"Raise a hand if you haven't gotten involved in the mage business." A high, willowy voice calls across her sisters and brother, as they stand around the bubbling cauldron. Well 'sisters' by craft.
She looks around the faces, and tutts, seeing more hands than expected but less than she had hoped. The large skull she used as a focus was fed with flowers, and the scent was one of mulchy decay. She presses her hands to the bone as magic draws up her arms in glowing red spirals.
"The more they explore and tamper with the paths between realms the more they will risk the realms with their choices." Mrs Vesperine offers, one of the smaller of the troupe, the coven, as she stays firm in her convictions.
"The more we hinder them, the more we set them to collide with beings on darker paths." Astrid retorts, a thick cloak covering her this eve.
"They have to choose their path, sisters. We've not the right to be shaping their path like a human." Agava says, chewing on a candied fruit as their leader watches them.
"And what of the twinform? Why have you three not shown him to his community?" Pipes up the voice of a witch in a loose hood like thing, feathers poking from beneath the hairline and pink lightning scars tracing her cheeks. As her arms move in gestures the folds of wings are shown between her body and arms. "Should I come to Natare more, given this is a global problem?"
The head witch coughs. "Sister no. Let the sisters of Natare grasp the handle of their cauldron. There is still all the time should the coven need to lend voice to their actions. The sisters just need to work on their harmony, so their choices may work as one."
The four witches nod at the wisdom, as the witch of bones and skulls presses her glowing hands into the searing cauldron, a large bubble forming as she infuses the fluid with magic and power.
"Sisters, brother. Let us sing once more under the moon and be reminded why we practice, lest squabbles drive our motives onwards."
Yarrow worries. Twisting the ring that barely fit on their pointer, while watching their team mates and competitors train. The Hunter, Thane, and his retinue were coming to the city soon. This could be an amazing opportunity for Yarrow to advance to Primus or even take apprenticeship with the Hunter should they impress. But there was a reason people called Thane Hunter - monster Hunter, beast Hunter, twinform.....
The ring works over their flesh in ways that bruise the flesh there, and Yarrow has to remind themselves of their training. You cannot be a good combat mage if you are in your head that much.
<You got this.> Thalia's words would ring in memory in Yarrow's mind. Said this morning over breakfast, Yarrow can still remember how nice it felt to wake up next to Thalia - in this thing that they are not really dealing with, but not really stopping either.
Yarrow, spins the ring again, the feel of metal on skin weird, especially next to the shell rings adorning their other hand. There's a warmth of connection in the action, bringing back a join between the something-mores, even as Yarrow braces to return to training.
They are just about to return and try another lap of the obstacle course, when they see a weird movement nearer to the part of the Academy that borders the city wall. It is a small collection of thick trees, designed to invoke the forest behind the wall, even as that area of the hill is woods for only a bit before dropping away in cliff. Still, Yarrow moves carefully, feeling the talisman strain around their throat strangely, like a noose; where previously it has been a comforting force.
The growth resists them, seeming to close behind the figure, almost as if the figure is magicking the plants into their path. Pulling apart thickened scrub and twisted branches, they move, scratches and bloody scrapes soon caking their arms and tearing at their training uniform. They growl low and eyes look back at them, glowing yellow through the shadow - then it takes off. Only a few options flit through Yarrow's mind, none of them good - all of them needing someone to keep the academy safe from.
The growth gives way all in a rush, the stones at the base of the wall here ripped with claw marks, and crumbled stone making a hole - an escape in the city wall. They would have to tell someone later, after they apprehended the threat, dropping to all fours as they feel more comfortable in this locamotion outside of foliad gaze. The topsoil feels complete and soft under their hands and gives perfect purchase for them to race after those yellow eyes, even as they get further away.
Yarrow taps into their training as a combat mage, as a tracker, and the passive power of their twinform abilities that despite being shackled, are still a part of who they are. Their senses push out, enhanced as they tap into the wild animal within them, and they can almost see the flare of heat from the being running away, still in a crouched lope, like they were drunk on Starberry wine, or carrying a load of bindings from around their neck.
They pull slowly away but Yarrow is relentless and soon both predator and prey are plunging over the side of the cliff, falling through trees and canopy, a nasty gash opening on their cheek close to their eye. They feel something strange, like the echo of concern distant and not their own, but they shrug it off, More trying to cacoon their body to protect against damage before grabbing a branch in their path, wind driven from them as they make the ground, a far distance down from what the average foliad, troll or human could survive. It could still be creature-kin, but with their actions - especially with Yarrow's very obvious combat mage outfit, they would be completely off-permit.
Yarrow's head comes up, reaching with those senses once more. Their head scans left, then right, eyes narrowing in their green eyes that are turning their own animalistic yellow as they tap into the animal inside. Teeth itch as they start to run, loping towards that heat signature.
This is almost like the combat mage battle course, even as mud sloshes up those arms and legs as they dive through half a stream, taking them deeper into the Forbidden Forest.
At last the prey tires, and Yarrow keeps going, catching them and pinning them to the topsoil. Her eyes are yellow, her muzzle shrinking as tiredness drives all the stamina from her body, white feathers retreating into her elbows. Yarrow does not know this woman, except that she is a twinform like them, and they let out a snarl of triumph into the woman's face.
Her autumn red hair is short cropped on her head and she arches beneath them.
"Let me go, hunter. Let me go killer of your own kind." She flexes and a name they do not know comes to mouth.
"I am not hunter, Honey, though it is the safest place to be for folk like us." Yarrow says, body reacting in a spectrum of emotions to her presence.
"You wear the colours of the combat mages, and we all know the kinds of people they become."
They note the little heart tattoo beneath their left eye, and the sheer impracticality of running through the forest in a corset and high laced breeches. At least they had gone barefoot.
"Time has passed, maybe we can change the system from within, prove we have a seat at the table."
"Not enough, my aunt was taken by hunters and it was only distance that has kept my parents and I safe." Honey says with a deep growl.
Yarrow growls back and pushes her down. "We are going to the city, and we will get tea and talk about all this. You are paying."
She kicks at the dirt with a scowl. "Might want to find a healer first, hero."
