Horace

Needs 10 Art(4 gajinka, 6 Dragon), and bio.

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insert poem about pearl

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insert shadow egg
The woods have always been her home, for as long as Horace can remember.

The Tangled Woods are a curious place, full of shifting shadows and all sorts of trickster creatures determined to lead travellers astray. To the denizens of the woods, however, these woods are a familiar playground, even for a hatchling like Horace. His early childhood is little more than a vague blur of memories, but as far back as he can recall, he's lived here for years. Where there's life, there's a way to survive - even if it means observing others under the cover of night, mimicking what they do.

Finding Willow had been a happy accident - the Wispwillow Peryton had gotten one hoof entangled in a nasty patch of twisting vines, which Horace was more than happy to free them of. They'd ended up frolicking in the little grove for hours afterwards, wandering the woods with carefree abandon together. The duo were inseparable from that point on, and Horace had never been more pleased to have a partner-in-crime to play tricks on others with.

The highlight of Horace's young life, however, would come to pass one moonlit night, while exploring the border at the northern edge of the woods. Few came to these parts save to enter the shadowlands, fewer still cared to make their way through the thorny barricade guarding the border. Yet that night, the air seemed to fall completely still, without even the rustling of wind to fill the ominous silence.

A pair of gleaming violet eyes stared at Horace from the depths of the shadows.

He's frozen to the spot, but he can't tear his eyes away. The air itself almost seems to whisper of the being's power, an aura unlike anything she's ever felt. They blink at him once, twice, before the very shadows themselves seem to shift to accommodate the creature that is the Shadowbinder, mistress of the night. Yet reflected within that ancient gaze is an odd sense of familiarity, like she's looking at herself in the mirror.

A fallen twig snaps beneath the Shadowbinder's weight, and the crackling sound jolts Horace from his reverie. He shouldn't be here. Every muscle in her body screams for her to move, to flee from this ominous presence. After another agonizing moment of paralysis, she finally gathers enough courage to unroot herself from the ground and run, only stopping when his legs can move no more.

It's a sight that remains burned into her mind for years afterwards. The memory of it haunts her sleep sometimes, those strange lilac eyes staring straight into her soul. Horace would recognize them anywhere, even out of the corner of her eye as she picks her way through thick brambles. The Shadowbinder is here, but she's not alone - with her is another ancient being, though he looks somewhat out of place amidst the dreary woods.

"...lost hatchling..."

"...woods... shadow..."

Their voices are faint, the words indistinct. Straining her ears, Horace inches herself closer, ignoring the ***** of thorny brambles against her skin. Who are they talking about? There has to be a good reason behind the Arcanist and the Shadowbinder meeting in secret like this, surely.

"...pearlcatcher... unknown..."

"Abandoned... not sure..."

A lost dragon. What would one lost pearlcatcher be worth to two of Sornieth's elemental deities? Curiosity piqued, Horace leans in, only to meet a pair of striking purple eyes as the Shadowbinder glances up. Alarmed, she scrambles backwards, fear coursing through her veins - will they punish her for eavesdropping? Smite her? Horace doesn't want to know. Doesn't stick around to find out, either, crashing through the tangle of dense undergrowth and brambled bushes in a desperate bid to get away before either one of them can decide to drag her back for due punishment.

She doesn't know how long she's running for. By the time Horace actually makes it back to her nest, hidden in a tangle of thorny bushes, the woods have fallen back into their usual quiet, the silence broken by the occasional bird's call. Shaken and worn out, it takes him some time to fall asleep that night, and when he does, he's thrust into the strangest dream he's ever had.

He's floating in an empty void, with nothingness stretching out as far as the eye could see. One by one, flickering orbs of light come to life around her, glowing with an unearthly sheen. There's voices coming from somewhere, but no speaker in sight. The words are muffled at first, but as Horace's vision adjusts to the darkness, the voices become clearer.

"I beg of you, please reconsider this course of action!" The pinkish orb to his left wavers almost restlessly, the bluish light at its center bright compared to the darkness surrounding them. "I understand your meaning, Arcanist, but surely this dragon can't be that special?"

