Everything rash

Featuring Caelan, Alucién and Hoyn (NPC)

Mentions of Siv, Starling

Implicit mention of Sparrow

Summer, 766 YNA

Windbourne, Westhaven

Alucién

Yeah, so that was about enough. That was a tad too much - even for Siv! “Stupid boy”, she muttered to herself. Until now he at least used to come home from time to time. Of course - He had to come home and tell his fairy-tales about all those does he had flirted with and other colts he had fought. Lucy rolled here eys. “Sure! Because nobody can resist a daft guy like you,” she kept ranting along. Honestly. Siv could just lie into your face without even blinking. And the most annyoing thing was, that he would ALWAYS catch you if you even tried finagling. However, coming home staggering and luching, telling adventurous stories definitely did not qualify him as a survivor. And now he was missing. Nobody seemed to know where he was - as always, naturally - again the doe rolled her eyes, kicking the next stone as hard as she could. Yes. She was annoyed. And still she could not help. She had to search for her foster brother. If nobody told her where he was, she was going to find out.

The golden doe reached the top of a hill. It was still early in the morning, but Lu had not been able to stay in the den or get back to sleep. It was now several nights overdue for Siv to return. The air was still rather brisk, even though the day promised to become very hot. Lucy inhaled deeply. She was now trotting around for several hours. Not the slightest hint of her brother. But - what was that? Lucy called a soft wind to support the scent she had caught. It was a familiar scent. For a second she had thought it was Siv’s, but her mind had played games with her. Before she could find out, a strong wind came up, blowing to the other direction and Lu lost whatever she had caught.

No! She had to know what it was - Who it was. She reared up before she dashed forwards, downhill. She enjoyed the wind, trying to blow her hair in front of her, while she ran faster to make it flow back. It was faster than she thought that she reached the woods where she would find what she was coming for, when she came to an abrupt halt, that almost made her flip over.

“No! Nonono!”, she cried.

A stag came stepping out the woods, towards the slender doe. “Yes, girl. You are right. It’s me. You always make it easier for me to find you than I expected.” Lucy’s eyes narrowed, sparkling dangerously. “You are not part of my life. You don’t even have any reason to find me, and I won’t let you steal away my time nor anything else I love!”, she hissed at the stag. “Oh, being your father is for sure being part of your life - I am the reason you live.” “By Molach and the winds!”, hatred started to pulse through her veins. “If I’d let you, you would rather be the reason I killed myself! I was lucky enough to have found a doe who fostered me while you were absent. Then you came again and messed everything up so that I again fled those I love because I hated you more! I was then lucky enough to find a stag who really cared and took me into his family - a true family. They are the reason I am alive. Not you. Don’t be a fool flattering yourself. And now you get out of my way! I am on a more important quest than making a fool of myself talking to someone undeserving as you.”

She turned around, just as she had last time and walked off. But something was different today. “NO!”, he yelled. “This time you will listen to me. We need to talk!” Desperation was in his voice. Lucy knew he had tried to get this one talk for many years, but there was absolutely nothing she could think of what he could say that would have interested her in the slightest. She did not even twitch an ear back at him as she continued walking away.

And then everything happened rapidly. “You will listen to me today, girl!” she heard him roar behind her. Then she heard a lashing sound, followed by Hoyn’s hooves meeting her back hard enough to throw her to the ground. The golden doe neighed up, more driven by her wrath than pain. She had always known he was selfish and evil, but she would not have expected that he would force her to listen to him. With a massive leap she tried to jump back on her feet, but Hoyn had already prepared himself for her move and before she could catch momentum, he had his hooves placed on her shoulder and neck, pressing her onto the dried ground. “You listen this time! And you will understand.”

Caelan

Crying like a banshee a big, black bird suddenly came soaring down at the two fawnlings, shrieking from the top of it’s voice, flapping it’s big, black wings at the stag, while clawing and biting at him the same time.

“Leave the doe alone!” a voice then soon enough called, belonging to a young, cream stag that came galloping over, he didn’t even wait for an answer, but threw himself right at the stag with as much force as he could muster, ending both stags up on the ground, while the black macaw still attacked the older stag screaming as long as any winter storm.

