Some Dreams Are

Some Dreams Are

Postby Dejicide » Tue Mar 14, 2017 11:50 pm

He had always woke before dawn, just shortly before, and used the hour or so of privacy there was in the day to feed the animals and prepare breakfast. This was of course done after his orders were received and studied. Like usual the papers were unceremoniously shoved under his door; a show of trust by High Paladin Dorinth. There were meant for his eyes only: none of his wife's business by all their accounts. To him the secrecy mattered little and often shared vague details of his work with Lillany. Her support and knowledge of the area was invaluable to him.

Just like every other morning he started the fire and prepared the cauldron of water to boil before sitting at the massive desk on the other side of the room so not to wake the woman still dozing in bed. A simple gesture would illuminate the area which had become an alcove of woods and paper over the years. Surrounding the desk were shelves lined with tomes: so much that he had already spoken up about the shrinking living space to Lillany. That was over a year ago and her collection had only grown since then. At least the desk was clear, he thought as he pulled apart his orders and splayed them out over the wooden surface in the poor light.

They would send him away for weeks it seemed. Disappointment welled up inside of him at the news he read over. There was a time he loved travelling alone to work; the solitude was good for him and reminded him of his youth, days long past. These days he grew discontent when separated from his wife: they wanted a family if it was possible and orders like these were counter-productive to that. Words of concern were given to Dorinth on the topic months ago and he rebuked with the concept that he had a family in the Order: his Brothers and Sisters. Surely the man knew there was a difference, he had a wife and two sons himself.

They're using you, my love, were words whispered so delicately into his heart that his hair stood on end. The voice was Lillany's and a quick check over his shoulder confirmed she was still quite asleep in bed. He tried to push the feeling away and go back to his reading but the voice nagged at him further. The closer you are to me the further you are from them. They're liars, Hok, and will leave you a husk of who you are. The words brought forth tears that blurred his reading. It was useless at this point. Worse yet he knew they spoke the truth. He knew exactly what was going to happen and had no power in changing it: perhaps if she had really spoken those words so long ago? Take me and run, fool. This path you've chosen led you to me: discard them before they discard you. Blaming a dead woman for not speaking her mind thirty-some years ago was enough to make him roll his orders up and stuff them away for later. He wouldn't have listened to her anyway back then. They taught him duty and responsibility: what was his happiness compared to the self-sacrifice his Order demanded?

Feeding the animals would clear his head, surely, and he would quietly make his way out the door. Things had to be done after all or she might suspect he had the same doubts she did. Doubts neither dared share with each other. If he didn't get to his chores they might have discussed this all and things might not have turned out the way they did and it was far too late to be changing things now.

Thorns. Briar. Dirt. The smell of lake and trees instead of paved stones and the perpetual smell of forges.

If not for his hide he would have woken up tangled in a mass of bloody scratches that demanded attention. Instead he woke up with the rare string of curses that distracted him mentally enough where he allowed himself free of the branches and vines. Sleepwalking and dreams only meant that spring approached. "No," he corrected his thoughts quietly so not to wake the sleeper inside. "Nightmares." By the Abyss he hated the warmer seasons: there was no peace to be had. Even when he slept his mind was restless and his heart was not so placid as to allow a simple, benevolent dream. He would be off to hunt, then, in the darkness before dawn. A bloody breakfast would be left in the same briars some time later for the inhabitant there. The ghost would get nothing: it was a dirty game to haunt someone while they slept. Besides, he was lucid enough to understand tricks the subconscious played.
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Drowned By Lucidity

Postby Dejicide » Mon Mar 20, 2017 11:26 pm

He was restless. The turn of spring often had that effect on him. Some biological hiccup that was unleashed when he lost that part of him that tied who he was to his draconic ancestry. He lost much that day, more than he knew, when the magic was consumed in the face of certain death. It seemed to balance or cub whatever half-bred characteristics he had to learn about in varying awkward ways. He had reason to look forward to this spring, however. It had been many years since he could say that.

He was rusty. Myrken Wood had made him soft, especially lately, and there were mixed feelings regarding that. There was very little to defend here, very little blood to shed. While he sometimes embraced the violence that swelled up in him the emotional consequence of taking life was always a heavy burden. Just reasons were no longer blindly trusted. Honestly, he thought, the only reason he hadn't been slain here was that no-one really bothered to try: if his old Order tracked him down there would be little chance of surviving again.

The concept of that mortality clung to him then as he made the walk to retrieve his arrows from the target he had set up within sight of his new home. Thoughts of the lonely, perhaps, certainly magnified by the new season. In this place, in this time, who would grieve? He had no legacy to speak of. Wasn't that a thing that people strove for, to be remembered by? He yanked the half-dozen arrows from where they struck with a scowl: all on target, none on mark.

There was a time when he strove for something greater than himself. Family and protecting his realm through the Order. Had that bled from him, too, or was he so disillusioned with such goals that he subconsciously avoided situations and relationships that might reignite that flame? It had been nearly three decades since then, three decades of stagnant wandering! The thought of the lost time enraged him momentarily and a tree he passed would wear those claw marks for the remainder of it's life. That mark there, Hok, is your legacy. He snorted at the thought and took up position with his bow to return to his practice.

Victoria- or rather the woman who called herself so- would grieve for him. He did recognize it would be a temporary moment in her lengthy life. Her companionship often brought him back to a time before regret and it was easy to forget who they were, who she was. It didn't matter until he felt emotionally invested in spite of himself. Perhaps she would invite him back to her people and he would carve out his legacy in those that would inhibit her: he was never one for politics. Would he be used? Certainly. Would he enjoy it? Immensely. But such thoughts were pure fantasy and he was inclined to try to dispel them.

