[AW] Government Jobs

[Raglan]

Raglan had taken to flying more in his newly found free time. It was strange to the stallion, the concept of time not spent with a particular goal in mind - no learning to scribe for Camdis Lohir, no memorizing lists of herbs and poisons, no missions with his Crow brothers and sisters, no following Reichenbach and watching his kingly butt. So with the aimlessness that he had developed in recent days, and the wanderlust that had driven him from the arms of his home once before, the horned stag soared over the continent that held his beautiful, passionate, angry people. Up so high, with wingtips slicing through cloud matter, Raglan imagined that the invisible borders placed between the kingdoms were nonexistent, that the children of each deity could come and go from one monarchy to the next, interchangeable and peaceful. 

Part of him was bitter still, at the abandonment that weighed his every breath, at the closed gates that stood so solidly between him and home... But another part of the Silvertongue felt only guilt - if he had been present, if he had been able to shield Reichenbach’s heart from whatever blow it had sustained, would his world be so fractured still? Would the Raven Gates stand open and would the mountain passes be filled with traders and merchants once more? He didn’t know and would never know what sort of consequences were brought by his absence. Raglan would prefer to believe that his impact was of no consequence, but he couldn’t shake the feeling that he could have at least done something to help smooth things over.

Caught in his thoughts as he was, Raglan couldn’t ignore the literal splitting of the earth that was occurring within the shadow of Veneror Peak. Brow creasing in confusion and pale eyes glinting with curiosity, the stallion spiraled lower in great lazy circles, keen gaze noting the ring of trees guarding their great stone table and the court tapestries hanging from thick boughs. The sight of the Kingdom sigils emblazoned upon such fine cloth, coupled with the elegant birds each seen flying toward in the direction of a realm soured Raglan’s curiosity. 

The youth couldn’t help but scoff at the majesty of it all, though there was no real effort behind his disdain, “The games Kings and Queens play...”

As his descent came to an end and pale hooves pressed into the freshly turned soil, the orphaned Crow peered closely at the seemingly impenetrable barrier of sentinel trees. Making his way toward the wall, Raglan made sure to keep an eye on the entryway, not wanting to be caught unawares by some haughty missionary from the gods. Slowing to a stop, the winged lad peered up at the hardwood and stuck his tongue out before addressing the giant plant directly, “So, you working part time for the Sovereigns? What do they pay you? Gallons of water?” He wrinkled his nose, “I know you can’t talk, but if you could have one of your friends fall directly onto the Raven Gate in Denocte - you know the Raven Gate, right? That big metal thing that’s keeping me and Little Sinner from going home? Yeah, that one - Anyway, if one of your tree buddies could crush t to smithereens to I can sleep in my own damn bed, I’d really appreciate it.”


 @Random Events (yanno if the tree would like to respond)

[Random Events]

Maybe the trees do speak?

As the grounds cracked and the earths moved at Tempus' touch, there was an eerie calm that took over the land. The silence was deafening in its purity and its volume, but Tempus and the Gods knew it would not last long. Curiosity always overtook, always drew the wandering ones in like flies to honey.

Tempus supposed that was not always a bad thing, for it was during this time that He needed His voice heard. But right now, His voice would not be heard. It was not the right time, not yet; but they would hear soon.

---

This leggy pegasus would be the first to descend into the area surrounding the Summit. The birds were quiet and the insects were silent, something that lent to the eerie serenity of the surroundings.. But he was not truly alone, as he might suspect.

There was silence as he spoke with the trees that guarded the stone Summit. Silence at a childish tongue stuck out. Silence at the ruffled feathers and near indignant-words (although one could hardly blame the young boy for his opinions). Moments of silence at the end of his request drug out into what felt like eons, the gentle sway of the trees' branches and leaves filled the clearing with their soothing sound. And it was in those silent moments that one awoke: A Shagbark Sentinel.