Rolling over, Caelan struggled to his feet again after the impact of hitting the older stag and falling over together with him. He shook his head, bringing himself between the stag still struggling with the bird and the young doe he had been assaulting.

“Ciel!” he called, the bird finally letting go of the other stag, flying up while still screaming in anger, however landing on the head of the younger stag, keeping to grumble and screech, her hood lifted threateningly. Caelan meanwhile glared at the older stag, ears folded back, placing himself between him and the doe.

“Who do you think you are! Leave her alone and back off immediately, before I make sure the queen learns about this!” Caelan growled at the older stag. It was somewhat unlikely he’d be able to stand his ground against the older male without the element of surprise he had had before, but he hoped the threat of involving the queen would make the other realize Cae was being serious and reconsider any further actions.

Alucién

Lucy had already prepared to hear some wild story. A story that supposedly contained an understandable explanation for her father’s almost permanent absence. Of course she was prepared to deny every single word, to close her ears and yell at him for treating her like this. But it did not come to it. A black something came fighting down at him with a cry that set Lucy’s teeth on edge. In the next moment another fawnling crushed into Hoyn and released Alucién from her father’s hooves. She leapt to her feet unconsciously forcing a gust to disperse even more dust from the ground than the two fighting stags already had. Her black hair fluttered wildly around her head as she watched the scene alarmed.

The newcomer spoke his thread towards Hoyn who already backed off somewhat. “Lucy! One day, you will understand!”, he cried before he turned head over healed and galloped off. The golden doe moved nervously, her tail see-sawing intensely. “I won’t!” she yelled, taking some awkward leaps after him, staring into the direction he had vanished between a couple of trees. For a moment she was caught in her own wrath, mixed with panic. What if he had something important to say, and she never let him do so? But wait - it was not her fault he was gone now. It was…

Rapidly she turned her neck back towards the other stag. He was about her own age and watched her with his brown intelligent eyes. It was annoying. “This is your fault”, the doe hissed at him, now turning towards him fully. “If he had to say something of importance? What then? Hugh? Have you even thought about that?” She was too caught within her mess of emotions to discern the ridicule of her behaviour. Someone had to be blamed for everything that was going wrong in her life at the moment.

“Seems like all stags are just stupid”, she grumbled.

Caelan

The dappled stag tried to stand as tall as he could, while the older stag seemed to consider for a moment, however ultimately come to the point that whatever he had wanted from the doe wasn’t worth getting into trouble with the queen.

Narrowing his brows into a glare, when the stag told the doe that she would understand one day, Caelan watched him finally turn and trot off, with the doe yelling after him. Wow. She had quite a temper, apparently. His ears then twitched somewhat, when she suddenly stopped and seemed lost in thoughts.

He wondered if she should say something, being pinned down like this no doubt was quite traumatic, even for a fiery young doe like her. Should he ask her if she was alright.

”Take he as your’s, she owes it to you!” the voice hissed into his ears. Shaking his head once, he was about to ask her what the stag had wanted to act like that and if they maybe still should go see the queen about it, when all of the sudden the doe spun around and began yelling at him!

Backing off a step, Caelan stared at her with wide eyes, while Ciel flapped her wings and screamed at her threateningly.

“Excuse ME!” Cae eventually returned, once both females were done yelling, with the doe not exactly screaming anything of more sense than the black macaw. What was wrong with this doe? “That stag had you literally pinned to the ground! I only wanted to HELP!” he sneered right back, “I’m sorry, if my civil courage messed with your...your...whatever is going on between you two.” he huffed.

Alucién

Lucy angrily smashed her tail onto the ground when the black something that had turned out to be a macaw croaked at her viciously. She summoned a gust that carried away the sound of it while she yelled at the bird: “YOU better keep outa this!” When she was just about to turn back to the cream stag in order to throw some more insults at him, he spoke.

His words were slowly taking away the blindness of anger that had driven Lucy until only a few seconds ago.

