"But the dream, the echo, slips from him as quickly as he had found it and as consciousness comes to him (a slap and not the gentle waves of oceanic tides), it dissolves entirely. His muscles relax as the cold claims him again, as the numbness sets in, and when his grey eyes open, there’s nothing but the faint after burn of a dream often trod and never remembered." --Brigade, written by Laura
And the walls kept tumbling down in the city that we love
With everything going right for once, Eyas isn’t surprised when it all starts to go wrong.
It started when Tiercel had come to Islandres. For a very long time the pegasus mare hadn’t used her darker abilities, or felt the need to use them, and then out of the blue he’d washed up on the island shores and driven her to that angry place again. Eyas hadn’t felt that way since she’d been a child, petulant and upset by the way their family was turning into something she couldn’t support. How, after so many, many years of containing herself and finding new reasons to wake up with a smile, could Tiercel just waltz back into their lives (her’s and Gale’s) and do such a horrible thing? She’d been happy here; wasn’t Tiercel the one who’d left them anyways? Hadn’t he been the one to abandon the avian family bloodline?
And for all his efforts what does she get? A snarl and a snap in her face, and Gale turning on her.
Then Narcisus had tested her patience, wandering closer and closer to that precipice she wouldn’t dare pull him back from. Her only son was looking into an abyss of pain and suffering, and Eyas was always watching him do it because she couldn’t gather the strength to cut that final tie between them. Last she looked, he was headed home. She would have to do something about that.
At least there was one silver lining to her waking hours: Santana and Catcher. Those two had kept her sane, and when she was awake @[Santana] was the only creature here who could persuade her to break free from the bonds of the earth and go for a walk, or to eat the fruit Gale sometimes left her. Eyas had stopped resisting him years ago, because what good was it to waste her energy trying to argue with a dragon? And whenever she did feel ill-at-ease or particularly stubborn, he would comfort her in that rough way that only Santana had learned how to manage. Catcher was her soft, grey dream. The smooth silk to offset Santana’s impenetrable scales. The three of them made an oddly good trio.
One day though, she and Santana had indulged themselves like gluttons - Eyas blind to how far they were going because her heart was filled with confusing sadness and her mind was so occupied with the smell of him, and all she could see was the blending of light gold and white until he swept her up into an embrace she’d wanted without realizing how badly she’d been longing for it.
And now, their world was dark.
Gale had gone to the final round of the Alliance, causing the crowned victor to tip some unseen scale of the gods. An eclipse came, shrouding the world, and for the first time Eyas felt a stir of life flipping her belly. She left that instant, dark or not, and made her way slowly from the heart of Islandres out towards the nearest shoreline, using the gifted eyes of so many nocturnal animals to guide her wary steps along the way until at last, a familiar smell greeted her.
“‘Tana.” The mare sighed.
Grey clouds roll over the hills, bringing darkness from above
The seals were barking. Even in the dark, they still make their raucous calls to each other, whenever their bodies tell them the sun should be rising. He'd be lying if he said he hadn't taken the matter into his own claws once or twice now, and silenced the noisiest offenders once and for all. Seal, he had discovered, was a filling but very greasy meat.
He was considering the pros and cons of thinning the herd once again, when a familiar voice reached through the night to grab his attention. "Eyas," he replied, catching sight of the soft warmth she emitted as she neared. His mouth softened into an unseen smile, glad for the distraction from his wailing beach-mates.
Her breathed hard for a minute, lungs like bellows stoking the fire within until his chest and throat glowed with molten heat. "Back so soon?" He asked, tongues of flame escaping his maw with his words. It was little enough light, but something was better than nothing. Darkness could be oppressive. He knew that as well as anyone else who'd lived in a cave for an extended period of time.
His orange glow illuminated the space between them softly, outlined their faces and reflected in their eyes. She'd been to see her brothers. The ones she had shared a womb with once. Their history was as tragic as the rest of her family's, and he hoped this visit had done some healing work for the three of them.
Catcher, he knew, was far better when it came to emotional issues. Something about symbolism and repressed feelings coming out in dreams. Things he didn't understand. But he could listen while Catcher was away, and he could offer distractions, if not solutions. Eyas, he had long since learned, was not a mare who appreciated being "saved" from her problems. A hard pill to swallow, but he'd mostly choked it down by now.
