Shattered Coast, and backdated to the 25th or so, because I’ve been lazy.
[html] It was still dark. The early morning breeze pushed the sea into the shoreline rhythmically and the water lapped softly against the sand. The only thoughts on the coyote’s mind were of the last four months, and how they didn’t amount to anything now that he was back. Sure, it had been enough time for a lot of things. He had shed many of his insecurities on the other side of that mountain, he had accepted a lot of things he hadn’t wanted to accept before, and he had realised what meant something to him—and what meant nothing to him. While the sand in the hour glass had never stopped draining, the southern side of the mountain welcomed him back easily. It didn’t ask any questions, and it didn’t chain him to the grains that had fallen in his absence. He had learned a few things about the world, and he had learned a few things about himself. Sooner or later, everything would be the way it had been, or something would change, and he would adapt. Controlling this was absolutely out of the question. The elapsed time didn't mean anything. It never would.
Although he was separated from Faolin again, he had a relative idea of where she was, and he knew for certain that she was okay. This mattered more than anything, and until she returned, his main concern would be to continually check for indications that she was on her way (of course, he didn’t know that she had already come back before he had, and he wasn’t aware that Talitha had come back even before that). Maybe the reality was that everything was conditional, but the one childhood fantasy that remained in his mind countered what was an unquestionable truth. Family mattered more than anything, and would matter more than anything despite whatever could possibly happen. His family could do not wrong because they never had.
Alone and content to bask in the absence of sunshine, his paws sank into the soft sand where the water could reach his toes, and he scanned the coast with sharp, champagne-coloured eyes. His makeshift hotel had always been one of the many caves chiselled out of the coastline and secure via the incoming and outgoing tides. Jesile had always felt safer there than anywhere else when he had been younger, but now it was simply a case of habit. He wanted to be there by the sea, the way he always had. An abundance of shellfish scattered there along the shores spelled out convenience anyway, and with the exception of high tide, there was virtually no downside to living there on the coast. With a final glance to the waves washing ashore, he began to make his way across the cool sand.
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against all this, i contrast you
when all is lost, the war is through
hey angel, dare the wings now we can fly
She never left home, not unless home was a place that moved. It didn't, in this case, but she was restless nonetheless. She had watched him die, but he still floated in her peripheral vision, smashed through her memory and brought with him a destructive amount of jumpiness. She had left in the night, telling her parents she was going to walk to help her clear her mind, and only reached the jagged coast when the sun had begun to lift its weary head over the horizon. The trek through the forest of spiders had been one in which she had chosen the most open and arachnid-free path possible, using a stick like a club to smash through their offensive webs and their little brains, until she had reached this place.
She wasn't far from Dahlia de Mai here, but she was certainly nowhere near close enough to cause problems. Haku had been nice to her, but that didn't mean he would stand for her presence on his doorstep a second time. She had chosen the coast because the water was a comfort to her, and Andrezej's ghost wouldn't follow her to anywhere with water, or so she reasoned. No ghost remained of that tortured man — his sister had buried him, but Rachias was very restless as well, and Talitha felt for her aunt only because of her overwhelming empathy — but he lived in her mind. He threatened in her mind.
She jumped at the shadow in her peripheral vision, and when she turned she was met with a coyote with yellow eyes. In the dawn light, he looked grey, and her breath hitched in her chest. It was only when Jesile drew closer that she realised he wasn't some kind of Andre-from-the-grave, and she relaxed, though only slightly. Her red eyes flicked over his pale yellow gaze and down his muzzle to his mouth, and from there back up. But she didn't say anything. The doggish girl merely drew her knees up to her chest and wrapped her thin arms around them, huddling against herself in case he was a bad man, too.
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You're quick. o:
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There had been a part of him that believed he didn’t belong anywhere, but that had changed, as many other things had over the last few months. His father had once called Inferni home along with so many of his half siblings, and Faolin was there, along with her mate and their kids. Jesile knew he would eventually go back and plead his case that he deserved to return to their ranks. He could see no reason why they wouldn’t let him. The only thing that had stood between himself and the clan since he had left so many months ago was the memory of his father and his desire to find him again. Everything that had gone wrong (which was not much; he had lived a relatively easy life) had done so because he felt the need, for whatever reason, to wander away from what was good. Whatever those reasons had been, the issue didn’t seem to linger there anymore.
