[AW] Allie allie lou.

[Dearest]

oh my Dearest
they will eat you alive

“Mama! Mom! Watch this one!” And the tiny red creature launched herself into the air, twisting wildly, kicking her legs out behind her.

Her mother laughed. “Well, you certainly have the spirit. But I think a little practice will help.”

”Practice? It was perfect. Watch again!” 

She took in a deep breath, a breath that stretched her lungs and filled them full to the point of bursting, before slowly exhaling. She did this two more times, letting her eyes close, black lashes touching gently to her red cheeks. Anyone watching might mistake the ritual as one to calm her nerves, but that was not the reality. She was excited and that feeling burned inside her, needing to be settled before she could find the calm needed for her first performance.

Finally, like clouds pulling away from the sun, she opened her golden eyes. They smiled from her face, large and bright, welcoming in anyone who happened to catch their gaze. Slowly, with an exaggerated slinking of her hips, she stepped forward, and the bells within her hair fell into a rhythm, one that she maintained with a rolling of her head that made the delicately carved muscles of her neck flex and dance.

She added a deeper beat next, with the hard stomping of a foot on the cobblestones. It echoed through the streets, falling into a pattern with the higher pitched ringing. Only then did she smile, those upturned lips parting to add the sultry rumble of her voice. It was an old song, one taught to her by her mother, and it seemed fitting for this place she was already growing so fond of.

“The maiden fair, the maiden sweet
Oh, allie allie lou
The maiden made of sun and heat
Oh, allie allie lou
Place your love on the grass at dawn
Oh, allie allie lou
In the night you find it gone
Oh, allie allie lou
Perhaps you will see her there
Yellow ribbons in her hair
But if you did, what would you do?
Oh, allie allie lou.
Allie allie lou”

Her voice trailed off on a sweet lift, body becoming still. The music she had been creating fell silent though the air around still hummed with energy. Some had passed by in the market, either too busy or too jaded to pause and listen to the words of a song, but those that had stopped stomped and made noise, causing her to break into a stunning grin as she dipped into a graceful bow. The bells twinkled again as her curls fells forward over her neck and so did her laughter. It was almost impossible to tell those two sounds apart.

“Thank you. Thank you all.” she said in a breathy way, blushing from the excitement of the moment. A few called out for more, an encore, but she shook her head and the market street slowly settled back into its normal routine. She turned to leave, feeling like that had at least earned herself a drink at the closest bar, when she felt a tug on her tail.

Dearest found herself looking at a child, still fuzzy with baby hair. They had huge blue eyes, and were looking up at her with awe. “Hello there, darling.” She said in soft motherly way, bringing herself down to the level of the little one so that she wasn’t looming above.

The child just giggled, seemingly shy, tucking a tiny white flower into the space between the girl’s black tipped ear and small horn before running away down the stone road.

This gesture, to Dearest, was better than all the praise in Novus.

[Sabrina]

Oh, won't you go, make the most of a bad existence
cause you're so much older than she ever planned to live with

Even in its barren nature, the capital of Day Court was still ostentatious. Eventually you’ve hung enough banners for your god. Sabrina forced herself to look at the ground because if she saw another tapestry of Solis, she would puke. He was fucking everywhere-- pressed into the walls, sewn in gold on flags, and his carved head anointed every other pillar. The idolatry made her sick to her stomach. She felt like she was trapped in some horrible, antiquated college town and Solis was the team mascot. Delphine’s school icon had been werewolves, and that was much cooler than some stuffy old sun god.

It was hot. Oppressively so, which seemed unfair for so early in the season. It made Sabrina miss her little apartment with the temperature-moderating runes etched into the walls (even though activating them made her nauseous). Her wings drifted and hung slack at her sides, the tips inches above the ground. She would not let them touch-- that would truly be sacrilege. Sabrina kept no gods; her wings were relics of someone much more holy than any deity Novus could spit out.  

