It is only a few paces from the edge of the wilderness to the lake; trees crowd close to the water in every direction. The water at your feet is pristine, shining blue. Gentle ripples ruffle the glossy surface of the water and whisper at the shore. The hump of Katahdin Peak, blue-grey with distance, looms over the trees as they ring the lake. The air smells clean, rich with pine and fish. In the distance you can make out a dock, and other signs of human habitation; but here, only the calls of birds, frogs, and insects disturb the peaceful quiet.
An airship bobs over the lake at the end of long, fine tethers that are fastened here and there around the eastern portion of the lakeshore. An array of ropes and winches dangles from amidships, ending at a small, floating platform with couple of small, neat dinghies moored to it. Occasional sounds emit from the airship: spinning propellers, jets of steam, and voices.
Did someone call for 'tall, dark, and handsome'? Well, dark's fairly well covered, at least. Jet-black hair's pulled into a long, loose tail at the nape of his neck, a few stray strands about the face occasionally drifting into his almost equally dark eyes, the irises of which are a brown deep enough that one needs to look closely to find the pupil. Nut-brown skin that sets off the white of his teeth and eyes -- it could just barely be mistaken for a very deep tan, if one really tried. Tall is a miss; he's still several inches off six feet, and he probably won't ever get there. Handsome... well, not a classic beauty, to be sure, but well-proportioned, with a stunning, frequent grin and deeply expressive features. Slim, but in perfectly good shape.
He's clad in... well, black leather pants. Somewhat faded, well broken in, but nicely cut and really =quite= nicely fitted. A simple cream shirt hangs untucked above them, long sleeved and fastened with a row of small, black stone buttons. Over that, he wears a decidedly well-worn old black trenchcoat, almost too big for him -- the cuffs hang down half-over his hands, when he lets them, and the hem hangs perilously close to his heels. Scuffed black leather boots with worn soles adorn his feet; there's a seemingly random collection of bracelets, all on one wrist, and several piercings along the upper section of each ear -- little silver hoops. His right ear also bears a rather delicate silver earcuff.
She's a young thing, looking to be in her late teens or early twenties. Not terribly imposing, she stands at about an average height for a woman with a build that's a few meals shy of healthy. Golden-toned skin hints at Latina heritage, a notion reinforced by her sleek, straight black hair, which has been bound into twin braids, each tied off with a length of powder blue ribbon fashioned into a bow. Several strands have fallen free to frame a pretty face with delicate bone structure and soft features. Dark eyes glitter behind the errant locks of her hair, bright and intelligent.
The dress she wears is a little loose on her, but she fills it out well enough to give her a distinctly feminine figure. Like the ribbons in her hair, the dress is powder blue, printed with tiny flowers in white and green. The cut is simple, a scooped neck with short poofy sleeves and a voluminous calf-length skirt. To keep warm, she wears a long coat over the dress, woolen and brown, with broad fleecy cuffs and more fleece lining along the lapel. Over a pair of somewhat faded white stockings, she wears somewhat battered leather boots embroidered on the sides with colorful flowers.
Around her neck, on a leather thong, is a pendant made from what looks to be a piece of glass taken from a chandelier, a faceted teardrop that catches ambient light and reflects it back in prismatic sparkles. She also wears a silver charm bracelet on one wrist and a mismatched pair of silvery clip-on earrings.
Danny stands just under six feet tall and moves with an odd grace that's difficult to categorize. It's not quite the artful manner of a dancer nor the economic movements of a trained warrior, still there's certainly something different in how he carries himself. Fit musculature on a lean frame gives him the look of a runner, and his clean and smooth features suggest a northern European heritage. He has well-defined cheekbones that lend a youthful cast which may bely his true age, while a faint five-o'clock shadow makes his otherwise friendly smile a little disreputable. His eyes are expressive and match colors with his full, wavey, chin-length hair: a deep dark brown that's only just this side of black. His skin in naturally pale, but days working outside have given it the faintest suggestion of a tan.
His clothing is casual but work-oriented, with a light-weight, long-sleeved tunic in off white linen belted at his waist with a black, woven leather belt. A loose pair of dark brown linen pants are tucked into calf-high, black leather boots that look a bit newer than the rest of his apparel, their sides finely tooled with Celtic knots. A stamped silver coin bearing the triune horse symbol of Epona hangs around his neck on a silver snake chain, and there's a sky blue ribbon tied just behind his ear, trailing in and out of his dark hair in a former bow that has apparently come untied.
