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All Welcome  - thy kingdom come. [meeting]

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Aislinn
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#1




 

A I S L I N N
thy kingdom come, thy will be done
on earth as it is in heaven —




The night sky does not mourn, but bleeds in burning embers that are its stars. Silver tears drip and blink across the sky in a brilliant show of anger amidst the smoke that rises from the mountains far. The beauty of the Night Goddess’ skies is a perfect contradiction to the battlefield that has overtaken their borders, leaching across the courts like an ebony stain. Now, the regime is angry. She is angry. Together, and only together, did they swallow the hard truth of what was to come. And it would be said that on this night, this night everlasting, that Calligo herself struck down with her meteors as her children walled themselves within her kingdom. They will come to know this night as the Seclusion. For too long has the Night — her Night — ran rampant; for too long have the Solar Courts maimed and warred and bled the star’s sons and daughters without consequence.

But for no longer.

Far, far away, she can swear that the smoke of dragon’s fire still curls in her lungs. She can almost hear the roars of an ancient beast resounding across the towers of stone that was their mountain borders.

And now, she stands as the Messenger.

Denocte! her voices booms like rolling thunder, reverberating against the stone walls. The growing wind tangles her hair across her face, a halo of wicked silver that only essenuates the glow of her eyes. Let them see her. Let them see their King and Regent and Emissary on this night. Let them. For together she will stand by their sides, for her people and for her goddess. She had sworn an oath the night she had ascended after all.

And like hell would she damn herself to break it now.

A wicked, lovely thing she is. The stormsinger stands upon the raised dais, orbs of blue piercing every soul that’s gaze lands on her midnight skin. She reaches to capture their stares, igniting their colors with the galaxies of Calligo’s own, as she can only hope to unite them with their decree. Aislinn does not falter before her people. Her storm-wrought soul only searches for Peace — desperately clinging to the Eternal Calm that is of legend alone. And when she looks to their faces as they stare up at her.. she sees blood stained snow. Rips through the Void of this world and the next. Sun drops bleeding across  Solterran sands in attacks of fire and ash and dust.

How much more could Denocte take until they must atone?

She need only hum to summon a crack of thunder to silence their whispers, but yet she does not.

”The Raven Gates at the Arma Pass have been closed. She sweeps the crowds that gather, marking each face both foreign and familiar. The shadows that grow on this long night cradle her as she continues to speak: ”This is an order of protection. Our solitude is one of Peace. Movement outside of our walls is hereby forbidden to steady the sea of chaos that has begun to rift across the kingdoms.” As if her goddess’ own star-strewn hands held her, each breath steadies the ache that claws in her chest. She is not innocent in this matter; her own undoing only added gasoline to the flames of their disaster. But Aislinn would not stand without a mirror showing her demon’s ugly face.

She would be transparent. They had every right to know why the gates of feather, obsidian, and gold have been shut. After only a year of their opening once more.

The Regent sucks in a breath of humid air, heady with woodsmoke and heavy with the invisible chains of her words. ”We have come to an agreement that it is the best for our Court to return to isolation. The discord of our actions, and of the actions of others, has caused the fragile calm between our kingdoms to shake.” Her chin raises, as she blinks to both Reichenbach and Isorath; their presence a constant solace at her side. ”I am no stranger to these actions.”

The hush of defiance of some begins to rise amongst the crowds that grow to hear their stormsinger speak. But she does not relent as she points heavensward to the Calligo’s brilliance of stars — silver streaking across the sky in shivers of light. ”We will stand as steady as the stars,” she promises, ”as we always have. Our Goddess has never wavered from us, and like Her, we will do what is best for our people.”

Her wings stretch beneath the sky, imagining the mountain pass alight with blazing red. One last decree to pass; a promise, a warning, not nearly close to a threat. Not against her own people. Not against her Court, her kingdom, her home.

They only wanted to protect them. That was all.

Aislinn’s voice softens, but her eyes do not. ”For those who are blessed with flight, you have until the last ember dies to depart our kingdom, or make your temporary goodbyes. For all others, you have moments once the fires of the Pass die out. I can only imagine Aether will not secure safe passage for long.”

