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forlorn-crows · 10 months

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Mountain getting fucked in pretty lingerie, but only waist down :) Garter belt and stockings, flower pattern lace. His chest decorated with hickeys. Him blushing like the freshly blooming flowerbuds in his garden. Sweat glistening on him like morning dew getting hit by the sun. Just letting you think about that :)

yeah i'm thinking about it. in tandem with @media-nocte's tidbit about "tall stockings, real silk, Mountain WOULD NOT wear polyester nylon. Are they stay ups or maybe he needs a garter? The choice is yours" and @riverghoulsworld's ask for "Mountain getting princessed the way he does for everyone else".

morning dew, you say?

“Should get you under me more often if it gets you to look like this.” Warm hands drift over the silk stockings adorning Mountain’s long legs, fingertips playing with the lacy trim at the top hem. The stockings, reaching all the way up to his mid thighs, are held up by a garter belt slung low on his hips. It’s adorned with leafy embroidery, bright magenta appliques that frame his groin in little triangles of lace. The socks are the same purple, a perfect hue to bring out the olive undertones in his freckled skin. The matching set brings an air of grace to the earth ghoul’s otherwise gangly limbs, softening their edges and making him look almost delicate beneath Dew.

The fire ghoul hooks a nail under the garters, snapping the ribbon gently.

“You know I wouldn’t say no, if you asked,” the earth ghoul rumbles. He rubs one of his calves against Dew’s thigh, caressing, indulging in the satisfying, yet grounding feeling. Dew snaps the elastic at the top of the stocking too, just for good measure. It makes Mountain’s breath hitch, re-ignites that nervous flutter in his belly, all too intoxicating.

“Hm. You’re blushing,” Dew comments, smoothing his hand under the opposite leg and grabbing at the meat of Mountain’s thigh. Shifting him gently. His flush darkens at being called out, the saturation almost matching that of the bright magenta silk, or that of the dozens of marks that litter his chest where Dew sucked, kissed, and bit.

“Cute.” It’s a warm compliment rather than a tease. "This is a good color on you, you know." Dew skims his hand further up the underside of Mountain's thigh, nearing closer to his ass. The other hand abandons the hem of the stocking to travel up the line of the garter strap, migrating towards the belt and hovering just to the right of Mountain's ruddy cock. It kicks at the proximity of Dew's hand, a little bead of precum welling up from the slit. He bites his lip, watches it drip out.

"Fuck, please fire lilly," Mountain gasps.

"Ask me?" Dew says in a quiet voice. His fingertips trail closer to where he really wants it, dancing along the appliques just above his dick. "I like when you ask," he says with a small smile.

"Hah—will you—" He takes a shaky breath. "—will you fuck me, please?" Mountain looks up at him, a twinkle in those begging puppy dog eyes.

Dew presses a kiss to his bent knee and eases it over his shoulder. "Absolutely." He runs the flat of his palm down Mountain's cock, making a pleased noise when it throbs under his hand. But he keeps going, tucking under the opposite leg and hiking that one over the corresponding shoulder. He sinks down onto his belly, eyeing the earth ghoul with a coy smile all the way down. Dew licks his lips, tantalizing and slow.

"Yeah," Mountain breathes, craning onto his elbows to watch Dew close the gap between his mouth and his hole. "Yeah, your mouth—please, oh." His head thumps back onto the mattress, sentence dissolving into a soft feminine moan as Dew licks across his rim. His tongue is hot, just like every part of him, smoothing over his hole with a wet warmth unique only to Dew. He wastes no time, dipping the tip inside, carving space for himself. The earth ghoul keens, curling his stocking-clad toes against Dew's ribs.

The fire ghoul huffs a laugh against him. "Watch the feet. Tickles."

“Sorry,” the word breaks into a whine when that hot tongue dips back inside, swirling and prodding. He continues to wring little noises out of him—sounds just as small as Dew manages to make the big earth ghoul feel. Delicate. Soft.

Mountain’s wringing his hands into the sheets in less than three minutes, smushing his cheek into the pillow while his slack mouth threatens to let loose a line of drool. His thighs start to shake when Dew really goes for it, pressing his nose into his taint and pressing his tongue in as far as it’ll go. Mountain can feel the curl of a smile in his lips when he hums against him on purpose, just to make him throb.

