OOM All Skate Skellig Dream Magic Weirdness -Part Nine

[brave_kreyu]

Kreyu has gathered plenty of henna and even woad, a blue dye, for some experiments with designs on Skellig's skin.

"The blue would look lovely on you, I think," she remarks. "Your fairer skin would show it off quite well. Though I am far more experienced in applying henna."

She's gathered bits and pieces of designs to look at for inspiration. Celtic style knots, viking style abstract patterns and stylized beasts, the mandala and floral type designs he's admired on her, and more.

Comments

[27_53]

"I am more than willing to be your canvas," Skellig says. "We will have to practice regardless, before any festivities when it comes time to do so."

He casually thumbs through the drawings and sketches she's brought out.

"Some of these would look good in blue," he agrees, glancing up at her. "I know it is not the full color of my eyes, but I've seen it against my skin with the silks, and it is..."

He does not need to finish the sentence, because he KNOWS she likes the way he looks near the color. And that headscarf he picked up at the market nearly sent her over the edge...

[brave_kreyu]

"I should probably start with something relatively simple," she muses. "This one, perhaps?"

"And since you will have to be still for quite some time for the color to take, I thought we might discuss sacred stories of other cultures that could be adapted to work with the ritual?"

[27_53]

"I will manage to sit still," he promises. "Without having to be tied up."

The smirk he gives her is anything but innocent, but he nods at the drawing. That would be a fine place to start, let her get warmed up, so to speak. "Where would you want to put it?" He glances around the room of the Lair. "And where would you have me?"

[brave_kreyu]

She laughs at his response. "I'm sure you will."

"We should make a nest of sorts on the floor, away from the more precious bedding. I know I have some sheets of linen somewhere." Eventually, she finds the right chest.

"I was thinking on your torso, perhaps your chest? Somewhere with a large and relatively flat surface."

[27_53]

Once they have created a sufficient 'nest' on the floor with a mix of cushions, linens, pillows, and blankets - Skellig settles in to 'test' out the comfort level, flopping softly onto it all.

"This will suffice."

He allows his wings to shake out softly as he finishes getting comfortable, finding a good way for him to sprawl out where she'll have access to his chest.

[brave_kreyu]

She smiles at him, warm and soft, when he says it will suffice. "Good. I want to be sure you're comfortable."

And he looks lovely, sprawled there in the 'nest'. Her materials are set on a tray within easy reach as she settles next to him.

"The same themes tend to pop up over and over in sacred stories about fertility. A male-female pair, one or both divine or supernatural in nature."

[27_53]

"With you by my side? I would be comfortable on a pile of rocks," he teases gently - though there is an underlying honesty and gratitude in his voice she will be able to pick up on. "You are more than capable of building a fine 'nest', my love."

He adjusts his position slightly as she settles in next to him.

"And you are the only mate I would desire to share one with," he adds. "Which may add well to the stories they will craft about us."

Because yes... he knows they already tell legends of the Great Lady Kreyu...he heard several accounts from excited chattering as they waited in line for her audience in the square. So he knows there will be stories and tales that will bloom once their relationship is revealed.

[brave_kreyu]

She laughs at his teasing. "It took some time how to learn to build a proper nest for this shape. My dragon shape can sprawl quite contentedly on metal and stone without issue, but this form is far more delicate."

She marks out the rough design in charcoal on the left side of his chest, fussing with it to get it just right, to get the feel of the lines.

"And I would desire no other mate than you, my love." She chuckles. "Given that some have already combined me with the Winged Goddess, I would wager you are likely to be combined with the King of the Gods in the same way over time. Although the Goddess rescuing her lover or husband from death or the underworld seems to crop up most everywhere people have taken strongly to agriculture."

[27_53]

"It will be intriguing to see how my persona is shaped over time," he admits. "If I must be honest, before I found myself in the desert I paid no attention to such thoughts, as I had little reason to look forward towards the horizon."

He remains still while she works to finesse the line work on his skin.

"But all of that has changed." (Meeting her, their union, his most recent 'conversation' with Death...all of it has adjusted and shifted things.) "You have rescued me," he says. "That is no myth."

[brave_kreyu]

"It will be," she agrees. "You might pick up some influence from various Gods of the hunt or the forest as well. Some of them are depicted winged, and most are lovers or husbands of an Earth goddess of one kind or another."


