Mysoken

Bonded to: Jörmungandr Balechild

Age: less than 200, Born in Leaffall/Autumn of 'Bald Mountain Year -30' or so
Sex: Female
Soul Name: none yet Known By: n/a
Mate Status/Sex Preference: Kez, lovemated briefly, killed by Trolls; bisexual
Children: K'iya, dead from malnutrition
Parents/Relatives: Mother: Ituri, killed by Trolls
Father: Yeehen, killed by trolls
Siblings: Brother: Soaxen, younger, still alive, still kept by Trolls
Brother: Sheyda, older, killed by Trolls
Height: 4' Build: once well fed, becomes quite voluptously round
Hair Color, Length, Style: platinum, naturally wavy, to their high back
Eye Color, Size, Shape: ruddy red, brown but reddened from damage, narrow
Skin Tone: olive-tan, numerous scars from beatings and occasionally wild fire
Voice Quality: scratchy, hardly speaks
Clothing -- Summer: tunic as in winter but with lighter pants
Clothing -- Winter: heavy fur pants of alabaster, a long-sleeved coarse fur taupe shirt, and low, heeled boots, plus wrist wraps
Jewlery Worn, Made: doesn't wear any of the things that might have been made in the mines, would prefer to wear only carved wood or bone
Tatoos/Markings/Scars: many scars, mostly small ones but has a large burn scar over right shoulder and upper arm from early accidents using magic
Pets/Animals Kept: none, not allowed with the Trolls
Notable Posessions: none
Holt Function: maintains any fires and makes sure they aren't out of control
Magic? How Powerful? Sending: Below Average; Magic Feeling: Low; Fire Starting: Extremely High
Climate/Locations Preferred: cold and windy, rugged
General Likes: physical activity, freedom
General Dislikes: being told what to do, slavery, loss
Fears/Worries: being recaptured, never finding a new lovemate
Special Strange Info:
Stats: Strength: Very High; Dexterity: Above Average; Agility: Low; Health: Very High; Intelligence: Average; Appearance: Average; Charisma: Below Average; Magic Power: Below Average
Basic Personality: She enjoys getting close to lovers.
How they feel about
Humans: hasn't really encountered any of them beyond those in the Holt, and a few on the plains while traveling with Redback, they can't be nearly as bad as the Frost Trolls
Elves -- herders: huh, well that's convenient
Elves -- magic users: need to train with people like them, and thankfully they are quite good about helping learn!
Elves -- bond-riders: this could change everything, couldn't it
Trolls, etc: with the exception of Redback and maybe whoever else has joined the Bald Mountain tribe of elves, they are absolutely bad, and she will formulate a plan of attack the moment she knows of them
Bond Animal Info if any: Jormungandr Balechild, see below
Skills: Trapping/Nets: Extremely High
Hearth Fire building: Average
Contortionism: Average
Appraisal (of objects): Above Average
Hunting - Axe: Very High
Ranged - Lasso: Very High
Against Trolls - metal, heavy shield: Below Average
Would try to ride Jormungandr but... that would be stupid. Has a Below Average ride Elk skill from childhood in the Go-Backs

History: She was captured with her family by the Frost Trolls when she was around 30, and was forced to work under the king's prize mate, with her family and group, until her magic developed. When it suddenly appeared, it was in defense against a beating, and she was isolated for quite some time before they allowed her to use it again. On command, of course; she was made to start and maintain fires for forges. She attempted numerous times to escape, but the Trolls already had heavy protective gear. The fire did damage her, she spent a year being tended to before being put back into the forge - with a more humble attitude. Most of her life after that was a blur. The elves among her family and tribe that were captured slowly but surely were killed - all of them, to keep her in line. Her lover Kez was the first, but her child with him had died from malnutrition before then. She learned to dread seeing her own people, because her isolation was enforced outside of these executions.

And then one day, she and Redback happened to cross paths. Even if they were two breeds, they were both slaves. And more: Redback had a... strange sensation about him. She noticed that he kept attracting her magical attention. Even if it was weak, he... he had magic? She had to confirm this somehow, and it came in the form of weird half-dream images. Was he asleep? Drunk? Who knew, but the outcome was that she knew he was trying to communicate with her, and she also knew that as slaves they'd both be beaten sensless if the guards found out they could do this.

She had to initiate contact, while they were both awake. With a gentle nudge she felt around for his mind, and he latched on to that contact easily. Impressive! Though his sending was inexpect and somewhat difficult to understand, she did get the impression that he had a plan, he needed to leave and he wanted her to come with.

That suited her just fine. It would be too late for her family, and that thought gripped her gut. But Go-Backs weren't known to be very attached to their young. After all the centuries of battle with the northern Trolls, like these that had captured them, the group was used to bearing young and raising them for quick, hard lives. What was the point behind forming too much attachment if it meant you would suffer from seeing them...

Well, that worked on her, probably because she had been young enough to be cowed by it. Had her father not sent one last good-bye before being speared by that Troll's blade before her eyes, she might have managed to brave the rest... But one by one her will had been whittled down in the form of those elfin fingers and ears collected on the Frost King's necklace. He wasn't ashamed to casually caress them, an eternal reminder that he was in charge of her life.

