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Rikyn the Puppeteer Posts: 549
Aurora Basin Lord atk: 7.5 | def: 11.5 | dam: 4.5
Stallion :: Unicorn :: 16.3 :: 4 HP: 70 | Buff: SWIFT
Duir :: Royal Cerndyr :: Earth Spirit Bunnie
#1
Rikyn

"Sia," I answer as I turn, the feminine voice which greets me rising from the memories lying in the warm shallows of youth.  Duir lifts his ears to catch the sound, eyes nervously following the turn of my own from where he stands by my flank, on the side opposite to her approach.  The blue dipped mare is a familiar sight, a good one, and I greet her with a signature smile of greeting:  welcoming, vibrant, and swift.
 
My buck enjoys these meetings, with those who inspire such good sensations in my heart, rather than jealous or hateful tightening.  They seem to be few and far between, and mostly female, however.  As the memories of the champagne woman trickle in, he observes with interest, particularly the image of two children, far too small to be wandering, on the borders of a vast, desert realm, viewed through the eyes of none other than yours truly.  Though she exists in other places in my mind, the most poignant memory of her is the faint smile of knowing, while she had let a little boy and his dearest loves dream of being more than children; that playful, patient kindness becomes who Sikeax is, to my nearly grown fawn, his forest eyes seeing her with a familiarity now that had been absent on her first approach.  Peering around my chest, he smells hesitantly at the air between she, and I.
 
"I’ve been well enough," I answer, not yet aware of the tidings this holiday season truly means to bring me, "and how do you fare?"
 
Looking about for her absent brat, and finding the shape-shifter about no where, an ear flicks back, golden gaze seeking him out, and finding him making his way to the tree.  The last I’d met with Sia, that cretin had earned my contempt, and she had earned the smallest bit of condemnation from me, for not keeping her companion under control.
 
Duir’s quick snort, however, as he retracts his gaze back behind my shoulder, to continue watching the tree (and eavesdropping on my thoughts), speaks volumes of how little I can talk of controlling one’s bonded.
 
"I hope also you’ve had better luck with that thing," I say, not particularly ashamed of my dislike of the creature, and unwilling to withhold my opinions for Sikeax’s sake.  Besides, if someone doesn’t tell her he’s awful, who will?  

 [ OOC: Set as Helovia gathers about the Giving Tree, after Magic Day, for those interested! I'M AN IDIOT AND NEVER TAGGED YOU ]

 
 
Coding by Tamme - Image by Dingo

@Sikeax

Wishlist - Plots

Force/violence is allowed to be used on Rikyn permitted it does not permanently maim or kill him (PM me!).

Sikeax the Sea Soul Posts: 355
Outcast atk: 4 | def: 9 | dam: 6
Mare :: Hybrid :: 16 hh :: 5 years HP: 64.5 | Buff: NOVICE
Hobgoblin :: Common Rougarou :: Water & Seoul :: Plain White Dragon :: Toxic Breath Zuno
#2
into the sea, you and me
all these years, and no one heard
i love you, let's go


She blossoms in the nickname, slipping a smile across her lips with little hesitation. Comfort bubbles up at the sight of his own, and any worry over their last meeting is lost. Hobgoblin only takes note long enough to scuff at her feelings.
“Dumbass.”
His hatred of him burns a hole in her that she quickly works to beat the flame away. Please don’t. I’ve really missed him.
Well, Hobgoblin really misses the feeling of her crown and the power that comes with it, the bounty of the Dragon’s Throat that keeps his stomach full, but not everyone can have what they want, can they? In the crowd, a scowl rips over his face and she winces in the mental backlash of it.
You’ve got to understand that it was for the bes-
Silence lets her know that it isn’t worth it. Hobgoblin has already darted up the tree and is fast to receive a gift, one meant for both of them, but she doesn’t have very much want for it in this very moment.
It ends with a sigh and the search for Rikyn’s shoulder, reaching out with her muzzle ready to take in his scent and the comfort of his companionship. More of it pours in with the promise of good fortune. There isn’t a reason in this world that she could think of for him to suffer, but Hobgoblin begs to differ.
Stop.
Laughter beats her up and she lets it.
“You weak. Crown need strong. You not deserve. Hobgoblin deserve.”
He asks her how she has been and all she can manage to feel is the desperate need to bury herself in him, to weep out her sorrows and let him know that the world is cruel, that she feels as if there is little to live for these days and that possibly the whole of Helovia would fare better without her because since when does it failed Sultanas?
Instead, she does the opposite. Her body pulls as far away from him that she can manage to have without making it look like she is running, aching in her disappointment and drowning in her sorrows.
“I’m glad to hear.” She halfway lies as she follows his eyes, staring into the crowd but not sure what to lock onto. “I wish I could say the same myself, though.”
The tongue in her mouth catches itself as Hobgoblin returns, amulets strung up in his antlers, pausing only briefly to stare in the direction of the man and his companion. A moment is spared in thinking before being thrown to the wind.
“Hate bond but bond?”
I don’t think he’s against bonding, just how you acted.
“Get over.”

