[P] Sky Dancer; Grounded

[Raglan]

Mist clung to the plains as a boy breathed in the scent of his once-home. 

Not so much a boy now, not really; he had grown in the two years he had been gone, filling out a bit along his shoulders and chest. The childlike lankiness that had always marked him separate remained, though, and he supposed that age would never change what had been forged in blood. Legs tucked tight to a mahogany abdomen while wide feathered wings held him aloft, Raglan soared over the swiftly cooling earth. A cloudless sky had greeted him, as if the heavens themselves had bid him look — just look; Denocte still stands, the bonfires still burn, the citizens still dance to the tune of the stars. 

See? Murmured the loving voice of Night Court, of freedom and woodsmoke and dirt-filled beginnings, I have survived, just as I always have. Fire and war are no contest for my people, for your people.

And yet, he flew on. 

Maybe it made him weak, made him a coward — Gods knew that he had been so before, and he would be so again before the darkness took him. Raglan had long ago come to terms with the guilt associated in his flight from Novus, but that did not mean that he could just alight within his people’s capitol. Indeed, the boy’s heart was far too fragile a thing for such a venture. 

And so, he flew on. 

A setting sun limned the stallion’s deep red wings in flame, ushering his brilliant silhouette toward the Sideralis where he sought to land. As pale hoof pressed to soft, grass blanketed earth, Raglan felt an exhalation that reached down into his very bones. Nearly half of his life had been spent away from his home; this brilliant, wild motherland whose streets had sung him to sleep between cobbles and castles. His returning was silent and careful and calm, not at all what he had imagined, but just what he had prayed for. 

Would that he could shake the sensation of being a stranger. 

 

@Bexley ;_; 

[Bexley]

BEXLEY BRIAR

my carnivore heart comes out after dark -

---

It is like any other night on the prairie—quiet and still, no noise but the wind and Bexley’s breathing as it stirs the long, purple-tinged grasses. She lays with her head tilted up, eyes toward the soft darkness of the sky, and names the stars: Perseus, Hercules, Cassiopeia, pinpricks of light strung together with thin streams of bright silver.

This has become a new tradition—a ritual, nearly. Denocte proper is far too wild for her. People enjoy themselves far too much. In Solterra, at least, there was the impression of worthiness, in that their sun-stung inhabitants thought their wildness was the natural  fault of living in a place made for savagery. The sun, the sand, it drew something out of that. But here it is all gluttony, and no suffering to balance it out; Bexley finds herself disgusted by the amount of smiling, the sound of laughter, the hedonism that runs rampant in every street.

And this is where she realizes she has become old. Since when is she one to turn away from pleasure? Since when does she refuse the pursuit of happiness?

She is old, old, old, and lonely, and the world has changed; Bexley is more than a girl now. She is quite tired. And quite grumpy.

Something flits overhead, a black cloud blocking out a swatch of bright, pale stars. Bex blinks. It is a wide swoop of wings, a pattern of smooth-edged feathers on a body which comes down in circles, in tightening spirals, until a long, dark leg comes to rest on the dirt—then another, a third and a fourth, and a tall, neat silhouette is walking toward her, shifting the grasses. She watches and watches, eyes narrowing in unbridled suspicion. Still the shadow approaches; finally Bexley climbs to her feet to scrutinize the stranger.

It’s—

“Raglan?” Bexley’s voice is sharp with incredulity—she stares at him in such strong surprise she can hardly blink, can hardly move, stricken into place like a statue poured from the feet up.

How long has it been? And if Raglan is here—

What else might show up?

---

@Raglan <3  

[Raglan]

The twilight world was soaked in lavender as the sun dipped below the horizon.

Raglan could feel in the distance how the Night Court was stirring, coming alive in the arms of evening as only Denocte’s children could. It called to his blood, pulling at the wild heart pulsing within his breast and quickening his breath. He had been born and forged there, amid the grit and cobbles and exquisite chaos. Raglan’s blood still stained the stones of the Downsides - a result of brawls and stumbles, a childhood that had always been both too old and too swift for it to really be called such.

The grasses were cool where they brushed against mahogany skin, a few of the more precocious stalks tickling at his upper legs as he moved. Raglan had no direction, and so wandered slowly about the prairie with something akin to a quiet mind for the first time in months. The stallion reveled in the sensations outside of him, no longer trapped in some self-made hell of regrets and worries and constant mental strife.

There was a breeze, crisp but not chilled, toying with the layers of mane hanging over the Crow’s shoulders. It carried scents from the city beyond and from the forests and streams just out of reach - this world he had abandoned seemed to pay no mind to his absence. Raglan couldn’t decide if that should be a source of sorrow or relief. Pulled from his reverie, the blood colored stallion started at the sound of his name being called with the voice of a ghost. Blinking rapidly, he cast his opalescent gaze about and saw that the ghost was... most definitely not a ghost.

It took the young stag a moment to find his voice, the shock laying so heavily across his tongue that, for a moment, he wasn't quite sure he had ever possessed the ability to speak.

In the few beats of silence where Raglan searched for his voice, the Crow found himself moving toward the golden figure, expression stricken. “Bexley Briar? Bexley?” Heart squeezing almost painfully, the crimson stallion found himself before her, pupilless eyes devouring her face, her hair, her skin, her absolute and undeniable there-ness. His mouth flapped wordlessly for some time, face reminiscent of some great gaping fish before he was able to speak again, though his words sounded to him as if he were speaking from some great distance, “Who hurt you?”

It was only after the question was posed that Raglan realized that he was furious, that the scar lacing the mare’s face was not something that could be earned by anything other than violence. His words had lashed out of him, a series of sharp, angry things that felt almost foreign. The idea of someone laying the golden spitfire low both scared and infuriated the boy - for that was very much what he felt in that moment, a lonely and frightened boy - to no end.

He blinked hard, breathed slow, and tried again, “It has been a... very long time. And I’m sorry that my irresistible charm seems to be more rusty than I realized.” A halfhearted smirk flitted over blackened lips and a tiny bit of shimmer returned to those opal eyes, “Either that or your presence is so breathtaking that I couldn’t bear the shock — how is it any nation is still standing in the face of your wit and beauty, Lady Briar?”

@Bexley Hi its sad flirt time