i am a leaf on the wind

It’s a strange feeling, having absolutely nothing to do. And in truth, she doesn’t like it. Yes, she enjoys wandering the forest here and she did in Morham. But in Morhan, wandering the forest was a respite from sitting in court, from greeting emissaries and being courted by princes and sons of other high-ranking horses.  She really doesn’t miss that last part. Actually, she doesn’t miss most of it. But she misses having a purpose. Even if her purpose before was all rather superfluous, more for show and alliances than anything else. Second in line for the throne didn’t mean much, but still, it had been something.

 
Here she wandered the forest day in and day out. She’s been out of the forest too, into the green fields that lead to the cliff. But it’s too cold lately to spend much time out there, and she sticks to the shelter of the trees. Her black coat has grown thick and, if you ask her, a bit scraggly, though it does keep her warm. But still, the winds near the cliff can be bitter, like today, and she prefers the trees.
 
Though with the amount of time she’s spent in the forest, she’s beginning to feel like she’s going in circles. Well, she is going in circles, but at least for a while it kept feeling new as she learned her way around. Now she knows the place at least reasonably well, and wandering about is less thrilling than it had been at first. She’d gone out into the wilds a handful of times as well, but with winter in full swing, she didn’t like taking to the sky or getting lost in places she still wasn’t familiar with. Freezing to death wasn’t high on her list of things to do.
 
So today she’s hoping maybe she can run into someone. Hopefully learn a bit more about the Edge and what she can do to help here. Tembovu had mentioned vocations, but had been pulled away by more pressing business before he could tell her all the things she didn’t know. Which really, was just about everything. She was more of a burden to everyone around her than she liked, not even knowing what she didn’t know. That would change, certainly, but she wanted it to change sooner rather than later.

watch how i soar.

lyanna

i am a leaf on the wind

It turns out, that despite the cold, someone else is out wandering in the forest too. Lyanna’s never seen the mare that approaches her, but she’s also not surprised that the other is a total stranger. There’s evidence of plenty of horses within the Edge, after all. All sorts of smells and trails and myriad of flashing colors in the trees now and again. Lyanna’s simply never actually met any of them. This is, of course, a byproduct of being woefully new, and woefully uninformed about absolutely everything. 

The mare that finds her is pale where Lyanna is dark, though their manes are both white and blue. The girl’s wings are more truly bird-like than Lyanna’s as well, their coloring far more natural than her own tri-colored wings. She smiles at the ice breaker comment that the other mares offers, and the smile is easy and genuine. “That you do,” she says pleasantly. Lyanna doesn’t really have a particular strand of hair to move forward in response, but there’s so much teal in her mane that it’s rather hard to miss. 
 
“I’m Lyanna,” she offers after a moment. The wind blows again, and the branches and the trees rustle with the cold winter wind. Lyanna tucks her wings tighter to her side, trying to block the chill that creeps into her bones with that wind. She doesn’t really want to know what it’s like outside the shelter of the trees. “Any chance there are warmer places to hide around here?” She asks, not even really knowing where to begin. 

watch how i soar.

lyanna

i am a leaf on the wind

Auriel, in a small way, might have reminded Lyanna of her sister, if she had known the girl was a princess. Corbin had been the first in line for the throne, and groomed to perfect because of it. Then Lyanna, and while she was given some freedom, still, much of her time was spent learning to walk with her head held high and speak with polite sophistication. Not that anyone had ever expected something to happen to Corbin (how could anyone harm the boy the wielded fire?). But still, Lyanna’s roll in the kingdom had to matter, at least enough, because she would have been married off to some prince or other noble horse’s son. All for political gain, certainly.

 
But Adelene? Ah, Adelene had been the spoiled, youngest child. Yes, she would be married off too. But it had been such a distant future for the girl, and her parents couldn’t seem to help themselves but give in to the girl’s every whim. Not that Auriel had that spoiled attitude that Adelene did, but rather, that each girl had more personality than Corbin or Lyanna ever did. It was a good thing for them, in truth, to be allowed to be something more than pretty words and politics.
 
“It’s a pleasure to meet you,” Lyanna says when the girl gives her name. She files it away, trying to learn the names of everyone she calls a herd mate now. So similar to Auriel, though of course, Lyanna doesn’t know this either. Though she also notices the smoke around the girl’s lips as she speaks, and since she’s no longer anyone of importance at all in this life, Lyanna’s becoming a little more bold with her questions. Though only a little. She’s always still terribly polite about it. “Smoke? Do you mind if I ask about that?”
 
The answer to Lyanna’s next question is no. It’s not a surprising answer, really. Lyanna’s spent so much time wandering this kingdom, and she hadn’t actually found anything else. But still, she’d been hoping maybe she’d just missed something. No such luck.  “It might be a little pathetic of me to ask, but lacking in what? If you can’t tell, Helovia is a whole new place to me. There were no crafters where I came from.” She has no idea what the other herd lands have here. She only knows there’s a broken wall of glass around the kingdom, but little more than that. 

watch how i soar.

lyanna

i am a leaf on the wind

The girl is fun and easy to talk to. Like so many in the Edge, conversation is easy, and Lyanna finds herself glad she’d made the choice she had. She knows it’s hardly the end all choice of her life. So many that she’d spoken to had lived in more than one place, and perhaps, one day, the Edge will no longer be home. But she can’t even begin to think on that now. It is still hard to remember that Morham isn’t home. She doesn’t want to dream of a life in which she makes yet more home changes. And perhaps, she won’t. Perhaps she’ll simply stay here. It is an option, and one that she finds tempting.