There had also been a part of him that hadn’t believed he was good enough, and he had never understood it. However, in the time that he had been gone, his confidence had exploded with enormous ferocity that was only visible on his own radar. He had imprisoned himself for so long under the weight of his thousands of insecurities that he could finally breathe. Paranoia and worry had evaporated and finally left him alone. He could walk there along the beach and linger in the shadows without looking over his shoulder and cowering at the slightest change in environment. His own mind had been his judge, jury and executioner. Finally, this was no longer the case.
It happened in a split second. Although he was quite alert, the withdrawn figure he came to startled him more than anything else possibly could have. The moment he caught sight of her, he doubled back his gaze. Her appearance made it no question as to who she was, but how could she be here? Even then, why was she away from Inferni? Talitha? He squinted slightly as he addressed her, even though he could see perfectly well. His voice emerged as a hoarse whisper which also shocked him. Maybe he thought speaking any louder would shatter the darkness. Maybe it was only because he hadn’t used his voice in so long. His features smoothed and he gazed at her calmly for the first time. She probably didn’t know who he was. |
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Every single time she met some stranger, they seemed to know exactly who she was. It was obvious — who else but the daughter of Gabriel had a developing, feminine body with the pattern of a german shepherd? — but it still shocked her to hear her own name from an unfamiliar timbre. She immediately shrank away from Jesile, worried now that he was one of the cohorts her mind was convinced would come after her if Andrezej failed. She did relax just slightly after a moment, hoping to redress some of her prior jumpiness, but it was marginal. Anyone who knew her name whom she had never met before was treated as dangerous.
Who are you? she asked, a little too harshly. Her fear upset her tone, and the near-hiss that she had spoken in was all too evident of that. She remained rigidly seated on the sand, waiting for a response; if he took some kind of negative action, she was tensed and ready for it. Everything about her tightly wound body screamed, "ready, aim, fire!" and it would take an idiot to think he could catch her off guard. In the background, she could see that peripheral version of Andrezej, unreal but still very much there to the traumatically stressed lycanthrope, laughing at her, promising that this new man was a threat.
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I’ll be slow for the next couple of days. Sorry. D:
[html] Something had happened, and there was no denial set in her features to ward off the thought. She was back, she was shaken (by the presence of a coyote at that, albeit an unfamiliar one), and she far enough away from home to stir more than just offhand curiosity. The situation had various warning signs plastered all over it—and so did she. Jesile’s nature clearly indicated that, if someone was family, connected to family, or even so disconnected as a stranger, he wanted to help. He was concerned for their well-being. Talitha was somewhere along the lines of family in his eyes. Just where she stood was yet to be decided, but it didn’t matter because she was his sister’s daughter. That fact implicitly overrode anything else.
I’m Jesile, he replied, gauging what he could or could not do, things that would let her know he wasn’t a threat, and things that would set her off in panic. In the end, he simply remained still. He didn’t move away, but he didn’t sit or imply in any way that he would stay if she didn't want him to. He remained relaxed in posture, and he didn’t move a muscle. Mogotsi. And now she would know who he was in a relative sense, or think he was lying in order to make her feel comfortable until he was ready to strike for whatever reason. The bottom line in this was that she was afraid, and anything was possible. |
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[html] out of character out of character
I hope you don't mind me jumping in all of a sudden! o:
Hehe. <3
in character in character
Faolin had followed her daughter wherever she went. Especially if she left the lands of Inferni. It was just a gut reaction to everything that had gone on. The woman had lost so much sleep since she had been back, she had lowered herself to just taking naps and even then she was just an inch from the waking world. A whisper through the trees, a cricket's chirp, anything would bring her right back and on edge, just in case he had come back. Her fear was just as real as Talitha's, but her fear was fear for someone else, her daughter, nothing to do with herself. Her daughter seemed to stop and sit on the beach. Faolin watched through blood red eyes from a distance and decided to lay down herself. She wondered if Talitha would mind her following her. It would only be for a few weeks, or however long it would take to feel calm again. Possibly never, but she could not stalk her daughter to the end of the earth, no matter how much she wanted to. Talitha needed to be out on her own, be her own person. There were dangers out there for anybody, just one of them had happened upon her daughter. What were the chances it would happen again?
