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  • 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]  i just want to hold you close to me
    #1
    Gale
    this is going to break me clean in two --
    this is going to bring me close to you



    Night has turned the rainbow of Hyaline’s blossoming trees to a thousand shades of silvery grey, and moonlight dapples the black earth with pale white light. Overhead, the full spring moon is almost day bright, casting each individual stone into stark relief, and turning the world around him truly monochrome. The wind that blows down from the highest mountains still whispers of snow, but spring’s hold on the mountainous kingdom is firm.

    The cursed creature  can feel the soft press of new growth beneath his leonine paws as he descends, the heads of grasses eager to cover the granite cliffs with green. Far below him, the lake is a distant glitter between the trees. He licks his lips, then picks at the stubborn bit of bone lodged between two pointed teeth. Rock sheep are not the most delicious of prey, but they are challenging and he’d wanted a challenge.

    Or rather, he’d wanted to know what would happen after the challenge.

    And he knows now. His belly is full and the slaughter of the hard-haired bovid had been enough. The need to kill, to maim, to destroy - it’s satisfied. One small sheep, and he’s done.

    This makes no sense.
    So he ignores it.

    The glowing creature continues down the mountain, passing the cave where his child sleeps, secure and safe. It has taken him several months, working magics that he half guesses and half creates. But he’s taken the memories of Malik from nearly every eye that ever saw him, pulling and weaving and changing what had been seen to illusion. It makes him dizzy most days, and occupies much of his time. In this way, too, he is not so unlike Gale had once been: always Staring off into the distance.

    Tonight though, he is looking with his own eyes. Blue and sharp, they rove the black and white kingdom until he finds her. He’s not sure what drew him to her, but the Curse finds her easily, slipping up beside the white Queen and touching her gently as he shifts to match the skin she wears.

    His newly grown heart thrills at her nearness, but the sensation no longer alarms him, no more than does the way Contentment eases out of him and into the air between them. Their time together has added countless bits of blue to Gale’s skin, but he is gentle tonight as he smoothes the snow-to-shadow hair that has been mussed by the night wind.

    He says nothing, because the concern that had been lingering despite mentally shoving it away has eased in her presence. A strange sensation, but one he is growing fond of.


    @Mazikeen


    current appearance:mostly navy blue lion with glowing perlino markings and blue lightnings -> whatever Mazikeen is
    #2

    This is the first spring in Hyaline she’s been able to really see since before the eclipse - the last had been spent without eyes. A year ago she had been giving birth, a year ago she had been killed by Gale for the first time, but the Mazikeen she had been when those things happened no longer exists so it feels like they were a lifetime ago.

    Tonight she has exchanged her usual feline tendencies for a winged elk, her antlers twisted and black with glowing fiery cracks, a mane of black-tipped fur coating her neck. There are sharp teeth in her mouth still, which she had used on the herd of deer she had joined at dusk - unable or unwilling to fully commit to pretending to being herbivorous when she is on her own. Some blood still stains her face from her meal, but she is lost in thought and has forgotten to go to the lake to wash it off.

    A ear twitches at the sound of someone approaching and in a way she cannot quite describe, Mazikeen knows it is him even before she feels the gentle touch on her skin. A contented smile brightens her red-orange eyes as Gale joins her, brilliant as a blue elk - likely (hopefully) with sharp teeth of his own.

    She’s enjoyed their time together, relishing each addition of blue she’s added to his coat - every inch a different memory and if she lets herself, she could trace them all. She would remember each violent and exciting moment and lose herself in them, let the ocean-deep of his coat and the taste of his blood drown her.

    But she also enjoys the gentleness with which he touches her now, leaning into it with that same instinct. Despite the cervid form she wears a soft purr escapes her as he smooths the hair on her neck - there is an ease existing between them. He does not say anything so she does, her eyes drifting from the moonlit scenery to him. “I am glad you’re here, I was feeling restless tonight.” As though this is news, as though she is not almost constantly restless in one form or another. Sleep comes easier to her now, with so little left in her heart to worry about, but she is still a mare meant to be on the move.

    There is a question that would be so easy to ask right now, an invitation for him to choose how they spend this night, but she holds it in her mind and does not speak it out loud out of a lingering stubbornness.

    She does not want to continue to default to his ideas and preferences but she is lost on what it is she wants that isn’t his dream of chaos with her there at his side. Mazikeen has never had ambitions and had learned to squash everything she might want so thoroughly. And now that she finally is free enough to go after whatever she’d like, she can’t think of a single thing that isn’t the creature by her side that she touches softly. Even the goal of killing him one day is shoved far away, because why would she deny herself even a moment with her king when they are enjoying themselves so much?

