The giant lay eternally among the slowly drying thistles. Dirt, grass, and debris clung to his coat as a evidence that he had been down and rolling for some time in the meadow. Thinking himself alone, a long and low groan escaped his pained sides. This sickness from the Flats hurt. It was not the sharp pain of flesh wounds or long ache of broken bones. No, this was a prolonged, unrelenting misery of his abdomen and skull.

Through squinted eyes, he turned to bite at his colicking sides. Though promptly regretting the motion as it sent a fresh wave of pounding pain through his immense head. He let out a slow, long breath— trying to control the pain. Blood had dried in thin, crusted, brown streaks from the base of his ears down beneath his cheeks. Even now, sluggish rivulets of the ruby liquid drained from hist thick, pale ears.

He had been lucky thus far in avoiding any ailments in the Rift Battles. Besides falling beneath a melting god. And being ripped apart like a chew toy by mutant wolves. And being burned alive by Mauja (with good intentions, of course). He considered avoiding the next battle altogether.

His gut began to spasm once more from the parasite. Gritting his teeth and squeezing shut his eyes, he began to roll again. Hoping that this would ease his convulsing intestines. He grunted against the pain that erupted in his head as his brain rattled around in his skull while he rolled. Could he be cured yet?

living like we're
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What the hell.

He feels like—

Death.

His head throbs, his heartbeat pounding like a war drum in his ears—loud, echoing, and constant. The pressure makes him feel as though his skull is going to burst, any sudden movement sending him into a dizzying whirl of pain. His abdomen is bloated and terribly uncomfortable, not helped by the seared flesh of his flanks, where the Rift God’s acid blood had spilled onto him. Damn beast. His whole body feels tender, as if a single touch would send him crumpling to the ground (but he wouldn’t, because he’s a man). He suffers silently, but certainly not peacefully.

Perhaps he had been heading back towards the Edge, or perhaps his body had unconsciously led him here. He is already surrounded by the purple clusters of grass before the Warlander takes notice of where he is. Huffing a groan and tipping back his ears, he comes to a slow halt. The last time he had been here, he had not been alone…and it hadn’t been a particularly pleasant experience either. There had been death…yes. His eyes fall on the tree, recognizable by the mound at its roots, the earth upturned only weeks prior. The memory flashes before him—of the little black filly, far too quiet, and her mother.

Her beautiful, grieving mother.

It had nearly been an out of body experience for him, as uncomfortable as he is with things like emotions (the tender kind) and comfort, but he doesn’t regret the experience. The petite brown mare had needed him, and he was there for her. He has not seen her since then, when he had left her alone at her Basin’s borders, her pretty little face twisted in frustration that he wouldn’t join her inside. Tough love, baby.

Movement eventually draws the stallion’s attention away from the flowered tree, a flailing of some kind—he catches legs darting above the grasses, connected to what seems to be a heaping mound. His initial reaction is to scowl and turn away (the pain of his body igniting his temper and shortening his patience), but standing there, he soon realizes that walking away will likely take more effort than it would to saunter the few yards forward. His sides expanding in a dramatic huff of breath, Rohan shakes out his mane (and immediately regrets it, as the motion and weight of his antlers agitates his already throbbing head, and causes a fresh trickle of blood to stream from his ears) before forcing himself to move.

It doesn’t take long for the Warlander to recognize the stranger—or at least, recognize what he can see of him. It is a stallion—have they been formerly introduced?—that he has noticed a time or two lurking around the Edge. Of course, Rohan hasn’t been the most dynamic herd member himself, so his memory could be playing with him (it’s a battle that he has no intention of fighting now). Settling a safe distance away from the flailing hooves, his hips dip sharply as he rests a hind leg, his other hip angling awkwardly as he favors his whole hind end—almost like he’s going to crow hop.

But of course he wouldn’t dream of that right now.

