RAVEN

Her heart was pounding so loud that she was disoriented. For the span of a few eyeblinks, all she could see was the bear collapsing to the ground. She could hear the cheers of those around, and although she couldn't identify the look on Ros's face, she assumed it was something like joy, or pride. 

She didn't know. Or care.

Because it was wrong.

With the taste of bile in the back of her throat, Isopia lunged into the air, ignoring the screams from her punctured wing. Immediately her body shriveled and darkened as she became a raven, and into the sky she fled. 

She didn't know to find, or call the members of the WHATCH, but if ever she thought they had a purpose, it was now. 

Helovia had just murdered someone. Did it matter that the bear might have crossed over into their lands without permission? Our four Gods had done the same. So what if he was tyrannical, if he had murdered and suppressed. Hadn't our Gods done the same? The WHATCH would bring justice. Iso knew they would. It was their purpose .

Unsure of what to do, the girl found a relatively open pathway. If someone flew overhead, or walked by, surely they would look - especially after she was done. Pulling the earth from beneath her, Isopia created a small spire - about 10ft tall. On the top of it she placed the dagger she had been given, and upon the dagger she placed her small avian body.

She was the raven after all. What better signal could she give?

FAIRYLIGHTS

Something was happening, something strange and dangerous, for this mountain had certainly not been here the last time the faerie girl had been in these parts. Before meeting Kvothe she had wandered to and fro throughout the threshold and never come across a mountain where the trees grew red, leastwise not at this time of year.

Aisling ventured cautiously into the forrest, deathly curious but mind running riot with stories of the dangers to be found in a haunted wood. So many monsters, and villains would love to make their layer in a place like this, she thought, but if she were to ever find adventure, she had to find them. The winter had been so terribly dull and lonesome without the friends she had made, and the little mare’s search for distractions was seriously lowering her inhibitions.

Still, she could never quite manage to ignore all her mother’s teachings and so kept to the best lit paths she could find. By an by, one led to something special. Aisling spotted the out of place formation from a ways away and was immediately drawn to it. Picking up to a trot, she closed the distance in her bouncy little gait and circled the pillar once to investigate. She frowned as she examined the rocky monolith. It reminded her of the circles of standing stones at home but this one stood solitary. She stopped after one turn around the base and then craned her neck to look upwards.

There at the top sat a raven, with a little blade under it’s feet. Now this, she thought, was definitely something out of an adventure tale. Armed ravens did not just sit on top of strange pillars for no good reason! And then she remembered the day on the beach, the spontaneous rescue effort by strangers and the talking raven there and she smiled up at the bird. "Are you keeping whatch then? I hope nothing is amiss in this odd forrest.“

She didn't even need her blade to find the dark girl. She was searching for her as soon as she got a moment to breath, as soon as her herd was safely on its way home from this battlefield she had been absent from. Still, the blue of Ampere's eyes peered hungrily into the reflective metal of Tuor, searching for a set of eyes that would be looking back, a whatcher.

"Raven!" she called out as she spied the avian on a mountain of stone. Deftly her wings brought her closer, a hasty smile and a nod tossed to Fairylights as she landed alongside the mare. "What was that" Ampere asked hurriedly, her mind still whirring with everything that had happened that she hadn't even seen. What did it all mean - the death of a god?

"Was that bear really a god like everyone says? Did horses really kill it?" uncertainty lent Ampere's tongue to lick her lips, blue eyes wide with energy, good or bad she couldn't decide yet. "Why?" she insisted, becoming more stern, more judgmental. Ampere was not against violence, not even particularly against murder as a last resort as long as she felt it was justified - but that was just it, was this justice due? She knew nothing about the bear, and nearly as much about the Time god. That her served Helovia might be enough for some horses, but she was more guarded with her faith - only the Sun had managed to earn it so resolutely with his guidence and protection. Too often Ampere found deities drunk with power, their decision left unchecked and justice well due, but in this instance who was more deserving? It seemed hard to believe the Time god would go out of his way to 'save' a land and its people, as the rumors seemed to suggest. This seemed more like an act of war against another, which she was also not directly against, only if it was the strong taking from the weak, only if it was land that needn't be taken.

What herd could thrive in that bloodied domain? None she thought, hardening against the Spark.
So again she asked, why?