May the stars be with us all.


TO ALL NIGHT COURT MEMBERS!
☽☉☾

On the night of the mountain’s fires and Calligo’s meteor shower, the Regime calls to all of Denocte.

The Raven Gates have been closed. (You can read it in this thread.) Entrance and exit from Denocte is hereby forbidden. For the safety of Calligo’s sons and daughters, the Night Court has reverted back to an isolationist state until further notice.

This meeting is not mandatory. Denoctians currently outside the kingdom’s walls will be able to return to Night through the Raven Gates, but once they do, your character will not be permitted to leave. The same goes to other courtiers who are not native to Denocte. Once your character is in Denocte, they must stay. If your character has wings, an air patrol will be initiated to monitor the skies. The air patrol will rise with the sun’s first rays. If your character is blessed with wings.. you have until then to depart or say your temporary goodbyes. All other characters have the chance to leave, but not for long!

Your character is open to ask and inquire as many questions to the Regime during this thread.

This is an order of protection by decree of the Night Court Regime.

@reichenbach @isorath


☀︎









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Isorath
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#2







R

He stood beside Aislinn, a cold tempest in the wake of Aislinn's thunder storm. Where he'd been warm, he is now cold, colder than winter's breath, colder than death's frigid caress. A blizzard barely contained in equine form, the Moon's lance ready to pierce at a moment's notice. Gone is the kindness had lined his regal features, the careful brush stroke is now an angry smear of what had been. There is no kindness swimming in the depths of those lilac eyes, there is only barely contained contempt. Loosely leashed anger that coiled and slithered, serpents in a pit of oil over his skin and across his senses as his chin tipped in an apathetic light.

The moonlight bathed him in her illuminating glow, the iridescense of his pale hide shimmered. The braids in his hair remained, outfitted with gilded coins similar to the coins his beloved wore. He smelt of dragonfire and ash, he smells of war and the battlefield. It is a comfort, in this time, to slip back into those old smells and drink them deep. Inaction is no longer the plan laid upon the field, and Isorath shed his skin like the serpent would, and adopted one that was more familiar.

They come as Aislinn called, like wraiths from smoke. They dance into focus in the way they only know how to, they move to a beat that no one else can hear. The dance of something intangible and fierce, and he committed each and every one to his memory once more. There is a flicker of pride in his features, but draconian claws enclosed around it and snuffed it out, replaced it once more in a casual flick of his gaze toward the burning night.

In the distance, the pass burned and it's demise is sung into being by the music of dragons.

Aislinn spoke, and Isorath listened. It suited her, this title, the diadem she now wore fit her like a glove. So sure is she, he might've mistaken her for royal blood truly. The blood carefully crafted over an era of careful marriages, the right lovers falling into certain beds, destinies pre-selected and carefully cultivated. Wild yet contained, she is fierce as she is kind. Ruthless when called. In her Isorath found a semblance of a kindred spirit. Slitted pupils glanced at her leisurely, calculated and measured as she becomes more and more animated beside him.

They wanted to protect them, and the price of that was often the villains shroud. It is the sword pointed toward the crowd and sins laid bare, it is a show of force. Denocte has ran too rampant for long, and now they will learn.

Their games are over, and they will come to heel. One way or another.

Only when Aislinn softened, did Isorath come to life beside her. Life breathed into his icy bones and his moved with the sharpness of a life spent being trained for action. It is the movement's of a warrior, a commander, a dragon. He sized each face upon, as he towered on pillars of snow and ice. His bones sang and his chest vibrated with a hum — melodic but fringed with teeth.

"You may leave, but my dragon offers no assurances of safe passage once time is up." Isorath agreed softly, a purr not unlike aether's before he unleashed a torrent of flame. He smiled then, before it disappeared and masked itself with an apathetic indifference. "We have allowed ourselves to be swept up into chaos, allowed games and petty squabbles to escalate. It's time that we seized control of our destinies once more, and that starts with Denocte herself."



