 I suppose I was lonely far more often than I was alone.
We never said it wasn't complicated. We never said it worked out swimmingly all the time (goodness knows we could start our own business selling all the wrenches that had been thrown into our plans throughout the brief years). I never let him see the pain, even when I knew he could sense it anyway, and I did not mention the nights his eyes drifted more somberly toward the earth in the grips of his own suffering. That was our compromise; that was our price our mother never told us we would pay for our 'gift'.
I wandered through the moonlit meadow as though entranced, my eyes and thoughts fixed first upon the skies. These were the selfsame stars of my childhood, though perhaps it was not their season or their place. Wherever I might wander, however lost I might become, my stars always showed up again somewhere, somewhen. Even his star was there, hanging bright and nameless amongst the sea of insignificant others. My gaze lingered upon it with a half-smile equally charged with pride and regret.
Oh, the irony of scouring the sky for angels.
Sasha, like my red shadow, had little natural patience for the stars, however gracious he might be in humoring my enthusiasm. With the skies as clear as they were, he would understand the chill of my absence, and yet...and yet.
The stars did not occupy the width and breadth of my attention tonight. I began there as I had begun on the night of my birth, necessarily comforted by the familiarity, but some part of me hoped instead for the future.
I was a lost boy. One day, perhaps soon, I would begin to grow up.
| World's Edge Mare atk: 4.5 | def: 8.5 | dam: 6 |
| Mare :: Hybrid :: 16.0 :: 5 HP: 62 | Buff: NOVICE |
|
Mara :: Common Rougarou :: Shadow
ali |
 | |
I never expected life to be so complicated and full of decisions that threatened to shake the very foundation you stood upon. I was used to looking at the world through rose colored glasses, but the color faded and became dimmer with each passing day. The day my rosy outlook started to fade was the day that Hototo had left to fulfill whatever destiny his father had set out for him. It dimmed more when Ros left. Then when Momma left it went away altogether because I was alone in the land I had been born in. I always felt like others were staring at me and judging me because my mother gave up her leadership and left. I don't know if it was just my mind screwing with me or if it was true, but it drove a rift between myself and the herd. I wandered more often than I stayed, but it was in my wandering that I had found Ros again.
Now I was faced with a decision. Or, should I say, I was faced with the aftermath of a decision I made far too easily. In agreeing to travel with Roskuld and see everything that we could see I was forsaking my home. I always thought about how different I was from my mother, but in deciding to leave the Foothills so easily I suppose I'm a little bit like her. I wonder what she would think about that.
After leaving the forest I had walked for hours. The sun set and the moon rose and I was still walking, mulling over how I was going to tell Apollo that I was leaving and wondering if I should just go and not even bother looking back. On and on I walked because walking would give me more time to think than flying would. And did I ever need time to think about what I would say and how they would take me leaving. Would they talk among themselves about how much like my mother I am? Would that be a bad thing? Momma is strong and capable.
But I'm not like her.
I sighed and shook my head then looked up, realizing that I had been staring at my cloven hooves as I walked. I wasn't alone in the meadow. There a few paces ahead of me was a black stallion looking up at the stars with a half smile on his face. I looked up at the stars for a few seconds before looking at him again. I swished my tail and ruffled my feathers then took a few steps toward him. "Hello." I said after clearing my throat so I wouldn't startle him if he hadn't heard me before. "Um... would you mind if I joined you? Just for a little while." I clarified, offering my own smile.
| |
|  |
Image Credits
aud pixel!
Family was a decidedly alien concept to me; home, perhaps even more so. Who could blame me, with a cold, distrustful father and a mother whose genuine affection could not mask her pity? Sasha was the only fixed point I’d ever had. Everyone and everything else only felt permanent in my memories.
I heard the rustle of another individual nearby long before acknowledging them, nursing a habit of thoughtful discretion. Perhaps they, too, were lost in thought, or preferred to be alone. I wouldn’t mind either way.
Shared silence is beautiful.
Only when she spoke did I turn, my smile brightening unconsciously. She was young even by my reckoning, and not simply equine.
My days within the realm of Nocturne were not so far behind me that horses bearing whimsical markings and weapons and wings were a shock, but nor had I ever grown exactly accustomed to seeing them. I was a mundane creature, unremarkable in every way but the circumstances surrounding my birth, and I found that I much preferred to feel awe rather than inspire it. This young night-dark filly was gilded from her hooves to her horn to the tips of her wings, and though she bore little true resemblance I saw shades of little Katya in her. How our hearts wander in the moonlight, Kostya.
