ORIGIN

We moved silently and swiftly through the tunnel as our wing beats carried us forwards. Easily, we were getting the hang of this, in our talons was clutched the lamp that had been imbued with light by the crow woman. We weren't sure why, but it held significance to our life's calling. As we grew older, we would find this out. Light began to fill up the darkened tunnel as we came into the room filled with piles of bones. It neither disgusted him nor did it drive him away. It was fascinating how many creatures had passed and they had all chosen to do so here. Either that or someone had meticulously planned and created this area.

Unsure how to land properly with the lamp, our first attempt was merely placing the lamp before we dropped down in front of it with an awkward wobble and the slight toppling of a nearby heap. A few metres behind us lay the lamp and he hopped over to collect it. Raising it in our beak, we waddled forwards through the precipices. Confused and enchanted, we turned left and right, the gentle tinkle tinkle of the metal handle against the frame the only noise. Crest erect, our head was craned forwards when we put down the lamp, a particular skull of a rather large buffalo type creature capturing our attention. We had no real understanding of what it was, instead we just raked our claws over it, the dust that we created from the bone gathering beneath our claws.

Is that a fucking flying light...?

A spotted hyena's long, muscular neck slowly turned so to track the whatever-it-was soaring through the cave. She thought she heard the distant sound of wingbeats; was it Aza'zel, then, with another bauble?

She squinted, though, when the thing tumbled to the ground--she couldn't see this, not over the far away bones, but she heard it. Or maybe it had landed in a bone pile, and sent some flying? Either way, it wasn't a landing that the Bone King was prone to make, meaning one of two things: that he was injured, or that it wasn't Aza'zel at all.

The lack of raucous shouting or the screech of "GIGGLE! COME LOOK!" cemented her belief that it wasn't her "beloved" king.

The hyena stood, curiosity--and mild concern--piqued. If it was a stranger, she wanted to know if it was perhaps an enemy, a spy. Or a friend.

If it wasn't, it might be someone who needed help.

Shaking a few stray spores from her gore-matted coat, the spotted hyena trotted forth, picking her way along the well-worn rock trails that wound through the piles of bones.

She slowed her pace, moving as silently as possible as she drew closer--she was nearly stalking catlike through a pair of twinned shoulder-height bone mounds when she heard it, a gentle tinkling like something metallic dangling against something else.

A few moments later she was peering over a stone outcrop to look at a strange bird--a large one, very large, his feathered body an odd and attractive pattern of monochromatic lack-of-color. Her dark eyes ranged over the stormy dark grey, the paler dove grey, the whites and the blacks, the hooked beak, fearsome-looking talons, and the feathered crest.

She perked a brow, as best a hyena can, and glanced at the glowing lantern he'd set down, and at the buffalo skull he was investigating--not quite a buffalo, but something close, something related.

Finally, satisfied that the stranger was merely indulging his own curiosity, she stepped quietly out to greet him. She wasn't sure if he hadn't noticed her, or simply ignored her, but she hoped it was the former, or her ability to sneak wasn't what she'd hoped at all.

Then again, her rancid stench could be detected by a good nose thirty yards away on the best of days... ahh, well. Could birds smell very well...?

She pushed the thoughts aside, and spoke, her voice rough and masculine but her tone friendly enough. "Hello; welcome to Canis--I don't think we've met. I'm Giggle--are you new here?"

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Roll the bones.

Bored by the skull, as so many more lay strewn about that needed investigating, we pushed it away and hopped over to a femur bone. We were not the carrion eaters that our brothers were, the meat that we were interested in had been picked clean long ago. Our fascination with bones came from somewhere inside us, the understanding that this creatures, this gembound no longer had life within it. Instead reduced to lumps of matter that had become waste in a pile of bones. No one respected them anymore, as they had no more say, opinion or personality to give. It saddened us, but it was the nature of life. Lumps of carbon couldn't be something more than that.

Interested in moving deeper, we headed back towards our lamp before the acrid smell, or rather taste, of death and decay came on the wind. It stuck to the roof our beak and almost made us choke, but we showed no indication of this as we swung around to face the hyena woman. A curious creature, its body was sloped awkwardly in a fashion we didn't find appealing. It appeared it carried weeks worth of rotting carcass on its back that produced the smell.

Not even being able to wrinkle our nose, we just watched on as she drew closer. Introducing herself as one known as Giggle. Names weren't something we had come across yet. No one had ever formally introduced themselves to us instead referring to themselves as what they were. We had done the same, but the idea of a name was an interesting one. Not speaking anything, we tried to figure out what we should call ourselves but couldn't. "We are wanderers." Maybe a name would come to us soon.

"New. We are new to the world yes. New here. New everywhere." Blinking, we wished to ask our own questions. "Why bones?"

...Right, then. Another crazy.

Giggle managed not to sigh--barely--and instead briefly inclined her head, before glancing around.

"Why bones? Are you asking why they are here?" She padded somewhat closer, though she left a safe distance between them so as not to frighten the stranger away. She glanced around, as she did so, eyeing the various alien bones that lay scattered here.

"It is a place of death. The bones tell me that is because it was a place of life, once. A place where the living were kept--an ark, perhaps, or a prison. Perhaps they were thrown here, and barricaded themselves away, and died. I don't know. The tunnel still bears hints of some sort of magic--a magic meant to separate. To keep whoever owned these bones away from the rest of the caves--or to keep something else out."

She pondered over this slowly, as if merely thinking aloud, then looked back up to the eagle.

"You spoke of yourself as 'we.' Are there more than one of you?"

She asked this politely, and again slowly, merely making conversation--trying to learn about this stranger, about what it needed or wanted, what it was doing here. She wasn't concerned so much as curious; it wasn't every day that a stranger arrived in Canis, let alone one referring to itself in such a fashion or seeming so... detached.

He almost reminded her of the bones themselves.

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Roll the bones.

Moving forwards, we were not one to be frightened and instead we let her approach as she pondered over our question. Answering it by saying she could read the bones, we were immediately enraptured and we continued to stare in awe at this woman who could read bones. Life was a connector to death, death was the end of the path. But it felt as if we had always known that. It also felt as if there was more, but we weren't sure quite what was there.

Our excitement was evident as our crest completely flared out and our eyes widened, head twitching back and forwards excitedly. This was something we hadn't even considered, why the bones were here. It was interesting to talk about it with another, "We wondered. They seem better in a group yes." It calmed us slightly knowing they had been together at their time of death. No matter how grizzly it had been. Through starvation or through cannibalism, it was just a calming feeling knowing they had been there to simply bring a presence. The last one would have died alone.

"When we were born, we were we. There are more maybe, more than us. We are not sure. We are many and one." Not even caring whether that made sense or not, as we were certain we were speaking sense, we just left it as that and showed no signs of concern over having not explained ourselves properly. "Bones in all of cave?"

...Interesting.

"Mph, yes, there are bones throughout the cave. Some are in piles, some in heaps; some are shaped like shelters. The only place it changes it at the west wall; there are still some bones, there, but moreso there are carvings along the walls."

Giggle paused, eyeing the strange bird over. It had flared its crest, its eyes changing, when she'd spoken of the bones. It had clearly shown interest, and this had in turn again piqued her curiosity.

"You are interested in this place? In the bones? What's brought you here?"

She leaned slightly closer to sniff the bird, taking in its scent with the same politely curious demeanor she'd shown since her arrival. Just who was this strange fellow? Or, perhaps, more properly--what?

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Roll the bones.