She knew it was coming. Drench was here, and with it came the ever-constant stream of rain. It was almost like the world had flipped a switch from insane heat to monsoons. While it was still somewhat warm from the left-over days of Scorch, Drench poured in and soaked the spotted girl’s body to the core. Both her and Khairi were covered head to hoof with rain, her usually gold body hinted closer to bronze from the dark hues of her skin from beneath, though the white from her rump where the spots spread had an opalescent sheen to them. Her head was stark black against the shadows the cloud cover hiding the sun provided, yet her eyes were bright as always – if not a bit determined. The rather large X marking etched into her chest that continually oozed a glowing teal liquid was a bit more subdued thanks to the rain, the goo washing away easily, leaving what appeared like a glowing X on the right of her chest.
Kiada chose not to wear her armor at this point, either. All she had that was visible was her rose-gold face plate hidden along her neck as she often wore it down, and the same hued shoulder plate that covered her left shoulder. She also carried her small necklace on a chain with the trinkets from both Helovia and here, a treasure she had grown accustomed to, staring off at it before she fell asleep to reminisce in times where things were seemingly safer. But as Kiada crested the hill to the ruins of Halyven, Khairi was the one that carried the important items. They had gathered a strange looking herb from the Siren’s Summit a few weeks ago, and in their travels she had managed to find a shrub that seemed to overtake everything around it. All of the herbs were hidden in a small make-shift bag Khairi had managed to put together with Kiada’s help, once broken because of Vynter, but reinforced after he had done such.
Quietly, Kiada stepped toward the center of the ruined city, taking a moment to drink in the alabaster walls drenched with water, before shaking her head – water droplets flying off of her crescent shaped horn and plopping with the rest of the raindrops around them as she headed for some sort of cover, and of course some place to put the herbs she had gathered for when their vagabond group gathered for another meeting.
The rain sings. It sings notes of black all along Seiji’s body, cold and slick. He is no stranger to the cold press of its little hands, but his ears tilt back in mild distaste, all the same. Rain likes to put its fingers into them and - disconcerting. He walks in silence under its touch, his head bowed, his body a long, slim shadow cutting through the downpour. He is here, at last: Halyven. Halyven. Despite what Kiada told him, he finds it a silent place, filled with only the drumming of water, the quick flow of coalescing drops. Maybe she lied. Maybe something has befallen her companions. Maybe they go elsewhere when the weather turns.
Seiji doesn’t mind the rain, really. He isn’t yet too cold. It reminds him a little of home, even if the temperature and the smell are wrong. It reminds him of standing on the beach, wind slicking around the narrow edges of him, or of peering over the edge of the garden, leaves dripping over his back, and every green thing whispering in soft delight. His eyelids grow heavy as he moves; he wants to stop and think about it more. He wants to daydream that he’s back home, to probe tendrils of thought into the memory and check it for errors. But he fears remembering too often damages the image, too. He fears the garden in his mind differs already from the one on the island. Instead, he must remain here.
Halyven, he thinks again. His mouth forms around the the shape of the word, the shape the word would take if he could breathe it out. He wonders if he’ll recognize his own voice, when he finds it. And with the thought, a needle of fear slides into his heart.
Seiji hesitates, his dark eyes turning. He heard something. He gazes past pale walls slick with rain, and they remind him of the forgotten bones of some great god. They remind him a little of a place he’s visited before, though no birds gather here. No feathers whispering in the sky or hiding in crevices from the rain. He is surprised to find how much his misses them: the flocks, their singing souls, the brush of their little lives against his own.
He doesn’t know what he heard, but he feels cold, now. Shaking his head, water dripping from the sharp tips of his ears, askew, he clings to the walls, searching for an overhang. Always, the small sensation of trespassing, as if the dead linger here. As if this place remembers…. Something. Something grandiose and past. He’s thinking on it as he walks, looking for shelter. He’s thinking on it and not so much on what lies directly in his path until he turns a corner and someone is there. Until he turns a corner and Kiada is there - he knows her - and his eyes dart to the tip of her horn as his body flows instinctively sideways to avoid it, as his hooves skid to a halt over the rain-slicked stone.
He stares.
