everything standing on it. Okay, so maybe it wasn’t so bad. And the zapping didn’t hurt, really. Most of the time, anyhow.
There was no storm looming high up above today. The sky was bright and clear, and Rune was heading out to his favorite little oasis, one he’d found on an adventure with his sister-friend Ellie. They’d been playing catch me find me, just like Momma Elsie had taught them, and it was Ellie’s turn to catch him. Turned out catching was pretty easy out in the open stretches of sand, especially since they left tracks. Very pink tracks that led straight to their hiding…well, dunes. When they’d found the oasis with its happy little trees and grasses and shrubberies out in the middle of the sand, they’d whooped and cheered and thrown themselves headlong into the green, where the hiding was lots easier and the finding was lots more fun. The little oasis had quickly become his favorite place, with shade and water and sneaking and fun. And less with the clingy pink sand. Since it was all in his nose and his fur and his everywhere, green stuff and water seemed like a fun alternative.
But on his way there, he got a teensy bit sidetracked on account of the shiny new friend he found, who looked like a big scary cat thing with sharp claws and catlike stalkiness but with a weird sort of monkey-thing face. His tongue lolled out all panting-like, and he grinned at Rune and wriggled just like Rune had been wriggling in the sand to try to scratch his itchy baby fluff. Except his new friend was still standing up, and the wriggling was from excitedness instead! So Rune wriggled right back, bounced toward the funny monkey-faced shiny cat thing, gave a little buck, and jumped forward to tag him right in the shoulder--ZAP!
“Ow!” Rune yelped, and the puppycatmonkey yelped right along with him. “I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to!” Little Rune’s face fell, and he crumpled into a sad little ball of dejected sadness on four gangly legs. “It just does that. I didn’t mean to hurt you, new maybe-friend.” After all, maybe his new friend wouldn’t want to be friends with somebody to crackled and zapped him. But his new friend just grinned, his tongue lolling right back out of his funny monkey-mouth as he panted happily and wagged his cat tail.
so you wanna play with magic? Perhaps the Deserts is something of a place for the ridiculous, or at least the bizarre, she thinks as she watches the colt interact with Gumby.
Nothing goes unnoticed here, of course. She knows of Caius and Else, and their little daughter Elanor. She knows of Perun too, the little adopted son currently having such a good time with their big strong protector (may he never have to be that, she thinks). She understands enough of their mutual pasts that there is no need for her to go seeking them out. She understands that Else has gone through something that even Camrynn can hardly fathom, and that Caius has been through something almost as bad. She knows that they lurk at the shadows, dancing in the fringes, avoiding the most of the rest of the Deserts. And she is entirely content with that.
Let the Deserts be a refuge for them. Let the Deserts be the home they need. If they wish for it to be more, she and Pevensie and Yael and Girr and Zilpah and Kreios will accept them with open arms. And Gumby will accept them with barking and purring and his usual enthusiasm.
Obviously.
She appears well enough behind him that she won't startle Perun, and watches him in person for just a moment. Gumby is on his best behavior, being as goofy as any dog could ever be. Perun is far more fascinating to her. She's never seen anything quite like him – stormborn is the word that comes to mind, the word that seems to try to define the zaps, the hair that stands up all over his body, the static. But whatever it is, it's some kind of magic, and magic is fascinating to Camrynn. It's just the way of things.
"It'll take more than a little zap to faze him." she says with a smile, approaching the boy and the puppy-cat-sphinx. "His name is Gumby. He's the Deserts' protector." she explains further. By now she's standing near the two of them, coming to a stop underneath the hot sun. "And he likes you."
Her smile is kind, surprisingly maternal. For all that she is, she understands children quite well and is very good at making them feel comfortable. "He really likes to play fetch." with a thought, she summons a stick (not George, Girr's friend, but just a stick) from thin air to the ground by Perun. "You pick it up in your mouth and throw it for him. He'll bring it back to you."
She is quiet for a moment, watching the boy-and-his-dog scene in front of her with a smile. "By the way, my name's Camrynn. I live here too. Nice to meet you." She could've said that she was the queen, but what is that to a child? She may be proud of her position, and never hesitates to share it, but she's not arrogant enough to go bragging to a foal.
And with that, Gumby finally notices the stick and approaches it, his butt up in the air, eyes fixed on the stick, lion's-tail wagging (incongruously). He's every inch the dog, and he wants nothing more than to play fetch.