Hard eyes only succeed in enjoying his need to spite her. If Rikyn doesn’t like him, then he could care less, or he would had if he actually did.
But she can’t help herself from feeling some sort of contempt towards him for it. Ears sink like rocks thrown from a cliff edge and the look previously intended for Hobgoblin is handed over to Rikyn.
“Hobgoblin is not a thing, and I’d prefer that you not call him that. As for luck, there’s no such thing as luck with him.” The words snap out of her before she has a chance to figure out what she’s saying, and now that they catch up with her, she can’t help but feel the pounding of regret.
Fuck, unintentionally thrown out to the void where Hobgoblin cackles.

OOC: ITS OKAY I'M RIDICULOUSLY SLOW SO IT'S NOT LIKE IT CHANGED ANYTHING.
Hobgoblin comes back in his Wendigo form with Sia's giving tree's prize(three amulets) hanging in his antlers.

lunarblues!

@Rikyn


you were angels,
so much more than everything

:: please tag me
:: minor force and power play allowed


Rikyn the Puppeteer Posts: 549
Aurora Basin Lord atk: 7.5 | def: 11.5 | dam: 4.5
Stallion :: Unicorn :: 16.3 :: 4 HP: 70 | Buff: SWIFT
Duir :: Royal Cerndyr :: Earth Spirit Bunnie
#3
Rikyn
I don’t like that Sikeax is having a rough time of things, my expression softening, hooves angling me towards her, though she turns away. I will never understand women, how they allude to their hollows, and then swiftly hide them, as if one should go burrowing beneath all those layers to try and find the hole again. The worst part was when you found the hole, but fell into it, rather than safely inspecting it…

So I take my time, thinking about my next words carefully, because there is a god damned emotional pitfall around here somewhere, and it’s not going to get me.

Good luck, smugly remarks Duir, having seen enough of my verbal game to be highly dubious of this moment having any outcome other than it degrading into a shouting match, or worse. Even with my memories of her being pleasant, my buck is almost sure that any person can only spend so much time with me, before they’ve had enough, and begin to shout insults, rather than sense.

"Has something happened to the Throat?" I ask, because of all the things in Helovia, I don’t know much about the south. It’s the land of my sister, and her father, the Sun, and sat at the foot of the realm where I’d almost died for the very first time; though I pretend like I avoid it for hate of the heat, there are much deeper, psychological reasons I’d rather not get caught out in the sand.

Blissfully ignorant, most days, but, today, I regret my lack of information about the place.

Snorting, then, when she tells me to not insult her horrid rat of a companion, I feel my lips smirk up as she simultaneously claims him unchanged. My kind friend has little capacity for punishing that which deserves it, I am learning, over time, and I wonder why it is that fate had been so cruel to her, and so kind to me; despite our differences, Duir is very important to me. His company, and noble perspective, while aggravating beyond all measure on many days, also has its moments of salvation – such as now.

Don’t be a dick, he tells me, quite flatly, having noticed a bit more about the morose desert mare than I have, namely that she seems to withdraw into herself after she speaks. Looking at her now, really looking at her, I can see it, but I’d certainly not have if not for my cerndyr’s compassionate heart, and interference. Though I’m still a bit too much of an asshole for my own good, what comes out of my mouth is certainly better than what would have, had he not jumped in.

"He is unkind to you," I tell her, instead of retorting with “things are hard to train, after all,” (as I had initially plotted), "your bonded or not, you hurt my friends, and we have issues. If you wish me to be kinder to the cretin, gain rule over him, or I’ll call the beast what I want."






Coding by Tamme - Image by Dingo

@Sikeax

Wishlist - Plots

Force/violence is allowed to be used on Rikyn permitted it does not permanently maim or kill him (PM me!).

