07-13-2017, 08:58 PM (This post was last modified: 07-13-2017, 10:03 PM by Dallilja.)
Dallilja
Hooves splashing in blue water, kicking up sand with every step. Aunt Rosaria had always told me to stay off the beach. A giggle escaped my lips as my black reflection jumped under me. Aunt Alistorie said the same about the south at all. Warm breezes caught my hair, swirling it around my neck and legs. There was nothing wrong with the beach, nor the south. It was like any other place in Arazar, or. Well. Obviously it wasn't the desert but you know what I mean. As another giggle took flight from my lips, a pull dragged me closer to the sea. It was strong, like someone pushing me by pressing their head to my bum - forcing me to move forward.
I didn't like it.
Darkness flushed up from the sea - like inverted fog - and the closer the shadows came, the stronger the pull. What even. What was this. Was the land I called home under attack from something? Even if it didn't look like anything we had experienced before... Out of nowhere, an image appeared. Edges were blurred, as if warped, and it was so dark. Pull got stronger and eventually I had to give in because it kinda hurt. Leaning in, taking a leap, my curiosity took over and I... jumped.
Jumping into the darkness, having the frame close behind me and all light that had once been was replaced with quite the strange atmosphere.
Wait.
Did I just jump into another world? The only thing I truly knew was that I had landed in a rushing river. Surrounded by forest and darkness and not sure what. Where was I? Turning my head, I saw only more of the same that was in front of me.
...Well then. New home it is.
"Talking." ooc // oh holy i am rusty ;__; hopefully i'll get into the swing of it again! wc // 295 tags // -
Normal Items 2 gold earrings Golden hair cuff connected to chain - decorated with gold-plated pearls ending in 3 of them Orange/Yellow feather - gift from mother
07-14-2017, 09:03 AM (This post was last modified: 07-14-2017, 09:03 AM by Rift Presence.)
Strange lights—fluorescent blues and bright greens, stark red and eye-biting yellow—crowd between the warped, moss-covered trees. In the distance, thunder rumbles, but the lightning flashes in the deep cloud aren't bright, electrical white.
They're other colors, like an aurora borealis transformed into spears and thrown across the stormy skies.
The air is heavy with moisture, laden with power, sheer forces crawling in the churned mud of the Portal's forest.
Whatever the hell this place is, it's unlike anything you've ever felt.
I enter this world afraid, shaking and breathless because I know the fate that has befallen my mother, know that on the other side of the portal she shoved me through - she was gone. She may have not have been the strongest, healthiest presence in my life, but she was someone who made it better, she made it matter. She may have let things slip, unexpected chastising for so eagerly seeking to know as much as I could, to understand my world better through the gain of knowledge. She reprimanded me for scaring her when I would wander, never harsh, but never a gentle punishment either - she would warn of the great dangers our world held, and I would believe her, but at the same time I felt untouchable, that never in my life will I be in the grip of any danger she describes.
Oh how wrong I was, to stand there at her side while the world we knew fell apart, while Helovia collapsed beneath the malicious weight carried upon the shoulders of Kaos, a corrupt god seeking power, recognition, they killed mercilessly and ruined lives, leaving my mother to weep, leaving me to weep. She called for the Mother of Companions, for Phantom, she wept for the dead, for the ruined lives of her friends and she was crushed beneath the sorrow - she had told me so gently, so stubbornly, that she would not leave Helovia. She would not leave her home, that she would remain by it until its last moments, that it was filled with too many memories - good, bad and ugly - to leave, to toss aside and leap into a false sanctuary. She gave me everything, from the two feathers adorning her mane, her father's, to the crown of armour, the blossoming branch and the amulets that adorned her body - she gave them all to me, and she said her goodbyes. Amidst the catastrophic events, she apologized for never truly being there, for being too caught up in her own troubles to help me through mine, to guide me through the world the way a mother should. She left me with a chaste kiss to the forehead, hesitant and sweet all the same, meaningful but still so distant and foreign, before she shoved me back into the portal despite my sudden protest.
