Of all things which brought discomfort, which had included the undefeated drone of the hum and the small, beady red red eyes of the strange blackbirds, the sun bore down into his back like a saw. It creased along the dorsal line with an unwavering ferocity – a heavy glare, a grating sheen that sparkled in the scales of perspiration that cried out from his pores. It didn't take long for him to crave all too deeply a return to the damp darkness of the forest with its seabreeze and scattered not-moonlight, despite the jarring display of unnatural-ness that sprouted from the wilderness without much notice. Of course, the proper term for it may have been magic, but Erasmus is a stubborn fool who basks in an old world age, and the simplicity of magic is something that feels too cheap to find a way to his tongue. But it is – and it was – he felt it in his bones, his blood, (we feel it also, we drink it in deeper than any wine sunken to the roots) the way it wove into his flesh and tugged at the springing strings of his hair. It is youth, it is light, it is darkness – how ever darkness, that which curls at his heels and caresses up his thighs, it rolls over his back thinly in some subconscious attempt to veil him from the sun. But it is not his magic that hums. And if it were the word of magic that found his dry belief, he would be certain to know that he was no more a master than a servant to its whims.
Perhaps that could be the greatest discomfort of all.
Almost so great of discomforts of course, that he had nearly lost track of her name when she said it. He had been watching the way the tide rolled in and drove out against itself, all frothing and thundering and hissing against the bright sand. The way it shimmered and grinned in the sunlight, almost as if it were amused with mortality, with its frail bitterness and simple tidings. His gaze waded the waters until the roar of the ocean had just almost drowned the hum that resonated in his ears – before he caught the echo of her name on the wind as a shadow passed overhead, one of the ruby-eyed grackles circling above, shortly joined by another of brighter iridescence. Morrighan. a brow raised as he looked back to her, his skin twitching where the heat of the sun bore down almost unbearably just off the center of his spine. The way she spoke today was – is kinder the word? Was it gentler? Was it more patient? – with a tuned softness that he could not recall from their first meeting, though it still held a tinge of toxicity that lurked in each corner of dialect. He could not tell if he should be concerned or grateful, and so remained on the better side of neutral, attending her every word with a lingering curiosity that probed for meaning.
Erasmus did not care for the Novus gods. It was not a matter of loathing by any means, but a carelessness that grounded itself in his birthright. His every thought of a god was a flawed thing, no thing greater than a mortal but for their immortality and supernatural gifts they were so called by, no matter what name found them. Tempus did not hit a place with him that may have with many others, but he recalled the name thrown around haphazardly by the cavalry at the beachside bridge. In fact, the cadence was lost to some unfound limbo in his wares, to the point that his brows furrowed at the mention and he shook his head slowly. Caligo, Caligo, now that was a name he recalled from the murmurings of passerby and the swift scrolling through pages of history that he wandered through at times of languor, but there was more to it than that. "'fraid not." He answered bluntly, his eyes raising to watch the commune of what was now four circling birds, each silently spectating the two below them with a mighty scrupulous eye. One of them was odd, something deathly and cruel to imagine, were it an exoskeleton who made his crown – a fine knitting of bronze bones caught the glint of the sun when he angled about, or it was the way his feathers were painted bright against his wren-brown down. He was larger than the other three, not quite double their size, and the smooth, coppery undersides of his flight feathers were tinged with a cool green that shifted to blue when he caught the reflection of the sea. The needle beaks of the others remained pursed and thin in their solemn quiet, though in some lights they seem to be almost jagged as a serrated blade.
He shrugged a shoulder and looked back to Morrighan before making steady strides through the sand onward, the small relief of breeze finding the small of his back when he walked. "I take it you're not here for a casual stroll." Erasmus searched for the shadows of landmasses in the distance, but any hint of shade was swallowed by a current stronger than the last. Each crown of frothing white broke over the former with a hungry overbearance, until the moment you would think the sea would devour the whole of the island once more - and they would subside into smaller waves, gentler creases in the ocean tide that washed thinly over the sand in silvery pools. "Or are you here to taste the finer fruits of life? What if this trinket is at the bottom of a volcanic well?"
Perhaps that could be the greatest discomfort of all.
Almost so great of discomforts of course, that he had nearly lost track of her name when she said it. He had been watching the way the tide rolled in and drove out against itself, all frothing and thundering and hissing against the bright sand. The way it shimmered and grinned in the sunlight, almost as if it were amused with mortality, with its frail bitterness and simple tidings. His gaze waded the waters until the roar of the ocean had just almost drowned the hum that resonated in his ears – before he caught the echo of her name on the wind as a shadow passed overhead, one of the ruby-eyed grackles circling above, shortly joined by another of brighter iridescence. Morrighan. a brow raised as he looked back to her, his skin twitching where the heat of the sun bore down almost unbearably just off the center of his spine. The way she spoke today was – is kinder the word? Was it gentler? Was it more patient? – with a tuned softness that he could not recall from their first meeting, though it still held a tinge of toxicity that lurked in each corner of dialect. He could not tell if he should be concerned or grateful, and so remained on the better side of neutral, attending her every word with a lingering curiosity that probed for meaning.
Erasmus did not care for the Novus gods. It was not a matter of loathing by any means, but a carelessness that grounded itself in his birthright. His every thought of a god was a flawed thing, no thing greater than a mortal but for their immortality and supernatural gifts they were so called by, no matter what name found them. Tempus did not hit a place with him that may have with many others, but he recalled the name thrown around haphazardly by the cavalry at the beachside bridge. In fact, the cadence was lost to some unfound limbo in his wares, to the point that his brows furrowed at the mention and he shook his head slowly. Caligo, Caligo, now that was a name he recalled from the murmurings of passerby and the swift scrolling through pages of history that he wandered through at times of languor, but there was more to it than that. "'fraid not." He answered bluntly, his eyes raising to watch the commune of what was now four circling birds, each silently spectating the two below them with a mighty scrupulous eye. One of them was odd, something deathly and cruel to imagine, were it an exoskeleton who made his crown – a fine knitting of bronze bones caught the glint of the sun when he angled about, or it was the way his feathers were painted bright against his wren-brown down. He was larger than the other three, not quite double their size, and the smooth, coppery undersides of his flight feathers were tinged with a cool green that shifted to blue when he caught the reflection of the sea. The needle beaks of the others remained pursed and thin in their solemn quiet, though in some lights they seem to be almost jagged as a serrated blade.
He shrugged a shoulder and looked back to Morrighan before making steady strides through the sand onward, the small relief of breeze finding the small of his back when he walked. "I take it you're not here for a casual stroll." Erasmus searched for the shadows of landmasses in the distance, but any hint of shade was swallowed by a current stronger than the last. Each crown of frothing white broke over the former with a hungry overbearance, until the moment you would think the sea would devour the whole of the island once more - and they would subside into smaller waves, gentler creases in the ocean tide that washed thinly over the sand in silvery pools. "Or are you here to taste the finer fruits of life? What if this trinket is at the bottom of a volcanic well?"
@Morrighan
