|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 Posted: Thu Jun 19, 2008 11:26 am
 It was a dark, moonless night beneath the forest canopy. It would have been pitch black if not for the flickering flames illuminating the Kalona's every step.
Being a Kalona, Somnium of course refused to admit even to himself that he needed that light to keep from stumbling on the exposed roots and random rocks and other things that interrupted the forest floor. Even so, it made him quite happy to live in the desert where there was little to worry about under the shifting sand. And, more importantly, there were no branches in the desert to foul his wings when he wished to fly.
That was what really bothered him about the forest - the fact that not only was he stuck on the ground, but that he couldn't take off quickly in an emergency.
And that might just be necessary tonight, he admitted. Oh sure, it had sounded wonderfully brave and daring back home with his father and brother and grandmother and Thistle. But now that he was here, getting closer and closer to his goal, Somnium wasn't so sure this was a good idea.
After all, he was going to see his mother.
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Thu Jun 19, 2008 11:36 am
 It was utterly dark beneath the treetops - just the way she liked it. Not a sound stirred the air because all those creatures that would make noise were too afraid. No one wanted to be a Skinwalker's next victim.
Wyrsa laughed silently to herself, yellow eyes almost glowing in the darkness. Poor little forest creatures. They didn't realize how doomed they were!
It had been months since she'd last seen another Soquili, months since that disastrous night when Tloc and a group of stallions had come to steal the baskets. Wyrsa snapped at the air with the memory. How humiliating! To think she couldn't even fend off a half-injured Kalona and his cronies! The baskets themselves weren't so much of a loss, though it had meant she'd had to go out hunting instead of devouring the helpless Soquili within-
-a pang, where her heart used to be. No! She hated that feeling. Hated that she would always be weaker than a pure Skinwalker. Hated that she could never be the strongest one she knew.
Wyrsa snarled. Perhaps it was time to go pay a visit to a certain desert teepee. A savage grin followed the thought. Yes. Tonight she would go tease a certain Kalona.
But this time, no baskets!
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Thu Jun 19, 2008 12:04 pm
Somnium was so intent on picking his way through the forest that he almost didn't notice when all of the night noises around him suddenly ceased. That was...not a good sign. Especially when those creatures hadn't reacted to his presence in such a way.
The Kalona remembered back when he was a foal how Thistle had always told stories. The scariest stories, by far, were of the fearsome Skinwalkers who were said to be so inherently evil that they couldn't even feel for their kin the way a Kalona could.
More importantly than that, Somnium remembered when he'd asked about his mother. Tlocatl had refused to say anything on the subject, and Nagual-an had given him one of those sad, sad looks and shaken her head. Only Thistle had been willing to say anything.
It was amazing how much sense everything made with the big secret out in the open. His mother, a Skinwalker! Back in the desert with the open sky above him, it was easy to be proud of having such a fearsome creature for a mother. But here, in this dark and silent forest, Somnium wasn't so sure. Thistle's stories had been fairly easy to laugh off hours ago when he could see the stars, but now the young stallion's bravado was wearing off.
He was very glad of the flames of his hooves. The flickering light comforted him in the darkness, even though he knew it would make it that much harder to find her.
And even as he thought that he wondered just how Thistle had known how to get to her preferred hunting grounds.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Thu Jun 19, 2008 12:48 pm
The Skinwalker paused as an elusively familiar scent made itself known. She couldn't put a name or even a face to it, yet she knew she'd scented this Soquili before. It seemed Tloc was getting a reprieve tonight.
A moment's concentration and Wyrsa collapsed into the body of a black coyote with pre-bloodstained paws and muzzle. In this form she could soundlessly maneuver through the forest and spy on the unwitting trespasser in her domain.
The smell of smoke, coupled with the strange but familiar scent led her until she saw a flickering orange glow. Fire? With a Soquili? The only one she knew of like that was Tlocatl...
Wyrsa reached out with a paw to move aside a leafy branch, allowing her a first glimpse at this stranger. A Kalona, she noted, seeing the proud wings and horns. His orange mane and long, flowing tail made a splash of color against the darkness and the white markings on his back seemed to move in the light cast by his flaming hooves. The rest of his body reflected the firelight at unpredictable intervals, like scales.
