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 Posted: Thu Jan 03, 2013 5:01 am
 The snow had fallen thick and fast overnight, blanketing the forest in white. Everything looked the same coated in snow; branches bent under the weight of white powder and icicles and drifts piled high along the banks of the streams running through. In slower-moving sections, the surface had frozen over in a thin sheet of ice, though the sound of water trickling underneath could still be heard. Little fish still flitted through the water, up and down the current as if the world above was none of their concern.
In the morning, Dardanos woke with the sun. He treaded his way through the knee-high snow to break the ice on the stream and drink from the icy water running underneath. The day promised to be a cold one, as had the day before and no doubt the days to come, but Dardanos never much felt the cold. Frost had formed to tip his fur overnight, but he shook them off before they could melt, for melt they would and soon enough after he awoke.
The guardians and grimalkins he called family still seemed asleep for the most part. Little Brother muttered noisily in his fitful rest as always and Idriss slept curled next to her brother with a sweet smile on her face that evoked a child's simply joy. Feather was nowhere to be found, but that too was entirely normal. He stood a moment to survey the odd souls that surrounded him and felt, as on many days, wonder that they had all come together in such motley fashion and gratitude that they had and desire to see them all remain as safe and untroubled as they looked now. That had become his responsibility and one that he wore with ease. He had been born into this.
Leaving his herd to their sleep, he crossed the stream in several splashing steps, emerging on the opposite bank where trees still stood thick with leaves and heavy bark. Their shadows bid him come closer, to venture in and explore their depths. So he followed.
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Posted: Thu Jan 03, 2013 6:46 am
 A rook flew through the forest, calling out, "Wake up! Wake up! Get out of that cave and wake up!"
The buck sleeping in the cave groaned. "Be quiet, I need my sleep."
"What if someone comes? What then?"
Kalani sighed and got to his hooves, stalking out of the cave he'd slept in. He raised his head up and the rook flew down and landed on his antlers. The buck stumbled slightly, still drowsy with sleep. "I think you put on a few pounds Arson." he said. The rook laughed and flew off inside the cave.
The two of them would take turns watching for intruders and going about their daily lives. Kalani never asked about what Arson did on his hunts and the rook never asked about Kalani's 'boring' days. However boring Arson thought Kalani's days were, they weren't usually that boring, usually included him scaring off those that got too close to the cave, unintentionally. Having wolf eyes seemed to scare off most guardians that wandered by. Kalani had never talked to anyone but Arson because no one else stayed to chat. Of course it didn't help that Arson looked a bit frightening of his own accord.
The two of them lived in a very dark part of the wood, and Kalani's eyes had adjusted to the darkness from years of living there. Sleeping alone in a cave, with only a rook for company. He could be called strange, definitely. He never had the chance to make more friends, but he didn't mind. Kalani liked his small meager life. He had yet to experience better.
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Posted: Thu Jan 03, 2013 8:12 am
Leaves rustled around him, the sound of a bird winging through the trees perhaps, but Dardanos did not lift his head to follow the sound. His was the demeanor of one who feels confident and complete at ease with his surroundings, as if he could handle any way the forest thought to challenge and understood that fact beyond the shadow of a doubt. He was not afraid of the forest; he was one with it, a king among kings as he strode the forest's shadows.
The landscape changed under the snow, but it all still looked familiar to him. He knew every turn, every tree, every corner in this part of the woods where his family had made its home. Perhaps one day, they would move and find themselves a new location; when that day came, he would learn every path and tree there too. For now, he could rest content that there was not an inch of their home that could surprise him.
The buck came to a stop in a clearing facing a cave, its depths dark and unknowable against the thin fingers of light filtering through the forest's thick canopy. His eyes glowed the pale yellow of the heart of a fire as he watched.
Interesting.
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Posted: Thu Jan 03, 2013 8:49 am
Kalani had left the cave alone for a while, foraging for something to eat for his breakfast just out of sight.
The cave itself looked very lived in, and at the back was a spot that had been smoothed out into a sort of nest shape. Within the cave itself was a sleeping rook. The rook was sleeping on a rock shelf right near the entrance to the cave.
The brushes rustled near the cave. Kalani looked out before stepping into the clearing before the cave. The sunlight caught his fur in a way that practically made him glow.
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Posted: Thu Jan 03, 2013 9:29 am
There didn't seem to be anyone in the clearing, but Dardanos was a good distance from the cave. The dark beckoned as it always did, as if it was asking to be lit up from within by a living soul. The buck moved closer, stopping when he stood in the center of the clearing. That was as far as he would go; much as he would like to explore the cave, there were some instances when following such urges could prove foolhardy. And Dardanos was anything but a fool.
From several lengths away, he could see into the mouth of the cave, were the rook dozed on a ledge. He couldn't help but to think what endless enjoyment having a bird around would provide for Little Brother. No doubt the grimalkin would spend hours upon hours antagonizing the poor thing, despite strict orders not to touch a feather on its head. Authority had never seemed to sit well with Little Brother; he submitted to Don's command, but rarely did he do so completely. There were always ways to bend the rules, to find some wiggle room, and Little Brother was certainly talented at that.
