the Rift


[OPEN] Big wheel keeps on turnin' [BIRTHING]

Glacia Posts: 111
Aurora Basin Medic atk: 4.0 | def: 8.0 | dam: 6.5
Mare :: Unicorn :: 16.3 :: 4 Years HP: 62.5 | Buff: NOVICE
Name :: Snowy Owl :: None Nessie
#1
Glacia

The day went fairly quiet. I made my way down from Rikyn's cave. I hadn't started working with Lena yet, choosing to re-familiarize myself with my home until my child was born. Today I had taken the trek up to the hot springs. I had reached them without too much trouble, and was soon submerging myself in the hot water, and my eyes closed, taking deep breaths of the mineral rich steam. I stayed here for some time actually, enjoying the heat and steam. It had in fact been a perfectly lazy day.

After I had my fill of soaking, I made my way to the grassy area by the lake and ate until I was full. After all, I was feeding for two. As I looked up, I noticed the sun going down. Getting a quick drink, I made my way back to Rikyn's cave. That's when all the issues decided to come into play.

It started with a few cramps, and then the feeling of liquid rushing between my legs. And then a full on panic. I knew what was happening. It had happened before. And last time I had been alone. I didn't want to be alone again. Rikyn... I needed to find him. I wasn't far from the cave. I only hoped he was there. Each step hurt, due to each contraction, and as I reached the cave I hoarsely called out for him. I wasn't going to make it to anywhere else. I needed to just stay here. With a groan of pain I laid myself down, trying to keep myself calm, and not exactly succeeding. I was already a sweaty mess, with tear stained cheeks, and a mind that kept going back to what happened to Vidar. It would kill me. And I closed my eyes and prayed to the gods, prayed that my child would be fine. I prayed with everything I had.
"Talk."

@Rikyn

Once Rikyn posts and Gwyn is officially here people can post <3 Except for if Lena is brought requested <3

image | bckg

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
#2

Hey, uh, I think… comes a tentative Duir mind-link, suddenly blooming with snap glimpses of what he sees, from where he was lazily spending his time in the nearby pine grove, opposite our resting place (he always has, and probably always will, prefer the woods to stone walls). What I see is Glacia, her face lined with worry, and her steps hesitant, as if she’s in pain.

Always a bit dense when it comes to female matters, it takes me a moment to garner what’s happening. When I do, however, the speed and anxious giddiness with which I take off earns a humored blast of air from my buck’s nostrils.

It’s not long before he’s leaping alongside me, each bound of his unusual legs carrying him the distance of three of my strides, and in no time, I skitter into the faintly glowing cavern. Wide eyed, I lead the way with a suddenly stilled charge, my always more cordial and graceful companion more gently tapping in behind me at a walk. Wishing I’d an awning of moss at a time like this (as mother had) I suddenly miss her cavern, long since fallen in across the valley, but, as I look down at Glacia, illuminated with the glow of the native mushrooms which grow in the corners and crevices along the walls, I figure this will do fine, too.

The faint blue matches her well, I decide, only then noticing the… mess all over my floor.

What the fuck, I exasperatedly think, promptly feeling Duir’s nearest antler point jab into my ass. Really? we both ask one another, my eyes shooting back to his to glare, while his return a far more steely, mature grimace of grow the hell up.

"Go get a healer if one is about – preferably female," I tell him flatly, without emotional intonation at all, swallowing down all my feelings and putting on my “father face” when I look back to the woman having my child, "is… uh… crap, oh, damn, DANG I mean. Do you need anything? What do I do?"

So maybe my “father face” is the same as my “I don’t even know what the fuck face.” Its pretty much the same situation, at this point.



Art by Esa82@DA

@Glacia

Wishlist - Plots

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

Glacia Posts: 111
Aurora Basin Medic atk: 4.0 | def: 8.0 | dam: 6.5
Mare :: Unicorn :: 16.3 :: 4 Years HP: 62.5 | Buff: NOVICE
Name :: Snowy Owl :: None Nessie
#3
Glacia

It actually doesn't take that long for Rikyn to show, but those few minutes seem to take an eternity. Those few minutes are enough for me to think of everything that could possibly go wrong. I was a blubbering mess by the time he arrived. But y spirit did lift when I saw him. I wasn't going to go through this all alone. However, my mood is soured quickly when he asks me if I need anything. In a few moments my ears are flat against my head. "Really?! What do you do? You don't do anything! Your not giving birth!" But another contraction stops my tirade on the poor stallion, and my teeth grind together, muzzle pushed up against the stone until it passes, which is thankfully quickly. "I'm sorry. You didn't deserve that. Just." Another contraction rips through me and I cry out. "Please, just stay. Don't leave me. I can't do this alone." My head lifts and I look at him. "Have Duir find Lena if he can. Just in case." And with that I stop talking, my strength is far needed elsewhere. And I am quiet, besides particularly rough contractions, which result in whimpering or a cry out, based on the intensity. Soon though. Soon our child will be here. If she came out fine, I wouldn't let anything hurt her. I would be strong for her. She would feel the love I had for both my children, but she would know it. Kvasir never knew how much I loved him. She? I wasn't sure where that came from, but it seemed right. She.
"Talk."