Her eyes closed and she breathed in the scents that surrounded her. Both of her ears were pointing in the direction of Talitha, she was a few yards away from her daughter, far enough behind that she would not notice the rusty colored female. At least she hoped. The sound of approaching footsteps startled her and she leaped right up and peered down the beach. It was a male, awfully familiar at that. Her eyes widened, another coyote, a threat perhaps? No, there was something about him.. No.. it could not have been. Segodi? Her eyes looked the male up and down, and it was his golden eyes that gave him away. She took a step breath and took a sharp breath in. It had been a long time since she had thought about any of her family really besides the ones that were still here, in Inferni. She just never expected anyone to come back to here really. There was not much left for them. But, Jesile. Here he was, back again, and bigger than the last time she had saw the sandy boy.
Faolin hesitated for a moment to run and fling herself towards him. She froze in mid-movement, it would give her away to Talitha. Hopefully she would not be mad, but this was a chance she could not pass up. How long had he been here for anyway? Her tail wagged happily back and forth and she instantly shot forward just in time to hear him speak his name. As if there was any doubt in her mind to begin with, it was only confirmed one-hundred and fifty percent now. It was him and he seemed to remember her daughter. Full of smiles she covered the short distance quickly and collided with the male, attempting to roll him over and cover him in kisses and hugs and just anything she could muster up. It was the most playful she had felt.. well, since, a long time. Way before the war, back when her two pups were only still small. Her heart burst with excitement, tail beating quickly behind her.
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Even as the name was dropped, and her mother's last name given, she wasn't completely convinced. Her eyes did light with recognition of the name, but she couldn't for the life of her remember who he was, or how she was supposed to remember him. It would take more than a name to promise her that he wasn't some friend of Andrezej's who had come to finish her off. She swallowed shakily, watching him warily but saying nothing, for there was nothing to say. No words could come to her, and so she merely leaned back and away from him, hoping he wouldn't attack.
Instead, something very different and very new happened.
Mom? she asked as the rusty coyote went flying past her. The quick movement had caused Talitha to flinch backward, but it was obviously Faolin; nobody else was that colour. She visibly relaxed the moment her mother's tail blurred, and she let out a small giggle; this man could be trusted, then. The girl placed her palms face-down on the sand behind her, leaning back and using her arms to hold her up while she watched the spectacle that was her mother and Jesile. He knew who she was, and now it was clear how that had come to be.
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[html] He didn’t know what else to say. There was no way he could convince her on his own that he wasn’t who she was afraid he might be, or that he cared about her even though she probably couldn’t begin to imagine why. This left him helpless as he stood there before her, reasoning within himself that there was no way he could to leave her there alone, but grappling with the idea of staying and causing her further or extended discomfort. Soon enough, his answer arrived in an unusual form, and one he could not have anticipated.
The coyote’s reaction to the impending collision of bodies gave him time to recognise just who had launched herself toward him. His mind did not follow in real time. With every fashioned slow motion second he created he thought he could feel happiness surging out of control and into his body, receiving it from some foreign outlet in the universe that had been obstructed for a long time now. He was electrified and his nerves were ignited, but he allowed her to bowl him over quite obligingly, and to squash him to the ground. Jesile laughed.
The minute I let my guard down I’m attacked by friendly fire, he grinned, finally pulling himself to his haunches and giving his sister’s shoulder a rough nudge with his nose. His eyes could have lit the sky if the darkness had not already begun to fade.
There were a thousand questions scattering the expanse of his mind that he had intended to ask Faolin when she returned, but Talitha’s presence kept his mouth firmly shut. She had obviously gone through some traumatic experience, and reliving it just now would do her no favours. Right now, all that mattered was that Faolin was here, and she had managed to smooth out a whole lot in just a few abrupt seconds.
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[html] out of character out of character
Sorry for the wait, I've been grounded! ;o;
in character in character
As Faolin rushed by her daughter the female noticed the surprise in her daughter's voice. It was funny, because Faolin had been following her daughter ever since the incident, not wanting to intrude on her private thoughts and not wanting her to feel like she had to be watched. Faol did not want any more harm to come of her daughter, so there was no way she would ever let the chance happen again. Jesile seemed just as surprised as she had been and Faolin collided with her brother, easily pushing him over even though he was bigger than she was now. A surge of happiness swept through her entire form. It was the first time in a long time she felt this happy. The entire time she was away from Gabriel and Talitha everything seemed to go in slow motion and she just wanted to run back home and into her mate's arms again. But, this is not what she expected when she returned. A surprise visit from her brother? A friendly face, it pained her how much he resembled Segodi though.