@Reichenbach @Aislinn










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Rhoswen
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#3

[Image: Rhosheader.png]


Rhoswen

It wasn't the smoke that woke her, nor the scent of blistered earth -- it was, instead, the sound of her daughter's voice chiming like a church bell through the night: 

"Mother."

The world materialised before her dark iron eyes, and it was nothing like the one she had left upon losing herself to sleep. Sabine stood beside her bed -- a spectral figure against the hum of florid scarlet light that bled into the darkness of their room through the yawning window, and with three breaths, Rhoswen's mind swam. There was an urgency in her daughter's eyes that crushed the air around them - air that was already suffocating beneath embers, and smoke, and the promise of revolution. Sabi, again, pressed her nose against her mother's shoulder to urge her from her sheets; as if she needed any encouragement. Rhos swung afoot, her heart a war drum hammering at the bearskin of her chest: what was happening? There was only heat, at first; a great swallowing torridity that encased them from every angle, and Rhos knew, in an instant that took her breath away, that it was the mountain. The plumes of smoke were too thin here, the heat too tolerable, and the ominous light that poured in from outside only testified to the fact. 

Quickly, Rhoswen swept into the corridor, glancing once at the unmade bed she left behind: Raum was absent, of course he was. With a muted Sabine at her side, the red woman seared down the hall - watching the feverish glow through each passing window until the call came: Aislinn's call. Denocte -- that was her now, Calligo had branded her with a feathered Corvine hand to reel her sunkissed soul back into the dark, and oh, there was no escaping the shadow in the valley of Night. Rhoswen emerged into the moonlit courtyard slowly, her auburn skin illuminated thematically by the backdrop of a dragon-forged sunset; in the distance, the sky melted beneath an inferno that raged to break them all and Rhoswen burned at the very sight of it. She was a fusion of conflicting emotions: the mountain had been her salvation and her captor - a guide to a new world, and a wall to keep her from it - who, then, had dared to scald it so. Aislinn; Aislinn, and Isorath. Eyes that broiled with an expression that was both nameless and familiar turned from the Arma to rake over the silhouettes that waited patiently for their people. Their people? Rhoswen's lip threatened to curl, a snarl promising to crack, no: Reichenbach's people. It was with a gaze that was as pyretic as the blaze to their north that she demanded an explanation. Rhoswen could not have expected what was to follow.

”The Raven Gates at the Arma Pass have been closed.”

No. The ground beneath her feet dropped, and deep within her stomach a new violence churned, though outwardly there was only a mask of fire and slow, calescent anger. More words passed from the Regent's lips but they were just further testament to the rage that bubbled in gunpowder in her blood. How could this be? The Raven Gates had been open for a year, no longer! How could the regime have failed so miserably as to retreat within such a pitifully short amount of time; this could not be happening. Trapped. Here, in this pithy cold lair where the sun did not glitter and the light was purged of gold -- here, where the desert sea was only a dream and her nightmares were brought to life. Where the fuck was Raum? Her head swung from left to right, scouring the growing crowd for a flash of silver - but his absence was deafening, and her ire was stoked again. This time, Isorath stepped forth, and Rhoswen might have hissed like a sandsnake if it weren't for the shock that was still pumping through her veins. When Reichenbach had elucidated the events of months past, concluding with the announcement of his new love, Rhos had been wary; what was a sibling if not protective? And this burning austerity had only grown with the time she had spent watching Isorath, and hearing of his deeds.

This was a man she would never trust. 

The kirin's voice boomed over the congregation, but Rhoswen was only biding her time, waiting until at last their address was at its end. She moved from the throng like an amazonian arrow carved and sharpened by their words, their actions. Rhoswen is, at last, a forest set alight. Her cardinal hair whirled in the whipping of an easterly wind, her eyes glimmering with fury, but her voice - her voice was but a low, raw murmur, "where is Reich?" Her glance flitted between regent and emissary, razing them with a question that gleamed like a knife. There was only time to continue,

"There is no we - no our - You have danced with chaos, your actions have threatened this nation, and now you are making your precious people suffer for it. How long did we roost like little birds behind those gates, how many centuries of silence? The future is one of freedom, and you are no better than fools."