    So is it enough, to simply want him? To want to aid him in every plan, every hunt, and be there with him while everything else burns? Maybe.

    All these questions sit uncomfortably in her mind now but they are easier to ignore as well, especially with Gale so close. So maybe she doesn't outright ask him what they should do tonight but the silence that follows her statement is an invitation anyway.

    art by nikkayla


    @Gale
    #3
    Gale
    this is going to break me clean in two --
    this is going to bring me close to you



    The arrival of their son and the necessity of occupying Bolder have crept into the time he’d once had with the orange-eyed mare, and he is occasionally jealous enough to consider killing them both. He hasn’t - he won’t - because Mazikeen doesn’t want him to, and that is reason enough.

    The snowy alpha has captivated the creature that runs his sharp teeth along her pale spine, just as she had captivated the first consciousness that inhabited this skin. Her orange eyes are so bright they seem to glow, and her pale sides are bathed in the fiery glow of her impressive antlers.

    He can smell the blood on her lips, and smiles at the image of her pursuing the deer. Keep the fleet footed she’d said once. Or maybe thought.

    Gale has trouble telling the difference these days. The telepathy that he’d taken from the yellow-eyed mare had been difficult to learn, and he’s only ever had Mazikeen to practice on, and he finds her so fascinating that he listens and Listens to her near-constantly. He very rarely Hears anything at all, but that doesn’t stop him from trying.

    Had he known how narrow this makes the veil between his mind and her own, Gale might have been more cautious. Once substantial, he has chipped away at it with his glittering blue magic, drawing ever nearer the growing orange core of her mind.

    Restless?

    He is content to spend more time as they often do, enjoying the security of the Entity’s barrier in exactly the way that Mazikeen had intended to, growing every more familiar with Mazikeen and becoming ever more blue.

    Hhe stands taller at the shoulder just as in their equine shapes, just tall enough that he can drape his neck across her and nibble at the blood red smear along her upper lip, the one that melds with the crimson V of her marking.

    The low purr that rumbles through her glistening fur causes it to glitter in the bright moonlight, and Gale admires the effect with delight for only a moment. He is focused instead on using his teeth to gently trace the line of her neck down toward her shoulder, gentle, but but the promise of danger were he to only press a little more firmly. This is not a shape that he has seen before, and he traces the long muscle and thick sinew of her cervid shape with languid caresses.

    His heart begins to beat more rapidly, but he attempts to keep his movements slow. At least for the time being, so she’s feeling more receptive to the way he presses against her, the way he pushes aside the last of intangible magic that separated their minds.

    He feels no different, and is thinking of very little. Only that she is beautiful and marvelous and that he can think of a great many things to keep her busy tonight and how much they'll both enjoy them.

    She’ll hear the thoughts as though they are words in his voice, though his lips are kissing the back of her hip. She'll feel the desire that courses through him in a way that is far more genuine even than the way he can emotionally project it.

    But his single-minded focus (on moving slowly) leaves him entirely unaware of this unexpected magical development.

    @Mazikeen



    current appearance:iridescent mostly navy blue elk with glowing cremello stripes/markings and blue lightnings,
    white spinal mane and tail, white wings, red V-shape on left wing, black tentacle antlers
    #4

    No verbal response comes but it is easy to not mind as Gale drapes his neck across her to nibble at the blood upon her lip, a smile forming at the odd sensation of it. And when he begins to move across her body, she does not feel restless anymore. She relaxes under his attention, this very particular joy and heat that only he can inspire inside of her.

    She knows the danger that those teeth caressing her skin can bring, and Mazikeen eyes blaze in the mix of fire and moonlight. There is no wrong way for him to touch her, not anymore. Whether they are tasting each other’s flesh with lips or teeth it is still exciting, still encourages the churning flame and shadows inside of her to move at a more pleasant pace.

    As Gale moves away from her mouth, her tail turns into a more prehensile version of a lion’s tail - something that she can use to mirror his lingering touches, ghosting the furred tip along his soft belly. Her movements still only for a moment when she feels something inside of her mind. Almost but not quite the same feeling as when her vision is being altered. And then she can hear him there, as though he were speaking in a way meant just for her, and her tail strokes the skin she turned iridescent along his sides.

