A return to the desert was made not in solitude but with a flock this go around; the raven and the rabbit, but not a Nazli. In fact, there would come to be no Nazli at the lake, and during the trek when hot air singes his lungs he wonders how the Queen and Red Prince will take news of her disappearance. Especially now, on the cusp of war.
Sun-eyes find the back of his raven’s neck, old tears mended by pink skin. With his muzzle he directs her attention to the blood mesa sitting on the horizon.
“Akashingo,” he introduces to them both.
As they draw to the base of the upland he stills, settling his steps into the loam and casts a high call for
@Tuna ,
@Toula or
@Senmut.
Soot Teller's words fall like leaves on his ears. He does not know the other dark-pelted wolf which accompanied them. Her presence did not offer clues as to her intentions, but she was there with them, and therefore Fallen had been trying to come up with a suitable name for her.
None flickered to light. Perhaps interaction was needed. The golden boy among them looked out over to the desert before them. It was far unlike the forests of his homeland, as blurry as those images were to him. He did not know what to call it, but it was... red, and ... sandy. Thus, the wolf decided to call this Red Sand.
An absolute naming genius.
But he had to wonder where Soot Teller was taking them and who he had called for. It smelt heavily of pack-scent, and felt odd to his paws. As if the land were troubled beyond his paws. Unease rested in his heart.
A maw guided hers. Where her nose and eyes had been put ahead of her, he shifted her to where she needed to be. Where the land of red sands towered above her in beauty. A cousin of dunes. A welcomed stranger got to experience this with them. That was fine. They could be with them. It wasn't just her who had made friends. She could tell, and she saw, and she heard as the quiet echo of her serpent's tongue quivered inside of his mouth, that he'd made friends too. He'd been busy. Even when bitter and casting into his eyes the stare of her own, she'd stayed ever so close to his side and trail. Even with the taste of sour in her mouth, she was never below brushing her shoulder to his.
She decided she would save watching him dive headfirst into a river for another sunny day!
When they arrive, when they are in the realm of Akashingo, as Seth once spilled into her ears, her head was. It was low with offered respect. Why, she might as well have been offering herself to be taken in as a willing prisoner to the desert.
Her smile turned into a simper, eyes squinted and dulled while she greeted the grounds alone for herself. "Hello."
a call is carried through the arid winds of the mesa and rouses Tuna from her duties to approach the borders with haste.
Upon the borders, she finds the Mazoi. And next to him stand two others, a fluttering shadow and a silent sunstone. Curious, curious things to Tuna as she draws closer to the trio before coming to stand in front of them.
with a respectful bow of her head, Tuna comes to greet Seth first. "Mazoi," she says politely before looking to the others, "who 'ave y'ah brought t'a th'a blessed Akashingo?" her brown gaze would come to meet the others for a moment before settling on the favored man of the divine Toula. And certainly, Tuna could appreciate that these two were oriented in a way of welcoming a powerful presence.
wolves. seth with them.
senmut drew down from the mesa and looked between them, these who the man had brought.
"give me your names." it was not so hard a command, but an order all the same, softened only by the presence of the mazoi.
For the golden fellahin with the curious twang, a dip of muzzle, and lower yet with a flourish of paw as the Red Prince makes his approach, a sharpness upon the tongue.
“My liege,” he is quick to allay, gesturing first the younger boy, “If I may. The Rabbit is a mute, but a loyal one.”
Then with a deeper purr, “My associate: Legend Sekhem. She brings news of the girl Nazli.”
Ohhh, he was HANDSOME!
Her head was daintily turned towards Seth's shoulders, holding there and watching the approach of a wolf of embers and taunting green eyes. They were shocking, demanded attention. She hurled it right at him, leaning her head away from her serpent's shoulder and swishing her tail. Nazli, Nazli, Nazli! Right. She came to speak about Seth's mystery lady on the run for the hills. Or dead. One or the other. Fine, she'd use her tongue as she needed! He asked so of her. Oh, and how Legend had ensured she'd done her job on such.
Two fast blinks battered from her eyes. She let them trail behind him, to the beautiful sands behind the approaching stranger. Long had she gently taken in its scent and let it burn all through her mind. Now it was this stranger, his face, and his coat that she let burn into her vision. Nodding her head down as she spoke, she quirked her smile on up.
"Oh, well, it is very nice to meet you!"
Fallen's own gaze rested over the approaching wolf. They looked... rather similar, and although silent, his head was full of questions that would go unasked and unanswered. ... Sand... Keeper? He thought to name this one, how he padded protectively over his territory. Sand Keeper, he'd call this new one. Some wolves were far easier to name than others; some needed one thought, others needed two or three. Fallen Sun's eyes were sharp.