There was a gathering of bodies ahead and some sort of musical performance laid over top of them. Sabrina cut one way to go around it, then the other, but they had packed the streets so with their patron flesh that there was nothing to do but wait. Someone bumped into her and she pinned her ears back in warning; the individual uttered a hasty apology and moved away.

At the center of the group of onlookers a red mare was doing some silly little dance. Her height gave her a clear view of the performance. She had a nice voice, Sabrina had to admit, and she moved with a grace the winged creature could only envy. When the production concluded the mass of bodies began to clap and cheer like trained monkeys and the performer drank it in, though she seemed… genuine, at the very least. In due course, the crowd began to disperse, until all that remained was a gangly child who offered the blood-colored mare a white flower.

It was only when the youth darted away and the performer watched them go with stars in their eyes did Sabrina realize just how young she was; it twisted her up inside, for reasons she couldn’t quite understand. As she stood there, puzzling over the knotted-up emotions in her gut-- Sabrina was a gut-feeling creature-- she realized she’d been staring.

She cleared her throat and struggled to find words. It’d been so long since she’d willingly interacted with another creature. “That was… good.” God, was she always this bad at talking? “Did you… learn that, somewhere?”

Yes. Yes, she was.

"SPEECH" ! @Dearest
anyway here's this GRUMP

[Dearest]

oh my Dearest
they will eat you alive

“She said she didn’t want to be my friend.” The young child pouted, pushing a rock back and forth on the ground with one of her tiny cloven hooves.

“Everyone doesn’t have to be your friend, my Dearest. Sometimes quality is better than quani-”

“Why don’t they have to?!” She interrupted, looking up at her mother with shock, “I don’t understand. I asked her to play. I was being really nice.”

Watching the child run away down the cobblestone street was bittersweet. A soft smile played across her lips as she let herself get lost in her thoughts of days not too long ago. They still seemed impossibly far away, these images of herself giving flowers and trinkets to the dancers, but she still could feel how much giving that gift meant to a child. This had been all she wanted when her legs were too long and gangly, her voice still holding the squeak of youth. To earn the praise and admiration and perhaps bring a bit of happiness to a world much crueler than the one she grew up knowing in the process. But this didn’t stop her from missing home and all its familiar offerings.

She was pulled from her nostalgia by the clearing of a throat, and she was thankful to the stranger before she even laid eyes on her. After all, there was no use falling into the past as the present passes you by. Her savior was well-built, her skin broke apart by splashes of contrasting color. She hadn’t noticed the woman staring, preoccupied with thinking about white flowers and the kids who consider them precious, but it wouldn’t have bothered her if she had. Dearest was the one staring now, noting the sculpture of the feathers and the single, spindly horn and finally ending at a set of blue eyes. They were as bright as the cloudless desert sky above them, and though this other mare may seem awkward in her words, the eyes made her comfortable and it was a feeling not to be questioned. Something about beauty always put her at ease.

The praise made her blush. Red cheeks managed to deepen in color but it was not out of embarrassment that this happened, though it could seem that way on the surface. She was simply that pleased, and it lifted her voice in cadence. “Thank you. Sincerely.”

Her grin deepened as she considered the question. The girl looked left and right before she took a step closer, leaning in as if whispering a secret, “My mother taught me the song. Beautiful voice. Angelic. But you ask her to hold a rhythm and you mighta just as well have given a badger a stick.”

She laughed at her own joke, heartily and without shame, the bells in her hair twinkling along. She hadn't realized how much she missed having someone to talk to. Being an impulsive creature, and once her throaty chuckling settled down, she considered the mare before her. She was hot. Literally. The heat was affecting them both. “I’m Dearest, by the way. Was going to head off and get a drink, cool down a bit, maybe sing for a few folks the other side of sober. They seem to appreciate it more than most. Would you wanna come?”