Slim and delicate at her modest 5'5", Rahne has an almost childish quality to her form and features. Carefully trimmed reddish-blonde hair hangs in loose, bouncing curls about an impish face that hovers between youth and maturity. High cheekbones offset wide oval eyes of bright emerald green and a frequent smile that adds to the rebellious look of her deeply tanned face.
Arms and legs that once seemed a bit too long are now a bit more proportioned, well-muscled from hard work and good food. She looks quite the wood-child, truth be told. Russet brown fabric cut into a sort of halter covers her torso, tied once about her neck and once around her rib cage. The hem of the garment barely brushes her bellybutton, and the cut only accentuates the pleasant feminine aspects that have before gone hidden. Dark brown shorts cover her waist and the tops of her thighs, but not much more. They might be longer, but the bottom cuffs have been rolled up to form an inch-wide band.
Standing out amongst the summer attire is the large, broad knife she carries. A length of cord, dark green in color, is wound about her waist three times to secure the blade's worn, tooled leather sheath to her body on the left side. A smaller bit of cord pins the bottom of the sheath to her left thigh. The leather bears the fading intricacies of celtic knotwork, a composition of light and dark growing dimmer with age.
Around her neck, a thin gold chain dangles a small, heart-shaped pendant delicately between her collarbones.
There is nothing subtle about this young woman's equinity, it sets there skittish beneath brown skin, behind dark eyes. It draws her limbs out long and slender, curls her legs to the horse's tread. Her hooves are shod in steel shoes, silver-bright like the broad bands at her wrists, her coarse black and gray hair frames her long, determined face, spills down to her shoulders like the loose-curled mane it is. She's wrapped in a tawny cloak with a long, tassled hood and spirals woven along the hem. Her shorts are aged denim, her dark tail spills down long and straight to brush her ankles. Tall and lanky, quick as the turn of pointed ears, twisted scars and a rough-edged whicker, that's Ruth today.
It's a nice afternoon in Bud, with fluffy clouds and light breezes. The fading sunlight casts the new leaves in greens and golds and sparkles sapphire upon the surface of the lake. Aurelia sits by the lakeside with a basket at her side brimming with wild herbs and flowers gleaned from the forest. Her hair falls in twin braids, her youthful face serene and pretty as she gazes up into the sky. Then, with a malicious smile, she hucks a rock at a crow flying overhead, pegging the creature midflight. It tumbles a bit before recovering and flying off with raucous chatter of complaint and empty threats.
With patrol finished, Thundersnow emerges from the trees, running at a ridiculous speed in his smaller horse shape, and slows only a little before launching himself at the water. It has the makings of a long and graceful jump, but instead he vanishes into the Umbra with a dark whisper, only to appear several heartbeats later out over the water, which he plunges into with an excited squeal.
"Death from above!" cries a voice from the vicinity of the treehouse, just before a large swathe of fabric comes hurtling downward toward the girl by the lake. It opens up somewhat in flight, slowing the fall just a touch.
Aurelia startles at the water launch, and then cries of death from above. When one has been tormenting crows, one learns to fear retribution in all its forms. She's up in a crouch in a heartbeat, not precisely ladylike, but as Thundersnow plunges into the lake, her expression goes from startled to sardonic, and as the fabric flutters short of her, she just shakes her head and says, "Sad."
The large splash made by the landing horse clears to reveal Danny in his human shape instead, brushing his hair back from his face. "Goddess that feels gre--uhoh, look out, blankets from heaven!" His warning comes too late, and he can only laugh at Aurelia's predicament as he slowly swims towards the shore.
Serendipity leans out through the trapdoor in the screen, above the window boxes, from which he presumably threw the blanket, and shakes his head. "You are =not= cooperatin' here," he chides Aurelia sternly, then grins at her, sunnily. "Hiya, beautiful. Evenin', Danny." He disappears, the screen falling shut, and then emerges from the bottom of the structure, swinging down recklessly on the rope.
Aurelia hmphs and lowers herself to sit, smoothing her skirt primly over her lap. "I was doin' something before you lunatics came along and started nuttin' up the place." Speaking of her important business, the crow perches on a tree branch and cusses her out from afar. "So's yer mother!" she bellows toward it. With a shake of her head, she watches Danny swim ashore and says, "You're gonna catch yer death if you ain't careful."
Danny pauses in the shallows. He's not wearing a shirt, so there's at least one less article of clothing that'll need cleaning. "Shouldn't attack the crows, they've got friends everywhere from the look of it," he teases. "And didn't you hear, we don't get sick. Well, not that easily, at any rate. You should come on in for a swim, the water's fine." He drifts back a length or two, saying, "Evenin', Ren. Had any of that present Miki gave you, yet?"
