HeavenlyAristo » Lair » Verona

Verona

(#33963388)

Level 25 Skydancer

Familiar

Opheodrys Serthis

Energy: 49/50

Personal Style

Apparel

Skin

Scene

Physical Attributes

Battle Stats

Measurements

Length

4.04 m

Wingspan

4.66 m

Weight

655.81 kg

Genetics

Honeydew
Tiger

Chocolate
Stripes

Amber
Capsule

Hatchday

Jun 24, 2017
(6 years)

Breed

Adult
Skydancer

Eye Type

Arcane
Common

Level 25 Skydancer

Max Level

STR

117

AGI

DEF

QCK

INT

VIT

MND

Lineage

Parents

Rho
Surasa

Offspring

Biography

nitrogen and carbon // calcium and phosphorus // magnificent soil

VERONA - High Priestess

She still sees it in her dreams. The fire flickers in the depths of the crystals, clawing its way higher and higher, filling her head with smoke and hungry dreams. Blurred visions of blood and water drift across her mind, and the scent of charred bone jolts her awake every time.

She remembers these things in her dreams, but when she wakes, they vanish, carried away in the night. They leave her only with the sense that she must not chase them down, that she must keep herself hidden from their reach. They are not kind dreams, but deadly ones, and they remain buried for a reason.

They’ve haunted her since she founded her coven so long ago, always lurking in the dark. The Moon Siren chased them away for a while, at least; she promised to hide Verona in the shadows, to protect her in exchange for worship, and Verona readily agreed, promising in turn to venerate the Moon Siren always. In the heart of the Tangled Wood, she raised her first altar out of lashed-together branches and a pine bough canopy. The skulls of small animals lined the shrine with candles in their eye sockets, and they flared to life without her touch, filling the woods with the heady scent of ichor. That was the first sign that the Moon Siren would keep her word and always watch over her disciple.

The second sign was the influx of new dragons. So many stumbled upon Verona’s little camp, all claiming to have seen visions sent from the Moon Siren herself. The coven’s numbers swelled from only Verona and another dragon that had come with her to the Tangled Wood all the way from the Starfall Isles, all the way to a bursting host of dragons who held the same deity near and dear to their hearts. Since she was the first, they named her their high priestess and begged her to lead. Part of her wanted to refuse the responsibility; sometimes she dreamed of leading, dreamed so vividly it was more like a memory. In those dreams, she fled across crystallized lands with her heart pounding in her chest, her wings shackled to her body, her eyesight blurred with tears. Sometimes there were others with her. Sometimes, she was all alone.

She tries to forget those dreams, because when she wakes, her wings ache and she is short of breath. It takes time to compose herself, time and many bones, lovingly blessed by the light of a skull candle. She keeps the bones everywhere now. For every damned soul she sees out of the corner of her eye, she carves another and hangs it in the trees to ward away evil. For every foul dream, she crafts another bone chain to coil around her wings, her wrists, her neck. There can never be enough bones in the coven to keep it safe from harm. There can never be enough to honor the Moon Siren fully.

Verona knows her acolytes whisper about her. She knows they say she’s mad because she warns them that the Moon Siren is always watching. That isn’t madness, though, so much as it is prudence. But they also say she’s afraid of the world beyond the wood, that she fears magic that pours from crystals under the sun, that she will never change.

And she fears that they are right.

Something keeps her from leaving the Moon Siren’s lands, and though she puts it down to her devotion, perhaps there’s another reason, one she can’t recall. And when she flinches from crystal jewelry and sunny mornings, she says they hurt her failing eyes, but perhaps they do more harm to her ailing heart.

As for change? That, Verona knows she fears. Even if the Moon Siren will always call her children back, change could tear them far apart, and her coven is her family. All of her ornaments and earrings and macabre decorations are meant to protect the coven from whatever harm may come to their home, whatever misfortune may test their hearts. They are not merely madness given form. They are sacred.

The only change Verona longs for is the disappearance of the dreams. For all her hard work, for all her devotion to her deity, they persist, fiercer than ever. The dream fire scorches her to the core, threatens to rip her limb from limb. To what end? To what end?

Not even the Moon Siren offers answers to that, and so Verona dreams of crystals and smoke and chains at her back. They’ll never go, no, they’ll never go.