“Well you look like shit,” his deep voice broadens in a witty monotone, noticing the overall apparent discomfort of the stallion—judging by the dark stains below his ears, Rohan would bet that they’ve both been infected by this Flats parasite. Poor bastard. “What a couple pieces of eye candy we are,” there is a leak of humor in his voice, even if the rugged lines of his face remain impassive, save for the light in his eye. With bleeding ears, twisting gut, and seared flanks, not to mention the throbbing pain throughout his entire body, he feels more confident than ever! Breathing out a sigh from his nostrils, he looks down at the stallion. “My name is Rohan, of the World’s Edge—I believe I’ve seen you there before?” He squints his eyes against the sun’s light, cursing its brightness.


notes; Yay muse!
“Speech.”

rohan

A rumbling, masculine voice breaks through his painful haze. He ceases his rolling and immediately rights himself, lying sternally on among the purple blooms. Creased eyes look up— far up, as it is a tall stallion approaching him. It is an unfamiliar sensation, for the elephant rarely has to look up to see someone.

A lopsided smile crosses his broad, dirt-stained face at the man’s words. “I’ve looked better, I can’t deny it,” he started to chuckle, but the rumbling sound was too painful to finish. Instead he studied the stallion- a striking beast who seemed vaguely familiar. His banding was similar to his own, but he had handsome antlers and feathering on his ventrum. He was also much more golden than the elephant’s silver buckskin.

A short, low groan escapes him as he lurches awkwardly to his feet— sending his gut back into spasms and his head back into pounding. The motion sends a wave of blood from his ears, which he pins flush with his skull against the pain. Tenderly he settles his weight, favoring his twisted right knee. He takes stock of the rest of his injuries: scabbing bite wound from the wolf god on his withers, a burn on his haunches from friendly fire, and a lingering stiffness in his right side from sparring with Nyx. Damn.

His eyes sweep to Rohan as he finishes introducing himself, now looking slightly down to the stallion. Taking in his awkward stance that favors his hind end, he grins outright, “We’re a right sad lot.” His eyes sweep once, looking for shade against the blasted brightness, but finds a tree too far away— with strangely upturned soil at its base. But the mammoth pays this no mind- he does not know the sad secret that lies beneath the earth there. Nor does he need to.

“Well met, Rohan. You, too, look familiar. I am Tembovu, Glazier of the Edge. So I hope you’ve seen me there,” his words are an attempt at humor, but it is difficult to manage in this fog of pain. “What got your haunches in the lizard-god battle?” His great horn motions towards the seared flanks of the elk-stud, and he gingerly shifts his weight on his injured knee.

living like we're
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It doesn’t take much to catch the other stallion’s attention. He is quick to sit himself up, thick, twisted horn tilting back as he looks up to meet the Warlander’s eye. Rohan gives a short bark of a chuckle in response to his mention of appearances, too weary and irritable by this blasted headache to do much more of an animated response (his head far too sensitive to do his usual eye roll and rumbling laughter). “You and me both,” the antlered stallion muses, pursing his brown lips almost in a hum of musings. Truly, he is quite confident in his own skin, not doubting his charm or appearance—they’ve proved themselves useful on more than one occasion (because he likes to think positive).

Rohan leans the weight of his body backwards when the stallion heaves suddenly to his feet (he doesn’t envy him of the wave of pain that rushes to his head, judging by his expression), preferring to not physically move his muscles if he doesn’t have to. Fluted ears tilt back leisurely, his green eyes following the hefty beast as he rises—and rises and rises. Now the Warlander has seen a fair amount of massive equines, some perhaps even taller than this one, but whether it’s because it’s been so long, or the slightest case of delirium that clouds his throbbing mind at this point, he finds himself nearly aghast at the stallion’s height. He’s enormous!

“We’re a right sad lot.”

The tiger-striped stallion huffs out a gruff breath, flicking the thick length of his tail around his lower hocks. “And you are a mammoth, my friend. You’re huge,” like the horned stallion’s, Rohan’s voice is meant to be laced with amusement, humor even, though little actually manages to change the inflection of his monotone speech. There’s just too much to focus on…his brain can’t handle it right now, and he’s certainly not going to test it.

