i had somethin' to say - Printable Version +- 'Souls IPB Archive (November 2007–October 2012) (https://soulsrpg.com/ipb) +-- Forum: Dead IC (https://soulsrpg.com/ipb/forumdisplay.php?fid=110) +--- Forum: Dead Topics (https://soulsrpg.com/ipb/forumdisplay.php?fid=21) +--- Thread: i had somethin' to say (/showthread.php?tid=905) |
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- Nocht - 02-01-2008 [html] bgcolor="#170226"> out of character::black engulfs the dying light
sléibhte=mountains
we launch ourselves into the bright::in character
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So she turned around and went back, mumbling to herself darkly for a few moments but this soon gave way to a juxtaposition of cheerful humming. It was almost a relief to be moving away from that solid rock face, for it reminded her of a wall, and that was the last thing Legacy wanted to think of. There were probably myriads of other routes to ascend, but she'd lost interest in climbing now. The view (even here where it was mostly just the mountain itself) was a delight, spreading out like an unrolled map. Seeing a boulder, the were-girl perched herself upon its edge. Looking down and out, into the infinity of air and land she sighed, enraptured.
She scrambled up rock and over loose soil, here, still low down, where the ground wasn't
quite ground, just scree and rock and loose dirt. There was such a slight, but continuous
incline that after no more than fifteen or twenty minutes she found she could turn and see
the ground below spread out below her. Nocht grinned to herself and kept moving up, getting
to where it became more uneven and rockier. Here there were suddenly larger rocks, which
appeared to have come out of nowhere. Small plants and mosses were beginning to grow on
them, taking hold in the nooks and crannies, but if she peered up Nocht could see where
there had obviously been a rockslide recently enough; some of the cliff face had just
crumbled right away. However, it was still quite far away and it posed no danger to her. On
the contrary, she was enjoying scrambling over the rocks and small boulders, finding paths
and jumping from one to the other. She wiped her hand on her thighs, brushing the dirt onto
her grey coat and swiped a hand under her nose. She took a moment out to deal with a
particularly annoying itch in her nostril, avoiding her septum piercing as much as
possible, before setting off again.
By now the incline had become sharper, but Nocht almost didn't notice, concentrating more
on the childish pleasure from jumping from rock to rock than the landscape set out behind
her. It caught her attention when she slipped on a loose pebble and looked backwards in
irritation after she caught herself. She quickly forget her mishap when she noticed the
patchwork map of land beneath her, space she had already crossed. She stood and turned to
behold it in all its glory. It almost didn't look real, more like the maps she had seen in
books than anything else. She took a deep breath and let it out, sighing and feeling a
smile settle over her features. For just a moment Nocht felt at peace, but she quickly
forgot this when she turned to continue ascending the side of the mountain. She idly
wondered how far up she was already and how far she planned on going. Spying a ledge
further up, she decided on pausing there and then re-assessing. Suddenly a russet furred
pup appeared near her ledge, hopping onto a boulder and surveying the land below her.
Without thinking Nocht yelled "Oi!" in a bid to get her fellow climbers attention, smiling
friendly-like and waving slightly.
It was a little puzzling - why had her attention had been sought? But then of course, in the grey wolf's place she would probably have done the same - it seemed only polite to announce your presence. Unless the stranger wanted something particular, or was looking for someone, or something. Pushing back a lock of unruly auburn mane, the child hollered back a "hey!" A faint, polite smile teetered at the edge of her mouth, but her eyes were a little suspicious - a deep, unrelated unease that had her almost wanting to turn and flee, run all the way home once more. Logic held her in place. She would not listen to the initial pang of fear. She'd survived so far, and that was enough, wasn't it? But maybe... better to reassure herself of the amiable conduct of the stranger, before she did anything else - before she let her out of her sight, while they were alone up here.
They were too far apart for any more in-depth conversation than had already been made, so she paused on the boulder edge for a moment, one leg swinging, then pushed off with her hands and dropped to the ground, padding forwards a little, tail held politely low and yet ears pricking forward curiously. Poised slightly above on the slope, Legacy was ready to dart away if any antagonistic movement was shown, but far too inquisitive to just sit and wait to see if the other came over to her or not.
She felt a bit foolish when the red wolf didn't reply quite as enthusiastically as Nocht had greeted her, but pushed down the slow burn of embarrassment, forging onwards head first. She would take out the sheepishness and feelings of foolishness later, when she was alone and it was all quiet and turn it over and over again until it drove her mad and she grew bored and shoved it down again. Instead now she hopped from rock to rock until she was a bit nearer, the pup approaching her as well and then paused, allowing her to set the distance between them, conscious of the slight female's cautiousness. Nocht grinned widely at her and held her hands loose by her side, held her posture in a loose neutral stance. She felt in a silly, friendly mood, adventurous and unwilling to let herself second guess every move she made, as she often did around strangers, tripping over herself and tying herself up in knots and making herself self-conscious and abnormally shy.