    He gives her a glimpse of his thoughts, filled as they are with complimentary things that delight her nearly as much as his pressing touch. Once, she had hated hearing such things - doubting their sincerity, unable to see such things for herself, and having learned compliments often come before hurt. But now she believes it - she is beautiful and marvellous and she likes that he views her this way. There is no shortage of satisfaction at having so successfully won over the affection of this creature wearing the skin of her once-lover. Even though she’s been won over just as successfully.

    She assumes he is doing this on purpose, filling her with his desire so that it mixes with her own like it is another game, but she’s far too distracted to comment on it at the moment. She’s not even sure she could find her voice if she wanted to. And if he is doing this on purpose - doesn’t he know by now, she wonders, that she wants him constantly? There is no need to supplement the feeling within her that had already been growing. So now the twin threads of desire inside of her are almost overwhelming as he kisses the back of her hip and a quiet moan escapes her into the dark night. It is quickly followed by a soft growl and she shifts herself backwards into him - impatient for more but knowing well enough that she’ll enjoy it if he continues to tease her because he enjoys it too.

    art by nikkayla


    @Gale
    #5
    Gale
    this is going to break me clean in two --
    this is going to bring me close to you



    His kisses falter and Gale becomes still, the soft echo of her voice reverberating still in his ears. He can feel it now; something has changed.

    Changed again. They are always changing, Gale has accepted, changing alone or with the other, some supernatural effect that he has not yet identified. He is not particularly bothered, not when he has Mazikeen to distract him. His happiness does keep his magic weak, but there are some things in life worth such vulnerabilities.

    He can feel her desire, and the way it feeds into him and loops through them both. The realization of this seems to magnify the sensation tenfold, and when he touches her thigh he all but expects it to steam with the inferno that has turned his mouth to ash and burnt all the world but Mazikeen in front of him.

    In front of him only for a moment, and then he pulls her so close that he never even notices the way their lovemaking chars the forest floor. Only afterward, when he gently pulls the half-burnt needles from her hair, does he look around and appreciate that they hadn’t managed to set the kingdom ablaze.

    That is a strange realization, because a year ago he’d have reveled in such an opportunity, would have delighted in watching Mazikeen moan in an entirely different way as she grieved for the loss of both her home and her loved ones.

    She is remarkably beautiful when she cries, but the Curse can no longer recall the last time he’d hurt her for the simple pleasure of doing so. He does want to, he decides, but it is a soft and distant need. Hardly worth bothering himself over, not when there are far more satisfying ways to cure boredom.

    He is thinking of one now, as he rests his chin along her side and gazes down at the moonbright kingdom.

    “Do you think he’ll come for Bolder?” he asks. The Curse had wanted Nashua to come immediately, but it seems Gale’s golden brother is less rash than this host would have been. He’d wanted him to, but each passing day makes it more and more likely that when Nashua finally comes that he will not be alone.

    How many warriors could he take on, Gale wonders? How many could Mazikeen?

    They’ll go to Islandres, he decides. He’ll take Mazikeen and Malik, and they’ll hide in the depths of the rainbow jungle. Even if someone comes looking for them, there are few alive who know the place better than Gale. They’ll wait, and bide their time, and perhaps Malik will mature into someone useful in a fight.

    He does not speak this plan aloud, and does not intend to. Mazikeen doesn’t need to know, not yet. Best to keep it a secret. His forelimbs have shifted back to the white-feathered wings, Gale notices. It’s not unusual when he is distracted, and he smiles to himself and finds that the worry has been momentarily solved by making a plan.

    There’s always the chance that Nashua will come alone, he reminds himself, or maybe he’ll just bring the boy’s mother. She had looked remarkably angelic, and having to constantly refrain from Hyaline’s local cherubs, Gale’s hunger for them has only grown.

    The warm afterglow of sex, his full belly, and the dark shadows of midnight are lulling him into a stupor. He could easily fall asleep, but remembers Mazikeen’s earlier mention of restlessness and keeps his eyes open.

    @Mazikeen



    current appearance:natural horse form - iridescent mostly navy blue elk with glowing cremello stripes/markings and blue lightnings,
    white spinal mane and tail, white quetzalcoatlus forelimbs, red V-shape on left wing, black with blue glowing horns, sharp teeth
    #6

    A soft laugh escapes Mazikeen at Gale’s question, wondering whether he often thinks of his brother while they’re together, but she is too satisfied to tease him for the moment - too intoxicated on his presence and his touch. So this joke fades and she just replies to the question. “Eventually. But every day he delays will make it easier to keep his son from him.” Her opinion of Nashua hadn’t been favourable since the day he brought Bolder here for his first shifting lesson and it has steadily lessened the longer that time stretches out after the steal. Did he even care about the boy at all? Was he under the mistaken belief that Bolder was under the care of the warm-hearted Mazikeen and the kind Gale instead of the creatures they are today and so unworried?