More-over they were distracting. More arrows far off mark were landed. Everything was distracting: thoughts he couldn't dispel, feelings that betrayed him, skills that were lacking, dreams that haunted. Perhaps closure was called for on the topic of those nightmares. He knew the undefined rage that summer would bring next. He knew, unlike spring, that there was little to quench it: unless of course, it found direction. With a soft curse Hokwing went to fetch his arrows once more. He had planted that seen of thought himself and by the Abyss, he would regret it.
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The Forms of Things Unknown

Postby Niabh » Wed Mar 22, 2017 4:00 pm

The song is only spring, she had told Catch, as if there were such a thing as only spring.

She did not hear what he heard--and was probably better off for her deafness--but she had her own rhythms. The broadening of the sky by day, the cnagaire drumming in the trees, the perfume that was a combination of thawing earth and warming air and the lingering nimbus of ozone after a storm: a thousand little stirrings that nudged and whispered that the time had come to move on.

Imbolc was the last fire before the clan turned north to the summer grounds: days of trudging under cinereous clouds, endless fields of plum-colored mud, the way the inside of a hide hood always stank and grew slimy and never really kept the rain off, arse going numb from bumping over a thousand ruts in the trails, legs aching from squeezing the pony's flanks...and then, interminable days later, the line of dark green trees that seemed to rise from the earth as the clan advanced, until finally, high white Cnoch-na-Niall itself rose like the moon over the horizon. The last day was always the worst: the excitement of finally seeing their destination and the frustration of knowing they wouldn't reach it before dark. She used to dread that long ride, would have done anything to get out of it.

But Imbolc was a whole moon past. Now that spring was here, her eyes sometimes flew open in the dark, her heart racing from her oldest, her only nightmare: the clan had moved on, and she had been left behind.

When the fear came, she took herself into the woods. She was parceling it out day by day to make it last longer, the way a child might ration a bag of sweets. Every trek went a little deeper. On these excursions, she brought her bow, but had yet to find cause to draw it. Three times she had reached a turn of the path where her sole of her foot tingled when it touched the ground. The tingling traveled to the back of her skull, blurring her vision. At these points she would mark the location in her mind, then turn to prowl elsewhere. Conscious thought played no role in these decisions; they could not even be rightly called decisions. It was a simple understanding that those places were claimed.

Creeping through the shadow, her fingers scraped over the clawmarks he had gashed through the bark. Clear sap welled in the wound, and she raised her hand to her lips and touched her tongue to her knuckles. The taste was still wan and green, faintly astringent, but getting stronger.

Black doe’s eyes followed the bowstring to his jawline, jumped to the arrow’s path when he loosed it, calculated its arc. Her own first fingers--the only ones left on that hand--unconsciously curled around an invisible string, and her shoulder pulled backwards with his draw as if she could compel the shot to correct itself. Favoring left, she thought, and flinched in sympathy when the arrow missed the mark.

She waited until the round was finished and he was going to retrieve his set before she glanced to the ground, located a stray stick, and deliberately cracked it with her foot as she stepped out from between the trees. This early in the day, with no intentions of venturing near society, she wore her red plaid shawl knotted into a kilt, her feet wrapped to just below the knee, and her binder under an open vest--her real clothes, in other words, unaugmented by glamourie. A little badge of trust. She hadn’t bothered to glam her hair, either, so her braid was only still a braid by virtue of being bound at both ends, a ragged, flaming corona.

"Curious thing," she called lightly. "Animals keep dying, turning themselves inside out, wrapping themselves in their own skins and leaving themselves at my threshold. Soothly, this is a land of marvels."
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Re: Some Dreams Are

Postby Dejicide » Fri Mar 24, 2017 5:45 am

It was uncommon here in the trees to catch him unaware. His attention to detail in the surroundings he was so intimately familiar with was often unrivaled; however, there were always exceptions. He would silently give the woman credit through body language as he instantly froze and slid his pupils in the direction of the noise. Perhaps it was his mind a-wander on this fine afternoon where the sun cast long, dark shadows of the leafless trees over weeds that had been eager to start growing and matted grass. It was likely easy to move from shadow to shadow without rustling the new foliage: perhaps she just knew what she was doing. Still he was quick to downplay his surprise when he saw her and offered a welcoming smile and excuse for his shooting.

"It's been a few weeks," he chirped after a brief sigh. The last time he used his bow was longer than that. It had been since he put an arrow through a man's face who at the time didn't deserve it. He had considered if that show of eager violence was the reasoning behind his hesitance but it was a passing thought since he hunted with his claws. He simply overthought the use of force; overthought too much on his own. It was all too easy for everything to fall away and be replaced by undivided attention that was given to his guest, though. She was always welcome even if her timing resulted in some mild embarrassment.

Hokwing had been starting to catch on to her glams, he felt, and was always flattered when she was without them in his presence. For someone that hid so much it was meaningful to be let in on that sort of intimacy. The sight paused his frustrated march to recollect his arrows and he took a second to uselessly brush caked dirt from his own vest: there wasn't much but subconsciously it made sence to show some care about his own appearance. His almond shaped emerald eyes would meet hers while he did this, taking that moment to seemingly forget what he was doing entirely. In all fairness those black orbs of hers should have bothered him as he had seen similar on so many creatures he had put down when in service of the Order but there was a pleasant exception there in that he made no connection.

"I'm only happy to share. It's the least I can do."

For her companionship, for his guilt when he had difficulty disconnecting himself from fantasy. It had welled up in him, saturated his thoughts, when he found himself sleepwalking his way out of her burrow. His mind had substituted it for his old home so many years ago and was often trying to make a liar out of him. It wasn't what she wanted and his intentions were similar. Intentions, though, were rarely the sum of actions in the long run. He bowed his head solemnly in Victoria's direction and he began making casual steps over the earth, nonchalant, while his tail betrayed him in it's movements. He was happy for the company and like usual was terrible at hiding such simple things.

