There is a story they tell the young boys of Oresziah of the magic inherent in all women’s souls, and how the sea sings to them; they tell a story of a mother leaving her son to the waves. They say that when she touched the sea she became salt, and dissolved.
Torix has never been one for fables and wives’ tales. But something about it speaks to him as he prowls along the Denocte’s coast, along the cove that reaches inward toward the Arma Mountains. He has studied, quite religiously, the map of Novus’s terrain. He likes this place despite the fact it is all so unfamiliar, despite the sea is so volatile against the jagged rocks of the cliffsides.
Further out, Damascus is flying above the waves. He is hunting; dolphins; whales. The silhouette is massive, and dark, and strange.
Torix is still uncertain what to think of a creature he might have hunted, once. But when the dragon screams out over the sea, the sound feels like his own soul crying out, fracturing. When he closes his eyes, he can fear the wind, the spray of water, the rush.
when the shadows come and cover the horizon i will be the one to slay all the giants
It had been nothing but the shadow of the dragon in the distance that had called her to the place where Denocte’s shoreline goes from kissing the sea to reaching toward the sky. It is a tale as old as time, the way that she knows Isra came from the sea, is always refusing to go home to the sea.
When Antiope sees the shadow of the dragon, weaving through the clouds, her heart begins to hope before she can tell it not to with her head. Perhaps it is Isra, back from her war. Perhaps it is Fable. Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps.
But when she reaches the cliffs, with the seaspray dampening the air and the roar of the waves like a drumbeat in her ears, it’s not her friend she finds standing there. If it weren’t for white softly covering everything from his neck down, she might have mistaken him for Rezar, with his sun and midnight coloring. And that hurts more than anything.
Antiope presses forward, a hand resting carefully on the handle of her axe slung just behind her shoulder, and when he opens his turquoise eyes she settles her own on them, sapphire and sharp. “Lost?” They are rather far from the court. Rather far from anything.
Now that the dragon is not Fable she cannot help but wonder; what is a man with a dragon doing, lingering in the dark, on the coastline of her kingdom.
Vercingtorix is pierced with her likeness to the wolves of his homeland, that live back in the inhospitable forests beyond the three towns. Vicious creatures, larger than normal wolves, and many shot through with eyes like sapphires. Yes. This woman is striking, and predator, and her axe alone sends a message of her character.
But she should not be holding an axe, he thinks, as in his mind her stripes resemble in some strange likeness Bondike’s—no, Boudika’s—and that, too, unsettles him.
But he is a hunter.
And does not remain unsettled long.
Vercingtorix almost smiles; either way, his expression softens into something amiable. “No,” Vercingtorix says. “Only exploring.” Damascus, through their Bond, notices Antiope for the first time. He tilts his massive wings and careens toward them from where he is silhouetted far out at sea. His cry sounds lost, even if Vercingtorix is not.
Says he isn’t, at least.
“This is a beautiful land,” Torix comments, gesturing to the cliffsides and the jagged rocks, the way they cut the sea and sky with little regard for either. Stones like knives. "I am Torix, by the way."
when the shadows come and cover the horizon i will be the one to slay all the giants
No, he tells her, his lips settling into something not-quite-a-smile. This, she thinks, tells her everything that she needs to know. He does not carry the smell of sun and sand, nor of forests and flowers or the pervasiveness of the sea and salt. He is certainly not from Denocte.
He is either from everywhere, or from nowhere, and how is it that someone from either of those things could not be lost Antiope wonders.
From the corner of her eye she sees the dragon tilt its massive wings and head toward them, long before its cry splits the air. It’s a painful sound, a sound that cuts through all the layers of her and settles deep inside. It takes everything in her not to answer it, one other-thing to another.
“Thank you,” she responds, taking a step forward with a roll of her shoulder. The night court Queen tilts her head slightly, “but one false step and it can quickly lose its charm.” The rocks are black, black, black, like the blade of her axe, and probably just as sharp. “I am Antiope.”
Normally she is not one to brandish her crown. Some days the attention that comes with her position still brings a prickle to her skin, but finding this strange man on her shores has her feeling possessive. For now she leaves off the title, however.
this is who we were, before bones, before dirt, before even light. this untameable expanse. this blue mirror-of-god. this heaving, churning proof that we have always been deep, restless souls.
