the Rift


[JUDGED] Birdsong battles [open training spar]
Ascended Helovian

Ophelia the Amaranthine Posts: 701
Outcast atk: 6.5 | def: 10.5 | dam: 7
Mare :: Hybrid :: 16.0 hh :: 6 Years HP: 77 | Buff: BULK
Tinek :: Royal Silver Dragon :: Frost Breath & Shock Breath Tamme
#1


[[Setting: The SKY ISLAND at the beginning of BIRDSONG. The air is just starting to warm up, and it is midday with the sun in the 12 position. Since there is no snow, the ground is just the sand in the battle arena in the center of the tent set up and all that.

Type: Open training spar! (I analyze your posts and give you tips and pointers)
Time-limit: no extensions, would prefer a quick spar!
Notes: I would really prefer someone close to Phi's HP/VP level!



Ophelia had taken a brief respite since her initial battle with Elsa. The fight had been interesting to say the least, and she was learning how to rely on her magic to become invisible. Conveniently, the powers seemed to be working. Taking out the specific chunk of memory she needed, at the exact right moment, took time and effort, and she needed the practice to sufficiently augment her battle skills. The murder of her mother still lingered in her mind, pushing her advance into the arena again. Now, she had more to consider than her own safety. If the herd needed her? If she needed to fight to protect one of the Basin citizens?

She had to be ready.

The pale princess took the familiar route to the center of the sandy ring again, her gait still ethereal and infused with confidence. Though her heart, frozen, was still aching with doubts and pain, she had won. Ophelia knew that in time, she could do so again. Strange, two-toned eyes noted the shift in the wind, the southerly thermals pushing the northern gusts. White hairs fell from her sides as the warm weather indicated shedding season. She shook, sending a cascade of alabaster hairs to the wind like a dandelion.

A bright sun had already risen, finding its apex in the deep blue sky, and her doubts and troubles melted away with the closing of her eyes. Today was not about fear, not about destruction, not about her mother or Torleik. Today was, for the first time, just about her and her skills. She would cast aside the anxiety of previous battles and concentrate on the present. The layer of ice guarding her damaged heart would hold, and she would rise to any challenge again.

So, she stood, waiting for a challenger. Waiting to test her skill.


[[[0/3]]]



Art by: veradaine @ DA




Undertow has come to take me. Guided by the blazing sun. Look at everything around us. Look at everything we've done.
Please. Anyone. I don't think I can save myself. I'm drowning.


Please tag me in every response!
Ascended Helovian

Mauja the Frozen Light Posts: 1,392
Outcast atk: 6.5 | def: 10.5 | dam: 7.5
Stallion :: Unicorn :: 17.2 :: 14 HP: 79.5 | Buff: HUNTER
Irma :: Snowy Owl :: Terrorize & Diego :: Eurasian Eagle-Owl :: Rage Neo
#2

i am the vanguard of your destruction
[ couldn't resist, mate... ]

Break every bone I have
That will not change a single thing...


They had not broken his bones; they had broken his soul.
"They". Interchangeable with he—the one who had manage to lose everything, simply by not daring to hold on. He had let them go, because he hadn't known how not to. And if he blamed the world, old Sparkplug, or something else.. well. If you always pretend nothing's wrong, how will you ever change? He sighed softly as he wove through the unfamiliar terrain. It didn't matter how many excuses he made, or how much he tried to pinpoint when he'd lost sight of the joy in living, or.. anything, really. The only thing that mattered was what he'd not done about it. What he hadn't dared to do.

Because wasn't that exactly what had gone through his head, before he left Helovia again? "Oh I can't go north because the one I'm looking for might actually be there and then I have to face myself and what I feel and all these things and then go to the Edge and potentially get killed by a bunch of moronic hypocrites who can't see further than they piss."

Mauja snorted, cautiously rounding some unknown structure. He didn't know what it was. Didn't care. As long as it didn't bite him it could stand there for all he cared. All the same, blue eyes watched it warily as he slid past, wondering where the hell he'd ended up.

He'd gone south again, down from the frigid north and into the arms of gentle spring—but why, he wasn't quite sure. Wasn't the north Ophelia's place of desolation, for wandering and thinking, the refuge she went to when things were too heavy on her mind? So wouldn't that be the logical place to look for her? Then why had he left those vast, empty spaces again? No matter how much he wrestled with himself, he could never figure out if he was running again, or if it truly seemed more likely someone down south would know of her whereabouts.

Maybe she was dead.

The thought cut through his mind like a knife, to the point where he actually stopped dead in his tracks, nostrils wide and eyes blank. No.. she couldn't be. He—he wouldn't let her be dead.

As if he could do anything about it. Hadn't seen her for years. How many wolves had he saved her from? Blinking in the sunlight, Mauja peered about himself. Where the hell was he, anyway? He'd walked into the sky, and.. the more rational part of his mind made a sour face and turned away. It was way too trippy. Or depressing. Maybe he had died.

