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The forest was dark, and wet today, humid with water and full of sound. Not that she minded much, Naida was on a mission! A very important mission with very important consequences for the future of her ferry service! With Thaumaturgy under her belt, and mind buzzing with possibilities, Naida was ready to enact the last part of her ultimate plan. She had the water magic, she had the boat - that she could now carry! Wit...

It was just before dawn when Lavenlach extracted herself from the pile of fur and feathers in the stable. Primrose, Pansy, and Marigold shuffled to allow her to move and she nosed each in turn. Narancia called them their “daughters”, which wasn't entirely wrong. They did have another daughter though. Lavenlach nosed her blanket over Auraq’s sleeping form. She still needed to properly talk to Narancia about their...

The low light of the forest was a soothing and comfortable dark. Phosphor trotted, humming, through leaf litter and around old-growth trees, nose to the ground and hunting. Spring was here, and there had been a notably large rainstorm a few days ago. The damp forest floor would be a ripe ground for the growth of all kinds of fungi and he needed to assess that the local mycological ecosystem was functioning as it should, after all! Usually it was fine, but there ...

The Wiz trotted along the beach, ears pricked and knees kicking like he's some young colt showing off his colors. The wind was fresh from the sea with a tickle of salt. It was cool against his fur in such an energizing way. Nothing at all like the snow of the high mountains. The footing was a bit loose in the drier sand but Wiz had spent most of his time trotting through the wav...

This was not where she was meant to be.   She had been simply wandering through a dark part of the forest, mulling over the magical call of their Mother Goddess. Many elkh had felt called to improve their magics recently, though she herself had been content not to make the effort. It just did not feel as if it was a call for her to fulfill…  But… Something was ...

The clouds overhead were dark and roiling, flashing with lightning strikes in bursts of blinding light. His final teacher, and final mastery, was finally here. His fur stood on end, static racing across his skin, as a bolt of lightning struck the ground behind him with a thunderous crack that had his ears ringing. He turned around to face him. The Lightning Master snorted, ...

Rayne nuzzled him goodbye, with Astryne trotting to and fro when he left towards his next destination. Careful hooves took him over the grass and past trees, then to the bare rocks and stone around his next training ground. Magic suffused his steps, and he could tell he was getting ever closer to the possibility at the edge of their collective understanding of magic. It was an exciting idea, if a bit frightening at the same time. It sort of felt like his head was buzzing out of his ears....

Astrelli had gained such wonder from the many places he had wandered that coming home to the Eastern Domain for his next two teachers filled him with immense appreciation. Familiar grass beneath one’s feet was so much sweeter when one had the experience of wandering and yearning for home. The great Buckh Mountains rose like comforting guardians, and well-trodden paths sung to him like old friends greeting a long-gone traveler.   ...

Urgency was setting in. He could feel something… Changing, deep in the Earth. Word had spread about Beacon, about an Elkh with a dragon’s body, and the possibility of some great ascension beyond what they already knew. Was it possible that Aiti’s gifts were granted to bring Her Elkh somewhere higher? Had this been the plan all along? … He was a little frightened, in truth. Rayne and Astryne hadn't joined him o...

Lantern salamanders scattered into the dark, briny water. Astrelli stepped carefully from muddy ground to stable stone, Dream, Sirius, and Twinkle nestled beneath his cloak. His next teacher lay somewhere in this dark place, and he was determined to find her. His astronomy shawl tied and untied itself over and over as he picked his way through cage-like trees and around deceptively deep pools of dark water. Occasional...

Astrelli pulled his shawl a little tighter, the quiet energy of the pool sang to him in ways he only barely understood. He could feel now, how inferior his understanding of the earth was, when he had such a strong grasp of the thaumaturgical arts. Earthsense felt as if he'd pulled something in his foreleg, it was tight and unyielding, almost painfully so. He sought guidance in his dreams, and in his dreams, he kept re...

Rainsong Bay was a beautiful place. Astrelli had seen many places in his wanderings around Silkkassa and Miatias, but the beauty of the local environment never ceased to be a source of wonder. Since the Corruption, it had become more commonplace for elkh to step foot around the human places, if only to check in on Aiti’s other creatures and how they were getting along. He was no different in that respect, though he ...

He could feel the footsteps before he heard the human, a steady, plodding, two-footed gait that was nothing like the rhythm of an elkh’s steps. He had learned after a while how to differentiate between the different motions of the natural world. Shroomkin, squirrels, rabbits, bears, elkh… How a river sounded versus a rockslide, and how the rumble of a cart betrayed a traveler long before the sound. He had been lay...

The buzz of the jungle was an ever-present sound, humming in her ears like some kind of choir. In a way it was reassuring, a thrum of life, a heartbeat tying the earth to the plants, the plants to the animals, and the animals back to the earth. Birds cawed, insects hummed, and Matcha was part of the greater world that surrounded her.   But today she couldn’t bask in the circle of life. She had a mission....

There is something amiss. Seraph halts, silent steps steady on the soft ground. There is more to sense than to see, and what they sense is unsettlingly close. The hum of Hymnos's chants heralds their heavier steps. Even powerful things could be made uneasy by something unknown. With ears perked and awareness pricked, their pace hastens through the dark forest, stirring up l...

Word had spread like wildfire over the deserts of Matias. Vesper had left the pool to search for the answer as to why the elkh were still struggling with corruption. It had caused no end of tittering in the elkh community around the desert, and even Tianxing was a little uneasy. Vesper was a well-known and recognized member of the community, for her to have left meant that this was truly something to be worried about. ...

He feels ready. Tianxing has gotten to know his healing abilities. They have served him well in protecting his family from harm. Even now, as the human and the elkh worlds become ever so slightly more intertwined, he finds use for the gifts granted by Aiti. He can heal injured human-elkh, heal their companions, bring forth beautiful cacti and young trees and make them flower or bear fruit… But he is itchy. There is ...

The first thing Shanyue notices when he wakes up is that his head feels... Funny. Not really a bad funny, per se, but a different kind of funny that seems to be a little bit abnormal. He opens his eyes blearily to the morning desert sunlight streaming into the cave that his family is sleeping in. Naoshu and Tianxing are squished into each other's sides, and Ansai is curled up against Tianxing's side. Shanyue is tucked around his family, nuzzled into each other, so it takes a moment to extract...