In the breadth of his appearance, he had heard and seen much more than he expected to in his first time within the confines of the worshiping peak. He hardly knew the figures gathered here, but his skin prickled as his body - lazy in its posture and poising - stepped further forward into the dull light. Ombre ears were caught between wishing to pin slick to his crown or perk up bemusedly at the situation developing amongst the worn stone walls. An electric fire lit his veins anew, that was for sure; predatory eyes connected with Raum's gaze, and there they stayed.
The cool blue of the quicksilver stallion's gaze was a challenge, was it not?
The thick arch of his neck strengthened, his head rose, and his ears slid forward. Certainty etched across his muscles, and he offered a tilt of his broad head at the stallion's.. congratulations. Torstein's trust in him withered away as quickly as the rose he watched him lay at Caligo's altar died in the open air. "Glad to see you showed up, as well." He wished to say I was as shocked as you, don't worry - but he refrained, his eyes instead sliding to Freya and Mila as they quipped whatever semblance of an insult they were trying for. Freya more-so with the insults.
There his stoney gaze stood, upon the bejeweled mare as he regarded her. She looked fragile and flashy. "Maxence certainly decreed a lot of rules upon his first meeting, no?" spoken to Raum while staring at Freya. Predatory eyes returned to the quicksilver for a brief moment, and a dull smile curved the pink lines of his lips. It was devoid of real emotion - more for show - and disappeared as quickly as it came.
And then they flitted to Rhoswen, his surveying gaze regarding her dainty appearance, flowers, and near-immaculate hair. She was.. not what Day court usually consisted of, nor was Raum. His smile returned briefly, although it was disconcerting at best. "Call me Tor; it's a pleasure to meet you, Rhoswen and Raum," he introduced himself. Now he had a name to the faces.
And then Aislinn drew his attention, his scrutiny, and his ears slapped back against the circular crest of his horns. Rhoswen's words regarding Solis did not fall on deaf ears - quite the contrary, he rolled the idea of explaining what he saw around inside his head. Ultimately, he decided against it.. maybe at a later time, he would coyly breach that subject.
Instead, his eyes stayed upon the Champion of Battle, haughty in her words and stature. Her chin up high, chest out, feet squared stance brought a chuckle to the massive Warden's lips. She almost looked childish to him, with her stature and apparent knowledge of Solterran inhabitants and their 'inherent dangers to those around them'. So says one of the Night Court, who bathed and hid in the shadows like bats..
And like bats, their bones could be easily crushed and their wings easily torn.
"You don't trust us?" he said slyly, a humid, loud exhalation slipping from his nostrils as a ghost of a chuckle breathed from his throat. Large, worn hooves clacked against the ground with a dull sound as he approached, gait slow and vulturine. He had no sense of personal space, after all, and there he stood in front of her - much taller, more imposing, and looking begrudgingly amused.
"Why so much disdain? Does being a birdfetching dog not suit your pretty feathers?"
There were few things Torstein was hesitant about; this tiny, ruffled-feathers pegasus wasn't one.
She was wickedness clothed in smoke and shadow; her fury tangible and building like the promise of an on-coming summer storm. The stars behind her blinked and shimmered sweet nothings and the raw reminder of this place; the cracked and bleeding thing that was her heart that now thundered like a churning hurricane in her chest. She could have sworn that the air around her vibrated and thrummed to the beat of it's madness; but no, not now. Her anger fueled the blood that ran like liquid fire through her veins, her frustration turning her gaze into flames of brightest blue, her heartache a match next to the gasoline of annoyance bubbling in her very core.
Aislinn was a singer of storms and cyclones, a daughter of Calligo's great darkness and the chosen king's Champion of Battle. A warrior, a defender, a destroyer.
And she would not let puny sand-suckers forget such a thing so easily.
Her gaze roved over the bodies crowding the stone citadel; ever watchful, ever marking her targets of interest. The blue woman's mocking laughter simmered the raging seas in her lungs, her words viperous and dripping with disdain. Aislinn's delicate ears pinned flat against her skull as her gaze narrowed on the other woman of Night, a muscle twitching in her brow. A retort of equal sarcasm nearly touched her lips when the silver man's remark struck lightning through the growing storm clouds gathering in her dark. "I don't believe I was speaking to you, wyrm," she ground out, her voice raspy and gritted through her teeth as she spoke. Go back to your sand of lifeless soil and rot. @freya @Raum
The girl of red and gold sunbursts strode forward next, all at one the center stage of attention that drew the fae's gaze to her small and freckled frame. Her original target, the little thing snickered and eyed her with orbs made of emerald daggers; her words, however, dripped with a poison that could have been lethal to anyone with a weaker backbone than she. Had Aislinn known any better, she would have guessed the girl could have been far older than she appeared.. but the knowledge of the youngling's true age had the oxygen in her lungs burning like untamed wildfires. To be so young, and so utterly disrespectful. Her lack of patience was palpable; Aislinn's face screwing up in a shadowed mask of barely-controlled anger. "You will not dismiss me so easily." @Mila
The stormsinger's great wings began to slowly unfurl as every nerve in her strong body scorched like hot coals; her muscles tightening in anticipation, struck by swords of electricity that ran the length of her spine. A living, breathing storm.. and if she had any drop of magic in her blood, then and only then could she truly move mountains in her anger's wake.