On silent wings the owls glided ahead. If he had bothered to feel, or to ask, he would have sensed how suppressed Diego's thoughts were, urged outwards and blocked by Irma, and the vague, ticking anxiety mingling with her blood.

But he didn't. Just trudged on, watching the odd surroundings with wary, absent-minded interest, until his frosty hooves found a circle of sand and his eyes a creature clad in the palest of whites, with locks dipped in cold blood. A creature as fleeting as a deer and as regal as a lion—fierce and dangerous, lost, and so utterly, fundamentally beautiful. With a look of stunned awe on his face Mauja stood where he was, haphazard and awkward, heart and mind spinning frantically as the owls settled on the wooden railing at the arena's edge—

"Ophelia," he whispered, to himself, just a hushed breath escaping dark lips. After all this time.. after all these years... Her perfect image grew blurred, and he blinked furiously trying to clear his eyes, but it didn't help. It wouldn't go away. It couldn't go away, not with the way his heart was wanting to burst out of his chest.

So he simply stood there, crying softly in the sunlight, and drew a shuddering breath in. He knew where they were. He could feel it in the sand, in the space, in the faded scent of adrenaline and blood.

"Will you dance with me?" he asked her softly, neck arching as he took a single step forward, graceful as a dancer.

[ 0/3, @[Ophelia]. ]
angels, they fell first, but I'm still here
Ascended Helovian

Ophelia the Amaranthine Posts: 701
Outcast atk: 6.5 | def: 10.5 | dam: 7
Mare :: Hybrid :: 16.0 hh :: 6 Years HP: 77 | Buff: BULK
Tinek :: Royal Silver Dragon :: Frost Breath & Shock Breath Tamme
#3


Leaden weights sunk into her cloven toes, rooting her unwillingly to the ground when a figure from memories and dreams appeared in her sights. So many thoughts raced through her head, words unspoken, lost before she could grasp any sentence to say. Nothing could define how she felt, confused, abandoned, lost, betrayed but glad, at least, that he was alive. There were so many questions unanswered. Had he been taken prisoner by Midas? Why? Had he disappeared into the sea as Gaucho had claimed? With another?

Why did Glacia, Sialia's child, bear such a marked resemblance to Mauja? What about he and Psyche? Ophelia had spoken with her aunt, known they ruled together.

She should have asked Midas more probing questions on her visit, but what reason did she have to know? Other than her own curiosity, she had no other purpose to ask such minute details. Now, that knowledge would have been useful. Still, all of that faded, the urgency disappearing with time.

After time, those questions seemed to matter less and less, but his revival sparked a sense of anger, and she narrowed her gaze, heart hardened. Soleil was dead. Her mother had died, and no tears had been shed. Phaedra was dead. Ailith was dead. She was the leader of the Basin now, promoted by the God of Time, and so much had changed. Torleik had arrived in a pushy, masculine way into her life, fitting comfortably by helping honor her mother in death, giving her a home. Mauja, though perfectly clear in her memories, had faded from her present, presence lost even in whispered secrets.

Until now, and he stood, handsome cheekbones glistening in the daylight with tears - tears he shed and she could not.

The pale princess drew a tense breath, delicately shaped ears flattened against her shapely neck when he asked to dance. After over a year he asked to dance? As if nothing happened? As if he had not disappeared and she had not had to survive on her own? Ophelia lifted her neck high on her shoulders, struggle hidden only inside.

The sound of his hooves on the sand was a soft thud, and Tinek, circled overhead, spying the grouchy Irma and now another owl, a darker brown one. The dragon, older and wiser, cast a sideways glance at the snowy bird but gave her little else in terms of greeting. Ophelia's mood was faltering, her confidence wavering like a small ship in a big storm, and he flew on sky waves, stalwart.

Urges to run gripped her long legs, wanting to carry her far away from this conflict. Instead, her strange, dual gaze turned, the beauty and emotion in her curious, seeking eyes dulled. Ophelia lunged forward, cloven toes gripping the sand tightly beneath her body and propelling her forward. She was here to battle, was she not? So be it if her opponent was a memory, a shared dream... anger. Too long had she waited for him to return. Too long had she been left with questions lingering, doubts.

Roughly, she thundered toward Mauja, horn pointed lethally toward his chest - a heart for a heart. Any sense of control and power she had garnered from her previous win was shattered, falling in shaking pieces around her frayed nerves. She barely knew if she controlled her legs or something else, because she was moving as if possessed. Motion was jerky, halting, so unlike the casual grace she normally exuded with such ease. Ophelia was shaken, trying so hard to appear strong. Fate had given her tools in infant hands, didn't tell her how to hold them, and she watched as bloody, broken fingers desperately gripped at the crude pieces, fumbling to put them back together.