“Of course I don’t mind,” I said softly, glancing skyward; almost immediately I looked back again. “I mean, I’ve not taken your spot, have I?” It certainly seemed to be a nice place for thinking, and the gilded filly carried herself like someone with a lot weighing her down.
| Helovian Ancient |
| Stallion :: Equine :: :: |
| |
|
A lovely, single pink flower is growing in the middle of the purple thistle. The petals are soft like a rose and the stems are a deep, emerald green. You have never seen this flower before.
You can leave it alone or eat it!
|
| World's Edge Mare atk: 4.5 | def: 8.5 | dam: 6 |
| Mare :: Hybrid :: 16.0 :: 5 HP: 62 | Buff: NOVICE |
|
Mara :: Common Rougarou :: Shadow
ali |
| |
"Thank you." I replied when he told me that he didn't mind if I joined him. I don't know what I was expecting, but I felt better knowing that I wasn't disturbing him too much. It wasn't like I intended to talk a lot, anyways. I just wanted a little bit of company while I mulled over my decision and the pros and cons after the fact. That was another way I was unlike my mother. She was not spontaneous. She didn't make decisions that could affect her so drastically at the drop of a hat. She thought through what she wanted to do before she did it.
“I mean, I’ve not taken your spot, have I?”
"Huh? I.. oh. No." I spluttered before pressing my lips together so I wouldn't look like too much more of a fool for already having zoned out. I shifted my weight then ventured closer, keeping my wings tucked close at my sides. "I don't.. have a spot. Not here. I mean ... I don't own this meadow." I flicked my tail and looked around. "Its big enough for more than just us." I hoped then that I was finished with my spluttering for at least a few minutes because I did feel like a fool. I'd never had so much trouble talking and making coherent sentences before in my life, but I guess that's what happens when you zone out after asking someone if you can join them.
"I'm Ranjiri." I said as I turned my head toward him. "Formerly of the Foothills." Boy did that ever feel weird to say and even weirder to hear. I pressed my lips together again and let my gaze drop to the ground, which is where I noticed the strange pink flower that was growing out of a thistle. I'd never seen anything like it before and it made me curious. I wondered, suddenly, how it tasted, but I could hear Momma's voice in the back of my head reminding me not to eat something that I was unfamiliar with no matter how tempting it was. So I left it alone for the time being.
| |
| |
Image Credits
aud pixel!
“I don’t belong anywhere either,” I replied with what I hoped was a reassuring tone, staring wistfully into infinity. So many times we had turned our backs upon the promise of home, believing it our choice alone, but perhaps we were simply unfit for civilized company. Straightening, I shook the troubling whispers out of my thoughts. It would not do to dwell upon bitter maybes.
“Well met, Ranjiri,” I said warmly, “I’m Konstantin – or Kostya, if you prefer. I’m not exactly from around here.”
I followed her gaze toward the brittle summer grass, alighting upon the single vivid flower in amongst the thistles. My ears flicked forward with undisguised interest ; as much as I looked at the sky instead of the ground, it was hardly surprising that I missed the odd little blossom at first. I, too, had never seen such a thing, but moments ago I had never seen a horse that looked like the filly before me and scant months ago I had never so much as entertained the thought that anything remotely magical or mystical even existed. Novelty was becoming the norm for me.
Needless to say, with or without a suitable mother figure in my life, I was not about to destroy anything so lovely. I glanced questioningly at the gilded filly before leaning in to brush it with a tentative whisker. It felt soft and supple and, unlike the surrounding vegetation, unaffected by the ravages of summer.
Curious indeed.
“What do you suppose it is?” I murmured, tilting my head. Something about it made quiet seem appropriate, as though the flower might either burst into flame and kill us at the slightest provocation (I nearly shuddered at the memory) or shyly vanish back into whatever void magical flowers inhabit when they are not blooming under the noses of mere mortals.
| World's Edge Mare atk: 4.5 | def: 8.5 | dam: 6 |
| Mare :: Hybrid :: 16.0 :: 5 HP: 62 | Buff: NOVICE |
|
Mara :: Common Rougarou :: Shadow
ali |
| |
"I don't belong anywhere either."
