Oh, don't worry little noodle. Even later-cycle Gembound were trash fires and with molotov cocktails for personalities. Healthy coping mechanisms are few and far.

For a while, that seemed to be the norm for the Vita lineage. Father Aza'zel, as great as he often was hailed to be, never wore his heart on his sleeve. His happiness had been feigned for a long time, self-doubt sewn into his flesh and blood and constantly itching and surfacing. Ashtoreth was on the money about that. Yet, the old King had only wanted to love and love and love; he gave everything he had until there was nothing left but his own deprecating thoughts and a helpful set of claws attached to his son.

But, Aure wouldn't know. He didn't know any of the baggage that came with the noodle presently blowing a great gust into his face and mussing up his feathers. ("Hey!") Crimson eyes glinted mischievously, and he laughed. Spreading out his wings, he hopped a fair distance away and focused in on his magic. From the spot where he stood, wings spread, a multitude of fake-Aures sprouted. Each one took to the air and hovered, materializing in a show of light from another fake copy and seemingly solidifying into perfect imitations. The wyvern immediately felt the strain of the casting, but he held fast. It'd be worth it to be a show-off and see if Ashtoreth could figure out which one was the real him.

@Ashtoreth

Wh--!

Ash puffed up into an entire fluff ball, her feathers shifting into an absolutely eye strain as they shifted off of one another, shuttering in a flickering white-black strobe. The bright light of the illusion didn't help much with the glistening of her feathers, either.

She opened her jaw to reveal a a sharp row of teeth, and this time Aure's voice came directly out of her throat. "guess I could use some practice." She stared wide eyed at the dozen copies, tail lashing as she tried to figure out which one was the real one. "some practice. SOME. PRACTICE."

Just in case her point wasn't coming across, she lifted herself on to her hind legs and tried to bat at one of the illusions, his voice squawking back at him, Thinking I could compare to that!!!" What an absolute moron! This was incredible! How did he do it? How did he make all those copies of himself-- this wasn't fungi magic, or pressure magic, or anything-- what, did he just happen to know several forms of advanced, different elemental magic?

Ash had never seen anything like it, and trying to bat away the clones, she fell over dramatically on to her back with a huff.

@Auré

Well, the reaction he got was most certainly the intended one. In awe, astounded, in wonder. And astonishedly using his prior statement against him. Ashtoreth batted at numerous copies like she would swat away a swarm of flies. Each copy she 'destroyed' vanished in dramatic ways. Often into a swarm of butterflies. Why not? Why not be dramatic? Vanquished by her many foes, however, the noodle flopped onto her back.

The real Aure remained hovering higher above as he loosened his grip on magic, shaking his head - shaking off the strain of it and preparing to take a heavy nap later. His talons clicked as he landed, laughing and flopping back down onto his stomach. In classic sploot position next to Ash, he demurred, "I meant the song! Magic's a completely different thing, Ashtoreth. Your dad made a whole thing just for you. I'm just using what comes natural to all of us in - yeah, a lot of different ways."

He seemed to melt on the spot. "That was the first time that's actually worked, though." Congrats, that was the debut of an Aure original. Light-cloning!

@Ashtoreth

And impressed, Ashtoreth was. She stared at the dozens of butterflies fluttering away, hardly noticing how much energy it had taken out of Aure. Only once he melted next to her did she look back at him, nose twitching.

First time it had worked or not, it had been impressive. She rolled on to her side, wiping down her muzzle with a few licks of her paw and a few furious rubs to her face. She twisted, reaching up a back paw to scratch an itch on her neck, and finally, spread out her wings and melted on to the floor in a puddle beside Aure.

Weirdly enough... She liked him. The little noodle reached up a paw to boop his beak on the snout. "That was cool," she told him in her magical voice, though she was panting for breath at this point-- in parts from the laughter, the magic use, and the flailing all at once-- the tiredness didn't transfer to her voice at all.

She wished that he would stop bringing up her dad. He definitely seemed too clueless to know what he was doing, but now she was starting to wonder how he was doing, and... How all of Bonebound was doing. She would have to admit that she hadn't been home in a few dozen cycles, though, and... Well, it was just hard to bring up naturally. She would much rather talk about anyone and anything else.

"... Maybe we could teach each other," she suggested after a heartbeat, giving him a toothy grin.

@Auré

Aure blinked at the most delicate of boops, a friendly gesture he hadn't been prepared for so soon. He glanced down at himself, quickly trying to determine what the next best course of action would be. Crimson eyes flickered from his claws to his peets, then up to his blunt wing-claws. Chirping, he shifted a wing to give a return-boop. Revenge! But of a friendly sort, of course!

