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 Posted: Tue Jan 08, 2013 2:15 pm
The pale coloured cub didn't often go far from her mother's side, but tonight was a unique case.
Sakura walked through the roguelands slowly, small patterned paws moving along slowly as she looked ahead, eyes seeming unfocused, but she herself wasn't unfocused. An argument could be made that the cub was blind, but it wasn't that, either, and she wasn't fully aware she'd gone so far when she seemed to 'snap' to reality.
Sakura, however, was lost in a vision. And she didn't know what it meant, but the scent of blood, much like a kill from her mother's endeavors, lingered in her nose. Honestly... It was, in a sense, strange, but now she was lost, following ancient scents that were gone.
She knew her family saw things. A pride long ago, a home forgotten. She didn't get such visions as strongly, but, what she did see made her uneasy.
She had others coming, but she couldn't understand what she saw at all. Mouths, words....
Nothing made sense. Now she was lost, and Sakura sat, looking around.
Now what?
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Posted: Tue Jan 08, 2013 7:58 pm
Not one tiny hair of a bit. Mortals were bad enough as it was, but she didn't need a whole pride stomping around in blood magic. There had been an entire coalition at one point in time. Uuni may as well have lived with them, they were always asking for things.
They'd helped her memorize thousands of ways to say the word, 'No.' Funny, no usually worked the best.
And when the small, pale cub tripped an old, ancient blood ritual, Uuni didn't like the tingle that went with it. If she started following old secrets, well, she was going to get into a s**t-ton of trouble. And, if, further still, she brought this knowledge to others, it would mean a bloody mess (quite literally) for Uuni.
So, the goddess did not cover her appearance or her size as she teleported. Fear often helped strengthen the word no. She had not moved far, but the earth still angrily snapped and the sound of thunder rolled through the sky as she appeared.
Uuni narrowed her eyes at the tiny, fluff of a thing mortals called cubs. They still didn't look cute.
"Go away from here," she told it. "There's nothing for you here."
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Posted: Tue Jan 08, 2013 8:05 pm
Sakura never expected to find anyone, honestly. When the thunder came, the tiny, pale cub was startled, falling back, paws all askew as she mewled, startled, before pulling herself to her paws, looking up. It was a goddess. Instinct told her that-- she wasn't sure if it was a normal instinct, or instinct wrought of being a god's child, but it did bring her to attention, and the cub immediately huddled low, both in respect, and fear. Not all gods and goddesses were kind, and she didn't know if this one was. She certainly didn't seem happy. "I..I'm sorry, my lady." Small, blue eyes flicked down, ears pinning low. "I don't mean to trespass... I.. I was following my nose.... A vision.... I don't mean to trespass." Her voice quivered, and Sakura shook slightly. "I'm sorry... I just... I smelled blood...."
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Posted: Tue Jan 08, 2013 8:59 pm
They apologized, these fearful ones, hoping they'd be granted some form of mercy. It was almost far more annoying when they did that.
"You're not trespassing." And, she wasn't. Uuni didn't take ownership of places, or things. She certainly did not want this spot so wrought with old magic that it may as well have been tainted forever.
Only a seer, or another god, would know. The plants didn't care, the normal mortals passed through without a care. And no one had been interested in it until now.
"You're just stupid."
A hissing click of her tongue against the roof of her mouth. "Of course you did," she answered. Perhaps she was too young to understand, but Uuni felt a funny tickle, like there was magic at work, and it wasn't just the fading remnants of her own. And as nothing had died here recently, no wounds had been opened on this ground, it could only be one thing.
"A long time ago, a lot of blood was spilled here."
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Posted: Tue Jan 08, 2013 9:05 pm
Stupid? Sakura flinched, the cub huddling down again, flinching like she'd been struck. At the goddess' next words, though, she looked around, as if trying to look for signs, blinking. "I... Smelled a lot of blood." She spoke quietly, tone a careful, metered respect. She'd seemed to offend once. She didn't want to do so again. "There were others talking to me." She wasn't intending to mention more of her vision, but she was curious, blinking. "Why was there blood?" She knit her brows slightly. "Please... I don't know what my vision meant. Do you think they were related, my lady?" Almost immediately, Sakura flinched again. "I don't mean to seem rude...."