I landed harshly, splayed out across the cool, damp earth and gasping. The sound of the little shred of portal I had popped through ends in a pop! I'm left in silence, in absolute darkness (as I have been), but silence and fear brew together, egging one another on until I'm wheezing against the ground, taking in sharp breaths and falling into a despairing attack I hadn't been prepared for - the last I'd had an attack, the home that I finally settled into collapsed, destroyed by a band of power hungry, blood thirsty stallions who pillaged the hidden town and burned it all, who did not take care to look through the books or recognize the serene atmosphere, they came not to seek solace but more power, more blood to wipe against their skin and stain their hands. They were merciless, they took prisoners of the weak and broke the defiant, they took all we had and more, and I fled - I ran because I was scared, because I couldn't face them, but I tried. I remember the feeling of my forelegs being consumed by fire, warm and welcoming against my skin as I had struck out against a stallion seeking to take me as a captive - I remember how easily he evaded, how afraid I had been bolting with my tail between my legs, weeping as I ran directionless, purposeless. The only place I had felt at ease and it was gone, brought to ruin by bandits who just wanted to have fun.
So I panicked and sobbed for the first time since the fall of Svijest, I felt helpless and lost, I was grabbing for things that weren't there, for my mother, for anyone - but my hands kept coming up empty. I savoured the faint touches of my grandfather's feathers, of the weight of my mother's laurel, of the blossoming branch and the amulets that hang at my neck. I curled up, wings splayed out across the earth, and sobbed. It was loud, it was ugly, it hurt. I wanted to go back, to go back to Svijest, to Helovia, I wanted to hear my mother's voice, the cracks as she spoke of her past, of the history of our family, of far away places, of places close to home - but it was all gone now, and the distress tore at me, jagged claws and rage consumed me and I was left to weep against the dirt, raising my head only to acknowledge the footsteps of another. "Hello?" “talk talk talk.”
-- table by velvette --
Magics:
- {SAFE} :: [ Magic: Fire | Hooves are engulfed in golden flames that cause minor to moderate burns ]
:: [ Restrictions | Burns last 3 threads and can cause gold markings if a pass is used ]
(idk how this would work here? but id like to keep the golden burns kinda thing, even if they're just temporary!!)
- :: [ Magic: Light | Connected to his twin, Alala, telepathically ]
:: [ Restrictions | Connection weakens with distance ]
Enchanted items
- {SAFE} :: [ Item: Armor | Defensive. Silver armor with two horns from the base of his ears, covers his forehead, shoulders, spine, upper portion of his barrel, and his haunches; collapses into a wreath around his ears. ]
:: [ Restrictions | Heavy when in full armor mode; requires assistance to take on/off. ]
- :: [ Item: Bronze branch charm | A small bronze branch that grows a new flower every morning. ]
Rift-god / Kaos items
- n/a
Amulets : 2, 1 sun & 1 moon
Companion/s :
- n/a
Species change (if applicable) : n/a
Requests: coming in with normal items:
:: [ Item: Feathers | Two golden feathers woven behind left ear. ]
:: [ Item: Set of earrings | Two golden studs and a cuff on left ear. ]
:: [ Item: Cuff & chain | A golden cuff with a chain that connects to the higher cuff on his left ear. ]
:: [ Item: Set of nose rings | A thick golden ring and small stud in left nostril. ]
The rumbles of the sky sent shivers down my spine, making me raise my horned skull and observe the strangest flashes of lightning I've ever witnessed. Better to look at those than the orbs staring at me through the mossy forest pillars. Whatever this place was, it didn't feel friendly. Slowly, I began to move forwards and carefully placed each step in front of the other to not fall into a dip and break something.
Wouldn't have been very nice if I did.
Glowing eyes seemed to stalk my every move, tailing me, leading me even far away from where the warped frame had been. Auntie Laila had always told me that the dark wasn't scary, no monsters hid there - but for the first time ever, I felt doubtful about just that. As I was about to pick up speed, perhaps end up somewhere brighter, the faint sound of someone crying caught my attention. Curiosity took over my fear and soon enough, my legs carried me towards the noise.
The cries became louder the closer I got, nearly giving me a headache on the spot. Then suddenly it stopped, only to be replaced by a faint 'hello'.