@sabrina

[Sabrina]

Oh, won't you go, make the most of a bad existence
cause you're so much older than she ever planned to live with

Delphine would have hated it here. Sabrina could hear her complaining in her head, Everything is so beige, she would admonish, before setting off down the streets casting spells to fill the world with color and light. Delph’s voice was some years younger. Back when they talked more. Back when there was always something to talk about. Yeah, her sister would have turned Solterra from this starchy backwards sandpit to somewhere worth visiting.

It was part of the way Sabrina knew she wasn’t here; not in the capital, at any rate. But she had made a promise to search everywhere to bring her sister home and a promise made over an open chest cavity and a failing heart was one you kept.

There was, of course, always the off chance that Delphine had been changed so drastically, Sabrina wouldn’t recognize her. That thought made her sad. It was one she had to fight off constantly, like hyenas circling the lion at a fresh kill, in order to preserve her will. She could not let her resolve fall, for she was nothing without it.

The performing girl gave her a quick once over. Not prone to vanity, Sabrina bit back the urge to ask if the younger found what she was looking for. She was tall and wide and strong and plain, with straw yellow hair that shared the same texture. It was unkempt and unbrushable. This dancer was the picture of daintiness; even her horns, as gentle little black nubs, were dainty. Sabrina’s was a gaudy, hollow bauble. It was a symbol of a magic-bearing line that could bear no magic.

She, too, was hollow. She did not notice the rise of color in the young mare’s cheeks. Her gratitude fell on deaf ears. “I call them like I see ‘em,” she said, succinct and gruff.

The dancer took a step closer, and was smiling now. Sabrina fought back the urge to take a step away. She hadn’t willingly shared space with anyone since that night in the alley. Teska had to get close to sew her stolen wings on, but she had been blessedly unconscious for that.

The performing mare spoke lovingly of her mother and Sabrina searched her heart and stomach for even the smallest pang or pinch of homesickness. She came up empty. “Good thing you’re better at it than a badger with a stick, then?” she said, half-rhetorical, but it was mostly swallowed by the red mare’s laughter.

Sabrina’s gaze shifted to the side, slightly awkward. It was an odd analogy. She didn’t get the joke. But, more importantly, when was the last time she’d laughed?

She’d knocked some handsy motherfucker’s teeth out at that viking pub in Skaravegg. She’d laughed over his molars like pearls on the ground, blood pooling around his head.

She was shocked back to the present by the performing mare introducing herself-- Dearest, and her first thought was it sounded sort of like Delphine but not really-- and inviting her for a drink. “Uh… Sabrina,” she responded, trying to ignore that it seemed she had forgotten her own name. Her first instinct was to reject the proposal, but for a moment she thought about that twisted-up feeling in her guts, and her last barfight.

Her tone was softer for her thinking. She didn’t smile, but the tension dropped from her muscles by a milligram. “Sure, Dearest. Lead the way.”

"SPEECH" ! @Dearest
im sorry

[Dearest]

oh my Dearest
they will eat you alive

"Dearest. I need you to be honest with me.” Her mother spoke calmly, but there was a seriousness to the tone that made the small child nervous, “Did you eat all the berries out of Miss Hawth’s garden.”

She blinked in an innocent way, her eyes going wide. “I didn’t know I wasn’t s’pposed to.”

Her mother frowned. “There is a sign that says ‘STAY OUT’ on front of the gate.”

“But I did!” She argued, “I sent the boys in there to get them for me.”

It wasn’t that she was unaware of the fact that the stranger she found herself talking to was awkward. It was rather evident, in her halted words and uncertain body language. To put it simply, Dearest did not care. Even the most graceful fish would be awkward on dry land as it flopped and fought for breath. Perhaps that is what this other mare is doing right now. Fighting to breathe. Who was she to judge how a creature lived their life? And to be honest, she loved a good story. She hoped that perhaps under the gruff exterior was something worth her curiosity.

If there wasn’t, so what? She was still getting her drink.

