[Official NPC]

Rider Sianet Urielle clicked her tongue twice and leaned slightly so that her bondmate banked to the left. Below her stretched a seemingly endless range of snow-capped mountains skirted by a vast forest of trees that would be dwarfed by those of her homeland.

Another click and Cormet spiralled into an updraft that took them higher over a fortified settlement built on a high plateau. Urielle steered the myst closer for a better look, twisting in the saddle as movement caught her eye and Cormet turned right. At first, she was unconcerned. So far in her reconnaisance of the forest south and east of the portal, she had not encountered a soul capable of meeting she and Cormet in battle. Much as it was back home, it seemed that mysts were the kings of the skies, with only the larger predators to worry about. Armed with her bow and shrouded in Cormet's mists, she did not expect anyone to challenge her, and could out-altitude any who did.

As Cormet swooped lower, however, she realised that the citizens of this fortification had wings of their own! Several of them were clumping together in tight formation, pointing up toward Cormet's shroud and yelling. Curiosity guided Urielle's hand and she pulled the reins to starboard, silently asking her bondmate to loop around for another look.

The small formation was taking off, great wings flapping in a display of feathered power that startled her. It would seem that mysts were not the kings of the sky here, after all. In which case, "Time to leave, Cormet."

The myst's wings scooped air and the shroud was dissipated by the sudden burst of speed. Urielle guided her bondmate higher into the clouds.

[Aella]

Crunch.
Crunch.
Crunch.

Every plodding step of the massive helion echoed off impassive, cresting mountain summits, frosted and ethereal and all too abundant. The accumulated snow blanketing the ground melted and evaporated in an instant, and so the helion and its rider left behind a winding trail of hoove-shaped marks, stone and soil exposed to the despondent gray sky. Hel was overhead somewhere, though not visible. To Aella it felt oddly remote, as if that impossibly far object had moved even farther away; maybe it had even abandoned Elysia altogether.

Off in the distance, some animal gave a sharp cry, and it slashed through both her sullen thoughts and through the solemn, rhythmic crunching definitive of the pair's wintry journey.

Aella turned towards her approximation of the sound's source and waited. She did not have the skill to track or hunt, and the creature sounded too far away to be dangerous. Nevertheless, caution took precedence.

Her companion snorted, impatient and burdened by packs filled to the brim.

She had checked the order more than she'd like to admit, not wanting to disappoint her Anyeli client and not wanting to make a far and treacherous journey only to be told that she had forgotten some piece of armor. The route would have been impossible (or at least impractical) before she had the fortune to bond with her animal companion; ever since that day, Elysia seemed ever-smaller, and the raw beauty unexplored in the world and its mysteries felt that much closer to her unyielding grasp.

It was not strange of her, then, to accept such a request a month's travel away. She was a nymph living in the desolate paradise of the Dusky Mountains, and she missed not the trees or the warmth of her former life.

With caution she marked her location on Noyle's tattered map, and not hearing the noise again, continued onward.

That is, until she noticed a strange rust-colored shape blotting the steel-colored sky. It descended at a shallow angle towards what appeared to be the ruins of an old Anyeli fortress to the north-west. It paused, hovered, and Aella squinted to determine what it was: some sort of flying creature to be sure, though too small to be a dragon. She had never seen anything like it and was instinctively curious.

Her thigh pressed urgingly against the warm flank of her companion; no spoken word was necessary.

It did not take the helion long to bound up the gradual slope leading towards the crennelated walls nestled deep against the mountain's face. The wind tousled her hair and elicited goosebumps along her bare arms. She shivered involuntarily.

And then she shivered for another reason entirely. A myriad of Anyeli soldiers burst forth from the structure once thought abandoned (and not marked on her map, she noted), and the flying beast had enshrouded itself in a type of mist or dense air to obscure its hasty retreat. The scene unfolded before her in an instant, but its effects upon her were profound. She sensed some mastery of air unbeknownst to her and yearned for it. And yet, she felt an odd sense of danger. She had not been spotted (it seemed unlikely that the Anyeli would look down, after such a spectacle occurred overhead), and she was unconcerned with their questions should they notice her. It was something else, something she could not quite place or reason or find, something much like Hel smoldering away unseen beneath the glaucous, emotionless sky.

Whatever it was, it chilled her more than the cold ever could.

Piper's Boutique || Jessica Clark