The volcano, now dormant, remained a disconcerting shadow against the too-blue sky. An aching sky. A grasping sky. A sky, if one craned their head at, caught their eyes on, would swallow you. So Boudika did not look for the sky, as she broke through the brambles and the dense undergrowth of the forest. There were few game-paths or easy-to-follow trails. But Boudika knew, with a dogged determination, that this forest would not conquer her.
The beaches were smothered with too many people, as though the relic were waiting to be discovered in the bleached-white sand. As though it would be easy. This had begun to frustrate her more than she had words to express. Boudika felt tethered, utterly, to the sea—when she wandered too far from it she was brought back to the precipice of the land, staring, waiting for something impossible, imperceivable. Waiting for something hopeful, tumultuous. But the sea was choking. It was choking with equines too timid to pursue the deeper parts of the islands, equines frightened by bizarre birds and gleaming jungle-cats.
Then why, Boudika found herself asking, did she stay. At last, Boudika broke from the beach with a simmering anger. She took to the forest at a run, delving into the depths like a whetted knife. The branches, even now, lashed her face. Leaves and thorns tore at her flanks and she felt the hot swell of blood where they broke skin. Boudika returned the small pains sevenfold, tearing through the deeply tangled trees into a small clearing. For a moment, she could reassess her surroundings—and there, the volcano continued to loom, like a relic itself. Like a temple. The mares flanks heaved; her ribs swelled out and then retracted with each heavy, laboured breath. Her skin was flecked with foam, her eyes wide and white, nostrils flared.
From there, she took her journey more methodically. Boudika transitioned smoothly between a walk and a canter, closing ground quickly. The earth had begun to slope, and she took the incline in stride. By midday, Boudika had reached a half-way point on the volcano pleasantly disguised as a mere mountain. She rested on a ledge, overlooking the whole of the eastern side of the island.
Perhaps she was a fool for venturing so far inland, for abandoning the familiarity of the sea. It gleamed at her, a cruel abyss, and her eyes shied from the wicked brightness. Boudika took a moment to look, instead, at the deep forest. It was deceptively ebullient. The life in it overflowed, swollen with colourful fruits and berries, blossoming with spring flowers—
Boudika’s thought were cut off as a large, falcon-like bird dived toward her. It did not make a sound; instead, it ducked its wings and descended like a flash, talons bared. Boudika narrowly ducked the assault and stared incredulously as the bird repositioned and resumed the attack. Boudika snorted and backtracked, swiping her horns in the air to wave the avian off. Then it screeched at her, and hovered above for a moment, with a head far more reptilian than bird-like. Boudika bared her teeth, snapping them at the air with a resounding click, but the bird dived again toward her eyes—
And was joined from more from the canopy below. Boudika swivelled, tossed her head, but the ground beneath her gave way, and she suddenly found herself tumbling several feet down the slope. After multiple, terrifying seconds, Boudika slowed her fall by catching her front hooves on the nook of a fallen log. Breathing heavily, she pulled herself, shaking, to her feet. Her body was covered in cuts and scrapes, and Boudika was certainly bruised, but at least nothing felt broken. Boudika glared up toward the bare edge of mountain where she had stood—the birds were still circling, celebrating their victory.
It wasn’t that she shied away from the thought of adventure - she’d always been drawn by it, eager to discover, to test herself in the process. It was that things here were so strange, so different from everything she’d known; the closest thing to it had been Isra’s maze, and she’d only managed to survive that for a matter of minutes.
She had a feeling that the magic here wouldn’t nicely spit her out somewhere safe.
Perhaps it had been a mistake to cut into the forest, especially on her own. The thick cover of trees, the suffocating canopy, the reaching, tripping vines - all of it disoriented her far more than the canyons or the empty expanse of the Mors ever could, and the feeling of claustrophobia was growing. She was a thing made for open skies and rolling dunes, and no matter how carefully she tried to step, branches snagged at her wings and scratched at her sides, and logs and tangles of ferns and flowers tripped at her feet. Here, at least, her short mane and tail were not a drawback. But even the air seemed to press in on her, the humidity of such a verdant place slicking sweat along her sides like no heat she’d known before.