"Hello?" As I peeked behind a large tree, there lied a colt. Blessed with wings and horns, I first thought I looked at a royalty. Usually they're the only ones back home with both. But he was alone. Weeping. "Hi there... Who are you?" As I looked him up and down, I found it funny that he sported lightning bolts as well as I did. More fiery, but still. He also had two golden feathers behind his ear... that looked exactly like the one I had in my ponytail. 'Coincidence. Nothing else,' I thought.
"Talking."
ooc // fixed the table coding luls buT YAY FAMILY
wc // 291
tags // @Shahrokh
07-15-2017, 07:43 PM (This post was last modified: 07-15-2017, 07:44 PM by Rift Presence.)
The moist forest floor shivers as more moisture hits it, pools on the already saturated surface. This is what it wants, this is what it needs. It does not matter (or perhaps it is better) that this moisture is not rain; but, rather, panicked and soul sucking tears.
Magic:
Offensive: Ability to summon golden flames to hooves.
Knowledge: Telepathically connected to Alala; when used, connection causes intense headaches and nosebleeds.
Items:
Defensive: Silver armor with two horns on brow; collapses into a wreath around ears. You nearly feel the purr of satisfaction as the flower is stolen from the bronze branch you carry. It will bloom no longer.
Amulets: Are taken by the shadows with a swiftness that you nearly miss.
07-16-2017, 05:50 AM (This post was last modified: 07-18-2017, 02:07 AM by Cahira.
Edit Reason: Fixed typos and added a better table.
)
swallowed by a vicious, vengeful sea
She arrives in a murky chasm—a tear in time, somehow alive, snarling, ripping, shredding at the world behind her hooves like a beast—for a moment there is abyss at her heels, and then she is flung into the soggy muck of another world. A world between worlds. Her withers slam into a spindly, though stalwart, tree and her momentum is hindered with a choke of pain, the area smarts and Cahira is only dimly aware of it as she stumbles a few more shaky steps away from the flora. Like the rapids of a river her vision swims, whirls around in a bewildering medley of tears and mist, and then she sees them.
He’s mourning, too, though unlike her there isn’t any blood on his skin, and he doesn’t stench like battle and sweat, there’s lightning veined through his inklike coat too, but all she can see is the mare, and her heart thrums in her throat and she feels like howling, pouring all her affection and joy into words, but all she can manage is a croak.
"Mother..."
And then her view settles. The joy, the relief, pours down into her heart like rain, changes, threatens to drown her in something new. Azarel had held her in his grasp, at the end of a metaphorical chain, he’d held them both. But she knew the Lightningborne’s face like the crimson down her spine and this, this was only like her, exuded the very spirit of her. Yet the lines at her face were wrong, the burden of the things she’d seen. she’d carried, in her very presence was wrong, she was a filly, not a mare, and Cahira’s throat threatened to suffocate her. There was a noose around the latch of her throat and she ached. “You… who… who are you?”
She had no time to careen out more words, more desperate pleas for knowledge, in the next moment her knees hit the mud and she was on the boy’s level, now, a soft tormented wheeze echoed from her maw and—Nótt, Dagr!—where were they, like a match to kindling the very essence of her mind was on fire. Nótt and Dagr, they were gone, the lack of their company inside her head driving her nearly frantic, “M-m-my soul,” she wanted to bellow, wanted to snarl, I am life, I bring life, roared the voice through the woods, and she flinched. “This is death,” she breathed, the sinew of her sides convulsing with misery as thick as the canopy of leaves above their heads.
Magic: Passive :: [ Magic: Light | Sports a seraphim halo above her head. The light it exudes pulsates gently with her emotional state. ] :: [ Restrictions | Unquestionably useless and uncontrollable. Provides very scant light in terms of circumference. ]
Enchanted items:
None
Rift-god / Kaos items: None
Amulets: None
Companions: None
Species change (if applicable): None
Requests: Her normal item, and if possible, a mention of what happened to her companions when she came through the Rift, since they weren't from Helovia! (I wasn't sure if the magic should go here, since she wasn't on Helovia, but had it on a different site.) :: [ Item: Horn Jewelry | A silver ring encircled around the base of her horn, with a slim, blue gray chain dropping from under it, carrying a slight silver saucer with a star sapphire embedded inside. A gift from her mother, through Azarel, her brother. ]
This was not under their protection—it bore not the scorching marks of Sun, Moon, Earth, and Time, a flower with deep roots planted on its heart. This soul was wild and brazen, with a bond not sacred enough to keep from the Rift's slavering jaws. Where it was able to drive a wedge between them, here, it could sever, and sever it did. The magic tasted sweet, of love and devotion and desperation, and afterwards, it left only the bitterness of loss.
