• Logout
  • Beqanna

    COTY

    Assailant -- Year 226

    QOTY

    "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


    [private]  there must be something in the water; Islay and Fenwe
    #1
    Gale
    this is going to break me clean in two --
    this is going to bring me close to you



    When the sunlight returns and Gale has the light to aid him, he is finally satisfied in his count. He has seen Fenwe, glowing and bright, and spotted Islay, the younger of Aedan and Vita’s children.

    He’s not seen her parents or brother, nor his own sister, her lovers, or their children. Had the Monsters taken them, he wonders, or have they all withdrawn to the inner jungles, to a sanctum hardly Islandres at all?

    It doesn’t matter, he decides, and he is eager to return to where he’s flown from. If they do no want to be found, he will not waste what little time he has looking for them

    Gale spirals down to the beach as an osprey, calling loudly to the two women. If they come, he will name them Chiefs of Islandres in much the same meritorious way he’d been named Chief - by being the only one there.

    @[Fenwe] & @[Islay]

    Reply
    #2

    Islandres has been a quiet place to grow up.

    Islay has learned to count her days with the tides - with the way that they lap against the shore and recede from their black beaches. But her nights, her nights have been a delight because she had learned that the moon and the tides are one.

    (In one of her silly stories, the moon is a man who loves the waves too much. He sings songs like a siren might in hopes that she will come to him and they spend eternity this way. With the moon singing the waves to shore and the ocean sighing when it comes to close - a kind of existential force that understands they must come together and then apart to survive.)

    The two-toned girl doesn't mind the return of daylight. She has grown rather elated by it because its return must be a joy for sun-marked Aestas and her magician mother who has a garden so beautiful that even Islay has heard of it. But the return of the sun has brought back the moon and so the wonders of night return to Islay - hours that she spends with starlight and mornings she returns covered in stardust.

    This is one such dawn and though she is tired from lack of sleep, Islay is smiling. As she moves down the empty beach, who she thinks is Erne quickly becomes another creature. It resembles the companion that she has so often seen with Gale but there is an odd iridescence to this bird that the other one does not have (because Islay knows, she has grown up admiring Gale with his paler-than-seafoam mane and the wild blue of his brindled coat). The young mare stops before the calling osprey and lowers her head, more curious than cautious about its coloring.

    "@[Gale]?"

    [Image: lSYWxe.png]
    Reply
    #3

    And I know it's true that visions are seldom all they seem

    oh me oh my, i thought it was a dream...


    The calling osprey grabs her attention as she stands glimmering in a shallow blue pool. She was watching the fish delightedly, looking over the sparkling crystals clinging to the rock and the brilliantly colored sea life caught in the shallow pools. She’s only been here for a month or so, arriving just before the sun made its return and the monsters retreated. It is a peaceful, beautiful place, and she’s grown to love it and its array of creatures. The tropical air, jungle plant-life and gorgeous sea-shore edges have already captured her heart.

    Curiously, even boldly, she trots her way toward the calling osprey. Something about it seems as though it is meant to grab her attention. Since it appeared she and Gale were the only inhabitants, she thought it might be something interesting. As she draws closer, she sees the other young mare, and hears her gentle voice question the raptor’s identity. She clears her throat, a smile wide and genuine on her pale lips, nodding, “Hello,” she speaks with a soft low voice, stopping to also look at the bird, looking into his familiar eyes awaiting an answer.

    Fenwe











    @[Islay] @[Gale]



    Reply
    #4
    Gale
    this is going to break me clean in two --
    this is going to bring me close to you




    He remains in the air until he sees them, settling onto a beached bit of wood as he waits for islay - and farther behind her Fenwe - to arrive

    It is not until he’s looking up at the blue girl that he realizes he remains in his osprey form, so with a soft laugh at himself, Gale becomes his equine shape again, complete with white feathered wings and a cheerful smile at the pair of them.

    “I suppose this is becoming a bit of a tradition now,” he says, thinking of the way that Ruinam had left the island, leaving Gale, and now Gale intends to do the same.

    The brindle stallion is thinking back on the day that the white stallion had invited him here. It had been a place to wash the red dirt of his grave away, to sleep, to worry about nothing at all. Islandres had been a paradise when he needed one, but now he needs something different.