The coyote remained still, studying this intruder. He was fully as big as Tlocatl, and his markings were reminscent of that stallion. But his scale-like hide and yellow eyes...Wyrsa recognized those as well. It seemed impossible, but what else could this young idiot be than one of her own offspring?
The boy seemed afraid, and well he should be! She could almost see him trying to bolster his confidence with that inborn pride all Kalona seemed to possess. Wyrsa decided to continue watching, seeing if he really could boost his confidence or if he gave in to nerves. A test of the strength of his will and his courage. The Skinwalker bared her fangs in a nasty grin. Oh...this would be enjoyable.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Thu Jun 19, 2008 2:44 pm
She was here, he was sure of it. Somnium ignored the fairly likely possibility that whatever Skinwalker was nearby was not, in fact, his mother as well as the less likely one that it was somehow himself striking terror into the nocturnal animals around him. No, she had to be here somewhere. Probably watching him from the shadows.
The young Kalona swallowed with difficulty, wishing he could swallow the fear that was threatening his sensibilities. From what Thistle said, he could guess that any Skinwalker would be stronger and faster than he, and his eyes would never fully adjust to the dark due to the flames on his hooves. Flames that would clearly indicate his position. In all ways he was at a disadvantage.
Oh, yes, he was a proud Kalona, very proud of his lineage...but what was pride in a darkness so thick and a quiet so heavy that it threatened to choke him with claustrophobia? His folded wings twitched, longing for the open sky above the desert.
No! To give into fear now was to admit that he was a weakling, the grandson of a miserable regular mare and Somnium was not ready to admit defeat. Had he not come this far, despite his dislike for the forest, despite everything that Thistle had ever told him about Skinwalkers? He would not leave without meeting his mother!
Those thoughts gave him the courage he needed. Somnium stopped picking his way through the forest and planted his feet. "I know you're out there, watching me!" he yelled into the silent night. "Why don't you just come out already?"
Brave and probably foolish words, but the stallion's nerves were on a knife edge now and he wanted to get this confrontation over and done with.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Thu Jun 19, 2008 5:38 pm
Wyrsa could smell her son's fear and it was a delightful bouquet to her nose. She noted his twitching wings, anxious eyes, and panting breath. He was scared and that pleased her. The Skinwalker supposed he was trying to regain some cocky confidence and failing miserably. She chuckled to herself as he shouted into the dark forest.
Delicately, silently, she crept in her coyote form around behind him. Even if he was looking, it would have been difficult for him to distinguish her from the background of the forest with her nightblack fur. Even the bloodstain-like markings on paws and muzzle could be explained away by the light his own flames cast. To the young Kalona, she was invisible.
A moment's thought and the coyote released its hold on the dark Soquili, resting upon her back and head with its paws crossed in front of her chest. Wyrsa stayed silent a few moments more, savoring the quiet calm she was about to shatter and the fear she would incite.
"Of course I'm here," the mare told the boy, amusement with a cold undertone coloring her voice. "The question is, why are you here, Boy?"
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Thu Jun 19, 2008 6:51 pm
When no one responded immediately to his shout, Somnium began to tense up. Every evidence of his ears was that someone - or something - was out there, watching him, though his eyes and nose found nothing. Even so, when the oddly warm and yet bitingly cold female voice spoke out of the darkness, his wings flared halfway open and he almost bit his tongue.
The voice was right behind him and as much as the Kalona wanted to whirl around and face her immediately, he forced himself to be calm, to be patient and above all else, to do nothing that would mark him as prey.
So the young stallion slowly turned around and found himself face to face with the first Skinwalker he'd ever met - his mother. The bizarre yellow eyes, so much like his own, stared out at him from what was, at first glance, a face of darkness. The fur of the coyote skin enveloping her was matte and thus pretty much invisible against the black night, though there were disturbing reddish marks just barely visible on the muzzle. The flames of his hooves reflected off white fangs and glittered on the scaly hide below. Odd, he'd never thought a Soquili could have scales, but they were beautiful in a darksome way.
Irrelevantly, Somnium found himself wondering what she'd look like without the pelt that added a certain bestiality to the overall image. Perhaps pretty - and dark - enough to have snared Tlocatl? Possibly...but why would this Skinwalker hide what she was to impress some male? The young stallion was mentally grasping at straws, trying to understand just what his parents had seen in each other that compelled them to have children.