“Sabrina, eh?” She gave a small nod, as if deciding it was fitting, ”I like it. The tavern isn’t far. Lets hope I can drink better than a badger with a stick too.”

Obviously amused with herself, she lead the way as instructed, looking back to make sure her new friend hadn’t dipped out down some sun-soaked alleyway. “So what's your story? I haven't been in Novus for long, but the one thing I've learned is that everyone has a story.” She paused in her words, as if just realizing this may be a bit too invasive. She sometimes forgets that people don’t always want to tell their tales. “No pressure, of course.” She continued on, rambling, with enough energy to rival the heat that plauged them all, “Just think on it. Little place is right ahead.” and she gestured to a sort of hole in the wall with a worn sign that hung over the door.

Clearly, this establishment had seen better days but Dearest had fallen head over (all four) heels with the gritty atmosphere. The patrons that slipped in and out at all hours were real. She could see it in the lines of their faces and the bend of their backs. But the real reason she comes here every day? She hadn’t been able to make Old Hargis smile yet, and it had become quite the game. He was standing near the bar as they entered and the red mare’s face lit up with mischief. Slyly, she gave Sabrina a wink, before yelling out over the chatter of voices and glasses, ”Oi! Hargis! You agree to marry me yet or not? I'm not getting any younger over here.” and the older fellow let out a sound of disgust that was so loud, the tender asked him if he was choking.

“Ah’m not choking!” He scoffed, “You heardin’ that!? Scarlet woman, ah tell ya. Have’er go shake’er bells at the Leaky Dragon! Not ‘ere!.”

His words were not taken seriously, not even by himself as could be told by the slight glint in his eyes that didn’t match his grumpy mood. A few of the other patrons laughed, and it was soon an exchange left in the past as she turned her attention back to the mare.

“Sorry bout that,” she said, ”Took me a week to get him to acknowledge me. You shoulda heard what he said that day.” This memory must have amused her, because she gave a small chuckle. Luckily, the cooling enchantment attached to the building was already doing its job. She could feel herself relaxing, and she shifted her weight, tossing her head to move a few black curls out of her face. Of course, they fell right back where they wanted to, but it was the effort that mattered.

“So what's your poison, Sabrina?” Dearest asked, gaze shifting for a moment and a hoof stamping to signal the worker before her attention returned fully to the patterned woman.

@sabrina

[Sabrina]

Oh, won't you go, make the most of a bad existence
cause you're so much older than she ever planned to live with

Sabrina began to realize that she felt bad for the sanguine-toned mare. She was so young and yet, here she was, dancing and singing for her supper. Sabrina screwed up her face in some internal battle against hypocrisy. Maybe she was wrong. Maybe Dearest really did just… like doing this shit. But there was an image of her head of a busker on a city sidewalk with ankles half-deep in the refuse of an overflowing storm drain; then there was that one kid at the corner of Westshev and White with the sign that read WILL RAP FOR FOOD.

Sabrina wondered what it felt like to not have to do something and to still do it.

Dearest announced her name back to her and nodded as though she had any say in the matter. She whipped out that weird analogy again and began walking; obediently, Sabrina followed, stuck in some weird mood halfway between feeling nothing and not dreading what was coming next. Her hooves were a steady rhythm on the cobbled Solterran streets; she kept pace a little behind Dearest and was on the verge of being… if not happy, then comfortable, until her new acquaintance threw her head over her shoulder and asked that loaded question.

Immediately, Sabrina clammed up. Her lips pressed together and the muscles in her cheeks tensed. No pressure, Dearest said, as though being able to think and speak freely was as easy as breathing. This was someone with no ghosts in their head. A closet empty of skeletons.

Everyone has a story. Some are fairy tales-- they’re okay then bad then better. Some people, Sabrina’s learned, can roll in shit and still come out smelling like roses. Puck was like that, until he died. He was a prince, though, so maybe the rules were different for him.