    “I’m leaving for Hyaline,” he tells them both, “And Islandres will need someone to act as leader.” He looks from one to the other, “Or leaders.” He doesn’t ask them, not quite yet, but he does look from Fenwe’s teal face to Islay’s blue one with much curiosity.


    @[Islay] & @[Fenwe]

    Reply
    #5

    The two-toned girl looks up, momentarily startled by the presence of another. A glowing mare - perhaps a little older than herself - approaches and Islay has to ignore the desire to tug on the shadows in the jungle behind her. On the Mainland, she was familiar with the concept of strangers.

    But not on Islandres and her immediate reaction is to cloak herself in darkness.

    Stranger than the unknown mare is what happens before Islay. (She has known for a while that Gale can shift but it is not something she has seen for herself.) Her blue eyes widen and the filly steps back to allow the shifter room to change into a more comfortable skin. And it would seem that Gale's shift is not the only shock for the morning. He is leaving for Hyaline, he tells them. For a moment, she thinks of asking him for how long.

    Oh.

    Gale looks at her and then to the other mare, who Islay realizes she still hasn't greeted. "I," she starts, looking between @[Gale] and the teal mare. It is easier to focus on introductions first for the adolescent. "I'm Islay," she tells the other. Islay feels like saying more: that she wishes her father was still on the island, that she had a chance to talk about this with Aestas, that she wishes Gale wasn't leaving at all.

    So she swallows all those words down and instead asks @[Fenwe]: "Do you know how to lead?" Islay decides to reveal her only attempt at leading anything anywhere. "I tried to get a starfish to follow me to shore once. But he wasn't like my stars and I'm afraid he ended up as a... snack for the birds."

    [Image: lSYWxe.png]
    Reply
    #6

    And I know it's true that visions are seldom all they seem

    oh me oh my, i thought it was a dream...


    Fen is no psychic but she can feel the other girl withdraw a little, and it makes her step to the side, naturally avoiding closing in on her. The scaled girl has always been social, never hesitant or uncomfortable with strangers as long as they were friendly. Sometimes a little suspicious, but nothing more, unless the situation merits it.

    Gale’s shift isn’t a shock to her, her father is an avid shifter – she remembers being in awe as a baby, watching him change from this to that. She hardly even knows what Aodhán’s horse form even looks like; he is so fluid in his other animal forms. The shock comes when Gale says he’s leaving for Hyaline. Leaving Islandres? Her mouth felt sour, and she wanted to grumble, her ears falling back until she hears his request.

    a..a leader? Her eyes slide over to the other mare, who looks equally bewildered. Fenwe suddenly notices she’s probably not being very helpful with her puzzled expression, trying her best to change it to a smile. “Fenwe.” she nods, “And I…” she snorts, tossing her long tail nervously. She digests the girl’s story, where it sounds like she brought the birds a snack, talking about her loyal stars. She thinks of her new stardust that appears at night, something the pair have in common. “I’ve never led anything before either; but together I’m sure we can manage it just fine, right?” She giggles anxiously, looking back to Gale. “Thank you, Gale.


    Fenwe








    @[Gale] @[Islay] sorry this is kind of an awkward one



    Reply
    #7
    Gale
    this is going to break me clean in two --
    this is going to bring me close to you



    Islay is the first to speak, and Gale fixes her with his bright eyes. She sounds hesitant, and her words are soft, so Gale steps a little closer, and presses his muzzle gently against hers. It’s no different than the greetings he’d given her before, when she was a youngling with her family. It doesn’t occur to him that several (dark) years have passed since then, and that she is no longer a weanling, and that greeting strangers in such a way has gotten him into trouble before.

    “You’ve got this,” he tells her reassuringly, trying his best to hide the smile at the tale of her gull-bait attempt at leadership. His blue eyes meet hers and Gale smiles warmly.

    Fenwe, when he glances toward her, seems no less perturbed. At the nervous switch of her tail he repeats the gesture with the teal mare, patting her reassuringly on the shoulder.

    “I think you two will make a good team,” he tells them.