Verona has been plagued by nightmares for years, and in that time, the Moon Siren has watched over her, according to the pact they have made. No matter how foul the dream, the Moon Siren's power has shone clear and bright, protecting the coven from all harm. She honors the worship of her devotees with a dedication of her own, one with the tenderness of a mother's touch and the fury of a howling storm in a single entity.

And yet she cannot protect Verona from these dreams.

The bones so meticulously carved do no good. Verona has strung them from her wings, her neck, the walls of her den, the trees of her coven, and yet they do little more than clatter in the wind, their inscribed faces whirling as the strings that hold them twist and turn. So long as steadfast defenders, and still the nightmares come.

They are nothing like the fiery dreams of her youth, the ones that drove her to seek the Moon Siren's protection to begin with. Those dreams inspired her to act, to seize the opportunity to resist the coming darkness. She founded an entire coven in response to those dreams, turning her spine to steel and the spines of others to delicate charms. These dreams, though, these dreams are like ice.

They all start the same, with the glorious silver moon in the center of the sky. Its light is nearly blinding, and on the wind, Verona swears she hears the Moon Siren calling out, reaching for her in soft, glowing tones. The scene would be peaceful enough if it were only the presence of her goddess in the night, of course, but there is still more.

It always takes the shape of a frozen lake beneath her feet, with ice so polished she can see her reflection plain as day.

Sometimes the dream moves quickly. All sound fades, the moon flickers and wanes, and suddenly, the ice cracks with a roar. As Verona screams, her reflection only laughs, reaching up to drag her into the depths as the ice breaks apart and exposes the churning waters below. The bones around her wings and neck weigh her down, and the moon goes dark as she sinks, turning its back on her in her hour of need.

But other times, the anticipation is nearly enough to kill her, and she can never seem to break free of the dream in time. She spends eons some nights, trapped on the ice, waiting with dread coiled like a snake around her heart for the inevitable. By now, she knows she will not wake until she hits the icy lakebed below, until her innards are as cold as the ice above, until the moon abandons her completely. And still then, she will not wake until her reflection flickers in the water, a shadow of everything she is, was, could be, but with pits of night for eyes and her heart clutched in its claws.

Too many nights, she wakes in a cold sweat, heart racing in her chest to a rhythm beyond her ability to tame. She spends the rest of those nights awake, afraid to fall back into the same dream again, to face herself in the ice, to watch her goddess's emblem wane and fade from sight, leaving her in that terrible dark.

So she goes to the forest, where the mushrooms gleam with soft blue light, and a ruined fountain bubbles with silvery ichor. It is here that the Moon Siren once gave Verona her blessing in exchange for worship, and it is here that Verona has begun to redouble her prayers.

She cannot fathom what she has done to displease her goddess. In every way, she has been a faithful disciple, longing to the last to prove her worth and earn the privilege of divine protection for her witches. They depend on her, believe her strong! They cannot know she is plagued by terrors in the night, that her heart is beginning to cave under the pressure.

But she supposes they must suspect. She has asked her historians to research all manner of deities and even lesser spirits which might seek to harm the Moon Siren's devotees. Word has not yet spread wide that Verona suspects a threat (her historians are far too discreet for that, and she labors these days to compose herself in the public eye), but it will not be long before her witches know that there is something in the dark, something that takes joy in staring back at Verona with her own face, watching as she sinks down, down, down, frozen with the coldest fear.

She can only pray that the Moon Siren will answer her at last, that she has not been abandoned by the greatest source of strength she has ever known. The survival of her coven depends on her ability to keep her fears at bay.

Verona does not yet know whether she has the will to succeed.

Bio by Tues.

Snek Did a little review for me! check them out!!

Quote:

Is sad day for Snek! Snek can see a spider he wants to eat but there is a scary ghost familiar with Verona so Snek no want to come closer! Snek doesn't like ghosts very much! Is scary! Snek heard Verona is much care for other dergs but Snek is scared of ghosts so can't tell! DON'T COME CLOSER, THROW THE SPIDER!/10

Art By Mine

Art by ThirtyOne

Art by LemonFunk

Mood board by Siouxsie

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Exalting Verona to the service of the Shadowbinder will remove them from your lair forever. They will leave behind a small sum of riches that they have accumulated. This action is irreversible.

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