"If you've come to tell me to stop, it's useless. If you've come to offer the house warming you promised, it's welcome." A brow lifted at her expectantly at her while he wore a broad grin. He expected nothing of her except for a frustrated excuse about coming barehanded. That was still more than enough.
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Re: Some Dreams Are

Postby Niabh » Fri Mar 24, 2017 10:28 am

That was the other side of the glittering coin that was glamourie: the smug pride in going undetected, of being able to hide indefinitely should one choose, and the equally fierce, unabashed glee in capturing someone’s attention. It was no less a triumph to win that look of admiration with no glam at all--particularly when she was looking a bit like Greer's poor shabby rag doll. She beamed in return and bounced impatiently on her heels as he trotted to her. It had been difficult to read his body language at first, however so accustomed he was at replicating human mannerisms, but a tail was a tail no matter what it was attached to. Tails didn’t lie--though it was a trifle discomfiting to predict one’s lover’s temperament by the same measure she’d use for a stray hound.

“Housewarming gift is coming, promise. The only gift I really want to give you is a copper washtub. I may have named you too well, airgead, because every time you come out of your box, you’re tarnished.”

Clucking like a fussy hen, she made a show of brushing down his vest, with a great deal of ineffectual patting and swatting that set the flecks of mud scattering only to settle elsewhere. In the end her hand lingered upon his shoulder and slid tenderly to his elbow before it drew away.

She swept aside the remark about his shooting with a shake of her head. “You were distracted. I hope they were pleasant distractions, at least. May I see?”

She put out her hand for his bow, while sliding her own off her shoulder and leaning it against the tree. Mostly she was only interested in what sort of draw the thing had. Talking about shooting with someone who knew what they were doing was another small, common comfort that had slipped away so silently amid the disarray that she hadn’t realized she’d missed it until she was in the middle of it.

There’d been a lot of those bittersweet revelations lately, reminders of things lost between Here and home. Never anything too important. The simple fact that her presence was welcomed and her absences noted was one. Fortunately, she was more inclined to revel in the moments when they came than to pine over their lack.
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Re: Some Dreams Are

Postby Dejicide » Mon Mar 27, 2017 12:00 am

It was true enough he could use a washtub as his den was nearly entirely empty. The logistics on finding and transporting one to this place would be difficult, though, especially if one considered the means she would likely use in obtaining one. The thought of her musing over the possibilities amused him more than the comical visualization of Victoria trying to pull the thing out through someone's window. Obviously the challenge was the only reason there was a delay. A corner of his mouth curved upwards into a smirk as he silently watched her expression while she fretted away at the dirt that was so common on him. They both knew the uselessness of such an act and it never stopped either of them.

He remained silent for a time as she spoke and he gladly relinquished his bow to her. The recurve was of Myrken osage: locally harvested, crafted, and perhaps on the few possessions the half-dragon still had that he did not make himself. It stretched a little longer than most and the grip, likewise, was designed for a larger hand. While one might assume some incredible, dramatic force to pull the bow fully it say at a heavy seventy pounds. Powerful enough for any mundane task while not being burdened by some ego-driven over-compensation. Hokwing remained close while she tested the bow, just behind her, positioned to give plenty of space to get the feel of it. He had lost interest in immediate practice but had nothing but patience for her curiosity.

"You'll tell me what airgead means now, aye? It's unfair to make such a reference while I'm in the dark."

The tone in his voice was expectant and non-committal on the topic. While he always had assumptions and was comfortable with whatever nickname (or pet) she had for him there was always going to be some curiosity regarding it. Hokwing would rest his hands on his hips with casual eyes resting upon her. He would have preferred to embrace the woman before him in some affectionate manner but again, the virtue of patience held strong. Even in this season where he had asked for her and supplied a warning of over-eagerness and carelessness which hadn't quite found it's way to dominate his more cautious and considerate self. Truth be told he hadn't quite learned the rules of casual affection yet and was keen on respecting his lover's immediate personal space. In most cases, at least.

"I was distracted by much of the same as what distracts me now; however, I prefer the latter to my thoughts. You may wander in and out but they like to go places I've been before while urging me to make terrible choices." A shrug of his shoulders was given that rustled his wings behind him before he continued a moment longer, his tone reflecting that of a favor being asked: "So tell me what's on your mind instead. Why have you come to me? Until now, I've always sought you out."
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Re: Some Dreams Are

Postby Niabh » Mon Mar 27, 2017 12:37 pm

“Oh, didn’t I say?” Her brows arched up, coy and innocent, the eyes below them twinkling with mischief. She knew damn well she’d never said. Mostly she’d been waiting to see how long she could get away with it before his curiosity got the better of him. “It means ‘silver.’ But it also means…oh, valued, treasured, I suppose would be the closest words.” The compliment was tossed out with calculated nonchalance. The Tuatha tended to treat nicknames as trinkets: given impulsively but with affection, intended to be used a few times and then discarded. And it never hurt anyone to have a few extra names between their true name and the rest of the world.

Normally she was not much a one for discouraging anyone’s terrible choices, but the way he said it made her pause in taking the bow. “Is it so strange, that I might want to see you? I knew where you might be and hoped to find you. And here you are. I wanted to say you good morning, and to see if you had any plans for the day.” The prospect of a quick afternoon tryst had also crossed her mind, but she decided, with uncharacteristic decorum, to keep that proposition to herself until she unraveled his mood. “Beyond that, there was not much. Mostly I go take to the woods to shake off whatever’s been on my mind. I’ve not slept well these past few nights. Bad dreams.”

