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 Posted: Mon Nov 10, 2008 7:49 am
The morning was slightly overcast, and the sun seemed reluctant to even attempt the climb up into the sky in an attempt at warming the cold bite of the autumn wind.
Tasnim stood still, half-sheltered between two large trees, content to listen to the occasional whistle of the wind with his wings tucked in close to his sides, half-hidden by thick branches and his own lush, green foliage, so at odds with the reds and golds that surrounded him. Much as he still was at a point where he cherished the newness of each day, he was of the mind that the day would start once the sun was fully risen, and made the chill a little less noticeable, particularly since he'd yet to finish growing in a thick winter coat to help protect from the cold of the oncoming winter.
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Posted: Mon Nov 10, 2008 8:09 am
It was autumn and as an autumn baby this particular mare was more than content with the current state of affairs. Her thick winter coat had already grown in and though it made her look a tad fat and fluffy she was comfortable. It came with living in the mountains, everyone appeared to be a tad puffed up due to their thick coats but there were no complaints - it was comfortable and she had more than a few friends who were happy to cuddly against her. She radiated heat (or so she was told) which was just as well for a few of her companions who had forgotten that technically speaking...they should have been hibernating.
Nevertheless, as fate would have it the mare had found herself exploring again. Having inherited the wanderlust of her father, she had left home before the sun had even reared it's head above the peaks. There had been absolutely no indication that it wanted to either, apparently the sun enjoyed hibernating as much as the bears, but slowly but surely the horizon was turning a faint shade of pink. She knew what this meant, there was going to be rain... Aha! A small smile lined her lips as she dropped into the grasses with a muffled thump and she quickly furled her wings snuggly against her sides. Well if there was to be rain she would simply have to remain in the shelter of the forest.
...That wasn't a problem!
Her wistful smile remained on her lips as she drifted inwards and glanced around briefly. The forests here were quite unlike the pine forests of home, these trees shivered and turned different colours in winter while her pine trees remained snug and unchanging. It was no wonder her father had found these places so fascinating! Alas, adventurous as she may have been she was still rather hungry and as if to remind her of the time of day her stomach gave a grumble. This in mind she began to traditional breakfast hunt, taking note of various plants and animal life about her. As was to be expected there was little in the way of animal life, but there was some interesting plant life...
Unaware that one of the particular 'plants' she was looking at was in fact a soquili, she swept passed him briefly before the red upon him caught her gaze. They looked a lot like apples, and everybody knew how much this little mare liked apples!
"Oh oh oh!" she chimed merrily as she swept back to the unsuspecting stallion, lowering her nose to prod idly at the 'apple'. "So lucky, didn't even know you were in season - no no!" she chattered to the so-called fruit.
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Posted: Mon Nov 10, 2008 8:50 pm
Furrowing his brow, Tasnim opened his eyes slowly, not quite sure what to make of the tugging sensation somewhere off to his side. Craning his neck, he turned to face the young mare, amusement lurking in his gaze.
She matched the season, with her thick, reddish coat, he couldn't help but notice. Waiting a moment longer, admittedly curious as to how she'd managed to overlook the fact that the fruit she sought was attached to a soquili, he finally chuckled, breaking the silence.
His eyes glinted, something a little darker than one might expect, given his almost lazy expression, lurking in their depths. "They shine quite temptingly, don't they?" he offered, watching her reaction carefully.
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Posted: Tue Nov 11, 2008 6:57 am
The first sign that something was wrong, was the fact that her food moved. It wasn't a really big movement but it was enough of a twitch to make her narrow her eyes. She was fairly certain trees couldn't move, in fact she was positive that they couldn't! However the greatest shock she received was when the apples talked to her - she had yet to look up to meet the gaze of the stallion and so the naive mare had yet to put two and two together. Instead, she gave off an undignified cry of astonishment and set off a series of events that merely highlighted that sneaking up on a creature (or surprising them) didn't have it's advantages sometimes.
