• 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


    [open]  Not quite what you would call refined
    #11

    She was not quite what you would call refined

    Popinjay laughs when he eats the bird and drops her hold on the magic without worry for if it will harm him. If he is going to be foolish enough to eat lightning then whether or not it is safe to do so is no longer her concern. (This is also one of the things that makes her a poor mother, but the twins growing in her belly have not yet had to learn that lesson.) The thing in her chest shivers when he mentions it and she does not quiet the quaking, eager, feathers. Some shifters fear their other shape, what it makes them, but it is not in Poppy's nature to be afraid. It has made her more, after all, made her something dangerous hidden beneath curls and wild laughter.

    Later, she had told it. Well, now is later.

    At first, she had wondered what parts of her became which pieces of the bird because it seemed like there should be a rule, that her forelegs became wings and her hind legs, the claws - and certainly, she can shift in this way if she likes - but time has taught her to trust her original instinct; that rules are flexible things built only of others' expectations and she doesn't need to concern herself with them. Now, the shift happens quickly, with the finesse that comes from years of practice, in a shiver of skin and feathers and dust. The black Lightningbird is easily as large as a dragon, over forty feet long from beak to tail with an even wider wingspan. Her talons curl into the soil underfoot, leaving great furrows there. It is a shape made for the sky, but even burdened with being earthbound, the raptor has a threatening aura not at all like the merry girl inside it. The beak is a cruel curve of shell, the eyes bright gold with a serious, forward-slanted brow. When its feathers brush against one another, small streaks of lightning burst into life, crazing across her body the way his blue ones do on his.

    Popinjay twists her great head down to his place in the water with an inquiring trill. The Bird is a poor speaker, not built to mimic as some other species are, but its interests are clear. It is something other from its Thunderbird cousins; it is not a creature that brings Life, but one that brings Destruction.
    Image by Breyos


    @Gale
    #12
    Gale
    this is going to break me clean in two --
    this is going to bring me close to you



    He feels it stretch when he asks, can tell that it is something large. So he takes a step back after his caveat and feels the water close over more of his pale back.

    Her shape is the same as the birds, but the scale is far greater. At this size, he can see the wicked curve of her beak and the talons with which she grips the earth. Little things that he had missed in her display, but that he appreciates now in this monstrous bird.

    Gale recognizes an animal that hunts for its meals.

    “Very nice,” he tells her, and there is no fear in his voice, no sign that he is worried this monstrous creature might bend down and snap him up. She could, he thinks, and perhaps he should be more wary.

    But the Curse only smiles up at her, and silently imagines all the things that one might do with a Lightning Bird.

    Fire he has, and lightning now too. Perhaps he should find the other elements as well? He's heard Taiga has a plant mage, and surely one of the Ischians has mastered the water. He's gathered the entities already; surely a few more mages would not be so difficult. 

    “What is your name?” He finally asks. “I'm Gale.”
    @Popinjay



    current appearance:glowing perlino nereid with lightning and iridescent navy blue scarring
    #13

    She was not quite what you would call refined

    He calls himself Gale and the name makes the Bird's head tilt curiously. It is familiar, but only vaguely, and it does not occur to her that this is the blue brindled stallion that came to Nerine during the Eclipse. Remembering names has never been a hobby of hers and she keeps a paltry collection compared to most. Like so many others, Gale asks for her name, and irritation sparks across her feathers. The trill in her throat turns sharp and guttural, losing the faint musicality of before, and those angry feathers melt away. Reluctanly, the Lightningbird becomes equine once again, though there is nothing of that sullenness in her bright expression when the little mare peers at him through the dark curls of her forelock.

    "Poppy!" she announces gaily, and then, as if to explain her transformation back, "It's hard to say without lips."

    The Bird is there still, though, in her heart, in her mind, and she imagines that it is standing behind her with feathers slicked down except for the ones at its crest and the nape of its neck which stand up instead, irritated and impatient. It is so different from the little bay with mischievous laughter ever-threatening in her throat and her eyes and the shock of white splashed across her brow, with the soft curl of madness - just a touch - in her grin, like a gold vein cutting through quartz, like lightning breaking open the sky. Without losing the smile, she turns to look away from him.

    "This is getting boring, now."

    The muscles of her haunches bunch when she leaps, releasing the Lightningbird again in a chaotic, roaring, rush of feathers and electricity and wind. Each wingbeat sends thunder pealing across the lake and down the mountainsides until she's high enough to soar and set charges in the clouds.

    She had promised they would hunt, after all.
    Image by Breyos


    @Gale have a closer




    Users browsing this thread: 1 Guest(s)