Contrasting Elements

[LvSoulFriend]

((Bit of fun back story for my Misery. Jenn and I wanted to play *grins* Please don't join in unless you are asked to! This is for developing mine and Jenn's Miseries a bit more <3 ))

Misery of the Weeping Clouds was exhausted. He had been chased away from civilization yet again, not allowed to explain why he was approaching and what he wanted. Right now, the only thing he wanted was sleep. And food. Water would be nice as well. Shade and company would also be welcome, but then any company that he had would probably turn on him too. So it was just as well that he was alone. Not that he wanted to be alone, really. But it seemed that fate and the gods were against him, right now.

He shifted in the air, preparing to land before his wings gave out. Or at least, that had been the plan. His wings gave out right before he could land on the far bank of slow-moving river. With a loud smack, he hit the water. Somewhat stunned from the landing, he was lucky that his magic saved him. Months of incidents like this, where he was forced to flee nonstop for hours at a time, had developed his magic to the point where, instinctively, it would react to save him if he was in danger of dying. This time, it caused the water to become more buoyant, holding him up til his breath returned, and his vision cleared.

Having recovered enough to release his grip on the water, he sank a bit, then started paddling, swimming to shore. He came out in a different spot than he had intended to, but this new spot seemed like it might be for the best. As far as he could tell, there was no living thing around. Exhausted, he managed a few sips of water, then collapsed into sleep under a thick bush.

If it rained, well, he would get wet. Getting wet was no big deal for him. He was a water mage, after all.

[Jennalyn]

A young Misery had been following the long and winding river ever since she'd left her home. It had only been a week, and already it felt like she'd been alone and outcast for years. She could still feel the hostile eyes of the Song of the Quartered Dawn on her back sometimes, staring at the hateful mane that striped down her back. All of them had watched her leave save one. Her dam. The mare hadn't even been able to meet her eyes on the day she departed.

Coward. Craven. Selfish! She had hated the Mystics more that day than she would have ever thought possible.

And yet now, alone and hungry and aching from her travels, she missed the safety. When she sat near her dam, the mare was physically if not emotionally warm. At least the weather hadn't turned yet. Dark skies threatened overhead, but the breezes were still warm and the rain wouldn't melt her. It would just cause her mood to fit her species even more.

When the sky decided to open, it did so with little advanced warning. A drop here, a drop there, a speck on her nose, and then all of a sudden she noticed that the wet earth by the riverbank was being covered in fresh little freckles. By then, the rain was almost upon her. She squealed loudly and ran for cover, almost diving into a thorny bush before she saw the gleam of wicked spines just in time. Backing up hastily, she dove for a less threatening bush, her small size allowing her to wiggle right through an opening.

She slammed her nose into something warm and furry. Gray eyes closed tightly at the sudden pain, and then snapped wide open. Oh no. Had she just run smack into a sleeping predator? Well it wouldn't be asleep now! She stomped a hoof on the ground immediately following that thought, a thin mound-wall of earth raising between her and the mass of fur, as she quickly tried to wiggle out of the meager cover. More than meager. It didn't stop hardly any of the rain. Ugh!

[LvSoulFriend]

Sound asleep for the first time in three days (the previous Song he had run into had been particularly vigilant in chasing him away), Clouds was abruptly woken by the sensation of something ramming his belly. Cracking one eye open, he noticed that it was raining. Huh. He hadn't noticed the sky before now. It felt nice though. But that wasn't what had woken him. Blearily, he looked around without moving his head. He was far too tired to actually move. Sleepy and tired as he was, he quickly spotted the source of his wakening.

It was a foal. And, he discovered, not just any foal. A Misery foal. A bit stunned at seeing another of his species - his species too, not just another Sam-kin, but the basically the same as him! - he nevertheless moved quickly. Or at least, as quickly as he could without rising from where he was lying, which was swiftly turning into mud.

His tail swept around behind the young one, blocking her probably escape route. The only other way out, as far as he could see, was on the other side of him, by his head. "Easy youngster, I'm no Oquiesa to be fleeing from. Just a very weary traveler." He paused a moment, then added, "Besides, it's pouring out. You can barely see your hoof in front of your face. More likely than not, you'd run right into the river." His voice was a bit rough and scratchy, mostly from exhaustion.