No sooner had she gave her little cry than she had fallen backwards, her hind legs tripping over the fallen, yet thick branches behind her. Unaware of the majority of her surroundings she stumbled like a newborn foal and then literally tumbled backwards. She wasn't sure why, but for some reason there always seemed to be a bush to cushion her fall and it was with a muffled thump that she landed rump first in the bush - her eyes still wide in surprise.
It was only when she had recovered from the initial shock of landing on her backside that she turned hr attention to the 'apples' again. Still sat now comfortably on her rump within the bushes, she finally noticed that this tree wasn't actually a tree. It was part soquili part tree! Was that even possible?
"You're a soquili!" she gasped in surprise and blinked her eyes, "How can you be a soquili and a tree all at the same time?" she demanded curiously, completely disregarding his own question in the process.
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Posted: Wed Nov 19, 2008 10:24 pm
Tasnim watched her reaction closely, and when the young mare went tumbling backward, legs flailing, he couldn't hold his mirth in any longer. Chuckling, he shook his head, the action making the vines that hung across his neck sway.
Not at all offended by her forthright questions, he inclined his head, taking a moment before he responded. "I am indeed," he observed a moment later, amusement still apparent in the gleam in his eyes. "And I'm not really a tree. Most of what you see grew over time, while I slumbered, and seems to have taken on a life force of its own." Shrugging, he left it at that--he saw no need to go into the history of the fruit, or its relation to sin, and the original fall from grace.
Stretching his legs, he moved languorously, not the sort to rush at much of anything--not even when it came to awakening from a chill night's sleep.
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Posted: Sat Dec 06, 2008 2:20 pm
So he was telling her that he'd been standing in that spot long enough for all those plants to grow? Her mind attempted to register this, struggling to fathom how anyone could remain completely still for that long. More to the point, the fluffy mare could barely comprehend how anyone or anything could possibly sleep for that long! Completely unaware of any hidden meaning the fruit might have had, or his otherwise 'dark' offer from before she was stuck on the rather unimportant facts that she found somewhat illogical. As young as she was, she had yet to fully come to terms with the fact that there was a lot of magic in the world and not everything was meant to be fully understood.
"You must have been stood there for a really long time," she mused softly, regaining her composure and creeping towards him again to inspect the vines and numerous other plantlife that had grown across his body. The closer she inspected the more apparent it became that he was indeed a Soquili, the contours of his body were much like her own even if his appearance and colour fit a tree. "But why would anyone sleep for that long...?" she continued, a rhetorical question if anything else before she perked her ears and stretched out her nose to prod at his own.
"Ooooh, did you have a cold?" It was as though all her questions had been answered, given the petite mare distinctly recalled soquili and humans alike sleeping a lot when they got ill. "There's a really good herb for the sniffles, not sure if it grows on you but if you ate that maybe you wouldn't fall asleep for so long?"
How naive.
"I mean the foliage is interesting and everything but you need to be careful," she gasped.
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Posted: Fri Dec 12, 2008 8:11 pm
Chuckling, he inclined his head, his eyes sparking with his continued amusement. "A long time indeed," he agreed, completely at ease under her continued scrutiny. Blinking slowly, he waited, patient as he was with everything.
The path her mind took...was innocently clever. It was refreshingly unpredictable. Shaking his head, he refrained from chuckling again.
"I do not have a cold, but I appreciate your concern," he began, flicking his tail lazily. He wasn't even really sure why he had slept for so long. The garden that had been his longtime home had fallen into disrepair, although it was a harmonious, free-flowing sort of disrepair that had slowly eaten away at all motivation on his part, until finaly he'd stopped between two trees, unable to even gather the motivation to lift his head, slipping away into darkness for...he knew not how long.
"I suppose I simply closed my eyes and let time slip away," he said candidly, a self-mocking smile playing at the corners of his mouth. He did not regret the time he'd lost--the world felt much more alive since he'd awakened--although whether that was because he'd been asleep for so long, or because the world had really changed, remained to be seen.