And the walls kept tumbling down in the city that we love
Right now, Eyas wasn’t in the mood to have her feelings sorted out. She was in the mood for Santana and his abrasiveness. That was about it. The meeting with her siblings had not gone well like she’d expected, and she wasn’t sure how she’d handle Gale from here on out. He’d hurt her, which was something Eyas hadn’t experienced with her blue-brindle twin before. Tiercel’s rejection was easily handled: she’d simply disowned him. Things were much easier for the both of them, that way. Much simpler. Eyas could bury him in place of Gale.
“Couldn’t get away soon enough.” She sidled up next to the bigger stallion, making her needs obvious. Being touched or offering affection was a rarity for her, and she wondered what ‘Tana would think at the way she wordlessly lifted a wing and pushed herself against his scaly side. “Hunting again?” She asked him in the dark, smiling to herself at the distant barking of his fast-food habits.
She let him respond if he wanted to.
In the moment Eyas was content to lean on him for the support she so often shunned. The pegasus mare sighed again, finding it hard to release her bottled up thoughts and feelings in the absent quiet following her question. She wanted - more than anything - to be the kind of horse who could just… be themselves. But after having lived through so much loss and knowing that there was still more yet to come, Eyas felt that being happy or content would be a betrayal to the memory of those left behind.
So she corked the lid and kept her mouth in a tight line, and (sensing her discomfort) the uncomfortable sensation of something writhing in her belly made Eyas shift.
“I’m pregnant, ‘Tana.” The pegasus blurted out.
At least he couldn’t say she wasn’t to-the-point.
Grey clouds roll over the hills, bringing darkness from above
It was easy to stretch, to push his muscles in a long, luxurious swoop and pull them back in again. To return upright and eye the shadowy figure of the pegasus woman.
He laughed with hot breath at her caustic assessment of her day, rolling his shoulders as she slid in against his side. She wasn't one for touch. Not unnecessary touch, anyway, and to Eyas, almost all touch was unnecessary. So he let her press against him for a moment, not asking for anything in the moment while she settled into the embrace.
His maw curved into a toothy grin at her question, ears flicking back to the barking creatures. "Thinking about it," he admitted, running his muzzle down the curve of her neck. When she didn't immediately pull away, he continued to stroke and brush through the knotted length of her mane in a firm kind of affection. The seals would keep, of course. This moment of unguarded interaction was a rarer kind of conquest on its own, one far more valuable.
When she stiffened, he was sure she'd pull away in the next moment. Say something scalding to make up for the fact that she'd been soft for a few heartbeats. When she didn't, his puzzlement grew, until he shifted to look as well as he could on her face and the words at last came out.
The dragonkin blinked. A thread of flame hissed from between his lips as he opened his mouth and shut it again. "Uh... Congratulations," he said at last, lamely. Pregnant. That was unexpected.
And the walls kept tumbling down in the city that we love
It’s so easy to forget about what she’s capable of when Eyas spends time with Santana. He is dragonborn, through-and-through, and a nature like his isn’t easily or readily matched for a long term commitment. Eyas remembered finding him cached away in Hyaline’s mountains, hiding out like some fire-breathing beast lording over his dark piles of gold. She remembered how, in the beginning, their strong wills and stronger feelings clashed against one another. He ran his nose over the physical reminders, the scars puckered over and healed by time. Eyas does well not to forget the feeling of ascending from her own physical body, the day she shoved her soul recklessly into his form, and how it’d felt to claw the earth with giant’s paws. Santana was powerful; a taste of his second form had been more than enough to prove that. More than Eyas could manage to control or subdue.
But at the back of her mind is an itch she can never scratch. Santana and all his strength and might may never compare to the dark side of Eyas. She has done and will do terrible things. She will never escape that. Never.
Tonight is no exception. The pegasus pony stood nervously, every muscle rigid and her eyes peering into the nothingness around them as if she could discern his expression from willpower alone. She stayed put and stayed quiet when a stream of light finally illuminated his face for a moment, studious as she flushed comfortably in the heat of his minor flame from standing so close. One does not make love to a dragon and fear his fire, oh no. And then Eyas quirked her brow in the ensuing dark, which jerked her lips into a black, sinister smile.
