[P] oxenfree

[Seraphina]

☼ s e r a p h i n a ☼

and she spoke words that would melt in your hands
and she spoke words of wisdom

Salt and brine bite at the mare’s lips almost as sharply as the cold as she stands on the edge of one of the ancient wooden docks that border the sea, staring out at the tumultuous, depthless grey surface of the Terminus. The waves are up today, splashing cold water across the already-slick wood in a foaming spray, but, in spite of the cold and the poor weather, – Seraphina thinks that she can smell a storm in the distance, if the wisps of dark clouds hovering at the far edges of the waves are any indication, and, for the gods’ sake, that’s the last thing they need – figures swarm around the docks. A group of children, no more than a few months old, play fight near the edge of the pier; a big, sand-colored colt shrieks and flutters his feathered wings in a childish mimicry of a teryr, and a trio of brave guards, led by a small, quick commander lead the fight against him. One of the guards steps too close to the edge and slips, nearly careening over the edge and falling into the waves below, but she steps forward in one smooth stride and closes the space between them, pressing her dark muzzle into his side and pushing him upright. He stares up at her, brilliantly green eyes wide with alarm, and, edging away, mutters his sheepish thanks. His eyes linger on her collar for a fraction of a second.

“Mmm,” comes her noncommittal response. “Just be careful.” The small group nods, as though she is chiding them, and they quickly back away from the edges, towards the sandstone roads that border the maze of piers. A far better place for them to play, she thinks, though she has the feeling that she’d scared them off – although the queen had been in her role for the better part of two years, now, she had the feeling that she’d gotten no better at setting her people at ease. None of them knew her, here, and she could take some comfort in the quiet that her anonymity provided, but, then, all that they knew of her was around her neck. The children might know whispers of what the thin band of silver represented, but they could not know how grateful she was that their stares did not hold the same fear and apprehension that she’d grown so accustomed to in the past – they could not know that, rather than filling her with a certain sternness, that it delighted her in some passive way to see them simply playing along the docks, that they only played at war, rather than fighting it themselves, that they, though poor, perhaps orphaned, wore no collars around their necks. It was surprising, she thought, to see how quickly the past became something inconceivable, at least to the young.

The wind twisted through her long masses of white hair, brushing it into her eyes, and she cursed herself inwardly for leaving it loose that morning. Her eyes linger for a moment longer on the children, and she wonders how they’re handling the cold – if they have been ushered to shelter from it, or, as children thrown out on the street often do, they shy away from authority and stay in the cold. Her gaze catches on a passing sailor, and, with a flick of her snowy tail, she strides towards him. He stands alert at her approach, snorting.

“Do you know those children?” Her tone is cool and eerie – a question in phrasing but not in intonation.

“Only in passing.” His accent, she notes, is foreign; she wonders from where he hails. “The sandy one – his mater used to care for the bunch of them. But now she’s dead. Solis knows what happened.” He eyes her suspiciously. “Why do you ask, lass?”

“It’s cold, to leave them out on the streets,” she says, simply, and brushes on past him without another word. She’ll send someone to fetch them tonight, if they can find them; it’s dangerous for children to be out on their own. (Gods know there are still slavers about, and this snow…) The guards can take them to shelter, though she knows that it’s a flip of the coin if they stay. Children like that don’t trust authority.

Exhaling clouds of glistening white, she continues her patrol down the docks.



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notes | hello friend I am rusty
tags | @Elif

@

[Elif]

elif

It is too cold for horses born to sun and scorching heat, too cold for sleek thin coats like hers.

As strange as the plunging temperature is the echoing hallways of her family home, empty save for the once-servants who still live there. Since her parents left (after the latest Davke attack, after her brother’s death) she has barely darkened the door, but now she glides past each archway, glancing into room after room of lesser treasures.

She has written to her parents only once since their move to the Summer Court. She told them of the gods’ coming, of the blizzard, of the Summit and all the strange whispers that followed it. When her father’s reply came, it took her only a heartbeat to scan his thick penmanship: Do not shame our name before Solis.

Elif stops outside a small room that has only been used, as long as she has known it, as a storage closet. It is piled high with decorate scarves and thick woolen rugs, lavishly made but seldom used, musty with the smell of cedar and sandalwood.

She thinks of the cold and snow outside; she thinks of the things within, numerous and useless to her. Elif isn’t sure if her parents will ever return, though she does have an idea of what they will do if they come back and find all their belongings given away. Grinning (guilt a shadow over her, but a thin one, the kind that makes her heartbeat feel like a dare) she steps within.


The basket of blankets is lighter at her side hours later as she makes her way down to the docks. Despite the scarf she wears around her own neck (well below the woolen alaja) she shivers from the wind that comes slicing off the water.

A dun colt the color of the Mors at noon eyes her curiously as he passes with his small cadre, and Elif raises a brow at him in return, her lips already pulling in a grin. It was not so long ago that she was the age to play along the docks, though her noble name kept her from groups like this, save for when she’d slip away from her home like a wolf pup from its den. All things young enough to be half-feral were alike in this way.

She asks them, too, if they would like any of the blankets she carries, but they only laugh and part around her like water. They are too young and hot-blooded to be cold, and she is still smiling as she continues on, though the wind lashes her cheeks and throws salt in her teeth.

It is a woman the same color as the gunmetal sky and silver sea that she comes upon next. Her hair is down and wild as the white-caps, and it and her clouding breaths disguise the band of silver around her throat. With all the commotion of the docks and fish-sellers and merchants, Elif thinks nothing out of the ordinary as she approaches the mare, fluffing her feathers against the cold.

“Blanket?” she asks brightly, and her grin is girlish and crooked in the heartbeat it takes her to recognize that it is her sovereign standing before her. When she does her green eyes widen, summer sun on new grass.

“Oh, your highness, I-” inelegantly she extends a leg and dips her chin in something that might be a curtsy if it weren’t so hurried. Then, lifting her eyes once more to that keen, dual-colored gaze, she says, “Well, I suppose the offer still stands.” To cover her sheepishness she tilts the basket toward Seraphina, rolls of silk and wool in deepest blue and warmest yellow, a dream of summer.  





@Seraphina  clearly Elif was not to be outdone in wordcount
<3 good to write with you again

“Do not be afraid to bare your teeth -”