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Posted: Sat Dec 13, 2008 8:21 am
Puchi simply couldn't envision falling asleep for THAT long, she had entertaining dreams but even they came to a very definite ending. She would find her knight in shining armour in one, then she'd be the hero in another. Each day was entirely new for her and one dream was never the same as another - but they didn't 'flit' through her head like a story book, it was one dream per night and that was how she liked it. Thus it was with a small frown that the mare examined Tasnim more closely and shook her head - so what if he was like her and could only have one dream a night? Did that mean he fell into complete darkness when he was finished with that dream...? It was both scary and troubling (though she didn't know why) for the tiny mare to grasp.
Alas it was with a small whicker that she reared up onto her hind legs and gently bopped him against the nose experimentally. While his dreams sounded lonely he seemed to be happy, he was chuckling and found entertainment in her antics and she'd always been told that this was a good thing. She was doing her job by bringing a smile to his lips, though the smile that did follow when he made reference to falling asleep wasn't quite the same as the others.
"Time's a very precious thing, my Great-granpappy said so..." she murmured quietly. "You shouldn't let anymore slip away, there's so much to see out there and slumbering in a forest must be lonely," she continued. Although after a little more consideration she did raise a brow and shake her head slowly. "Besides if you sleep anymore you'll be tied to the ground like a real tree and then where will you go if you can't even move?" she gasped. Her eyes widened at this thought and then she tilted her head to one side, carefully mulling over how awkward that might be.
"Then again Mama never said I should tell anyone else what to do so how about this - if you fall asleep again for too long and get stuck, then I'll come and dig you out. Sound good?" She enquired with another bright smile.
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Posted: Fri Jan 02, 2009 7:56 am
He watched with interest as a myriad of emotions flickered across the young mare's face, completely taken aback when she bopped him, the playful action making him jerk backwards in surprise, blinking for a moment before laughing, both a response to the action itself and his own awkward surprise.
Smiling gently at her when she continued, concern writ clearly upon her expression, Tasnim nodded. "It sounds like your Great-granpappy is a very smart stallion," he observed. "Although in this case, seeing as I don't remember much aside from falling asleep, it wasn't overly lonely at the time..." Shrugging, he didn't really comprehend loneliness-he'd never really been anything but alone, for as long as he could remember...but it wasn't something that had really left him feeling empty, or unfulfilled--perhaps because he'd seen so much in the way of the darker natures of others, tempted by the shiney fruit that clung to the vines that hung across his back.
"That's good to know," he replied, inclining his head slightly as a measure of respect, and appreciation, for her offer. He would assume that if that were a real risk he faced, however, that it would have already happened...particularly given how different the world felt--he had a feeling he'd been slumbering for far longer than even he might begin to guess.
"So what brings you...here?" He asked, after letting a comfortable silence lapse for a minute. He saw no sign of other soquili, and smelled none, either--and she hardly seemed the type who had spent a great deal of time on her own--there was an ease to her conversation that implied an upbringing with a great deal of contact with others.
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Posted: Fri Jan 02, 2009 9:16 am
Puchi had never been taught that those who didn't dream were merely deep sleepers, as a dreamer herself she had always assumed that those who didn't dream were lonely. Plagued by the dark, they couldn't act out their desires and watch all their efforts culminate into one happy ending. It was an empty existence and one that actually scared the young mare as she thought about it. It was evident that soon after she had pondered such issues, she quickly dropped them in favour of accepting his assurances that he hadn't been quite so lonely as she'd anticipated...
Nevertheless when he mentioned the intelligence of her grandfather she couldn't help but beam with pride. She was generally a modest creature, inclined to take pride in her family as opposed to her own achievements. Thus, the mention of her grandfather possessing such intelligence didn't so much as cause a blush, as a nod of agreement. While Tasnim had never met her grandfather he was a smart living-tree-pony! Ruffling her wings against her sides, her expression remained gratuitous and her smile deepened considerably.
