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the Rift

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Lace the Silverthorn Posts: 459

Deceased atk: 5 | def: 9 | dam: 5.5

Stallion :: Equine :: 15.3 hh :: 14 HP: 65 | Buff: NOVICE

Fajira :: Plain White Dragon :: Fire Breath Chan

09-06-2012, 11:31 PM

LACE

Who, in his mind,
has not probed the dark water?

Darkness could hide so many things. It had never occurred to the gray-coated soldier that a shadow could be something frightening, but as he stood by the raging sea and scoured the black nothingness for a sign of life he felt a chill travel down the spine that had little to do with the wind or the splashes of water that landed on his skin. Even though the dragons frolicked and warbled happily within his sight he suddenly felt alone, painstakingly left to himself. He tried to shrug the feeling away, accept it as a part of the choice he had made when deciding to remain outcast and wandering, but it was difficult. He was sure that Mirage was out there somewhere, but the fact that he couldn't spot her was maddening, annoying, it was even a bit spooky.

"Damn mare, make a move sometime" he muttered between gritted teeth, nostrils flaring to catch any hint of a scent that might belong to the black and gold. Lace pretended not to feel the creeping sensation along his back, the feeling that something might be stalking up on him from behind and would pounce at any second.

It was pathetic, really. Here he was, seasoned warrior with years of experience of both battle and traveling, and on this empty beach he suddenly felt afraid of shadows? Just because of a strange mare that he knew was there but couldn't see, whom he didn't know and wasn't sure of in any way. Pathetic indeed, Lace. A black hoof smacked irritably into the wet sand, hoping that the impact would be able to shake some sense into him. It worked, almost. The slender stallion stirred, began to walk along the shoreline with eyes firmly planted on the ocean. If she wouldn't show herself then he wasn't going to come running, like some lost colt looking for his mother. Mirage was not the same as comfort, for that she was too strange, too... Too what? He didn't know anything about her, Lace had to remind himself of that. It was beyond annoying how he couldn't let her go with his thoughts, wherever he tried to turn them the memory of golden eyes on black, filled with riddles and half-spoken truths rose from some secret hiding place in his mind. How had she managed to nestle her way in there? His strides became sharper as restless irritation overtook him. The darkness that seethed within and around him made the equine flammable, his temper unstable. All that he felt was superficial, like colorful shimmers surrounding a bubble of nothingness; there was no meaning behind it, no reason, no nothing.

He was just about to fall into a sharp trot when a deep rumbling voice reached through the storm, speaking his name. The grulla stopped dead in his track and spun around in a single smooth motion, sand spluttering around his feet. A sound similar to tearing cloth made him deaf for a moment and as the heavens were ripped apart by a huge lightning he could see something on the dunes above. Something large, massive, glimmering and shining with an enchanting luster against the inky sky. Black and gold a thought commented casually in his mind, for a moment piercing through the numbness that had settled over him.

It couldn't be. No. No way. He had not just seen the largest dragon in his entire life and it had not just uttered his name. Another lightning brightened the scene, forcing Lace to stare at the apparition again, unable to believe what his eyes and the White was telling him. He heard the trilling cry of Akaith call out to the giant that loomed before him. An ear twitched. White tassels flicked hesitantly against the hocks as the instinct to flee something that beyond doubt was a predator fought with the realization that not everything was as it seemed. Air blew from the sooted nose in heavy bursts, and every muscle in his body was tense to the point of agony. What should he do? He couldn't run. If he ran he'd be done for, he'd be caught and eaten and his bones scattered to slowly whiten upon the white shore and..

Black and gold, silly.

Lace swallowed heavily and turned the ears backwards, reluctant and hesitant and frightened all at the same time. But Fajira would never tell him something that wasn't true. She was pure and honest and reliable, and if she said that something was, it was. He took a small step forward, then another. With utmost hesitance the soldier approached, completely set on running at the slightest sign of threat. Some things you just couldn't fight..

"... Mirage?" he asked hesitantly and stopped, still with a good bit of distance between them. He still couldn't believe it, didn't recognize anything about the soft shadow of a mare in this predator, golden and fierce and altogether dangerous.

""

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