The mammoth introduces himself as Tembovu then—which does manage to stir the faintest amount of recognition in the pulsing haze of his mind—although it is the fact that Tembovu recognizes him that catches most of his attention. Really? He wants to question him, somehow amused by the idea. Rohan could be a better herd member, he knows; he hasn’t been around as some of the others, or as involved as they have been—but hey, he could be a lot worse too, right? At least he’s not stirring up trouble somewhere. Not intentionally, anyway (most of the time).

“Aha—yes,” he responds with a hot breath, glancing sourly at his seared flanks, “Its damn blood. Blasted liquid was like acid and had no trouble leaving its mark on me.” The antlered stallion exhales heavily from his nostrils, looking back to Tembovu by the time he’s finished speaking. “Although I’d have to say it’s the least of my troubles at this point,” he closes his eyes in a long blink, clenching his jaw against the throbbing, incessant pain that thrums at the base of his skull, a heavy drum of pain and mockery. The Rift’s final laugh—only he doesn’t find it so funny. Would it have been better for them all if the Gods had just left everything alone?

Not wanting to entertain that particular thought process much more, Rohan opens his eyes a little bit, still narrowed against Tallsun’s blinding heat. “Glazier…is that the one that creates stuff?” He’s still familiarizing himself with Helovia’s ranks, as well as the Edge’s special lingo for everything (although every herd seems to have something of the same nature). “I’m a Huskarl, a warrior,” he pauses, shifting his weight a little bit to keep his hips from aching. “How long have you lived there?”


“Speech.”

rohan

A bark of laughter escaped him as Rohan called him a mammoth, “I prefer elephant,” he winked in humor. The elephant knew he was large, but it always amused him when others addressed it. His laugh sent a few rivulets of blood coursing from his ears, ticking his neck. Thick skin shudders against the irritation, twitching and sending the blood (and dirt) flying to the dry earth.

Gingerly, he nodded his great head as the antlered stag spoke of the lizard’s coldly acidic blood. Indeed, he had seen it burn many on the battlefield. And, indeed, it was the least of their worries currently. The painful cramping through his abdomen and aching head were much more demanding problems.

Ears swing forward from their backward, painful pin as the warrior questions him. “Indeed, it is,” he answers his question about crafting simple, “So, if you’ve any suggested renovations for the Edge, I’m all ears.” A lopsided grin tugged at the corners of his pain-pursed lips. Ears, elephant… heh.

He blinks slowly against the meadow’s harsh sun as Rohan continues to speak, inquiring how long he had been in Helovia. “Not long, a few seasons. Though it feels much longer,” he pauses, thinking, “I nearly chose to be a warrior such as yourself, when I came— though felt it too similar to the life I left behind.” He shares, shifting his weight uncomfortable as another wave of intestinal cramps move through his barrel.

“Yourself?” He returns the warrior’s question.

living like we're
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One of the stallion’s rimmed ears splays to the side when Tembovu mentions elephant, his apparent preference to his size. Bright green eyes appraise his fellow herd mate a short moment, mulling over the idea; personally, he prefers mammoth himself (it seems much a more powerful, proud, and promising title) but he will not argue with the horned stallion. Tembovu isn’t nearly as hairy as himself, after all, which he supposes is the difference between the two massive beasts. “Very well then, elephant,” his brown lips twitch into something of a smirk, quite amused himself with the description (for it can be nothing but fitting).

His skin twitches along the length of his abdomen, and his large head turns as his teeth nip at his agitated gut while Tembovu continues, confirming Rohan’s assumption of his herd rank. The Warlander returns his head slowly to its natural position, not wanting to upset his already throbbing head further, a low hum, a shadow of a chuckle, whispering from his throat. “Well the shattered glass wall is ever so welcoming,” his lips curve into a more genuine, crooked smile for a moment, his voice laced with dry humor, “I’ve mentioned as such to our leaders...I don’t think Torleik was particularly amused.” His smirk deepens in amusement, recalling the black stallion’s passive-aggressive humor.