She'd been blessed with quite a lot in her life and she wasn't even aware of it. Unlike Tasnim she had never experienced the true 'darkness' of another's heart and had never witnessed it's consequences. She had lived a life of peace and had been granted the opportunity to explore and develop her own rather naive and innocent view upon the world. She had never met a darker creature and as such, remained firm in the belief that deep down they were all pleasant and merely misunderstood - perhaps that was why she was so comfortable even around strangers?
That being said she had been raised in a rather extensive family and very few of those individuals were shy. Social interaction wasn't something she had been starved of and as such, excelled at it...even if her approach to things was a bit off.
"S'promise," she offered after the small silence between them. "If your wings get stuck in the ground or anything I'll come dig you out then, so you can walk about properly," she lowered her head and once again closed the gap between the two to nudge at his wings. They seemed a little battered in comparison to her own, but she was more concerned with the fact that the vines upon them were so closed to the ground. Pulling away again, she flashed another of her warm smiles and tossed her hair out of her eyes.
"Here?" She pondered his question and then simply rolled her shoulders, "I just felt like it? It's a pretty place so why not explore it - you know?" she offered gently, indicating that she was inclined to be spontaneous... and really, outside her family she didn't have many friends, so visiting them wasn't an option!
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Posted: Wed Jan 07, 2009 9:50 am
He couldn't help but wonder, seeing her atypical responses, so open and, just how she'd handle one of the cursed fruits that hung from the vines on his back. Call it morbid curiosity, but he was half-tempted to offer one outright just to see what would happen...particularly since she'd initially shown such an interest in them.
Lifting his wings voluntarily at her prompting, he tucked them more neatly against his sides when she shook her mane out of her eyes. "That's infinitely preferable to my having to uproot on my own," he observed, allowing a teasing note to enter his voice.
Raising his eyebrow at the simple, almost flippant response, he took a moment before speaking again. "Do you wander often, then?"
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Posted: Thu Jan 08, 2009 8:05 am
"Oh, I know..." Puchi agreed and shook her head. Her expression became almost grim, her tone serious as though she hadn't really picked up on his teasing. Or perhaps she had and was simply playing along? It was difficult to tell with someone like her but it would probably have been safer to assume that she had taken him seriously. Teasing tone or not, she deemed it a very serious subject and would permit the stallion to get trapped. It was a cruel fate for anyone, it wasn't right for him to get stuck and as such... Well, needless to say she would be keeping an eye on him. "If you struggled too much you could get hurt and that's a bad thing if you can't find a unicorn around!" She pointed out wisely. Admittedly it hadn't crossed her mind that his wings were already damaged but then again, this world was filled with so many unique creatures and their wings all varied so how was she supposed to tell damaged from 'normal'?
Thankfully for her, she remained completely oblivious to his unhealthy and arguably twisted musings. She wasn't entirely sure of the exact consequences of eating one of those fruits and it was a good thing she had lost 'interest' in them. You see, things had changed considerably when her fruit tree had turned out to be a living being. Even if he offered one to her now there was a good chance that she would be so fearful of the repercussions that she'd refuse. Oh - she wasn't frightened that the fruit would be bad! On the contrary, she was more frightened about whether or not he'd be hurt if she plucked one off - or worse yet, bit one!
"Mmmm, very bad," she repeated more to herself than anything. However, when he once again brought up her idle wanderings again she gave a giggle and nodded. "Oh I wander here and there, maybe I have been here before..." she drifted off for a few moments, perhaps in an attempt to recall memories. "But if I have I guess I never came near you before - that's okay though...cause there's always new things to see in locations you've already visited. Just gotta take the time to revisit 'em, you know?"
"For all I know I coulda walked passed you while your apples weren't in bloom! Then I would've never even realised you were there," she pointed out, none the wiser.
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Posted: Fri Jan 09, 2009 6:41 am
He debated saying something to the effect that while the sentiment was appreciated, it wasn't something she needed to worry about...and decided against it.
"That would depend on how badly one hurt oneself, but it would certainly be inconvenient," he agreed. "But, I don't think I'll be sleeping for that long again, so hopefully that never becomes an issue." he said, shaking a strand of greenery out of his eyes.