[[[(1/3) || (630 words) ||
Summary: Ophelia lunged at Mauja, horn aimed at his heart ]]]



Art by: veradaine @ DA




Undertow has come to take me. Guided by the blazing sun. Look at everything around us. Look at everything we've done.
Please. Anyone. I don't think I can save myself. I'm drowning.


Please tag me in every response!
Ascended Helovian

Mauja the Frozen Light Posts: 1,392
Outcast atk: 6.5 | def: 10.5 | dam: 7.5
Stallion :: Unicorn :: 17.2 :: 14 HP: 79.5 | Buff: HUNTER
Irma :: Snowy Owl :: Terrorize & Diego :: Eurasian Eagle-Owl :: Rage Neo
#4

i am the vanguard of your destruction
What the hell was he doing. His own fractured existence was forgotten, broken down and pushed aside by the overwhelming nearness of her presence. His world shattered like glass, a thousand tiny fragments raining down in a hail of prismatic colors—in that moment, everything lost its meaning. Even the beating of his frail heart was consumed by her radiance, every thought, every feeling but that aching sense of adoration, simply obliterated.

Words fled the desolation of his mind. Mauja, idiot that he was, had not set a further goal—had simply pinned everything on seeing her again. The gears stopped turning. He couldn't—didn't want to—comprehend what he saw, the cracks lining his world, and the rampant darkness threatening to come pouring through. It was all in the details, in the small things he could barely focus on, the dull look in her eyes and the uneven, jarred gait. The way she looked older, somehow, more tired and tested, the scars and bruises on her soul reflected through her eyes.

He knew a moment's bitter anger.

Then it was gone, and he simply felt exhausted.

Had he expected anything but this? Had he, truly, after all he was supposed to have learned, thought that he'd be greeted with much the same enthusiasm she used to show in those days before he had vanished? Had he thought whatever bitter marks he'd left upon her perfect memories would've been washed away by laying eyes on his pathetic, bedraggled corpse again? Had he, truly, thought that she would save him?

When you're starving, hope is all you can eat. His eyes were leaking, but it wasn't enough—he wanted his skin to split open in mockery of a shared dream, and for blood to well out of the cracks instead of gilt light. His eyes alone could not weep enough for times lost and dreams broken by that soulless gaze. Her horn pointed at his heart, the heart he wondered how it still beat, but he could not remember how to move, or find a reason why.

He had seen her again, and now she thundered towards him with a promise of pain to be repaid. He had seen her again, and seen how his presence dimmed her glow, and tore something in her composure apart—he had seen what he brought with him.

Pain and suffering.

So let it end here.

White lids closed over blue eyes, and hid his look of pained adoration from sight. Black wings spread from the mess of his heart, and his soul teetered upon the brink of existence, waiting to take flight. He was over. He was done.

A thread of disappointment needled itself through his thoughts, a single note echoing in the stillness of his acceptance—a whisper, not a word, a touch that was not a touch and yet a touch all the same. It traveled along the darkened edges of his mind, and she knew him too well, she understood, so she could not be angry, she could not feel betrayed, but yes—she was disappointed. His resignation was not theirs.

He could not let his selfishness be the death of them.

So his black wings folded again, and his eyes snapped open almost as soon as they had shut. That he was the one who had started this was irrelevant, and gods, what had he been thinking? He didn't want to hurt her, never had, never wanted to, but—

He found his haunches, found his feet, all four of them, and tore right with all the gracelessness of a startled animal. The soft sand shuffled and whispered beneath him, drowned out for a moment by the gasp torn out of his throat; fire, he remembered fire, this feeling of flesh ripping and blood pearling against snow-white fur, and how in the blinding moment of impact he could not feel where he was hit. The nerves of his left shoulder screamed, a jagged red line drawn across the flatness of the bone.

Black nostrils opened and closed, faster now with the adrenaline of pain spiking his blood. Perhaps it was not a matter of hurting her. His tired mind flailed to grasp the logic as he reversed on his haunches. Perhaps it was a matter of proving.. proving.. what she meant to him? By hounding her in battle? It didn't add up.

Heedless of the devastation she could wreck with her hindlegs he thundered after her, mind blank, intention nothing but to simply run into her. In a moment's reversal of roles he had become the hunter, but there was no true love for the chase in him: just a vague, uneasy sensation, a burning notion that he had something to do—prove—here.

[ 793 words, 1/3, @[Ophelia] ]
Summary: skitters right to avoid being speared, taking the hit across his left shoulder. turns upon his haunches to try and ram her from behind.

