As the sweltering heat clawed around them, choking, strangling, and smothering, his lithe frame beaded with sweat, but he was drawn away from the cumbersome weight by his friend’s teasing and complaining. He laughed alongside them, the fawns of the north, plunging hellbound into southern venues and piercing sun; the little scion presumed if any Throat members came towards their peaks and valleys, they’d probably hold protests and objections as well. But his eyes glazed and glanced back over to the tree, nurtured by sand and soot, by sultry waves, enticed by Rikyn’s ruminations, kindling his own (could it truly be a house of the divine?). He’d met the Sun God before, had felt his stare ripple over his gangly frame before turning to someone else, yet, he couldn’t imagine the flaming deity staking claim over a piece of timber. Aithniel’s proclamation seemed a bit more realistic: a celestial being cloaked and breathing in fire, drenched in embers, soaked in infernos. Contemplations ran rampant, scouring and scraping over his childish whims and impish indulgences, only to be scarcely abandoned the moment another showed up. The filly approaching, like a watery beam on the horizon, older than their gathered group, was light-hued, and reminded him of the dunes piled and stored amongst sea beds and shores, horned (for a sword was an important thing to have), and was perhaps just as stalwart as the tide’s ebb and flow – her scolding voice pierced through their dusty glen – and he muffled the thought that he contained power over the ocean, that he could walk, run, and leap over her watery boundaries. The sneer threatening to corrode his features was also quickly stifled, extinguished, accepting the reprimand as he often did, schooling his fixture into reticence, as if it left him with no feeling at all. But her tone changed, and Erebos’ ears flicked over the alteration, carefully noting their proclamations as guests (it was a nice word, like they’d been invited instead of barging upon borders), her name, her status. Her softening caused the lad to diminish his defensive mode, plastering on a roguish smile, and his eagerness bayed over the stifling air, refusing to be suppressed. “We’re exploring! We wanted to see the Dragon’s Throat.”

They’re joined almost immediately thereafter by another: Cera, winged, sienna, tall, and pleasant. He wasn’t alone either, flanked by some ball of fur, and the colt’s eyes widened at the sight of this tiny animal, lowering his head to peer at it a little closer, to figure out what it could be before the inevitable query was launched from his throat. He snorted and watched clouds of dust puff from the ground, intrigued by its antics, by it’s cooing, and his gaze tore back to the stallion’s figure, voice bounding again with its wild, untamed exuberance. “What’s that? Is it yours?” A strong desire, wanton and unyielding, possessed him to inch forward, but he refrained, attempting to coax a modicum of respect on someone else’s lands; curiosity was tethered tautly, biding its time before it was unleashed. His mind floated back to the tree, listening with one eye still trained on the creature, hearing the tree was, in fact, not a house. He hoped Rikyn wasn’t terribly disappointed, and turned back to smile at him despite the incorrect nuance. Cera’s tale distracted him again, however, as he spun a story of dragons, a copse’s survival, sap running like blood, and swept away, enamored, the queries, the responses seared along his lips one by one. “I like it! It survived wars, which means its tough and brave!” Then sentiments swirled into another pitch altogether. “Do you have dragons here?” The mere thought of draconic lizards, flying, gliding, breathing molten fire and setting the world ablaze was a stirring, poignant image, and a slender hope built inside him at the chance of seeing one before their eyes. He almost uttered his herald, since Cera had asked for it so nicely, but then one more joined their throng, and he was distracted all over again.

This brujo was entirely different (and also had a fox! Did they collect animals here?), and the small prince’s eyes gestured wildly over his frame, ebony (goodness, surely an ineffectual color out in this heat), and then marked by blood splatter – and Erebos wanted to know so many things about him. How did he become stained in ichor? Did he fight in a war? Had he earned it as a symbol of his strength and fortitude? Even more fixating was his introduction, Sacre, King of Spies, and the title sounded amazing, to be crowned a lord over informants and sleuths, gathering secrets and clandestine affairs, scouring labyrinths, clenching cloaks and daggers. His appreciated ghosted and coasted in a wild exclamation and a wry smile - “Wow!” - before proceeding down more nefarious avenues. Perhaps he could practice being a scout, gathering information and revealing none about himself; furtive, specious, sly and sneaky, and without looking at either of his friends, he concocted and composed his first march into the surreptitious. The lie curled and coiled across his tongue, small, simple, straightforward, almost effortless, floating from his teeth on an easygoing grin, stolen from the pages of his mother’s tales, a grandfather touched by fire. “I’m Ignatius!” A sense of apprehension filled the back of his mind, because maybe his friends wouldn’t go along, would stare and give him away, and a keen wish stoked immediately behind it – maybe they’d join him in innocent deceit.


@[Rikyn]