Well apparently it’s going to be a party in the Falls. Probably the most horses in a group that she’s seen around the joint lately except meetings. There were horses in the Falls, after all. She just didn’t necessarily see them much. Largely her own fault, which was just fine by her. She could only handle so much social interaction. Sher (because let’s be real, Syrena was not about to learn this mare’s entire name, it was too many letters all smashed together) asks to see the Falls, and then the Edge. It seems like an entirely reasonable plan to Syrena. Does she hope the mare picks the Falls? Sure, cause they need it. But only if she wants to. The Falls doesn’t need dead weight.

And then Sher is speaking something else, so quietly Syrena almost misses it. Something about missing things, not wanting to miss any more. Ha, go figure. Were Syrena anyone else, she might know what to say here. Certainly, she’s supposed to say something. To ask if she wants to talk about it (what the hell even is it?), to ask if she needs something. But even if Syrena knew what she was supposed to ask, she wasn’t sure she could bring herself to care quite that much. Maybe. But she doesn’t know what to say anyway, so it doesn’t much matter.

She’s grateful when the filly speaks up, though her eyes linger on the flames dancing along the girls back with an energy equal to the girl’s own. Kaida. Stop calling her girl, she thinks to herself. Kaida asks to come, and Syrena rolls her shoulders in something of a shrug. “Sure,” she says, hoping neither Isopia or Ranjiri would mind. If she’s not mistaken, the Edge and the Falls weren’t on the best terms, but she’d avoided all that hubbub and never did learn the details. Whatever it was, the girl (Kaida) seemed like she was probably an incidental party. Besides, it’s not like they’d be learning any great secrets on their trip. Syrena didn’t even have any great secrets.

Kaida manages to come up with a real answer to Sher’s mutterings about missing stuff, and again, Syrena finds herself vaguely grateful. And also a little uncertain how anyone can manage to have so much to say. Useful, apparently correct words. Where the hell did those even come from? But she just moves on, nodding in the direction they’d be heading before turning herself and beginning the trek back. She turns her attention back to the girl for a moment as they walk. “I’d like to see the Edge sometime, if you wouldn’t mind,” she says, because she has not seen it, and it seems like something she should do. How many years has she lived in this hellhole now? And how much of it does she know? The answers were rather disproportionate, and not in a way that was good.

“Do you have any questions?” she asks Sher as they walk, willing to answer, but not wanting to just throw piles of random information at the mare that she may not care about. This, at least, she is not terrible at. Honesty is a skill, mostly because she is too blunt to bother with lying. And in the end, she’s not trying to sway anyone into thinking the Falls is the best. She just figures it’s her job to give them the information, and they can do with it as they please.

She keeps up whatever conversation the other mares want to have as they walk, trying to be polite and useful. It’s strange having others on this walk back with her. No one ever came back to the Falls. Well, Dragomir, but he’d come on her own. Syrena wasn’t sure she could take much credit for that one.

The walk, at least, is relatively short, and it isn’t long before the forests and craggy ruins of a mountain rise in front of them. The place is beautiful. This time of year, the trees glitter like ice sculptures, icicles hanging from their branches with vaguely dangerous points. The pools of water are covered in thin layers of ice, and snow blankets much of the ground. It is not the warmest place in the winter though, with little shelter thanks to the naked trees. But the paths are winding, and much of the herdland can’t be seen from here. There are places to sneak away to, if you can find them. “This is the Falls. It’s a little greener normally.”


les words "chat chat"

Syrena

let the water take me

She would have made the entire walk in silence, because she is far more comfortable in silence than in pleasant conversation. But if nothing else, she knows this would be considered rude. Besides, hadn’t she had her own barrage of questions when she was new here (so long ago now)? Hadn’t she pestered….Essetia, she thinks….with her own questions and then scared the crap out of the mare when she started talking about being a siren. It hadn’t taken her long to learn that even in Helovia, where the strange and awful abounded, she was still seen as a monster. At least by those who hear her tale, hear just what it is she used to be capable of, what she once called food.

Now though? If they thought about it, she was harmless as a damn fly though. It’s not like she could eat flesh (and didn’t even have a taste for it), and she couldn’t eat souls without magic. She didn’t run around killing other horses for no apparent reason. She ate water plants and could make seaweed grow so she never starved. Definitely monstrous.

She tries not to dwell on these things though. Instead, she pretends (mostly) that her past doesn’t exists. She bites her tongue and keeps her mouth shut because she’s no good at conversations anyway, so it all works out just fine in the end. Her creeping dark thoughts are cut short, thankfully, by Sher’s question. She had meant, really, do you have questions about Helovia, the Falls, whatever. She hadn’t even expected that the mare might simply ask about her.

