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Swooping Season - Amalthea - 10-03-2020


Well, that was stupid.

This was the most appropriate thought in Amalthea's head as she watched the little dragon scurry away, a sparkling ear cuff pocketed in its bulging left cheek like a chipmunk.

Maybe it hadn't been the most well thought out idea to admittedly goad the little reptile, and maybe even mean. When it had sidled up to the stall and tried to peek up over the edge, she'd picked up the cuff in her telekinesis and lifted it so that the dragon could see, even giving it a few shakes so that the light bounced off of it.

That was the big mistake.

She saw the dragon's eyes widen to dark, dilated pools as its head followed. The little thing must have been young, still growing into its head and talons. It lowered itself closer to the ground, wriggling its entire body like a snake sliding over water before leaping up and chomping the ear cuff out of the air.

Amalthea, to her credit, did react swiftly.

She hissed a quick apology to her grandfather, who was staring at her as if she'd just told him not to be alarmed but that she thought that the moon wasn't the same shape every night, and darted off after the scaley little thief.

With the usual crowded and festive atmosphere of the market, it meant a lot of starting and stopping. Which meant always being several steps and counting behind the little dragon, the only way she was even able to keep track of it was the way its raven blue scales glinted in torchlight as it scurried beneath hooves.

A break in the crowd allowed Amalthea to make up some ground, giving her room to raise her speed before the ephemeral meadow in the forest of bodies closed in again all too soon. Much too soon for her to slow her pace as a stranger came into view at an alarming rate.


@Aspara


RE: Swooping Season - Aspara - 10-04-2020


The streets of Denocte were in many ways like a living thing- pulsing, breathing, dreaming. And by the Spring of 506, they felt like old friends of mine. Much of my childhood was spent there, running wild down the back roads and slinking like a panther through the markets. I had my favorite places and my secret spots. I knew the way it looked in every light-- the evening’s long shadows, the orange lick of the bonfires. Foggy mornings were my favorite, the streets shrouded in a haze so heavy I could pretend I did not know where they ended.

That spring evening, I was racing my wolf, who had taken the meandering back alleys. I had taken the more direct but far more crowded route through the market, and I bounded through it quickly and recklessly. The snow had thinned but not yet melted, it clumped on the sides of the streets in sullen, dirt-fringed mounds.

I slid to a stop and tilted my head to direct my horn to the sky- one of the first things a unicorn learns is that there is a weapon in the center of their brow, and it will cut even when you don’t want it to. Too late. “Ow!” We stumbled into each other, bumping shoulders rather roughly. The crowd mindlessly continued their path around us, parting on one side then reuniting on the other like flowing water.

I’m so sorry. Are you alright?” I looked her over methodically and checked to see if she had dropped anything. It was not the first time I had collided with someone at the markets, and it would not be the last. I was and had always been quite clumsy, and I also liked to run. The gemstone beneath her horn caught my attention. I had never seen anything like it on a unicorn, and it deeply intrigued me.

We definitely had never met before, which wasn’t unusual. I knew many of the vendors and stalls, but there was always something new to see, someone new to meet. Anyway I had always been a little aloof, more interested in the wares than the people looking over them. I think that’s just the way I was, like I had been born with something in me always stubbornly turned inward, but maybe my magic had something to do with it too. With it I could talk to the stone streets and the tables heavy with merchandise, and I usually found their stories far more interesting than the hawk-eyed vendors.

The race had already been lost, there was no way I would catch up to Furfur. I was not terribly bothered by it- there had been nothing on the line except pride, and I didn’t have much of that to begin with. I looked into the stranger's eyes, one unicorn to another. “Where were you going in such a hurry?” I grinned. Usually my twin and I were the ones running through the markets, catching dirty looks.

a s p a r a


@Amalthea <3



RE: Swooping Season - Amalthea - 10-05-2020



Oh, she'd tried to stop! She really had!

The almost glass-like clinking of her crystalline hooves on the stone gave way to a harsher scraping as Amalthea tried to slow her momentum. But it was all for naught.

She flung her head to the side, accepting the jarring impact that she could feel through her torso as she and the other unicorn collided. It caused her skull to rattle uncomfortably on her neck, but thankfully it stayed attached along with the rest of her. The biggest loss being a gust of breath forced from Amalthea's chest that escaped with a small oof!!

Stumbling back from the stranger, Amalthea opened her mouth to apologize when they beat her to it. Still, it wouldn't do to leave it unsaid.

"I'm fine, thank you," She replied, looking up at the moonlight colored unicorn she'd run into. "What about yourself? I must apologize, I wasn't looking where I was going-Ah!" In the confusion she had briefly forgotten just why she had been running in a crowded place anyways, the dragon!

Oh...that ear cuff hadn't been the most expensive item they had but it was still time and resources gobbled up by her own mistake!

Tears began to well up at the corners of her eyes and she willed them to just...to just suck back in if they could! The stranger would probably assume it was related to the collision and feel bad, when it had nothing to do with them.

Clearing her throat, Amalthea tried to keep her voice even and answer the last question spoken in her direction.

"A dragon snatched a piece of jewelry from my family's stall, I was trying to chase it down but..." She sighed in the direction it had gone, visibly deflating as she tried to brute force her way through the stages of grief and straight into acceptance. "It's long gone."

That wasn't this random soul's problem though, and she didn't intend to make it so.

"Che sarà, sarà. Nothing to be done now!" She asserted, forcing her voice to soften as she turned back to the stranger. "Are you sure you're alright?"



@Aspara


RE: Swooping Season - Aspara - 10-13-2020


And the lilacs drank the water, marking the slow, slow, slow passing of time
T
he unicorn was kind, easygoing, and even more apologetic than me. I flushed and smiled and felt foolish blush tickle my cheeks for running into someone. Again. 

It made sense to me that she was chasing down a dragon. I had been chasing a wolf. “Oh they’re nasty little things, aren’t they?” But there was warmth in my voice, for I was really quite fond of the tiny mischief makers. They brought a little more life to the world, a little more magic. A little headache, too, I admit.

Che sarà, sarà... I had never heard such words before, and I committed them to memory with a wide-eyed blink. It sounded like a spell, something whispered over a boiling cauldron. I had a wild imagination, and I was all too happy to indulge it-- but only privately. On the surface I strained to be as sensible, as normal, as possible.

(Later I would laugh at how hard I once tried to maintain a certain image of myself. As though if I could cultivate a personality, a way of being, as if I had any choice in the matter. But alas, it would take me a long time to learn to let go of those things.)

I quickly realized she was not upset by the physical pain of our literal first contact, but the loss of what the dragon had stolen. She looked visibly distraught. Deflated, like first all the air had left her and then all the bones began to follow. I wanted to step in and prop her up, but that felt out of line.

Oh, I hated to see anyone in distress. Something flared up in me, all noble and aching. “Yes yes, I’m fine! You know, I have an idea on how we can maybe get your jewelry back. It might not work--” I did not want to give her false hope, for I knew firsthand how crushing it could be. “But it’s worth a shot, right?” I stepped down a side alley orthogonal to the direction which the dragon had scampered off, gesturing with my head for the stranger to follow.

First we’ll need bread.” We were going to Halwyn’s. I lead the way, as confident and comfortable in the gritty side streets as I was in the mountains or by the sea. “What’s your name? I’m Aspara.” I was terrible at small talk (still am) but names were an easy enough place to begin.

@Amalthea <3