Sikeax the Sea Soul Posts: 355
Outcast atk: 4 | def: 9 | dam: 6
Mare :: Hybrid :: 16 hh :: 5 years HP: 64.5 | Buff: NOVICE
Hobgoblin :: Common Rougarou :: Water & Seoul :: Plain White Dragon :: Toxic Breath Zuno
#4
into the sea, you and me
all these years, and no one heard
i love you, let's go


If she had caught his softened gaze, then maybe she would have dove for the dying gasps of air that she believes their friendship is breathing. There aren’t many left for her these days, and the list of those that she believes will willingly speak to her without fear of shame feels far longer than the previous. It’s almost as if that it has been so long since that she has felt the comfort of love and companionship that she has forgotten that in some places it still does exist, she just needs to find the courage to look.
So, staring off into the blur of bodies and looking for something, anything, Hobgoblin, she misses it all.
He asks the question that haunts her without pause, and she scolds herself for not expecting it. Of course anyone would like to know the story of how she fucked up the entirety of the Dragon’s Throat, left behind three of her children, lost one, seemingly killed one of the most cherished people in this land, and managed to become Sultana and lose it all in just a few brief seasons. It’s definitely one for a hell of a Shakespearean play.
But nothing is telling her that she should hide it from him. Never has she thought of him as a demon, one that would turn against her and seek to destroy her further. Their memories are ones that bloom happiness and brought joy to her when the night was too dark to see in.
Maybe he’s the only one she can trust these days, all for his ignorance.
She’s got to fall before the words can come out of her mouth. The great pillars of her city named Pride that was already in ruins come crashing down, the dust buries the world around it and engulfs it until there is nothing left of it, and in the middle of it, she sits with her palms cupping her eyes as waterfalls slowly begin to pour.
Outside, she’s unsettlingly calm. Hobgoblin pops! once and she feels the cool rush of invisible water rush over her twice as he turns back around, wiggling out of sight as if he needs to resituate himself back into his skin the proper way. There are no tears streaming down her cheeks to wash the last of the blood-coloured sand away, none brewing at the gates of her eyelashes. The only real thing that could be caught onto before her epic is told is the heavy heave of her chest as the scared and scarred hands of her lungs reach out into the world to grab the breath they need to give her the bravery to do this.
Her eyes are actually a tad bit damp then, but no waterfalls or rising flood waters. They look like rain in blue skies when there is not a cloud in sight.
“Gaucho, the Sultan, he died, and I couldn’t do a thing to stop it.” She says this first sentence with such sorrow in her voice that it is almost monotone with the weight. A sinking ship that has accepted its fate after all of the stages of acceptance and grief have come to pass. “I don’t know if I ever told you, but when we first met, I was only in the Dragon’s Throat because I wanted to be a healer and the leader then, a single-winged Pegasus named Africa, was a dear friend and had offered me an apprenticeship beneath the Sun Physician at the time. Yea, well, I did that, and when I had found I had a knack for it, I got the chance to become the Sun Physician.”
Hobgoblin steps in with their gifts now and turns to her with a look of confusion, quiet. Sikeax doesn’t even offer him an acknowledging turn of the eye.
“Bitch.” He thinks for a second as she continues, not doing what he would have liked.
“I did it. I did that for years, and didn’t have a single problem with it. But Gaucho, he started dying. I can’t stress the dying part more. I don’t want to say that men like him don’t stay dying like that, but oh god Ryn, His nickname on her lips is like the foam on ocean waves as they roll up on the beaches. It fits perfectly, and she wonders why she cut herself from it mere minutes before. “you can’t stop death like that. He wasn’t even fucking human when he came to me. It was like his brain gave up and his body decided that there wasn’t much to do without it.”
She softens until she is barely anything more than a cloud, head hanging low at the memory of his sweat-soaked body, gasping for air and blue eyes darkened by the storm of his illness. Her gaze continues to run to wherever safety is: straight into his direction, only visible by the movement of her eyes in their sockets.
“It’s not like I didn’t try to save him, though. I’ve got to admit that now, looking back, it was kinda naive of me to think that I could when he was obviously so far gone, but it’s hard to tell when you’ve never had someone die on you before where the line between keeping going and letting them go on their own is.”
Her lips curl into her mouth and the corners of them ache. “I let him die alone. He didn’t deserve that, I don’t think anyone does, definitely someone as great as him, and yet I still did it. And you know what I got in return?” She lets him have a brief pause to voice any thought he might have had about that, about what he expected her to receive. She bets he won’t hit the jackpot though. “The Sun God came and made me fucking Sultana before his corpse while the herd I considered my family either screamed at me for not saving him or accused me of killing him myself. A few pledged themselves to me, but I got scared. I asked a friend of mine, Volterra,” Rage explodes like a fireball in the back of her chest and burns a hole deep into the pit of her very core.
“SKULLFACE FAIL YOU. SKULLFACE REASON WHY NO LONGER CROWN.”
His voice bellows through the caves of her mind and she finds herself in the deepest hollow of them all, curled up in a ball, quivering, with no strength to fight back. All she can do is hope that someday Hobgoblin will accept the crown wasn't fitting, the people unwelcoming, and her throne built of thorns.
“to take up the Gladiator position in the herd, and to help me when I needed him. He was my crutch, and when I couldn’t keep myself up to uphold my crown when my so-called family hated me so much, they went after me and him when he had done nothing wrong other than be a potential barrier to me losing the crown.
“So, I did what I thought was best for me, and I didn’t fight. A whore who believed Gaucho’s decaying cock and their bastard sons was her right to the throne, and I didn’t care enough to even think about whether or not she had that right. I just let her have it.”