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Posted: Tue Jan 08, 2013 9:14 pm
"If I hear 'my lady' one more time out of your fluffy pink face, I will disappear and leave you to your nameless thoughts." There was a reason she never kept any of her own around. They thought strange words were important, and they were always asking questions.
Still. . .
Uuni's head tilted and she surveyed the small mortal. There had been others talking to her. To her? That was odd indeed. Perhaps she merely thought she was being talked to. After all, they'd already established she was stupid.
"I know they're related." Did she think. Uuni really tried to avoid thinking. That led to feelings, and complications, and already she was putting too much thought into thought itself. "I was here."
The goddess clicked her teeth together and let a small puff of air push through her nostrils.
"What did they tell you, these others?" There was a sort of bored curiosity in her tone, but at least it lacked its previous irritated snap.
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Posted: Tue Jan 08, 2013 9:50 pm
For a moment, Sakura was quiet, formulating her answer, and working out what to say. She finally did, however, speak, trying to recall the vision. "I... didn't like what I heard. It didn't feel right... Demands. Expectations. I was upset." She closed her eyes. "I smelled blood and I recall the wounded. I'm not sure I was hurting them, or helping them... Some faces were unfamiliar, and some I knew. There was a pride... I know that. Sometimes large, sometimes small. The faces I didn't know smelled strongest of blood, and I didn't like their eyes." Sakura looked ready to apologize again, but bit her tongue. "When I recognized the faces, I was taking care to help them." She worried, just a bit. Were her visions blurring? She didn't know-- the lady seemed angry enough, however. "I know I followed the cent. I felt like I was supposed to... I don't know." She shook her head a little. "My siblings see things all the time. Old pride life... Things before our time. I just struggle trying to understand when I see things." Then, she sighed. "It was all old, though. There's nothing I can see from my vision here, anymore." Sakura looked to the goddess, then tilted her head. "That's all I saw. Did I... Do wrong?"
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Posted: Tue Jan 08, 2013 10:08 pm
They were always looking for some sort of justification, these cubs. As if the world had a sense of right or wrong. As if one's thoughts or ideas could be more important than someone else's.
"I don't care," she told the small creature. And, she didn't. Wrong was for her parents to decide, wherever they were. If she had any. Was she a lonely cub who was going to die of starvation? No, she'd said she had siblings.
"Blood magic does both hurt and help," she murmured out loud, as if in her own thoughts about the matter.
Then, she was moving on again. "Are you a special mortal, or do you have a god parent?" Then, she realized the fuzzy pink nuisance wouldn't understand. "A father who is," she let the word trailed off as she thought, "strange like me. Maybe with feathers?"
Uuni cast a brief illusion of wings over herself to make clear what she was describing. If this was a god child, Uuni needed to take great care that no harm came to it. At least, while it was in her sight. Once it was back with its family, she was going to pretend they'd never even had this conversation.
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Posted: Tue Jan 08, 2013 10:13 pm
Blood magic.Sakura's ears pricked attentively now, but she minded to answer first. "Yes. My father is a god." She said softly. "I wandered away following the scent." After a moment, she spoke again, remaining respectfully small. "May I ask what blood magic is?" It sounded... Helpful, if it healed, or hurt! But she didn't say so, not wishing to offend the goddess.
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Posted: Tue Jan 08, 2013 10:40 pm
Dumb cub!
Uuni's eyes rolled back up into her head and she took in a huge breath. Wandered away from a god father, did she? That just would be her luck. Didn't mortals punish their children for running away these days?
Damn.
"You already have," she pointed out, bluntly. Already so young, and this cub had started with manipulative polite-talk.
"What you really want to know is will I tell you what blood magic is." And, it was a fair question. Would she? The immediate answer was no. No, she didn't want anyone else romping around in blood magic. Yet, she needed lions to believe in it in order for her self to live. It kept her safe. And, if explained properly, perhaps this cub would grow to tell others not to use it at every turn.
"It is what it sounds like," she began. "Lions bleed, intentionally, and the power from that bleeding creates change." Uuni paused here, looking at the cub, making sure she was taking in this information. "That change can be good, or bad, depending on how it is used."