Granted, if the young one persisted in disappearing into the rain, he wasn't so sure if he'd be able to stop him or her, whichever the young one was. He hadn't rested enough for his strength to have fully returned, but the rain was doing wonders to help him.

[Jennalyn]

As the form began to move, she tried to back out even faster but found her path impeded. A tail? She was a little over half the size of the form in front of her, and yet its tail was enough to effectively block the small hole she'd darted into. She let out a squeal of panic, sure she was about to be eaten by a slumbering Oquiesa. And then it spoke.

She realized this was almost worse.

Eyes far blacker than the heart of the storm she'd tried to escape from looked down at her. She couldn't tell what emotions might be hidden in their colorless depths, unused to dealing wtih Lamanayr-kin whose eyes were more difficult to read. The tail had caught her attention first, and it held it as her own eyes slowly traveled from its furry tip all the way up and around. It covered the entirety of the Samanayr. Well, of its back. It was... a back mane.

Which meant that this creature in front of her was another abomination. She started to hyperventilate as his words filtered through her mind. He was trying to keep her here in the bush with him. He was using soft words to convince her to stay, to cajole her into speaking with him so that he could plant even more horrible things in her head than she had already been born with.

"Let me out!" she shouted at him, the sound far too loud for a confined space. Her eyes flicked every which way, looking for an opening or an escape route, anything to get out of this situation.

[LvSoulFriend]

((And here I thought she might chomp on his tail XD XD ))

Clouds blinked. Such noise from such a little foal. He was sure that it was a filly, his nose working properly now. And she wanted out. Or maybe she wanted away from him. Either way, he was quite willing to oblige her. His stomach, now that he was more awake, was letting him know that he needed food. Quite insistently too. He shrugged then, "As you wish," lifting his tail out of the way, and rolling to his feet in one move. Ducking his head, he turned his back on her, and went out the other exit, the larger one, leaving the filly to the bush.

Once out in the rain, he stood for a moment, head tilted back, wings spread, enjoying the feeling of the rain creating patterns on his fur, washing away the mud. Glancing back at the shelter, he couldn't help but let out a snort of amusement. Out of all the places that he could have chosen to sleep, he had to pick the one spot that was lower than the rest. Figured. Turning away from the place where he'd last seen the filly, he drank his fill of water from the river, then moved over to a bramble bush, on the other side of the clearing. Examining it, he was pleased to discover berries, and ones that were safe to eat too.

His stomach let out a loud grumble, and with a soft chuckle, he started filling his belly. A sudden thought occurred to him, and he craned his head down and inward. Breathing a sigh of relief, he noticed that his charm was still in place. It was the last thing he had from his mother. Woven from strands of her hair that she had given him before he left, they were strong, and not prone to breaking. There was always the chance that it could slip off his head, however, and he didn't want that to happen. The charm itself was from right after he escaped, created in a fit of anger and despair on a beach by lightning that he had summoned. He had still be learning to control his powers then. He had gotten better now, but occasionally, his control still slipped.

Involved as he was in reminiscing, he lost track of what was going on in the clearing.

[Jennalyn]

The second his tail moved, the young Misery dove out the opening like a bat out of hell, streaking several yards away in the mud and pouring rain before stopping and panting. Only then did she dare to turn around, stiff-legged and ready to run the second she saw the beast trying to chase her.

But he was just standing there and stretching. She stayed warily still, hunching under the torrent of large droplets and squinting to see through the haze of rain.

Ahh, he was moving! She dove a few more feet away before turning around. But no, he wasn't going after her. He was getting a drink. In the pouring rain. And then turning around to... eat something? Had he found food? Her stomach yowled like an angry cat that she needed to fill it, but she wasn't willing to go any closer to him than she already was. Which was quite a distance away.