“You don’t seem very excited.” Eyas pressed him, wanting to laugh. She held her composure, but only because she loved the idea that he wasn’t quite getting the picture and she could dangle the truth above him for a little while longer. “Are you surprised, at least?” The little mare snorted.
Grey clouds roll over the hills, bringing darkness from above
The golden mare was and always had been adept at surprising him. At every turn, it felt as though she were one step ahead, and he could only claw his way through to try and keep up. It was exciting, truth be told, and Tana enjoyed the challenge of her company more than he'd ever be willing to admit.
That, paired with the contrast of Catcher's more subtle nature, made the three of them a remarkably well balanced trio, at least in his mind. Gold, silver and electrum, all worthy of adoration. There is nothing in the world quite like the adoration of a dragon.
His initial surprise quickly gave way to a thrill of excitement. Success, the dragon called it, in the most primal of undertakings. A gravelly thrum, like the purring of an enormous cat, vibrated in his chest. He turned to recapture the curve of her neck beside his. "Give me a moment to absorb it," he requested, pressing a scorching kiss to her angled brow.
"There," he followed up with, only a heart beat later. "I've absorbed it. I am surprised, excited and, assuming it's mine-" he paused on a wicked note. "Somehow both pleased and disappointed that it took so very little effort to achieve." He grinned into the dark, feeling the satisfaction of passing on his genetic material once again.
In his youth, there had been a spate of minor flings, some of which he could only assume had resulted in offspring. And there had been Venus, and the children she had mothered far better than he had fathered. A childhood romance taken too far, he had eventually concluded. A lesson that had drawn him to be far more selective with his regard.
In that was, he was very excited. Eyas, and the strange, convoluted way their lives had tangled together had been more than a surprise. Once he would have felt little more than inconvenience at her death, likely because he would have been the one doing the killing. Or the dying. It had been either or for a time. Now he knew that between her and a mountain of raw ore and succulent jewels, he would choose the contrary mare. And would only cry a little about it. Now she was carrying his offspring, and that feeling grew. He nuzzled her, uncharacteristically soft in the moment.
They were his treasure; and he knew without doubt that he would raze continents to keep them safe.
And the walls kept tumbling down in the city that we love
A dragon gone sweet. A fire soothed by steady rain. Santana had gone unusually soft as the realization settled in, then (as Eyas had expected) he got sharp again. She chuckled lightly and enjoyed the simple embrace of his soft lips against her rough skin, a fleeting touch Eyas realized had been too sparse in her life. Catcher’s soft phrases and loving nature had come as naturally as breathing to Eyas when they were together, but Santana’s affection had been much more difficult to accept and return. Perhaps it came down to the origin: Catcher had always been soothing, Santana infuriating when she needed it to fuel her spirit.
Eyas sighed, excited that the prospect of a child between them had somehow suddenly flipped the norm. The warmth and steady presence would be a welcome relief in the weeks to come before the foal’s birth.
“Exactly my thoughts.” Eyas admitted with chagrin. “Which is why I also think it’ll be a boy. Only a stallion of your blood has that kind of audacity.” She teased ‘Tana.
And then she thought about Narcisus, which caused her pain. This pregnancy should’ve been her first. The promised son was swelling inside of her, but the happiness of the moment never quite reached her like it did Santana, not with that dark outlier always on her mind. Eyas knew that she couldn’t dance around the shadow of her past forever: one way or another, she would have to confront her long-lost son and take the necessary precautions of ensuring he wouldn’t meddle in his half-sibling’s lives. Ever, if she could manage it.
But for now the darkness was assuaged by light topics. She pushed the memory of his face out of her mind and smiled darkly, asking “What would you like his name to be? The little devil.”
He was enjoying the moment, and even if he missed a lot of things, he knew he couldn't miss this. It was a memory worth storing away, to be pulled out on some probably not-so-distant day when they'd be at each others throats again. A reminder that they were capable of tenderness, when they weren't getting in their own way.
He exhaled into the tangles of her mane, warming the area. He missed the heat of the sun. Stretching out in strong beams and soaking them in until he felt like he was glowing with the collected warmth. It was lucky, he supposed, that he didn't require the sun the way serpents and lizards do. Would they be dying slowly in their holes, so long away from the sun? A twinge of pity for his distant cousins flicked his gut.