I am caught up in mourning, weeping for everything that I had lost and the guilt that pierces through my heart, that crushed me beneath the pressures of living alone. As far as I know, there is no one left, not my mother, not Aurelia or Alala, not the Throat, all of Helovia has perished and as far as I know, I am the Last. I do not hear the soft whispers of reunited families, of long lost souls finding the courage to return to the light of reality, to be seen by brothers and sisters, by lovers and friends - it is silent, the rush of blood in my ears and the thunder of my heart is all that surrounds me, deafening as I shroud myself in my wings, sheltering myself from the world in the same way my mother used to. It brings comfort, a familiar touch of a feathered appendage as it drapes over my body, shields me from the dangers of the outside world.
And that is how I am found, in response to the panicked, confused hello? That I had offered, I received one in return. I cannot tell whether it is relief or disappointment that makes its way to my face, breathing out because I am not alone, not the last to walk across the world in absolute silence, but it is a voice I do not recognize, and my heart is sinking because I am the only one left. There is no one here who will know me, who will understand the pain that I suffer, shouldering the weight of my guilt and mourning because I am the only one who can. There is no shoulder to cry on when I am completely alone in this world, when I am an unknown face to the world. No one will remember me from when I was but a colt clinging to my dam's leg out of fear of the danger outside of the Throat. And this voice is unfamiliar, certainly not someone I can recall from the briefest time I spent in Helovia, much less outside the Throat's borders.
I clear my throat, trying to push aside the sorrow that tenses up my shoulders and grips my heart as I give her a pitiful introduction. "Shahrokh. I- I was from Helovia," I pause to let myself breathe before I continue. "Were you there when everything happened? Di-" I cut myself off because I couldn't bother to ask if she had seen my mother somehow make it through the portal, if she truly had decided that she would follow me into the unknown rather than cling to the last moments of her homeland (it was my homeland too) - but it felt too hopeless of a question, because I already knew she wouldn't have seen her come through, if she was even there to witness Helovia's final moments. My mother would have stayed, she would have clung to Helovia's soil and bellowed her rage, her guilt and the fear that tore through her in her own final moments, in stride with Helovia's as it crumbled around her.
I stiffened at the approach of one more, this presence cast in a vicious, warlike aura, strong, hardened, it was callous and aggressive. The girl spoke weakly, a shred of joy, of relief that slips from her lips, souring, turning bitter as something process and I am recoiling at her tone. She is an unpredictable storm, one moment melting with the mistake of someone she has found someone she has been looking for, and suddenly she's a cornered animal, she's threatened and mistaken, she lashing out and then crashing, the pouring rain that beats against my skin during heavy storms, the pain of pieces being stripped away, slowly, painfully. I gingerly stand on weak legs, I do not attempt to approach (in part of because I don't know where she is), whispering quietly, cooing something soothing in the same way my mother sometimes would when everything felt like too much, when I never felt like I was enough. "It's okay, you're going to be okay. You'll make it through this," perhaps it was more for myself than anyone else, but I paraded about pretending that I was trying to help her rather than myself.
Because I wanted to believe that I was okay, that I would make it through this, that I would survive in this foreign world, but doubts overflowing my mind and I was lost to their depths. I was eaten up by the anxiety, I was drowning in pitch black, in emotion that clawed through my sides, that left me choking and lightheaded, that left me drifting, no longer grounded to the world I once knew. My binds to reality were slipping and I was being left to collapse, to fall apart inside as a shell presents itself to eager eyes outside - I just wanted my mother, just wanted someone to recognize who I was, to reassure me that I truly was Shahrokh, a child of Destry and Aurelia, twin to Alala. That I was the only one left of my family, that I was the last, that my blood was stained with gold fire and lightning, that I was a lone fiery storm walking among men. “talk talk talk.”
