Cerulean Cape i've been living in the dark for a long, long time

@Komal

In the beginning, Zushone had murmured against the down of her nape as a child, there'd been no music. 

In the times before the First Songs, there'd been no voices - no magick. She'd shuddered then, to imagine a world of primordial Before: of black and silence, a void to vacuum all color from the world. Now, it was an eon she could picture well. 

Alone, a staggering, jarring existence she could not quite acclimate to, the Tipani could feel that ancient dark seep into her flesh. Absorbent it seemed to be, spongey, sopping the forlorn ache into the marrows of her bones to wind through vein and artery - locking about her heart like the last stone of a tomb laid in place. 

Foolish it was, tiny auds flickering as a ripple dilated along her length (as if to cast it off), some sadistic sliver of her chastised. Iär'e could practically see her papan's expression of dissaproval: the lift of his chin, the sparkle of his ruby gaze as he peered down at her expectingly. He'd not approve of this, this allowing herself to be mired, weighted by grief. 

Try as she might, the despondency prevailed underneath stone mask and shouldered determination - an exhaustion underneath her efforts that would not abate. 

The Irathi was grieving. And remembering. 

And longing.

The lands had shifted, the northern coasts long abandoned for a milder winter in the south, but the morphing scenery meant very little. Forest, mountain, shore, all blended as weeks lengthened into months; the Tipani a vagabond, a gypsy, a boat untethered and cast adrift.

Even so, a glimmer of the girl Nolais had reared shone beneath the veil - there were moments. 

Moments such as this one, as the warrioress's head raised to take in her surroundings, teal gaze gliding over the inland forest to a narrow peninsula of shattered stone. Even shrouded by pain, the beauty of the place was undeniable - halting her aimless gait midstep as ocean eyes froze upon the terrain, the ghost of a smile haunting her split lips. 

As if tugged by an unseen magnetizing force, her steps led up over the sandy rise, paw pads catching with care upon the slippery rocks as she picked her way out to the apex. Sea spray dashed her coat, teasing and deceitful in its playful caresses that threatened to wash the sazri away. Despite its danger, Iär'e felt her lips part, tongue darting out to catch the salt, as a grin danced upon them. 

At the peak of the jutting land, she perched - hunched and clinging to the rocks as balmy wind whipped her wild locs. The girl's gaze lifted to the horizon of tangling blues, a clash of sky and sea, to the vast expanse of unknown with a vague sensation of something akin to hope - an intuition of incompletion, transit.