Next post Gwyn will be born :DDDD
@Rikyn
image | bckg

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
#4

To my surprise, as Duir turns to bolt out across the valley in search of someone who knows how to handle this situation better than I surely do, Glacia turns around and yells at me. My ears fall back and my mouth opens, and I take a hesitant step backward, one golden hoof suspended midair.

Well, excuse a fellow for not knowing, I think to myself in wary shock. I had been thinking of comforting her with a touch or something. Nope. Not now. I’m staying well over here where she can’t stab me.

Even when she softens, all I do is put my feet back down, and move a little further inside, still not sure, and entirely hesitant to close our bodies within striking range. Still, she’s obviously in pain, from the shout that rattles through the cavern, and my heart begins to beat hard and fast in my chest.

"It’s going to be fine, Glacia," I try to calmly intone, though I’m anything but; watching her make her way through this, I’m filled with the same trepidation I have been all along. I could run, now; turn around and leave, never look back, find a new life, pretend this never happened…

But it would follow me. I knew that, even if I was otherwise an idiot. Besides, I was excited, an even more frightening thought than anything else; I couldn’t help but wonder if it was a son, or a daughter. I pondered what they would laugh like, who they would become; it tethered me here, if nothing else did.

The what if.

"Duir will be back soon," I quietly tell her, rising from thoughts of a child I did not yet know, but was already wanting greatness for; a sickening similarity to my dam that I quickly try to shove aside for better thoughts, not wanting to be like her in any way. The woman who’d raised me with naught but greatness in mind, and who hadn’t ever really seen me at all…




Art by Esa82@DA

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

Lena the Songbird Posts: 663
Aurora Basin Time Mender atk: 4 | def: 10.5 | dam: 6.5
Mare :: Unicorn :: 15.3 :: 6 HP: 69 | Buff: NOVICE
Imogen :: Common Kitsune :: Fire Heather
#5
and the kindest of kisses break the hardest of hearts
The chill emboldened her more than the last lingering remnants of the summer rays – because it was a destined change, a warp, a catalyst that spurned and invoked movement and motion. It was a sign of opportunity for the final herbs to be counted and tallied, to be gathered before they wilted and faded away in the balm of the changing, shifting, falling leaves, it was a swell of air inhaled and exhaled, a clamor of quiet, a rush of persistence and perseverance. It was how she’d lived for years now, beckoned between the hushed tones of dedicated glaciers and melting rime, thrust back into the corporeal existence of the winter swirls – just starting to blossom on frosted dew. She smiled even at that, touching her maw to a curled leaf beneath a vagabond fir, Imogen bounding over to tuck it between her teeth, pull it away from the earth threatening to freeze, intending to give it new life and furnishings back in the greenhouse. It was chamomile, common, but a necessity for ailing stomachs and light sleepers, and she grinned at its zest, its fervor, as it rested along the kitsune’s fangs, laughing slightly with the merriest of tunes as they continued onward through their trek on the northern borders, hunting, searching, in their own predatory way, not for blood, not for prey, but for the coiled fronds who’d yet to be snagged and ensnared by the cold. When night fell, neither rested, taking their turns and motions and angles in harmonic reverie – chasing after the midnight oils and the nocturnal splendor, enlightened by the stretch of wonder and bright hues floating along the horizon, basking in the glory, in the glow, of what was to come and what was to be – a world renewed all over again.
 
