[OPEN] The Lore Of The Highlands

[plate_builder]

WHO: Reeve Tuesti, Open
WHERE: Temba
WHAT: Shadow Hauntings
WHEN: During The Storm
WARNINGS: CW: Big, predatory dog, eyes in the darkness

I. The Cat-sìth | Early Storm Days

There wasn't much to account for the first time let himself go outside into the fog. It was actually a strange thing for him, where he hadn't noticed it the first day at all. He'd been inside, and his unique forms of magic didn't really seem to linger in his mind or awareness except when he was actively using it to reach for and control Mini. Given he'd been so busy with working on getting logs into the storage room he'd taken for himself in the Ampitheater, he'd gotten tired and just settled into a cot by the door and slept. So passed the first day of the storm. And so it was that Reeve didn't end up finding out their problem until he walked outside on the second day.

Even then it had taken a moment for him to process. Fog wasn't, in and of itself, a problem after all. Weather could be like that. It wasn't until there was a strike of crimson lightning that Reeve realized something was wrong. Even then it was mostly because the flash of lightning cast a new shadow from Reeve's body, and it was behaving weirdly.

Mostly because it was behaving. The shadow swirled and swirled until brilliant crimson eyes were staring out at him from the fog. Cat eyes. Cat eyes at the level of a dog's head. The form stepped forward, hissing, bearing teeth that were as stunningly white as the spot on its chest.

"Cat-sìth," Reeve said in shock. How could he not understand what this was with a single sight? It was a story that had shaped him as a child, what had led him to making the original Cait Sith. A fairy-cat, one that stole the souls of the dead. Which, of course, meant Reeve should be safe, provided he didn't die.

That wasn't good though. Okay, how to deal with this... Reeve was frozen in place as he thought and the shadow continued to grow. To split. To spread. And soon Reeve was being surrounded by scores of felien eyes.

"A man goes out in heavy rain with nothing to protect him from it. His hair doesn’t get wet. How does he do that?" Reeve asks. The feline creatures pause in their advance on him, instead looking at each other.

They couldn't resist riddles after all. And, with them distracted, Reeve turned and fled. Maybe he wasn't dead, maybe no one was particularly weak to the soul stealing (he hoped), but Reeve rememebered what his power was. Inspire, after all, was a soul magic. He was perhaps at too great a risk.

II. The Cù-sìth | Late Storm Days

Fairy-Cats were hardly the most threatening of the fae that stories were told of when Reeve was a child. They were so easily held back, so easily driven aside with riddles and attention and even cold temperatures. So Reeve had come to be prepared for the cats, and was more willing to go into the thick fog. It's not easy, of course, but he has the maps memorized so with carefully counted paces, he can more easily find his way in the fog. Sure, it wasn't perfect, you couldn't walk in a straight line for any distance without points of reference, but he could try.

The flash of lightning wasn't enough to make him jump, he was used to the ghostly felines arriving. The growling made him stop though. Made him freeze and look back over his shoulder. What he found made his blood go cold.

A massive, shaggy creature like a dog, but the size of a small cow. Its coat was a dark shade of green, and its bared teeth yellow against the color. The creature's eyes were a bloody crimson and shining, and as it snarled those eyes were narrowed.

The terror was too much. This creature was one Reeve knew, and was as dangerous to the living as the cat-sìth were to souls. Reeve knew the stories said the creature had a bark that was low and menacing and carried impossible distances. One bark could reach miles, even over the waters of the sea. And to hear three of them would be to die from terror of the sound alone.

"Fuck," Reeve said, and he started running. Even though there was silence behind him, that didn't keep him from running. He was too terrified to stop. the hounds were said to be silent hunters, and all he could do was run. He needed shelter and to find a way to plug his ears, and he needed it now.

Comments

[crystalmaster]

"Scotland is a land in my world that also has highlands and the legends about Cu-Sith and Cat-Sith," Radley says. Maybe Reeve's world is another Earth with different country names, he wonders.