She snorted, more at herself now than the stag with the pale hair: “You are right. I’m sorry.” Rolling her eyes she came closer towards him, still keeping a suspicious eye on the bird. “I… I did not mean to lash at you. It’s just... “ another snort escaped her. Why was life so complicated. She hated to apologize and explain herself. But here it seemed this self-chosen saviour of hers deserved an explanation. “I have not made many good experiences with stags so far. My father is a selfish coward who would rather leave his motherless child alone with some random foster mother. The stag I fell in love with is a dork who will ruin me and…” Nervously digging a hole into the dry ground at her feet she tried to avoid mentioning Siv: “The only stag that has ever been good to me is our band-leader. But then there’s his son - my brother…” another angry smash of tail. Why could she not restrain from yammering like a kid in front of a stag she had met the first time! “He is an idiot honestly. And he has vanished and is overdue to return. So again… I have to look for him and see that nothing happens to this nutbar. And it drives me crazy to think of the grin he will give me when I find him, telling me wild stories about his imaginary adventures to impress me like all the other does, who - according to him - fall to their knees when they merely see him.”

Lucy would never have admitted it, but talking about it was good. Her wrath was slowly disappearing and a spark of the deeply hidden love and worry for Siv flashed through her eyes when she added far more calmly than before: “But if anything happened to him, I could never forgive myself for not having been there to help him”.

Then she shook her head. “Erm, I don’t know where that peroration came from. I’m sorry to bother you with my own business. I guess we all carry our own burden.” She halfways turned away as if she was about to leave, but she did not want to appear impolite, even though she very well knew that that ship had sailed long ago.

Caelan

The black bird seemed little impressed by the doe’s try to use her magic to mute her, but kept squawking and flapping her wings violently, while Caelan just stood and stared somewhere between dumbfound and utterly baffled.

Especially when the doe suddenly changed her attitude and while she had been looking like she was about to yell at him one moment, now apologised. What by the Wind was wrong with her? The change of attitude at least also seemed to calm down Ciel, who stopped screaming, but merely turned to puff herself up and glare at the doe silently.

“I’m not surprised, if you react to everyone trying to help like that.” Caelan couldn’t help himself from muttering, when she said she hadn’t had too much good experiences so far. She however seemed genuine and it was clear she struggled with the apologie, but still tried her best, so he said no more, but just listened to her try explaining herself.

Then, however, a bit of a chuckle suddenly escaped him,

“My father hardly talked to me and ended up struck by lightning from the god he thought he served, my mother disappeared and I still don’t know what happened, I was also given to random foster mother and when I tried talking to the mate of my late father I made her cry, I made a strong, independant doe cry and now I doubt she’ll ever talk to me again, the only connection I’d ever have had to my father…” he twitched a brow somewhat, “You’re not the only one with a crappy life, it doesn’t justify bad manners, my foster mother always says.”

When she then spoke on, telling about her adoptive brother and how she was looking for him, obviously very worried for him, despite trying to hide it behind a mask of anger, Caelans features softened again, especially once she did admit she might’ve been just a bit too brash there. Tora had always said, that every apology was something to be accepted. It didn’t make things undone, but a genuine apology was always a start and how should somebody be able to redeem themselves, if no chances were given? Caelan thought it was very wise.

“That’s true. I’m sorry, if I interfered where I shouldn’t have.” he eventually said with a little dip of his head, watching her turn around to leave, just to add, “Are you Alucién, though?”

Alucién

She had hated the situation. She had hated it with every hair of her coat. What made her the most reluctant was that this guy was always so right. Every thing he said was right and there was no reason for yelling at him, even though Lucy wanted to. She needed to. Particularly when he explained his own history and made clear, that your past does not help with apologizing at all. Yes, she hated the situation, particularly this stupid pranced, fluffed up bird, that was ogling at her, waiting to find a reason to fight down at her.

Leaving was the only way to escape, she thought. And she thought it was a good idea until this stranger suddenly addressed her with her name. Damn! She was so darn close to escape. So darn close.

A mixture of panic, alarm and a tiny tad of curiousity made her jerk around. Her blood cooked with fury again. It felt like he had interfered into her private zone again. But this time she reminded herself not to flip out completely just in time. So instead of yelling and calling wild winds, she froze in place, staring at him with burning eyes: “How!”, she exclaimed. “How do you know!” Stepping closer with another very attentive glare at the macaw, she now stood closer to the cream stag than before.