    She cannot imagine that there was a force on the earth that could keep her from something stolen from her.

    Mazikeen is distracted from visions of her burning the wilds as they had scorched the earth beneath them tonight when thoughts coast through her mind that are not hers. She growls in response to them - not the needy growl she had made moments ago but one filled with that stubbornness that could not be snuffed out. A few glowing markings appear down her spine, adding their fiery light to the night and illuminates his iridescent skin where he leans against her.

    I don’t hide.” She comments in an icy voice, her burning eyes focused on Hyaline. All of Beqanna could show up to tear her apart and Mazikeen’s mind blazes with the belief that she will return, that the gift Gale had given her will see her reborn and then everyone who dared to touch her will feel her wrath.

    But she also feels some of the sense of this plan, though she isn’t sure it is her own understanding or simply his thoughts transplanted into her mind. If there is a day when they are outmatched, it does make sense to regroup somewhere else - doesn’t it? So when she continues speaking, there’s less ice in her voice though it is no less pointed. “But if we’re to run to Islandres or be driven from Hyaline, I hope it is because we had more fun than stealing one stupid boy.”

    And now she feels it again, that restlessness rising up and twisting her stomach. Surely there should be something else they do with their time (in addition to this particular favourite pastime, of course, not instead of). Weren't they going to burn the world? Wasn't she going to stand beside him through it all? Mazikeen still does not know what she wants for herself, but there are many things that are easy to want with him.

    art by nikkayla


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



    Her skin brightens beneath his touch, and he knows she’s irritated before he meets her eyes. Gale cannot hear her thoughts, but the ripple of her anger warms his black heart and strengthens the shadowy core and the magic that seeps out from it.

    Gale smiles, even when she mentions hiding, even though her voice is sharp and cold. He suspects nothing until she mentions Islandres. When she does, the smile slips from his face. How had she known?

    He replays the last few moments in his mind and is sure he’d said nothing aloud, certain that he’d said nothing of the possibility in the past. He withdraws, taking a step back and all his magics with him, shielding himself from whatever is happening as best as he can and returning to his natural shape.

    “How did you know that?” He demands, his lightning eyes narrowed. “I didn’t say anything about...How did you… I...” He is still bothered by what she’d said earlier though, at the implication that hiding was a sign of weakness.

    She’s never been hunted before, he reasons. She doesn’t know what it’s like to truly Die. There are some deaths that one cannot Heal from, at least for Curses with no corporeal form, and his death in Loess had been one. Only the interference of a god and Monsters from another realm had returned its sentience, had reassembled the consciousness that now resides in the brindle stallion where Gale had once dwelt.

    Once she feels the sting of permanent death, perhaps she will understand. It is better to hide and survive than die in the effort.

    She will have a permanent death rather soon if she does not explain her knowledge, he thinks. Has she betrayed him? Has she stolen his thoughts to use against him, to kill him when he is least expecting it?

    “Are you reading my mind?”

    @Mazikeen



    current appearance:natural horse form - iridescent mostly navy blue stallion with glowing cremello brindle
    stripes/markings and blue lightnings, white spinal mane and tail
    #8

    Mazikeen resorts back to her natural self when Gale steps away, confusion sinking in as she turns to face him head-on. Fragments of his thoughts come to her, though they are less clear than before. As though they are moving through a fog (or shadows). She’s distracted by sorting them out as they tumble into her mind and doesn’t answer his first stumbling questions.

    She doesn’t care for the way that it stings when she catches the thoughts wondering whether she’s betrayed him. She brushes this feeling aside so she won’t focus on it, so she won’t become determined to prove to him that she is loyal. That she has not been lying when she tells him she wants nothing and no one else even when she doubts whether that is enough.

    “Not intentionally.” She answers plainly, her confusion cooling her temper for the moment as she frowns. “You aren’t the one doing this? I thought you were sharing your thoughts with me on purpose. I could feel your desire and then the connection never broke.” There is no accusation in her tone, because she hadn’t minded. It had only enhanced what she had already been feeling.

