Nova Peak i have had horrible nightmares ever since

the early morning is clear; devoid of clouds, allowing the moonbeams to splay across the landscape unfettered. it illuminates his path as the scorched kommandant weaves like the phantoms he is named for thru the soft mist that kisses the forest floor, brushing against the needles of the evergreens, frost glimmering off the emerald grasses and needles at the base of the peak where he presently dwells. he keeps a steady gait, drawing in the comforting touch of the moonlight upon his back as he drifts out from the shadows of the evergreens —

— only to come to an abrupt halt.

the north half of the forest is as scorched as he; trees blackened skeletons, some broken halfway up their trunks. the earth is scarred, devoid of grasses. pupils widen in their mismatched irises, breath trembles out unevenly from betwixt his lips.

he is frozen; a soft wail of horror dragging itself from deep within his chest.

geist trembles from head to toe; choking on black and engulfing smoke that only he can see, trembles from the blistering heat that only he can feel; ears plaster against his skull as the screams of the woodland creatures unfortunate enough to be stuck in the flames as he was are left to the unmerciful whims of hellfire.

abruptly, he understands why he was drawn here; the haunting becoming so effortlessly and so helplessly the haunted.

She had travelled down from Sunspire, aiming for some time alone from her packmates. She liked them, of course, but it was nice to run beneath the moon without being slowed or having to wait. The golden she-wolf slows to a brisk walk as she weaves between the lush green trees, pine needles pricking her pads. Forests are not favoured in her mind, the open skies and soft sand beneath her paws are much more pleasant. Here among the trees she sticks out like a sore thumb, her red pelt turning her to a brand of fire in the moonlight, a ghost of what had once happened here.

Suddenly, the trees are black. The ground is charred, barren. It takes her breath away, but only for a moment, for now she has sensed another. He stands there, frozen so still she's sure he's dead. No, his chest moves. Auriel watches him for a long time, wondering if perhaps he died here in these flames and is actually a spirit doomed to wonder the scorched forest. "Are you alright?" Her accent is strong, placed somewhere across the sea to the sandy ocean of her homeland.

a flame moves across the blackened and scarred landscape; singular as it draws ever nearer. a flash of a figure that is distinctly wolf is photographed like the quick snap of a camera's shutter in his widened pupils before he sees the blackened landscape go up in sweltering flame; belching thick plumes of smoke and ash. glowing embers float by him, stinging his eyes. he blinks rapidly, breath rattling from his lungs like they are still full of smoke and ash and he retches in front of the she-wolf. in the stubborn clutches of his episode he expects the contents of his stomach to be black.

instead, it is normal in color — mostly spittle.

she asks him something in common but geist cannot keep his gaze upon her. he does not wish to look upon her fiery pelage. at least, not here. and yet, try as he might to will his legs to move they feel like iron bolted to the forest floor; refusing to move.

he does not answer her, because while he can glean a rough assumption from the tone she used: mild concern upon an accent that sounds as foreign to him as the common she uses ...he does not think he could find his voice regardless; ravaged by the hellfire as his body.

She feels a deep, mothering pity for the yearling as he throws the contents of his stomach out over the charred ground. That is when she notices his scars, ravaged by the same kind of disaster that overtook this land. Slowly, ever so gently, she nudges him back towards the lushous green of the undamaged trees. "Come now, it is doing you no good just staring. Let us be off." 

The she-wolf continued to push him, images of fire swirling in her skull. The one time she had seen the red flower was when a No-Fur had thought it funny to set a feral cat aflame. The poor creature had screeched and writhed until it's own fire burned out.

geist flinches at the woman's touch. he recoils back as if she is flame given life; licking at his flames. he can tell from her body language that she does not mean him harm ...but he's only ever been close with so few. mutter. rabe. rabe, more than any other. a stranger's touch sends tingles of unease thru ravaged nerve endings and his lips curls back. do not touch me is what the gesture says. bizarrely, though he cannot understand her gibberish — for that is what common largely is to him — geist feels a twist of shame in his gut, weighing heavily in his chest. her tone, though he understands not the words, are composed of a soft pitying tone that reminds him a bit of his mother.

though he does not allow her to touch him again, geist does allow her herding of him back to the dancing emeralds and steady browns of the sundappled woods. the fairytale just before the horror. though the smoke of his flashback has began to fade, slowly, like the ache of a heartbeat beneath a bruise; geist takes greedy gulps of air that has always been fresh and clean, all the same. he no longer feels as if he is once more choking upon ash and smoke. burning wood, leaves, and flesh; his own mingling with the flesh of the unfortunate woodlands.

his heart still thrums wildly within it's prison of flesh'n'bone all the same; mis-matched grey gaze wildly eyeing her now that he does not fear to look upon her so. he does not trust himself to find the volume to speak and so he settles unnerving gaze upon her, expectant.