Finally he gave it up as a lost cause best left for some rainy night and focused on the present. The mare was waiting for his answer. He swallowed nervously and thought hard before committing his words to the air.
"I wanted to meet my mother," he said slowly, carefully. "In person and not through someone else's stories." Thistle had said it was stupid, pointless and suicidal to actively seek out a Skinwalker but Somnium hadn't cared. The need to know had propelled him out here, the need to find out things for himself, unshadowed by someone else's perceptions and opinions on what he should know.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Thu Jun 19, 2008 7:31 pm
The mare considered this carefully. The boy had known where to find her, so someone must have told him something. Probably inane and over the top stories about how fearsome a Skinwalker could be. Well, that didn't mean they were wrong, but for the first time Wyrsa felt a stirring of pride - the closest she could muster to some weak maternal emotion - for this son of hers. He certainly had guts. And apparently some brains. That couldn't be a bad thing.
She circled him slowly, examining the boy from all angles before even beginning to formulate a reply. He was gutsy, but nervous. The area stank of his fear. And yet...he didn't back down, he didn't turn and run. He twitched and glanced upward fairly often, but no more than that. And above all else, he was a handsome boy. Anything he'd gotten from her was certainly a bonus to looks, she decided smugly.
"So," she said at long last, having made her way back in front of the young Kalona, "does Tlocatl know that you've come?" It was a casual question, made more important by the fierce edge to Wyrsa's voice, the bloodthirstiness that marked her regardless of how soft and kind she might appear to be. The question also allowed the stallion to easily say yea or nay to whether or not this particular Skinwalker was his mother. It also allowed Wyrsa to know whether or not the boy was actually her son. And if he wasn't...well, pity his poor mother. Especially if she ever found his mangled corpse.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Fri Jun 20, 2008 3:25 pm
Somnium ducked his head in embarrassment as he answered the direct question. Not answering, or even just delaying, was not an option with this bloodthirsty Skinwalker mare he determined.
"If I'd told him I was coming here, he probably would have thrashed me just to keep me home," the young Kalona admitted. Tlocatl's refusal to have anything to do with Skinwalkers was powerful, and the older stallion was adamant about his sons' adherence to that philosophy. Thus the secrecy of Somnium's trip. What Tloc didn't know he couldn't forbid, and couldn't punish until the younger Kalona had actually earned it.
Still, standing here now fighting fear and panic, Somnium conceeded that his father may have had a point.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Mon Jun 23, 2008 12:44 pm
The Skinwalker chuckled nastily as she heard the response. That certainly did sound like Tlocatl. And there had been no hesitation in the boy's reply either. So...he was her spawn, though he clearly took after his father in most respects. Not that this was a bad thing. After all, even before Wyrsa had been cursed she'd thought highly of the Kalona, and not just because of his race. Given enough time, the Skinwalker reflected with a mental snort, she might have deluded herself into thinking she "loved" Tlocatl.
Thank all the gods of darkness and hate she'd been spared that fate and that her eyes had been opened to see how stupid an emotion like that truly was.
Wyrsa returned her full attention to the young stallion before her. He was still afraid, though congenial enough to show some personality despite that fear. It amused her and was something of a relief in some ways. One did get old of screams and panics when they were all the same. It was the individuals who stayed individuals through their suffering whom she enjoyed tormenting most.
"That does sound like Tlocatl," she replied almost casually before continuing, "a boastful braggart with too much pride." The second part of her statement was a coldly delivered cruel jab. She was getting the feeling that this son of hers looked up to his father...perhaps too much. "I assume he picked out some sort of name for you," she commented sharply, the question and threat clear. Answer it...or pay the price. Nothing ever easy or freely given.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Wed Jul 02, 2008 2:39 pm
Somnium inwardly relaxed a tiny bit. If she was going to be civil enough to ask his name, she probably wasn't going to do anything drastic to him. Still, he didn't take his eyes off her. The Skinwalker's posture suggested that there was nothing unnatural about her - if you could ignore the coyote pelt draped over her - and that she was entirely at ease. Even so, the very air around him was still full of threat. None of it was directed at the Kalona for the moment, but it was palpable.