A lingering sound snatched at her ears, and she turned her head, inclined amidst the thistles and ferns, arching her brow towards Imogen, who shrugged, chirped with her mouthful of leaves. The decibels answered, clearer, louder this interval, and finally the Songbird recognized it for the depths and inclination of a forest spirit – regal Duir, come again with the summons of their King. The Northern Lord had kept her busy with recent beckonings, but she didn’t mind, telling Duir so with a fond smile, a touch of her muzzle to his crowned head. “Show me, please?” She whispered, a hush, warm puffs of air amidst the dulcet tremors, pondering over who she was to mend now – if someone had erred, if someone had faltered, if someone had been beaten and bludgeoned by an unknown force and they were to be mired again with havoc and upheaval. The femme swallowed down her apprehension, rooted it into the sanction of her movements and heartbeat, followed the rush of staccato hooves and fox tails, pressing into the Stygian allure, summoned again and again for her enchantments, for her invocations, for the hours pressed into her chest, into her entity, into her soul.
 
But when she arrived, she certainly hadn’t expected it to be for a delivery of a child.
 
It’d been so long since any foals had been brought into their glacial empire, especially this late into the season, where the rawness of Frostfall was only weeks away. Her surprise was only more imminent as her eyes gazed from the mother-to-be, Glacia, and the King standing nearby, a knowing look prospered across her features only by a softened smile, a worldly, enlightened clarity dawning upon her mouth. She said nothing about it, kept quiet, kept astute and aware, but her attention was solely riveted upon the laboring dame thereafter, merely quirking a brow at Rikyn as she settled nearby, curled her forelegs behind Glacia’s frame. “Congratulations, my dear,” she whispered, grinned, smiled, radiant and sublime as she began to hum, a picture of eloquence and effervescence, calm, composed, a portrait of serenity meant to soothe the rush of pain and agony associated with childbirth. “Now, let's bring the little one into this world, hm? I’ll sing, and you breathe,” she winked then, then resumed her prior incantations, feeling the rush of anthems and hallelujahs linger from her lips, poised across the cavern walls in a beautiful, symphonic triumph, meant to provide strength, aid, and soothing conjectures., a tale of respite and sanctuary. 

the songbird


@Glacia @Rikyn

Glacia Posts: 111
Aurora Basin Medic atk: 4.0 | def: 8.0 | dam: 6.5
Mare :: Unicorn :: 16.3 :: 4 Years HP: 62.5 | Buff: NOVICE
Name :: Snowy Owl :: None Nessie
#6
Glacia

I want him closer, but I had already ruined that when my mouth had wrought cutting words on his poor being. Instead I try to focus on everything but the pain and the contractions. His breathing. I almost wonder what he's thinking. But I don't ask, and am left in silence. He says something at one point, but I am unable to really focus on what he actually said.

After what seemed an eternity, the sof sing song voices of Lena touches my ears however, and weakly my head lifts to look at her. Her presence is instantly soothing. She knows what to do. The trust I had in the bridsong was unyeilding. She was my idol growing up, and I had seen her heal a wound that I thought was impossible to heal. Granted there was a scar there still I'm sure, but she was amazing.

"... I'll sing, you breath." She was laying behind me, and as her soft lullaby's began I let my head rest, and focused on the job at hand...
---------

Finally, it was over. It's amazing, how in such extreme exhaustion, we mares are still able to stand after the birth. But I wasn't sure if I wanted to stand. I was sitting up, legs ready to go, but I was frozen. It hesitated only for a moment, but it felt so long, because I wasn't sure if I wanted to see her. What if she wasn't alive? What if I had failed yet again? She had been moving this morning, it was preposterous. But I still couldn't shake the fear that maybe, just maybe something had happened to her.

But I stand, and slowly turn to look at her. And gods is she beautiful. Tears that I didn't think I had anymore were already streaming down my face as I looked down at the beautiful creature that was my daughter. I watched as her rib cage moved softly. Breathing. She was alive. And I cried even harder. My muzzle reaching down to begin to clean her. She was all that mattered. My legs folded to curl around her. Beautiful child. My eyes slowly did lift to look at Rikyn. "She's beautiful....Our child is so beautiful." A smile pulled at my lips, as I looked back at her. My heart swelled at the sight of her. She would do great things. I would be a better mother to her than I had to Kvasir. I look to Lena before my attention is completely gone to focus on my child. "Thank you, Lena."

"Talk."
@Rikyn
@Lena

Open! ALSO WELCOME LITTLE GWYN
image | bckg

Gwyn Posts: 10
Aurora Basin Filly
Filly :: Unicorn :: 16.2 :: Newborn
Bunnie
#7


She arrives into the world with a graceless tumble, all legs, and slick black parts, and lays for a while, still, recovering from the struggle that had led to this escape to the unknown. Slowly peering at the horribly bright place she has been deposited into, her head tosses back when Glacia’s lips first touch her back, a wary, wet bleat escaping her lips. When the touch speaks, however, a sudden ember blooms in her chest, and spreads like wildfire. Love pulses through her, and comfort, for the depths of that rumbling voice feel like the warm place she’d just arrived from. With jerks and wobbles, and a wet blast of mucus from her nostrils, she alerts the tall shadows about her that she is alive, as she seeks out the source of the voices.

