Here kitty, kitty come and tighten the leash;
How about a little discipline for the violent beast!

Growling in frustration, Lurid smacked a nearby sapling with enough force to break it. Where was she!? Searching in vain was what it felt like, as though she would never find her little sister. Lurid hated to waste her time chasing ghosts, and the longer Atropos was gone, the more angry the pale goddess got with her. The small purple healer was supposed to meet her at their home on the ship, not get herself lost in the northern wilderness. Searching the forest where she had been hidden all these months as she recovered from her mysterious illness, Lurid could not find a single trace of her sister.

The childlike demoness was sure playing a good round of hide and seek this time. Lurid couldn't even find a trace of her, it was as if Atropos had disappeared entirely. Ilyn looked at his queen, curious about her mood. Grumpy didn't quite cover it, but enraged was too strong a word for it. Growling again, Lurid sat down in the snow and leaf litter, once again at square one. How on earth would she find her sister before winter truly set in? This cold was only a taste of what would come, Lurid had spent enough time in the north to know. A pang of genuine sadness struck at the thought that little Atropos was tracking her, also in vain, only to get lost in the snow. This only added to her sour mood. Samael dropped down to rest on the angry empress' shoulder, wrapping a wing around her as if he were comforting her. In his way he was, 'We will find her, my queen, and when we do she can pay hell.' Ilyn patrolled around them, also looking for any sign of life from the fairy-sized witch. Lurid said nothing in return, simply shrugged the raptor off of her shoulder and sat down.

Word count: 316 words. || "Talk." || 'Think.' || 'Hear.'

Note: Sorry it's so short! Will get better <3

Swinging machetes in a crowded room;
And now I'm coming after you!

ART

It was rare that Tethys went far from home at all, and when she did decide to wander it was almost always in the lands surrounding the Armada. Why would she need to go anywhere else, when she had everything she needed right here? Not that food was terribly abundant in the midst of winter, but they weren't hurting for prey bad enough to send them far from home anyway. They were northern wolves and they knew all about surviving so far removed from the rest of Boreas.

She let out a sigh as she moved through the forest, her head low to the ground and she tested the scents that she passed. Some vaguely familiar, most not known to her at all. Her attention was torn away from her task at hand by the sound of someone moving through the forest, not far off from her at all now. The yearling was still and silent for a long while, dark tail pausing at her hocks where it had just been swaying, head lifting as she searched for the source of the movement.

It took her a long while to find the white-coated female, given how easily her coat blended into the surrounding snowy landscape. The stranger was not alone though, a rather large bird standing next to her in a way that signified their comfort with one another. A strange companionship, one that Tethys couldn't possibly begin to understand but it wasn't her place to either. After deliberating for a long moment, the girl made her presence known with a soft bark before approaching. "Afternoon," she greeted the stranger, maintaining a reasonably distance between them while she waited for a response - and assessed this stranger's risk level.

code & art © skelle 2023

Here kitty, kitty come and tighten the leash;
How about a little discipline for the violent beast!

Crunching snow was hard to hide, even for the pale demonic queen who could usually walk around without a single sound beneath her paws. Pensive, she sat still as a statue, trying to ignore the instinct to continue her search for her sister. Lurid needed a break from her wild goose chase. Ilyn gave a small growl just as the scent of pack wolf invaded her nostrils. 'Afternoon.' Came a small bark from behind her, the miniature polar bear would pay for his failure soon enough. So lost in thought she had been that she hadn't even heard the girl approach. Turning that holographic white and lavender gaze on the girl, Lurid kept her expression blank. "Salvete," she spoke in hoarse, flat tones, her throat still not healed from her illness.

Turning the rest of the way to face the stranger, Lurid took a better look at the girl. She sat a respectful and smart distance away, and while her pelt would be a beautiful addition to Lurid's trove, she smelled strongly of a pack. If she remembered correctly this was the smell of the Armada, a pack she still could not afford any sort of heat with. "What brings you out here? Surely you should be with your pack. It is not wise to run through these woods all alone." She should know, she was the reason it wasn't safe. Lurid spoke in dulcet tones, her voice cracking every now and then. Yes, this one would make for a nice meal. It was unfortunate that she should belong to a pack as strong as the Armada was rumored to be. Darkly pelted with pretty hues of red and blue strewn over her, it was the molten orange of her eyes that Lurid was drawn to. Oh, to be able to pluck those eyes out of that pretty head and put them in a jar. Atropos would love them as a gift.

Anger rose, though she hid the emotion from the stranger. Atropos should be here, to help with situations like these. Lurid had never been good at idle chatter, she always had better things to do than sit and talk about nothing. Today, now, there was nothing to do but wait for her little sister to show back up and maybe entertain a kid. "I am called Lurid. What is your name?" Trying to keep her mind off of her missing siblings, Lurid made an attempt at making her mood better. Melancholy was better, right?

Word count: 423 words. || "Talk." || 'Think.' || 'Hear.'

Note: Hover over Latin to see translation.

Swinging machetes in a crowded room;
And now I'm coming after you!

ART

Most wolves were quite hard for Tethys to relate to, even those very close to her, so a stranger felt like something completely foreign to her. At least with her packmates she could tell their intentions were good, but a stranger was significantly more difficult to even begin to understand. The yearling kept her distance as she greeted the pretty woman, studying Lurid's expression carefully as she replied to Tethys with a word she didn't understand. Strange. Her next words were even more odd to Tethys though. She couldn't quite tell if the stranger was being threatening or helpful; but either way she was pretty sure she didn't need her advice.

"I'm not far from home," she admitted after a moment of thought. The yearling spoke factually and without hint of much emotion at all. Maybe a wolf more in tune with the finer nuances of vocal inflection would be more threatened by Lurid, but Tethys couldn't quite tell what she was getting it. "I was scouting out some prey though. Seeing where a good place to hunt soon might be." Not that the Armada was necessarily starving but winter was an often merciless season, and having an eye out for where their next meal might come from was never a bad idea. Being prepared was important, something she was realizing more and more as she got older.

"I'm Tethys Fatalis," she introduced herself with a slow dip of her head. "Nice to meet you, Lurid. Do you live around here, then?" Small talk was not her biggest strength but she knew it was a necessity to get to know someone. Not that she could tell if this woman really wanted to talk or not anyway.

code & art © skelle 2023