And just as quickly as she had come, Rhoswen was gone. Turning back into the night with a haste that was feverish, they had to find Raum whilst there was still time, and she lingered only for Sabine to cast a final curious glance at the regime, before they both disappeared into the black.


@isorath @Aislinn @reichenbach welp, there she is. I assumed Reich wasn't there / hadn't turned up yet? 










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Lyra
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#4



l y r a

SHE IS MADE OF MOONBEAMS AND STARDUST

 
Lyra had seen the chaos that had rained down over the pass, Aether's roar sounding all the way deep into her soul. The night kissed woman was no stranger to what was happening outside of Denocte nor within it's walls, while she hated the idea of what all this could mean she heeded the call of Aislinn. Her step was light and quiet, as silent as the stars above her as she approached the regime, silver gaze piercing as she listened and watched the two of them. Aislinn's words cut through the air and her eyes narrowed slightly at the notion of 'protection'.

"What of those that have family outside these walls? I trust we can still send at least letters to those of us that have loved ones not of this court." Her voice was soft but not weak as she gazed upon both Aislinn and Isorath. Her gaze was indifferent to the ivory prince for she did not know him nor did she completely trust him as of yet. He was still too new to her and his title for Lyra to wholeheartedly throw her fate into his hands.

She was champion of the people and she could feel the fear and the anger rolling off of them all. There was no warning for any of them and to be quite honest, Lyra's respect for Isorath or what little she had for him waned. He had his dragon set fire to their home and for what? To show off his power? A true leader didn't burn his people's lands no matter what the intentions were.

"I am trying to place my full trust in you all, even those I barely know. But this is my home too, these are my people as much as they are yours and I hope you are ready for some of the trust built here to be lost. I hope.. you all know what you're doing." At last her gaze landed on each of them, piercing and cold when in other circumstances they would have been warm.

 


Umm have a slightly wary Lyra I guess?? It's weird writing her as anything but shy man xD

Neverr & space









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Isorath
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#5







R


where is Reich?

"He will be here." Came Isorath's lilted reply, lilac eyes coming to rest upon the red woman who spoke out in the crowd. She is foreign to him, not among the pictures and names carefully inked within his memory tome to pick from and his head tilted with mild interest. A newcomer perhaps? Or someone visiting from one of the lands now denied access to the City of Night and Stars?

It does not cross his mind that she would be the sister of his beloved, and so he does not linger upon her long, though he waited patiently for her to speak. Her outburst isn't a surprise, it is a flash of red against a vermillion sky, the whip of sandy winds upon the dunes. But it is just that, hot air striking against mountains and ancient towers. The Emissary would of questioned how much she knew, in the grand scheme of things, did she know the beginning, middle and end? Had she spoken to those afflicted and affected. Did she know the price of carrying a nation?

He doubted it.

But she did not give him the pleasure to respond, and so he doesn't. Not to her at least, and instead turned his attention to the next who spoke. A look of pleasant curiousity washed up upon the shores of his sharp features. The Champion of Community, doing her duty no less. A smile finally broke on his pale maw at her words, proud even. She showed promise, she did not say her piece and scurry away.

"You may, of course, send Ravens to those who are dear to you." He replied smoothly, the lilted tongue of a diplomat in his element is apparent. "We do not wish to restrict that pleasure from you, and those who cherish you deeply. Our isolation is one of a physical presence, so that those who wish to wreak havoc, cannot." His gaze then flicked across the crowd, searching and observing, before they returned to Lyra.

"The fire in the pass is to ensure that others stay away, a message if you will. You may not agree with it, and that is your right." Isorath paused and then he sighed. "I do not ask for you to agree with it, it would be foolish to have you follow blindly and place your trust in someone who you do not know. Or perhaps someone, who you have heard things whispered in the shadows about." It is then he offered a thin lipped smile, he's sure that there are half-truths and deliberately omitted details. "It would of been easy, too easy, to keep the Gates open and allow the cycle to continue."