Dew pulls back, giving his hole one last tease before giving the side of his thigh a smack. “Alright, ass up, princess.”

Mountain barks out a laugh at the demand. “Okay, sir.”

Dew shimmies out from between his legs so the earth ghoul can flip onto his stomach. Mountain slowly lifts his hips into the air, peeking over his shoulder and wiggling his ass at the fire ghoul. With his thighs pressing neatly together, his ass and legs make the vaguest heart shape. Dew can’t resist the silhouette, grabbing his hips and yanking them further into the air with a playful growl.

Mountain gasps, head dropping back down to the bed and tail lifting to grant Dew better access.

“Fuck, Mount,” he groans. He traces around the still spit-slick hole with one finger. “Even better from this angle.” He presses inside, just up to the first knuckle. Watches the way the ring of muscle constricts around him, beckons him further.

Dew places a warm hand on his lower back while he works him open, heat radiating into his muscles and helping to relax him to the stretch of Dew’s fingers. It’s lazy, indulgent; there’s no rush to his ministrations, despite the slightly desperate way Mountain ends up fucking himself back onto the digits once he’s full of them, precum no doubt staining the fronts of his stockings.

When they’re ready, Mountain lets Dew guide him to the right height, pressing his chest further into the mattress and lengthening out his legs. The fire ghoul runs his hands down the back of them appreciatively, tops of the thighs down to the backs of his heels. Mountain groans fully into the sheets, one heel twitching up as if to follow his hand.

Dew’s own cock kicks in his hand at the sound, wringing a twin groan from his throat. “Satanas, you're so gorgeous.” He jerks himself a little, pressing the tip against his hole. “So, so hot.”

“Please,” Mountain whines. “Come on, you’re right there, fire lily.”

Dew huffs a laugh. “I know, just—” He presses the head in, easing the rest of his length in with one slow, measured movement. They shudder in tandem when he bottoms out, sighing out held breaths.

“Feel s’ good,” Mountain mumbles against the sheets.

“Yeah,” Dew breathes. “Yeah, it really does.” He drapes himself over Moutain’s back, slipping his arms around his middle and pressing the side of his face into the flat space between his shoulders. He grinds a little, once, twice, delicious heat seeping into the earth ghoul’s very bones.

“Hn,” Mountain keens. “Oh, Dew, fuck.” The flutter in his belly returns and mixes with the ache between his legs.

Dew allows himself a full bodied moan into his skin. He twists his fingers into the waistband of the garter belt, tugging a little as he thrusts in earnest. “Shit,” he hisses. He pulls almost all the way out, thrusts back in. “Shit, that’s it.”

“Please,” Mountain says in the smallest voice, thighs starting to shake again.

“I’ve got you, gonna make you feel as good as you look, Mount.”

#ficlet #this is not how it went in my head but oh well #here ya go #ask #golden-rats #river #media-nocte #mountain ghoul #dewdrop ghoul #mountain/dew #dew/mountain #mountaindew #the band ghost #the band ghost fanfic #fanfic

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blackswallowtailbutterfly · 2 months

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One Dewy Morning Part 1

So way back when, 2010, I had graduated from Graphic Design and was looking for a proper job after my regular summer job at the Canadian Tire garden centre was coming to an end.

Got a call-back for a balloon place in need of an "artist" and I woke up bright and early that morning in late September for the job interview...only to get there and find that they'd forgotten or someone was sick, I honestly can't remember. The secretary apologized profusely and promised I'd get a call-back (which I did and ended up working there for several years).

And there I was in the early morning with nothing to do but walk back to the bus stop. But it was so early that morning that the dew hadn't dried up yet. It was still golden hour and in those days I regularly carried around my handheld Olympus camera. It was an industrial part of town, and the places between the buildings and train tracks were not well-maintained and thus left to go fallow.

And so off I went through the fields to find the wild plants and weeds, to the garden area outside the Tim Hortons where they had roses and ornamental grass, and eventually home to my grandmother's garden.

To say it was magical, well...

Photos are mine, unedited.

Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5

#One Dewy Morning #golden hour #photography #my photos #blackswallowtailbutterfly #flowers #weeds #wildflowers #garden flowers #native wildflowers #September #dewy morning #dewdrops #drops on plants #drops on flowers #morning dew #September 2010 photos

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amethyst-ghoul-backup · 11 months

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puppy mountain and puppy ifrit but mountain’s a saint bernard and ifrit’s a golden retriever.

#they both get the zoomies #and run all around the ministry #always stressing out zephyr and aether #and and and ifrit and dewdrop are golden retriever x black cat #nameless ghouls #nameless ghouls headcanons #the band ghost #the band ghost headcanons #ghost band #ghost band headcanons #ghost bc #ghost bc headcanons #meliora #meliora era #mountain ghoul #ifrit ghoul #aether ghoul #zephyr ghoul #dewdrop ghoul

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hannah-heartstrings · 9 months

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"Sparkle"

Macros of dewdrops on clovers in golden hour.

#clovers #flowers #nature #golden hour #photographers on tumblr #photography #original photography #original photographers #pink #green #dewdrops #macro #my photography #so excited to share these ^_^

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mozaicstudio · 2 months

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Captured the magic of morning dew sparkling on spiderwebs in the California buckwheat.

#naturelovers #nature photography #spiders #spiderwebs #dewdrops #buckwheat #backyard habitat #get outside #good morning #golden light #chaparral

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ask-healthy-light · 2 years

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A Summary of Events

In a secret room, far down a hidden flight of stairs, in the ruined Castle of the Two Sisters in the Forest of the Everfree, Light read the book that they had secretly been given by the Green Unicorn, Boomlord, detailing his rise and fall, and revealing the truth of his history to the Princesses whom he had met eons ago, though, in wishing to stay forever, he was forced to leave.

By a strange coincidence, at the moment that they finished the story, breaking many a heart of those present in the room, Boom entered the room, supporting and supported by Rockhoof, both of whom exhausted after their clash in the Catacombs, gaining a mutual respect for one another, though, fortunately, mostly unhurt, and healed easily due to another one of Boom's healing tonics.

Looking upon a loved one of old, whom they had lost, by their own hooves, all that time ago, their memories surged back, finally feeling more complete, and together, the entire group exited the hidden room, though with this remembrance came many questions from others, who feared their own thoughts in their mind had been similarly influenced, with Nox, in particular, feeling overwhelmed.

After the group had started heading back through the reinforced tunnels, Light wandered off for a moment, shortly followed by Nox, who broke down crying just out of view of the group, unable to hold back all her fears and doubts, though, fortunately, comforted back to contentment by Light, whom she had helped to let out their emotions just that very morning, and together, the two left.

While they were walking through the tunnels, Starswirl the Bearded ran out ahead of them, and with his Guard, they followed him all the way back to the park, where, after everycreature had a moment to calm down and rest, Starswirl wrote down an intriguing message he found, deep in the tunnels, wondering what other secrets may lay hidden there: "Beware the Shine of the Dark Ice…"

Now, with everycreature gathered and new clues discovered, the entire group headed back to Ponyville Palace, resting for the night, though Light was unable to, still unable to forgive themselves for the harm they caused, until Boom made them see things from a new perspective, finally allowing the Kirin peace in their mind, which was replaced by ideas and connective threads.

The following morning, after a playful fight with Boom, the Princesses and a handful of other young ones, Light laid out their thoughts, connecting the phrase the Bearded had found to the Crystal Empire, planning to head there next, when, to everycreature's surprise, Boom vanished, claiming he could not return until he had cleansed himself of that which possessed him.

When the initial shock of Boom's disappearance had worn off, the group split again, with Harvest, Banana, Caff and Decaf and the Pillars remaining in Ponyville and its surroundings, while Light, Nox, Eclipse and the Princesses headed North, to the Empire, though their journey was interrupted when news was received of blocked train tracks in the Northern mountains.

While Boom visited Discord and started searching for the requirements to cleanse himself, the group visited the small town where they departed the train, with Celestia and Luna disguising themselves, just in case, as Golden Feather and Soothing Dewdrop, after which they spent the night in the Mel-Inn, ran by Melon Grumps, where everything felt wholesome and familiar, like a home away from home.

