ORIGIN - Hoo Are You?

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Kethri was perched in a tree, her downy wings furled at her sides. She still had down poking through her flight feathers, a dark, smoky grey compared to the white and black of her normal plumage. What was even more comical about her look was the fact that her head was covered in down very sparsely, making her look like a sort of... Birdie Sanders, if you will.

The owl was preening meticulously, pulling out more baby feathers as the days passed. More and more of her beautiful adult plumage was showing itself, but it would be a while until she became the pure colors of black and white. Soon, she hoped in disdain, plucking another fluffy feather from her wing, watching it spin around to the murky depths below. She couldn't even see the ground from up here, just a mist.

It was a good thing she could fly.

Kethri took off from her perch after a while, her stomach full but her curiosity not yet sated. She flew between the trees silently, not even her breathing audible as she delicately perched on a lower branch, peering at the black water below. She wondered what was down there. Monsters? Other Gembound? She wouldn't dare look, of course. Instinct told her that waterlogged feathers spelled her death, even if nothing ate her. Hypothermia would set in and it would be a terrible death indeed.

@Hecate

She hated this place. Being blind, or at least nearly-so, made navigation impossible: rather than the graceful, soundless flight with which she should have blessed Cetus, she was instead trudging through the mud and muck beneath.

It wasn't too cold; but it was gross. Mucky, smelly, sticky.

"Uuugh," she said, for probably the fifth time in an hour, lifting one four-taloned foot from the mud and trying to see it. She couldn't; past the green haze of her gemstone, everything just seemed dark.

Who decided that this cave could stay open..? she thought, bitterly disgusted. I think once I have the power, I'll close it off for good. Or throw undesirables in here, she added to herself, disdainfully. She trudged on, tailfeathers mired in black, and after a few more moments, paused to look around again. She was utterly unaware of the arrival of Kethri above; if she couldn't see her own foot, she certainly wasn't noticing the other avian above.

Hecate sighed again, the long-suffering sound of someone who had been through terrible hardship (and not at all the mild irritation of someone who was just a tad muddy), and aimed her magicka at a spot just before and above her in the mist. A light, surely, would help her to orient? And then maybe she could find her way back out of this hole. Though she focused, nothing at all came, earning another, louder "UUUGH!" from her in response.

@Kethri

Birdie Sanders- I mean Kethri- turned her head, the noise of a very upset individual meeting her ears. She shuffled along her branch and looked down, head tilting as she squinted at the other owl. Why weren't they flying? She could see wings, perfectly functional ones from what she could tell.

"... If you don't want to get all muddy, why don't you just fly?", she asked from above, her wings opening as she dropped down, swooping up at the last second to perch on the lowest branch of the tree next to the other owl, "Are you broken?"

Asked rather meanly, the question could be taken as an insult. Kethri didn't care either way, for if the owl was broken, she'd stop questioning why they were walking around. If she felt nice, perhaps she could lead the other out of the mud and onto a branch or something.

Noting the other's odd green eyes, the owl thought that perhaps, the other might not be able to see. Too bad for them, she supposed. Some creatures drew the short stick, and she could only be grateful she hadn't.

@Hecate

The first touch of voice to ear-tufts startled her, and she might--might--have been frightened. Certainly, her heart jumped in her throat, and she herself jumped up, and sideways, wings half-spread as if to take flight, herself.

She saw, rather than heard, the brief blur of white as something drew closer; she did hear the slight scratch of talons on branch. 'If you don't want to get all muddy, why don't you just fly?' came the voice, and Hecate, startled, opened her black beak to explain that she was blind. 'Are you broken?' The tone was not a friendly one, and Hecate felt her own brand of nastiness brewing back up in her. Gemstone-coated eyes narrowed as she resettled wings and ruffled feathers.

"Broken-? No," and she immediately paused to try and draw up a wisp, directly in front of the other one's face. Ostensibly, to illuminate what Hecate wanted to look at. Realistically, to shove a light in the rude stranger's face. "And what about you? Are you broken, to ask something like that?" she asked sweetly. "Did someone raise you without teaching you what's acceptable behavior? -No, I suppose not. No matter--I don't blame you. It's hardly your fault you were hatched with such a... disadvantage." 'Spiteful bitch' was in her tone, masked by the false front of 'good breeding' that Hecate couldn't claim. No one had raised her, after all.

But she didn't go around insulting strangers without reason-!

Hecate studied, as best she could, the figure up above. It was... white, yes; the wisp showed something birdlike, she thought, though mostly, past the green blur of her emerald, she couldn't make it out. After a good, long moment, she drew the wisp back toward herself, keeping it hovering helpfully close at hand.

@Kethri

Kethri had half a mind to whack the stupid light back towards the owl beneath her, but simply batted it away with a wing instead, scoffing, "Raised- ha. I don't need anyone to care for me. I have no disadvantages."

The owl's feathers bristled as she looked down, inspecting the other critically, "... You're like me... and yet you wear a crown of something upon your head as if you deserve it. Your feathers are muddy- it's disgraceful to be caught on the ground, let alone looking like you rolled on the ground like some kind of vermin."

Kethri harrumphed and turned her head haughtily, miffed. She'd only asked a question. Now they were trading insults like one would trade fancy baubles. It pissed her off more than the insults did.