Music: Audiomachine - The Truth

Dramatic Mau is dramatic.
angels, they fell first, but I'm still here
Ascended Helovian

Ophelia the Amaranthine Posts: 701
Outcast atk: 6.5 | def: 10.5 | dam: 7
Mare :: Hybrid :: 16.0 hh :: 6 Years HP: 77 | Buff: BULK
Tinek :: Royal Silver Dragon :: Frost Breath & Shock Breath Tamme
#5


Heart racing dully in her chest, she ran wild, feeling the bite of vengeance keep her hooves moving forward instead of fear shoving her away. At the end of the world, floor falling away beneath their hooves, they stood upon the ledge and stared down into the abyss. He shone gold, and she bloomed roses, and like all times before, he disappeared, falling. And just like now, she did not make chase.

Too many memories faded to black, final scene awaiting a sequel that never came. Her story continued, pages flipped relentlessly by a hungry reader, and she struggled to survive, to endure the endless progression of fate. Broken heart, iced over, refused to be shattered again, rebelling against the heartache that plagued her existence, and she raged against this aggressor. Ophelia was too broken to embrace the soft, inquisitive inner child, the one who cared and loved without thought. The selfless girl, strange, quirky and compassionate, had been used, cast aside and forgotten.

She was not the same.

She would fight back against fate, and lock up all who’d left scars.

And somehow, the tears he shed only added green leaves to a fire. So much smoke… What right did he have to cry over her now? To pity what she had become? What right did he have to ask her to dance as if a year had not passed and he had not left without a goodbye, again. Crimes stacked against him, whether he committed them or not, she did not know. But the accusations were there nonetheless, and they could not be baseless. Gaucho and Midas may not be the most forgiving or open hearted, but they were not fools.


A brief moment passed when she thought he would stand, let her horn drive straight through his heart. Conflicting emotions trickled through two veins in her chest, one of peace and another of guilt. Sending Mauja to his grave would be burying a piece of her past, putting to rest another tragic thread. But, could she? He did not deserve to die, not when she just as culpable of her own crimes – of hurting those she claimed to love. They were not so different, and this soft ground was neither grave nor dance floor. It was just dirt, cruel reality.

Both swerved as she approached, her horn tearing open part of his left shoulder. The impact rattled against her skull, yanking the muscles to the side as the pristine tip caught in flesh. Ophelia used her body weight to pull away, blood spattering through the sky and curling down the grooves in her spiraled horn. The red liquid glittered in a chilling promise of her commitment to battle her past. Cloven hooves paused, the gravity of what she had done overwhelming her mind and body.

Not so long ago, she had wished she were a healer, having to go find Tor to fix burns that mottled the skin on his back. Now, she was the assailant. The sounds of thundering hooves called her back to reality, out of memories so perfect and real that she struggled to differentiate. Quickly, she turned, watching him run toward her with two visions, one present and one past, one here and one in the World’s Edge. Ophelia blinked her strange, dual colored eyes, shaking her head as if the toss could dislodge the double vision.

She took a step forward, but not before his mass barreled into her full force. One leg was already up, balancing on three, and he, superior in mass and height, tilted the fulcrum. In a matter of seconds, her hooves were swept in the sea of sand, body toppling over as her side hit the ground, legs swimming to keep upright in merciless gravity. The impact had forced breath out of her lungs, knocking her right shoulder and crunching ribs that protested against the strain.

Tinek, her silver saving grace, curved his leather wings, diving easily between Ophelia and Mauja. The dragon exhaled a strong breath, body and power heightened with age. Ice and shock billowed from his maw, a potent combination of winter’s stormy might. The Forsaken lurched to her hooves, feeling her whole right side ache from the fall, and she felt a shadow cross over her heart, a nightfall. Was this how her father felt when he battled? Was this her engraved invitation to the violence of her bloodline?

She gave way to the consuming power of the blackness in her soul, lunging forward on weakened legs with fangs bared. The pale princess of marble took her bite at Mauja’s left side, wanting to strip him of the white he wore with lies.



[[[(2/3) || (784 words) ||
Summary: Ophelia falls when he shoves her, bruising and straining her entire left side and her neck was wrenched with her first attack. Tinek flies between them to give her time to get back up, and she lunges forward, aiming to bite at his left shoulder.

Aphelion - Girl with the dragon tattoo soundtrack

]]]


Art by: veradaine @ DA




Undertow has come to take me. Guided by the blazing sun. Look at everything around us. Look at everything we've done.
Please. Anyone. I don't think I can save myself. I'm drowning.


Please tag me in every response!
Ascended Helovian

Mauja the Frozen Light Posts: 1,392
Outcast atk: 6.5 | def: 10.5 | dam: 7.5
Stallion :: Unicorn :: 17.2 :: 14 HP: 79.5 | Buff: HUNTER
Irma :: Snowy Owl :: Terrorize & Diego :: Eurasian Eagle-Owl :: Rage Neo
#6

i am the vanguard of your destruction
Movement forced blood through broken veins, pushed it to the surface of his skin—it was a macabre smile painted across his shoulder, a thin-lipped mouth moving silently in synch with the muscles underneath. The air kissed it, bitterly.