After Boom, who had a tough night, teleported himself in shock back to Ponyville to visit Pinkie Pie, an old friend, and Rarity, who made for him both a new cloak and repairs to his old one, they headed to Ponyville Palace, for Boom wished to send a message, and though no news has been received as of yet, the group in the Mel-Inn is preparing to head out, in case they mean to continue their journey…

Featuring: Boomlord from @thedumbguywithaheart43 Nox Lunarwing from @nox-lunarwing Solar Eclipse and Twilight Sparkle as Twilight Eclipse from @asktwilighteclipse Melon Grumps from @ask-a-grumpy-melon

Banana Pie from @askbananapie Caff and Decaf from @askcaffeinehazard Harvest Duran from @duran301

(Thanks ever so much for reading! The third summary, at one hundred and fifty days of writing, and bonus episodes and requests too! Incredibly impressed with myself! Thanks ever so much to everyone who reads, likes or reblogs the episodes for all your support! It truly means a lot to me!)

(As always, ask box is open, so feel free to send an ask or a request for a story about your character!)

Send an ask or request! | Start at the beginning!

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rachelsrandomsphotos · 11 months

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White Golden Dewdrop (Duranta erecta)

Taken at Gleason Park in Indian Harbour Beach, FL

#golden dewdrop flower #golden dewdrop #flower #flowers #florida #florida photography #photography #nature photography #Gleason park #nikond3500

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gfloutdoors · 2 years

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Golden Dewdrop Care Guide

Here are some quick facts about the Golden dewdrop. Botanical Name Duranta erecta Common Name Duranta plant, Golden Dewdrop, Duranta Plant Type Perrenial (Indoor), Annual (Outdoor) Flower Color Blue, White, Violet Size When Mature 2-4 feet tall and 1-2 feet wide Bloom Time Spring through frost Sun Requirements Full sunlight USDA Hardiness Zones 9-11 Soil PH Range 5.6-7.5 Soil…

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#Golden dewdrop

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comicaurora · 7 months

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tldr I committed to a bit too hard

The slow-dawning sunlight dappled down through dense, rich foliage, scattering golden lace across mossy trunks and grassy hillocks. The light caught on the forest floor in a thousand glassy dewdrops and bent, fisheyed, in globed inversions of the canopy above.

No breeze stirred the forest so early in the morning, but a thin mist gathered in the valley under the warming air. Sunbeams lanced through the fog, pale in the dawn but soon to brighten and intensify. For now, the air was damp and cool and still, and the scent of the night lingered.

Pip bent a pawful of grass to the side and sniffed the air suspiciously.

It was too quiet, too still. And with no wind, she couldn't mark the position of the strange beasts and their odd, dusty, acrid scent that had no place in these woods. It hung low and directionless over the peaceful morning, distant but permeating, like a faraway fire.

She adjusted her backslung blade, wrapped her cloak closer around her and dropped onto all fours, nose pointed straight ahead and whiskers standing at attention. Her dusty green-gray wrap would shield her from all but the most attentive prying eyes, and - she quirked an ear, just to be sure of the silence - most of the forest was still asleep, unlikely to mark her passage.

She managed to stifle a flinch as a sound that wasn't a sound bypassed her ears and rang straight into her head.

Pip? Where'd you go?

She exhaled softly through her nose, the barest expression of frustration she allowed herself.

Scouting, Alder. Go back to sleep.

She set off before he could reply, scurrying silently along the mossy forest floor, tracing a sinuous route through the canopy's shadow to stay out of the slow-brightening sunbeams.

Scouting?!

The thought squeaked with disbelief. She didn't answer it.

Alder never had fewer than three thoughts at a time, and the more agitated he became, the harder they became to sort through. A jumble rang in her skull, a snatch of Eldest told us- and moves like thunder and have to hide, that last one echoing in six different ways with the significance it held in his mind. She concentrated on tracing her silent route, one shadow to the next, and came to a stop under a broad-leafed stalk as Alder's distress built to a crescendo.

If she kept moving, eventually she'd slip out of his range. Wasn't that a tempting thought.

I said go back to sleep, she sent, and with an afterthought of inexpert kindness, added I'm being careful. It'll be fine.

The chattering ground to a halt, and she felt the effort it took him to focus his thoughts down to a single thread. Come back, Pip. We have to stay hidden until they're all gone.