Trunk cracked and split as its arms pulled from their slumbering state, the crevices of its bark deepening and forming the creases that made up a vaguely sentient expression that lacked eyes but was never blind. Roots pulled from the soil as the Sentinel rose, a long limb-like arm pressing against their brothers and sisters as the roots became their legs.

And then, they turned, eye-less gaze peering down curiously at the blood-colored pegasus at their base. Their trunk creaked and groaned as it bent and warped, a quiet hum reverberating from the Sentinel. 

In due time. They were not words spoken aloud, but Raglan could hear them none the less as the Sentinel lumbered forward from his post, closer to the little pegasus. A gnarled arm reached up, the vine-like tendrils that represented their fingers growing and ascending into their canopy to grasp a small stone from its depths.

A heliotrope, or bloodstone: The perfect marriage between the vibrancy of the emerald upon Raglan's forehead and specks in the color of his bloody coat. 

Grasped tenderly within their vines, its arm lowered down to present the gemstone to the pegasus in their open palm. In due time, little Denoctian.

---

@Raglan has been greeted by a Shagbark Sentinel! These sentient tree guardians are known to foreshadow good luck in those who they meet, and gifts from them should be highly regarded as gifts from Nature themselves.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The gem can be added to Raglan's permanent inventory, although it holds no magical properties. If you wish to keep it, please add it to your character's profile under the "accessories" section. In addition to the IC gift, you have been awarded 250 signos for having participated in a Random Event. This has already been applied to Raglan's account!

[Raglan]

As the lanky pegasus had expected, the mighty trees did not reply. A silence so profound that it seemed almost unnatural permeated the Crow’s surroundings, broken only by the sighing of the wind and the deep, ancient sounds of the living wall before him. Boughs and foliage creaked softly and whispered to each other in the balmy breeze that rained down from the Gods’ Mountain - but they whispered in a language that Raglan couldn’t hope to understand. Cocking a pale hoof and leaning his weight to one side, the lad gave an affected sigh and nodded up at the massive sentinel, distantly wondering if there were any books in the vast libraries of Novus that could teach him a thing or two about the language of the trees. He doubted he would be able to mimic any of the sounds, undoubtedly he would have an atrocious accent if he could grasp the dialogue at all, but if such a tome existed, Raglan would like to see it.

Just as he parted his lips to voice his interest - even if they didn’t reply, there was something soothing about speaking to the trees, as if they really were listening to what he said - there was a mighty groaning sound. Brows shooting up, Raglan took a few steps back and craned his neck to peer skyward toward the uppermost branches of the sentinel, wondering if one of the great limbs had broken. 

But then the tree moved.

Raglan blinked at the great split that appeared within the bark before him, his mind not yet caught up with the reality that he was witnessing. Cocking his head to the side, the horned stallion considered the mighty trunk as it began to shudder and...

“I don’t think you should be moving...” The Silvertongue spoke slowly, his brain continuing to struggle in piecing together the existence of a sentient tree, “No, that’s not quite right..” Came his puzzled words as he watched the mammoth plant grasp its brothers and sisters with its giant hands... hands?

 Hands?

“HANDS?!” Screamed the bloody bay stag as reality finally clicked into place. Opal eyes widened and watched in horror as the creature heaved itself from the soil, it’s eyeless face seeming to be peering into his very soul, “You-shouldnt-have-hands-you-shouldn’t-be-moving-you-better-stop-that-stop-it-fella-yikes-yikes-yikes-shit—” 

Raglans words poured out in a breathless string as he scrambled backward, wings hanging forgotten at his sides, their feathered tips dragging unceremoniously across the rocky earth. All the fighting spirit of the stallion fled out of him in that moment as he was filled with the absolute knowledge that regardless of how fast he ran or how strong he was, there was no escaping an ancient with a goal in mind. Attempting to swallow past the dryness in his throat, Raglan wheezed out a prayer to Tempus that he wouldn’t be smashed to a sad pulp beneath the root-hands of the sentinel.