Finally, Faolin climbed off the younger male and grinned from ear to ear as she bounced on her spot. The lady looked back at her daughter staring quite dumbfounded she guessed from the surprise attack on someone that she did not even know. The rusty colored femme could not help but grin and tilt her head to the side in question. Wondering if it really was him or just some illusion of sorts that was there to trick her. It could not have been an illusion though; she collided right into him. A collision that sent them both spiraling into the sand of the beach. It felt like she was back in Inferni again, and only when the scents registered in her brain did she realize she was not on the sandy beach of her childhood, and in fact on the beach not far off from their new home. She was completely surprised that Jesile was able to find them so far away from the lands they used to live. They could have been farther though, and the distance only took a couple days travel if you traveled at a walking pace, not a full fledged run from the burning flames licking at their heels.
"This, Talitha, is your uncle Jesile Mogotsi. He's one of Segodi's sons! He saw you when you were really little, hence the reason you do not remember him much," she laughed and licked her daughter behind the ear. "And, you! How did you find us?" Faolin asked, turning her head back to her much larger brother. She hoped he would not get any bigger, because then she would have to start looking up at him even higher and possibly cause pains in her neck. There was one more question she needed answered though, and it would probably be tough to hear it because she knew what Jesile was like. Well, she thought anyway, the male never stayed in one place too long it seemed and it saddened her. "How long do you plan on staying?" a frown formed on her lips and her eyebrows pinched together slightly at the question, her voice soft and pained.
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She remained quiet in her position on the sand, her ears turned back at the exchange. Normally, Talitha would have laughed at such a spectacle, but times weren't normal anymore; they never really had been. God Above had not saved her from an attack by an uncle, and here was another uncle. Was she expected to trust uncles? Her eyes narrowed a small bit at the question that ricocheted off the darkened sides of her mind and disappeared into her memory, because at that moment a tongue swiped the backside of her ear and she flinched a small bit, but managed to smile shyly nonetheless.
It wasn't like her, but it was the best she could manage. Hi. And that was it; she didn't know what to say to a man she hadn't seen since she was a baby, and didn't remember at all. Knowing that he knew who she was when she could barely remember him was also uncomfortable, but the young woman would probably get over that someday. That was, of course, the way of life. Her eyes didn't leave the lemon of his own for a moment as she probed into him for answers; first and foremost being, naturally, "can I trust you?"
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[html] There was nothing he wanted more and that still wasn’t enough because he had been without it for so long. He had created every reason he had ever had to do anything from fragments of stupid ideas, and he had run after the wrong thing all along when all he needed was there, right now, in front of him. Everyone probably made the same mistake at one point or another, but no matter how often he assured himself of this, Jesile felt an extraordinary pang of guilt and regret every time he thought about it. Faolin had always, always been there for him, but he had always been busy chasing ghosts and searching selfishly for somewhere he could fit in. That place had remained constant, and he had walked by it countless times without so much as a second glance or thought.
His gaze lingered on Talitha a moment longer. Someday he would show her that he wasn’t at all like whoever had stolen a part of her. It was painful to look at her and see only the ghost of a young girl instead of the vibrant creature she should have been. He had been in the company of Andrezej as his pawn, and quite possibly the only one that particular Lykoi had ever treated without any outward aggression at all. The bottom line was that he would have never guessed the other boy of anything. Not even if he had three chances to do it with a hint thrown in to heighten the odds.
Champagne-coloured eyes strayed and Jesile was left staring off toward the ocean. For a moment, he didn’t answer his sister’s question. He had been there a long time and she hadn’t known anything of it. What kind of brother was he? I came over the mountain like everyone else. I had a general idea of where Inferni was, and someone from the clan confirmed that for me. For a while I lived here on the coast, but I left again…months ago. I came back because I knew you would be here eventually, I just didn’t think it would be this soon. He smiled. It had been the most welcome surprise he had come across in a long time. However, her second question was another story.
Promises. He didn’t like them for the simple and unavoidable truth that they could be broken. How easily they could be broken was up to the one who made them, and no one could tell just how long a string of words could last. Jesile trusted actions more than words (though he had been fooled enough times by them), but words could mean a lot more to Faolin. He didn’t want to tell her that he would try his best or that he would make sure his stay was a permanent one, but he also didn’t want to tell her that he couldn’t make any promises and lead her to believe that she didn’t mean anything to him. The coyote found himself trapped in a set, vicious circumstance that he had created for himself with fear and loneliness. All he had to do was make everything alright again, but he wasn’t sure how to do it. Then again, he wasn’t about to pass it off as impossible either.
I don’t have any reasons to leave. It was the truth, but it had never stopped him before. |
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