We can't hide if we don't know where they are.

Pip caught the beginning of his protest and shook herself violently, breaking off the connection. It was rude, she knew; closing her mind completely was one of her rarer talents, but unlike her other oddities, this one she wasn't particularly respected for. Her skills as a scout were admired precisely because she had such sharp senses, physical and mental both - some days she could even hear the slow, tangled thoughts of the Long Shadows - but when she didn't want to be disturbed, she could wall herself off from the others as thoroughly as if she'd been on the other side of the forest.

And right now, picking her way between treetrunks and sniffing her way towards the bizarre menagerie that had invaded her forest, the last thing she wanted was to be disturbed.

Her right forepaw sank in unexpectedly soft soil, and she recoiled with a stifled gasp. Her eyes darted across the swath of ground, analyzing its shape - and then she widened her scope, scanning the yards beyond that first strange softness. In a low-lying, hollowed track between two thick-rooted trees, the carpet of grass and flowers were flattened and crushed into a felted mat, mud bubbling through it in irregular patches like sickness in a wound. A wide track had been beaten into the soil by dozens - at least dozens, she amended - of flat-pawed creatures. Their dusty, acrid stink lay heavily over it.

She drew back from the unnaturally soft soil. Even with her diminutive size and weight, there was the risk of getting mired in unexpectedly watery ground, and while rescue was never far away in these woods, she certainly didn't want to weather Alder's overconcern or Eldest Luma's quietly smug passivity. Instead she skirted towards a point where the track narrowed, lashed her tail for a momentary burst in balance, then sprang over the mud and latched onto a tree root on the other side, freshly ripped free from the soil and scored with dozens of thin scars from the claws of the marching creatures. She scurried up and settled at the tree's base, where the gnarled roots tangled into a more-than-sturdy foothold overhanging the morass.

With the newfound advantage of height, she surveyed the terrain. The tracks overlapped one another in a mad scramble, pouring up from the lowland forest and curving up and away.

They moved with surprising organization for such motley creatures. She counted at least four very different sizes of print in the track, some barely longer than her own body (nose to the base of her tail) while some were large enough to crush her underfoot without even noticing.

The tracks were only a few hours old. The swarm must have passed in the early pre-dawn. She strained her memory to try and recall if she'd felt any tremors from down in the sleep-halls of the hollow, but if she were honest with herself, they were too far down and too well-insulated by the soft soil walls to have marked their passage.

She turned her attention to where the trail vanished from sight, curving over and up the slope. The land in that direction was treacherous and, to the mind of her people, best avoided. Gravel slips and rain rivulets ran down between the massive plates of rock that jutted out of the soil, and even though trees and flowers overgrew them, their roots could not be trusted to hold the ground together enough for safe passage of one of her size. Fresh rainfall unearthed and dislodged glassy chips of stone, and the soil turned to mud and slipped between the boulders, exposing treacherous chasms that could swallow an unwary traveler. The shattered earth built up and up until it abruptly skewed and slanted down in a gentle curve, like the ground had been struck with a terrible force and the shattering had rippled out from the center. And in the heart of that broken land, glimpsed fearfully from treetops or the shadow of the stones, lay the stronghold of the Long Shadows.

Once, long redmoons ago, Pip had traveled three days and nights to scale the shattered peaks herself, to see the stronghold with her own eyes (mostly due to a burst of rebellious curiosity after a scolding from Eldest Luma). The works of the Long Shadows could always be distinguished from natural formations or nests - they had a love of smooth things, and the stone they shaped stretched cleanly skyward and bore no footholds beyond the straight, geometric fissures that ran up and through them. So Pip already knew that the stronghold was encircled by a massive shadowcrafted cliff, pale and smooth as ice and taller than trees, and it surrounded the entire stronghold just behind the shattered peaks. Beyond the wall, great columns and cliffs jutted skyward, more smooth handicraft of the Long Shadows. At times they were even spotted outside the walls, tending great swaths of land in the same precise straight lines they shaped their stone. Those tracts bore vast quantities of food in unnatural abundance, some that grew nowhere else in the valley, but the Long Shadows guarded them closely and harshly punished intrusion, and the Eldest three generations before Luma had forbade anyone from entering (or even approaching) their strange geometric works, no matter how lean the winters became.

