What the...

[donotmail]

| characters | Arj and anyone!

| date/time | Wednesday afternoon, just after the crystals shatter

| location | 1st floor of the tree

| rating | PGish?

| summary | Arj gets a sudden welcome when the new floors open up!



Arj is outside when he hears the commotion. He'd slunk off into the outdoors some time earlier, in search of a quiet place to hide. Outside, he'd been overwhelmed by the vast forest in front of him. Did greenmount trees really get this big?

Of course none of it matters, because this is a hallucination, and he is going to be calm about it and not get into trouble. So he's found himself a nice hollow in one of the great tree's roots, and is how hiding behind a curtain of illusionary moss. He's curled up in a tight little ball, ears turning this way and that. He can hear things outside, people talking, but he is going to be sensible about this. There is no point whatsoever in talking to anyone who doesn't exist.

Until the crystalline sound of shattering pierces the air, and he startles, the 'moss' vanishing into nothing. Against his better judgement, he half runs, half slinks over the massive roots to the hollowed out trunk.

"What on Ryll was THAT?"

Comments

[donotmail]

If only it were acceptance. Arj would rather be anywhere than here, but if the tree wants something of him, then he'll take on any task imaginable. Whether or not he's any good at it.

"My name is Arj," he says, "and I am from Clan Aauron in the Heshroun Basin." There it is again, that word that sounds like Ryll in his head, as if his home was only one of many and not all that is. "From Ryll. The Ryll."

But what was that she'd said earlier? "Flying?" He takes note of the translucent butterfly wings on Celena's back. "I don't think I can-"

He stops. It didn't occur to him that the butterfly wings weren't a natural part of her body, any more than... "One moment." He digs through the leaf saddlebags on his back, and takes out the gem he found earlier, the dark blue one. He knows he's found it as soon as a pair of moth wings appear on his shoulders, folded neatly on his back. He keeps the stone in one paw so that he's standing on three legs. "These things work?"

[celena]

"It's an honour to make your acquaintance, Arj." She curtsied using the ends of her blouse in place of a skirt, then pulled a chain from under her collar, making her wings vanish as she revealed her day gem.

"Yes, they work, and they feel as natural to use as if we were born with them." She tucked her chain back into her shirt again and her wings reappeared. "Don't think of how to fly any more than you think about how to bend your knees when you walk. Just leap with the wish to fly and you'll fly!"

[donotmail]

Arj stares as the human's wings vanish and reappear, just as his own did. He places the gem on the ground and removes his paw, and feels the emptiness at his back as they disappear. A paw on the gem... and they appear yet again.

"Don't think?" he says. Once, long ago, he'd watched the clear desert skies as a tiny clan of Air kiarr passed overhead, little winged shapes in the blue. It was the only time he'd ever seen the sky-going species, and sometimes he'd wondered what it was like to fly too. Now that the prospect was actually in reach, though, all he could think of was how hard the floor suddenly seemed to be.

She's watching you! a part of his mind hissed at him. Do something!

He spreads the wings and looks back over his shoulder. They don't look like they could support his weight, yet Celena didn't have any difficulty. So he gives them an experimental flutter. Leap with the wish? What am I here?

And yet, he finds himself airborne. It's a clumsy first flight, and he bounces and veers like a cub trying to learn to use their legs, but he's most definitely off the ground! He's aware of that for about a second before the wings suddenly lock up with surprise and he plummets. Thankfully it's not far, but enough to make him feel very sore when he picks himself up.

"Maybe I should have wished a little more?