CAMRYNN co-queen of the deserts, magical, mother of badassery
Wiggle-waggle wiggle-waggle went the monkey-cat’s tail, and Rune’s little scruffy baby tail did the same almost all by itself-like. The static had faded from his hair some once the big crackling zap had happened, but it started to build up again as his tail wiggled with happy excitedness. His new friend wasn’t mad, and was still wanted to play with—oh! Another new friend! Rune beamed at the nice lady with the sparklies who knew his monkey-cat friend.
“Gumby! Cool! I like him too. He makes my belly smile. I’m Rune! Or also I guess Perun, but everybody mostly calls me Rune now. Maybe Perun is a big-me name? I dunno, the sky man gave it to me and I like it fine, but so far I think I feel more like Rune. And my new momma and sister like it too! I wonder if my maybe new dad will like it too? Guess I’ll find out when I find out if he wants to be my new dad like he’s Ellie’s, and like Miss Elsie-mom is my new momma. It’s nice to meet you, Miss Camrynn, ma’am! You are the first person I’ve met who lives here who isn’t Ellie or Momma Else, or my friend Rowyn and her momma Miss Darking. ‘cept they weren’t from here when I met them! Whoa, where’d that come from?” he broke off, distracted by the stick that appeared at his feet out of nowhere at all.
Rune tried to snatch up the stick, but it was pokey at his gums, which were really only used to nursing and playing with the grass he still had to reeeach for because on account of his legs were really long. And he only had those weird chompy teeth things in the very front-most of his mouth. So he used them to pick up the stick, mouthing it a bit before holding it gingerly between four baby teeth, flailing his head about, and releasing the stick as he flicked his nose forward. The stick went sailing a few feet, and Gumby-friend barked all excited-like and pounced on it, grabbing it way better than Rune had managed and hopping back over to drop it at Rune’s feet.
Rune threw the stick again, and this time it went waaaay farther! While Gumby-friend was off chasing it, he grinned at his new Miss Camrynn friend and bounced over to bump his nose against her shoulder affectionately. “Ow, shoot!” he said as a little static shock jumped between his nose and her shoulder. “Sorry, I forgot. Thank you for the stick! I like this game!”
05-18-2015, 10:40 PM
(This post was last modified: 05-18-2015, 10:40 PM by Camrynn.)
so you wanna play with magic? Words come spilling out of the youngling's mouth and it's all Camrynn can do not to laugh. Not at him, but at his youth and his innocence. The world is still his oyster, and everyone is his friend. She has never thought that (well, not the part about friendship, at least – for her, she's never lost the feeling that the world is her oyster because truly, it is.) But in the end she does not laugh, and in fact says nothing, content to watch him with a surprisingly authentic smile.
But she is taking notes. He's one of the most interesting magic-users she's come across because his power seems still very underdeveloped. She feels certain that he has the potential for more, the potential to turn his sparks into thunderstorms and his static fuzz into lightning and thunder. But she's got no interest in making him grow up faster than he likes; she doesn't want to make him learn, she isn't a cruel mistress (in that regard). Perhaps she would be, if she weren't the mare that she is. But she is Camrynn, she doesn't need powerful others to help her kingdom survive against whatever the world can throw at them. Let the boy be a boy; there will be plenty of time for him to grow into a man, cradled safely in the warmth of the (pink) sands where the only loss he will know is how it feels to lose at hide and seek.
Her smile grows wider as she watches him struggling with the stick. Gumby is terribly interested in it, of course, and she doesn't doubt that the determined boy will get the hang of it in time. And he does, his second throw going much better than the first – and it didn't hurt that she'd given it a little bump, of course. Not that the boy would likely ever know.
Her eyes follow the stick (and Gumby) into the distance for a moment before looking back to the boy just as he reaches out to touch her. When the spark arcs between his nose and her shoulder, she does not flinch. In fact, she does not even seem ruffled by static. Instead, the spark dances along her skin like a tiny ball of lighting, a contained little unit, and impossibility of physics (but with her, everything is an impossibility of phsyics). She rolls it from her shoulder to her back like a marble, letting it trace her spine and slide down her haunches, until finally she balances it delicately on the bulb of her hind hoof, her hindleg delicately raised into the air.
