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 Posted: Sun Jul 29, 2012 10:24 pm
 It had to be a wild goose chase. There was no way his leading lady had willingly gone to the capital of the Isle, but something in Balthier's heart had commanded him to go to the city proper. So far, his deep, reddish brown eyes had taken in the sights of poverty and decay in the Red Circle, the elegant decadence of the Upper Circle. They'd drunk in the sight of the commoners striving to better themselves and move up in rank, or falling into disarray and losing sight of themselves. He'd seen compassion from those who lived in the Red, cruelty in the Blue, and nearly had his lovely gun nicked off of him when he'd dozed off in the Middle Circle, too close to the Red.
Snorting and tossing his head, short, spiky mane flicking. That left only the castle, which was before him now, cast in lovely blues and purples in the moonlight. He sighed lightly, looking about quietly, to see if anybody was watching. The guards were coming and going at regular intervals- this would be easy enough. Waiting for an opening, Balthier grinned lightly as he slowly moved from the Upper Circle's edges, and then into the darkest shadows of the castle. The only thing that would give him away was the subtle glint at his ear and forehooves as he moved into the castle.
Once inside, Balthier quietly peered about, not seeing any sign of Fran... or anybody, really. This place seemed surprisingly empty for a castle. "Fran, are you... here?" he whispered softly, his resonant voice echoing slightly throughout the castle. The leading man sighed slightly, worried that perhaps he'd been heard. He had to leave the main hall quickly, he knew, just in case, and moved as silently as he could, and slipped into another room, peering back into the room quietly, to make sure he wasn't seen.
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Posted: Mon Jul 30, 2012 12:25 am
♕x x x xK i n gxxA z r e t hx x x x♕ ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━  x Azreth wandered the halls of his castle, green eyes downcast as he strode along. Something was pulling him, something came out in the night, a feeling that wrapped itself around his dreams. It jerked on his heartstrings, breaking him from night terrors of his late Bonded's death. His heart hurt, it hurt more than anything he had ever felt before. More than the death of his father, more than Morpheus reneging on their Contract. And yet...this feeling had wound him around it so wholly, so completely, he could do nothing but obey its subtle command.
He had been walking through the miles-long maze of passages -- both the main ones, the one for the use of servants, and even the secret ones that hardly anyone knew of -- and still he had not found what he had been seeking. The King chewed on his lower lip, worrying it between his teeth, lost in thoughts concerning the upcoming war. The shadow of it loomed over his heart, his mind -- every moment he was awake, he was aware of the deaths that would be laid in his lap, the blood that would indirectly be on his hands. It filled him with sorrow, thinking that many good men and Azrein would die because of his Proclamation . . . but he had had no other choice. The Six could not kill so many Azrein, causing their Chosen -- he, included -- to be Shattered. That was a horrid, terrifying experience; one many Chosen didn't make it out alive from. He was strong, though, and knew he had to be strong -- for his people, for the Greater Herd, for the sake of the future for the very Isle.
Giving his head a small shake to break out of his thoughts, the man nearly tripped as the pull on his heart subconsciously yanked him to the right, down a wide hall leading towards the Audience Chamber. A small frown creased the King's brow as he headed towards the grand room, the candles in countless sconces lighting the shadow-edged hallway. He felt his goal -- whatever it was -- looming near, and knowing this castle and its halls like the back of his hand, he closed his eyes, opening the gateway to his Skill and Listened. He heard a faint voice, but none responded. It was coming from just around the corner, right outside of the Audience Chamber. The click-clack of hoof-beats reached his ears, and Azreth abruptly cut off his Skill, hastening towards the sound.
He hadn't changed into his nightclothes even though he had fallen into bed, though he did at least remove his high-heeled boots. His bare feet padded along silently -- years of training with a performing troupe would do that to you -- and he slowed down as he reached the right angle where the hall turned. He reached down to the hilt of his slim, ornate rapier, wrapping slender fingers around it. Taking a deep breath, the King squared his shoulders, allowed himself to shift into a relaxed posture, and stepped around the corner, green eyes widening at what he saw.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ [ [ O O C : ] ]
✖ ❤ ✖
✖xx♔ xx✖
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Posted: Mon Jul 30, 2012 12:56 am
Something filled Balthier first with unease, then pure elation, though he knew not why. He flicked his ears back, and stepped backwards away from the entrance to the room, and then swung his head around quietly, looking first away from the direction his massive heart told him, and then slowly turned towards...