Just think on it. “Think I’d like it if you’d mind your own b--,” she muttered, then swallowed the ire, sharp like glass in her throat, and amended with: “Don’t hold your breath.”

They ducked into a little shithole dive that was less of a bar and more of a broom closet clawed out as an alcove in the stone. Chilling magic made the air less awful than outside but did nothing for the slight dankness and the smell of misery, which Sabrina was as intimate with as her own soul.

She completely disagreed with what people said about misery and company.

The magic made her slightly nauseous, but she swallowed it down. Dearest jumped straight into the mire and started yelling at one patron, something about marriage; Sabrina tuned it out. It was a topic she avoided at all costs, even in jest. Gentle chuckles escaped the small crowd of patrons and Sabrina had to hold back a sigh as Dearest turned her attentions back to her. She started talking about how she had to annoy this old fool into paying attention to her and oh, see, I like annoying people, and you look easily irritable. Am I right?

“Some people like being alone,” she said in a tone that suggested she was intimately familiar with the subject. “You’re lucky he didn’t smash you over the head with a glass. ‘Swhat I would’ve done.” All of her patience and restraint had been spent on Puck. Anyone who sidled up next to her these days got a face full of teeth.

Sabrina pulled her wings in tight to fight next to Dearest at the bar; she didn’t want to thwack her over the head. “Whiskey, neat,” she said to the barkeep, who seemed to know Dearest and what she wanted.

“So, uh,” Sabrina started, clearing her throat, “how do you find a place like this? Aside from needing somewhere to crawl in and die.” It was kind of a shitty way to ask what's a nice girl like you doing in a bad place like this but Sabrina had never had that level of tact, charisma, or give-a-damn.

"SPEECH" ! @Dearest
she's the worst

[Dearest]

oh my Dearest
they will eat you alive

“You’re sure you can’t change your mind?” Her mother asked in an almost child-like way and for one brief second, their roles were reversed.

Dearest smiled, a sad sort of smile though, touching her forehead to her cheek, “It’s not that I can’t. I could. But I don’t want to. I just need to...” and she trailed off but her mother nodded, showing that the rest of the words were unnecessary.

“I know. I only worry because the world out there... it’s not as beautiful as you’ve dreamed in your head, Dearest.”

This place was an acquired taste, and that was putting it lightly. Her new companion squeezed next to her and she instinctively shifted, giving her a bit more space but also angling herself to study the mare better as she spoke. There was a very blunt and direct way to her words, and the red woman could appreciate that.

“He didn’t smash a glass on my head. Did throw a bottle though, so what I’m really lucky for is my reflexes.” Dearest gave a small chuckle at her own words, as is her way, before shrugging it off. “If we’re being honest, I don’t think anyone likes to be alone. I think they like not having to trust again. He’s a gruff man out of defense. Not aggression.”

Her lips twitched down at the corners, as if she was about to say more, but the drinks were suddenly clattered on the bar and whatever emotion had been there was replaced with a satisfied noise from her throat. She didn’t wait to cheers. She didn’t sip from the large stein. She instantly chugged the glass, sound effects included as she finished the last drop and burped. Perhaps ‘burp’ was an understatement. She belched like a creature 3 times her size, exhaling afterwards with an audible “woo”. If she was with her childhood friends, she would have blown it straight in one of their faces, but she was with Sabrina and had turned her head to the side. Looking back, her eyes were bright, like lanterns in the dingy musk that was this establishment.

“Excuse me. I really needed that.” she said, though her voice lacked any embarrassment, and the tender must have expected it because he was already silently getting her a second. Dearest mulled over the two-toned mare’s question, waiting for her new drink and for him to scurry off to another patron before answering.