Torix knows what it feels like to be studied. He knows it is accompanied by a certain, underlying tension. He feels that now, but he does not allow it to unsettle him. No. The wind simply continues to blow; the sea continues to sing her siren song; his dragon flies on the horizon. And he studies her in return.
Alabaster and tiger-striped bay; god-blue eyes. She carries an aura of confidence Vercingtorix has never seen on a woman before and that, that he takes particular note of. He is nearly certain in the way she speaks, the way she holds her head, she had never been made to feel less because of the disadvantage of her gender.
And that, he thinks, is dangerous.
Thank you. But one false step and it can quickly lose its charm." I’ve found anything with charm is similar.” Duel-sided; contradictory; dangerous. Few charming things are chaste. “A pleasure. I’m Torix.”
He does not give his full name, because of ceremonies he has seen performed on clifftops with crushed shells and blooded doves. Her name, however, seems familiar. His smile is languid—nearly boyishly charming, with the way his hair falls disheveled into his eyes. “It can’t be coincidence that’s the name of Denocte’s Sovereign.”
Damascus is nearer, now; with each pump of his duel-pair of wings, his size becomes more evident and so, too, his darkness. When he reaches them he does not land near them, but on the jagged rocks below where the surf crashes.
we lick saltwater stains from our hands, and yes, they taste like all the shipwrecked songs of our forefathers, but also like every sorrow we used to be afraid of devouring until we understood that this is a place of rebirth too
when the shadows come and cover the horizon i will be the one to slay all the giants
As she often does, Antiope wonders what he sees when he looks at her; a girl bearing an axe, a girl with blood at her throat, but no scars. He has scars. She can see them across his eye, his lip, riddling his body. It is clear he has fought before.
But is a warrior without scars seen as more or less dangerous? As she often does, Antiope wonders if others fear her. The lioness in her bones says that they should, if only they knew what she has done.
“And things without charm rarely ever reveal themselves to have any,” the Denoctian sovereign adds, almost idly.
He then solves the problem of Antiope having to use her title herself, and she finds for once it doesn’t bother her; for her reputation to precede her.
The dragon lands on the rocks below them and she shows no fear of it. She has killed gods, after all. Antiope smiles, “I do not believe in coincidences.” And she finds she is waiting the entire time for him to lose his charm, like rocks she is plummeting toward.
this is who we were, before bones, before dirt, before even light. this untameable expanse. this blue mirror-of-god. this heaving, churning proof that we have always been deep, restless souls.
And things without charm rarely ever reveal themselves to have any. He almost ask what she means by that. In the way of women, there seems to be an implication; thinly veiled, perhaps slightly barbed. Vercingtorix only makes a noncommittal noise of agreement, a small mhm.
Antiope does not flinch at Damascus’s arrival; but why would she? She is bold enough to become a queen. Vercingtorix finds this sort of arrogance foolish, however—and also inherently feminine. He does nothing to demonstrate his contempt, however. The gold-and-black stallion only answers her smile with another smile. “No?” He laughs. He supposes he doesn’t, either. “What do you think that suggests about our meeting?”
Damascus is keening a song as old as the world.
Hunger. Vercingtorix, for the first time, spares a glance for his dragon. The great beast is stretching up the cliffside. Although it does not seem right to describe a dragon as such, there is something almost doggish in his expression; a pleading look to the eyes, a softness.
“And this,” he says offhandedly, as one speaks of a child or pet: “Is Damascus.”
we lick saltwater stains from our hands, and yes, they taste like all the shipwrecked songs of our forefathers, but also like every sorrow we used to be afraid of devouring until we understood that this is a place of rebirth too
when the shadows come and cover the horizon i will be the one to slay all the giants
She is busy trying to find the snake beneath his skin when he asks, “What do you think that suggests about our meeting?” Oh, if only she knew. When Isra first met Raum, could the unicorn have known that he would try to kill her? Kidnap her, enslave an entire kingdom and nearly start a nationwide war?
She smiles, and it is sharp, sharp, sharp, like the lioness in her bones is bearing its teeth instead of a woman. “I suppose only time will tell,” the sovereign suggests, but she wants him to know it’s a warning. She wants him to know that she will be waiting, if he comes with sharpness and darkness and serpents pouring from every seam of him.
The dragon scales the cliffside, reaching toward them. As the man turns toward the creature so does she, getting at last a better glance at it. Not the first dragon she has seen, but far more foreboding than Fable alone by the obsidian color of its scales. Idly, she fingers the sharp edge of her axe, blacker than black too, and kissed by gods.