A man. It was only a man, with shoulder-length blond locks, startling green eyes and fair flesh. He was of a moderate build, not too large, but definitely fit, and carried himself with a dignified air, even barefoot and looking slightly disheveled. Balthier moved closer, and shivered as he felt his heart settle properly for the first time since he'd awakened, and he slowly grinned at him. This man, like Balthier, appeared to have been Seeking out something or someone, and the strangest sense of familiarity washed through the stallion.
"Well, well... to whom does the pleasure belong in meeting me?" he murmured, even though his voice threatened to crack, and he felt an odd sense of... rightness. But that couldn't be right. He was in a castle, and not even the treasure room! Furthermore, Fran wasn't beside him, hadn't been since he'd gotten to the isle, and it made him nervous. But, he supposed, he would have to survive without her for the time being, and deal with the tasks at hand.
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Posted: Mon Jul 30, 2012 1:13 am
♕x x x xK i n gxxA z r e t hx x x x♕ ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ x Green eyes were wide, almost mesmerized. Before him stood a chocolate-colored stallion, with brown locks, and eyes of the richest, deepest mahogany he had ever seen. He held the stallion's eyes, his own gaze unwavering, unblinking. He felt something click within him, as if all the planets had aligned in a micro-second. He took a faltering step forward, lean arm extending outwards towards the Azrein, palm out, fingers extended, as if reaching for something neither of them could see, but could most definitely Feel.
He stopped a foot short of reaching the Azrein, his chest rising and falling slowly, his chest expanding and contracting with each heavy breath. His pulse pounded in his ears as his heart sang, bare feet tingling against the rough, cold grain of the stone floor beneath him. "Azreth. My name is Azreth De'servian." Though his voice was quiet, it was confident; a smooth, deep baritone. "And what is the name of the pure creature that calls out to my heart?" Green eyes never left the stallion's gaze as he spoke. He had to look slightly up, as the gun-toting Azrein was a good eighteen hands, if not more. But even though he was tall, he was certainly not big enough to contain the emotion the King felt pouring out of him, powering through the Web in his mind that connected him to every Azrein on the Isle. No, his pinprick of light was now the size of a star in his head, almost blinding him with its radiance. Gods, this stallion was indescribably bright.━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ [ [ O O C : ] ]
✖ ❤ ✖
✖xx♔ xx✖
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Posted: Mon Jul 30, 2012 1:28 am
Something was horribly off. Balthier was certain this was not natural, this inexplicable, inescapable sensation of belonging to and with this creature before him, and it made his heart tremble in his powerful chest as he drew in a shaky breath. If he'd had hands, he would've run them through his mane. Instead, he twitched the muscles in his neck reflexively, and stepped closer to the man as he spoke. Azreth De'servian... it rolled through his mind, like a wave over the sea, and he felt like he was about to drown for a second in emotions, until he reached out, and touched his snout gently against Azreth's slender hand, and breathed warmly over it.
"I am... Ffamran mied Bunansa... but I prefer Balthier... I... find myself at a loss for words... and the leading man should never forget or lack lines..." he murmured, and then lowered his head slightly, to look into Azreth's emerald green orbs, silent for the moment... and then the words came to him. They unfolded in his mind like a script before an actor, and like any good leading man, he read them proudly, "Where your body fails, I shall be your strength. When your judgement is clouded, I shall be your clarity. Whenever you feel broken and lost, and feel as if life holds no meaning, I will show you the wonder and joy it holds, and will heal and guide you back to my embrace. When the weight of the world is on your shoulders, I will carry you. I will love you, no matter your crimes, your decisions, or your fears. I will always accept you, and you shall never be alone again. Your despair will be met with my hope, and the fetters that bind you are no more. Your soul is mine, and my soul is yours, and we will never be apart, even in death. If even a hundred thousand years pass, I will always love you..."