    Her bright eyes do not stray from his face, wondering now why this bothers him so much. Haven’t they shared nearly every single piece of themselves with each other by now? What is this one extra thing?

    Unless he has thoughts he wants to keep from her. Unless the idea of betrayal stems from something he is already doing.

    Distress and sadness are no longer emotions she feels easily, and instead she stands there with the uncomfortably familiar notion that Gale does not care for her the same way she does him. Not even this twisted, strange version of caring that’s sprung up between them.

    But she doesn’t want to ask about that so she just asks curiously “Do you ever read mine?”

    art by nikkayla


    @Gale
    #9
    Gale
    this is going to break me clean in two --
    this is going to bring me close to you




    She becomes a horse as well, and the ease with which she does it does not draw a smile like it once had. Instead he frowns - has she been responsible for the strange sensations he has felt? Has she used his thoughts to manipulate him? Has she been changing him on purpose?

    It is something he has done - made her darker, colder, better, but hadn’t considered her capable of the same.

    And…
    Well…

    Perhaps she isn’t capable after all. She seems only puzzled, suggests he’d been the one to cause it. The paranoia is gone as quickly as it had swept in, but the source of confusion remains. He has no thoughts he would not share with her, but the sudden sense of vulnerability still rankles at him.

    Gale does not move closer, and instead looks out at the glittering lake and the full moon it reflects, lost in thought. Had his efforts to read her mind backfired somehow? With impossible timing, she asks the same thing he considers. Gale shakes his head.

    “I can’t.” That bothers him, his frown says. “I’ve been trying, but I hardly get anything.”

    He has been trying, and she seems to have managed it without trouble. Perhaps he was responsible, but it seems impossible that he wouldn't have learned the skill himself before somehow giving it to Mazikeen. Magic rarely makes sense, he reminds himself, but he is still frowning. His worry has returned, and this time he is unwilling to look at her and make it disappear. 

    "Do you still plan on killing me?" The words sound lighter than they feel, and he slowly matches the stars in the lake to their source in the sky rather than meet Mazikeen's gaze. 

    @Mazikeen



    current appearance: iridescent mostly navy blue stallion with glowing cremello brindle
    stripes/markings and blue lightnings, white spinal mane and tail
    #10

    She makes some effort to not let it show how it pleases her that she can read his mind but he cannot read hers easily. He has remarkable power and she has seen so few of his limits. When he had drained himself keeping them both filled with energy after their first hunt, that it had taken some time for him to regenerate after she had bitten off his head, and now with this.

    Mazikeen knows they are not true equals, and she delights in the near-endless abilities he seems to be capable of, but it is still enjoyable to discover that she is better at something and that she can have some power over him (even while admitting what he has over her is just as strong).

    He doesn’t look at her but her gaze does not stray from him for a moment. Her deep orange eyes trace his face, the strands of his white hair that move just slightly in the night air.

    “I don’t know.” She answers honestly, the first time she’s vocalized her uncertainty - first time she’s even let herself think about it. For years she’s clung to her promise with absolute determination. But the initial promise she made means nothing now. It is too late to stop the curse from taking a hold and she does not even really want to limit the chaos it can spread. “I told the other Gale that I would once you became too much. But my definition of that evolves every day. Things that would have churned my stomach then make me purr now.” She finds again and again there is no real limit to what she will not do with him, to what she delights in now. The members of this kingdom are protected by a promise, a deal, but even that could change tomorrow if it were convenient. The only real, true tie she feels anymore is the one to him.

    She takes a small step closer. Her instinct is not to touch him unless he touches her first, but she is still fighting how she defaults to his wishes so she brushes a gentle kiss against his cheek because that is what she wants to do. And then she pulls back and continues to speak into the night air, watching as the fiery light from her horns catches once agains on his iridescent coat she is responsible for bringing back.

    “I still mean what I said the night you brought Malik back - I do not want to be without you. But if there is a day when I want to kill you, to repay you for when you killed me, it will not be a surprise. I will not be subtle.” And here a dark smile forms - because she doubts she would be capable of being subtle even if she tried and he must know this. Her rage turned explosive too easily.

    “You can always know anything I’m thinking - you just have to ask.” It is not the same as being able to see for himself but perhaps this will be enough. “I’ll give you a hint, though. Most of the time I am thinking about you.” These words do not carry the sweetness they might have once, they are low and dark and spoken like the languid caresses she is thinking about.

    art by nikkayla


    @Gale




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