"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
Gale this is going to break me clean in two -- this is going to bring me close to you
The boy had been excited to see Mazikeen, to see Gale even, but he is not certain that will still be so.
They arrive beside the lake, and the queasiness of this new ability is brief and uncomfortably intense. Perhaps it will distract Bolder from the abruptness of their departure, from the fact that he’d not been allowed time to say his goodbyes.
Now that they do not have the audience of protective family around them, Gale looks more closely at this nephew. He has stripes like so many of the others, and shifting. Does he have Healing?
If Gale were to snap his legs like he had Ciri’s, would the boy scream loud enough for his family to hear him back in Tephra? This thought makes him laugh, and he lowers his head to murmur it in Mazikeen’s ear.
Once they appear in Hyaline, Mazikeen returns to being a horse, wanting to be a form that won’t vomit as her stomach twists from Gale moving them. She focuses on herself rather than checking to see if Bolder is okay first as she would have done once (the Curse, she knows, can take care of itself). When she is sure she is fine, she looks for the boy but pauses to listen to Gale’s laugh and murmured words in her ear. There is a moment where her first reaction is to smile at these words, the amusement with which he speaks them calling to something in her. But that grin is gone so quickly it could be missed with a blink as her markings crack and glow down her skin and she shoots Gale another glare.
Bolder isn’t to be harmed, that glare says. But the brief touch that follows it adds - not unless they must. Not unless they have a reason. What that reason might be, she doesn't know - she isn't sure a good enough reason would exist. But then, she hadn't thought she'd ever hurt her daughter either.
These thoughts do not trouble her, though, and it is not very difficult to make her voice friendly when she speaks to Bolder. She does like the colt. A little harder is the smile - her warmth is missing. Neither the icy burn or the raging heat that come to her so naturally now are appropriate for speaking to a foal, she knows, so she makes an effort to keep her expression somewhere in between.
What to say is another difficult task, so Mazikeen opts to ignore the current situation entirely to make it easier. “Have you been practicing your shapeshifting, Bolder?” She asks the colt, as though nothing is amiss. As though they had not just stolen him away from his parents, his uncle, and whoever that butterfly-winged mare was.
And then a little more prying. “It’s too bad you couldn’t have come back for another lesson sooner.” Had Nashua figured out what was going on with Gale, was that why he kept his son away? It was hard to believe Bolder hadn’t been interested, what with the enthusiastic greeting he had given them back in Taiga.
07-04-2021, 03:44 PM (This post was last modified: 07-04-2021, 03:46 PM by bolder.)
Never having teleported before (and certainly not expecting it), it takes a moment for the disoriented pegasus colt to realize where he is. Hyaline doesn't boast a dense canopy of trees as Taiga does but a deep and mysterious lake. His silver gaze rests there while sunlight shimmers in an eerie display of brightness that the adolescent that hadn't been there a few heartbeats before.
There had been the reaching and intertwining branches of the Redwoods above, his mother, his Uncle Yanhua, Amarine, and -
"Mazikeen?" Bolder asks her once the Hyalinean leader shifts back into the shape of a horse. There is an unspoken question in his eyes; what had happened? The other shifter - now a perlino stallion - reaches for Maze in a way that the young Taigan has seen his parents do several times. But neither of his parents are here now and the striped boy shifts his weight at the thought, his golden stripes gleaming beneath the same Beqanna sun as the nearby lake.
Bolder nods carefully at her first question, one that doesn't feel as out of place as he does. "Yea," he starts tentatively because the agreement that he had made with his father was that there would no shifting unless it was under Mazikeen's knowing instruction. At least not until he was older and had a better chance of controlling it. But being born a shifter with a bright curiosity, Bolder couldn't help from trying to lengthen his legs like Uncle Yanhua's or matching the seasonal colors of the young sentry, Targaryen. And the young pegasus decides to show the white mare and the strange stallion (his Uncle, Bolder reminds himself) by taking on a similar shade of Gale's scarring across his entire hide and letting the red of Mazikeen's 'V' marking bleed into his pale crescent moon one.
The yearling is rather proud of his coat creation and glances at the pair, wondering if they might be impressed with it as he is (Bolder has never pulled colors from multiple sources before).