Being so far out of her element had the effect of making her more prickly, more aware. She was as mindful of the whip at her side as she would have been were it a living snake, though after a few hours of reaching for it at every rustle of leaves or snatch of peculiar bird-song she at least let it be now.
She needed to get back to the open. By now she was thoroughly turned around, streaked with dirt and sweat, skin prickling from scrapes with thorns and insect bites. What Elif wanted was a breeze, and a clear view -
just then, the raucous crying of birds called her attention to both. They were screaming like a flock of crows after an owl, harsh and laughing, and she flicked back her ears at the cacophony. She could just make out the silhouettes of them through breaks in the canopy, and she stumbled the last few yards into a clearing. Here, she shook herself and glared up - about a half-dozen of them circled there, and their noise and boldness made her frayed nerves boil over. The pegasus flared out her wings, uncoiled her whip, and took a few running steps before launching her narrow frame skyward, beating her wings hard to clear the trees.
Her sudden approach alone was enough to draw the birds’ attention, and she just had time to make out the beady gleam of eyes before they began to swarm her. Here, at least, was a foe she could face, and room to do it: Elif squealed a challenge, scythed the air with her front hooves, and cracked the whip with a sound like a gunshot.
It was the last they did not at all care for; she snapped it again, just missing taking a group of feathers from one of the strange bird’s wings, when they seemed to decide it was too much trouble and whirled as one back to the cover of the trees. For a few moments she gave chase, the wind cooling and calming her like the old friend it was, and then she circled, buoyant, laughing, to land on the ledge the birds had been circling.
She was just tucking her wings back to her sides when a flash of red and white caught her eye. Immediately she returned to tension, stiff-legged as she peered over the edge - down into a striking mare’s face.
“Hello,” she said, cautious, thinking of the whip again - but then her gaze made out the scuffed-up path of dirt and plants, and the cuts and scrapes and beading blood, and the other woman’s own expression. The clamor of the birds had died away, but Elif could still hear it echoing, and she thought she understood. “Do you need a hand?” she added, and softened just a little.
@Boudika
elif
06-21-2019, 10:08 AM
Played by
Staff [PM] Posts: 309 — Threads: 165 Signos: 989,640
As the birds flee from the Solterra mare’s attack, the memory of her whip still echoing through the air. One by one they dart into the forest, until all that is left of them is their cackling laughter and a few stray feathers torn loose from their bodies.
These feathers drift now through the air, agonizingly slow, spiraling and dancing on the spray breeze. They rise and they fall, spinning around one another all the while, as if they, too, are laughing at the first mare’s tumble.
But then the trees shift, their branches part, and a ray of sunlight strikes a single feather.
It catches in midair, frozen.
And then, it begins to change.
It starts at the quill, a ray of light creeping up its base. It leaches up the feather, like blood seeping into paper, until bit by bit of it is transformed. In the time it takes to breathe, the feather has been turned to solid gold.
Only then does it resume its fall, faster than before. It falls and it falls and it falls, spinning past one pair of green eyes before it lands, gently, across the red-eyed mare’s back. Its touch is surprisingly warm and heavy, its vanes still feathery and swaying in the breeze.
The trees shudder again, and more light breaks through the canopy, gilding more and more feathers.
Perhaps if they step in the sunlight they, too, will turn to gold.
@boudika and @elif have both been awarded +200 signos for encountering a random event!
A few feathers have been torn free in the birds’ attack; as the birds disappear, their feathers remain, floating slowly down to the earth. In midair they are caught in the sunlight, and there they are kissed by magic, magic that turns them to solid gold. They’ll fall around the two horses, a dozen or more surrounding them.
Enjoy!
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