"He is," cuts in a voice from somewhere behind Horace. When she twists around to look, all she sees is a glowing, paler pink orb, though it's glowing brighter than the others. "This one has potential beyond anything you have ever seen."

"Absolutely not!" cries another voice, higher in pitch - female, this one coming from a sphere of lavender light. It almost seems to be pulsing with distress. "He's dangerous, we don't know what could happen!"

"What can happen is that this world will be blessed with a gifted time oracle," murmurs a fourth, familiar voice, sibilant and hissing. Shadowbinder. Her orb is a deep, almost inky purple, so dark it almost blends in with the rest of the void around it. "This one's gift is truly extraordinary. It would be a sin to waste it."

They're talking about him. They have to be, or why else would Horace be hearing all this? "What gift are you talking about?" Horace asks, but none of the quartet answer. What even is a 'time oracle'?

"Having a gift is one thing, but the risks are enormous," points out the first speaker, blue and pink melding together. "How can you be sure they'll be right for the role?"

"We know nothing about him," agrees the other unknown speaker. "All you've told us is that she's 'gifted', and suddenly you're just choosing him to be the new oracle? With all due respect, this is... difficult to accept."

"Don't I get a say in all this?" Horace protests, but it's like talking to a wall for all the reaction she gets. "I don't even know what a time oracle is! Hello? Helloooo?"

The Arcanist hums, the sound low and thrumming. "What else is there to know? In all my years, I've never seen a pearlcatcher with this much latent talent before," he notes, and his orb pulses thoughtfully with a soft, pastel glow. "This is our edict, and we have chosen. She will be trained, and she will be the next oracle of time. So it shall be."

"So it shall be," echoes the Shadowbinder.

One by one, the orbs begin to circle Horace, spinning faster and faster until they're a blur of colored light, shining so bright it hurts to keep her eyes open. Just as he thinks he's going to go blind, they fly straight through his chest, one after another, suffusing his entire body with power, pulsing just under the skin like a second heartbeat.

And Horace opens his eyes.

The first thing she notices is the eyes scattered along the line of her neck, blinking in time with the two normal ones on her face. Horace has to cover them up with clothes before leaving the house, because she doubts the townsfolk would be so understanding as to how and where they suddenly came from. What is happening to him? The dream from the night before has already faded, leaving Horace clueless as to the changes taking place in his own body.

She's talking to the sweet elderly dragon running the local flower shop when the first vision hits like a bolt of lightning from the blue. It's as if he's no longer standing in front of the flower cart, but instead hovering over someone's bed like some odd ghost overseeing a funeral, before he catches sight of just whose bed he's staring at.

The florist, surrounded by her loving family. Horace has seen her in town for as many years as she can remember living here, knows she's old, but to be witnessing what looks like her passing is something else entirely. None of them so much as bat an eye to Horace's presence, save for the old dragon herself, who looks directly at Horace with the same sweet, tired smile he's always seen her wear.

"Is it time for me to go?" she whispers, whispery-soft, thin as a thread. "I don't mind if it is. I've had a good life."

Around her, several of her relatives are weeping. Horace swallows, arrested by the strangely soft, yet knowing look in those eyes. Yet deep down, she knows the old dragon speaks the truth, can almost sense the way her soul is flickering weakly, barely tethered to this realm. "Yes," she answers solemnly. "It's time."

"-wrong with them?"

"...monster..."

"...not normal...leave them..."

"-ce? Horace?"

Awareness returns like the tide washing over the sands, Horace blinking as he comes back to himself. His feet - when did he start floating? - come to rest on the ground once more. Around them, the townsfolk are shying away from him, turning their faces away with uneasy muttering. What was that? A vision of the future? The same kindly old dragon peers at him, visibly concerned.


"Are you alright, Horace? Your eyes, they went all cloudy, and then started glowing. And you were floating, mumbling something about how it was time..." she trails off, seeming to understand. "You were seeing something, weren't you?"

"How did you...?"

"...I've seen many things, child. I won't question it, but you'd best take care. Not everyone in this town will understand what it means to be gifted with sight like yours." She pats him on the shoulder gently and presses a sprig of forget-me-nots into his hands. "Here. Something to cheer you up. I'll be off now, dear."

A week later, he leaves those forget-me-nots at her grave, resting in a small vase.