"Haha, thanks," the wyvern chirped from his pancaked-self, sighing. Perhaps, they could teach each other magic - he most certainly seemed to have more to learn about his father's natural element. Yet, "I'm a little tired after that, though. Might need to take a second for a breather, eh?" Clearly, Ashtoreth did too, panting silently through vocal cords that seemed to just not work.

His chest swelling rapidly with his breaths, Aure rolled onto his back. Crimson eyes fixated on the fungi clusters on Polaris's ceiling, marveling at their constant glow and stunning beauty. The conversation lulled, and he wanted to press - for some particular reason, he wanted it to be the source of his need for magic practice. Completely unaware of what he was doing, he murmured to Ash, "my father was a King - Aza'zel, if you've heard of him. He ruled over the skies and the bones. I want to - be a protector, a guardian like him."

@Ashtoreth

Ashtoreth wasn't about to complain about taking a breather-- even talking took a lot of energy out of her; if Aure though he was tired, he had no idea. She was pretty used to pushing her limits, though, so this wasn't anything new. She stretched out her little noodly limbs, a pop happening somewhere along her spine and sending a shiver up her fur.

The wyvern laid upon his back, staring up at the multicolored ceiling, and she too wiggled back to peer up at the reflected glow of crystals. Polaris looked like it was underwater in some sections, with the way the lights shifted and glistened off of one one another. It was soothing, tempting her to close her eyes.

Then, Aure revealed that he was her half-brother. The confirmation solved a question that she had been stubbornly ignoring despite the way it nagged at her; but... The way he spoke about Aza'zel rubbed her the wrong way.

"Aza'zel," the bird's voice reflected back at him. And then, again, it repeated, changing to a voice a bit more clear. The timbre became loud, crisp and clear, as though someone similar but not quite Aure was saying the name, "Aza'zel." It was her father's voice, just as she remembered it. "We are the Bonebound, bound to our bones."

Despite the words that she shared with Aure, she seemed relatively unfazed. She stole a glance toward him when she thought he wasn't looking, the tip of her tail twitching. "... my little star." She squinted, shuffling back on to her belly, and wriggled up next to Aure, reaching up a paw like a cat about to smack a toy-- and held it up next to his beak.

"Was a king," Aure's voice returned, like an out of tune copy of her father's voice, "He ruled," she repeated, "was... Was... was..." The word echoed softly, a question that she did not form into her own words.

@Auré

Aure hadn't expected any sort of response from his companion, only giving a soft sigh and letting his gaze trail back up to the multicolored ceiling. It was beautiful. Perhaps it would be worthwhile to make a map - so he didn't get lost in the colors and wonder.

His ears pricked, head tilting slightly as the noodle reflected his speech. It was nothing out of the ordinary, until Ashtoreth repeated - in a different voice. The sounds of uh-zah-zuhl was distinct, even in a deeper tone and calling across a cave. He could almost hear the trademark echo of Canis's low roof and many bones. Her voice - well, was it really hers? It felt nostalgic, warm, like the fatherly voice he'd always imagined the old King to have - pressed, calling to the purpose of the Bonebound, words that were not his, but his stone's. Old man Aza'zel was dead, and had been, but he lived on through the bones, through Ashtoreth's mimicry.

The thought of it was enough to nearly bring him to choke - a knot had formed mysteriously in the back of his throat, and he had to roll onto his side to stifle it. His beak bumped against the noodle's little paw as he did so. Crimson eyes searched in Ashtoreth's own, raising a wing and draping it over her. Aure scooted closer and chanced a soft nuzzle. "I guess that makes - makes us siblings," he choked out softly, ears moving backwards.

It suddenly hit him that she well and truly didn't know of the old man's fate, of his wicked end.

"I'm sorry," Aure cooed, lowering his head and tucking his chin against his fluffy mane, tear-tracks already forming down his cheeks. He sniffed, "he's - sleeping now. I'm - the new Bone King." Unsure of how to proceed, he hesitated. The wyvern's feathers puffed up and smoothed down, tail thumping once against the ground. "Do you - want to see him?"

@Ashtoreth

They were siblings. It was a strange revelation for the both of them, as she stared at him, waiting for an answer that didn't seem to come. She didn't know what he had meant, and as he apologized and ducked his head, her heart steeled against the obvious answer. He told her that Aza'zel was sleeping-- maybe he had returned to his chrysalis? That happened, sometimes... So Aure was in charge of the Bonebound in his absence?