Serendipity shakes his head, strolling toward the shoreline. "Not yet. Savin' it for a proper occasion, I think. Almost seems a shame t' open it, in a way." Though he doesn't sound too broken up about it. "Was thinkin' of takin' a swim myself. Rae, you wanna join us?"
Aurelia frowns on general principle. "Crows are stupid," she explains. "Besides, this is raven territory now." She eyes Danny and Ren both suspiciously. "You got a present?" she asks. "What is it? Can I see it? Why'd he give it to you? When was this?" It had to be mentioned in the presence of a Corax. "I might go swimmin' but you gotta tell me what you got."
Danny sighs dramatically at Aurelia's inquisitiveness. He leaves the description of the gift up to Ren, and asks her, "Raven territory, hm? That mean you're going to get yourself that rookery and raise up a nest of hatchlings?" He gives her a lop-sided grin, then dives under the water and swims further out.
Serendipity grins broadly at Aurelia, dropping down to sit beside her and nudging her shoulder with his own. "Yeah, gonna make you guess, yeah, gonna make you guess, an' the other night," he replies teasingly. "First I wanna hear what you think he'd give me an' what for."
Aurelia shoulder-nudges Ren and replies promptly, "A muzzle for the good of all mankind." She then gives Danny a Look and replies, "I just might. Haven would be much improved by the presence of proper blackbird."
"I think you should. More ravens is a good thing. Crows eat songbirds, so we'd chase them off when there were too many back in Sunset Crater. We can find you two a nice house and build a hutch for the rookery, or if it's got an attic, maybe use that." Danny smiles at Aurelia warmly, then swims in a circle. He looks back and helpfully tells her, "It's not bigger than a breadbox," then disappears under the water.
Serendipity fffts at Aurelia. "Hey, a good portiona mankind's happier when my mouth's free t' do as it pleases. I got references." He settles back, getting relatively comfortable. "Anyway, bzzzt, wrong. Try again. Oh, an' maybe Tristan c'n have the basement. I told him, when he gets back, we'll prolly be in the new place, an' we're savin' him a room. So."
Aurelia nods agreeably to Danny and Ren. "As long as I get that rookery," she warns. Ren gets a dour look, and then a succinctly ordered, "Tell me." She pokes him in the ribs with a quick jab. "Is it a breadbox?" She sits by the lake near a basket of herbs and wild flowers, near the kin she's cheerfully abusing. On a tree branch not too far away, a crow is cawing incessantly.
For a minute there are bubbles to track Danny's path under the water, and then they stop. The surface of the lake begins to still from the various disturbances he's caused.
Serendipity oofs exaggeratedly at the poking. "Hey, leave my breadbox alone!" he protests, swatting lightly at her hand. "...an' no, it isn't. It's a special drink. Pretty bottle, an' Miki says, if you have two drinksa it, you can get true dreams, if you got the gift. Which I doubt I do, but it sounds tasty anyhow. Oh, and you gotta only open in it the shade." He watches out over the lake idly while he talks with her, relaxed, though by the end a tiny touch of tension gets into his shoulders. "So, hey, you prolly know this... how long can Danny hold his breath, y'think?"
Faint humming trickles through the trees towards the lake, growing less faint by the moment with someone nearing. Soon enough, the source appears, as Rahne pushes aside a branch at the treeline and pokes her head out thoughtfully. Looking this way and that, still humming quite merrily, her gaze alights on those by the lake and a smile stretches across her face.
Aurelia stops assaulting Ren as he coughs up the answers she's demanded, and she settles back primly again. For those who can understand beast speech, the gist of what the crow is complaining about seems to be an utterly unfounded claim that Aurelia was menacing him with rocks. A few other crows answer, cawing from a distance. Aurelia skims the treeline with her gaze, looking a touch annoyed. "I dunno," she tells Ren. "but he'd better not push it." She casts the waterline a worried glance.
Danny surfaces a ways out from the shore, floating so his head's just barely above the water. He concentrates on remaining like that, his eyes half-closed. "Goddess," he says after a minute, his breath still short. "I didn't, realize, it'd gotten pulled, out that far."
Down along the road comes the steady rap of hooves on stone and earth, two measuring a certain beat, carrying Ruth along as she runs with her black and gray hair streaming behind her, her long ears canted back. At the lake she lifts her head, whickers a greeting as she turns to meet the others gathered there. Hey, she says, in the way her eyes brighten, the way an ear turns. Then, she's stopped, an ear askew, dark eyes on Danny in the water.