DARKEST EVE - BRIGHTEST DAWN
THE WHATCHING SHIFT - GOES EVER ON

THROUGH ICE AND FIRE - WIND AND RAIN
WE STAND VIGIL - BREAK THE CHAIN



IF WOUND DOES BLEED - IF HEART DOES SOUR
THE WHATCHING SHIFT - ENDURES EACH HOUR

HEAR US NOT - SEE US FEW
WE STAND VIGIL - 'TIL JUSTICE DUE

PIRATE

It was all still a little fresh on his body. The cool humidity of the forest, the sound of the falls, and the flashes of red and deep shadows. Pain still etched in burns along his neck and limb as he began to move in the uneven gait away from the epicenter. He thought perhaps if he shifted into another body it might ease the pain? But then he remembered it was in another body he gained the wound. And not only had it marked that body but it kept him from holding it too. Still, he didn’t want another conversation, or to have the struggle to keep up his expressions. So with a pained grimace he had slowly reached around and pulled the black clock back over his body. For his efforts a fresh trail of blood dripped on the vegetation below.

But that invisibility came like a soothing touch over his whole figure, and he could relax to be in its sweet hidden corner. He might have gone on then. Moving back to the mountains to huddle in the sweet cold embrace. But fate does funny things. He was nearly run over by a shadow, causing him to shrink to the side, and earth eyes grow sharp with attention. Ampere had nearly landed on the poor creature, but she wasn’t the only one about. The raven, which brought a small ghost of a smile across his lips, was there, and others were gathering. Still he did not pull off his cover just yet. Instead he listens, curious at their conversation.

He supposed it was rude just to eves drop, though now was a funny time to get his morals in priority. Or perhaps it was just he wanted to show off his bit of fun, more likely. So the hidden golden moves carefully forward to Ampere’s side and she finishes speaking, and in a strain his head reaches to whisper into her harks, low and soft. “Pirates are ever Whatching.” Then he lets his body sway and press ever so slightly against hers if she didn’t turn away too fast or miss it. A tip, a warning. He was here and listening. But then he backs away, leaving himself to listen in again. Like a fly on the wall. Hmm, he didn’t like being a fly. He was too lovely for a fly. Like a demon in the shadows. That was better.



"TALK TALK TALK"
OOC:: Thran's just hanging out invisibly.

RAVEN

She watched as a rather buoyant mare come her way. The seeming ease in her step made Isopia's stomach turn with something close to anger. It felt wrong that after a murder anyone could ignorantly go about their day. A life had been taken. "Something is definitely amiss." She began - but Thunderhead arrived before she could say more.

Iso fluffed her wings against her blackened body as she turned her golden stare towards Thunderhead. Silently she tried to form her thoughts intentionally so that words would spill out of her mouth in a meaningless mess - just like how they had left the bear God. Closing her eyes, her beak opened and closed for a moment before she found the words she wanted. Her voice came out low and intentional (wouldn't Thranduil be proud).

"The expansion project our Gods undertook apparently involved seizing the lands of others. Apparently they believed it justified, for those lands were plagued and managed by tyrannical Gods." The girl-raven paused, clearly trying to imply that she thought this assumption was less than justified. "The Time God opened the rift - and in poured inhabitants from another world - but it also allowed in their God. The Bear God that they killed was merely fighting for his land and his people." Was it really their place to judge? On what standard was tyranny and revolution measured? Did their Gods have such a ruler? Iso's brain whirled as she began to wonder if it was even her place to judge this situation. Perhaps there was more to the situation than she realized.

FAIRYLIGHTS

The little mare's smile faltered at Raven's response. Despite her question she hadn't actually expected anything to be wrong at all, but that just goes to show that her years had not yet shaken her childish naiveté. Before she could question the bird, Thunderhead descended and did the job for her and it seemed that the blue mare already had more information that Aisling did. She returned the nod or greeting hastily and the listened with growing concern as the featherd pair both spoke. Second by second her storm-grey eyes grew wider and wider as the other spoke of what had happened in this strange place.

It sounded like something out of an old legend: creatures from another world and angry gods pit against one another. In any other circumstance it might have made a story the dreamy girl would have loved to listen to, but this was no ancient tale, it did not start with "Many years ago" or "In a far away land..." but had happened recently...had happened here! "But that is terrible!" she exclaimed, voice sounding almost hurt, full of pity for this Bear God that raven spoke of. "All I have heard of the gods of Helovia have been good, why should the Master of Spark do such a thing? Surely there might have been lands to be had a price not so dear."

Little white ears fell backwards in apparent distress. She didn't know what she could do, for from the sounds of Raven's tale it was too late to change the fate of the foreign god. She waited for a moment, trying to come up with something useful to offer, but this situation was so grim so wrong... 

Wrong...

Bad.

Bad!

Danger!

Instinct had alerted her body before she could recognize why and all of the sudden the little mare's heart was pounding and she felt not only distress but fear. She whipped her head around automatically, eyes wide to search for a predator nostrils flaring wide. Blood Her mind finally landed on the reason. She smelled blood. Forgetting to pay attention two Raven anf Thunderhead, she turned in a tight circle, eyes darting everywhere to pick out a source but there was no other presence, no looming monster. Until her eyes fell down and spied a little red gleam of wet upon the ground near the blue mare. Her ears came forward again, concern covering fear. "Thunderhead, are you hurt?"