 
Having her entire life ripped from her and her home snatched away once was enough. Not that the future is really in her hands. Anything could happen. She knows this, perhaps better than most. Who ever would have thought she’d end up here? Who ever would have believed that Morham would fall to a handful of rebels? But they planned so well, and not even the royal spies heard a rumor on the wind.
 
Yes, anything can happen. No, she’s not really thinking on that one too hard.
 
“Ah, magic, at least, I am somewhat familiar with,” she says as Auriel explains her skills, ears pricked to listen. Magic here was somewhat different than Morham, seeming to span so many variations. In Morham, it was rather elemental. Control of a certain element and usually all that power entailed, powers growing stronger with practice. Here, everyone seems to have something very unique to them. “Remind me to stay on your good side,” she says, with a playful gleam in her eye. Yes, she might be a well-manicured Princess most of the time, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t be a little playful too.
 
The mare shared so easily, that Lyanna feels like she should offer something in return. She hasn’t avoided speaking of Morham necessarily, she’s simply avoided the parts where her family was completely dead and her home in the hands of usurpers. “In Morham, I could control the wind.” If she were human, she’d twirl around with her arms wide as if to demonstrate this. But as it is, she can’t twirl all that well, and blatantly refuses to pull her wings from her side. It’s too damn cold to do that. “Until I came here, of course,” she says, managing to sound less sad about that fact than she actually is. Not that she’s terribly sad about a lack of power, but rather, it’s just one more thing that was ripped away from her.
 
Auriel goes on to explain some of the different things the other herds have, and again, Lyanna listens with interest. Learning and understanding her knew home was the only way she was ever going to make it here. And she had to make it here. There was nowhere else for her to go, after all. “I did notice all the holes in that wall.” But Auriel’s confidence seems so sure (perhaps it is the confidence of a child, or perhaps because she knows enough about the Edge’s crafters to be certain), that Lyanna doesn’t doubt her words. Tembovu didn’t seem like one to mess around either, and she suspects he will do well by the Edge. “It seems like there are things to look forward to around here then. Do you mind if I ask what you do here?” 

watch how i soar.

lyanna

i am a leaf on the wind

There’s a brief flash of mischief on Auriel’s lips, her eyes sparkling with life. At exactly what, Lyanna doesn’t know, but it feels like she might have a friend here. The moment is gone quickly, but it doesn’t make Lyanna feel any less like she might be alright here. Perhaps she just clings to everything she possibly can, finding hope in even the smallest of things. But even if that’s the case, it’s been working for her. Mostly, the sorrow doesn’t consume. Mostly, it is easy to smile and feel like herself. Mostly, she’s okay.

And that, at least, is certainly something.

That’s incredible. I’m sure you’ll be able to get it back, she says. The thought makes Lyanna’s heart soar. Even just a bit of it back would be something. Perhaps it would truly make her feel like herself again, to call the wind to her side once more. Perhaps she’d never be able to call a tornado down from the sky again, but then again, how often would she ever want to do that anyway? Destruction wasn’t much her thing, after all. “I hope so,” she says with a soft smile.

The smile falls at the next question though. She doesn’t mind answering. The question was inevitable, after all, for she talked of her home enough to invite it. But still, it wasn’t something she’d really voiced aloud. Even her sister and her and avoided the conversation as much as possible as they fled. It felt terribly real when she spoke it, and sometimes she liked to indulge the idea that maybe it was just a terrible dream.

“Morham was ruled by the pegasi. Specifically, by my parents. And though there were otherwise equal opportunities for everyone, unicorns and equines couldn’t rule the kingdom. A small, rather well planned group of rebels murdered my brother while he was serving in the army. Made it look like an accident. When my parents went to investigate, they were murdered as well, plunging the kingdom into chaos. My sister and I escaped, with the help of a few friends, but we couldn’t stay. The teal is a mark of the royal family. We had to go far enough that no one would recognize it, or care if they did. Helovia seems to have provided that.” 

Her voice is quiet, though she tells the story relatively well. Her voice doesn’t really crack, but she does sound somewhat distant from it. Trying not to imagine Corbin and her parents lying in the dirt in their own blood. Trying not to imagine what really happened. Lyanna had seen so little of it, and for that, she was grateful. Though sometimes, her imagination got the best of her. In the end, what did it matter? They were dead, and Lyanna could lose it all and live, or she could die alongside of them. One way or another, she had almost nothing. But at least in one option, she got to live. 

It sucked, but it was an easy choice.

The topic switches back to Auriel, and Lyanna pricks her ears forward, whatever pain that might linger on her face erased, tucked away because it does her so little good to dwell on it. Instead, she listens as Auriel tells her that Elsa is her mother, making the girl a Princess, but also a warrior. “Protecting your kingdom is a very good use of that title, if you ask me.” she says, rather matter of fact. If life in Morham had continued, she would have served her time in the army. After Corbin. But of course, life never got that far.  “Your mother is actually the one who invited me here. I can’t say I know her well, but she seems like a good woman.” 

ooc | no worries! I'm not always the fastest poster myself

watch how i soar.

lyanna