After a moment, she cleared her throat. "It is dangerous. Many would say more dangerous than it is helpful." And yet, Uuni would disagree.
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Posted: Tue Jan 08, 2013 10:52 pm
Another apologetic look-- a moment-- and then Uuni spoke. Sakura snapped to attention, very quietly taking in the knowledge. The small female listened quietly, tail swaying slowly as she did, and she seemed curious- moreso as Uuni spoke. This was making sense. "But the good can offset the bad, couldn't it?" She was trying to formulaye questions sounding silly in her mind, but it was... Well, interesting, in a way. "If one bleeds, then it sounds... Dangerous. But you said it could be good... So... Sometimes, the cost outweighs the good?" Her tail flicked slightly again, ears forward. She wanted to know more, she had a million questions, but she simply smiled like an eager student. "Does this mean it can be... A tool? It itself not bad... But those whom use it?" Or abuse it. But it did NOT sound like a toy. That much she gathered at the mention of danger. "A tool for adults?"
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Posted: Tue Jan 08, 2013 11:09 pm
"Maybe."
It was an honest question; one that she would have asked herself as a young, naive creature. Uuni was no young creature, nor was she naive.
"I guess that depends on whose paying it, doesn't it?" It was a rhetorical question designed to get the cub to think. And Uuni did want her to think. If there was any brain under all that fluff, she would need it.
"No." Tool. That was the mistake that many had made before. "It is no more tool than you, or I. It is unpredictable," well, to those who had not seen it work before, "and it has acted differently, for the same situation, on different mortals." The statement was not entirely true. After all, each mortal was different, and blood magic, when it acted, seemed to be heavily twisted towards the thoughts and purpose behind its wielder. Uuni herself did not like using the magic, but she copied and emulated the things she'd seen it do. As a god, perhaps she didn't have to, but it had become a superstitious habit that she was afraid to break.
"It is like a trade," Uuni decided at last. It was, without a doubt, the perfect mortal work to describe blood magic. "If what you give up is good, so shall good happen. If what you give up is . . . not so desirable, then that shall happen to." In truth, there was no 'good' or 'evil', and never would be. However, in the mind of a cub, and in the concept of most mortals, these things existed. Sometimes, a lion did what it thought was "good", and blood magic gave them something "bad". But, the magic itself appeared to have no concept of this. Of course it didn't. How could magic think?
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Posted: Wed Jan 09, 2013 12:27 am
Sakura listened to the answer intently, but took it in. A trade? She seemed to contemplate this a long time, looking up finally. "Does this mean, then, that it would be a trade one learned and not wholly a gift?" She tilted her head. To earn a greater good... One gave one? Hmmmmnnn. It sounded more complex than that. Still, she didn't expect one to instantly be perfect... In fact, it seemed trade set in the cub's mind readily, comfortably nestled in her mind by any other lesson. Still... Payment. "...Have... Others hurt the innocent for personal gain?" Sakura frowned. She... She didn't hope for that. It sounded... Terrible.
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Posted: Wed Jan 09, 2013 12:38 am
"Yes."
It was the only answer that fit. At times, that consequence had grown to hurt them as well. However, what the cub did not understand, and perhaps would never understand, was that there was no innocent.
Innocent was a word used by a mortal to describe the history of a lion they did not know. On rare circumstances, it was used to describe another animal who had not committed a list of atrocious acts.
But in the purest form of the mortal's mind, there was no innocent, and the magic knew what had been done, even if the wielder did not.
"It is time for you to go back, cub." Before your family happens by and decides to murder me, she meant.
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Posted: Wed Jan 09, 2013 8:50 am
Sakura's ears twitched again. It was so much to learn, so.... Different, perhaps. And on a level, she felt terrible knowing the magic abused. Was that this Goddess' domain? Was that why she was angry? Sakura got up slowly, before looking to Uuni with a quiet expression, one that almost screamed she was sorry for upsetting the Goddess, that her domain was.... Misused. "I'd like to learn some day. Not everything." Power corrupted. "But maybe a little? I want to help others... If you would allow it." It was.... Mostly intent. But also a hope. She wanted to learn. She wanted to help. But never everything. She didn't want to tempt fate.
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