"For freedom, so you say. For the people, for the better of us. But there is no freedom in the reputation Denocte has gained. Only chains of distrust and wariness, rumors and whispers that will dog you where ever you go. Denocte has done wrong, just as Novus has done wrong to us in turn." Once more he paused, this time deliberately, slitted pupils narrowed further to slits. Swallowed by the cold lilac they swam in.

"Those of you who have done nothing wrong, have nothing to fear from this."


NOTES;










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Acton
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#6

Acton
whatever you feed me I'll feed you right back
 

Acton tried very hard to wait until Reichenbach arrived before he spoke.

It was the hardest thing he had ever done in his life.

First there was the sheer disbelief of it all, the rats' scurrying of panicked citizens in the streets, the smoke that rose the same way it did in a thousand of his dreams (only much, much bigger). Acton was a busybody by nature and by trade, and while he was slower than he might have been – limping did that to a man – he still arrived in the square just before the decrees began, Raum a cold comfort at his side.

At first he was even curious, but that evaporated as quickly as whatever poor bastards had been caught in the pass at the wrong time likely had.

Still he tried to wait, though his curiosity turned to disbelief and then (always) to anger. Not secure safe passage for long? He remembered the day the gate had been opened – the celebration there had been. Acton had been hungover for days.

To be closed in now, threatened with a dragon – no. He had spent the first part of his life in a cage under threat of punishment. He still bore a scar as a reminder (and the nightmares, but those were far more secret).

Isorath was as elegant as ever, and Acton found that his previous apathy was quickly sharpening to disdain. He did admire the audacity of the kirin talking about games and petty squabbles they he had certainly taken an active role in – but in no world did Acton’s destiny begin behind a locked gate. No power-hungry prettyboy was about to tell him otherwise.

He wanted to cheer when Rhos spoke, and Lyra, too, and wanted to spit at the kirin’s smooth-voiced retort to what they had said. He had a hard time believing Reich’s  lover knew nothing of the king’s beloved kin, but maybe the man had just been too busy polishing his jewelry to learn much of his new home.  

Still he tried to wait, even as he felt himself bristling, distracting himself by searching the crowd for Isra, for Moira, for the twins or Rostislav. Anyone whose face might echo the sheer disbelief of his own. But then –

Those of you who have done nothing wrong have nothing to fear from this.

Ah, Acton could never restrain himself in the end. He was too much tinder, looking always for flint. And here was a whole pile of fuel, and already the world smelled like burning.

“Is that a threat?” The buckskin whistled through his teeth, and wore a grin as wide as a scythe.

“You think the best way to stop rumors and whispers is to lock your people in and set fire to the door? I’m just a street bastard and I know that’s a stupid idea. Now they’ll just add cowardice and madness to our list of sins.” He paused to lick his lips, remembering the taste of blood; how much easier it had been, when all his problems could be solved with scuffles. Acton claimed no head for diplomacy (he avoided such responsibility like the plague), but this did not seem like politics to him – it felt more like theatrics.

And oh, Acton knew what made a good show.  

He stepped forward then, still favoring the leg Bexley had well and thoroughly injured a month or so before. “But you know, I am mad. If you’re so wise, you should know who’s done wrong. And if you’re so diplomatic, you should be able to fix it out without punishing the whole of Denocte.” His gaze did not stray to Aislinn; he’d always respected her (though he had always found her tendency to follow rules sadly tedious), but now he could only hope none of her gypsy family had been traveling through the pass when the dragon had done…whatever it was it had done. No; his eyes were only for the kirin’s, whose own looked so like a snake’s.

Acton loved Denocte. He loved her wildness and her freedom, and he had fought for her, bled for her, done entirely idiotic, misguided things for her. And he loved his king like a brother, like a father.

But this was not the Court he knew, and the king he loved was nowhere to be seen.

If this was about sins committed, Acton knew well how black his ledger was. He leered at the kirin, and his gaze was a dare. “I’d tell you to come down here and make a threat like a man, but I’m still recovering from the last person I pissed off. Only she was three times scarier and twice as pretty as you.”
