An outward laugh makes a weird escape. It isn’t meant in humor, more so in the context that she can turn around and laugh at the shambles of what she has done.
Even now, the Throat is not faring any better, but that’s not her problem anymore.
“I haven’t spent much time there since, and I think I’m going to be leaving when I can say my goodbyes to those there that still matter.”
Hobgoblin scuffs and the jagged stone edges of her eyes bring no change in his demeanor. Only a raise of the head and a tilt, sticking his nose into the air in defiance. A frown slithers over her face at both Rikyn’s snort and smirk, and Hobgoblin’s attitude.
And while his reasoning does soften her feelings towards his towards Hobgoblin, it doesn’t silence them completely.
“He has a lot of reasons to be.” Surprise bursts in her like a distant supernova, not catching the jerk in Hobgoblin’s ghastly body as he catches her say it in the calmest of tones. “When we first bonded, I was still fairly low in my view of myself, and Hobgoblin is…”
She has to pause for a few seconds to figure out a way to describe how he is, rolling the dull edges of her teeth along the back of her lips as she does so.
“very high in his view of himself, but not in a bad way. He’s very brave and doesn’t think twice on doing what he thinks is right and what he wants to do. It’s something I can respect him for, but not all the time.”
She gives him a quick look, watching as Hobgoblin stares at her with almost awe and most definitely confusion.
But last of all, “He also reminds me of my son in a lot of ways, but not in the bad, destructive ways. I guess I could even say he was my first child. I raised him from birth, was patient with him like I was with my other children, and he became who he intended to be with my guidance when it was needed.”
Rikyn’s golden gaze is hunted down with almost a predator’s craving. “Children aren’t born to be controlled, and I refuse to believe that I should do the same with him.” A passing glance is exchanged for a study of his own companion, taking in the sight of the rather large deer.
“Do you do the same with him?”

lunarblues!

@Rikyn


you were angels,
so much more than everything

:: please tag me
:: minor force and power play allowed


Rikyn the Puppeteer Posts: 549
Aurora Basin Lord atk: 7.5 | def: 11.5 | dam: 4.5
Stallion :: Unicorn :: 16.3 :: 4 HP: 70 | Buff: SWIFT
Duir :: Royal Cerndyr :: Earth Spirit Bunnie
#5
Rikyn
I don’t open like she does, I decide, watching her, at first, as she pulls into herself, tightening, like a night blooming flower in sight of the Sun. Eventually, though, all that heaviness seems to slowly chip and flake away from her, her tears a steady trek down her face that she ignores, or does not notice, and when she sobs, I gently reach out to touch her shoulder. Pulling away when she starts to speak, numbly taking in the emotional display and revelation of my friend’s recently passed months.

The Wildfire, dead? My head lifts with my ears, eyes widening with surprise, having not heard the news that the greatest foe I would likely ever face down, had fallen at last to the mortality that binds us all. The loss of my potential revenge stings, but I have gained enough societal goodness in the past year to step out of my initial, selfish impulses to be angry at fate, to tend to Sikeax, alongside me.

Duir’s heart pulls and throbs with sympathy, and I suppose mine does too, in ways. In others, hearing her speak openly of feelings and failures, I am envious, and cold. There is weakness so clearly marked upon her as she weeps and moans, a frailty that, early in my life, I had been taught to keep hidden beneath layers of stone, and ice. As I’d grown, however, I had begun to learn that trapping everything you felt under the mountain slowly turned you into a volcano, but knowing and being are two very different things.