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Posted: Mon Jul 30, 2012 1:31 am
♕x x x xK i n gxxA z r e t hx x x x♕ ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ x Azreth felt a wave of heat course through his body as the stallion touched his palm. His eyes widened, remembering this feeling from once before. No. His thoughts shied away from the Bonding and Falling of his Valdien. He took a shaking breath and opened his mouth to give this stallion a proper speech about entering the castle unattended by his Chosen when a calm settled in the air, and all background noises were muffled, as if the air had hardened and condensed around the pair, blocking out everything else.
And then the Words were spoken. The King's heart raced in his chest, his breaths came out in panting gasps, and tears kissed the corners of his eyes as Balthier said those ageless words -- the very same words, unchanged words that his great-grandcestor had heard so long ago. Azreth, First of his Name, King of the Floating Isle, son of Vandrian De'servian, Namesake of the First Azrein dropped to his knees, arm still extended above him, fingers remaining on Balthier's velvet nose as the stallion finished the Words. The proud, vain, selfless King sat there for a moment, his thoughts a hurricane in his head, wanting nothing more than to refuse this Bond offered to him. He couldn't go through a Severing again, he was still Shattered, his mind, heart and soul broken from the loss of Valdien. He couldn't put another Azrein through the pain off all he would ask them to do. He would have to ask this wonderful, strong stallion to lay his life on the line, to willingly step forward into a world of chaos and blood, with a very good chance that neither of them would make it out alive.
The words were on his lips to refuse this Bonding, to sever it before it could finish forming, but then his shoulders slumped and he took his hand from the stallion's fur, burying his face in his hands. Gods, he hurt, he hurt everywhere. His body was ravaged from barely sleeping this last month, his heart was raw, his very soul was marred by a white-hot gash of suffering and loss. The proud King wept openly in his halls, with the tall stallion standing over him, his equine heart open, the Azrein's soul bared before him through the Bond. He was offering to give up everything he had ever had or ever would have in his life for the King, and he knew it well. He knew the challenges they would have, he knew all the hurt and negativity that came with a Bond. But it was there, plain as day: he also knew the joy and the end to the loneliness that it would bring. He knew well that he would never again have to carry his burdens on his own, that he would have Azreth to share everything in his life with, be it good or bad. And Gods, how the man needed it.
He needed it more than anything -- to have a partner again, to feel his soul completed, to know that someone would love him unconditionally, no matter his faults or his decisions. Choking on his breath, Azreth swallowed hard and straightened, rising gracefully as the Performing Troupe he had traveled with for two years had taught him. He wiped his eyes on the back of his sleeve and staggered forward a step, rising to his tiptoes to wrap his arms around the large stallion's neck, feeling the warmth radiating from him both physically and spiritually. With shaking words, the King answered the Call with all his heart.
"Where your heart wavers, I shall be the ceaseless beat that supports you. When your decisions falter, I shall guide you in the choices you make. I will always be by your side, I will never leave you, even if death takes my mortal body. When we are together, we will be flying without wings, for nothing, no matter how difficult, will ever bring us down. I will loose the fetters from around your heart, and I will take you unto my soul, my very essence, and I will always remain open to you. Never will I lie, never shall I betray you my heart of hearts. I swear to the sun and stars that I shall always accept you, no matter what may transpire in our lives, and I will love you unconditionally, without hesitation or fear. We shall forever be one, until the last breath leaves my delicate frame. I accept your Choice, Balthier, and I am yours, for now and until the end of time."
After the Answering Words were spoken, the King felt his knees buckle beneath him, and he slid down the stallion's chest until he was supporting himself with his arms, cheek resting against Balthier's neck. He felt the Azrein's heart beating, right next to his own, and a peace that Azreth had not known he had been seeking since Valdien had passed on suddenly enveloped him, and with a sob the King felt Balthier's soul merge with his own, banishing the heartache and loneliness within him.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ [ [ O O C : ] ]
✖ ❤ ✖
✖xx♔ xx✖
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Posted: Mon Jul 30, 2012 2:25 am
The only reason Balthier didn't let his knees buckle was because the exhausted King had collapsed before him, Azreth's cheek over his heart, which felt so much... lighter, but heavier at the same time. Joy had flooded it and made him feel completed like nothing else had. His breathing was ragged, like he'd been running for days, and he felt tears flooding his eyes, and then dripping down his equine cheeks.