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Rostislav
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#7


Though we are a fair distance from the Arma Mountains, the smell of fire - burning wood, soil, flesh - permeates the air, and my nostrils are filled with its pungent odor. The smoke rose against the horizon, curling up to blend in with the clouds above. As the denizens of the Night Court gather in the courtyard, stone walls penning us in for the pending speech, my gaze remains fixed on that horizon. My heart aches, and I could swear that through some link with my newly rediscovered magic, the aura of grief spreads out to envelope those around me.

I can only imagine the lives that were taken as Isorath's dragon, Aether, spread his frostfire. Not just the potential victims that were part of our herd, but the innocent creatures of the forest. The rabbits, deer, birds -- the forest that itself acted as both habit and natural border. Sure the mountains themselves were still there, but it would take decades upon decades for the area to recover and become what it was only hours ago.

Damaris weaves through the crowd, scaring unwitting commoners as she brushed past them. Those that did not know her were bound to be set on edge, especially with destructive dragons flying around. She sits down by my forelegs, and both of us change our focus to Aislinn as she begins to speak.

The gates are closing. This is your chance to leave. If you miss your chance, you must stay. This is to protect Denocte and her citizens. Praise Calligo.

I feel it starting within me. First it is just a tingle, somewhere in my spine. It spreads toward my head and toward my tail, tingling, growing warmer... hot. An anger.. no.. a rage. It grows as each horse steps forward to speak their mind. Isorath. Rhoswen. Lyra. Isorath again. And Acton. I'm shocked to find that, apart from Isorath and Aislinn, the feelings conveyed mirror my own. 'Shock that they agree with you? Or that you agree with them?' It's a fine point I don't care to argue. The cobblestone around my hooves begins to crack, and small tremors cause fine splits in the stone, emanating outward with the persistence of a ripple. I glance around, looking for Reichenbach. I want him to hear what I have to say -- but it cannot wait.

Damaris steps forward, baring her teeth and growling. Those standing in front of us jump out of the way, eyeing the slime that drips from her jowls with appropriate wariness. "The discord of our actions! Games and petty squabbles!" Greater cracks appear, and what I feel is not pissiness spurned on by inebriation; it's fully-sober righteous fury. "They're right!" I gesture toward Acton, for he is the representative for his and Rhoswen's barked replies. "It is our Regime that is at fault - not the rest of the Court! Specifically, the two lovers that rule together." I shoot a fiery glare at Isorath. In the back of my mind, a stray thought of concern scurries through: that Aislinn should realize that my anger is not directed at her. But it is, isn't it? She is the one here announcing this new "order of protection." She's complicit.

"It is because of Reichenbach, Isorath, and the Crows that are playing the games orchestrated by the Regime that this chaos exists! It should not be the choice of the guilty whether we free citizens are given the mutually exclusive 'choice' of staying or leaving. How, pray tell, do you find yourselves to be fit to govern us?!" The cobblestones around me have begun to crumble completely, and the radius continues to expand as each second ticks by.

And now all will see the indignant rage of Rostislav and Damaris.

ballllls DEEP. longest post I've written with Rosti in ages HE'S SO MAD
Rosti thoughts | "Rosti speech" | Damaris mindspeak


Rostislav
more than a drunken fool
x - x










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Isra
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#8

Months have passed by her in the mountains and the forests since she ran so far from the court and herself.

With only the trees and mountain goats to keep her company the time slipped, away, away, away like sand beneath the sea. Where the treetops were too thick to see the sun she lingered, content to forgot how many hours, days and week passed.

Soon a month had passed and to Isra it felt like a slumber, a story she was loathe to leave.

The trees were her heroes, tall and mighty and refusing to bend in the wind as the seasons came and left and came again. She would whisper to them, tell them of the memories she remembered. They alone knew that this was not her skin, not really. There were no secrets she kept from the sea, as she lingered below them nibbling away at their leaves and licking water from their bark when the skies granted her rain. She even told of them the chains (so many chains) and how she spent nights tethered to walls and beds.