Mewling a cry of displeasure at the suddenly noticed chill and overwhelming nature of this multi-tonal world, the filly finds her voice to be somewhat startling, and stops as soon as she starts. Her spindly legs lift her knees into peaks before her, and she gazes over their wet backs with blue eyes, pale as the waters of the lake gently lapping against the shore outside, and wide with wonder at this world, damp ears tilted back. The mare she first sees is warmly colored, like the earth that Gwyn has never seen, and her sweet voice ensnares note by note the tiny one’s ears until they slowly lift forward. It is not her, however, nor is the deep rumble belonging to a very tall, imposing figure clad with metal in the cavern with them.

She doesn’t know her name, mother, not yet, but it already fills her whole soul with elation as she tilts her head back to behold her. There! There she is!

A desperate bleat accompanies her notice of her white emblazoned dam, her small hooves scrabbling on the stone beneath her. A rumbling in her belly growls and snarls, and adds haste to her cries and struggle; it takes her some time to manage her hind legs beneath her, before the fall over. Another few moments and she does it again, and again, before her front legs make their way up, too.

With a frustrated wail, she topples; so it continues over and over, until, at last, she stands, on trembling knees, with her gaze holding Glacia captive. With wobbling, uneasy steps, she does not topple down, but makes her way to her dam’s flank, nudging her nose instinctively beneath her warm, round belly to put an end to the ravenous thing in her tummy.

[ OOC: dundundundun GWYNNNNNNNNNN ]


’cause you’ve got teeth like a wolf
but you cry like a sheep


Image & Code by Me

@Glacia

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
#8

Duir arrives with Lena, and pauses alongside me, earning a grateful touch to his forehead with my dark lips, the ongoing events having, miraculously, stolen my words away for the moment. Sharing in Lena’s knowing smile with my own uncomfortable grimace of a smile, I’m glad when she turns her attention to the laboring Glacia. Soon, the cave is filled with Lena’s singing, and the magical hum of her healing, and though, occasionally, Glacia’s cries rise above the wordless hymn I have heard lilt from the caverns in this land all to often, I relish the peaceful tune, trying to remember it for when I look back, and remember when…

She comes. I don’t see the more gruesome details of it all, having stationed myself near the mouth of the cavern, a hesitant distance between myself, and the mare who gives me a daughter. I’m awkwardly trying to stay close but out of the way, not sure at all where my place in this moment is, having never paid attention to any birth, ever (no thanks). Now, it made sense why people chose to attend the arrivals of new children into the world; to be ready for their own.

I’m left haplessly unsure.

‘She’s beautiful…’ and she is, all onyx laden with snow, and embellished with gold, ‘Our child is so beautiful.’

"She is," I softly say, in awe, looking at the wet, sealed lids of her gold detailed eye, so like mine, wondering if her hidden gaze is gold, bronze, blue…

At first, everything is still, until Glacia moves to clean her; with a jolt, the babe comes to life, cries making their way from her lips as her icy blue eyes fly open, and she seems to see only the mares closest to her at first. It fills me with an odd sort of jealousy, and a desire to have her see me, too, and wonder why she doesn’t. We too far, Duir reminds me of very young children, she not see good yet.

Feeling some of my doubt fade away, I decide to close the distance some, then. My ears lift, and everything in me fills with an uneasy tension, and I step closer, forcing my crown lower to seem less imposing, and to see her more clearly in the glowing blue light of the nearby mushrooms. When she moves to stand, however, I stop, and my head is again erect, my eyes wide with terror each time she falls down.

Sure, I’d watched Duir learn to do it, too, but that was somehow different. He seemed stronger than she did, or maybe it was just that our bond allowed me to know he was fine, no matter how hard he fell, or that it had been a loamy forest floor, not a stone one… When she does at last manage to stand and wobble uneasily to Glacia’s flank, however, my worry is quickly replaced with an amused smile, watching her nub of a horn press into her mother’s dark side; meeting Glacia’s blue eyes, I ask the most obvious question to be asked at a birth.

"What do you think we should call her?" I ask, remembering how my mother had named me, and taking a quick moment to think of a similar combination of Glacia and I’s names for her; all the while, I watch her nurse, the most perfect girl in all the world, "what about Lynn? Or, hm, Gwyn has a nice sound to it…"

Maybe could have thought of this before now, Duir mentally scoffs.




