𝔔etzi'ah 𝔐orrison (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
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quietplace2018-02-05 06:51 pm
rou_gui) wrote in quietplace2018-02-05 06:51 pm
un: qetziah (the golden morning breaks)
Once upon a time, beneath the branches of a golden tree, lived a firebird who danced and spun, spitting flames from her plumage, which would have razed any other wood. Instead, her light flickered in the golden boughs of her special, lonely place. She ate golden apples, alone, and she drank silver water, alone.
Not even birds would fly above her shining, golden woods.
Lonely, she wept bitter, burning tears, and over time she, slowly, ceased to dance and spin, and the lights no longer shimmered among the trunks of all her golden trees. She sat in stillness and in silence in the darkness of her jeweled maze of trees.
In that silence, she was forgotten, and bandits and thieves began to infiltrate the golden woods. Looking for treasure they could take away with them, and finding instead only one sad bird and a boughful of golden apples.
When they approached her with their nets the bird screamed like a newborn and spit fire in every direction, leaving charred lacuna in their clothing wherever she touched them. So they dipped their ugly sack into the silver river, and pulled it dripping and drowning over her head in order to carry her away.
They carried her from her golden forest, across a barren, rocky plain, and at last up the steps of a cold, stone-built fort. They put her in a cage, under which they could insert planks of firewood. As though she were a hearth.
'To keep us warm,' they told her motioning to dirty women and dirty children looking on in awe. One would think they might be grateful, in respect of her heat in the face of a cold, lonely world. No, instead that awe would fade soon enough, and there would be too many small, grubby faces rattling sticks around her, jabbing at her and laughing at how she had no defenses. Food would be thrown at her, rotten things she could not even eat.
Peevish and injured, she spit fire into the face of one small tormentor, and burned half of it away. In revenge, the father came and ripped at her feathers while wearing thick leather gloves. She spit at him too, but he raised his arm and kept his damned eyes, losing only the sleeve of his shirt.
Smoldering in their courtyard, she sniped a few more that way, gasping out fireballs at their unsuspecting flesh... While her captors now had no silver river to dip her into to keep her under control, they would instead throw buckets water at her during the day, sending her sputtering as though she might truly be put out.
And she thought, truly, she might die there in that cage.
It was after the little boy, whose face she had melted, threw water at her again, laughing... She decided, not to suffer such a fate. She would dance, despite the smallness of her cage. So when the night fell, she began. She battered herself into its brass fittings, bruised limbs and blooded face, until she became a whirlwind of flame not a one of her captors could ever dream of putting out. Even as they came stumbling from their beds to investigate their terrible sounds of her body flailing; too late.
She burned them all, in the oven of that stone-built fort, and she melted down the cage around her. She picked her way through its remains carefully as she stalked from the charred corpse of the castle.
Once more able to see out across the plains, she waited for the morning to break, and for the sun to show her the glittering path back to the golden woods. She would travel back there, limping and alone, and she would return to her stillness and her silence and her darkness, alone.
Without even a bird above for which to lift her head.
Not even birds would fly above her shining, golden woods.
Lonely, she wept bitter, burning tears, and over time she, slowly, ceased to dance and spin, and the lights no longer shimmered among the trunks of all her golden trees. She sat in stillness and in silence in the darkness of her jeweled maze of trees.
In that silence, she was forgotten, and bandits and thieves began to infiltrate the golden woods. Looking for treasure they could take away with them, and finding instead only one sad bird and a boughful of golden apples.
When they approached her with their nets the bird screamed like a newborn and spit fire in every direction, leaving charred lacuna in their clothing wherever she touched them. So they dipped their ugly sack into the silver river, and pulled it dripping and drowning over her head in order to carry her away.
They carried her from her golden forest, across a barren, rocky plain, and at last up the steps of a cold, stone-built fort. They put her in a cage, under which they could insert planks of firewood. As though she were a hearth.
'To keep us warm,' they told her motioning to dirty women and dirty children looking on in awe. One would think they might be grateful, in respect of her heat in the face of a cold, lonely world. No, instead that awe would fade soon enough, and there would be too many small, grubby faces rattling sticks around her, jabbing at her and laughing at how she had no defenses. Food would be thrown at her, rotten things she could not even eat.