Pain tore at his frayed nerves as his body lurched forward, hammering the forgiving sand mercilessly. He beat it, time and again, and it simply shrugged, and didn't let him down.

Why wasn't more of the world like sand.

His blurred vision of this white angel disappeared, lost in the blue sky as he threw his head up while she fell, delicate and slender form hitting the dirt with a thud. It reverberated through his mind, a noise that made his bones tremble, and it just felt wrong. He wasn't here to put her down, he was.. he was here.. he was here because he had a heart... And it hammered in his chest, made him feel weak at the knees as he backpedaled. Fresh tears spilled from his eyes, both shoulders aching, one dull from impact, one jagged and obnoxious; demanding.

But he had no time for them, except to savor that he was cracking open—he only had eyes for her, his mind tearing itself between past and present much like hers.

He had seen this before. He had been through this before, in another dream, with another woman, one of soft blackness and deceit as profound as his. They had charged with an army, forced themselves through enemy lines, and with each step that they came closer to victory his heart had rebelled.

For he had known what lain behind their protection, he had known who they had been sent to kill.

The only difference was that he was standing still, now—and the dragon's mouth that opened wide against his face did not cover the entire sky, but for all that he cared, it might as well. Silver jaws and sharp, sterling fangs glittered in the sunlight as the porcelain doll they protected rose.

Mauja had never been one to like pain, but now he wanted it. His eyes closed again.

It matched his heart. Winter itself bit him in the face, froze his tears and drove daggers into his flesh—his skin crawled, muscles jerking, a jolt driving itself all the way into his chest.

It was not fire.

He was almost disappointed.

When he opened his eyes again, she was lunging like a wolf. He let her. He deserved it. He wasn't here to beat her up, he wasn't here to defeat her, he was here simply because he'd happened to walk upon her and because the easiest way to do something had been to abuse where they were. If he'd stopped to think about it, he wouldn't have said it.

And now, he was paying for it, tasting it in the pinched skin on his left shoulder and the tug against the wound's half-crusted edges. His head went up again, eyes rolling back; gods, his entire head ached, he felt like he'd been battered against a wall, but at least he felt something. For once, he relished the pain, drank it in like sunshine and truth, and—hesitantly—swallowed the bitter dregs that came afterwards, with sanity and thought.

Once, he had allowed Voodoo to use him as a beating post. Now, he was doing it again—putting himself above and beyond the rules of the combat, winning by not committing, because if he didn't commit, he couldn't lose, right?

And that was his problem.

He never committed to anything. Always had one foot out the door. Always ready to run. Slipping out the back quietly. And now, he had done it too many times—would she ever again trust him? Until either of them died, and they knew the truth of his loyalty? Was he forcing her to live like he had? Always doubting?

Something in him gave way, doors closed and others opened. With a strangled yell he threw his head towards hers, eyes pinched shut as he braced for impact—it didn't matter with what part of his skull he hit her or where it landed, it didn't matter at all, because the only thing that mattered was the power building in his soul. Something, something was on the verge of happening, a roaring blackness threatening to swallow him, and in the disintegrating chaos of his mind a river of flame swept forth. It burned against the darkness, it burned against the hot tears of shame and guilt, and it burned against all the pain—it burned in the shape of a swan, still locked up in his chest.

Upon the fence the owls sat, eyes unblinking. Neither of them moved. This was, after all, not their fight.

[ 797 words, 2/3, @[Ophelia]. ]
Summary: takes the dragon's breath full against the face and Ophelia bites his left shoulder, not too far from the wound. he then tries to bash his head against hers, with very little aim.

Music: E.S. Posthumus - Ebla

Edit, with permission from Aud--
This was part of what I had to cut out of the post when trimming it down to below 800, but I just.. want to put it here, to keep it somewhere.

"If he'd stopped to think about it, he wouldn't have said it, wouldn't have done it, but he'd always wanted to—secretly his mind had painted images of her thinner body and her deer-like grace, and wondered how fierce the lion in her soul was, how deceptive her skin."
angels, they fell first, but I'm still here
Ascended Helovian

Ophelia the Amaranthine Posts: 701
Outcast atk: 6.5 | def: 10.5 | dam: 7
Mare :: Hybrid :: 16.0 hh :: 6 Years HP: 77 | Buff: BULK
Tinek :: Royal Silver Dragon :: Frost Breath & Shock Breath Tamme
#7


No smile crossed Ophelia’s lips today, not even a bitter twist on a taut face. Anger burned, and her nares flared with heavy breath, corners of her mouth wrinkled in a sneer. Glass tears he did not deserve to shed follow track down his masculine cheek bones, and she yanked her body back up, feeling the black rage settle like seductive smoke through her limbs. He had no right to feel pity and sadness during battle, death looming in anticipation upon their every whisper. They stood on the same ground, plagued by heartache, surviving, and they were equals. Pity was reserved for those beneath your standing, for those so unfortunate to lose themselves in the maze of their own actions.