My ears twitched at the sound of his voice and the words that he uttered. Did I really make it sound like I didn't belong anywhere? I suppose I did by saying that I was formerly of the Foothills. But just because I left didn't mean that I didn't belong. Did it? I could feel my forehead crinkle as I thought about it because I didn't want to not belong. But maybe I didn't. I don't know. I certainly didn't think that I fit in well with my family, but I think every kid feels that way sometimes. I may have looked like my parents, but I didn't behave like them. I looked nothing like Auntie Ophie or Ros or Hototo. I was literally the black sheep of my family and I still kind of am, but its something I've come too embrace.
I like being me. I'm Ranjiri and I'm unique. There is no one else like me and there never will be. Sounds lame, right?
"Konstantin. Kostya." I repeated his names after he said them, liking how foreign they sounded. "Where are you from, Kostya?" I glanced in his direction as I posed my question then looked down at the flower that seemed to have drawn his attention as well. To be honest I wasn't really paying attention too much to where he was from as I was just watching the strange looking plant. It almost ... It almost felt sinister and it made me more curious. I don't know how a plant feels sinister, but it did.
"What do you suppose it is?"
"A flower." I answered, simply enough. What else could I have said that it was? It was obviously a flower, but I was no expert on foliage. I just knew what clover tasted the best in the Foothills and what leaves not to eat because they made my tongue itch. "Its very pretty, don't you think?"
| |
| |
Image Credits
aud pixel!
We’re all going to die alone.
By now I was used to the idea of being a sad little pilot encased in the head of a biological machine, directing its lips and its legs and its eyes in a desperate attempt to make contact with all the other little pilots whose murky shadows I fancied I saw flickering in the corners in my dreams. There were times I felt so close to them; that was when it ached the most.
These were deep thoughts for such a seemingly shallow mind – old words for one so young – but I was born a fragment of a person. Those scars ran more deeply than the exotic angles of my face would ever show.
Where are you from, Kostya?
I smiled slightly, my eyes flickering in the filly’s direction for an instant. “I was born on an island.” There wasn’t much else to be said for it. I doubted that anything but the most pitiful stroke of hereditary luck could deliver my brother and me to the shores of that island chain ever again. I was not Rodion; nothing bound me to that place but my memories, and few of them were good. “I think they called it Tinuvel.”
The flower was decidedly more engaging than thoughts of my none-too-distant infancy. For my part, I would not have described it as sinister, but I had beguiled a warrior queen and delivered myself unharmed from a devil’s playground – not through bravery, mind, but because it had never occurred to me to fear for my safety (Idiot, Sasha would say).
I chuckled at Ranjiri’s response. Yes, a flower; it swayed slightly in the breeze and my thoughts galloped backward to a night spent in the shadow of a withered tree and a ragged black feather left in the grass.
“It is. Here –.” My acquisitive nature took hold. Considering the gilded filly for a moment, I reached down and gingerly bit through the emerald stalk, drawing back with the flower and a workable length of stem gripped between my teeth. The strange sap leached from the broken end onto my tongue. Trying in my moment of indignity not to look like the rose-wielding suitor of every Disney romance and every realist’s nightmare, I quirked a brow in Ranjiri’s direction and gestured vaguely in the direction of her mane as if to say, ‘May I?’
Hopefully it wasn’t poisonous after all.
| World's Edge Mare atk: 4.5 | def: 8.5 | dam: 6 |
| Mare :: Hybrid :: 16.0 :: 5 HP: 62 | Buff: NOVICE |
|
Mara :: Common Rougarou :: Shadow
ali |
| |
I heard when he told me that he was born on an island, but not much else after that. When I finally realized that he had stopped talking I tore my gaze away from the flower and looked at him. "I'm sorry." I apologized feeling terribly guilty that I probably made him feel like the flower was more important than he was, which was simply not the case. No plant could ever be more important than another living, breathing horse.
"I was born in the Foothills." I offered him. "My mother was the Chieftess and my father was a General in the Dragon's Throat." At this point I didn't know what Daddy had been promoted to lead alongside Kri. Like my mother he had disappeared from my life, which bothered me sometimes, but sometimes i felt that it wasn't so bad. I was growing up and them having their distance allowed me to grow without them shaping me into something they wanted. I was free to be myself and make my own decisions and I was glad for that.