Serendipity slips his arms out of his coat, almost absently, and has just pulled his shirt off as well when Danny reappears. The slight tension that'd been there leaves, and he stands, stepping out of his boots. "What?" he asks in Danny's direction, before nudging Aurelia with a toe. "So, you comin' in?" he inquires, not seeming to have noticed the humming yet. Ruth gets a casual 'hey' of greeting, but he also doesn't seem inclined to try to chat with anyone in horse form just at the moment.
Rahne's tune isn't anything recognizeable, sort of meandering mish-mosh of whatever comes into her head. Stepping out of the treeline from the path she'd made for herself, she trundles on her bare feet towards the small congregation. Lacing her fingers behind her back, she looks up and around at the trees as much as where she's going.
Aurelia relaxes visibly as Danny surfaces. Then she scowls and calls out to him, "You're gonna give me a heart attack!" She rises along with Ren, bare-footed already so that all she has to contend with is the dress. She solves the problem by shifting. As her form melds into that of a raven, the crow in the trees goes ballistic and caws even more loudly, taking wing to come after her. Swimming is momentarily set aside as she gains some air and turns to attack the bird, wings flapping, beak flashing, and hoarse voice croaking. Egg stealer! Stupid fledgling! STARLING! That last insult is the final straw, and the blackbirds tumble in the air until the larger of the pair makes a dive for the water. When she surfaces, it's Aurelia as a girl, laughing and splashing. The crow flies back to his tree branch to glower in unsettled confusion.
Ruth turns her head as the din rises up from the trees, watches dark-eyed as Aurelia passes from air to water. A corner of her wide mouth quirks up, then, and she looks back to Danny. "What are you doing out there?"
Danny laughs softly at Aurelia's antics with the crow, and watches the fight with faint concern in his eyes. When she dives into the water, he relaxes, and gives her a re-assuring smile as he starts swimming towards her. "Have to make sure the riverstones are all in the right place," he explains to everyone. "The lake pulls them out a bit, sometimes, so I have to go and put them back. Rather stay under for a few minutes now than on wint solstice. That'll be some cold water, and ice too."
Ruth rests a hand at her waist and aims a skeptical, sidelong look at the other Perunka. "Why do you have to move them?"
Serendipity pauses in his disrobing to watch Aurelia and the crows, snickering a bit. He may not understand the speech, but the tone really says it all this time in any case. Whatever he might've replied to Danny is lost as he catches sight of Rahne approaching, and breaks into a full grin again. "Hey!" he calls to her, "'cha up to, lovely? You wanna come swimmin' with us?"
"Na'much, really. Swim? Sounds like fun!" Rahne calls back, picking up her pace just a little bit. It doesn't take too much work for her to shed her shorts and her knife by the time she reaches the lakeshore. Laying the garments on the ground, she stands there and regards the water a moment, left in just her top and a pair of what may have been leggings before they were cropped to high on her hips. She eyes Ren with amused speculation for a moment or two.
Aurelia gives the crow another mocking laugh for good measure, commenting with a content splash, "Stupid bird. And you call yourself a corvid." Meanwhile, the crow alerts other crows in his loud voice that there is a mean raven around here, uh, somewhere... was just here a moment ago, really. Aurelia treads water a bit, then swims toward Danny so that she can wrap an arm around his shoulders and make him do the treading for her. She spies Rahne a moment after Ren does and calls out in greeting, "Hey there!" Girl's got a set of lungs on her. Lucky Danny.
Danny eloquently tells Ruth, "I come from a place where we put rocks in water and sing at katsina." The volume of Aurelia's voice gives him cause to wince, but slips an arm around her and kisses her neck despite the damage to his hearing. He continues, saying, "Back there, the Pool's small, so the riverstones don't move around during the year. Lakes are a little trickier, and you have to keep an eye out, especially for the wint solstice riverstone. You don't want to go swimming down to get it under an ice layer in freezing water just to find it's not where you put it."
Serendipity leaves his pants on for a moment, long enough to wander up behind Rahne and wrap one arm loosely around her waist from the back as he leans in to say something quietly into her other ear, still grinning. He punctuates it with a resounding smack of a playful kiss to her jaw, just below the ear, and swiftly lets her go, removing his trousers in a quick and (one might say) practiced move before he's in the water as well, ducking under and cutting toward the others.
You paged Rahne with 'Nice seein' you again. Figuratively =an'= literally. Love th' outfit. But aren'tcha overdressed t' swim?'.
Ruth settles down on her haunches, her equine legs curved beneath her, her tail streaming out along the ground behind, coarse and dark. "Right," she says, amiably. "I come from a place where the people came from many places. I don't remember all of the ways my folks had to keep peace with the neighbors." With that she settles back on her rear, loops her arms loose about her legs.