Ophelia was not lost. She knew exactly which door she stood before, and she threw her body against the gate. Muffled voices haunted her from the other side, tempting her to release the beast inside, one she had so carefully locked behind ice-iron plaques on her heart.

A plume of pink affection swirled with the black in her soul and snuck under the door, watching as the… what was he now?... as Mauja stood, accepting Tinek’s punishment without hesitation. Cold winds stirred the long, tranquil and bloodstained locks of hair, but the second the silver’s breath ended, she moved forward, quickly blotting out that amaranthine compassion with the black rage. The Forsaken gave no pause to assess the damage he attained, instead gripping the skin on his left shoulder, so bitterly close to the previous wound, and pulled. Blood, foul and tangy sweet coated the inside of her mouth before ivory fangs slid from the fur. The shadow of Tinek’s wings crossed over them, and he landed on the fence, his mind a support.

“If you need me…” he whispered into the void, the words jumbling and sinking into the inky pit.

This battle was far too different to compare to any other. The chaos of their invasion had been an effort to beat as many opponents down while taking little damage, calling orders to her troops and seeking Jackal, the coward who fled argument. Any confidence gained from Elsa was shattered, for the thickly built, pegasus mare had not asked her to dance, had not broken her heart. Here, old wounds and memories cracked open, revealing the festering sores on the other side, having soured from years of being ignored. Funny, how they tasted just like the blood that stained her lips, coated her teeth and filled in the spaces.

Ophelia yanked her right, hind leg upward through the pain, inwardly cursing how slow it moved after the fall. Muscles made fists, gasping at use and pulling painfully at her persistence. A sharp, full inhale shoved against bruised ribs, and she stifled a groan, trying to move away lest a larger, feathered hoof cause more damage. He did not deserve to hear her pain. She hid it carefully behind flawlessly erected walls of stunning height – she had had years, after all, to form such defenses.

The pale princess of nothing shifted around to his other side, or so she anticipated, but she managed to make it close enough, it seemed. Like a blacksmith’s anvil being thrown from a hill, his head crashed downward, and she barely had time to shift and avoid her own face being broken. Ophelia scrambled on her injuries, unable to avoid the blatant attack entirely. The point of his horn scratched against her withers and ice crashed like a bitter kiss before being thrown from a mountain. His thickly corded jaw and orbit ground against the sensitive curve behind her shoulder blade, and she could feel the warmth of his breath on her skin like a thousand bee stings.

Her front, left leg was shoved forward, and she quickly fell to one knee, feeling the grains of sand, so soft beneath her hooves, bite like daggers against her fur. Ophelia pulled her body up in a plowing, forward lunge once the circle of his motion had reached its apex. The pale princess skittered away, muscles in her haunches aching, and she cast a glance back at the thin prick of her own blood that pooled in rubies on her white hairs. The glance was shot back at Mauja, a wall and nothingness behind her stunning, enigmatic eyes.

Ophelia did not pause long enough to let their gaze linger. Hooves on stinging limbs gripped the sand again, bringing her closer, and she used the weapon on her brow again in sweeping motion, keen on tearing the gash on his left shoulder cleanly through. With violence, she set fire to her tomorrows, painted over dreams, and took to the stage of lies where she was embraced by the misery of her own company.


[[[(3/3) || (796 words ;-; so much more to write) ||
Summary: Ophelia bites him and moves around to his other side where his head crashes down behind her shoulder, his horn scratching at her withers. She then lunges at him and aims to flay him on the same injury on his left shoulder with her horn.

The Space Between - How to destroy angels

]]]



Art by: veradaine @ DA




Undertow has come to take me. Guided by the blazing sun. Look at everything around us. Look at everything we've done.
Please. Anyone. I don't think I can save myself. I'm drowning.


Please tag me in every response!
Ascended Helovian

Mauja the Frozen Light Posts: 1,392
Outcast atk: 6.5 | def: 10.5 | dam: 7.5
Stallion :: Unicorn :: 17.2 :: 14 HP: 79.5 | Buff: HUNTER
Irma :: Snowy Owl :: Terrorize & Diego :: Eurasian Eagle-Owl :: Rage Neo
#8

i am the vanguard of your destruction
He was no phoenix: he'd been burned a long time ago, but he had not risen from the gray swirl of ashes. There had been no rebirth for him, no new life in the colorless dawn—Mauja was as hollow as a burnt-out husk, blackened bones and dry veins. The spaces in his heart, the ones that ought to be full of love and life and joy, were barren, desolate, empty of all but fleeting moments of pain. He didn't weep for her. He felt no pity for her (guilt, shame, but no pity—her life was not his to judge).