Peevish and injured, she spit fire into the face of one small tormentor, and burned half of it away. In revenge, the father came and ripped at her feathers while wearing thick leather gloves. She spit at him too, but he raised his arm and kept his damned eyes, losing only the sleeve of his shirt.
Smoldering in their courtyard, she sniped a few more that way, gasping out fireballs at their unsuspecting flesh... While her captors now had no silver river to dip her into to keep her under control, they would instead throw buckets water at her during the day, sending her sputtering as though she might truly be put out.
And she thought, truly, she might die there in that cage.
It was after the little boy, whose face she had melted, threw water at her again, laughing... She decided, not to suffer such a fate. She would dance, despite the smallness of her cage. So when the night fell, she began. She battered herself into its brass fittings, bruised limbs and blooded face, until she became a whirlwind of flame not a one of her captors could ever dream of putting out. Even as they came stumbling from their beds to investigate their terrible sounds of her body flailing; too late.
She burned them all, in the oven of that stone-built fort, and she melted down the cage around her. She picked her way through its remains carefully as she stalked from the charred corpse of the castle.
Once more able to see out across the plains, she waited for the morning to break, and for the sun to show her the glittering path back to the golden woods. She would travel back there, limping and alone, and she would return to her stillness and her silence and her darkness, alone.
Without even a bird above for which to lift her head.
UN: Xochipilli
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[Not that he's been secretive about his nature.]
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[ She had been trying to be tactful. ]
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Yeah, well, doesn't make me any less angry.
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un: oneoftwelve
He himself is named of the fire bird from his own culture, the markings on his face are an inescapable fact of that lineage and so a message of loneliness, of isolation..digs claws into a great many of his own fears. ]
If she would dance in adversity, surely she would dance for herself in the end?
[ That's very rich coming from Houou, but there has to be hope at least?]
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[ He's giving this far too much thought for a story, but let's call this cultural differences. Fire birds from his home bring prosperity or destruction, but always draw creatures too them, so a lone phoenix is strange to him....not to mention unsettling given his recent history. ]
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Was that really so important? It's all just pretend, you know.
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[ There's a novels worth of baggage behind this retreat, but Houou's pointedly ignoring that. Curiosity and nothing more. ]
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[ His name, his colours, his powers, Houou is living proof of such from his own world. ]
--Silver? Loneliness works just as well.
[ That and heartbreak. It's a wonder he's still standing most days. ]
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un: liaison.laurel
[ she almost said 'return home' but notes that those words were never used in the story. ]
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In some stories people are cruel. In some stories people are kind. In life, they are more tended towards indifference. We highlight their extremes to make our points and shape our tales, but its all just wordplay.
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so she tries something similar. ish. ]
Why this story?
Out of all the stories you must have from where you are, why this one?
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[ Though Kandake too would have fought with her over its bitter connotations, and insisted in more a joyous ending with freedom regained. ]
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lorem wants to go down that route - she's always been fascinated by the concept of having siblings, having been an only child in a quiet world that had so little people in it - but. hm. no. not yet. but it's a topic she keeps in mind for the future if a chance presents it self. ]
Is it a story that you enjoy too? Or did it happen to fit the themes you were hoping to tell for this occasion?
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I want to hear more stories from your world is all. I think there's something beautiful in the one you told. [ and. um.
yeah. ]
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[ In fact, she might not be able to control the fact. Faerie things liked to eke out of her, regardless of her will. ]
But you would not like the tales from my world.
[ Witches, blood magic, abomination, death. ]
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[ she thinks about certain stories she's heard since she was a child, a girl, a young woman. from home and from dust tumbles and from galateon -wild, untamed tales she still carries in her heart to this day. ]
If anything, that makes me more intrigued.
Would you like stories in return? Songs?
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[ 'Collecting' doesn't really do it justice. Her entire family hoarded. They hoarded artifacts and materials and creatures. To have things was a kind of power. They lined their private rooms with the items that resonated with them, covering the walls in their things, marking them like animals. A place where a Morrison had taken root always became oppressive with the weight of their collections. Smothering. ]
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Will any of those be efficient enough for a trade?
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As a thank you for this story. Seems right to start soon as possible.