It pained her to be even that specific, and she gave him a brief, almost guilty look, as if she had imposed beyond manners. She tried to erase the discomfort with a smile. “My mother was fond of saying that bad dreams are much better than bad wakings.”

She fumbled a little taking the bow before she realized her error and switched her left hand to the grip. Be shooting backwards over her shoulder next. It was longer than she was used, the grip too thick for her to handle comfortably—not surprising, since he had a whole head of height, bigger hands, and a full complement of fingers over her. The only way to draw and not risk her hand slipping was to brace the heel of her palm against the grip, which meant rotating her elbow so far inward that the string would catch it…but of course she would no more dry-fire his bow than she would snap it over her knee. Instead she examined the tips and the belly, even sniffed it, with a mystified expression, as if she could identify the unfamiliar wood by scent—would’ve touched her tongue to it, but he was watching—before she nodded in solemn approval and passed it reverently back to him.

“Betimes you are very hard to read. For example, you are all the way over there—” two long steps backward to accentuate the distance “—when you wear a look as though you would rather be—” and she stepped close enough to bump her hip against his “—about here-ish.” Tultharian were more reserved than what she was used to. They took you for either a whore or a pickpocket, or else thought you exceptionally rude, which was, in her mind, worse than the other two accusations. It was one of the first lessons she’d learned Here: hands to herself, always. Still it seemed odd when he did it. She wondered if she wasn’t being rude again by pointing it out.
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Re: Some Dreams Are

Postby Dejicide » Mon Mar 27, 2017 11:33 pm

What she had chosen to name him both pleased and amused greatly. Most of the words that she vocalized did so with little exception but in this instance where she pointed out his hesitance for affection he was eager to show his own bit of exception. He looped a single arm around her waist while she was close as a statement. She was quite accurate in her assessment of him: not so hard to read after all. To explain the distance she felt was another matter entirely and he would not immediately divulge such information.

"It's not strange, just uncommon, so I figured there may be reason. If your whims are what brought you to me I'm happy to have you. In spite of what you may think at the moment I'm glad to have you regardless of reason or sans reason entirely."

He would have the bow back but it was a momentary possession. There was hesitance as he slipped away from her to rest the weapon near where she propped hers. It was a tangible bit of emotional reluctance in the way fingers and the tips of claws drifted over her lower back as he removed himself from the loose embrace that may have felt a bit forced. Slow, casual steps carried him that way and back, speaking over his shoulder on his way.

"If not for my hair and hide I'd call it coincidence since I've never told you what the humans named me. I knew the name I was given by my parents but not a family name until much more recently. A surname was apparently necessary to live amongst them. Silvergild, I was dubbed, but I prefer your airgead. It's incredibly thoughtful of you.

He returned to her with a sincere smile full of sharp teeth that would never be meant for her and stopped close enough that they might share the same breath. Hokwing's hands reached for Victoria's as he gazed down at her, reluctant enough about telling her that she had taught him that distance that he wouldn't speak of it that way. Nearly every time he was eager to share space it was the wrong time to do so and eventually it became a space not to share. His solution would be simple: try again. Try anew. If the same boundary still existed, learn why. She deserved that, seemed to crave it as he did, and would not be burdened by blame in what might have been his own misjudging of cues.

"Anyhow, I had no plans until you showed up," he thoroughly admitted quietly between them. "I'm as inclined to distract you from your thoughts as I am to try to discover them. You know I can relate by the way I can stir next to you in slumber. I've insisted with sincerity that while you're away you're not alone." An apologetic expression seeped into his smile for just a second while he hands were given a bit of a squeeze. "I also can't help but pry at times, apparently."

A half-dragon could have some awkwardness to it when showing affection: the teeth and snout, mostly. It was easy to be hesitant about things when your natural body language and parts did not match your partner's but here in the forest at this moment there was none when he nuzzled just over the side of her brow and tail caressed her leg just above her knee. His words were quiet, befitting the little space between them, but not nearly as careful. "You're right that this is where I prefer to be. Knowing as a certainty you'll return from where you came from, though, it can create that distance you feel. I can't help that it's made a liar out of me."

Indeed that much was true. Truer than he would likely admit to the woman he had made a promise to. While he wished to revel in the mutual companionship they shared he was always aware she would leave and he would quietly allow it as promised. Staying too close, he felt, would apply attachment. These attachments would complicate and eventually snap. He wondered at times if the issue were simply those thoughts that were the issue.

This was not one of those times. In spite of his admission he was true to his word, enthralled by the moment.
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Re: Some Dreams Are

Postby Niabh » Wed Mar 29, 2017 12:22 pm

Hey!” The scoop around her waist took her off-balance and drew her up to the balls of her feet, one hand braced against his arm to keep from falling into him. “Well, it also gets around the awkwardness of me trying to say ‘silver,’” she admitted. In her accent, silver came out with a peculiar, persistent slushing sound: shill-var. “No thoughtfulness of mine,” she said. “Names find who they’re meant for, is all.” Still she smiled, pleased that he was pleased, before she squirmed herself to firmer footing and away from the prickly claws in her back.

“I had been wondering some about your late-night vanishings. Late night? Early morning?” She shrugged off the difference. “I took it for restlessness. It’s the season for it. You, me, and Catch alike, it seems, each for our own reasons. I know mine, and I would not dare speculate on his. I am some curious about yours, though.”