Ryn, she says, making my heart do that hard pull, cold and hot back flip it always does when something lances through all my armor and finds me, shivering in the dark. It’s easy to forget how others knew you when you were small and golden, at least until they use one word to remind you that, once, there had been a time when you might have held her close to your breast, full of nurturing warmth, but that all you can do now is mutely listen, and stare. The comfortable distance between us is what I know now, and as she speaks of death, of being unable to stall its charge, I can empathize with her, how it is to feel powerless to the will of existence.

Again, I touch her, a simple, swift gesture of cocoa lips to the curve of her defeated, bowed neck. It is a gesture which recoils away as her sorrow, and self blame, evolves into anger, my ears falling back and eyes narrowing with surprise and an anger of my own. I know Volterra, but that doesn’t matter, considering the amount of offense I take towards those the buttermilk mare had called herd-mates, on behalf of she, and Gaucho alike. Though I have tried to simply listen, to wait until all is said to say what must be said, the laughable insinuation that Sikeax had killed Gaucho draws a bark of cold, mocking disdain from my mouth, directed at whichever idiot had claimed it.

"Only Death or a God could have beaten such a man," I state, bluntly, recalling all too well the impotent, useless sensation of being thrust out across the red sand with a single blow; I’d given everything I had, and he’d defeated me with ease. I remember his fire, and gesture to the scars still smattered along my side, where he’d left them with his infernal beasts. It was a dishonor to his memory to accuse any one as gentle as Sia of slaying him, and it was a disrespect to me, or any other warrior who had ever faced him, and met defeat.

Regardless, as she finishes her story, I’m left with the oddly humble thought that, maybe, I’d left home impetuously, and for very little reason at all. While, certainly, being an outcast had been fun, maybe that was the only good excuse I really had.

"Helovia is a chaotic place," I say, after some time, "everyone thinks they are better suited to rule this or that. If life was a game board, Helovia’s pieces would never seem to stop shuffling, but for the very few, who know their place. The sort of game that doesn’t have many rules, and that no one really seems to understand, even though some of us pretend to."

"I would leave those people, if I was you. And I think that one of the few rules there is to this game, is to do what you want," I smile at her, "and what you think is right. Regardless, I’d have been proud to call you my Sultana, if I would ever want to live somewhere so awfully dry and hot."

I laugh, suddenly struck by a humorous thought.

"Maybe that’s why they’re all so awful, you know?" I grin, with a chuckle, "they’ve got sand in horrible places and can’t find water anywhere to rinse it out."

The conversation turns to companions, Duir listening with his ears lifted and with interest, having not really had the opportunity to hear others talk of bonding before, being the basics of how and when. That Sikeax views her Hobgoblin as a child is very akin to what I feel for my buck, I myself having no actual offspring; raising a fawn is as much like having a foal as I can imagine, and, though we bicker, and sometimes seem as if we might regret having found one another, there is also a vast wealth of love.

She meets my eyes, her question intriguing, because I’ve never asked myself. To be perfectly honest, I guess I sort of do, in ways, but he does me too, in others; I’m also deeply resentful of authority of any kind, and seek to dominate those around me, no matter who they are. It would make sense that I would have an equally arrogant companion, right?

"I try to control everything," I answer honestly; I mean, it’s an integral part of my being, down to the very magics I wield, but its not necessarily a bad aspect of myself, either. A lot of good can come from someone who naturally accepts responsibility, seeing it as a gain of power. Of course, bad can, too, especially when that someone is me, entirely ill suited to the concept of being truly in charge of what becomes of those around them. "For myself. Duir seeks to change everything, for the sake of... Honor? Goodness? In that regard, I guess we both seek to control the other, in our own way, as I often choose to live my life in ways that he finds disdain for."

"You can’t actually own anyone though," I adamantly conclude, because, well, you can’t. The only person you really own is yourself, and, some days, you can get away with owning absolutely no one at all, but you never got to dictate every action that someone else would take, even if you bent all your will to that one objective. It was simply too much, too hard; it was difficult to be yourself, let alone anyone else for an extended period.






Coding by Tamme - Image by Dingo

@Sikeax

Wishlist - Plots

Force/violence is allowed to be used on Rikyn permitted it does not permanently maim or kill him (PM me!).


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