Art by Esa82@DA

@Glacia @Lena

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Albrecht Posts: 249
Aurora Basin Impersonator atk: 6 | def: 8.5 | dam: 2.5
Stallion :: Unicorn :: 17.1hh :: 19 (Orangemoon) HP: 60 | Buff: NOVICE
Strom :: Suma Ball Python :: None Townsen
#9
It’s a little late in the year for such things, but the scent that blooms in the air of the north is unmistakably painted with blood and mucus, fluid and fear, joy, newness, birth. It draws the old stallion with a choking curiosity, a desperate, self-mutilating longing to see the innocence, the beauty, to witness a glimmer of hope in the world that this newborn creature might one day rise to do something good, something just, and not just perpetuate the soul shattering fuckery of present day – that, and the fact that they’re just so precious when they’re small.

Cautiously, he peeks in, ever wary of being unwelcome and even more so when he realizes just who this child belongs to, because of course it would be the Asshole’s. Step one, kingship, step two, heirs, right? He wants to be bitter about it, hypocritically condescending even, but looking past the adults and into the dimly lit chamber, all thoughts of negativity slip away from him, replaced with something far more out of character, something vulnerable, tender.

A tiny, spindle legged filly stands unsteadily between them, her blanket spotted rump almost glowing with the brightness of white and gold pigmentation splashed across it, creating a sharp contrast against her otherwise jet black coat. The old stallion's expression softens at the sight of her, his mouth relaxing from the angry twist it's so often seen in. He watches her nurse, her newly found hooves still shifting to figure out this whole standing upright bullshit, his thoughts slowly drifting, remembering others, so many others, all of them flawless and exquisite in their moments.

Saoirse. He thinks sullenly, wondering where the boy has gotten himself to this time. He pictures the extra arms of wings on either side of his infant body the day he was born - a first for the old stallion. They'd been fully feathered and well versed in flapping and gesturing the last time he'd seen the boy. How much longer will it be before he begins learning to fly? Will the Throat adults teach him? Will he choose to visit then, with that greater mobility? Will his mother ever fucking step back in?

Losing his focus, the old black stands quietly near the entrance, his eyes pinned to the new filly and her striking markings.


"Talk."
OOC // *slithers in*
albrecht
And I can't walk on the path of the right,
Because I'm wrong.

image | coding
           
[Image: 56c616e54affc]Rated M, R, NC-17, AO, 18+, NSFW
Tag dat azz!  @Albrecht
Violence & Magic okay.
Wish - Away - OOC


Lena the Songbird Posts: 663
Aurora Basin Time Mender atk: 4 | def: 10.5 | dam: 6.5
Mare :: Unicorn :: 15.3 :: 6 HP: 69 | Buff: NOVICE
Imogen :: Common Kitsune :: Fire Heather
#10
and the kindest of kisses break the hardest of hearts
The songs had yet to even hit their highest notes before the child made her presence known – a softened footfall, a rush of black and gold, a dusting of spots denoting eons of lineage, marksmanship by genetics and artistry. The Songbird rose from her prior position, placing a careful, dulcet stroke on Glacia’s neck, whispering in a valorous tone “Well done,” and winking again, before sliding away, like fairy wings, all gossamer and intangibility. Her eyes float from the child to Rikyn, pondering over his endeavors and contributions, but he seemed quite taken with the newborn immediately, and her smile brightened, a bit relieved to understand, to comprehend, that his future role will not be cast aside, forgotten, or misplaced. She bowed her head to him, the newly crowned father, but doubted he would even see – enamored with the bright little jewel beside her mother. So the femme glanced to Imogen, nestled in the corner, full of waving tails and ebullient eyes, watching as the fox started curiously at the delicate bundle of legs and fur, before their gaze solidified, met, the connection joyful and ebullient. All done? the vixen noted, and Lena bobbed her head, no longer a necessity in the quiet juncture of name giving and first breaths, shuffling out of the aperture and into the tundra air, only pausing to note Albrecht’s presence. Curiosity bubbled and brewed within her almost immediately, a brow arching, very delicately, across her regal, noble features, a query stuck to her tongue, a question poised across her lips at his presence, if he wanted to see such a christening. She didn’t say anything but a quick salutation “Albrecht,” and an affable nod – but left him to his own means and measures (wondering if he simply wanted to see another life brought into the world), as she waltzed back into the landscape.

the songbird


@Glacia @Rikyn @Albrecht [Lena out. ;D]


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