Creative Corner

[indent][font=georgia][b]01. of floodwaters and fairytales[/b] They told me I was born in the belly of a great flood. They said that the ice still burns in my bones, that I could become as great or as terrible as a natural disaster. That the pattern spelled on my hide reads of ancient waters and singing waves. Perhaps they never meant it. After all, you tell hatchlings all sorts of things: That the Centaurs will only get you if you don’t eat all your dinner, that if you ask nicely the gods will grant you the moon and stars. That death will never touch your life. That when old dragons die, it is peacefully, and quietly, and they go glad to see their loved ones, that they watch over you for years and years. You never tell hatchlings about death like this, brought by jagged shadows cast by nothing. There are no fairytales that end in clean white bone splintering the sky, the snow melted by the heat of blood. Maybe they never meant it, when they brushed their feathers down my back, petting soft claws over the ticklish membrane of my wings, promised me I would never be alone. That I would always have a family, a home. I’m not sure it matters now. What matters is that they were wrong. My name is Nereid, and I am not the daughter of any flood. I am nothing except alone. [url=http://flightrising.com/main.php?dragon=7630017] [img]https://31.media.tumblr.com/8d90c7990c593ec190f54c7874f94736/tumblr_inline_nf7rvedRC51rv2eu7.png[/img] [/url][/font][/indent]

[indent][font=Georgia]@VictoryInSolace, Added you to the pinglist! Thank you for the interest! \uwu/ Also ooh, could you add me to your pinglist as well? :D @LagMonster [b]02. of wind and water.[/b] When I returned to the cave, the walls had shifted again. It’s funny how amusing it had seemed to me, before, when my clanmates had been so easily accepting of it, making a puzzle of finding our way back through the passages, playing a never-ending game of hide-and-seek with the mercurial cave. As if it was so common as to be laughable, falling asleep to the soft whistle of wind and sting of cold air and waking to silence, the kind of darkness your eyes never quite adjust to, and cold blank walls where once you had expected to see the sun’s faint rays, a pile of blown-in snow. [i]Friend[/i], I had called it, crooning childishly, inviting it to play, brushing my wings across the warm stone, as deeply fond of the odd caverns as a hatchling of a favored toy, blindly convinced that it loved me, too, that it moved as it did to protect us: From the beastclans, from the bitter blizzards that blew through the Icefields. Though it must have been only a day since I had last found comfort within the shadows here, it seems unbearably cold now. For a moment, standing at the mouth of a cave I no longer recognized as home, I almost turned away. In the end my Sparrowmouse found me there, and from her pleasant three-note trill of greeting, the way she immediately nestled herself into the feathers at the base of my neck, I found enough of my courage to step into the passageways again.[/font][/indent] [center][img]http://flightrising.com/images/cms/familiar/art/3070.png[/img][/center] [indent][font=georgia]I do not know if the caverns came to take pity on me and silently rearranged its hollow bones to allow me into its heart, but eventually I found myself in the old sleeping-room. A little niche carved from the walls, overflowing with elk pelts, with wolfskins, the entire place smelled so strongly of my clan-mates as I curled in my corner of it all that I could almost imagine them there. (Three days ago I had fall asleep to the reassuring solid heat of another dragon curled around me, the soft hum of a drowsy, murmured lullaby. Three days ago I believed every promise they had ever made me.) When I woke again it was to the smoky, insistent purr of a Fangar, its soft, wide paws kneading at my side.[/font][/indent] [center][img] http://flightrising.com/images/cms/familiar/art/2604.png[/img][/center] [indent][font=georgia]I almost continued to drowse, for sleep is so easy an escape from the loneliness of wakefulness, until the Fangar rolled two round, cool objects against my side. Eggs.[/font][/indent] [center][item=unhatched wind egg][item=unhatched water egg][/center] [indent][font=georgia]It was not unusual for the shifting caverns to unearth odd treasures, to disturb nests and displace eggs guarded not quite carefully enough, to steal away little trinkets from bewildered wildlife. I suppose I should not have been surprised, and yet staring at the eggs I did not feel less alone—only deeply ill-prepared to deal with hatchlings. As if sensing the weight of my attention, the wind egg gave a peculiar wriggle, and the Fangar’s purring intensified as the shell began to crack away, peeling in flakes. It might have only been minutes before the hatchling freed itself, all splayed baby wings and uncoordinated limbs, licking the remaining egg slick from its muzzle.[/font][/indent] [center][url=http://flightrising.com/main.php?dragon=7850166] [img]https://38.media.tumblr.com/9b5f20d0fbe2b1f6423237ed1d3ecda1/tumblr_nf7xelOyFo1u3omloo2_400.png[/img] [/url][/center] [indent][font=georgia]She was a strange grayish thing with dark red-brown wings, almost as large from nose to tailtip as I. For a moment we regarded each other in silence, her small, wet wings awkwardly half-folded at her sides. Then she made a high, hopeful sound and I sighed. “You must be hungry. Come, do not be afraid.” [i]Do not be afraid.[/i] I see now how easy it is to lie.[/font][/indent]

I am really enjoying this so far! The more realistic coliseum death is a great idea too. If you wouldn't mind, I would also like to be added to the ping list.