Rohan has yet to form a solid opinion of the Friesian king, or either of their kings for that matter (not that he’s taken the time to do so). He isn’t particularly fond of the idea of being ruled, remembering only the iron-fisted, harsh authority of his dastardly father. He will not be governed in such a way again. (Why had he joined a herd at all then, you might wonder—why not stay an Outcast?) Perhaps because he had wanted to know, somehow, that not all governments are crumbling. Or perhaps to prove something to himself.

Perhaps, one day, the wilderness will call to him again.

“A few more pretty faces might do us some good too,” the Warlander muses with a roguish smirk and shameless play in his eyes. He does love the ladies, after all, and at least from what he’s experienced thus far, the Edge could use some more elegant touch ups (although the Edge mares that he has met are nothing short of striking). Surely, there can never be too many women around.

Flicking the length of his cream tail around his lower legs, Rohan shifts his weight, grunting a little as the tension in his muscles pulls at the tight, scabbed skin of his flanks. “The same as you, I believe. A few seasons now,” he purses his lips as he considers his answer to Tembovu’s question, wondering if he could say the same; it seems that the time has both been fast and drug out. “I’m afraid I didn’t have much of a life to leave behind. Helovia has tempted me with the mysteries of her wilds, and I have found it difficult to resist,” he gives a gruff chuckle. Of course, he had left behind everything—and everyone. But it is information that he keeps locked away, buried and smothered beneath his guilty pride.


“Speech.”

rohan

He grins, holding back his laughter for the sake of his skull, at Rohan’s remark of the broken glass. Though his grin fades as the man mentions Torliek, “I’ve only met the man a few times— he seems like a pretty serious sort.” he half-agrees with the antlered man’s words.

He shifts as another wave of cramps seize his abdomen. Though he still smiles crookedly as the other man voices his want for more women, “I can’t disagree with you there, good man. I’ve had some luck recruiting at the Threshold, but competition between herds is great.”

He catches the grunt as the stag shifts the charred skin of his haunches, “You might want to get a healer to look at that, when you return home” his deep voice rumbles. Ironically, blood began to flow more freely out of his ears. He sighs in annoyance.

His head cocks slightly and gently as the man continues to answer his questions. “Helovia drew me with it’s whispers of justice. It was rumored that the gods balanced the power— so different from my past life,” he sighs, “Though, after these god-wars, I’m not sure which is better.”

Indeed, so much had been lost in each of the wars. Though the elephant’s words were empty. For he knew, deep in his bones, that Helovia, with it’s wild and raw power, was infinitely better than his homelands.

A wave of pain in his abdomen nearly buckles his haunches, stealing a deep groan from his throat. “A cure for this sickness can’t come soon enough,” he grumbles. “Though I think I’d rather have this than the black lung,” he thinks aloud, “Those poor souls were so ill,” he thinks back to Rexanna nearly attacking him. Then he chuckles softly, “It’s a sad day when we speak of diseased we’d rather be infected with.”

living like we're
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The Warlander nods absentmindedly at the talk of their black king, not desiring to say much more on the matter. He doesn’t know Torleik very well himself, has only crossed him less than a handful of times, but Rohan doesn’t need much more than that. He fears that the Friesian is like his father—commanding, relentless, solemn, and cruel—and while his heart flares indignantly against his king because of this, there’s some small part of him that begs for Torleik to, somehow, change his mind. He had slipped away from his father’s rule for a reason…he’ll be damned if he returns to it.