Still, she felt her head and ears dip slightly in an expression of sheepishness. A wolf in sheepishness clothing, she thought to herself and then gave a mental sigh of exasperation at her own odd patterns of thought. "Well, how're ya?" She said, the traditional greeting roundabouts where she was from. The words ran together into a mess that one could just about extract the meaning from. She pointed at herself slightly. "I'm Nocht. Uh, pleased to meet you." She took greater pains with her second sentence, in a bid to actually make herself understood. She was a fast talker usually, which wasn't a problem when she was at home, but she had learned around strangers quickly that if she didn't slow her words down as they scrambled over themselves to be heard that they found it difficult to understand her.
"I'm very well. Thank you, and you?" Her words were more elaborate for she had the thoughtful speech of a frequent reader, but they carried the same ease of familiarity. "My name is Legacy... Legacy Kali," maybe the surname would be known in some form or other to Nocht, she thought, watching her carefully. "Big mountain, huh? Do you live around here?" She smelled sort of similar to someone else Legacy had met. Now who was that? Must be one of the packs over the river; Nocht was no coyote.
Nocht is totally based on me, so looks like we're rather similar.
-grin-
Really sorry for the wait, life has been insanely busy lately.
She was pleased to see the pup approach further, putting her at ease with her relaxed demeanour. Nocht smiled slightly, a touch of shyness to it, and shook her head. "Naw, I'm from over yonder." She said and pointed back the way she thought she'd come. "Storm." She clarified a moment later, just in case she hadn't pointed the right way. Her head tipped back a little, inspecting the mountain, unconsciously exposing her neck. A distracted smile graced her face, the bulk of the mountain once again catching her attention. It seemed impossible to take it all in at once. She eventually managed to drag her gaze away, turning back to Legacy. She shook her head a little again, eyes widening momentarily as she tried to shake away how imposing the mass of rock and stones was. "Aye, that it is. I don't think I've ever seen a bigger mountain actually." She smiled a little and a tiny carefree laugh slipped out, unbidden. "Completely dwarfs anything we've at home." She didn't clarify which at home she meant and then shoved thoughts of either to the side. "Are you from around here?" She asked politely then, peering interestedly at the slender pup. She had a pretty name, thought Nocht, much prettier than her own, with a surname and everything. She quickly let the thought go though. It never did her good to dwell on such things.
Another vaguely amused smile fleetingly touched her features as she noticed the pup relax a little. Some of the nervousness left her stomach and she felt her own posture loosen in sympathy as she began to lose her self-consciousness. "Jaded Shadows, eh?" Nocht echoed in a whisper, filing the name away for later. She'd probably forget, she knew, with her almost legendary powers, or lack thereof, of memory. She shook her head at Legacy's hesitant question.
"Nah, I sailed in in a ship that went belly-up in the bay." She explained, trying and failing to suppress an embarrassed grin at the confession, the image of the carcass of the boat roiling in the sea while they looked on stupified on the beach rising to the forefront of her mind. "We weren't the best sailors I 'spose." She added, rolling her eyes. "I've no way home for the time being so Phoenix was good hearted enough to let me join Storm." Her brow furrowed as a thought occurred to her. "I'll probably be here for a fair while, t'be honest. Takes a while to build a boat and get a crew together, even one as inexperienced as we were." She snorted a little again, finding the humour easily in her predicament. They had been rather godawful, if she reflected upon it. It was a miracle they had managed to find dry land at all, but they avoided discussing how woefully under-prepared they had been on the boat, lest it invite misfortune. Like all superstitious sailors of yore, it was almost as if speaking something would make it real. "We parted company on the beach though. Haven't seen them since. An' you, Jaded Shadows born and raised I suppose?" Nocht asked, expecting her question to be answered in the affirmative. It made the most sense, pups shouldn't be running around trying to find a pack or look after themselves. There was more than enough time for that later on. She crossed her arms and tucked her hands into her armpits while waiting for a reply, head tipped to the side in interest.
A question had been asked, but the small wolf was oblivious. She was usually a dynamic creature; sharp and sudden and lively in her movements and expressions, but now amazement had rendered her motionless in her rapt attention to the other wolf. A few moments teeming with ideas and imagined scenes of the watery life passed before she noticed Nocht was indeed no longer talking. She snapped out of the trance, stepping forwards with her hands clasping before her and eyes shining. Maybe some subconscious part of her had heard the question, for she answered it unaware that she was, preceded by a soft sigh in tribute to the delightingly piecemeal and evocative tale she'd just heard. "I was born here... I can't even imagine how it must be to be out there, going wherever you like, seeing the world - were you traders? Where did you sail from?"
Nocht grinned at the child's obvious excitement and turned to point behind her, at the vast expanse of water spread right to the horizon. "See that?" She asked. "On the other side of that is an island. I know it's an island because I saw it on a map once. 'S where we sailed from. We weren't all from there, of course. Some of the others called it Eireanntalamh. The map said Éire." She shrugged. "We called it home. I think some of the others were traders. Maybe Luka or Aleks." She said the names reflectively, remembering the hulking Russian wolves, brothers or best friends and almost inseparable. Their sheer size had made them seem intolerably intimidating, but deep down they were actually softer than some of her other snakier, more weather-beaten ship mates.
She shrugged and tossed the memory aside, turned back. "I just went for the trip really." She confided. "I felt like it was finally time for me to strike out on me own adventure. And what an adventure it's been so far." She said wryly, eyebrow quirked as she stared down to the beach once more. "Would you like to be a sailor?" She asked absently, without turning.