Ashtoreth shifted on to her feet, bouncing up with an arching in her back, and stretched out her paws. Well... She didn't want to go home, and she definitely didn't want to see her old man, but if he was in a chrysalis, maybe it wouldn't hurt to go by and figure out what had happened to the Bonebound. They were her family, even if she didn't like the thought of returning home to them...

As she went to summon magicka to speak for her, there was a sharp jolt through her throat and she gagged, her claws flexing into the dirt.

"I GUEAHHH--"
The air zinged with a sharp, highpitched noise that lasted only for an instant, like glass splintering in one quick, abrupt rupture. She coughed and hacked, ears leaning back. There was a jarring sensation through her body, and she scrunched down into the earth.

With a shiver and a shutter, she squinted up at Aure, gave her tail a twitch, and she tried to give them a reassuring smile. She reached forward to boop her snout to his beak in a reassuring nuzzle, still a little puzzled as to why he looked like he was crying... Maybe Aure missed Aza'zel? She shoved that thought to one side (before she could dwell on it too deeply) and pushed herself up on to her hind legs and gave a nod, before looking off toward Tunnel M-- that was the fastest way, right? They had to go through Orion either way...

@Auré

[cw; suicide mention]

Ashtoreth - didn't particularly get the double-meaning of his words. Let sleeping birds lie, bones picked clean of flesh by microbial life and the mud, wings stripped, worn, and returned. Aure didn't want to be the one to explain to his own sister that their brother had unwittingly assisted in allowing their old man the final push he felt he'd needed. Eythan, rather cruelly, had been a means to an end. An end that Aza'zel thought he needed to get to. One that he welcomed and left only his bones and stone.

Aure sniffed, ears flickering back once or twice as the noodle recovered, booped him, and stood.

Breather forgotten, the wyvern rolled onto his feet, talons scuffling as he regained his footing. "We'll have to go through - Tunnel N," he chirped, swallowing down his tears in lieu of grimacing - he hoped the mess the Bloodberries had left was long-gone, or at least not quite so stinking-to-the-high-heavens. Just as he went to take off, Aure flicked his ears and looked at Ashtoreth. Magic working, he established a feeble mental link to hers - pointedly blocking off his melting pot of emotions and only faintly paying attention to the little star's indecision.

"Here - I'm listening," he began, then transitioned to thought, you can think things at me, if that's easier? I promise that I'm not - looking at anything else in here. Aure started to trot forwards, regardless. He didn't want to push Ash if she really didn't want to go through with this.

@Ashtoreth

Ashtoreth's ears pricked with surprise as Aure's thoughts brushed against hers, her fur fluffing up defensively as she was completely caught off guard. Instinctively, her mind went blank, and she stared off, hesitant to accept the connection so easily. It wasn't that she didn't trust Aure-- but... but there had been plenty of Gembounds who had messed with her mind before. She... Didn't really want to think about that.

When Ash did think, she thought less with actual words and more with concepts and images, gut feelings and emotions. As she relaxed, padding after her half-brother, she pushed those thoughts toward him. There was a lot of emotions associated with home; she didn't ever quite feel like she belonged there, and... Well, she loved her family, sure, but she also felt suffocated and trapped when she had lived with them. It wasn't even the Bonebound's fault, or her father's, it was... Honestly, all just in her head. They hadn't done anything to her. They had loved her, and tried to protect her. Maybe it was that she felt that she had let them down, more than anything. This wave of guilt she shared openly through their connection.

If her father was "sleeping", she wanted to see for herself. She had spent so much more time away from Canis than in it, even though she still... Thought of it as home, just a home that she didn't want to go back to. It was hard to explain, even when sharing emotions through the connection; it was irrational. But she couldn't help how she felt. But, if I'm going home with you... It feels less weird than just showing up, I guess. She tried to put it to words. ... Thanks for not dragging me kicking and screaming back home. As stupid as it was, she had always been afraid that one of the Bonebound would show up and demand her to come home. She was terrified of being trapped there.

As they reached the narrow tunnel that lead back through to Orion, she felt a shiver down her spine. Gee, wonder where the paranoia of being trapped lead to. She shook her head and bounded forward. Well-- anyway-- I bet everyone's missed me! The little hybrid thought brightly, shoving down any dark thoughts that might try to come to the surface. She could just imagine them all; Liora, Bones, Giggle, Krakarak, Kerberos! ... Assuming they all were still around. Do I have more siblings, now? She asked, peering toward Aure over her shoulder.

... She was, um, more than a little out of touch, apparently.

@Auré