Slowly, so so slowly, Aislinn's gaze turned towards the third woman in the room. A lovely thing of rose-colored gold, and perfumed with the stench of dry, cracked earth. She spoke of her king so easily, and without hesitation; that very fact sparking a shred of tangy surprise in the stormsinger. His voice haunted her then; forcing the words that were on repeat back into her waking thoughts. But it was quickly extinguished by her anger instead, the crimson waves of scarlet flooding from her and turning her vision so very red. She rose her chin, defiant and suspicious, her voice clipped as she spoke: "I do not require his orders to do what I think is right to protect my people." @rhoswen
Her gaze narrowed even further -- barely slivers of of blue flame through thick lashes as she turned to face them all. "And I believe that you filth are exactly what I need to protect them against."
And finally, she shifted to take in the mass of the man that stood before her; easily dwarfing her with his stature. He was intimidating in his size, and the curious spines that ran the length of his chest. She bore into him with her breath coming in raged pants of broiling fury; not once flinching as she glared at him with blue flames that could have singed a lesser man's soul. Her wings extended to their near full span, she watched with a warrior's stance as he -- Torstein -- approached with no second thought to her personal space. Nearly chest to chest they were; he of several hands that stood above her like a tower of muscle and sharp horns, and her of fierce hurricanes and night-blessed stars. She had to crane her slender neck back to keep him eye to eye, but she was not afraid. For what he had in brute size and strength, she had in speed, should things come to a brawl of bruised and bloodied knuckles. @Torstein
Why so much disdain? Does being a birdfetching dog not suit your pretty feathers?
A muscle tensed and furrowed in her upper lip as she cracked her neck in retort. Aislinn nearly snarled, her lips curling backward in a wicked grin that spoke of horrors and the destruction of tsunamis. She stretched her neck as far as she could reach so her lips were close to his ears, her voice thick with her anger and burning with the shock of lightning strikes. "You tell me I'm a dog when no one has seen your desert king step foot outside of your kingdom. Does being a coward's protector set your heart in higher places?"
Aislinn retreated, her grin a phantom of every emotion that carefully burned and twisted in her stomach and coursed through the blood thundering in her veins. "That's right. You don't have any problems with that, now do you?"
... I do not know how to be on vacation xD
@freya @Raum @mila @rhoswen @Torstein hollyyyyy moly this took a while to figure out how she'd react! tagged each of you lovelies in the paragraphs where your babes are mentioned! "Aislinn speech."
She pinned Raum with a glare, refusing to be the one who ruined the quicksilver’s cover -- twisting her ears back until they flattened against her head. Rhoswen would know that Freya knew him, but she wasn’t going to admit it outloud and she hoped that the convert knew better too. And it seemed that she did, holding her tongue in a movement that Freya would begrudge her as wise. The mare tousled the dark waves at her face, brushing them away so that the warm night air could breeze by her more easily. Her insides were twisting with an ever tightening anxiety, but from the outside she appeared as cool as her icy gaze. @Rhoswen
”I don’t take kindly to anyone telling me what to do.” She said airily, her voice crackling with unspoken venom. ”If you want to call that discord, then by all means...take that back to the sand pit you crawled from.” @Raum
When she turned her head again, it was to meet the caustic cardinal three-eyed gaze of the beast who was eyeing her in return; but Freya was used to the eyes of men on her body. That was all they ever seemed to look at. The lush curly mass of hair that made up her tail swished lazily at her hocks, her glass eyes meeting his with not an ounce of defiance, but rather an intrigue that would invite him closer if he desired. She only let her eyes divert from his towering frame once he had looked away, rolling her shoulders as though she had won some battle that only she knew about inside her mind’s eye.
It was Aislinn’s words that caused the temperature in the caverns to drop, her mind’s youth betrayed by the stupidity that she allowed to flow forth in the presence of enemies. The Lady in Blue would tear her a new one, Champion of Battle or not for being so irresponsible with that tongue. The two of them were the same age, but Freya was certain that she had seen far more of the world’s cruelty than this stardust-wielding brat. @Aislinn
”Shut your mouth, Aislinn.” She warned, her words a hiss. ”Don’t presume to speak for anyone, especially me. I don’t want your ‘protection’.” She sneered -- holding a foolish hope to her chest that the gypsy would know when she was outmatched. Tor had brute strength and size, which wouldn’t guarantee him a win but it would put Raum in a position of weakness if they began an all out brawl in the caverns of worship.
”Have you no respect for the gods?” She tried again, her voice much more smooth -- calling them to remember that this was a place of worship, a sacred place. Her muscles, strong from her training as a dancer and woman of pleasure, tensed as she waited for the cream colored brute to issue a threat.
And he did, though perhaps to an untrained ear it would not sound like much. The dancer made her move with swiftness, a reaction that she made without thinking as she inserted herself between the brute and the bird, her lips reaching to place a tiny nip onto the cream-colored shoulder. It wouldn’t hurt too much, more of a loving sort than anything else and she was prepared to take any consequences that it might have to touch him. @Torstein
”Play nicely.” She said, her voice more stern and twisted her head to Aislinn -- pinning her ears back at the stormsinger which meant giving her back to the Day Court Warden. ”Both of you. Like I said, this is the place for worship -- a neutral ground.”
She may not have cared for the Champion, but that didn’t mean she was going to let a fight start between them. Day and Night already had such strained relations as it were, she wasn’t about to let things slide into chaos while she still had a chance. Reich would have her head if she didn't try to put a stop to things.
All of you are tagged at moments where Freya interacts or thinks heavily about you! :3 Sorry @Mila, she’s forgotten about you for now xD Sorry for the wait and the kinda garbage-ness of this post xD