His gaze having wandered with his thoughts, Rohan looks back to Tembovu when he continues, mentioning the Threshold. A gruff breath escapes the antlered stallion. “Indeed,” he muses, remembering his own Threshold experience—three of the four herds had come to him, begging,   imploring, and recruiting. What an emotionless word to use when proposing shelter to those who might want it—is it not a home they are offering, rather than a fortress? It’s like starving wolves with a piece of meat (he has since then largely avoided the forested place, only stumbling upon it once or twice).

Repressing a weighted sigh, the Warlander shifts his weight, turning around slowly to bite at his agitated abdomen, his eyes lingering on his scorched flanks when they are pointed out. “I intend to,” he concedes with a heavy breath. He has yet to meet any of Edge’s healers, knowing only the little brown Mender from the Basin—if his own herd is so lucky to have such beauties, he would not waste another moment searching them out.

A smirk flickering across his brown lips at the thought, Rohan allows silence to fall between the two stallions before he speaks, reflecting over his words and choosing them carefully—wary to reveal anything significant. Ever a man with his secrets, ever full of mysteries. “The Gods weren’t much of an influence where I’m from—each kingdom was left to their own devices. I haven’t learned enough about these Helovian Gods to form a proper opinion,” he presses his lips together, partly agreeing with Tembovu’s statement, although there isn’t a doubt in his mind between Helovia and Etherim. As dark as Helovia might get, he would leap into the seas before returning to his homeland.

“They don’t seem much different than the rest of us, though—imperfect, reckless, proud,” he chuckles dryly, his brow furrowing in displeasure when the motion intensifies the throbbing through his head. If they aren’t so different from the Gods themselves, then—what is it that makes a God a God? Did they just proclaim themselves one day? Gain eternal life and then staked their claim?

Rohan doesn’t linger for long on these thoughts, not much of the philosophical type, especially with the pain that sears through every inch of his body. Smirking when Tembovu mentions diseases, he lifts his head in amusement at the irony of it all (which is certainly anything but funny, more like horrific or terrible, but it isn’t him to dwell on it like that). “I didn’t have much experience with the black lung, but I did suffer from the Bloodfalls Boils myself…those were a bitch,” he shakes his head, remembering the bloody pustules. He pauses, breathing deeply. “Is it all worth it, do you think?” The question is almost rhetorical, not searching for any real answer as it slips unbidden from his tongue, his expression sobering slightly.


notes; I'm sorry I've been tagging Temb in every reply! I just saw your signature xD
“Speech.”

rohan

A silence stretched between the two ailing stallions as the antlered man becomes choosy with his words. The elephant glances at him out of the corner of his eye for a moment, trying to decipher if he was being duplicitous or secretive. The man didn't seem the deceitful sort; he seemed more of a brutally honest stallion. Then he spoke sparsely of his home, as Tembovu had of his own. He understood, for there was little need to open past baggage— it was bad enough lugging it around everywhere.

A slight smile crosses his face at Rohan’s criticisms of the gods, “Take care with your words, my friend. They might smite you with a worse fate than this sickness.” He grinned in amusement at his jest, for certainly the gods currently had greater dilemmas with the Rift than two sick stallions bemoaning their injuries.

He chuckled at the antlered man’s mention of the Boils— those had seem nasty when he saw them on Mauja. And even worse, Nuray. They had leapt across her naked skin, the pustules painfully ugly. “I am certainly glad I missed those,” his low voice rumbles with truth.

At the next question from the shaggy man, Tembovu’s face swings full to his comrade in ailment. One ear flicks forward, listening, while the other stays tilted back against the cacophony of sound the bugs, water, and nature make. It punishes the skull, truly.

His head tilts, for the first time seriously contemplating an idea in this light-hearted conversation of bachelors. His deep, expressive eyes study Rohan’s bright green ones. Thinking hurt his inflamed brain, but it took his mind off the painful gut spasms for a few moments.

Was it worth it? Was the destruction, injury, illness, and death worth gaining new territories to Helovia? “It is not worth the increase in territory, no,” he says deeply, firmly. For he had come from a land of increasing borders at the cost of lives. “But it’s worth it to those poor devils stuck in the Rift with greedy, vicious gods. To them, Helovia must seem… like a lifeline,” there was more truth to these words than he let on. The mammoth could justify the fall of a nation if it was inherently corrupt. He had justified it.