He wept for himself. He wept for broken wings and hollow hearts. He wept because she was beautiful, lissome and dangerous all at once.

Maybe, just maybe, he wept for them.

The nerves of his head had begun to scream, and it had very little to do with the fact that he'd bashed his skull against her shoulder. No, it was the slow, creeping agony of thawing, of hot blood chasing the biting chill away—sweeping tendrils of fire, matching the odd burning in his soul.

Flame had never been his. What was it doing now, unfurling inside of him? He had no time to pause and analyze, but he wanted to, and in that moment she fled from him. Blue eyes slid open to the unforgiving sunlight, glittered upon droplets of perfect red. She was bleeding.

The world slowed. It ground to an agonizing halt, his breath full of the smoke of guilt; his anger began to burn again, struggled to escape his throat, but he choked on it again. She was bleeding, a tiny gash like a mimicry of the stinging one slapped across his own shoulder, and he knew without even the owls' input that red coated the sharp tip of his horn. Even his memory filled in with the moment's tug against the muscles of his neck, the telltale sensation of hitting flesh, even if just briefly.

She was bleeding and it was his fault.

Commit.

Because after all, he was bleeding too, and that was her doing.

He was past believing that trading eyes for eyes solved anything, and whatever strange thing smoldered in his soul certainly wasn't aimed at her, but if he couldn't rise to this challenge.. if he could not be a worthy opponent.. he would've failed her as profoundly as he had by disappearing.

So Mauja, the fell flame, turned to face her. She broke his heart a thousand times over simply by existing, and laying eyes upon her made him want to shatter—for a moment it flashed across his face again, that look of pain and worship, but he swallowed it. Steeled himself. Frozen tears coated his cheeks but no new ones blurred his vision, and the blue of his eyes was as emotionless as iron.

She broke his heart again with the emptiness of her gaze.

And then she was running, the sand as morbidly cheerful in helping her reach him as it was the other way around, and he planted all four feet firmly. He was done with running and he was done with.. with.. with standing around and being beat up? Yeah, right.

Why did he have to give up before he'd even tried? It was getting old.

He fell into the darkness. He fell into the flames. He let go, and the burning swan reached out, swept him up in its wings and spread them wide against the blue sky; his soul was free-falling again, through a golden blaze, the world spinning around him in a sickening blur. As the flaming bird streaked out from his chest it seared his skin, singed his long hair and blackened his pale fur—long wings beat against the spring air as it sped away next to them. Somewhere in the confusing haze of the unfamiliarity of the power, and the agony which had spawned it, he felt a tug at his senses, another lash across his shoulder. The scent of fresh blood overpowered the one of old, and he shifted upon the forgiving ground, trying to curve away so that her horn would not continue along its path and into the mess of his ribs or the crook of his hip, and something in him outright died from the proximity. She was too near. She was near at all. She was alive. She was broken and wounded but there was a wolf in her and he, he.. he tried to not wish about the past, tried to instead think of the future.

If they even had one.

Black lips peeled back from blunt teeth, and in a desperate attempt to hold on to her he lashed out, seeking to latch onto her spine.

Don't leave me.

Please.


[ 800 words, 3/3, @[Ophelia]. ]
Summary: as she hits him, a burning swan spawns by his chest and streaks away, probably rather close to her. he takes her horn across his shoulder and curves away to avoid further damage, and then tries to bite her topline.
On another note, it's really hard to fit all the words I need into 800 ;~; I want to bake more emotion and technical stuff relating to his injuries in but there is not enough space! -flailflail-

Music: Kent - Ingenting
angels, they fell first, but I'm still here
Ascended Helovian

Ophelia the Amaranthine Posts: 701
Outcast atk: 6.5 | def: 10.5 | dam: 7
Mare :: Hybrid :: 16.0 hh :: 6 Years HP: 77 | Buff: BULK
Tinek :: Royal Silver Dragon :: Frost Breath & Shock Breath Tamme
#9


Air whistled through her lungs, expanding a ribcage which groaned against the strain. The right side of her body was fast becoming tense, shutting her down despite the fury in her soul. Crimson life trickled from the cut on her shoulder, and the swing of her leg hurt. She would say she could not remember the last time she had felt pain like this, but that would be a lie. Past aches and injuries stung like yesterday in her mind, shouldering her twin sister’s crippled weight as they escaped the shades. As children, barely young enough to leave mother’s side, their homeland was destroyed by dark shades, and Ophelia stayed behind to ensure her sister’s safety, traveling far to make it to Helovia alive. They did not stop until the Threshold forests were their greeting, and Ophelia had fallen to her knees, limbs shaking from effort while wounds inflicted by darkness bled.