And with a quick, smooth movement she kicks her leg out and the ball of electricity goes sailing to land – without a zap – on the tip of Rune's nose.
"You're welcome, Rune." She says with a chuckle in her voice. Her eyes have shifted, a sharp yellow-white that is somehow electric, but she's still smiling and relaxed. Her gaze is on him, and on the little ball of electric. It should make an interesting toy for him, at the very least.
CAMRYNN co-queen of the deserts, magical, mother of badassery
Rune watched in wonder as his little static jolt danced along Miss Camrynn's skin, turning into a pretty sparky marble of lightning all for him. His stormy grey eyes went wide, and his mouth stretched wide too in a grin big enough it should probably have broken his whole face open, but it somehow stayed together even though his excitement was much much much too big for his face to contain. "A present!" he exclaimed, as the marble landed on his nose. He nuzzled it and poked at it and cuddled the little lightning, his new toy friend, and it sizzled a little bit in response.
"Thank you, Miss Camrynn, ma'am! It's my bestest present ever! Ellie is gonna be so excited, I bet! Can I show her? My sister, she likes it when I get all sparksy-like, when I get all staticky and my hair sticks up and the things I touch are all the zapping, and I bet she would love this just as much as I do." He bounced it on his nose, catching it and sending it back up into the air again as it fell. And where anything else he tried that with quickly went flying, the marble kept finding him. He could feel it, the static tingling shimmery tickle in the air that was the little jolt of lightning, and it always found its way back to him. He caught it on the top of his head, and it danced down his neck, along his spine, down his tail, and he flicked his tail and sent it up into the air again and back to Miss Camrynn to play with too, because good friends share their toys. Even their extra special brand new toys.
(Sorry it's so short. I'm getting back into him.)
07-16-2015, 09:33 PM
(This post was last modified: 07-16-2015, 09:34 PM by Camrynn.)
so you wanna play with magic? She has to admit, the boy is a sweet one. She's never been much for children, despite having been one herself (more or less) not so long ago. It's not so much that she dislikes them as that she prefers the company of adults. It's so hard for most adults to match her even when they're at the height of their knowledge and power; it's even harder for children. But some, like little Rune, manage to be thoroughly fascinating in a brilliant idiot savant kind of way.
It helps, of course, that Rune is magically very complex. It helps that she wants to unwind him (metaphorically, she wouldn't dare actually harm him). It helps that she wants to poke around beneath his skin, to see how his magic works, what makes it tick. It helps that she wants to prod him into learning it, to see what happens when he tries to become its master, to watch him as he grows up and potentially grows into…well, what?
Sure, she could always just look, but that seems much less fun.
She returns his smile with one of her own, watching as he grows accustomed to her present. It certainly is like no lightning commonly known in the world, but then she is hardly a common thing herself, and Rune most certainly is not. An uncommon toy for an uncommon boy, she thinks.
And then the uncommon boy speaks again, his words once more washing over her like a wave, a crashing torrent of sound and thought and emotion. She chuckles. "Of course you can tell Ellie about it." her voice is warm and kind. When he bounces the toy back to her, she catches it, wrapping it around her like an electron in orbit before bouncing it back to him. "In fact…" her voice trails off and she half-rears up into the air. There is nothing threatening about her movement; she does not rear high, and she keeps her forelegs loose, rather than coiled to strike. The main goal is to allow her to toss her head, and by extension, to toss her main. Like a waterfall of black satin, her mane cascades down from her crest to her neck. And when she lands, she turns to him with another ball of perfect electricity balanced on the tip of her nose. She bounces it over to him.
"This one is a little different from the one I gave you." she explains, watching it roll across the sand like a ball, finally bumping against his hoof weightlessly. "She can control it a little better, despite the fact that she doesn't make sparks like you do." she smiles. "The one you have won't hurt her, but it will shock her from time to time, and she'll have difficulty making it go where she wants, way more than you will." She pauses. "But she'll have one, and you'll have one. That way, you can both play."
Camrynn is…nice? Generous? Good with children? Since when? Well, since she's decided that she wants to be an influence in Rune's life, to help him grow into whatever power he possesses. And to that end, well, she's not above playing.
And maybe – maybe – she's enjoying it too.
CAMRYNN co-queen of the deserts, magical, mother of badassery
You never have to apologize to me. Your posts are always delicious <3
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