And just as he was sure that it was all over, certain that Raglan Silvertongue, Crow thief extraordinaire, master of flight and ego, and notorious lady turner-offer, would be no more, the ancient spoke into his mind. 

“In due time...” Came the timeless, depthless timbre of the towering elemental as it reached into the thick canopy near its top and offered something small and dual-hued to the leggy pegasus. “In due time, Little Denocitan.” 

The words that hummed through Raglan in their immortal power held no cruel inflection. On the contrary, the voice was kind, almost benevolent in its tenor, and the Silvertongue felt a warm comfort spread through his chest as a result. With limbs shaking from the influx of unused adrenaline, Raglan moved closer to the sentinel with tentative steps. Lowering his head in a show of respect while peeking up through pale lashes, the orphaned Crow worked to catch his breath. As he peered over the oaken edge of the elemental’s palm, he stallion sucked a breath in through his nose, eyes immediately drawn to the glistening bloodstone that lay amidst the tangled vines and branches that made up the tree-man’s hand. 

“For me?” Came his quiet question, incredulity written over every line in his young face, “Thank you..” Carefully, gently, Raglan used his innate telekinetic gift to lift the emerald and scarlet stone from the sentinel’s grasp and tuck it securely in the joint of a folded wing. “It’s beautiful. I will string it on a necklace and wear it always... But why wake up for me? Why the gift?”


  
    @'Random Events'  @inkbone Random events doesn’t like me to tag it so I’m tagging inkipoo 

[Acton]

 
It had been a long, long time since Acton had climbed the winding path up to the gods’ peak.

In a way, his reason now was slightly more devout – where last time he had come to meet with the Ghost, to discuss secrets and stirrings, this time he was meeting nobody, intending only to commune with the gods.

The buckskin had never taken to the gods of Novus. They did not seem altogether different from those of his birth country; just as invisible, just as ineffective. Whether it was indifference on their part or the fact that they didn’t exist at all (he knew which he leaned to), he had never seen a reason to involve them in his life.

But now, after all that had happened, he wanted to give them a piece of his mind. He figured they were the only ones who must listen without interrupting, and he had plenty to say.

He was just about to begin the ascent when the ground started to tremble. At first Acton only thought of being back in the arena with Rostislav; it was the only time he’d encountered anything similar, and he braced himself now. There was nothing but the groaning of the earth beneath his feet, a shake that set the trees to sighing and all the birds to chattering flight. To his right there was a low, loud, rumbling sound, like a world coming apart.

Well. That was interesting.

Once the ground stilled and the grasses stopped their swaying, the buckskin began to make his cautious way toward the source of the noise. This wasn’t wise, likely, but his curiosity had been whetted, and life in Delumine was dull, and Acton had not felt the thrill of adrenaline that licked through his veins now in oh, too long.

He only paused once more during his approach, and that was when he heard an incoherent scream. One that sounded…familiar. The buckskin’s head cocked, dog-like, and then once more he started forward, this time at a lope.

He wanted to laugh at what he found, but the scene was too strange.

There was Raglan (how long had it been since he had seen him? The last thing he remembered was the Silvertongue tumbling onto the castle parapet, riding the winds of a storm), earnestly addressing a stand of trees. The trees themselves (and what they were guarding) were the least of Acton’s thoughts; he didn’t frequent this part of Novus often, though he should have taken note of the sharp smell of ozone, of new earth, of magic.

“Rags?” he said, slowing his approach, and licked his teeth at the distasteful sound of caution in his voice. “What’s going on, buddy?”

There was this, at least: whatever madness was afoot, it was better than discussing the shambles the Crows had become.
 


@Raglan

whatever you feed me I'll feed you right back

[Raglan]

The lad would never receive an answer to his question.

But that was okay, because Raglan forgot the entirety of his question to the ancient guardian approximately two seconds after the soft words fell from darkened lips.

Rags? Whats going on, buddy?