At the core, Ophelia was selfless. With curious glances and gentle words, she absorbed the torment of others, embracing it without thought to her own trials – and they were many. The pale princess had been gasping for air in the sea of her own choices, not living but surviving, and now, she was faced with only two options: drown or fight. She chose to fight.

There he stood, cradled in the bright daylight, a golden halo humming at all his curves and edges. Shadows hung in the corners of her soul, lulling her into the evening, no moon hanging in her skies. Fueled by the darkness and urged by pain to end this fight, she had aimed to swing her horn against his shoulder once more, but the victory was pyrrhic. The tip of her horn was confirmed by splitting skin whilst the sensation of heat bloomed. Confusion hummed in her mind, and she paused, body rattling against her own weight as she saw true evidence of a god’s blessing and she, rebuked.

Forsaken by fire, she watched as ashes of Mauja’s soul plumed into a bird of flame, burning brightly. The flames fluttered between them, her attack and this eruption of power combining within seconds in time and yet seemed so agonizingly slow. There was no escape from the fire, and she closed her eyes, ducking her head as heat licked by her side, searing a path where white hairs melted and skin bubbled under pressure. The pain ate at her with a gasp and erosion, much like the kiss of his breath. His body shifted away from her horn, but she barely noticed as she stumbled back, trying to breathe through the agony. The God of the Sun turned his face, his grace not fit for her tainted soul.

A thin line of burns formed from the path of Mauja’s divinity, marring her hide with the evidence of abandonment. Blinking loosed tears of her shame and tragedy, they fell to the sand beneath her hooves as they still moved, time pressing ever onward despite her mind still reacting to moments past. The wall of ice holding fragments of her thrice shattered heart faltered, flooding her chest with emotion she was not equipped to handle. And, just as she thought she would fight her way to the surface, the past wrapped its firm fingers around her hind leg and pulled her back down. Inhaling a thick breath of water, she suffocated in the pain of her past, drowning again.

Seconds past, that was all. Her hooves hit the ground at the bottom of her lunge, his body shifted and hers impacting with the sand, creaking and shaking all of her injuries and stretching burned skin. Unwilling to turn her face, too ashamed to let him see her leaking eyes, she moved, unprepared for his final attack. His mind, a fortress she could not penetrate, left her blind, and as she gathered her legs beneath her to run, run far away from this madness and affliction, he held her back. Teeth like knives split into her spine, wrapping around the intricate muscles of the middle of her back and keeping her tethered. Shock and pain surprised a noise from her throat, a strangled cry like the final howl of a wolf at the turn of the last page in his book.

She bowed her back to avoid the pain, barely slipping out of his grasp though the imprint from his maw was still left in hairless, bleeding punctures on her spine. Ophelia scrambled away from him until her hips hit the fence, adrenalin fading into the summation of her injuries. The heavens had devoured her entirely, giving her nothing but lies in this final hour. Empty promises hung in the air as the concluding remnants of hope leaked from glassy eyes, regrets never having known such sorrow.



[[[(closing defense) || (799 words) ||
Summary: - suffocates the word limit-
Ophelia is burned by the fire bird as it flies by, and he bites the middle of her spine which she only manages to escape by bowing downward.
Close the book and turn the page.

Said and Done - Eighteen Visions

]]]



Art by: veradaine @ DA




Undertow has come to take me. Guided by the blazing sun. Look at everything around us. Look at everything we've done.
Please. Anyone. I don't think I can save myself. I'm drowning.


Please tag me in every response!

Official Posts: 847
Administrator
Stallion :: Equine :: ::
Official
#10
By my verdict: MAUJA is the winner!

OPHELIA
Realism [+3.5]
:: There was little consideration of the surroundings or breed differences, but I realize that this was an emotional fight more than a technical one.


Emotion [+3]
:: You hit me right in the feels straight from the beginning and never stopped. Awesome!


Prose [+3.5]
:: A couple extra commas here and there, for example: The sound of his hooves on the sand was a soft thud, and Tinek, circled overhead, spying the grouchy Irma and now another owl, a darker brown one.


Readability [+3]
:: No comments or concerns

Finally tally: 30+(13*2)= 56HP

*******************************************

MAUJA
Realism [+3]
:: There was little consideration of the surroundings or breed differences, but I realize that this was an emotional fight more than a technical one.
:: I would have liked more mention of how his injuries were affecting him.


Emotion [+3]
:: I really connected with Mauja. Every word drew me into what he was feeling and why he was doing what he was doing through the entire fight. Great!


Prose [+4]
:: Obviously well-edited. Great job!


Readability [+3]
:: No comments or concerns.

Finally tally: 40.5+(13*3)= 66.5HP


Forum Jump:


RPGfix Equi-venture