My lips creased into a small smile when he agreed with me that the flower was pretty, but the smile disappeared when he reached down and bit the flower free of its stem. It was just a flower, but I wished I had at least bent to smell it before Kostya had eaten it. When I looked at him, though, I saw that he had not eaten it, but was holding it between his teeth. He gestured toward me and I made a face and shortly after it dawned on me what he wanted.
I laughed at myself then tilted my head toward Kostya so he could put the flower in my mane. I wondered if it would stay there and if it did how long before it would die, but I didn't voice my questions. I figured I'd just find out as time went on. "Thank you." I said after he'd tucked the flower within the white and gold strands of my mane.
"How long have you been in Helovia?" I asked so the conversation, what little there had been, wouldn't dry up completely.
| |
| |
Image Credits
aud pixel!
I wove the stem into her mane as if I had done it a hundred times before, mindful of our closeness and respectfully taking steps to avoid unnecessary touching. I was a tactile creature, but not everyone shared my enthusiasm or my ridiculously weak sense of personal space.
Straightening, I admired my handiwork for a moment. It really was a lovely flower – and, knowing flowers, it might well have withered within a day or so without ever having been properly appreciated. Flowers are not known for their longevity.
I shrugged at the question. “Maybe a few days.” It did not even seem so terribly long since we had left the turbulent kingdoms of Nocturne to their inevitable fate. I could not regret the move; most of those unfortunate souls sold themselves for power and personal gain. Of course, that being said, I also had little room to complain: idealistic though I might be, I was hardly what anyone would call ‘principled’. “Somebody from the foothills offered my brother and me a place there, but I guess I have commitment issues.”
It goes without saying that one becomes a tiny bit gun-shy after being summarily promoted to Master in Chief at the age of two and then leaving only to be recruited into a revolution at the very next stop. I did not relish the thought of pledging my allegiance to a group that, for all I knew, intended to start a bloody and bitter war the next day. Things like that tend to mess with your head.
“Why did you leave, if you don’t mind me asking?”
| World's Edge Mare atk: 4.5 | def: 8.5 | dam: 6 |
| Mare :: Hybrid :: 16.0 :: 5 HP: 62 | Buff: NOVICE |
|
Mara :: Common Rougarou :: Shadow
ali |
| |
I didn't realize I was holding my breath while he put the flower in my hair until he had taken a step back and my lungs felt like they were burning. Why did I hold my breath? I don't know. I didn't know them and I don't think I ever will completely understand why I did it. Eventually I just chalked it up to being a little nervous. You see, I had never been so close to a stallion before that wasn't related to me in some way.
Thankfully the questions I asked after he had finished and stepped back helped keep me from feeling too awkward. Maybe he didn't notice that I had held my breath. If he did I hoped he didn't think it was because he stunk, because he didn't. I looked to him when he mentioned someone offering him a home in the Foothills and began to wonder who it had been. I didn't know of many of its members going into the Threshold to recruit newcomers. I think that what made Momma so upset a lot of the time. That and she spent a lot of her own time patrolling the borders because she said that the warriors weren't doing a very good job of it. Thinking about it, she was unhappy a lot from what I could remember while she was in the Foothills. I just hoped she was happier now that she was gone.
"Who was it?" I asked when my curiosity finally got the better of me. Even if he didn't remember a name he could probably describe them to me and I'd know.
The conversation returned to me with his question on why I left and in response I shrugged my gold marked shoulders. Of course I realized a shrug wasn't much of an answer and I frowned. "I was alone." I said. "Daddy lives in the Dragon's Throat, Momma left because she wasn't happy, Hototo left because the Earth God had some mission for him, Roskuld left because of the Time God, Cera lives with Daddy, Eytan is Momma's companion." My frown deepened. "Roskuld came back and asked me to go on adventures with her so I figured why not. It beats being stuck in a herd without any of my family."
| |
| |
Image Credits
aud pixel!
”Irrydae.” Even now I found myself repressing the awe of seeing a mare thus clothed with the night. Moments like that always made me feel giddy, which I suppose means relatively for someone who seems to get excited about every single thing.
Admittedly, there are worse character flaws.
I have a few of them.
My ears perked up at the mention of Eytan, though the rest of the names predictably made little impression. All this talk of gods and missions sounded very noble, to be sure, but religion and all that it entailed were foreign concepts to me. Gods were for people that ought to live forever; I did not deserve to exist at all.