She did say she was going to Halyven, didn’t she? His ears twitch, up briefly before they go back again, and Seiji shakes his head to rid them of the sensation of rain inside. He’d already halfway supposed she was lying, or mistaken, or something. But here she is, alone except for Khairi - surprised he remembers both names.
Feeling a little embarrassed, Seiji nods at her again. Then casts a glance around, as if to say, Where are you headed? She looks about as drenched as he.
ooc // He didn't want to follow her here immediately but I did want to post here xD So I'm calling this a bit after they first met. I hope that's okay!
The Harpy hadn’t noticed the sounds of another approaching, her focus too tight on trying to find shelter. The rain pummeled the ground so hard, it seemed hard to even hear anything else over it. After a few moments, she managed to find an overhead and turned her head back to Khairi who sat upon her withers with the bag in his beak, little silver threading from where Vynter’s machine had fixed the bag after breaking it. As gentle as she could, she took the bag from him between her teeth and set it up against a try portion of the wall, using her nose and hoof to open the bag and survey the herbs she had gathered inside.
That’s when she heard a sliding moment. Immediately, Khairi jumped up along her neck, as her flames simmered in surprise on her back – the flames taking the appearance of multiple little birds taking off in flight to show she’d been surprised. Her inky head swiveled as she looked for the source of the sound to find Seiji, a stallion she didn’t know the name of, but recognized from their meeting a couple of weeks ago in the Portal. Her flames died down and Khairi crooned his hello to the stallion as Kiada dipped her head and offered him a gentle yet wide smile as she calmed her breathing. He nodded to her, and she noticed the look he gave as he glanced around.
She wasn’t entirely sure what he was asking, but she figured she’d elaborate. “There’s only a few of us. We don’t rarely come here all at the same time, too busy exploring. For now it’s just me and you, I’m trying to find a dry spot to put the herbs I’ve gathered.” She offered in way of greeting before adding, “It’s good to see you again. Find any trouble in your adventures from the Portal?” She tilted her head quietly to him before sliding the bag over and allowing some room beneath the overhang she had found so he could join her if he liked.
A moment — a moment where she does not recognize him. Muscle stands out in his haunches as he sits back, back, away from the sudden glow of flame. But it's mesmerizing, too: the flock of birds ascending from her spine, miniature feathers drawn in light. They don't reach the sky. Recognition blooms in her eyes and the birds disappear, and Seiji is left staring at their after-images, black and white outlines of imaginary things. He's still. Full suddenly of a heavy sensation, knowledge and dread. He was drawn here. It's written everywhere, in everything he touches. Everything he sees. This place calls to him, or laughs at him, or both.
His ears akimbo, he blinks at Kiada. Kiada — a name. A person. Not just a dream or an obstacle or a metaphor. The moment is past. She won't attack him. But he thinks, still, of the shapes arcing in flight from her back. He wishes he could ask her what it means. Instead, he returns her smile, his own narrow features soft. There is so much inside of him he cannot share; there are so many things he can no longer do. He feels suddenly as if he might die of it, all his bones pulled inward out of frustration. Emotion is a hole in his heart, and he hates it. But the hatred doesn't seep out. It isn't her fault.
He moves in beside her the moment she makes room. Dripping, sleek, he looks like a creature made of ink. Like something from a dream. Seiji resists the urge to shake, though it's everywhere in his skin. He stands there quietly dripping instead, every angle of his dark self crammed under the overhang. Thank goodness he's small.
His gaze moves briefly to the bag, curious, but she's asked him a question first. He shakes his head. No. The Rift, as she calls it, has been astonishingly kind to him thus far. He's seen a great many things, met some strange people, but he is unharmed. Maybe more than he can say even after his days on the road. For a moment he's still again, his expression falling just slightly. Difficult now, in proximity to someone he almost knows. Difficult with questions milling on the back of his tongue. With so many things, even just pleasantries, unspoken for so long. He wishes he could even say hello, tell her his name.... How many nights have passed since he last heard his name?
It's a dismal thought. He tells himself he will correct it soon, but alone with only Kiada and the eagle and the rain, he feels as though victory laughs at him from a thousand miles away. His affect has stilled; there is no longer the performative gentleness about him. Only a kind of drawing in, a chill. Water runs in a steady pattern off the bottom of his ribcage as he turns his head to lip gently at her bag. Then he raises it again, his ears pricking, though slowly, and blinks at her. What has she gathered? He doesn't know much of her, beyond her name and her magic and the public personality she wears. He had imagined her some kind of soldier, maybe a guard, but perhaps she's a healer instead?