Part of her healed, there between the trees in the gloom of a forest that was dull where the sea was blinding bright. That box of buried memories was open now but her heart no longer thrums a panicked song when a branch plucks at her coat hard enough to leave a scratch.

And just when she was ready to remember the sting of Acton, of the way he smelled like kindling and fire, the world around her ended.

It began in a blaze of blue and the trees sighed, swayed and all their leaves seemed to cry out the rainwater as they withered and died. All around her the mountains screamed and she screamed with them until her lungs burned and her heart grew cold enough to stop it's thready beating. At her back a branch falls against her rump and she sobs for the pain if it. But that branch causes her to her run and the forest starts to crack like a million whips.

Isra remembers the sound of a whip too well. It makes her frantic to escape, to be anywhere but there where the fire burns like winter and now, in the distance she can hear a dragon roar. Her hooves scramble over the roots and rocks. The goats and grouse run with her until they all blend together in  pack of survival, of mindless beasts that know only the words run and survive. It's a mantra insides their heads and it drowns out the hiss of the hungry fire are their backs.

Run, run, run. Run until our legs are broken and out flesh nothing more than snow and our bones ash. All the animals listen to only that song, that chorus of instinct that drowns out all the politics and wants in the world.

Oh how she runs, swift as a deer, elegant her sea skin. It's only those long legs that save her. They barely seem to touch the ground as she streaks down, down, down the mountain side. They are either swifter than the fire or the forest warned her of the end soon enough for her to flee.

She doesn't stop when she reaches the city edge. Even then she runs, slipping over the cobblestone like a newborn foal that somehow manages not to fall. Isra only stops when the finds the others and spots that sun yellow skin in the crowed.

Her panic is still too bright, too much an inferno reminiscent of the fire at her back that she doesn't realize they are still-- too still for fear.

“The forest is alive with fire, it burns.” She bleats as she slides into Acton, simply because he is the only face she knows, her only friend (if he can be called that at all) in the entire world. “We need to run, it's not safe” There is a wildness to her touch as she nudges at his neck, overlooking the way his eyes look ahead towards all the winged horses before the crowd.

When Acton doesn't move she follows his eyes and her own grow wide with white-walled fear.

Oh, but how she quickly realizes what has happened. A slave is never slow to find cruelty when it shows its face with smiles and laws and righteousness. Isra is a slave to the bitter end. Her skin is new but her soul is not and she steps back, back towards the shadows behind the gathering.

“What nightmare is this?” The words are a whisper, almost too low to hear with the way her heart beats loud enough to be thunder in her ears. She takes another step back, crying out when she bumps into someone else she doesn't know.

All my devils are here. Isra thinks to herself, sliding back into her own mind. It's the only place that's safe, in this world of pretty, bejeweled horses that bicker like jackals. Their words are like a language she cannot bear to understand.

And when she remembers running with the wildlife, all of them afraid that fear is the last thing they might ever know, Isra is glad she cannot understand their language of cruelty. She would rather die (sink back into the sea with chains to weigh her down) than speak a single word that she learned from their lips.


* * * * *
when your heart is full of blood












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Lavinia
Guest
#9




COME DOWN TO THE BLACK SEA SWIMMING WITH ME.
GO DOWN WITH ME, FALL WITH ME.
LET'S MAKE IT WORTH IT.






There was a soft clang of footsteps as the red and gold colored woman moved through the crowds, though she did not look like the crow of fire and gold as she usually did. She was probably of the last to show up and Lav had good reason for it, she should have been resting given the blackness in her lungs and the fevered gaze in her eyes. But no..she was here to remind everyone and she meant everyone of her loyalty to Denocte. To her king. She listened to the scorned words, the anger of the citizens and she made a loud snort and laugh at them all.

Her feverish gaze first landed on Rhoswen who had was already storming out of there like the bratty child she was acting. Then they landed on Acton. Her so called brother crow and she narrowed her piercing gaze on him for a moment before turning away from him as though he was nothing more than old news to her now. "As I recall..there are many here who are not innocent dear Acton. The next time they should open their mouths about it they'd do well to remember it and remember their loyalties." Her voice was cold if not a bit ragged, it was hard to breathe for the young girl.