    He could leave now, he thinks, but it doesn’t feel quite right to do so without telling them both what he knows of Islandres. He tells them of Queen Isilya in Tephra, who had been wise and beautiful, and that her successor is a stranger to Gale but surely as just a leader as she. The nereids of Ischia are friendly neighbors, but their cousins the kelpies will sometimes need reminding that Islandres is not a good hunting ground.

    “If you need help with them, you can come find me.” He adds, because while he thinks the two young women in front of him to be capable leaders, that is not a role that automatically comes with skill in driving off unwelcome guests. “Do you have any questions?”


    @[Islay] & @[Fenwe]


    ooc: i'm going to update the board now so you'll both have mod options; feel free to reuse the ranks code if you'd like! if you'd like a different title than chief on the board just lmk
    Reply
    #8

    She's still thinking of that poor starfish from the shallows when Gale comes too close and then Islay doesn't think of anything at all. He had done this when she had been small - a reassuring gesture like the ones her father, Aedan, had given. Though there are enough questions to fill an entire galaxy swirling around in her young mind, the doubts eventually steady and then the two-toned girl exhales them out.

    The former Chief (it is such an odd thought for Islay) smiles and Islay lifts her head with an expression to match his.

    Islay glances to the other mare once they've both had a moment to right themselves and catches herself admiring the gold that gleams on her teal hide. But there are more important matters to consider than how pretty her new companion is: Tephra had a Queen who is no longer the Queen (like Aestas' mother - Leliana - and so the filly begins to wonder if this Isliya keeps a pretty garden as well, if gardening is a common hobby for Tephran monarchs).

    The new leader may or may not like flowers.

    There isn't long to contemplate that fact and Islay frowns slightly when @[Gale] mentions the Kelpies. Their neighbors - the Nereids of Ischia - are friendly but their cousins (the aforementioned Kelpies) are quite forgetful and sometimes need directions to their hunting grounds. Looking back to @[Fenwe], Islay nods in what she hopes comes across as encouraging. Right now, she has no questions but the painted girl grows quiet in the case that her new co-leader might. Gale has spoken of many things.

    But she feels better about this now and from the way that Gale speaks, perhaps, "you'll come back to visit from time to time?"

    [Image: lSYWxe.png]
    Reply
    #9

    And I know it's true that visions are seldom all they seem

    oh me oh my, i thought it was a dream...


    It was awkward for Fenwe, and still, so exciting. The feeling of anxious dread wants to creep in, to take over and whisper doubt into her naïve little mind. To burst her bubbles of wonderment and optimism. Cheiftess? Me? Some torturous inner voice teases, but Gale’s reassurance chases it away like a fox to a rabbit, and her whole face smiles.

    She listens carefully, a frown creeping on her face – should she fear them, she wonders? Surely not, she can’t see herself fearing much when she’s survived the monsters alone. When cornered, she fights. She takes his advisements to heart, and tucks them away quietly, looking over to her partner, smiling bright in case the girl is feeling at all uneasy. (Fen feels uneasy, but for everyone’s sake, hides it best she can manage.)

    She has no questions for the moment, but his promise to be available if need be is soothing, and does not make her feel rushed to think of anything on the spot. Fenwe nods when Islay asks her question – “Yes, friend,” her hair sweeps across her white blaze, “please, come back to see us soon.

    @[Islay] and @[Gale] ♥

    Fenwe






    Reply
    #10
    Gale
    this is going to break me clean in two --
    this is going to bring me close to you



    Fenwe smiles brightly at Islay, and the exchange solidifies Gale’s choice in the pair of them. He cannot recall any of what he had been taught about the qualities of good leaders, but he’s fairly sure the ability to collaborate should be fairly high, and the two colorful young women seem capable of that.

    “I’ll visit mid-winter,” he promises them, “just to make sure you’re not out of your depths.” Gale chuckles at his water joke even if neither of the mares do, and glances up at the bright sunlit sky.

    If they’ve nothing more to say, he intends to take one last sweep of Islandres in his osprey form, and then head back towards Hyaline.




    @[Islay] & @[Fenwe]

    Figured this could be the wrap up and he can visit later? :)
    Reply




    Users browsing this thread: 1 Guest(s)