"Da always said we would but then my grandfather left," Bolder explains. "And then he became King of the North."
And then there had been little time for his youngest son in Taiga, his expression says.
And even less for the always promised visit to Hyaline.
@Gale @Mazikeen have a red, blue and gold bolder for the 4th
Gale this is going to break me clean in two -- this is going to bring me close to you
She glows rather than laugh, and Gale draws back. At her glare he turns his head and gives her a scowl of his own, and he is stiff beneath her touch.
He considers ripping the boy in half just to show her he’s not to be commanded.
Yet Bolder remains whole, and Gale does nothing more than watch her ask the colt if he has been practicing his shifting. The Curse is dubious - its existence has made that bloodline wary of skinwalking - so when the colt’s color adjusts rapidly Gale’s frown turns to an expression just shy of interest.
“You should be more advanced.” He tells the boy, thinking of the fight his daughter had put up as he’d ripped out her throat. “Your eye for patterns is impressive, but you’ve clearly been held back.” His tone is cool and almost dismissive, yet his crackling blue eyes do not ever leave Bolder’s.
“What do you think, Maze? Do you think he’s worth training?” Or is he too weak, stunted by lack of ability or training? Gale probes him curiously. Roughly, too, and the lightning that stretches toward Bolder from Gale is sharper than usual, crackling with static electricity as he searches for whatever magic lives within his nephew's heart.
07-04-2021, 06:20 PM (This post was last modified: 07-04-2021, 06:20 PM by Mazikeen.)
Mazikeen is glad to hear he’s been practicing, and her eyes dance as he takes on the blue of the scars she has left on Gale and the red of her marking, nodding her approval. Gale speaks more critically, though she has to agree. He could be much farther, but of course there’s a reason for that and she explains while her eyes trace the new additions to Bolder’s coat. “His father isn’t fond of shifting, thinks it’s a sign of the family Curse.” Mazikeen does laugh as she says this, because it is particularly funny considering who she’s standing next to. When the laughter fades, she gives Bolder a grin that’s maybe just a little wild. “But it’s just shifting and nothing to worry about.” And her voice shows her certainty plainly.
To Gale’s question, she considers the boy more intently but again there is a grin. “I think he is. Think of all he could learn from us? He’d excel at it in no time.” Mazikeen, who had once had her shapeshifting taken away so she would learn her lesson about how it did not define her, rarely passes a day without turning herself into one shape or another. And Gale, who was always there matching whatever she wore.
She watches passively when the lightning arcs out from Gale to Bolder, wondering if it will hurt the boy but not intervening until she knows whether it does. Instead, she has more questions for him.
“What do you think, Bolder? Want to stay with us for a little while, we could make up for all those lessons we didn’t get to have because of your dad?” She asks, even though it’s not really up to him. What happens will remain the same no matter whether he wants to stay or not. But she thinks how convenient it will be if Bolder wants to stay. And maybe the grief and pain his parents will feel at that knowledge will be enough of a ransom but she and Gale will just keep him anyway.
This time, she’s the one to turn to Gale and murmur this idea quietly into his ear, curious about what he thinks.
07-04-2021, 07:10 PM (This post was last modified: 07-04-2021, 07:11 PM by bolder.)
Bolder looks between the pair.
He looks at the glowing perlino stallion and his odd forelimbs - concentrating on them because he has never seen their like before - and then to Mazikeen. There is a whole conversation happening before him that the young pegasus has no understanding of. The golden brute tells him that he should be further along and Bolder - an easy-going youth - tilts his head at the possibility of more. He's shifted into a few animals (though he never told Nashua and Saffron and Bravely had been sworn to total secrecy) - a red-tail hawk, a stag, and then he had tried a moose (though he had gotten the limbs uneven and just stumbled about until he fell over).
The youth has always known that his father didn't like his shifting but until now, Bolder had always thought it was somehow a fault of his.
It's probably in his best interest to stay quiet. But whatever they are speaking of - this Curse - it is clearly something that they know about and even implicates that his father knows. While he listens to the pair talking between themselves, Bolder attempts to make himself a little taller. He widens his shoulders by comparing them to Gale's and then lengthens his legs to a similar height to Mazikeen's. He can do more, this silent affirmation says.