But now he saw the young black wolf again, and a new name floated to his mind that he thought suited her, his own gaze observant and largely appearing nonchalant. After all, he had no idea what was being discussed, and words fell on unknowing ears. It was his greatest curse.
Little Lightning Bird.
A raven-black little one, energy coursing through her. Would she give him a better noise to call her?
the rabbit. senmut took in the red pelt akin to his, the observant eyes a shade darker than his own. in another world they might have been brothers.
to the woman, a slinking cast of shadows with striking grey eyes, who sought almost to gain his gaze and offered her own obeisance.
nazli.
"the pleasure is mine," senmut returned quietly, nodding once at seth, for the skills he had brought among them. "i am the prince of akashingo, second to Divine Queen toula."
legend sekhem. his eyes bid her speak of the girl.
A prince.
As immediate as he'd said so, her head fell into a delicate bow, ears pointed at Prince's throat. "Nazli."
A slight smile rested upon her lips. With averted eyes, she brought them elsewhere. To the sky, to the grass, to her tip-toes. and in a gentle and quaint, submissive voice that wished to tell all to the prince and land of Akashingo, "I have been at Lake. Weeks. Searching for lady Nazli." Eager, eager, eager.
Then, she looked to Seth, her movements slow only momentarily. Then, her eyes broke from the God and fell upon The Prince again. "She gone. Not at Lake. She may be a runaway. She has not been seen. I've been careful," swish, swish, swish went her tail. "And met Khaba. He is not doing well." Khaba, Khaba.. Khaba.. It had not been personal.
He sits still, like one of the sandstone pillars that flank Queen Toula’s dais. But his eyes wander where they will, holding first Tuna’s strong form, offering a particular glint. Then to the Rabbit who also saw all but perhaps understood very little. Shifting to his raven as she spins the plight of the lake and the absence of the desert girl in it, finally coming to brush over the Red prince who is listening closely.
Fallen Sun, indeed, understood little of what was going on. Soot Teller was there, so it couldn't be too awful bad, but what perhaps was exactly said was frustratingly out of his comprehension. The golden boy followed the black wolf he knew as Soot Teller, even if he couldn't quite tell the wolf of many words what he'd been calling him for so long.
His head tilted slightly, unable to figure out what the trio was doing, or who they were supposed to trust. He whined slightly.
nazli, gone. a disappointment.
but her searchers would not go without reward.
a fine, thin nod for the blazing legend. a look to the silent man, and another for the mazoi.
"will you join the palace?" he asked of the hunter and her quiet counterpart. that khaba was failing interested senmut greatly, though he reined the gleam of his green eyes.
"If you will take me, yes," and oh, how she wanted them to take her. Now that she saw it up close, pretty Akashingo, she wanted it. She WANTED it! How she wished live in it, bask in it, learn of it as lord Thoth had long likely done. There rested an open book, many treats and many secrets all for the taking, all for her. So, so many pages for her to uncover and unfold, yet she hoped it was not all open. She wanted it to tease her, and she was all too stimulated and exhilarated for it to. And how beautiful their people. Akashingo would be lovely, yeah? Nice and lovely?
Akashingo extended his fingers to her, and she fell into his arms for it to cradle her. Cradle me!
With a small dipped head and an ear-to-ear smile, she perked her ears up and batted her eyes. "Then I will be at your service." Let me work for you! She wanted to.
A pleasured look, the one that dances between the Red Prince and his raven. He’s known her long enough to see infatuation in its early devise slithering into her eyes. It’s power, it’s amusement, it’s hunger.
Seth will be once again a man of his word, even if so little a one could be delivered of the desert girl, his raven will find a place to perch, and the mute Rabbit an assembly of tutors.
Business is finished, unless a post-mortem is required he will await his leave.
gonna say last for me! <3
this legend, she seemed eager, loyal perhaps even at once to him. senmut ignored the flicker of satisfaction in him at this, and nodded.
the great man did not speak, and so to her,
"welcome to akashingo."
to sutekh, a nod, a shine of knowingness — and approval. senmut would turn away then to lead this legend into the palace.
She'd been given a gift.
And hungrily, she'd open it.
Lowly, behind a prince of red and earth, she took after his every step. A devout follower, dedicated to becoming a disciple. Disciplined, and would bend at her knees to be more so. Sanctuary in a land of Queens and Prince's, where she would offer herself. Welded. Her eyes met a final glance to Sutekh, until they fell upon the spine in front of her; his fur, the reds, the mirror of the earth below their bodies, and in her eyes, she saw the rough edges of it too.
Hello, Akashingo.