The surprise doesn’t show on her face, though the slow turn of her head and the blink, followed by a short pause, might give some of her surprise away. “I do,” she says, “But I particularly like water, which is why I picked the Falls. There are, obviously, waterfalls, but also many hidden pools and rivers to be found. I stay because I do like it though. It is somewhat quiet and it suits me.” She likes (to the extent she likes much of anyone) the horses in the Falls. She likes being often left alone. She likes her pools. It wasn’t the life she had planned for herself, but it was not terrible as far as second choices went.

They seem to enjoy the scenery, and at that, Syrena realizes she doesn’t know what else to show them. It would probably be helpful if she knew someone well enough around here to be like ‘hey, let me introduce you to so and so’, but she doesn’t, and she doesn’t know if anyone else will join them. Perhaps, given that she’s brought two strangers into their home. But one, hopefully, would decide to call it home. Kaida was a little young to defect from her parents’ home, on the other hand.

The girl brings up the Basin, and Syrena nods, having never thought about it before but realizing the child (Kaida) is right. There are some similarities, from the bit of the Basin she’s seen at the festival. She hadn’t gone for the landscape, though she’s enjoyed that, but rather to learn about the Time God and the history of the Basin. She doesn’t know what the Basin has to offer other than the little she saw though, and she suddenly suspects it must be more than the Falls. They had some prison cells, a half-finished healers hut, and a half finished sensory deprivation room. Ha. They were apparently great at starting stuff. “Would you guys like to lead the way and explore? I’ll answer any questions as you go.” she finally says, figuring just letting them have at it would make up for her lack of anything worthwhile to offer. Which was, truthfully, less to do with the Falls and more to do with the fact she only cared where the pools were. But still.


les words "chat chat"

Syrena

let the water take me

Perhaps she could be good at spinning pretty versions of the truth, or spinning pretty false tales. Certainly, she should be good at these things. That was once what she did. Paint a picture of the world you wanted to live in with the sound of her voice. Painted something so beautiful, so perfect, it was worth dying for. Not that you knew you were about to die, of course. But even if you had known, you would have gone anyway. Such were the tales should could spin. But without the magic behind those stories, what was the point? Where did lies and cleaned-up truths get her? Nowhere. In the end, Sher and Kaida would find the truth for themselves (or whoever she happened to be talking to). So why waste time with lies in the first instance?

The crack of the trees above them, Khairi still in the trees, draws Syrena’s eyes upward briefly. Though not so much out of unease, but out of habit, because she finds herself often scanning the limbs of the trees here for Isopia or Hubris. Hubris was easier to find than their Czarina in those branches. But of course, he was bright and gold, whereas she was black and hidden in her raven form. But they are not there, and it is just the girl’s vulture. He is a creepy bugger though, but she’s grown rather used to that around here.

Sher doesn’t seem entirely sure where to go. Syrena doesn’t blame her, she didn’t know where to go when she first arrived here either. Now, when nothing motivates her, she stays hidden in the storyteller’s pool, her own little sanctuary of a sort. Technically a scared place, but she uses it as a home as well. Her questions come though, and Syrena, in no rush to move anyway, is fine to stay and answer them. “The Falls is ruled by Isopia, the Mountain that Knows, and Ranjiri the Goldenshade.” Not that she’s seen much of the second Czarina, but the girl was new to it, and apparently worthy enough to be appointed by the Earth God. So she figures she must be off doing something that Syrena simply doesn’t see, and truthfully, doesn’t much care to know.

The questions keep coming, and Syrena waits now until Sher finished, Kaida offering an answer to whether or not everyone in Helovia has magic. “Many do not. The Threshold strips everyone of their magic when they first arrive here.” The truth of that particular fact is still bitter in her mouth. Though her voice remains emotionless as she speaks of it, a brief flicker of sorrow and crashing waves flickers across her features momentarily. “There do seem to be ways to get magic though, even for those without it originally.” Often strange things, sometimes dangerous things, sometimes completely harmless things. Helovia was impossible to predict.

“As you see, I turn colors, and I don’t control that either.” she says, ocean eyes glancing at Kaida. “It’s always an ice breaker at parties,” she adds, and the deadpan sound of her voice here is almost comical. Syrena, at parties. Clearly she was the life of them and all. “As for jobs,” she continues, her attention shifting mostly to Sher, though glancing now and again to Kiada in case the girl has things to add. “We have warriors, healers, crafters, sleuths, and storyteller’s. I’m the Storyteller here, so my job is to talk to with the Earth God and relay his messages to our Czarnia’s, and to collect the stories of the Hidden Falls and Helovia. Each herd has a Storyteller, though they go by different titles, and each herd has a different patron God.” She falls silent, knowing there are many follow up questions to that. What Gods do each herd follow? What does that mean exactly? Somedays she didn’t entirely know. But at the moment, it feels as though she’s dumped enough information on Sher, and so she doesn’t add more.

“I can show you my favorite waterfall?” she offers, figuring she can lead if they would prefer.


les words "chat chat"

Syrena

let the water take me