Thankfully, Seiji remembers her as well. And as she makes a small space beside her, she offers him a gentle smile of kindness as he accepts and stands beside her. Silently, she watches the way he moves, somehow between the water dripping off of him and the darkness of his pelt, he moved as though he were a drop of ink in water, a fluid grace that Kiada herself couldn’t help but admire. Regardless, she offers him yet another smile. “Don’t be surprised, it will dry us.” She spoke in warning before summoning the flames along her spine.
They crackled and burned, but the warmth and the heat from them had already begun drying Kiada’s top half, and she hoped that it would help dry Seiji off as well. The tendrils of the flames licked in the shapes of griffons once again as she lowered her head to the bag of herbs once more. She noticed his attention on it, lipping it in curiosity but politeness, and quietly she pulls out a large wad of Sunweed. She didn’t know the name of it, but she did know that it might be useful in some way. It appeared like a giant ball of moss, and a sudden appearance as she recalled not seeing it during the last Drench and Freeze seasons. Lifting it up with her maw, she offered it to him should he be interested in taking a look at it.
“I found this, I’m not sure what it’s called but I think it might be an herb of some sort. I haven’t tried it yet, though.” She offered an explanation, muffled around the mouthful of the plant. Then, as if she felt she owed him an explanation, she lowered her head slightly. “My father was a great warrior, my mother was a thief. When I was young, I chose to learn about plants in the hope that if I were to be a warrior or thief one day I might know how to help myself if I was ever harmed.” She let her eyes land in his direction, hoping he might understand. She did have some battle training, and some thieving training (mostly revolved around picking up information and cues others didn’t) but her focus was on plants, on the interesting things that could be done with them.
She had never wanted to craft, not since Ru’in made his machines and she had tried to help him. She saw his frustration over them, then, and decided not to attempt it. Yet, growing older, and with Ru’in gone, she imagined that learning to craft would only rip open a hole in her chest that she couldn’t fill.
Obediently, Seiji is not surprised when the flames erupt once more along her spine. His head lifts slightly as he watches them: beasts playing in the glow. Not birds, this time, but things which resemble birds. What does it mean? Does she control it? The thought is maddening, a sliver of a thing digging down deeper and deeper into his brain. Like everything else in this place — teasing. He never knows what is on purpose — what isn't. He is trying, trying his best to learn and to find, but it feels at times a fruitless task. It reminds him of his earliest days on the master's island, when he was too young to speak the master's words. A child, helpless.
So he is still, still, still with the orange glow of her magic washing over him. A respectful distance away, so much as that can be achieved within the confines of their shelter. The warmth laps at the side nearest her and slowly the water fades. Better. His head bobs. He needs to think up new gestures, but that one is easiest. He is always saying yes, thank you. Always at the mercy of this... place. His eyes drift back to the rain outside, the cold drum, drum, drum, and he can almost believe they're the only things alive in the whole world.
His attention shifts back to Kiada when she moves to take something from her bag. Green and round, like something pulled out of a lake — but dry. Moss? Algae? Seiji's long face tilts to afford a better look. He knows very little about plants — a practitioner of blood and bone — but he wonders if the herbalists of his homeland would even find an advantage here. Delicately, he stretches his neck out near enough to sniff the plant. Near enough to lip at the plant. Near enough, actually, to nibble at the plant, to take it from her and examine it himself, unless she pulls away. He isn't a thief, but there's an odd whim, a sort of impulse, to taste it. To learn what it does.
So he is maybe not as sober as he ought to be when she explains about her family, though his head jerks up at the mention of her father, warrior (he knew). Her mother thief (a surprise). Her own desire to differentiate herself from the two of them. He nods. This is understandable. And then he pauses, thinking — the polite thing to do is share something of his own. But he isn't sure how, in the cramped space. His head lifts up; his ears tilt askance, and he's thinking. His own parents: shadows on a distant shore, hoof beats ringing up and down the rocks. His sister's voice, sweet with song. How old would she be, now?