“Damascus,” Antiope acknowledges the dragon and notices its opalescent eyes. She does not tell him that he has been gifted with a powerful and grand bonded, as judging by his tone it would not matter to him anyway. The being's cries, though, they burn inside her. “He seems to be in anguish.”
this is who we were, before bones, before dirt, before even light. this untameable expanse. this blue mirror-of-god. this heaving, churning proof that we have always been deep, restless souls.
I suppose only time will tell.
The comment remains cryptic. Vercingtorix does not spend more energy in trying to make sense of it, or discern whether the ambiguity is hostile or simply apathetic. In many respects, Vercingtorix is a mirror; he, too, can be equivocal.
This is the reason he says, in a tone equally bland, “I prefer to take stock of things immediately, personally. One can discern a lot from first impressions.”
He does not go on to elaborate what his first impression is of her, however. But, more or less, Vercingtorix has always learned everything he has needed to know from his first meeting.
There is one exception to that rule, of course, and she currently lives within this Sovereign’s Court. He wonders if they are friends. It seems as if Boudika’s dishonest nature might find comfort in women of similar caliber, those who—well, those who had far exceeded their station in life, their rightful lot.
He wonders if she thinks she is mighty, or brave.
He does not ask. He doesn’t need to. Her self-assurance is in her eyes, and the way that Damascus does not make her flinch. He seems to be in anguish.
Vercingtorix measures his response. “Oh, he’s only worse at hiding it than the rest of us. Who isn’t, Lady of Denocte?” Torix is nearly curious of her.
Nearly.
But not enough to ask; not enough to pursue polite formalities when everything she’s ventured thus far conveys inherent distrust. Damascus, too, regards her. An other thing. He sees only flesh, blood, a heart that beats. Dragons are not the same as gods. Damascus, with little effort, propels himself from the jagged rocks to their cliffside. The grasses give beneath the waft of air from his wings; the trees quake; even the soil shifts underfoot with the great beast’s weight. Those opalescent eyes do not leave her.
“Anguish is the first thing any living creature learns,” says the dragon. “Is it not your native tongue?” His voice is the wind in the trees; the crash of the surf; choked and thick with the weight of his golden teeth.
Is it not the sea forever beating against the shore?
we lick saltwater stains from our hands, and yes, they taste like all the shipwrecked songs of our forefathers, but also like every sorrow we used to be afraid of devouring until we understood that this is a place of rebirth too
CREDITS
07-10-2020, 01:34 AM - This post was last modified: 07-10-2020, 01:36 AM by Vercingtorix
when the shadows come and cover the horizon i will be the one to slay all the giants
She does not know why it is that she dislikes him so readily. If you were to ask her, Antiope might say it is because he was a strange man on her shore, with a dragon no less. A strange man with no apparent affiliation to any court.
She might say it is because her relationship with Caligo was tenuous, her belief that she truly should be Queen thin. Wanting to prove she could protect her court and be the sovereign they needed.
But maybe the truth is this: that Antiope has never distrusted anyone so completely, so quickly. Not even the gods that made her, that later took away her child and her lover. Perhaps the Denoctian sovereign has simply learned from that. Perhaps that is where her first impression comes from.
“Who isn’t?” he asks, and she thinks who isn’t, indeed. Even Isra, black and sharp inside, even Morrighan full of fire, even Orestes fulfilling his purpose. Even her—
The dragon, Damascus, rises to meet them and she feels the weight of him in everything. Her magic feels the well of energy inside him, deep, deep, deep. And then, he speaks.
Antiope is surprised, to say the least. She has only heard of a talking bonded once before, Solterra’s sovereign’s before Raum. A demon bird, some have said. Demons, gods, mortals. One thing the striped woman has found is they are all more similar than they seem,
“Ah, that is where you are wrong,” the Queen says after a pause. In perhaps the first completely forthcoming thing she will tell them, Antiope looks at Damascus and says, “My first language is death.”
She does not smile, nor frown. There is a sea in her sapphire eyes. The anguish did not come until later, until after the anger. “Perhaps that is the difference,” she doesn’t say it, but she means between me and the rest. She has always felt other, a feeling that hs never gone away.
![[Image: 13716916_Rc8f5hGvZkB3cYP.png]](https://file.toyhou.se/images/13716916_Rc8f5hGvZkB3cYP.png)