He just needs the chance.
"What do you mean by Curse?" he asks them, because the only kinds he knows are the ones that he has heard his older sisters use when they think their parents aren't nearby or things that sound like they belong in some far-away, fabled tale. It makes Bolder wonder why - whatever it is - that his father had never told him.
"I'd like more lessons," he continues to say and the gold stripes on his legs vanish so that the yearling becomes almost entirely iridescent blue, save for the blood red moon on his face. He'd been practicing, hoping for the chance to show Mazikeen all the progress he had made since the last time they met. "And my Da is always so busy," he trails off, thinking that perhaps Nashua wouldn't mind if Bolder were too stay (though that couldn't be further from the truth). His blue ears prick curiously ahead, watching the lightning strikes reeling off Gale's skin.
An electric current charges the air and the winged colt sharply lifts his head, wondering what the unfamiliar feeling in his chest was.
Gale this is going to break me clean in two -- this is going to bring me close to you
The Curse’s methods are threats and violence, and he considers these possibilities even as he waits for Mazikeen to talk to the boy, even as the boy grows curious, as he asks about the Curse. Perhaps her methods are working after all
“Why don’t you stay for a while,” He suggests, slipping back into the role of the boy’s Uncle that he had played so well for years. “We’ll teach you a few things, and then you can decide if you want to stay longer, to learn more about what you’re capable of.” He’ll choose the latter, Gale knows, and if he doesn’t Gale will choose it for him.
He’s smiling at the image a second time when Mazikeen whispers something in his ear. He grins, and nods, and says to Bolder: ”The Curse is power.” The lightning pulls away from his chest, the search complete. The boy is vulnerable. His magic is simple: bright, winged, and with a celestial brilliance not unlike Ciri’s stars. Shapeshifting is his only defense, and while Bolder has mastered a broad array of animals, he lacks a depth of knowledge of those shifts.
“I have it, and they are afraid, and perhaps they should be. Too busy to allow you to be yourself?” Gale shakes his head at the excuse, as though the burdens of monarchy are small and Nashua has somehow failed young Bolder by instead keeping the entire realm protected and safe.
He watches the boy grow broader, then taller, and recognizes the efforts for what they are. “Impressive,” he says cooly, as though the boy’s ability to change his appearance at will is not a wonderfully useful attribute. Perhaps his parents will not find him when they come to fetch him, Gale thinks.
If all goes well, perhaps he might even have Bolder drive them away.
“What’s the largest you have become?” Asks the creature who is made of change and misery, who slips into skins and shapes with the ease of centuries of practice. “And the smallest?”
Bolder does not seem afraid, or at least not incredibly afraid, and that seems like a good sign. She watches with true delight as he alters himself, growing taller and wider. He could be their child, with that build and the colours that he wears after he confirms that he’d like more lessons. In a way, maybe he might become theirs. Young enough still to be able to influence, but old enough that a taste of freedom could be exactly what he needs. Or, the illusion of freedom - but Mazikeen herself has lost the ability to tell the difference between what is real and not-real in cases like that.
She’s pleased to get a smile and a nod out of Gale, and she cannot help her own grin when he comments on the Curse. Power is certainly accurate, and she knows well enough that Nashua is afraid. It had not been difficult to see the first and last time he had brought Bolder here, but even then she had known there was no risk for the colt.
Gale goes on to encourage the boy, in his own way, and asks questions so they can see more. Mazikeen smiles softly at Bolder as if to say ‘we would never discourage you from shifting, we would not be too busy to help you be who you want to be’. It might be too much to say these words aloud, but it is not difficult for her to be encouraging. She wants him here, though the reasons for that fluctuate. And he will be safe in Hyaline.
Besides, if she did not get to keep her own children because of the Curse, why should Nashua get to keep all five of his?
07-05-2021, 03:02 PM (This post was last modified: 07-05-2021, 03:03 PM by bolder.)
The family that had helped raise Bolder in Taiga had been a large one. He and his two other triplet siblings had been reared alongside the children of his other Uncle, Yanhua. He regarded Ama and Borderline - the mothers of his cousins - as his Aunts and the affection openly given between the adults in his life had always extended to them as well. It is odd (though for Bolder - the youngest sibling in a brood of five - it is the silence. He isn't accustomed to the silence when the Redwoods had always echoed with the sound of laughter).