He remembers some of the words to her songs, but not the sound. Not really. He turns again to blink at Kiada, a little apologetic. He cannot tell her these things. He shuffles around, instead, to turn in her direction the shoulder stippled with white. The outline of a bird's wing etched indelibly into his skin. A memory: lying in the grass, his chin on the rocks of the low wall. One of the helpers on his back. The prickling of a sharp implement digging again and again into his flesh. Pick, pick, pick. Sleepy with the pain but content to wait, blood tickling through the sleek hairs on his shoulder. Seiji reaches around to motion at the scarring, now, perfect in its form. He gestures then past the overhang, to the outside world, to the sky. He trots forward to the very edge, rain pattering the end of his nose. He left his parents, too, long ago (it seems forever). He left them behind on the beach, the same way he left —
As Seiji became interested in the plant that she pulled out of her bag, she offered it to him curiously, should he want to see what it was like. Lowering her head to the ground she placed it there just in case the stallion would want to inspect it further himself. Then, she smiled to him after her explanation despite the sorrow and pain that wanted to crush everything within her, trying to focus on the now (that she was here, in the Rift, alive) and trying to suppress those darkened memories back into the inky abyss of her heart where she could keep them under lock and key.
And while she fought this internal battle, she blindly stared at him while he thought. His ears wavering as she forced the feelings to hide behind the wall she carefully crafted, absentmindedly watching his face as he contemplated what to do to offer his own sort of story. But she realized, slowly, and perhaps a bit sadly, that while Seiji could hear her that she couldn’t hear him and something about that bothered her. It wasn’t as though she really cared whether he could speak or not, but something about him seemed to scream to her that he wanted to, but that he simply couldn’t.
Her eyes widened slightly as he moved, pulling her thoughts to the present to see what he was planning to do as his lean body shifted. He angled himself toward her in a way where she could view something so stark in contrast to the deep inkiness of his pelt. There, along his back and onto his shoulder, there was a sort of marking that looked like a wing. Her ears flicked forward and she glanced at him with a small smile before inching forward slightly to better view it. It was intricate and curious to Kiada as she investigated the marking, realizing as she came closer that it wasn’t so much a marking as it was a scar, and she was infinitely curious and excited to see such things.
All her scars were brutal marring of flesh or scratches from events she couldn’t control. This was different, in the way that it was precise and made to replicate a bigger design that made her want to know what had done it. Then, she watched as he gestured to it and moved to the outside. Her ears flickered in uncertainty, but her heavy large footfalls followed him out toward the edge. “You’re not from here, are you?” She questioned quietly, letting her eyes land on him to see if she was right. He didn’t look like a Riftian, but she hadn’t met enough of them to know what one really looked like. “Are you alone?” She questioned as well, before breathing in tightly and widening her eyes slightly. “Could you talk? Before everything, before this?” Her voice had gone quiet as her gut roiled with horror at the idea that something had removed his ability to speak if he wasn’t mute to begin with, while she gestured to the world around them. He seemed to understand and gesture in ways that appeared to Kiada as though he had spoke before, but she felt like she was reaching out on a limb. And deep down she hoped she wasn’t prying.
He forgets the plant quickly. His mind moves to other things — the past. Always the past. His heart yearns toward home as a compass needle turns infallibly north. Seiji is silent as he gazes skyward. Silent as the rain tickles the end of his nose. Silent as Kiada moves somewhere beside him. He doesn't want to share his sorrow with her, but he does want to share something about his home. The place which grew him. The place he represents, even here...
Slowly, his dark eyes turn and turn toward her. His ears prick. "You're not from here, are you?" A moment — two heart beats — before he shakes his head. No, I'm not. And he never wanted to come. If anyone had asked him years ago, at the beginning of his ascent (the beginning, perhaps, of his destruction) he would have laughed that gentle, airy laugh of his. Why would I want to go there? He was ever content to dance on solid ground. To taunt. Looking back, he sees how arrogant he was and yet cannot condemn his younger self. His younger self was happy. Was beautiful.
He doesn't know how to answer the next question. One of his ears tilts back. Alone, he thinks. And the answer, instant: yes gods yes one thousand time yes but it isn't really true, is it? He carries them in his heart, those fading images, those imperfectly preserved voices. They are with him; they love him. And he loves them. Something wistful crosses his face, then something wry. He can't articulate the truth with his new, limited vocabulary. So he smiles at her — just smiles. Apologetic. And turns away. His hooves ring on the stone.