"Things have changed a lot since I last was awake...but yes, it's often upon revisiting things that you notice some of the more interesting parts of it." He could remember spending hours tracing his eyes over familiar trees in the garden, only to notice a bloom in a place where it hadn't been before, or a bird's nest that he'd overlooked.
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Posted: Fri Jan 09, 2009 7:02 am
Aha, some would have said that her response to such thanks would have gone down poorly however, like most of the mares in her family, Puchi had the very honed ability of selective hearing. Oh it was true that the stallions had it as well, but when it came to the females they generally didn't take no for an answer regardless of the thanks they received. Thus it could be safely assumed that whether or not Tasnim appreciated her sentiments and declined her aid - she would be back. In a manner of speaking she had adopted the role of his personal gardener and would prune him if necessary so that he could move around freely.
Granted, now that he had woken up it seemed unlikely he would allow himself to be tied down to he ground again but that didn't mean she couldn't be sure. It was a sad fact for the stallion to accept that somewhere nearby, his own personal gardener would be trailing him to make sure he didn't get stuck. She wasn't a stalker and had no intention of forcing herself upon him, it just seemed that her goodwill often led her to get a little carried away. He was her walking, talking, fruit blooming pet tree and she could safely confirm that she was probably the only one who had one!
With a wiggle of her rump and a ruffle of her wings, she politely listened to his own musings and his attempt to correct her regarding injuries. It was soon apparent that he was one of the practical sort where a sprained ankle could be worked with - it may hurt a little but crying was for babies and limping was a sign of weakness. Tisk, she could do nothing more than shake her head and release a sigh at this idea. She didn't agree with it at all and if she had her way even the pride-stricken would remain completely healthy.
"Silly stallion," she tutted again and shook her head. Good humoured as always, her expression wasn't one of jeering or judging...it was simply bemused by his opinions. "Inconvenient or not, no one should be hurt if it can be avoided," she corrected patiently and then gave a nod. After this she seemed reasonably satisfied that he wouldn't be sleeping for long periods of time again. It did beg the question though - would she be covered in shrubs if she fell asleep for a while too?
"Exactly," she continued at last, smiling as he agreed with at least one of her points. "For example, you're certainly an interesting part of the forest - to think there are actually talking trees!" She giggled and unfurled her wings, extending one out to brush one of the fines out of his eyes properly - with careful administration she was even able to make it drape behind his ear. "I thought you were a tree to begin with anyway, then I wondered if you were a forest nymph..."
"But I realised you don't giggle like a forest nymph unless you're a cranky forest nymph," she mused innocently before shaking her head. Her wing moved away from his face and propped against her own cheek as though it were a finger. "I don't know what you are really..." she confessed. "But it doesn't really matter, I can just tell everyone I met a talking and walking tree, nyah?" she teased gently.
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Posted: Mon Jan 12, 2009 8:11 am
Vaguely amusing, it was a unique experience for him to be fussed over so. Not unpleasant, but certainly out of the ordinary. So long as it wasn't restrictive to his doing what he pleased, when he pleased, he was certainly not going to turn away the attentions of another--he enjoyed being indulged, after all.
Unable to disagree with her next statement, he instead inclined his head in agreement, grinning. "A valid point." He'd suffered minor wounds and injuries over the course of his life, but mercifully had always managed to avoid serious harm--however, that didn't mean that he really enjoyed hurting himself, either.
When she used one of her wings to brush a strand of greenery out of his face, he blinked in surprise, looking at her, speechless, as she continued.
"A forest nymph....?" he actually snorted, chuckling. "I had an important task, a long time ago, and to be able to do it, some of the foliage was necessary. I can only assume that, as I slumbered, it was that much easier for new greenery to take root, and begin to grow itself." He had been (and still was, technically) the tree that bore the forbidden fruit, the temptation that had, eventually, led to the fall from grace. However, with the absence of the surrounding garden, he felt that it was safe to assume that his responsibilities were no longer so rigid.
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