Rahne snickers to herself at the whisper and wriggles her eyebrows after Ren. She enjoys the view, at least what there is before water is all she can see, and waves out at Aurelia. Shrugging a little, she shucks the rest of her clothing with a little less alacrity and slips into the water. She takes a moment to dip under and get her hair wet, then leisurely makes her way after the flash artist.
Aurelia stifles a giggle at the kissing and snuggles up to Danny, fortunately light enough that she's not that much trouble to keep afloat. This is her idea of rigorous exercise. Ren and Rahne's antics get a grin from her, and the latter gets an amiable wave. "I come from a place where only a damn fool goes swimmin' in the ice lookin' for rocks," she mentions.
"It's not a peace making thing, really," Danny says, diligently keeping himself and Aurelia afloat. "More of a mutual respect thing. They need us and we need them. What they need us for, I don't really know, except maybe as guardians of the mountain. So we do rituals about them too, because the more strange and arcane rituals, the better." He gives Aurelia an apologetic look. "Well that must make me your damn fool, then. Hope you don't mind."
Serendipity does not pop up right away. In fact, he doesn't pop up at all before there's a sudden, forceful tug on both of Aurelia's ankles, doing its best to drag her down off Danny and under the surface.
Rahne continues her languid progression after Ren...or at least in the direction he appeared to have gone in. She listens to the conversation as she swims, humming a little when the mood strikes.
Aurelia comments graciously, "You're a pretty good fool, so I figure I can--" And then she lets slip a less than ladylike squawk as she goes under. She launches herself at Ren for rib-jabbing and shin-kicking retribution before she even surfaces.
Ruth cants her head to turn a dark eye towards Danny and Aurelia and whickers, her voice edged all about with equine tones. "Suppose with my family, it was always about keeping peace. When you have pooka in the silos and a daughter of Oshun living in the river, you--" She blinks as Aurelia goes underwater.
Danny yelps as he partially slips under by the force of the pull of Aurelia's arms, then gets himself back to a peaceful equilibrium, chuckling. While waiting for Aurelia to return, he asks Ruth, "Who's Oshun?"
Rahne snorts and smiles as the water-feud begins, pulling up to tread water lightly, shoulders just below the surface. Shaking her head, she divides her attention between the commotion and Danny's question to Ruth. The latter does seem to interest her more, at least at the moment.
Serendipity finally does come up for air, gasping for oxygen amid breathless laughter and a good deal of splashy struggling. Rib-jabs and shin-kicks aside, he doesn't seem to particularly be inclined to give up right away. There is more dunking to be done!
Aurelia is a fierce little bundle of claws, she is! Not terribly strong, alas, but she flings herself at Ren ferociously on the grounds that if she's getting dunked, she's not going under alone. When she does surface, she utters a mix between laughter and profuse swearing.
Ruth draws her dark brows up, watches as water, arms and legs thrash about. "That depends on which of her faces you're looking at. When people kept slaves before the dark, some of those people brought their orisha with them. Like spirits, like gods, depending on how you saw them. The orisha didn't leave Africa, but parts of them came here, changed like everyone else did. Oshun's one of them."
Danny backs up a length or two from the wild fury of splashing and dunking that is Aurelia and Ren, and nods at Ruth. "That sounds like the katsina, then. Well, sort of like them. I guess spirits and gods are different in different places, like everything else is."
Serendipity eventually wraps arms about Aurelia in a hug and refuses to let go, taking deep gulps of air whenever he reaches the surface. When -- if -- she eventually stops trying to drown him, he lifts her by the waist to attach her to Danny's back again, and then treads water by himself, regaining his breath.
Aurelia eventually stops attempting to drown Ren. After getting in at least one good bite, she lays off, having made her point. She's laughing though as she drapes over Danny's shoulders. "Dumbass," she accuses Ren fondly.
Ruth settles back until her elbows are resting against the cool ground. She nods, looks down towards her steel-shod hooves, though an ear remains quirked towards the thrashing water. "America has a way of gathering people. I suppose that's true for everyone, even if its gone. So the farm always had a lot of people around. People you can see, people you can't see."
Danny reaches back to pull Aurelia's legs around his waist. "A dumbass for a kumimate and a fool for a lover. You're just blessed, aren't you," he says, turning his head to kiss her arm. To Rith, he says, "I think the katsina would balk at being called people, but that sounds about right. They say the Spider Queen's from Africa, so even the katsina came from different places."
Ruth settles back until she's lying on the ground, her hands folded on her stomach, her hair sprawling out in a crown about her head as she looks up at the sky. She quirks her mouth up. "Anansi's a spider," she says, amiably. "But male in Africa, in most places."