OOM: All Skate Skellig Dream Magic Weirdness? -Part Two

[brave_kreyu]

Kreyu intended to dance in the sky with Skellig the very next day, but events have conspired to prevent that from occurring. A raid on the village by former soldiers meant many wounded to heal and much damage to fix. Akatan's sister, Neferet, has a definite crush, an infatuation, with Skellig. She hasn't done anything but look and exchange some friendly words, but it still makes her brother FURIOUS.

For all that Euripedes was from a different time and place, a line he had Medea speak in the play of the same name still rings true: "I would rather stand three times in the line of battle than once bear a child." Even with Kreyu's magic, with Taweret's skill, childbirth is incredibly dangerous. There are reasons why Taweret's goddess image of She Who Is Great has elements of the hippo, the lion, and the crocodile, a fearsome appearance to drive off the many threats facing a woman giving birth. The second birth in a week began this morning and was still going on when the sun began to set. Not a good sign.

Skellig, trying to burn off nervous energy while Kreyu was working, happened across a few of the village men drinking. They said things about Kreyu they should not have said. That he was FEEDING on Kreyu, drinking her blood. There...may have been a fight. At least they don't think he's a demon anymore, you can't give a demon a black eye in a brawl with your fists!

It is truly night now, and Skellig can hear Kreyu's tired footsteps on the road...

(OOC: Warning for explicit adult content starting around tag 194.)

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[brave_kreyu]

Kreyu wakes up while he is returning to their blanket. She looks at him like he is quite the loveliest person she's ever seen.

"I am thinking very wicked things, when I look at you," she tells him. She stretches, limbs and wings both. "Dreadfully wicked."

[27_53]

He might be puffing his chest up a little, cocking his head to the side just so, to allow better angulation of his jaw in the dappled sunlight...

"Is that so?" He asks, all innocence in his voice.

Skellig looks himself over, up and down, then looks back at her, before shaking off his wings behind him - careful not to get her (really, their blankets) wet with any droplets.

"Perhaps while we are foraging, you can tell me of them."

[brave_kreyu]

"Perhaps," she allows. "Or I might let them sit and simmer for a while, for later."

"The island's quite rocky, difficult to traverse, but we both have wings." She grins. "Looks like a fair stretch of woods right up at the top of this cliff. Could be all kinds of tasty things in there."

She leaps skyward for a few hard wing beats, then alights at the top of the cliff.

There are wild greens growing at the edge of the trees that she makes a pleased sound upon finding. There are even flowers in sunset colors blooming at the edges of the forest.

Kreyu inspects the greens carefully, looking for choice specimens to show Skellig.

[27_53]

Skellig is following along carefully as she inspects things and paying close attention to what she's looking at - after all, he does want to learn what they can eat safely, and what to avoid - but he makes note of the flowers, his heartbeat briefly quickening at the idea that pops into his mind of gathering some for her.

(That is what men do for their lovers, he thinks? It is at least what birds do, to decorate their nests...)

But he will get those perhaps on their way back, when she is not looking...

"I know the kelp from the sea is edible," he offers, as he observes her making selections. "But as far as these plants...I have no idea."

[brave_kreyu]

She smiles at him, oblivious to his potential plans re flowers.

"This one here is a wild spinach," she explains. She plucks a leaf, tears it in half, and offers one half to Skellig. "And this one here, I do not know what it is called, but it has a sharper, stronger taste." That one is also offered as a sample.

A mushroom pokes up from the ground near a tree. "That mushroom there, that one is deadly. You don't even want to touch it, if you can help it."

[27_53]

Skellig takes the offered samples and chews them - they taste like 'green' to him, so his opinion as far as if they are 'good' or not is limited, but at the very least he knows they are edible.

And he eyes the mushroom, nodding.

"I will avoid those."

He squints slightly, as if something is triggered in his mind, a memory.

"Do...some of them...cause you to see the unseen, if you drink them in a tea?"

[brave_kreyu]

"There are some that are said to open the mind to seeing the spirit world, to unseen things. Others say they just cause the mind to play tricks, perceive illusions. I don't know if either is true, or both."

"Given my power, seeing something that isn't there could be quiet hazardous to whatever is around me."

She frowns as they comb through the forest for mushrooms. "Technically, one CAN eat those, but they taste dreadful. If we were starving, perhaps."

"Ah, a bit of luck!" she says later. There are blackberries still on the vines, hidden among the thorns. She covers her arms in scales to protect them while she digs in for the treats. Once she's retrieved the little jewels, she presses one to his lips, still warm from the sun.

[27_53]

"Avoid most all of the mushrooms...got it."

That is simple enough.

As he watches her shift her arms to become covered in scales, he nods, impressed. "That's quite a useful trick." He would have just fought his way through the thorns, and ended up bleeding with much fewer berries than she manages to collect.

The blackberry is perfectly ripe, and he makes a little sound of pleasure after she feeds it to him.

"Now those...those are very good."

[brave_kreyu]

She preens a little at his praise. "It is something I am very good at doing and that most dragons can't do readily. I could take almost any human or animal shape I pleased, if I wanted to expend the energy to do so."

And the sound of pleasure he makes shouldn't make heat coil in her gut, but it does. She may be planning on feeding him MOST of the berries.

"I think we've found most of what there is in this section at least. "Might be more to find along the shore."

She heads back the way they came, which would give him the opportunity to grab some flowers.

[27_53]

Skellig trails along a few steps behind her, allowing her to 'scout' the way - and then once they near the edge of the forest, he quickly selects several of the brightest blossoms, collecting the stems in hand - along with another interestingly colored stone along the cliff's edge.