“You better have a darn good explanation for this, if you stick to your version of just wanting to help. I have never had a sudden saviour who just happened to be there and also just happened to know my name.”

Caelan

Caelan could see the young doe boil with a mixture of many feelings hate and upset being the most obvious, even though just looking at her, made him feel like he would be looking at a raging storm. It was a feeling somewhat familiar to him, even if he never had been angry like that. He however also knew how it felt to be lost and alone and just float away on the wind, feeling like there was nothing left that held you on the ground. Back when his mother had disappeared and his father had simply given him away, he had felt a lot like that too. It was thanks to Tora and Blaise and other kind fawnlings, he had learned to cope, at least some. Still, he could understand her anger, at least to some point.

She was almost about to leave, when the question that had been lingering on his tongue quickly needed to be asked, before she was gone. Naturally it startled her, Caelans ears falling flat for a moment, when she spoke  single ‘how’ suspicion dripping from her word.

“I’m a friend of your brother, Siv.” he simply stated, “You probably saw me already, I came to your band to pick him up and have lessons with Starling quite some times.” he added, granted she probably hadn’t noticed him all too much, as they never had talked before, obviously.

Alucién

The cream stag looked at her, a thoughtful, soft expression on his face and for a moment he just remained silent. Lucy would have suspected, that he was trying to make up a plausible lie to explain everything, but the deepness in his eyes and the way he seemed to be fully concentrated on her made clear, that he was definitely not desperately patching up false facts. Lucy couldn’t decide whether he made her nervous, angry or curious.

But when he finally had made up his mind and explained how he happened to know her, Lucy’s eyes grew large. A gasp escaped her when she put together the pieces of the puzzle: “You… you are …” she had to swallow before she was able to say it: “Caelan?”. For a moment she stared at him with a perfectly serious expression, as if he was a ghost.

Then all of a sudden, she shook her head and a wonderfully relieving hearty laugh burst out of her, relaxing every muscle of her tensed body. Once she had gathered herself, she cleared her throat and explained herself: “By the winds. You must excuse my reaction.” Another chuckle interrupted her: “When Siv talked about how he bet you in several races, I thought you were one of his imaginary friends he made up to brag about his inexistent victories.” Her tail see-sawed a bit while she considered, that the fact that Caelan was real did not mean, that Siv really beat him. After all Caelan had proved himself a dauntless fighter and that definitely made it likely that he would win any kind of competition he could possibly have had with a mere cutup.

But then, Lucy remembered her initial quest and all of a sudden wondered, whether there was a more concrete connection between Caelan and herself than she was able to see: “But all jokes apart! Caelan, my brother has still not returned and I am out to search for him. Can it be true, that you are out for the same task? And if so: have you any hints yet?”

Caelan

The young stag watched the doe carefully, not quite sure what she’d be doing with the information she just had gained. She was quite a whirlwind of emotion and he wasn’t sure, if she’d believe him or rather yell at him again. However, the reaction that followed made his eyes grow big in surprise for a moment, for he definitely hadn’t expected that. Watching her laugh heartily, he couldn’t help, but smile in amusement himself, giving a little nod of agreement, when she seemed to recognize him. Why was she staring at him like that? It almost like a piece of imagination had turned to reality in front of her eyes all of the sudden.

Her next words then however made him blink in confusion, ears wiggling somewhat. Imaginary friends? What was she talking about? For a moment, he wondered, if they were talking about the same stag, yet he had obviously seen her with the nomad band before and she now also clearly recognized him, now she had made the connection.

“Well, I can assure you, I’m very much real and these victories are everything, but none-existent.” Caelan eventually said, he had lost to the taller stag plenty of times. Siv always was better in literally everything than him it seemed, well, expect magic, but the self-confident stag was so sure of his own abilities, he didn’t need any sort of magic anyway.

Once again he shifted a bit, when Alucién added about the actual reason she was so far away from her family nomad band, was her looking for her brother. Hadn’t he told her? Why wouldn’t he, though? It was all a bit odd to Caelan, the young stag clearing his throat a bit, “Uhm, no, I’m not looking for him.” he eventually said, “I actually know very well where he is, he swam over to journey the main isle and sell good in Glenmore.” he added a little hesitatingly, not quite sure if it was a wise thing to tell, but what should he do? He couldn’t just lie to her, could he? Siv never had told him to keep his journey a secret.