The Silvertongue froze, his muscles tensing as if time had stopped, as if he was nothing more than a Shagbark Sentinel that had returned to a timeless slumber. He felt himself blink, he felt himself breathe, he felt the pulsing of his bruised heart within the prison of his ribs. He blinked again, harder this time, blurring the world before him with the force behind the small movement. Raglan knew that voice just as well as he knew his own, just as well as he knew the scent that was drifting across the space between him and his brother-in-arms.

Again, he blinked.

The Orphaned Crow had to be sure that the world was real, that the figure he was about to turn to was real - flesh and bone and blood, not just a bittersweet memory.

Raglan swallowed and moved his pale eyes up from the palm of the colossus, stopping only when his gaze reached the eyeless face of the sentinel. Breathing slowly through his nostrils, the bloodied bay felt his jaw clench at the overwhelming familiarity of his comrade's scent. It had to be real, didn't it? The gods wouldn't be that cruel, would they? To allow one of their ancient, magical, ridiculously powerful guardsmen to awaken an serve the lanky rogue with a gift, only to manifest a specter from the past?

There was only one way to know, wasn't there?

Slowly the bay pegasus turned, opal eyes searching the near distance for that mottled black and sunburst coat. For the crooked grin and the mischievous gaze. For his Brother Crow.

"Acton?"

Raglan couldn't quite believe the sight, despite how desperately he wanted to. It would be too friendly of a coincidence, too kind of an ending to his pain, to be reunited with the pyromaniac that he had kept as his nearest friend. Despite the disbelief, though, the Silvertongue still couldn't quite fight the grin that had started to creep over his lips; for even if the boy - no, the stallion, the fully-grown, self possessed, stallion - that stood before him was just a ghost out of a memory, the Crow had never been able to look at his comrade without joy.

"It's you, yeah? Not some magic made up by the Tree-Guy over here?" Raglan motioned absently with a wing toward the crouched form of the Sentinel at his back, wondering if the ancient creature would fall back to rest in that position. "And to answer your question, the Sentinel isn't the aggressor. I started it - per usual."

@Acton smooches

[Acton]

 
The Silvertongue’s reaction would have been amusing to Acton, if only he wasn’t going through a similar sort of crisis.

It wasn’t his tendency to doubt his senses – he’d made his living off of them for a long time, and trusted them better than he trusted anyone else. Almost anyone else, that was, because unless they were betraying him now, here was one of the few that counted as an exception.

He did not blink, but he did stare: swallowed up the sight of the boy (boy no longer, but something in between the gangly youth he’d known and a grown man), the red shock of his coat and horns he’d never seen the like of on another.

There was no confusing Raglan for anybody else, even after not seeing him for…a year now?

But his brother’s gaze was still fastened to the tree, and Acton took another step forward, no trace of a swagger in it. He was about to speak again when at last, at last, Raglan turned toward him, and the buckskin was so desperately relieved to hear his name in that voice that his knees felt weak with it. (Then again, one knee at least always felt weak nowadays.)

“The one and only,” he said, and grinned stupidly. They must have made quite a pair, then, matched expression of wary, crooked joy in front of a copse of –

“Tree-guy?” he repeated, and at last cast his gaze more closely on what Raglan had been standing beside. He examined the trunk, the leaves, the reaching limbs as he closed the space between them, bumping shoulders with his companion in a way that felt achingly familiar.

He supposed there was a face there, vaguely, with whorled bark like wrinkled skin and smooth indents where eyes might go, if you were feeling particularly imaginative. And the branch that extended toward them with splayed and leafy twigs at the end did resemble fingers, if you were in a fanciful mood.

Acton snorted and stepped back with a shake of his head, then turned his attention back to his long-missing friend. “And what is it you started? Or, if you prefer, where is it you’ve been? I’m feeling a little overwhelmed. Also, I’ve missed you like hell.”  

 


@Raglan  I forgot how CUTE he is

whatever you feed me I'll feed you right back