Eyas adeptly pulled his thoughts back to the subject at hand, and the drake shuffled his wings to pull her closer to him. "I think you mean a girl. Only a female of your making could be so impatient," he growled teasingly, nipping lightly at the skin of her neck. Quietly, he let himself hope for a daughter. If she were anything like Eyas the world was in for it, and he couldn't wait to goad her on with gusto.
A boy would be exciting too, though, and he realized it didn't matter what gender their foal ended up being. Between he and the pegasus mare, they would be getting a hellion and a half either way.
Maybe a little late, he noticed the stiffness returning to her muscles. Had they touched on something uncomfortable? He was about to ask, but she had moved on already. He couldn't think how to broach the mystery subject, anyway. Instead, he lifted his head to exhale another plume of flame, thoughtful.
"'Little Devil', I dunno. Think that might be too on the nose?" He asked, a smirk in his voice. "Something along those lines, though. "Firecracker, Hellbeast, Thrasher, Brash, Crash, Smash, uh..." He trailed off, running out of ideas. He hadn't been given a whole lot of prep time, after all.
And the walls kept tumbling down in the city that we love
Strange, this weather they were having. Strange how Eyas felt happier than she ever had before under a killing moon. Odd and warm; the feeling of Santana’s sharp kisses. The way he spoke of their unborn foal. How he looked at her, insistent that she was carrying a filly instead of a colt, and Eyas only laughed. That was so like Santana - to disagree with her just for the sake of being disagreeable. She wouldn’t have him any other way.
“You’re hopeless.” Eyas sighed, rolling her vanta eyes sarcastically. “Firecracker? Hellbeast?” She chuckled. “Brash is the only one that’d suit your son. Brash little boy. I can see him now - terrorizing every square inch of this Island. More lizard than horse.” She threatened, but the sudden vision she procured of the little demon made her surprisingly... giddy.
Silently, the world around them shifted. Santana would know by now what she was doing, and she made it so that he could blink away the phantom of her making if he wished. (She knew how he felt about her witchcraft.) But the longing inside of her brought false life to the thing: she could make it so the world was a bit brighter, just light enough to see a leggy colt of her imagination dancing kiddishly over the shoreline waves.
And then, with a smile, she let the image of her dream boy fade away. “I guess we could plan for the event of a daughter, too.” Eyas grimaced playfully, “But a bigger part of me wants to see what she’ll look like first. She could be a Lepys for all we know, taking after my mother. Or an Ehko, more like you.” Her head tilted gently, contemplative. “I don’t even want to think about a Carbon Copy.” Eyas frowned.
She shuddered, leaning back into the steady countenance of Santana’s winged shoulder. Always, Eyas had loved the way she could still be tucked in close beside him without causing pain to herself. She was so small, and he was so large, that even with the both of them being "flyers" neither one got their wings tangled. A small comfort, but so significant in this moment.
“I’m tired.” She sighed again, happily. “When you finish up here, would come find me later?” The little buckskin asked Santana.
Lips curling in a languid grin, the draconic stallion houghed a smoky chuckle. She was right, of course. He was hopeless, helpless, an utter lost cause. The culmination of a lifetime of poor decisions and violent impulses that he had allowed to guide him in lieu of any real purpose.
He soaked in the sensation of her warm body tucked against his own. Too thin still, he fussed. Yet real and solid and persistently there. A loose-limbed sensation washed over his eyes, an involuntary tremor raising the hair on his spine. He winced, but let it go on. Watched the world lighten briefly, and the translucent dream-foal dance before them. She had woven them together in this fantasy child, the best of them both in brilliant cohesion.
"How lucky for me you have a thing for lizards," he quipped absently. It was easy to do with her, their banter as lively as anything else they did together. As easy as breathing.
There was an ache in his chest. A twist of regret that he had managed to miss this with children past. This excitement and anticipation for things to come, for the child he'd created with the mare who'd managed to infuriate and infatuate him in equal measures. That would not be the case now. She was the most beautiful mare in creation, and he was determined to be with her every step of the way. He would not miss this child's first steps, words, or fireballs.
"We have time to decide," he crooned gently into her feathers, lips tugging at the soft plumes. The barking seals in the background had faded from his awareness in the wake of her news, and he smiled as she remembered them to him. "I could tuck you in first," he offered blithely. His embracing wing unfurled from her shoulder reluctantly, releasing her into the black air.