There is one more question. One more, which is reasonable enough. Seiji lets it sink in for a moment, though. Something — maybe something sharp enters his expression. It might be ..... but they could be innocent, too. He glances at Kiada, at the great bird on her back, and he remembers the noise of so many wings. His eyes narrow slightly. It could be innocent.... Slowly, Seiji nods, but he's watching her. Watching and wondering if she knows something. If she maybe knows more than he suspected. He should not — he shouldn't trust any of them. They are not his people. They are not like him.
The plant was quickly lost between everything happening. One moment, things felt happy and free, if not curious. The next, there was a morose feeling stretching between them, helped little by the stinging cold rain that continued to pour, as if the skies too were crying for their losses. Her eyes remained on his inky pelt as he continued to stare away from her, and as the words left her lips his head slowly (so slowly) turn to face her. And she waited for his response, surprised to find she received one. He shakes his head, and she offered him a grim smile in response.
For she didn’t want to come either. She was forced, pushed into that Portal that Kisamoa had ripped into their lands, all after he had butchered her friends and loved ones. And she found herself looking away, in an effort to not let the memories brush to the surface, of the screams and terror and that teal black flame that her own armor now adorned. She was so certain then, that Kisamoa was the correct god to follow, but all he did in her formative years were use her and hurt her, and there was a certain darkness that rose within her at the challenge.
And now she carried that stupid “X” marking in her chest where his own amulet burst, marring her forever – as if the memories he etched into her mind weren’t permanent enough. There was a soft exhale through her pink splotched nostrils as she tilted her head back to him with her own words. She was alone too, it wasn’t that surprising. It might seem as though she had friends, but none of them knew. None of them understood what it was like. And that darkness within her hated them for it. But like always, she pushed it down. The beast roared angrily against her chest as she shoved back into herself, looking back to Seiji as he glanced at her.
Khairi looked on as well, aware of the battle within her but keeping an eye on Seiji while his bonded fought internally. But as Kiada shifted her gaze back to the ink-hued man, she notes his head bobbing slowly. Her brows furrow slightly, confused. “I didn’t mean to pry. I'm sorry.” She offers him quietly, barely loud enough to be heard over the falling rain, unsure if she should add more or question him again despite the longing to do so burning in her mind.
For a moment, they are wretched things: lonely creatures thrust together by circumstance. Seiji begins to wonder if Kiada is not, perhaps, more lonely than he supposed. He had assumed.... Foolishly assumed someone so charismatic would of course have friends. Many friends. A place in life. A calling, as he once did. But then why is she alone here, with only the bird? He is perhaps too critical; all at once he feels embarrassed by his suspicion. What is he doing? Who is he becoming?
A memory floats up: he can hear the voice of someone long lost, left on a distant shore, half-hidden by fog: Look at the daylight, meu amor. One of his ears tilts slowly sideways. I am getting dark again, he thinks. Bemused. A little embarrassed. He hears a sadness in Kiada's voice when she speaks, and he wonders if he has anything to do with it. For being distant; for turning away. For allowing his own feelings to rule him, while she is here as well, lonely as well. And he cannot know what moves inside her mind aside from what she's told him, but he feels an ache in his chest at the sound of her voice.
His features are soft when he shakes his head. Gently. No, he thinks. No. There is no need for apology. He wishes only that he could explain — put words to everything inside of him. Or even just tell her, I was better company when I was more myself. But he cannot; he can only shake his head, step forward carefully. Gauge her reaction. If she does not leap away, he wishes to touch her shoulder gently with the soft end of his nose. A sort of... it's all right. A foreign gesture to his mind but one he has adopted now in this place. Stolen from his dearest friend, who Seiji once considered a little overfond of touching.
Whether or not she allows him to touch her, though, he has moved closer. Eyes brushing over her shoulder. Her chest. Pausing on something there. He hadn't noticed it before. Maybe he was on the wrong side of her? But now his head tilts as his dark eyes linger on the strange, glowing wound carved into her flesh. It looks... painful. Strange: like something out of the deepest part of the sea. Seiji's ears come forward in a silent question. His eyes flick up to meet hers, wondering. For the first time a little concerned.
Halyven