“That’s Reolfwig. He owns this hole in the wall and is pretty damn proud of it so don’t let him hear you saying that. Good man. Bit proud, but that seems to be the trend in this court if we’re going off what I’ve seen.” Her voice grew a little softer then, lips becoming tainted with emotion close to sadness, but not quite, “You may see a place to crawl in and die. Me? I see something real. Every one of these people have a story. Stories of love and life. Stories of war and pain. I never knew how lucky I was before stumbling in here. Just a gypsy girl ringing her bells. And you know what? They accepted me. There’s something to be said about the downtrodden and the rejects. At least they appreciate the worth of a smile.”

She shrugged again, taking a drink from the new tankard set before her, “Also I get a discount because I rent a room in the back.” She said, finishing the sentence with a wink.

[Sabrina]

Oh, won't you go, make the most of a bad existence
cause you're so much older than she ever planned to live with

Ichor leaked in around the corners as though the bar was some old box stuffed away in someone’s cellar. That ever-present layer of sandstone dust which seemed to coat everything in Solterra dulled the colors and gave the bartop, old and oaken and hewn out of what was probably the last fucking tree in the desert, a somewhat uncomfortable fuzzy feeling. Or maybe that was just in Sabrina’s head. This was the most socializing she’d done willingly since Delphine had disappeared.

Dearest said that poor old man she’d developed a habit for bothering had chucked a bottle at her head and she could not stop herself from rolling her eyes. “Sounds like you deserved it,” she said, feeling like the young mare had gotten off rather light. Sabrina had always preferred to hot someone with the bottle-- her throwing aim was more affected by her temper than her smashing aim, and she did like that feeling of making a connection-- a physical one, that reverberates through the muscles and results in split flesh. Nothing emotional.

I don’t think anyone likes being alone. Sabrina mulled this over as her drink was placed in front of her, something simple in a glass compared to whatever concoction Dearest was having out of her large stein; old designs, long chipped and worn away, were etched into the hard ceramic. Sabrina watched with a flat face as she tossed back whatever was in there and belched hard enough to reverberate through the bartop and she had to swallow down foul, sharp bile, not from the act but from the familiarity. For a moment she was in a different bar, brighter but no less skeezy, and Puck and Delph had been slinging watered down soapy beers for two hours, and belching, and taking votes from the gathered clientele about who was more impressive. Sabrina saw fuzzy lines scratched in a white napkin with a golf pencil, dug long-forgotten from somebody’s pocket.

Dearest’s voice was far away as she talked about the proprietor of the fine establishment they were drinking in and waxing poetic about people and their fucking stories. And Sabrina felt something cold, cold and hard, well up inside of her, and all of a sudden she hated Dearest and she didn’t fucking care. She didn’t care about some sheltered baby walking into some shithole that attracted a whole bunch of sad people and then, by extension, feeling sad. She didn’t give a fuck about found family and that bullshit about appreciating the worth of a smile because it was all fake, fake, fake, and stupid and dumb and ripped from the seams out of some fairytale, and Sabrina knew fairytales didn’t exist.

“You sound delusional,” she snorted, swallowing her drink. It wasn’t bad. “Everyone’s got shit to deal with and sometimes it’s sad. Just because you didn’t realize that until you got here doesn’t make it groundbreaking.” She pushed her glass away and turned from the bar. “They like you because you pay them money and provide a service that may make them more money. But I guess if that makes you feel fulfilled then you’re luckier than most.”

She dropped a handful of signos on the counter and nodded a brief thanks to what’s his fuck-- Rugwolf, or whatever. Despite the incivility of her abrupt departure, she felt it was necessary; much longer and she would start punching people and breaking things.

Maybe Dearest just reminded her too much of Delphine. Or maybe it was Puck she kept seeing when she started to look too close.

“I’m not out here to make people miserable, so I truly hope you stay happy. And keep singing, and dancing, if that’s what you want to do. But you’ll find-- maybe not today, or tomorrow, or in the next season, but someday-- you’ll find the world isn’t nice, even if you smile about it.”


She tucked her wings in close, turned on her heels, and left.

"SPEECH" ! @Dearest
sorry this was very abrupt but this is where her character was taking me.... she's a HARD BINCH