The rustle in the bushes made him turn his head, almost languidly, toward the sound. His pale eyes fixed upon the golden buck, studying him without emotion, waiting and gauging the other buck's movements.
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Posted: Thu Jan 03, 2013 9:50 am
He turned his head toward the other buck slowly. Kalani said nothing at first, just twitched his ears.
"Arson, wake up we have a visitor," he said gently. The rook flew over and settled down on his antlers.He then walked to the entrance of the cave and turned to face the other. "I haven't seen you around before. What side of the wood do you come from?"
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Posted: Fri Jan 04, 2013 9:34 am
"The other side," he answered simply, unwilling to divulge too much of his herd's location. Dardanos had a certain innate faith in those who drew to him of their own accord, but those he found did not seem to warrant the same about of trust. In the absence of a fear of the physical there came a fear of the psychological, of the potential for betrayal. It was impossible to tell with strangers, after all.
The buck fixed his gaze on the rook and committed its name to memory. Arson. Some part of him knew that it was unfair to judge a creature by his name, but that same part of him knew that Arson was not exactly a name in inspire faith.
"I won't ask where you are from," he added, not hostile but not completely inviting either. It would take more time and interaction for Dardanos to gauge this other buck and his rook.
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Posted: Fri Jan 04, 2013 6:03 pm
He paced in front of the cave, keeping an eye on the other buck. Arson startled Kalani with a loud crow. "Stop pacing! I can't get a good look at him like that!" Kalani shook his head and caused the rook to lift off his antlers and then re-roost onto them. "The other side is quite a walk from here. You came alone. Do you really feel that's a safe thing to do?" he asked the other buck.
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Posted: Sat Jan 05, 2013 3:13 am
"I have not a fiery rook to keep my company, true," Dardanos answered with a dry smile that turned into mild amusement at Arson's caw. A fiery bird for a fiery name; that much, at least, the buck could appreciate. And it was a fine thing to have a friend that would not hesitate to cry out to keep you in line. Dardanos did not have that and had never had anything like it; he had spent his life in control and few had the will to defy him, though Dardanos himself had never quite figured out why. But he did have his family.
"But the forest does not scare me." He cast his gaze around the clearing, peering into the trees and past Kalani and into his cave. It was all shadows, and all shadows and dark needed was light. Evil lurked in the day as well, but it was easier to vanquish without the cover of night.
"It is only trees and shade; and beasts are not immortal."
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Posted: Fri Jan 18, 2013 3:45 pm
Kalani's ear twitched while he thought that all over. "You're really a strange buck," Arson noted, bobbing his head. "Now say that again in a way that makes sense." He looked back into his cave. "I suppose that may be true, but we are not immortal either," he said as he began walking up to the other buck. "Arson, don't be so rude to our visitor."
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Posted: Fri Jan 18, 2013 6:30 pm
"Refreshing, I would call it," Dardanos said of the rook. "Which is hardly a bad thing." Attitude had its uses, and better a bird that could defend itself with its tongue than the opposite. They all had their own gifts, after all, and Arson would be who he wanted to be.
"What I meant," he added in response to both buck and rook. "Is that the forest was here long before our births and will no doubt remain long after our deaths. We are all doomed to meet our ends one day. It is not the manner of our death that defines who we are, but what we do before it in light of its inevitable arrival, and how we confront it when it comes.
"That is what makes us who we are: attitude. Much like yours, Arson," he finished with a smile as Kalani approached. He regarded the buck with what might have been interest, though emotions never seemed as simply as that with Dardanos. Everything, after all, was interesting.
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Posted: Sun Jan 27, 2013 6:35 am
"You really are strange if you think a rook is refreshing," Arson hopped along Kalani's antlers. Kalani chuckled and shook his head slowly. "In any case, I don't believe you have said your name, stranger." "Neither have you," Arson cawed down at the buck. "Both of you introduce yourselves and maybe I can get back to sleep, how about that?"
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Posted: Mon Jan 28, 2013 2:03 pm
"Ah, but it is not the rook I find interesting, but who the rook is." There was a subtle difference there, but Dardanos was interested more in Arson himself than the fact that Arson was a rook. It was always the identity that mattered, the who rather than the what. The buck put little stock in outward appearances.
"My name is Dardanos," he added, at Arson's suggestion. "Well met."
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Posted: Mon Jan 28, 2013 2:10 pm
"I am Kalani," the other buck said, doing his best not to move his head too much. Arson yawned. "Good, now, maybe we can sleep. Hey Dar-whatever your name is I'm shortening it-, you gunna come in? We've got the room, unless you can't handle sleeping on cave floor."
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Posted: Sat Aug 17, 2013 9:21 pm
Riffler Oh, dear, I'm so sorry I never noticed this tag! D: I was just looking through Dardanos' unfinished RPs when I saw this. Hope you don't mind my ending it now!
The others were used to his disappearances, but it would not do to stay away for long. Even those rascals would start to worry after a while. "I do hope you enjoy your sleep, and may we meet again somehow in this vast forest."
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