Discomfort made him shift again, “Do you?” he paused, realizing that his question made little sense, “Do you think it’s worth it?”

living like we're
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The Warlander rolls his eyes playfully when the larger stallion jests about the fury of the gods, ignoring the pressure pain in his skull when he does so, and hardly suppressing a bark of laughter. He cares little for the opinions of deities at this point, too proud to allow mere strangers to have such a hold on his mighty heart. Let them think what they must, if they give him no reason to change his own judgements. “I suppose I should be flattered, if they consider my opinion worthy enough to do so,” he laughs more freely now, a glimmering spark flashing through the green of his eyes.

However, when the jesting of wrathful gods and their wretched diseases fades into silence, a seriousness settles in its wake. Rohan can tell by his expression that Tembovu is truly contemplating his question, which had meant to be nothing more than an off-handed musing of an ornery stallion. The Warlander shifts his weight uncomfortably, not in any rush to usher words from the other one’s mouth.

Rohan does not do well in solemn matters. He prefers to think of more fantastical and wilder places, where the black shadows of cruelty and injustice cannot penetrate. Of course, he finds himself swathed in their punishing embrace far too often, too young and proud now to catch himself in time.

With the pursing of brown, weary lips, he ponders shortly on Tembovu’s words. He does not possess the same compassion as the elder male, having survived an invasion before, while the pieces of his brother had not. Rohan can’t help but feel the same rejection towards these newcomers, but he is not a monster (despite what he might tell himself some days). He does not call for their blood just yet, allowing them a chance to prove themselves different from the beasts of his memories.

His attention rousing from his thoughts when the query is directed back to him, the Warlander lets slip a shadowing smirk. “That’s a question I’m still asking myself, my friend,” he shakes his head, gritting his teeth and exhaling against the painful weight of his antlers. “I have yet to acquaint myself with any of these ‘poor devils’ from the Rift. Part of me pities them, while the other half of me curses their foreign diseases,” Rohan’s smirk deepens, his pale tail lashing around his flanks, the long hairs biting at his tender skin. Of course, he supposes that they already face dangers within Helovia, from each other. Still, he remains mildly wary, a lingering fear escaping him in a heavy breath, “Let’s just hope they don’t turn out to be anything like their gods.”


notes; I'm so sorry for the wait!
“Speech.”

rohan

An ear swivels from towards the antlered man to catch his words, which voiced an opinion different from his own. Though the giant could appreciate his point of view, for this particular illness was rather painful. Though, to the elephant, it was just and right to rescue the lands from the reign of viciously greedy gods. So, no matter the cost or illness or disposition of the Riftians, it was good to have extricated them from their diseased realm.

“I think they’re better off from our help—” his response to the Wallander comes from between gritted teeth as his gut gave a particularly painful spasm, “— than from our pity.” His eyes narrow as he fights the buckling urge of his knees to drop and roll against the severe colic in his abdomen. His ears tilt back further as a low, painful breath whistles from his clenched jaw.

“Let’s just hope they don’t turn out to be anything like their gods.”

The words, though perhaps spoken in lightheartedness judging by the smirk on Rohan’s face, weighed heavily and ominously in the silence that fell between the two sick stallions. Shifting more urgently, as his bowel began to warn him of an impending, massive, and particularly disgusting movement, he forced a thin grin and glanced at the man, “I’m certain Helovians would rise to the challenge, if that is the case.”

Glancing around, his thin smile grow apologetic, “My good man, it’s been a pleasure, but you’ll have to excuse me. This awful illness calls, and I don’t think you want to be witness to it. I’ll see you around the Edge.” With his thick hide twitching in pain over his abdomen, he begins to stiffly walk towards the edges of the meadow to unload his bowls in private.