"You'yre a monsteyr!" she shouted across the distance, her voice half-drowned by the sounds of the rain but still audible. "Did you know that? Did anyone eveyr tell you? Because they told me. And you need to know. We'yre monsteyrs. Don't come neayr me again." Ignoring the fact that she had disturbed his hiding place.

[LvSoulFriend]

Weeping Clouds paused in his eating as she shouted at him, sighing as her words reached his ears. "Aye, I know that most, if not all yregayrd us as monsteyrs. I have heayrd it many times since I escaped my motheyr's tormentoyrs." He ate a few more berries, a bit more interested in filling his belly than arguing with a grumpy young foal. He pitied her a bit, being so angry at her age. He was lucky his mother had loved him for who he was, not what he was. Instinctively, he knew that the possibilities of him being born normal had not been good, and that his mother knew that, with the many Sa'kriens and the Mystery, that had held his mother captive.

He craned his neck around, looking through the rain at her. Sopping wet, and half covered in mud, she was a pitiful sight. But her eyes still glared at him, quite angrily. "Just because otheyrs believe I am a monsteyr does not mean that I will act like it," he told her quietly, his magic easing the rain away to a light drizzle so that it was no longer pouring. "I was yraised with manneyrs, and a sense of politeness, and love. Those that might have been my fatheyr had no inteyrest in me when they saw I was a colt. They ignored me, for the most part. But my motheyr cared for me, and taught me as best she could, before helping me to escape. All that I do, I yremember heyr, and act as she would want me to."

With that, he went back to filling his belly, moving onto something other than berries. Grass was green and plentiful, with little spearmint, peppermint, and clover plants growing among the blades.

[Jennalyn]

The mop of her slowly-growing main clung to the Misery filly's wet head, dripping at the ends and making her look more like a drowned rat than a proper equine. Her scaly hindquarters didn't help the image. Nor did her glare. Here it was, the embodiment of her species fully-grown and male, and he was acting with such tricky gentleness.

Wait... gentleness...

Her mind went places. Oh, that was just sad.

"Well, congyratulations on having someone in your life who cayred," she said, voice heavy with sarcasm in the way that only the equivalent of a twelve-year-old girl could manage. "But seyriously, Pyretending you'yre all good and sweet and gentle like a Mystic is supposed to be? That's just kind of pathetic. Betteyr to embyrace what you ayre than live your life playing at being something you ayren't and can neveyr be! Nobody will eveyr look at a monsteyr like us and see anything else. Ouyr tyruly evil natuyre shines thyrough no matteyr how you tyry to hide it. I can see it. So can you, even if you say you can't. Even ouyr magic sees it by making it easieyr to desyroy than to cyreate! You'yre yreally sad. And I can't waste any moyre of my time on you. I'm tyraveling." Not exiled or anything. Cough.

Unwilling to turn her back on him, she began edging away one muddy squelch at a time. When she was far enough away, she turned tail and ran clumsily away.


((OOC: Well... that was a little shorter than even I'd expected. O_o Since this is set very close to her leaving her 'birth Song', her anger and hurt is still very fresh. I think it'll be done after one last post from your boy. <3))

[LvSoulFriend]

((Hahah XD Such a grumpy little girl *tickles her* Thanks very much for the RP It was lots of fun ))

Clouds sighed softly as he watched her run away. Apparently she had received no love or kindness from her mother. Truly, that was sad. But nothing could be done now. So young, and so set in her anger and misery. Perhaps it was fitting for a Misery, for a monster, as she called herself. He knew he was a Misery, knew that he was supposed to be like her, angry at the world. But how could he? His mother had loved him, had taught him well. Even with his back mane, his horns, she had loved him. She had not been able to teach him anything of magic, as his was different from hers. Nor had she been able to teach him how to fly. The Mystery had done that, he had been the kindest of the stallions that kept his mother there.

Shaking his head, Misery of the Weeping Clouds finished his meal, got one last drink of water, and took to the sky, flying between the raindrops. Glancing back in the direction the filly had taken, he whispered, "I wish you the best in youyr life, young one. I hope that one day, you will find peace, and a place to live youyr life."

With that, he flew onward, following the river downstream.