Alongside the joy had been such pain, it made him blind for a second, before he focused on it, exploring the pain, and then pushing it aside gently, and nuzzling Azreth's neck gently, pressing him closer against his broad chest, his fine silk and leather vest warm against his face. He shuddered again, and then drew back slowly.
"Azreth... Rise, proud king... You shouldn't be at a mere Pirate's hooves..." he murmurs softly, and then moves closer again. "You feel so... lonely... No more, partner mine... Like I said, I'll always be yours..."
The tall stallion moves closer again, and blows warm air into his face, gently, soothingly, and then smiles slowly, lips quirking into a lopsided, wolfish grin. "...I'll admit, I hadn't expected to be cast in such a peculiar role... what is it you expect of me, beyond the script we've already spoken? Do you know what the future holds for us? I've heard... horrible rumors of war... Perhaps I've finally found a use for this gun, after all..."
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Posted: Tue Jul 31, 2012 12:00 am
♕x x x xK i n gxxA z r e t hx x x x♕ ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ x Azreth used the stallion for balance as he rose, wiping the back of his long sleeve over his eyes, scrubbing the residual tears from his face. The King reached up, grabbing either side of Balthier's face for a moment, standing on his toes to rest his forehead against the equine's broad skull for a moment. He let out a gentle sigh and released the stallion, side-stepping so he leaned his back against the Azrein's shoulder.
"Sadly, there will be a need for that gun. War is coming ever closer, and I must admit that I kind of . . . hastened it along when my Val-" He cut off abruptly, swallowing around a lump in his throat. "When my first Bonded was Severed from me by the Six. I'm sure you've heard of them, at any rate. I officially declared war on them, and right now, we're making preparations. Ensuring logistics are in order, supply trains, all sorts of craftsmen and grocers and entertainment for the men while we're on the road."
Azreth sighed and reached up, absently stroking the big stallion's ear between slender fingers. He blinked for a moment, green eyes peering around as if just now realizing they were in the castle. Ah, Zel would have my head if he knew we were chit-chatting in here. Come, let's get you settled into the Grand Stables. I have four personal stalls there with a room attached to each so that myself or another Chosen might sleep with their Bonded if the need arose. I have a personal one, though, with a hidden back door on both suite of rooms and stall, so that myself and the Azrein inhabiting it might slip out unawares if we were needed for clandestine work."
The King smiled and clapped Balthier on his shoulder, pushing off of the stallion and, not even caring he wasn't wearing shoes, fell into step beside the Azrein, guiding him towards the Stables.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ [ [ O O C : ] ]
silly azzy, having his secret hidey-holes. x3
✖xx♔ xx✖
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Posted: Tue Jul 31, 2012 1:12 am
Balthier normally didn't like for people to be so close to his face- if anybody else had done that, he would have stomped his hooves on their unprotected feet. That said, it actually felt nice when Azreth did that, and he felt himself smiling slightly.
The large stallion watched as the king sidestepped around to his shoulders, and then smiled a bit grimly. "I have heard of them... nasty lot... And I am sorry I didn't get to meet my bond-brother... If rumors are to be believed, and I'm certain the ones from my sources can be, he was a stallion worth going to war for...As to the preparations, that is for the crew to worry about, not the actors, is it not?" Balthier suggested, an almost playful glint in those deep red orbs. He flicked his tail when Azreth started stroking his ears, his fingers running over the warm metal of his earrings.
"And who, may I ask... is Zel?" the male asked, head swiveling slightly so he could give his new Chosen a quirked eyebrow and a slight smirk as he listened to him extoll the virtues of the Grand Stables. "I'm quite fond of back doors... Escaping treasure rooms and the like is difficult at the best of times, but it's all the more fun when a dashing pirate such as myself pulls it off and vanishes with his lea-...Oh, hells. I wonder where Fran is... I forgot about her...Ah well. She's a smart lady, the perfect compliment to myself, which is saying something..."
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