He seemed so afraid. As I gazed into his pools of silver, I realized why. Blind. "Shahrokh. I- I was from Helovia, were you there when everything happened? Di-" The colt stopped mid-sentence. Helovia? What was Helovia? I began to shake my head but realized the gesture wasn't needed. "Shahrokh. I wasn't there, as I'm not of Helovian descent unfortunately." Slowly, I lowered my head to simply breathe near him, letting him know I was close, as the colt was distressed. Wet hair clung to my lightning-struck neck, but I made sure not to let any strands touch him and take him by surprise.
An old uncle to me had been blind - back in Isilde - and I would always remember how he lashed out whenever a spider touched his leg or anything.
Somehow I was freakishly calm about being thrown into another dimension though. From frolicking around happily on a beach to being pulled into darkness and black fog and... rain. Speaking of. Uhm. "Mother?" Uhm. Uuuuhm. The loud slam against a tree was all it took for me to turn my black head, staring through a drenched forelock at what seemed to be a bloodied angel. Blue eyes shifted in search of whoever it would call mother but the three of us were the only ones present (except for the creepy eyes around us) and the more I stared at the large unicorn, the more I saw that Shahrokh and the angel looked very much alike - markings wise. “You… who… who are you?” Slight panic for the first time since the frame closed behind me took over my senses. If my aunts had taught me anything ever, was to not reveal my identity right away. Too many sneaky snakes around.
"I.. Uhm.. Who are you?" Taking a step closer to the dark hybrid next to me, I didn't take my eyes off the angel. Whom began to.. crumble? Falling to their knees, they murmured of their soul and how this was death. Let me tell you, this was no ordinary meeting. Clearing my throat - with an awkward cough in the middle as I had the grace of a hippo sometimes - my lips parted as I was to calm them down. However, the colt made it there before me by standing up and cooing at the angel's general direction. "It's okay, you're going to be okay. You'll make it through this." Brave. He was brave. Yet again I lowered my head and took a step towards the red and white giant. Braveness was a good trait, and something I wanted to display as well. "What's your name? I'm Dallilja."
It’s like the tide, like the sea, with its swells and lows. Through the rush of the blood in her ears she hardly hears the girl, and when the spasms subside, she is left with a dull, vitriolic pang, a burgeoning nausea in the pit of her stomach, there’s a cavernous wound where Nótt and Dagr should be and, for a uncommonly selfish moment, she longs for it to have taken her, too.
A voice breaches the maelstrom of her head and her heart, she rises her face to see the boy, and his words sink into her like anchors. He’s so plainly young, should be interwoven with childlike glee, but all she sees is subdued melancholy comparable to her own in his ghostly—they’re binary moons—eyes. What would Azarel think of her now? A coward, the lesser of a colt? The thought is sour, and she shivers. No doubt he’d considered her one the moment she’d ran from him.
Maybe she was.
“Thank you, I-I’m sorry,” she rasps, unsure of what she is apologizing for. Suddenly aware of how the back of her throat felt like sandpaper, how her tongue heavy as lead, how thirsty she’d become. There is an abundance of water here, filtering down the greenery to the soil at her knees, and forcibly she ascends, staggering with wobbly limbs. Exhausted, she raises her maw upwards and swallows what meager drizzle she can catch there. Her head lowers again as the filly inquires, and the rich light of the halo at her crown gleams as she addresses them, her voice clearer, though still soft. “My name is Cahira. The earth… at my hooves, it gave way as I fled war, and it brought me here. M-my companions…” Her voice falters for a moment. As she studies the two, there grows in her a sense of sudden dread, for there is a feather in Dallilja’s mane she knows from her mother, and her wildly desperate gaze flicks to the ones at the back of the boy’s ear. Perhaps it was a coincidence, but her pulse capers and she trembles. “Those feathers, my mother had two like them. T-they were from her lover, before… before I was born, w-where did you…”
OOC: Shahrokh
My apologies for the brief reply, I'm trying to get back into the swing of things too!
The Portal