She debated following the trail. It would inexorably lead her towards the stronghold, but if the creatures were focused solely on the Long Shadows, that was valuable information to bring back to the hollow. No doubt Eldest Luma would be pleased to have yet another reason to avoid the Long Shadows and their works.

A sudden awareness prickled in the small of Pip's back, shivering up into her ears and all the way down to the tip of her tail. Her gray fur bristled and she froze, eyes darting wildly, seeking the source. The feeling had no obvious impetus, but she trusted her tail with her life, and something was happening. Something sourceless, something…

At the base of the root she was balanced on, a sprout punctured the trodden soil and curled upwards, splitting into pairs of pale green leaves. She watched as it climbed to twice her height in less than three beats of her racing heart.

Instinct took over. She scampered up the tree like a shot, finding footholds in the bark with a practiced ease that belied her jolting terror. She plunged into the safety of the leafshadow and clung to a branch, breathing fast and shallow and trying very hard to stay quiet.

Below her, a green carpet spread across the mire as grass and flowers bloomed impossibly fast.

The Weeping Shadow was approaching.

Pip strained her ears and caught the hint of a whisper of movement through the grass, distant and soft but certainly coming closer. It was pointless to cast her eyes towards the darkness - The Weeping Shadow was, in the stories, always swathed in gray, near invisible in the shadow of the canopy, and it passed in many tales without a trace, save for its flowering footsteps as its passage drove the forest to frenzy.

But it never came so close to the stronghold. The Weeping Shadow's domain was the deep and tangled woods, much further into the valley than even the hollow. It haunted the river and the wild places, and its realm was thick with plants of impossible vitality and sweetness - but not even the bravest scout dared its domain, even when hunger was rampant. The fruits of the Weeping Shadow's realm were steeped in an absolute sorrow whose depth defied comprehension, and the slow pulse of its thoughts churned in dark and wrenching misery that could be heard across half the valley. It was too much for the mind to take for long, and scouts that had strayed into its influence took moons to recover from the borrowed grief.

That had been the prickling on Pip's neck. The slow approach of the Weeping Shadow was already casting a pallor on her mind - and it was getting closer.

Pip's thoughts scrambled for her next move. If she stayed hidden, the Weeping Shadow would pass nearer to her than anyone had ever dared. She flattened her ears against her head and focused on the walls around her mind. Could she close herself to it strongly enough to hold out?

A wild fear beat against her ribs. She wanted to stay clinging to this branch forever, but she also wanted to bolt, to sprint the length of the branch and fling herself into open space, trusting the soft soil to cushion her fall - or rather, if she were honest with herself in that moment, heedless of what the fall might do to her. The desperate urge to flee was strong in her people, and here, faced with a terror closer than ever before, it was nigh overwhelming.

But Pip had a third instinct that overruled all others when she allowed it, and it had been slowly growing in her mind ever since she'd slipped from the hollow before the dawn. It was a hunger, of a sort, and one that warred always with fear. The hunger was curiosity, a thrumming urge for exploration and understanding that spurred her on through peril and dark for the promise of clarity on the other side.

The beasts in her forest were descending on the stronghold, and their passage had stirred the Weeping Shadow from its domain. Something was happening - something vast, something perhaps unknowable. But it would certainly stay unknowable if she didn't even try to know it.

And perhaps the Weeping Shadow knew.

Pip had more control than most over the openness of her mind. It alarmed her peers, sometimes, that she could pass among them in silence, unreceptive to their soundless speech. It unnerved them more, for those who knew - from a time when she was more open with her secrets and her strangeness - that she could at times hear the deep thoughts of the Long Shadows, and stranger still, sometimes even catch a shred of their meaning. The idea that the minds of the Long Shadows could in any way compare to the bright, clear thoughts of her people was on the surface laughable, and just under that surface, frightening. Still, she knew it was true. Their minds were dark, slow places, but they contained meaning and knowledge, most beyond the reckoning of her kind.

The mind of the Weeping Shadow was an abyss of grief and sorrow, but if she could attune her senses to it - if she could withstand its pressure - she could, perhaps, glean its purpose in the shattered peaks, and what it knew of the creatures that she pursued.