"And you have rescued me," she replies. "My heart and my mind before my body, but a rescue all the same."

[27_53]

"I have seen the owls of the desert back home," he says. (His reference to 'home' is to the village, in this case.) "Their feathers are colored a bit different than my own. I am not as adept in shifting forms as you are, but if it would help things if...if I were to blend in...I could try to adjust them."

There is a slight hint of something in his voice she will pick up on - it is not outright hesitation, not sadness, just...something. She will likely understand it, as she herself has probably felt like the 'outcast' or 'oddity' many times over her lifetimes.

"Though I know with my skin as fair as it is, I will always be a bit different," he says. He glances down at his chest, at her hand resting on his skin - and while his tan is slowly improving, it will never be the same as a native of the region, and he doesn't expect that. "And that I do not mind."


[OOC: The owls Skellig is referring to are known today as the Pharaoh Eagle Owl. Wiki Link, Image in Flight.]

[brave_kreyu]

She leans down to kiss his forehead. "I do not think it would make a great deal of difference, and I would prefer you not need to make an effort, when you are known here as my husband." She does know that feeling, would not wish the discomfort of it on anyone.

Happy with the charcoal lines, she begins to put the woad on his skin. "You are unique, my love." She pauses. "At least, I think you are unique." She sighs. "There was a story, involving a Goddess of the Wood, and a man born with the wings of an owl, who became her lover and husband. My brother has spoken to me of the Winged Folk, but he has only spoken of those with wings of diurnal birds."

"I had thought, thought that it might be a clue as to your own people, your kind. But I have heard the tale only third hand, and the people from whom it came have suffered terribly from dealings with dragons in the past."

[27_53]

Skellig is interested by this information, but he does not press for more details - especially after she adds the comment about the Winged Folk suffering, even though he doubts highly that any of her brood had anything to do with such.

"It would not be wise to traumatize them just in search of answers," he says. "I do not need to know where I am from, or if I am even related to their kind. I belong here," he taps his fingertips gently on his chest near his heart (away from where she is working to apply the woad, mindful of her efforts as she applies the dye) "With you.

He sighs happily.

"Besides, if I am unique...that just makes our relationship that much stronger. Because it strengthens the fact that I am the only one you would choose to have stand at your side."

[brave_kreyu]

They did not, but those Winged Folk are understandably leery of any dragon!

"You may be able to ask them yourself someday," she muses. "Or we may mend relations with them through intermediaries over time."

"You would be unique even if there many thousands of your kind," she assures him. "My Skellig."

"Would you hear the tale, as best I can remember it?"

[27_53]

"Your Skellig," he affirms quietly. "Only yours."

This is a different type of intimacy, one that he is finding he enjoys just as much as their other 'activities' they get involved in.

"Of course I would hear it. You are a fine storyteller, and I quite enjoy listening to your voice, no matter the subject."

Nevermind the fact that she has him held 'captive' here in this nest, as she applies the color to his skin, and he must sit still to avoid it from smearing. He still enjoys being this close to her.

[brave_kreyu]

She is visibly pleased when he says she is a good storyteller and that he enjoys listening to her voice.

"The name of the people, of the tribe, varies, but the stories agree that they lived near a great forest. The tribe depended on the forest for their survival, for building shelter, for food, for goods and pelts to trade with other tribes."

"Most of the stories say a boy was born among them who bore the wings of an owl, though the difficult birth killed his mother and his father had died of fever some months before he was born. Others suggest he was a foundling, that they found him clinging to life by a woman's body who bore wings like his."

THOSE versions were what made Kreyu wonder if there might be more truth to the tales.

[27_53]

Skellig listens carefully as she speaks - his focus is on her voice as she speaks and on her touch as she applies the dye to his skin. His eyes do close to better allow his mind to visualize the images as she paints them with her words.

None of them are outright pleasant images, but they are important to 'see' regardless.

(And it makes him wonder, just a little bit...how did he come into existence, in this world? Was it a similar origin story as these tales? While he has never known truly how he came to be, and it has never really bothered him, there has occasionally been an ache when he considers it, watching young ones play with their parents, or more recently as when he watched the way Iset gazed happily at Neferet as they waited to visit with the Great Lady.