In the midst of her seriousness, something cool snaked across the back of her knee, making her let an involuntary squeak from both surprise and ticklishness. She jerked her hands out of his, glanced wildly down, and burst out laughing before brushing the intruder away and tugging her wraps back to her knee. Moments like these when it struck her, very forcefully, that this was probably one of the odder decisions of her life. Mostly she saw him as only himself, but there were always those unexpected occasions when she was forcibly reminded of the more novel attributes. Like tails. Most of the time she was only amused by how surprisingly effortless it was to overlook such things in the face of his sweetness and consideration. Other times it served as a reminder her that she never really forgot; part of her was always aware, and wary. Those times she kept silent. In part to spare his feelings, but in part--and she had wrestled with the admission for days before finally accepting it--because in the end, it was her neck she was risking. In her hunter's heart, she knew that if the moment came, she could not settle for simply subduing him. Part of the pain of that acknowledgement was the near-certainty that, should she explain it to him, he might understand.

She was keeping silent now. As he disclosed his reasons, a shadow crept across her eyes, blotting out the sparkle.

“Nothing less than divine intervention could make a liar of you, Hok. You’re terrible at it.” It was meant as a joke, to break the tension, but she had no warmth to invest in it. Damn the man. If he’d reached the point of saying such a thing, it meant he’d been thinking about it, and if he’d had time to put some thought in it, it was already too late: this dalliance could now be measured in days.

Carefully she pushed down his arm and extracted herself. "We have promised,” she said. “But it was a friendly promise for all that. If...if you felt that it will cost you too much, or that you couldn't keep your side of it, the bargain may end at any time and we both still part as friends. You will tell me, won't you?”

She bit her lip, and grimaced. She'd said will where she'd meant to say would. Would was hypothetical. Will was inevitable.
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Re: Some Dreams Are

Postby Dejicide » Thu Mar 30, 2017 12:50 am

She asked of his restlessness while mentioning her own after he had inquired about hers.

She questioned his distance and pushed away when he desperately wanted to be close.

She frustrated when he needed her most. It was only fair after the had overreached and expected too much; a byproduct of what, excitement? Was he so caught up in something new that he hadn't known for such a spell that he wanted more than he knew was on the table? He couldn't be entirely sure if it was specifically her or the companionship of someone, anyone, who shared similar values. Ask him a moment ago and he would have sworn it was specifically her. Ask him a moment later and it was not. Over-eager, over-emotional, over-expectant, and as irritants of thoughts started to gnaw at him on a spring mid-day, just over. Floods like this is exactly the reason he asked for her in the first place. He knew that having someone could help; however, he didn't think that self-sabotage was in store. Perhaps he should have known better.

Hokwing fought everything in him in order to not cross his arms while the rest of him seemed to simmer down a relaxed sort of sadness. His wings, once folded neatly behind him, drooped slightly and his tail simply hung there as he watched her reaction to her own words. He knew he didn't have to say a word, that she could likely read him like a book and the realization brought out a sigh that hung visibly in the air at the tip of his snout. Still, he'd speak. Not speaking would leave far too much open to possible interpretation.

"Aye, I suppose I'll tell you now. I feel like I need to invest, to commit, if I'm with you. With all my sincerity I didn't think it would be the case but at this point I'm not comfortable. My heart wants to latch on and my mind wants to know more. I can't even apologize because I know there's nothing wrong with that. I would understand your position even if I hadn't gotten to know you well. Sometimes, and this was perhaps a wisely calculated move on your part, I'm sure that I don't."

There was a long pause. He expected to feel some exaggerated surge of the disappointment that betrayed his body language. Instead he was relieved to speak his mind. It was true and her own behavior seemed like a solid confirmation that she had known before him. If the situation was different he would have thanked her for humoring him until he felt comfortable enough to speak the words himself. A brief shrug was made of his shoulders and wings and while he was far from in the mood to smile his features were free of a grimace or frown. Neutral, thoughtful, honestly diplomatic.

"No, I suppose it's less calculated and more natural. Being ambiguous is round-about is what you are and I'm honored that you've shared with me what you have."

He inclined his head to her in a sort of thank-you before he moved further away, resigning that such talks were not to be made at a distance close enough to touch. Shoulder and flank found a thick, tall tree to lean himself against and he gazed upwards towards the branches that started a dozen yards over his head. It was the deciduous sort that he had to squint through the branches of since the leaves had not yet filled its branches and there was nothing but bright sky streaming down between them. He considered what else he might tell her then, if he should let her speak before he went on. It was true that his questions were not given answers and he was troubled by that even if he knew better: asking the woman anything personal was a gamble. Asking him a question would always garner a response; however, and he wouldn't let the mood or previous words cloud that personal integrity.

"You were curious about my restlessness. I would blame spring but I have to stop doing that: regardless of how the seasons treat me they should not be an excuse for my own behavior. I, too, have unpleasant dreams. They're bits and pieces of who I was: reminders of what I was and what was taken from me. What you have before you is someone who can't move beyond the past regardless of how hard he tries. My heart and my mind transposes my experiences here with the ones I had these days to the point that even if you wanted to move on with me I couldn't. Not in good faith.

"The humans have a couple of practices that may have some weight to them. I was considering following through with them but I wasn't quite sure where that would leave us since it requires a trip back to the lands that reared me, months away. Now I suppose now a better time then I could have imagined. I want closure: I never returned to confront those bastards for the lies they filled me with and their attempt to put me down for challenging them. I want to say Good-Bye to her; long gone from the mortal world for sure, but this is for me. When it all happened I could do nothing but run from it all. Apparently I'm good at that, running. Even as I turn to confront all that I'm running from here and now."
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Re: Some Dreams Are

Postby Niabh » Fri Mar 31, 2017 8:33 am

She stared at him, aghast, while simultaneously tamping down a rather strong urge to go over and kick him in the shin. Because of course, of course, she should have seen this coming. There’d been a dozen signs of it—how many rusting shirts had he given her already, three?—and she’d taken it for simple kindness, as much as he would have done for anyone. Now she felt duped, as if he’d spent all this time luring her into a snare. Worse, she felt gullible for allowing herself to believe things were otherwise, and therefore culpable for his palpable distress.