"Our King and his regime have ran countries far longer than any of us combined. If they are closing the gates there is a reason for it. Perhaps instead of pointing fingers and calling names we should simply ask for the why." Lavinia then turned towards Isorath and Aislinn, a softer look crossing her features for a simple moment of understanding. A crow she may be and her soul may be black as coal, but she knew the cost of what they were risking. They risked the love of their people to keep them safe, taking their hatred in stride and Lav would help carry that burden. Until the day she died. That was a promise she made years ago to Reichenbach and that promise still held true now.




Have an ill and angry Lav!
speech color!












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Jezanna
Guest
#10

Jezanna did not know what to think, what to expect when she stepped into the crowd making their way along the streets. She bled into the spaces between them, a midnight shadow with moonlit eyes, and she carried herself on soft steps with her head held high. Such things, gatherings of this manner, were foreign and new to her. She had come from a young world that was inhabited by scarce else other than the creatures whom she had befriended. There had been no reason for such a thing as this. What, she wondered, could it mean?

The young moon’s eyes swept the amassed bodies, spying so few familiar faces. How was it that she had been living among these people for months now and yet knew hardly any of them. She spied Aislinn at the head with a man of ivory and gold that she did not know at all. In the crowd there was only Rostislav that she knew. Where was Reichenbach? Should the King not be present for such a thing? She did not know much, but she thought at least that this was something a king should show up for.

The news was hard for Jezanna to hear, a weight dropped in her stomach that was empty with loss. She had barely begun to explore this world and already it was being taken away from her, dragged from beneath her feet like a rug. The girl had nowhere else to go, surely nowhere that suited her as well as the night court, but how was it that they felt imprisoning the ones they supposedly loved and cared for would do them any good at all? And all around her voices rose, most of them in agreement with each other. All of them outraged.

She had so little knowledge on the why, as the chestnut woman with golden eyes said, yet she felt impassioned by the ugly truth that had been laid before her. Her silver gaze landed on Aislinn, wondering what had happened in the short time since she had seen her last. What had taken the wandering, gypsy woman and turned her into a jailer of her people? Jezanna felt the beginnings of being trapped curling in around her like the smoke blanketing the horizon, clinging to her hair and her antlers and her heart.

How was it that she might finally begin to feel like there was a place for her here, only to find that beneath the facade there had been something darker lurking. With bright eyes on the two figureheads, the girl breathed past the tightness in her chest.

“You say that you have closed these gates to stop a cycle, but how are chains to be broken if all you do is allow them to tighten?” She knew so little about the why, but of peace and of hope she knew something about. “To retreat into yourself is to only strengthen the opinions of those who would speak against Denocte and its people. It will not stop them from thinking, or speaking, or believing of you or the Court what they will. It will only prevent you from seeing or hearing it. It will only breed blissful ignorance, but it is ignorance nonetheless.” She took a step forward, though it was not challenging as perhaps the others had been.

“You cannot simply lock yourselves and your people away and expect peace to happen. You must make peace, you must go into the world and let peace flourish with warm hearts and open arms.” Jezanna looked around at the gathered crowd, at these she did not know well and did not know at all. And still, she felt for them, ached for the fury and the shock that was like an electric charge in the air. “You say this is best for your people, but your people say they disagree; and you will simply cage them in like an animal?”

She shook her head, dark hair swaying, moonshine eyes luminous but wise. So much knowing etched within the youth of her features. “You are right to say that I do not agree with you, but I also do not understand. I was told that in Denocte all were family, wild and free but loyal. This… this is not what family does, this is not how loyalty is built,” the midnight girl finished with her gaze upon Aislinn and the one she gathered was Isorath. So long she had been hiding within the shadows, fearing for her secret to get out, fearing what might happen if it did. But she could not stand idly by and watch a kingdom splintered by one tenuous decision.

"Speaking."










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