Did he have a mother, once?)

"Not an easy upbringing, with either option."

[brave_kreyu]

"No," Kreyu replies, voice soft, and slightly sorrowful. She can't help but picture the boy as Skellig, in her mind.

"The tribe raised him as one of their own, took care of him communally. As he grew, it became clear that he was aware of things others were not, attuned to the mystical and the uncanny. They did not quite know what to make of him, how he should fit within the tribe."

She paints the woad on his skin, her touch gentle. "It was an edge life he lived, among them. Part of them, yet not fitting in. He was more at home in the wild than among the dwellings of the village. The great celebrations were the hardest for him to endure, for though he was welcome at them, the places where he did not fit with them hurt more at such times."

There is more sadness in her voice as she pictures Skellig in his place. "As he grew into a man, he learned that though they would drink and feast with him, neither man nor woman would invite him to lay with them or accept such an invitation from him should he offer it."

[27_53]

As he listens, the image of himself in the place of the boy grows more solid and stronger, as he knows all too well the feelings she is describing - the feeling of being the outcast, the strange one, the 'freak' among those who would call themselves 'normal'.

"Community helps," he says quietly. "If one is lucky enough to have one to surround them. But it cannot replace the bonds formed by family."

[brave_kreyu]

"No," she agrees. "I understand that now, more than I ever did before."

"The tribe worshiped many gods, but the greatest among them was the goddess of the forest. The stories paint her in different ways. In some tales she is more of an entity to be feared, appeased. The tribe lets their own blood for her as an offering from time to time, and when she is very hungry a person of the tribe might be devoured outright, vanish in the forest. In others, she is gentler most of the time, but can be angered greatly by disrespect, by not receiving her due from humankind."

[27_53]

"She sounds as if she is not one to be trifled with," he comments, voice wry. "Though some of that legend could have been aided by those who simply wandered into the forest not to return, lost their way, and their disappearing needed a better explanation other than a poor sense of direction."

He is careful not to laugh, even as he might like to.

[brave_kreyu]

"Indeed. Or someone who chose to leave the tribe without telling anyone," her tone is wry.

She is careful as she paints on his skin. "Some tales say she grew angry, withheld her bounty. Others that the tribe gave a greater offering than normal at long intervals and when the time came they could not offer Her the greater bounty. The tribe agreed that someone must go into the forest, seek the Goddess, plead for their sake, but they were afraid. They knew that whoever went might never return."

"He who was born winged volunteered to go, to enter the forest in search of the goddess."

[27_53]

Listening carefully, she has his full attention now - and it is not only due to her 'prowess' as a storyteller, or due to the subject matter (and the 'main character' of the one who was born winged) - and his gaze is focused on her hands as she works on him.

"Interesting that he would offer himself as a potential sacrifice," he says. "Perhaps not out of a desire to gain the appreciation of his tribe...could have been due to the fact that he felt as if nothing could be worse than the feeling of being outcast."

Not even death. Death might have been a relief...

[brave_kreyu]

Her hands are moving slowly but deftly as she applies the woad. There is sorrow in her voice and her face as he mentions his reason as to why the winged man might have offered himself. "The stories do not speak of WHY he made that choice, but that reason had occurred to me also."

"I do not know that I could stop myself from trying to ease the pain of one so burdened. Especially now, when my mind would cast you in such a role."

"He knew the Forest well, its ways and paths, and he was strong and clever. He traveled to the forest's heart, to a spring where She was rumored to sometimes come to bathe."

[27_53]

"Speaking honestly..." Skellig sighs, bringing a hand to rest on his stomach - he is not interrupting her motions, but part of his subconscious simply wishes to feel a bit 'closer' to her, nearer her touch as he does so. "I have wished before to have Death call upon me, have asked Them in my darkest moments for the pain to be taken from me. Obviously...there were many reasons that did not occur, that I could not have understood at the time."

The largest one being the surprise of his arrival in an arid desert and being rescued by a winged goddess...and falling madly head over heels in love with her.

(There is more he wishes to say, but he does not want to interrupt her telling of the legend, so he holds his thoughts for now.)

"If I was the one born winged, I would have studied the forest in great detail. Found places to hide, seek sanctuary..."