He looks around. "What are those things doing here?!"

[plate_builder]

Yes, he's had that discussion with Cayde and Tony both, and very surely proven that Gaia was not the same world. But he could happily have it again, when he was not so afraid for their lives.

"I've no clue. But they've been stalking me through the days of the storm. Though today is the first time the hound has come."

[crystalmaster]

"That's not good. Are the storms always like this?" Radley frowned.

[plate_builder]

"I am given to understand they vary," Reeve says, his voice a whisper. Then he stumbled, right over a stone. A strangely shaped one. One he knew. He oriented himself on it, turned, and then strode off. Soon enough he came upon the wall of a building. Now to circle it to a door.

"I try to avoid them. They... make Mini sleep in a way that is upsetting to us both."

[crystalmaster]

Radley continues following him. "... Mini?"

[plate_builder]

"My companion," Reeve said. The companion set safely aside in Reeve's home, whom Reeve could have more distance from now than he might otherwise, with their bond strained by the storm.

[crystalmaster]

"Oh." Radley still had no idea who or what Mini is. "Why do the storms affect Mini so much?"

[plate_builder]

"Because the storms affect our powers," Reeve answered, as if it was the most logical answer there might be.

Which was accurate in his mind because he was, after all, a magical construct.

[crystalmaster]

Radley understood that much about storms.

"Oh. So Mini's power involves ... sleep?"

[plate_builder]

"No," he said, shaking his head. "He's sleeping now because of what the storm has done to us."

[crystalmaster]

"Ah," Radley said. He was still confused, but decided not to pursue this line of questioning further.

"... So. The bad, bad doggie. Are we just going to hide from it or try to get rid of it?"

[plate_builder]

"Get rid of it?" Reeve asks, sounding shocked and horrified. How did one fight a massive dog that moved with all of the silent grace of a hunting cat that could frighten one to death with but three barks.

"I know... I know stories about keeping them away. Nothing more."

[crystalmaster]

"Yeah, all I've heard is making them go away with iron and steel," Radley says. "I wasn't sure if I was missing something."

[plate_builder]

"Iron and steel?" Reeve asked, and oh but he longed to have heard stories like that as a child. "My family didn't tell the stories much. It was considered a dark telling."

[crystalmaster]

"Well, it's more of putting the pieces together," Radley said. "The dogs have fairies' weaknesses, and it's said that iron and steel are theirs, so ..."

[plate_builder]

Oh! Reeve's eyes go wide in shock and realization. They were fairy dogs, so that made sense. Iron indeed.

"I think I know where there's some bare rebar?"

[crystalmaster]

Radley perked up. "Great! Is it easy to get to from here?"

[plate_builder]

"There's some ruins, about forty meters..."

He looks around the space he had found for them before pointing in a given direction.

"That way."

[crystalmaster]

"Okay! Let's go." Radley moves to set out, staying alert for the Cu-Sith.

[plate_builder]

Reeve took a deep breath and then nodded, slipping out from the structure. "Try and stay close. It would be bad to lose you. Or be lost."

Because if they were separated, their chances likely dropped.

[crystalmaster]

Radley smirked darkly. "Oh, don't worry. I'm not going anywhere."

He stuck very close as they headed over.

[plate_builder]

Well, that's something. Reeve moved forward carefully, often checking himself against little bits of detritus in their path. Granted those 'little bits' were often large chunks of rubble, and he often had to circle them with very serious consideration for another minute before he was sure and he could reorient himself.

It took a painfully long period of time before they came to a tumbled pile of rubble.

"Here," he said. They needed now to look for the rebar.

[crystalmaster]

Radley started looking through the mess and soon pulled a long one halfway out. "Here's one! ... It's stuck, though." He tugged on it.

[plate_builder]

Yes, it would be. Reeve sighed and moved over to try and push at the pile some so the other man could pull it free.

"Pull when I push, alright?"

[crystalmaster]

"Right," Radley nodded, and did so. Finally it came out. "Got it!"