"My name's Somnium," he answered, pausing to see how his mother reacted. It wasn't a girly name, even if it wasn't a grisly one. It was just that, a name. And he rather liked it anyway. "My brother's name is Ruadh Wolfbane," the stallion added. "He's a Kalona too." He wasn't sure why he'd added that bit, but, well, didn't she have a right to know?
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Wed Jul 02, 2008 2:54 pm
The mare rolled the names in her mind. Ruadh Wolfbane, now there was a name she could respect and enjoy, especially since her other form was not a wolf but a coyote. A darksome mental laugh resounded from her little joke. Perhaps she'd have to make the time to meet her other son.
But...Somnium. It was...neutral. It bore no special meaning for her. It wasn't sharp-edged with hate, though it admittedly wans't so soft. She supposed she'd have to live with it, since the boy was old enough that it would be difficult to...convince...him that what she wanted to call him was better.
Wyrsa pushed her musings aside. Giving the boy a new name would have to wait until she'd seen something more of what he was made of. Bravo was one thing, but it could only last so long before being crushed.
A vicious grin lit the Skinwalker's face as she contemplated that. Oh, if Somnium thought he'd be rid of her once she let him leave tonight, he would be in for a rude surprise!
"So...does that mean Tlocatl feels more for your brother? After all, his name is much more...vicious," Wyrsa taunted. She abandoned her position to resume circling round the stallion, slinking through the flickering light cast by his flaming hooves.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Wed Jul 02, 2008 8:29 pm
He really didn't like it when she circled him like that, Somnium decided. It was as if she was examining him from all sides, searching inexorably for a weakness. And he knew that if she found one, she'd strike quicker than a cobra and he'd have no chance to react.
The Kalona frowned at his mother's words. He was perfectly happy with his name and, after all, his father had named him. Was she trying to provoke him? Well, he had to defend himself!
"If anything," Somnium replied hotly, "he likes me more! I mean, Ruadh barely talks!" The stallion paused, thinking what he was going to say more carefully, just in case the Skinwalker took exception. "Father gave us both good names," he muttered sullenly, aware of how childish he sounded. "And he really does like me more, says I'm just like him."
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Wed Jul 02, 2008 8:50 pm
Wyrsa kept silent as she digested the information and kept circling. It was quite clear that at least one thing Somnium had said was right - he was just like his father. In fact, if he hadn't told her outright that Tlocatl was his sire, she would've been sure of it anyway. From appearance to attitude, the boy was the Kalona's son.
Which would, logically speaking, mean that Ruadh Wolfbane took after her. Well, perhaps not logically. Perhaps that was what logic suggested should have happened. Though she had some respect for the other Kalona at this point, based on his name and his habit of not speaking overly much. He was rather like her in that respect.
The mare nodded to herself. That settled it. She would have to return to the desert and to the weakling's teepee Tloc seemed so attached to. Why he felt the need to linger not only near a hated, untrustworthy human, but also his pathetic mother was something Wyrsa didn't understand. She had a suspicion that Tlocatl might not understand either, so that made it a bit better.
An evil light lit up the Skinwalker's yellow eyes. Oh, the havoc she could wreak on all the pathetic inhabitants of that teepee! Perhaps...on the next moonless night? Yes, that would work. But, first things first. Before she planned her campaign of terror, Wyrsa would have to get rid of her get.
She bared her fangs in a twisted parody of a smile as she returned her full attention to Somnium.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Wed Jul 02, 2008 9:00 pm
Okay, he really didn't like it when she circled him like that. He liked it even less when she smiled at him like that. He didn't want to be reminded of the marks on her pelt that looked suspiciously like bloodstains or of the many terrifying stores Thistle had told.
If he could have retreated anywhere, gotten away from her somehow, Somnium would have. The agony of waiting for her to do something was surely worse than whatever she was going to do, right?
The Kalona began breathing heavily as he began panicking. All he could see was the Skinwalker and the darkness, and all he could smell was the stink of his own fear. And though she was never still, he could always see her, always see the flowing, menacing movements that never let up. His wings twitched with the need to fly out of this place, though the thought of what the innumerable branches hidden in the darkness above to keep his feet firmly planted on the ground.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