He might use a bit of cheating to hide her attentions from the flowers, stashing them near their 'camp' before they head to walk along the shoreline where it is easy enough to do so.

Another piece of sun-dried kelp sits upon a stone, fresh baked in the sun - he cracks a piece of it into 'bite sized' bits with his hand, and offers a chunk to her.

"It is salty, from the sea," he cautions. "But has good flavor. It pairs well with the meat you left from the whale. I have also cooked it before, in soup." (Another memory, filtering through the hazy clouds that cover his mind.)

[brave_kreyu]

She takes a bite of it, intrigued. "It's good," she says after she's finished chewing. "Maybe we should take some with us, when we go back. We can try to make a soup with it at home."

Not 'her' home, just 'home'. Because it's their home now, in her mind.

[27_53]

"I will be sure to gather enough to do so, before we return. It is best collected fresh and hung to dry, but on these rocks, it is clean enough."

Her wording is not lost to him, and he smiles broadly.

Home.

There are tidepools nearby, and while Skellig is not a huge fan of seafood, perhaps there is something that might work for her. However, his distraction is quickly caught by a glistening shell at the water's edge, and he hurries over to get it.

[brave_kreyu]

Kreyu's gaze is caught by his sudden hurry, and she follows quickly. It doesn't seem a 'trouble' kind of hurry, but she's curious.

[27_53]

Skellig has to fight an incoming wave that threatens to steal his 'prize', but with a victorious shout he grabs for - and emerges with - with a shimmering greenish-blue abalone shell, outer coating worn down by the waves to expose the colors underneath, hints of purple and pink also visible.

"Now this --" he turns and looks at her, and presents it to her proudly. "Is what I was looking for earlier."

[brave_kreyu]

"Oh, it's lovely! Thank you."

She takes it very carefully, then stands slightly on tiptoe to kiss him.

[27_53]

The kiss is a welcome 'reward' for the gift, though truly none is needed to be given. But he returns it, happily.

"What else do you think we could find along the shoreline," he asks, once they break and resume walking. "That could be of use?"

[brave_kreyu]

"I don't think the tide's in the right position for us to find many shellfish."

The sun is getting lower in the sky. "We might want to head back with what we have and start working on dinner."

Kreyu is already idly turning over meal prep in her mind, washing the produce they've gathered, cooking methods.

[27_53]

"I am not fond of shellfish," he admits. "But it would not bother me if you ate them."

Walking back towards their 'camp', he stops to gather more driftwood along the way when he finds particularly good pieces that are dry and will burn well. There is also a feather, from a random shorebird, which he tucks behind one of his ears to keep it safe as they walk.

And a few more shells.

"What would you have me do?" He asks, as they return - acting nonchalant and innocent about the flowers which he has gathered, and are laid upon the flat rock he had been using as a 'table' for himself. She will notice them.

[brave_kreyu]

"Anything you think would help. The fire will probably need fuel, things will need to be washed, meat cooked."

She notices the flowers. "I, were those there before?"

[27_53]

Slightly sheepish, he shrugs his shoulders.

"I gathered them on our way back from fetching things from the forest." The wood he's collected is left in the pile he started a few days ago, and the new shells are added to the ones he's got saved aside on another rock. "They remind me of the sunset. And of the way your skin glows, when the sunlight moves across it."

[brave_kreyu]

She flushes in pleasure. "Thank you. You'll spoil me, bringing me all these gifts." She touches them so very gently.

"Do you want to tend the fire while I wash what we've collected?"

[27_53]

Moving to tend to the fire, he grabs a longer stick to stir at the coals, breaking down the bed in preparation for adding fresh fuel.

"You are welcome," he says, also slightly flushed - though it is more from a nervous sort of energy, a mix of emotions that are a bit unfamiliar warring with each other in his mind and in his heart. "It...spoiling you is not a bad thing." (And he doesn't think that she feels that way, he just struggles with his words for a moment.) "You...you are my mate, it is just...right."

That is a very, very basic and broken down way of saying I love you and I want to spoil the hell out of you so get used to it but it is what he can manage for the moment.

[brave_kreyu]

It might be basic and broken down, but she understands it. She smiles brightly. "Then we'll spoil each other, when we can."

Once the greens are washed, they'll wind up getting wrapped, uncooked, around thin slices of whale tenderloin seared on hot rocks by the fire. The berries are fine just as they are, and she takes a certain pleasure in feeding them to him directly.

She's leaning against him as the stars start to come out, plotting exactly how she plans to drive him to ecstasy.

[27_53]

He is completely and utterly relaxed in this moment, her body leaning against his as they sit together by the fire. And while the majority of his mind believes that this is real, this place he has found himself called to...a small portion is still unsure, and thinks that perhaps he has died.

He is not religious. Does not believe in any one god or pantheon.
But if this is heaven, if this is the afterlife, or wherever 'good' souls end up going...

He is grateful he ended up here.

Tracing delicate patterns on her skin with his fingertips, he is watching the stars pop out as the light fades, looking for ones she spoke to him about the night before. He knows she has 'plans' for him in her mind, but those are not his focus right now.

[brave_kreyu]

A real place, an afterlife, or could it be a dream? A long, STRANGE, dream, but one so sweet he would never want to wake from it? Who knows.

She hums as he traces patterns on her skin, enjoys the quiet with him. When the last of the daylight has faded, he can see some of the stars she spoke about the night before.

She kisses his neck, soft. "I would give you pleasure," she whispers in his ear. "Shall I slip behind you right here, coax your wings open, then find every sensitive spot I couldn't reach last time? Or would you prefer to lay on your belly in our bed, let me pleasure you there?"