Bargains were made precisely so that this sort of thing didn’t happen. Bargains were safe. Mayhap if one was foolish enough, or desperate enough, to accept a bad bargain, one might find oneself on the short end, but there was never anything one didn’t agree to. And this hadn’t even been a true bargain—more a casual agreement. An she’d been certain this would happen, she would have drawn up a full contract, scratched it in stone, and made him sign it.

And then on top of everything…he damn well thanked her. He didn't have to say it aloud for her to recognize it for what it was. She wanted to scream. Feckin' tultharian!

She inhaled slowly, tried to keep her voice quiet and dispassionate to match his own, even though from the first word there were a tremor of fury that was doubtless going to take over as soon as she stopped thinking about it.

“Before we began this, I asked you why you’d approached me, when we scarce knew one another. This is why I asked. But you were practical.” She drew the word out, rolling it in her mouth like a bit of gristle before spitting it out. Practical, in the sense that his motivations had been what hers would be under the same circumstances: a quick scratch of the itch with agreeable company, no risk of entanglements. “I thought we were in accord with what we wanted. I told you from the start that there would always be things I couldn’t tell you. I’ve been as honest about my dishonesty as I could be without coming out the other side and being honest again. I’m being dishonest about things I don’t even want to be dishonest about, just to spare your stupid feelings, and do you know how…how not done that is? You tell me you’re keeping yourself distant because you know I’m going to leave—I can’t come and tell you on the heels of that that I’m restless because all I can think about is leaving; that’s cruel, that’s like rubbing salt in your eyes. You don’t even know my real name. Nothing ends well from those beginnings. And now you bring this into it? You’re this great grown thing and you’re acting like some green maiden in a flush from her first season, you…ninny!

Aye, there went the reasonable voice. Farewell, old friend. You did your best.

In lieu of an outright kick, she stamped her foot and flung down her fists. “You forget, this happens to me too. Every year. While it’s happening, it feels like the realest thing in the world. You think you want to settle down and build a nest with whomever you’ve latched onto. I assure you: the fever breaks. Then you’re done with it until the next time, and thank the gods for that; otherwise I’d be dropping litters every blasted year. I don’t think there’s ever been one of them that I even wanted to speak to again between times, but at least I could still be friends with them if I wanted. No one holds what happens during seasons as binding. It’s all just…play.”

The moment that last was out, she wish she hadn’t said it. She’d meant it to be reassuring—which, to her, it was, in its way—but under the circumstances it sounded callous. Which…well, if the shoe fit. She tried to shoot him a defiant little glare, but in the face of his quiet pain, the glare came off as sullen, furious disappointment, tinged with an almost comical confusion: how did we even get here? Her teeth gnawed in agitation at her bottom lip.

“Now we can’t even be friends anymore, much less lovers, because this silly…” Frustrated, she waved her hands about her face as if warding off a swarm of gnats. “…thing is always going to between us. No matter what we become to one another, you’re always going to have hope that it will turn into something else. And it won’t, because it can’t. It’s not just that I’ll be gone soon. It’s that anything you feel might not even be real.

She turned her back on him and snatched up her bow. Ever acutely aware of the power of a dramatic exit, her first instinct was to sweep back into the woods, her piece said. Except it hadn't been. She felt she hadn't even gotten near the bottom of her disappointment.

Finally she, too, let out a sigh. This time her voice stayed level. “These past weeks have been very sweet for me. But I have no claims over you than those you choose to give me, so long as you grant me the same courtesy. If this is something you want to do, or must do, for your own peace, the most I can do is wish you well of it. I hope you find what closure you seek. And I hope you come back to tell me about it.”

And that she was still here to tell. But mentioning that fact, on top of everything else, also felt a bit too much like rubbing in salt.
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Re: Some Dreams Are

Postby Dejicide » Fri Mar 31, 2017 2:44 pm

And I hope you come back to tell me about it, she said. He appreciated the contradiction there and recognized that in spite of everything else she had to say it had ended with that. Her emotions were more than understandable and he stood there, mostly silent and stoic while she voiced them. Perhaps a bit too stoic; that is, until she called him a ninny. In spite of the words passed between them and the weight they might carry he laughed aloud and carried on with it a moment. It was a wonderful break from what they were both experiencing at the moment even if she might be offended by how he took the ridiculous insult. Finally, grinning broadly at her, he lifted a hand to rub at his eyes before he sobered up a bit.

"What happens every time, Victoria, getting caught up in the seasons and looking for companionship? Aye, spring has it's way with me in that way and that is exactly why I came to you initially. If it were that to blame do you really think I would be so utterly oblivious to it?" He snorted loudly, a little offended by how little she thought of him in that regard. "I still have my faculties, thank-you. I can understand well enough that this was to be a fun romp and that you wanted to know if for whatever reason it couldn't continue as such. I can't."

He gave another heavy sigh as he watched her. His claws idly picked away at a piece of bark that had rubbed against his bicep the wrong way. He wasn't sure how to explain it to her while sparing her own feelings. It wasn't entirely about Victoria: he hadn't fallen madly in love with his friend though he certainly cared about her. If he hadn't he might have been keen to push on with the charade and use her while denying any misgivings she would undoubtedly have about the situation. This was about something in him wanting to move on and she was more a complication than a proper distraction.