"... You're intelligent, aren't you?", she asked, blue eyes narrowing, "Then you'll understand that fighting like hatchlings is rudimentary and crude. All I can offer to possibly brush off the insults we traded is assistance. I can lead you to a branch and possibly lead a pathway out of this damned fog... Possibly to somewhere a bit drier. And above the ground."

Kethri grumbled to herself gently. The only reason she was helping was that Hecate was a fellow avian and an owl at that. Birds of a feather flocked together, after all.

@Hecate

Eyes rolled behind the gemstone. Which was kind of irritating, actually--scratchy--but oh well.

"Those are antlers, not a crown, darling," Hecate answered, again in that sickly-sweet, sarcastic tone. The comments about being muddy, vermin, prickled her pride and her eyes narrowed as she responded. "If you think fighting like hatchlings is crude, perhaps you shouldn't open your conversations with insults..? In any case, I've no need to lower myself by speaking with you further."

Hecate turned away. Now... she had to trudge off through the mud, which wasn't exactly a nice, haughty exit. She could fly... which would be--well. She was blind. She could try to use the wisp to guide her, at least, but there was a good chance she'd just smack into a tree trunk in the misty dark.

But pride was a terrible thing, and after a moment she leapt up, wings spreading, in an attempt to simply depart this unpleasant stranger's dubious company.

A few wingbeats took her silently airborne, the wisp bobbing ahead of her, and she winged her way past one tree, then another--and then a muffled thump as chest impacted branch, and over she went. She tumbled, talons grabbing--and failing to grip--at something to steady her; and a moment later she was scrambling up from a face-down landing in the mud, some fifty yards from where she'd started.

@Kethri

Kethri rolled her eyes as the owl flew away, watching her duck and weave before- ouch. That had to have hurt.

She took flight and fluttered down on a branch above the owl, head cocked, "... Maybe you should stop being so easy to insult, then."

She started to preen one of her wings meticulously, claws gripping the branch beneath her as she settled down rather comfortably, "... I hope you realize that your light doesn't quite know what owl proportions are. I'm surprised you can fly anyway with mud sticking in your weird tail. You should clean it first before you get snapped from the sky by something that doesn't care about anything but a full stomach."

Kethri tucked in her wings again and huffed softly, before flying down to very carefully land on a rock, not at all eager to get her pristine feathers muddy. She turned to face Hecate and huffed, before looking around to see if there was a wide enough path around.

"... I can lead you to one of the tunnels, perhaps to Eridanus,", she said.

@Hecate

Her head hurt. Her body was aching and dizziness sent her reeling as she struggled back upright. Mud coated her front, her face, and burned at her eyes, slicking her gemstone and getting rather stuck there. To add insult to injury, she could hear Kethri further... well, insulting her, from behind. 'Maybe you should stop being so easy to insult, then.' Hecate huffed at this mockery, trying not to cry out at the pain; instead she hid it, pulling herself straight and stepping off into the swamp again.

Her pride was as hurt as her body: a shame born of her own arrogance. She wanted nothing more than to fly at this much smaller bird, to tear at it, to send her wisp hurtling toward it in a blast of flame, but that would be... uncouth. Instead she simply stepped away.

'I hope you realize that your light doesn't quite know what owl proportions are.' For a moment she was going to ask what that was supposed to mean, and then she realized that the bird still didn't know she was blind. She must think the light's trying to lead me, she thought, and some form os savage triumph came at least at this: the fact that Hecate still had her little secret, that the other bird--now on to making fun of her tail-feathers--hadn't figured this out. And then it was offering her help. Help-! Ha. As if she wanted anything to do with this bird after its attitude!

"I neither want nor need your help, thank you very much," Hecate responded primly, the bitterly savage thought I'd sooner drown in this filthy swamp snarling through her mind.

She turned, pushing blindly on into the murky mist, doing her best to put distance between her and the other--even if she had to walk to do so.

@Kethri

Kethri was far from stupid. She was cunning and analytic, and anyone could see that there was something wrong with the owl. Her strange green eyes, odd tail feathers, the horns on her head. Everything pointed to the fact that the bird should not be able to fly. Every instinct was telling her to either fly away and leave the other to die or to perhaps kill it herself. Seeing as she was a fledgling still, the second option wasn't very likely. Those claws looked terrifying to face even if they were used just to flail.

"Stubbornness means death,", Kethri said, fluttering after Hecate, teasing the other with her knowledge that she could fly circles around the bird should a conflict arise, "And the way you're going only leads to blackness."

Literally. The murky waters were so dark that they looked like a terrifying void. Should Hecate stumble in, she'd most likely drown.

Though... Kethri didn't particularly understand. She was offering help, why was the other not taking it? Her insults really meant nothing to her, glancing off of her like arrows off of armor. Her statements were simply fact, and an insult was really only an insult should the recipient be offended. It was Hecate's fault her ego was so fragile, not Kethri's.

"... You're slow,", she said, "You won't get anywhere trudging through the mud like some sort of swamp thing."

Kethri really thought that Hecate should accept her help. Perhaps if she did, she might ease on the fact-spitting.

@Hecate

Hecate ignored the owl, now. Anger was blossoming up, red hot, and threatening violence but for now she kept it on a tight leash.

And again, attempted simply to depart. She took wing, flapping into the trees, and hit a hillock--a rise in the muddy earth--not far ahead. But she was fuming, now. She studiously ignored Kethri, trudging on through the mud, and just hoped that the little brat... left.

@Kethri

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