The summer’s vigilance held the Reaper at bay for a few moments, pausing indignantly through the tundra’s fleeting copses, indulging in the briefest of refuges beneath their wide boughs and shadowy fixtures; a sinister wake in the crawling forest. He stared through the columns of earth and undergrowth, maneuvering over the plaited network of stumps, moss, sticks and twigs, maintaining a deadly, derisive elegance in seditious decadence, a steady, belligerent march across outcrops and borders. The monster may have continued on his wayward path, perhaps twisting towards the unfreezing lake for a moment or two of the chilling, frigid touch of its depths, were it not for a screech above him: a griffin landing amongst one of the fir eaves. The cretin’s skull rose swiftly, narrowing his gaze at the companion, curiosity running a rampant chase as recognition sparked and kindled through his Machiavellian ministrations; the ivory bonded belonged to Arah, he’d seen it enough at her side, floating along the air, twisting, diving, and spying, to recall the beast as brethren and ally. However, the avaricious incitement of his intrigue dragged a variety of nuances, unfurled and uncoiled, through his malicious speculation: why was the creature here, searching for him, and not with Arah? Was she hurt, endangered, and suffering along the outskirts of their home, begging for a form of absolution (and he remembered the state of her frame, of her daughters, crawling away from the Regime and the torturous sway of the crooked, disgusting Confutatis)? The little beast stretched out its wings, beckoning, summoning, and the formidable predator followed in Wynter’s wake, a mighty, dominating force of treachery and danger, thinking the worst and invoking the clarity of his devilish upheavals (the indulgent whispers of death, of demise, of quietus, flickered along his veins, his muscles, emboldened and finessed, the grace of a practiced Mephistophelean). Eager and fervent, ready for the fray, swift and rapid along the display of horrific, terrorizing displays, because if any of his own were threatened he’d respond with the most horrid, the most vile, the most deplorable of vengeance, snatch away life, claw at throats, stab and lacerate until their world dissolved in a haze of violence and villainy, he embarked and crashed amongst the Tallsun iniquities.

However, when he arrived at the borders, at the shackle and shell of the sentinels, he found all was well: the pale doe resting and conversing with a stranger, nestled and content. If the griffin laughed at him, the Reaper paid no mind, dissolving his taste and penchant for bloodshed into a stoic, recherché container, stifling the savage invocations yearning to destroy. While this made him no less intimidating, for the foils of his presence would always carry the disastrous, rasping, Lucifer sculpting, he could at least appease the Impersonator and not scare away her newest recruit. Feigning indifference, the beast offered a deep nod towards Arah, the faintest twitch of a smirk at his own foolishness, and then endeavored his lacerating stare towards the stranger, a painted mare, endowed with one of the few things she needed in order to make their threshold a home: a blade. She was taller than himself, but despite the imposing stature, seemed gentle, content, quiet; reminding him of their Time Mender floating amongst heathens and cretins, a belle in the rush of thorns. Perhaps she too had hidden depths and talents, rising beneath and below the surface of innocence and demure qualities, his brow quirked in a slight arch, bestowing her a curt nod as well. “Welcome. I am Deimos, the Lord.” For one of such a seemingly gentle nature, he pondered over how Arah had convinced her to reign amongst thieves, behemoths, and demons, or whether she had glossed over it entirely (revealing Arah also had the art of wiles and avaricious escapades, how she’d acquired her rank), so his blunt tones continued, framing aspirations and ambitions held in the sable and ivory figure. “What do you hope to achieve in the Basin?” Do you grasp for power? Do you channel rage, vigilance, anger? Or do you just conspire, waiting, a masquerading sheep amongst the wolves?


[My apologies for the wait! .__.]