The underbrush cracked. Pip flattened herself against the branch and peered intently at the sound as the rolling wave of green spread under the tree, blanketing in every direction.

A shape moved in the shadow of the trees, ponderous and slow.

Pip felt her eyes grow hot and stinging, the space behind them heavy with unshed tears. A borrowed bottomless grief encroached on the walls of her mind, lapping at it like a swelling river threatening its banks.

The Weeping Shadow broke from the treeline and stepped forward.

It towered, even from Pip's high vantage point. It was gray and still and almost shapeless in the dim of the canopy, but twin lights glimmered near its summit, pale green like the sprouts boiling at its feet.

Pip's head pounded. The pressure of its presence was terrible. It was vast, yes, but the power of the sorrow within it seemed vaster still - like all the forest around it was desperate to weep, and the Shadow was the only part of it that could, yet it refused to.

The Shadow tilted its head down, and the lights of its eyes vanished in the gloom. But it was not weeping, Pip knew. It was… looking.

Looking at the tracks under its carpet of grass.

Pip gritted her teeth, gripped the branch, and opened her mind.

It was gentler than she had anticipated. The pressure and power was indescribable, but once she stopped trying to push it back, she found it moved her rather like water would - with force, but without pain. It was almost easy to let the thoughts of this vast creature buffet her where they would.

The words in the Weeping Shadow's mind were unknown to her, but she felt a snatch of them repeating over and over again. The words mattered less than the feeling that drove them, and as she focused, she realized that the Weeping Shadow was, in some way, at war with itself; the thoughts were not all in agreement. The repetition smelled of deep, old terror, but its loop was broken over and over again by a different, newer thought - one that Pip herself was intimately familiar with, strong enough that she needed no translation to parse it:

But I can help.

Dimly, in her faraway body, she felt tears pouring from her, hot and desperate from a grief she couldn't fathom. Her claws gripped the bark of the branch. The Weeping Shadow's thoughts, at the moment, were focused on its inner war, but it did nothing to shield Pip from the substrate of its misery. Still, she was onto something. If she could just push through, she might learn what the Weeping Shadow understood of the intruders to their forest.

Pip dug deeper. The Weeping Shadow knew what these creatures were - knew what they intended - believed it could help in some way - but what did it know of them?

Running below the looping dread and the punctuating bursts of hope, Pip glimpsed a glimmering ribbon of understanding wending its way just below the Weeping Shadow's conscious thought. It snaked under the fear, coiled around the thought of help. This had to be the knowledge that had motivated the Weeping Shadow's unheard-of migration. This was the mystery of the creatures answered.

This, perhaps, was Pip's only mistake. As she caught the thread of that understanding, it abruptly yanked against the current and plunged her down, down, down into the icy depth of the Weeping Shadow's truest misery. Its knowledge of these creatures came from the same bone-deep wellspring as the torrent of tears, and Pip screamed aloud as it battered her mind full-force. Alien thoughts crashed against her, unbearably loud; the grinding of bone, the shifting of stone, the pounding of waves greater than any river, the splintering of mighty trees. A twisting, a breaking - a power like a maddened, wild animal, thrashing and uncontrollable, kept in check only by its own terrible exhaustion and grief. She was so, so small, and somehow in the depths of this vastness she was even further diminished, crushed to a single point of light-

And something was watching her.

With a last mighty burst of willpower she released the thought-thread, flung herself away, and tumbled off the branch. It was something of a mercy that she was too stunned to feel the impact, and the carpet of seedlings cushioned her fall.

The first thing she became aware of was her breathing, high and fast and shallow in time with her racing heartbeat, real panic and borrowed sorrow draining away with shocking rapidity. Second, she felt the pain; her head pounding with spent exhaustion, her paws cramped in every joint, her back and shoulders bruised from where the impact of the fall had driven her scabbarded blade against her spine.

The third thing she became aware of was the shadow stretching towards her, claws stretched as long as her whole body, the deep purple of the skies after dusk.

The Weeping Shadow loomed over her, vaster than mountains. Two points of green pierced out from the dark.

She ran.

#aurora #prose writing #look. I have no explanation #well no I do have an explanation #and I'm curious if this makes literally any sense to anyone but me #but I had fun and that's what counts #pip's fine I have plenty more ideas for her

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