"Things change. Feelings change. The same practicality you saw in me then is what's leading me astray now: I feel like I understand better how I feel now than I did then. I still accept the way you are even though I'd like to know more. I still accept you as Victoria even though I know why you have no name. I still want to remain your friend, your airgead, even if you just called me a ninny. What I don't want is for you to get caught up in my damned dreams. They're not for you: not the ones I want, not the ones I'm eager to be rid of. Blame the season all you like but that's what's going on in my head." He paused a long moment again and tilted his head at her, quizzical in expression. "What in the Abyss are you talking about, this thing? You've put limit on our relationship, speak of friendship, and strip it all away when I do as you ask?"

"It costs too much," he insisted. "At first I was concerned about losing you because the feelings I had for another were being pushed on to you. Now that I recognize this and I feel it's wise to step away you're saying it's going to happen anyway?" Any amusement he showed dwindled away then and were replaced by a scowl. "I'll spell it out for you, Victoria. I care about you, you're a close friend in a place where any friend is worth more coin than my father's ever hoarded. I respect your decisions on what and how you choose to share in spite of my curious nature. What you are not is a means to find some solace and that's what I need. You say that I hope this will turn into something else? That would require tremendous, unfathomable change from you that I can't ask for."

He watched her quietly then. He didn't want her to leave, he didn't want to be alone, but that was far too hypocritical for him to voice aloud considering it was his wish for what they had been sharing to be at an end. It was a mortifying way to leave things considering he had intentions of going away soon. There was regret that he couldn't simply get lost with her, abandon his nagging thoughts, and it showed as a sadness that washed over his features while his head hung low. Here was the only person he had mutual understanding and regard for and it felt like he was throwing it away for old demons he couldn't overcome.

"I'll miss it. I'll miss you, regardless of what's said here," he admitted. "I've no doubt the memories will help me through where I'm going even if I can't come back to them."
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Re: Some Dreams Are

Postby Niabh » Sat Apr 01, 2017 1:19 pm

Her black eyes fixed on him, but something had shifted in them: rather than the eyes of a doe, or a curious little fox, now they seemed a bit too large for her face, too bulbous. Coupled with her narrow chin, it gave her the chilly, calculating look of a wasp. “I could make you stay, you know.” Like the look, the voice seemed detached, as if it had come from behind her face, rather than through it. Only the faintest tremor kept her words from being an outright threat, rather than the angry near-plea of a merely hurt young woman. The tremor alone was hers. Everything else was the other voice that filtered through her. “If I wanted. You would hate me for it.”

And that knowledge—that he would hate her for it—was enough to make the voice and the expression break apart, like sunlight on water. She blinked and glanced down. Slowly stole over her the quiet awkwardness of one upon whom it dawns that they’ve just made an irrevocable arse of themselves. She rumbled her fingers through her hair and pressed the heel of her palm to her brow. “Dash it all,” she muttered, “must you always be so reasonable?” Granted, he had a very good reason to try to remain reasonable, to hold onto his temper when he could. She wondered what would have happened if she had kicked him in the shin.

Eyes still fixed firmly on the ground, as if she did not yet dare look directly at him less that cold voice steal back, she raked her teeth across her lower lip until she found something worth saying. “I don’t like being alone. I have never been alone, not once in all my life. The clan is…well, I talk about it as if it’s some great golden peerless thing, but it wasn’t really. We squabbled; there was always someone you couldn’t stand to be around, or who couldn’t stand you, or someone boorish and boring that you’d just rather avoid, just as it is here. But they were always there. Being alone has been a lot harder than I imagined it would be. I’ve appreciated just having someone to wake up beside in the dark. And something to look forward to in the daylight as well. That’s why I came to find you today—because I realized that for once, I could. I could go out and find someone and they would be pleased to see me. It’s very hard to imagine giving that up.”

She shook her head a little, ran a hand down the side of her face, and finally looked back at him, mostly herself again, but her humor had taken on a bright, brittle edge. “Save that you know, and I know, that if all goes well, I will be going home. I won’t have to leave again, and I won’t have to worry about being alone again. Which is all well and fine for me, but not very fair to you. So if that’s all that troubles you, then then I don’t much mind being your solace, since you’ve been as much mine as I’ve been yours. But…”

She sighed and gritted her teeth, annoyed with herself. Something earnest was always going to come out once you’d said ‘but’ and trailed away like that. It was excuse enough to pause and gather her breath.

“I’m sorry for the outburst. You were speaking of one thing and I was thinking of…myself, really. You were quite right when you said this was all calculated to shut you out. I thought it would make it easier, later. I just didn't quite want to admit for whom I was trying to make it easier: you when I had to go, or myself when it was over.” She gave a winded, helpless laugh. “I'm not even sure if I'm telling the truth right now. I think I must be, because some of it's things I planned not to tell you. It feels like the truth.”

In the back of her mind she knew with absolute certainty that later this evening, or mayhap in as little as a few hours, she could twist this whole conversation and convince herself she had revealed nothing of importance. The idea saddened her as much as it comforted her. The injunction held fast: never tell the tultharian anything. Always keep them a little off-balance. The trouble was that she had thought the rule a choice—that if you wanted to, or if it was really important, or if you trusted them well enough, you could tell them the truth. It had never occurred to her that the one of the old rules trapped her as much as it did them. The very idea was terrifying and too rich with complexities for her to grasp their enormity in the few seconds she had to pause and dwell on it. Paradoxically, it made her wish yet again to be back home, so that she could ask one of her own folk if it was so. Yet back home, it would have never occurred to her to question it.

“And I didn’t mean to call you a ninny,” she added meekly. “That just popped out.”