Alucién

Surprisingly her eyes still grew larger, when Caelan confirmed Siv’s wild stories. If Caelan had not had this particularly honest and calm charisma, she would have straight told him, he was lying too. But she did not believe he did. And just because Caelan was real, and just because he might have lost one or the other competition, it did not mean, that all those Ladies running after him were true too and all those muscular stags beaten by his wits neither!

However, she had not much time to ponder over the new views on Siv, Caelan was slowly starting to open up.

“HE DID WHAT?” she yelled, gasping for air - it was a weird mixture of breathlessness and shouting. She was not sure how she should feel now. She was hurt for the fact Siv had just left without telling her a word, but obviously everyone else knew. It made her grumpy. But at the same time she was horriefied. She knew what the trip over seas meant and she knew it was dangerous. If you did not get torn apart by sharks, you could still drown from exhaustion. And once you reached strange shores, it did not mean, that people would be nice to you either. On contrary, it seemed, that everyone who returned from trips like that told horror stories about those alien folks. Different ones, for sure, but yet all the same. Fear crept up within her. Siv was an easygoing young nature. He didn’t ever worry about things, but jumped right into the middle of every party, even if he was less than not invited. He could easily get himself into serious trouble - oh no! He would definitely get into trouble before he had put one single hoof on the mainland, Lucy was sure about that!

“All the gusts and tornadoes! I can’t believe it!” she yelped, still gathering her bits and pieces of emotions, trying to put them together. “Why would he… no!” she shook her black mane violently! “I won’t approve of this. This guy better batten down the hatches!” Within her indignation however, soon mingled the concern that drove her: “I can’t sit here and wait for him to get eaten or enslaved.” Her eyes narrowed and her body straightened. It was clear, that a decision had been made and that determination was now driving her strong mind.

“Thank you Caelan! It seems, that Siv’s friends are not necessarily just as useless as himself.”

Caelan

The young stag watched the doe in front of him, ears folding back when she yelled somewhere between anger and worry for her brother. Apparently she didn’t see Siv quite as able as Caelan did. Then again, it didn’t seem that unusual for siblings to have a somewhat peculiar opinion of each other. He sure also was worried for his friend, but it seemed like Alucién believed he’d plain get himself killed out there all by himself. It slowly began to dawn on Cae why Siv might’ve rather not told his sister, if all her reactions were quite that heavy.

Then again, it also wasn’t like he fully could approve of Siv’s action. At some point, even without meeting him, she sure would’ve found out and Caelan doubted that Alucién would’ve reacted any different, if she would’ve learned it later rather than earlier.

“Enslaved?” he then said, blinking a couple times, why should he be enslaved? He never heard something like this. Sure there were plenty of dark stories told by those, who had fed their old home and come to live in Windborne instead, but those mostly told about does being treated as lesser, ranks you were born into and never could escape, predators and hunger or strict, superstitious, military rules that turned soldiers into murders, like told in Sivs own story. Never however he had heard about anybody being enslaved. The thought made him shudder for a moment.

“I’m quite sure, he’ll be doing just fine…” he then added in a mumble, halfly to also reassure himself, but the doe hardly seemed to hear him, apparently her mind was made up, if it was for the good or the bad, he wasn’t quite sure of just yet. Hopefully she wouldn’t end up getting herself into trouble now, trying to find her brother, who probably was in far less peril than she apparently believed him to be in. However he found it probably was quite useless to try to convince her otherwise, much like Siv, she seemed to be the type that needed to learn thing for herself, rather than follow the advice of others and so he decided to let it go.

“Sure, it was a pleasure.” he so eventually added with a smile, when she thanked him, dipping his head, followed by a chuckle at her words, “Oh, you might discover your brother too is by far less useless than you think.” he said with a smile, “If you’ll excuse me now though, I was actually to report to a patrol.” he added, turning to leave, just to pause, looking over his shoulder, “Please...don’t do anything rash.” he just said after a moment of hesitation, before eventually trotting off to meet with the stormbringers.