“.“

She didn't jump into the air, but she almost did when Pirate whispered and pressed a light touch into her. Still, her body went rigid, and a flaring wave ran across her feathers before they settled. She might have reacted more strongly if she hadn't grown more accustomed to his sneaky ways with their latest endeavors - she might have marveled at his invisibility if not for the cloak she had already seen.

A small smile crawled on her lips, continually impressed by the golden swashbuckler.

She hadn't the time to think on him as Raven continued however, her knowledge rather extensive compared to most Ampere had managed to ask about this event so far. Though, the way Raven put it, that the lands were taken by the gods, Ampere found little fault. If the Helovia gods were conquering, then death was a part of war. Ampere did not have qualms with war - she liked the idea of strength being matched with strength, of mettle being tested and struggle resulting in a clear outcome.

And that was where Ampere's base being interfered with her evolved ideals, because wasn't war in a way an attempt at theft? Wasn't conquering something a scenario where the strong rise above the weak? No, she thought, though she was not confident in her own response. There would never be pure equality in life, and she knew that. What mattered to her was the purpose behind exercises of strength, the greed that fueled it and the target that was to face it. When she marched to meet someone in a fight, it was never with absolute certainty. She trusted in her own skills and willed them to be enough, but there was a difference in facing a fellow warrior than facing a foal that would surely perish beneath her blows.

Shaking her head, Ampere tried to wrangle her thoughts and her purpose.
"Have you ever gone hungry?" she asked, glancing around at everyone. "This winter was hard. Even in my herd land I thinned. I hate to think how many of those in the wilds perished." Her features set in a hard line, grim.

"Have you ever had want of shelter, or water? These are things we all need, and prayers the gods surely listen to constantly. In the herds we are protected, but we have our limits. We couldn't take in all the Outcasts, but their lands cannot support all of them all the time. Perhaps we needed expansion."

She hadn't decided yet if this was justified or not, but she was thinking, and the winter had been particularly cruel - all the gods had vanished then, was it connected?

"Are the people of the rift happy? Did they fight their own god, or us?" She supposed they would eb the best to judge this situation. "Maybe we need to talk to them."

Dying gods and aliens were things Ampere wasn't familiar with, but war? War she knew, and in war corpses were not unusual.

Her attention was diverted from Raven as Fairylights spoke her name. Glancing over Ampere shook her head. "Not in any physical sense," she murmured. "I came as the fight ended."

[D: not sure what blood spot or hurt you're referring to Laine]

DARKEST EVE - BRIGHTEST DAWN
THE WHATCHING SHIFT - GOES EVER ON

THROUGH ICE AND FIRE - WIND AND RAIN
WE STAND VIGIL - BREAK THE CHAIN



IF WOUND DOES BLEED - IF HEART DOES SOUR
THE WHATCHING SHIFT - ENDURES EACH HOUR

HEAR US NOT - SEE US FEW
WE STAND VIGIL - 'TIL JUSTICE DUE

PIRATE

Usually he loved a good shock. Jumping around a corner to send another feet in the air with fright. But given the circumstances the cool collection of the dark blue bird was more than satisfactory. The golden pulled back, his grin, hidden, was broad and bold. Most comfortable in his silence and invisibility the gold let his tassled tail switch happily behind him. With such pleasure he listens in on their gathering. Usually he was glad to sneak in totally unnoticed by anyone in crowds, but this time brought a dirty pleasure. Someone knew he was here, and listening, and they kept his secret. It was so to speak, a test. And much to his happiness she kept his secret and was passing with beautiful colors.

Of course the topic could have been of a little more interest. He was hoping for notes on wars and justice. Something juicy. Something he could use. But little beyond happiness was brought up. Still the overall picture given by the rave as most interesting. An expansion of lands…If this was the Time God, then where were the others. Four Gods….four new lands? Then a sinking feeling came. Four more battles? Feeling the burn still sharply ratting his nerves the gold immediately hated that thought. Though one of the gods included the sweet lady of the night. That wouldn’t be too terrible.

A voice, laced in a different tone draws him back to the conversation. A white mare. Her attention was squarely on the dark blue bird and a spot of blood on the grass. Harks pin back and earth eyes which had jumped with light grow cold. Whether meant or not the threat to his hidden keep was seen. The golden shifts back, moving slowly to keep the grass from shifting too much. It was fun to reveal himself to the blue bird, but another beyond that was not what he had in mind.




"TALK TALK TALK"
OOC:: Thran's just hanging out invisibly.