While he familiarizes himself with the lull surrounding the trio, he finds the way that Gale is speaking to him now is comforting. That does remind him of home and whatever reticence that Bolder might have been holding on to leaves him just as the last traces of his golden stripes do.
His father was often busy, almost always out on the Isle (especially during this time of year). He might not even return to Taiga until Spring. As the yearling pegasus considers his options, Bolder knows that the moment he returns that they likely won't let him leave. Not until Nashua returned and as he glances over to Mazikeen, he realizes that it would mean no more shapeshifting lessons until then. More months of waiting, with the very real possibility that his father would tell him no again.
Gale and Mazikeen are offering him something that Nashua never has: a choice.
As he eyes this Uncle's extravagant forelimbs, the young pegasus believes that he and Mazikeen would be able to teach him plenty. For a boy who has grown up trying to mimic the exact shade of the Taigan leaves or the wolves that he has always admired, those dreams suddenly seem (foolishly) limited. It's only his mother that makes him hesitate. She would be worried, he knows. "Could you send a message to my Mother?" Bolder asks and turns his silver eyes towards Gale. He seemed to be the one who brought them all here, so perhaps his Uncle might think of a way to reassure his dam that everything was alright.
That she didn't need to worry.
Bolder looks back to Maze and can see the encouragement blazing behind her orange eyes.
It emboldens him to tell his Uncle that he had once attempted a towering Moose (though he leaves out that he couldn't quite get the height just right; Bolder had been afraid that someone might see him). The smallest had been a Rock Tortoise - a species native to Taiga and varying in size - but the one he had tried to emulate had been no bigger than his hoof. "I've always wanted to try a -," the boy says and then pauses, feeling a little silly for admitting it in the presence of two accomplished (and powerful) shifters. "Well, a wolf." He's only seen the pack in Taiga a few times and never long enough to truly commit their shape to memory. The sole time he practiced ended up with Bolder resembling the tan-and-black creature Mazikeen showed him the last time he had come to Hyaline.
The last time he had been given the chance to learn what he could really do, he realizes.
Gale this is going to break me clean in two -- this is going to bring me close to you
“Of course,” Gale replies. “She was the white one, yes?” The host and his brother have a shared taste, the Curse recalls, picturing starry Islas, the purple-eyed Ischians, Mazikeen, and now Noel.
He will give her a message indeed, and it will be that she is not welcome, and that it is at Bolder’s request.
“You can do anything here.” Gale’s voice is softer now, because he can tell that Bolder is swaying, that the idea of becoming a wolf has tempted his young nephew for some time.
He demonstrates, trading his equine shape for a lupine one, the transformation starting in his chest and radiating outward rapidly. He remains still to give the boy a better demonstration of the shape, but does turn his head toward Mazikeen.
He is thinking of the deer that are grazing on the far side of the meadow: a doe, her two newborns, and last year’s fawn, a young buck. Gale dislikes the odd shade of yellow that the stag wears, and has been meaning to cull him before it spreads.
Maybe they can get Bolder into the shape of a young wolf, Gale thinks.
Maybe they can take him hunting.
The prospect makes him smile.
“Close your eyes,” he says, “I will Show you the wolf.” And then its there, the image of a chestnut wolf, one with his golden markings, one that looks strong and proud and bold. All the things a young shifter should be.
So this is why fatherhood is said to not be entirely terrible. There is fun to be had in raising a child, in experiencing the Firsts of life with them.
Gale is not at all upset to be taking these Firsts from his brother. Surely Nashua will not begrudge him First Hunt, First Kill, First Murder.
The wolf opens its mouth in a smile and a pant, his bright eyes fixed on Bolder as he waits for the boy to shift.
current appearance: glowing perlino stallion with feathered quetzalcoatl forelimbs, lightning, and iridescent navy blue scarring -> glowing perlino timberwolf with blue scarring and lightnings
![[Image: 37477440_mkk7ul7XODhpdJ7.png]](https://f2.toyhou.se/file/f2-toyhou-se/images/37477440_mkk7ul7XODhpdJ7.png)