“It does. My brother and I did the same thing,” and we had. To be sure, the islands had never had anything to offer us but the comfort of our grandsires’ noble legacy, but I don’t think I’d understood until the day that Cimarron surrendered to the ravenous seas: the cataclysm had swallowed far more than stone.
So much had come since that there were times I did not feel as young as I looked. Remembering and reliving every moment of it as I did in my dreams and waking mind, I might have lived a thousand lifetimes already, but for the youthful curves stubbornly clinging to my body. A thousand lifetimes – I bit back a fond smile. “I don’t regret the journey at all.” When you’re in the wilderness, you tend to find yourself and grow richer for it. I found much more (and felt like the richest horse on earth when I didn’t jolt awake from the nightmares, but I would not say as much to her).
“But why were you alone tonight?”
Why were you alone, Kostya? Someone who so flippantly leaves his heart behind is hardly in a position to be questioning strangers.
| World's Edge Mare atk: 4.5 | def: 8.5 | dam: 6 |
| Mare :: Hybrid :: 16.0 :: 5 HP: 62 | Buff: NOVICE |
|
Mara :: Common Rougarou :: Shadow
ali |
| |
I was expecting a description, not a name, but it was a name that I got and it was one that I recognized very well. Irrydae was one of the very first mares that I can remember meeting, besides Momma of course, and I remember thinking she was an angel because of how easy she made flying look and the stars that shone in her coat and the graceful way she carried herself. She had even offered to be my own personal angel, which had meant a lot to me as a child and I suppose it still does because she had taken the time to humor me. After that I had often watched the skies for her and would occasionally catch a glimpse or two of her as she flew past.
"She's beautiful, isn't she?" And she was just as kind and generous as she was beautiful. Of course if I had known that she had been unhappy for quite some time I would have made it a point to visit with her and talk, but its easy to say that when you look back on things. I was more worried about my own happiness and finding my own niche in life than anyone else. "Why did you decide against the Foothills? If you don't mind me asking, that is." I was curious because I was confident in Irrydae's ability to befriend anyone and take them home to the Foothills.
There I was calling it 'home' again when it was no longer my home.
"But why were you alone tonight?"
I looked at Kostya, the corners of my mouth pulled down into a frown. "I'm always alone." I finally said. It was a shame, but it was true. No matter how many horses might have lived in the Foothills with me, I was often alone. When my mother was around it was because everyone was terrified to some extent of her. I suppose after she left I was just so used to being alone. It wasn't until I found Ros again that I realized just how much being alone sucked. "Besides, I'm not alone anymore." I teased and reached out to gently nudge Kostya with my wing.
ooc:// sorry for the wait!
| |
| |
Image Credits
aud pixel!
When we were born, we had nothing. We were princes, heirs to an ancient and illustrious legacy, and from that moment on we had only each other. Natalya Koscheyevna, despite her kindness, was far too young and naïve to ever have managed us properly, and Zavulon Rodionovich....Well, he only loved himself.
You become what your parents fear most; my brother and I are no different.
Princes we might have been, but our hearts lusted after simpler things than power. Starlight captured my imagination, and I never wanted it to let go.
---
She’s beautiful, isn’t she?
“Yeah,” I murmured wistfully.
Vaguely I remembered the first pegasus I’d ever met and my fantasies of climbing up, up into the night sky, never to land. It was a passing fancy, but I still felt little pangs of jealousy toward the wingéd few. Was that why I had kept his feather for so long?
My next answer came more hastily. “I wasn’t against it, I just....” The last time we’d gone someplace new, my brother and I had ended up on the better end of a coup. Before that, I’d found myself shouldering the weight of leadership, staring down a warrior queen who could have bested me in every arena but the one I chose. I had a history of leaping feet first into raging infernos. “I don’t know anything about this place. I didn’t want to be wrong.”
When she stretched out a wing to nudge me, I smiled. It was nice not to be lonely (and for someone who had spent nearly every night before and after birth by the same horse’s side, I struggled with loneliness rather frequently; it’s one of those...things).
Look at us: just a couple of kids, sitting under the stars and trying to figure out where we belong. Story of the universe.
|
.svg/2000px-Google_Chrome_icon_(2011).svg.png){kind=icon}