This time she stepped nearer to him. A tentative hand hovered just upon his shoulder, as she gave a quick glance to his face to see if it was alright to do it. She sighed in resignation. “This…quest, or retreat of yours. Will it help you? Will it set you at ease again?
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Re: Some Dreams Are

Postby Dejicide » Sat Apr 01, 2017 3:46 pm

"If your subjugation would guarantee me freedom from my own conflict I might consider it myself," he mused with a tone much lighter than hers. He wouldn't take her any more serious than she would he if he threatened with violence. Passing, passionate thoughts that were nothing more than a quick fix to something that was flawed but precious. Acting on them would be destructive for both parties, surely, and they would both hate it either way.

She was welcome, of course, and he offered his arms to her when she neared for an embrace if she would have it. He was nothing but ears for her words while she spoke; too many words for her liking, more than enough to bring a soft smile across his muzzle. It was moments like that where he couldn't quite understand why she was so resistant against sharing her thoughts and feelings: was it because she wouldn't and couldn't commit to them or the chance they weren't real? His lover might have received some pity if the thought came at a different time or place but here she received sympathy. He understood all too well the difficulties in finding oneself in an alien place surrounded by strangers with incredibly different mannerisms and ways through-out life. He adapted and learned and was happy to be assimilated. She had no reason to. In contradiction she had every reason not to.

In spite of thoughts he rumbled a chuckle deep in his chest before his brows lifted at her. His inquiries were less rhetorical than they seemed, part of him wanting her opinion on what he had chosen to do while layering his tone in such a way that it wasn't obvious. He wasn't as confident as he seemed about his plan to leave as he put on but it seemed to be his only solution. It was also unfortunately his first. "Reasonable, you say? Do you think that sailing over a half-charted sea to exact vengeance upon a people that may not know what's happening is reasonable?" An exhale escaped him and his shoulders sagged as he continued, "Is it reasonable to take such a pilgrimage to say good-bye to a tombstone I left behind me? I recognize that it is impulsive and dangerous but I don't see another option. Perhaps this is how the season has decided to have it's way with me. Will these thoughts pass in time and should I drown out the thoughts with whiskey and your company?

"You speak of solace but in the end after we've said our words here could you, even?"

He paused then in a full stop as a realization washed over him. He had gone on a tirade of selfishness after she opened up to him and disclosed that she found a kind of comfort she only knew at home by having him near. Now he was considering abandoning her in a similar fashion as he would most likely be victim to in the end. It made him immediately wracked with guilt and if she had taken the embrace he would rest his head against hers affectionately and speak quietly. Just whispers of words laced with apology.

"I won't leave you. Not now, not like this. How dare I, after fussing about you leaving one day?" He breathed another sigh as a form of resignation came over him. "I don't want to. By the Abyss, I am a ninny."
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Re: Some Dreams Are

Postby Niabh » Sun Apr 02, 2017 8:01 am

“It would,” she said, with no embellishment or hesitation. Even if he didn’t take it seriously, she was most certainly serious—more serious than she had been the night she asked him not to joke about names. “It was how I planned to bring you to heel if things should ever get, er…”

With unusual delicacy—for her—she picked up his hand in hers, spread his fingers with her fingers, and lightly pinged her thumbnail off the tip of his claw.

Bringing his hand down, she gave him her studied gaze again. “Before that happened, I was going to ask to try it once in private, somewhere safe, so that you could…” She found her words foiled by an odd, hard knot in her throat, which perplexed and surprised her, as she felt quite serious and calm at the moment. She swallowed it down. “You could see what it was like and tell me whether or not you thought you could stand it again. But I never should have mentioned it just then. Not like that.”

She shrugged a shoulder, absently swinging his hand between them. “We’re greedy things, mostly, and selfish. About like your kind and your hoards. We have ways of keeping the things we want. But I’ve had it done to me before and I would not do it to anyone else. Not without their leave. It…it is not a kind thing.”

Eagerly enough she laid her head where it fit best against his shoulder, and brushed her fingertips under his chin in that little gesture that had to substitute for a kiss. It didn’t feel as reassuring as she would have wished, and she shifted her cheek a bit as if the spot she had chosen had an unfamiliar and uncomfortable knob of bone under it. This dalliance could now be measured in days, she had thought before, and now she could not shake the feeling that she had laid her curse over it. What pair did not have quarrels? Even serious ones?

What troubled her mostly was the new word that had come between them. Solace. Which seemed to be defined as substituting something else for the thing you really wanted. It was, once she considered it a moment, a definition that chafed her not at all: it fit into her nature to be something else, and to play the part to such perfection that the other party never suspected it wasn't true. Hadn't they already played those games, with his full consent, for the pure novelty of it? She was accustomed to being so used—although again, once she'd thought on it, to say used made it seem she was being taken advantage of, when in fact most of the time it was she who used her glams to take advantage of others. Point being, she was used to it. He was not. There lay the balance of power. The thought of it sobered her.

She snorted lightly, her fingers tracing the V of his vest, as he questioned what might be ‘reasonable’ or not. “Airgead, my folk have gone to war over a cow. Not even cattle. One cow.” She smiled ruefully. “Well, I suppose if I’m being truthful—and I am—what was really being fought over was pride. My point is that I’m hardly the one to tell a man what he should and should not fight for. An I were thee, and I’d been used as you were, I’d’ve called a rade on the bastards years ago. But I did mean that much of what I said: I have no place to make any claim upon you that you haven’t agreed to. That wasn’t a plea for you not to leave; I’m not so low as begging yet. More…if you’re to go, I’d like to at least tell you these things, rather than send you off with a hearty farewell and a yo-heave-ho. If only to let you know...you are wanted here. There’s more to you than your past. I can understand wanting to say goodbye to it, though.”

Her face drew up stern and skeptical again. “Although if I believed for even two heartbeats together that you were leaving with the idea of getting your silly arse killed, I’d hamstring you in your sleep.” Judging by the dry half-smile on her face, she wasn’t entirely joking.
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