She was worked hardest when the forges needed her magic to melt a volume of ore and stone, they would 'meet' mentally when she was appraising the forges and getting ready to give that big burst of magical energy. She had to send those thoughts before that - because she was all but unconscious after they were lit.

No more, she thought to the Troll who could send, no more, we need to leave.

And she felt in response, tomorrow when others are busy with this ore. It was a good idea: most of the Trolls working those hot forges would be quite focused, and it was true that they'd often just tossed her back into a cell with half a plate of mostly-rotten food other times she'd done it. She could easily escape that cell, even after they'd put extra bars on it - she was too skinny to be considered slender, but she was also quite flexible.

Redback gave her a dream in the morning, the very clear image of what he'd been working on, and where it was - follow the smell, his mind seemed to chuckle. Now, the tricky part would be moving unseen through these halls... Less tricky when there was an idiot in the forge that poured a bucket of hot metal right on his own foot! Even the Frost King laughed at him, he'd lose that foot for sure, and was told he deserved it... But everyone was gathered there, and not looking at her cell even in passing by it on the way to their infirmary. She piled what little there was of a bed into an Elf shape, stuck it against the far corner, and slipped out over the bars in a gap that was only as wide as her shoulders because she'd been fussing with the stone for two years. She and Redback had that in common at least!

Mysoken traveled quickly down paths she'd never walked before - but since Redback had, she... trusted his memory. She could almost feel his feet trudging along this hall, then that one, turn this corner and scramble up a short ridge... and there it was, a dark and very smelly nook that was nearly pitch black. It had irregular edges, but no glimmers from the one torch a ways back - no gems, nothing glittering from the walls. That's why he'd chosen this place to dig, certainly smart.

He collapsed the entry with a careful nudge of his pick, and only a few minutes later she boldly produced a flame to light their way. They still only spoke mentally, but it was much clearer now - they could use body language as well as proximity to aid them. He spotted a particular narrow, and began drawing the pick down it, shearing away layer by layer until the pillars were just wide enough for him to squeeze through. She had a much easier time, he was twice her width at his narrowest...

And then... They were in a cave that hadn't been explored by the Frost Trolls. Well probably it had at some point, from another entrance, but it had nothing to exploit. No gems, no shiny rocks, whatever it was they wanted out of it this cave didn't have. It did have bats. It did have grubs and... well, if they were fish they had no eyes.

But those fish were delicious and easily caught. Their first meal free from their captors!

"Where can we go?" Mysoken said, her voice broken and hushed. She wasn't sad - she just wasn't used to speaking any more.

"Up," he replied. "We will go up, see what's out there, Trolls don't care for the daylight. There's an opening somewhere, fresh air, smell it?"

"I can only smell your piss," she said, and they both laughed for the first time in years.

***

They followed bats and fresh air, always looking and listening behind them for signs of pursuit. And while they both knew that pursuit was happening, there was never evidence that those trolls had ever even found the now-collapsed pee-nook. No shouts, no pick-axe shattering stone walls. Redback was much better with listening for that - he'd feel the stone and just close his eyes; he once claimed that he heard with his feet - and she believed him, because his feet were big!

She told him her name, he traded his. And though it would take another few days to reach the plains beyond the Frost Troll caverns, they also learned more about each other as they walked in silence. They did conserve their energy - they didn't need to talk, to communicate. Redback claimed he truly appreciated that fact, and wondered how many other Trolls might have that power that the Elves did.

He also allayed her fears: only his family had known of 'friendly' Elves, and they knew that those Elves could speak with their minds. He had never shared that information with the Frost clan, of course. Perhaps if he had, they'd all have perished more quickly; perhaps if he had, the Go-Backs would have been doomed. As they traveled together, his skill with this power improved notably, and because of that improvement they were able to share more unusual memories. Half-remembered ancestral dreams, childhood events, and that one odd magical sideways-lurch that caused the Elf to have a very vivid vision. She didn't understand any of it, it was from a source that was clearly Elfin, but also involved the Trolls somehow. When the High One Timmain had been brought back to her Elfin shape, and broadcast to all around the world this amazing vision, not all the Elves in that world cared what she was showing them.

Plus, that vision had come while Mysoken had been beaten soundly for daring to spit at the Frost King. Of course she was hallucinating, speaking in a mutter, while being dragged back to her cell.

But they hadn't realized that Redback, and perhaps other Trolls, had sensed it as well. The pair spoke of this while they moved across the plains, following a waterway and keeping to areas that they could easily hide.

And then, one morning, a shadow came over the plain, as they were trying to capture a deer for dinner. The shadow spooked the animal, but then - it was snapped up in great claws, bellowing in a shrill terror as it was carried into the sky.

Mysoken and Redback froze in their own terror, but frantically the Elf's mind sought some kind of reason. What was that thing? Where had it come from? Was that - a person riding it? It wheeled in the air and turned back to them...

Landed. It was happy to crush the deer under its claws, and begin feeding while it splashed a little in the river they had followed. And an Elf woman stood from its neck and shoulders, then went to the ground in a single sleek motion. She dusted herself off, and Mysoken noticed that she'd clearly seen Redback and her standing nearby.

Redback... knelt in a manner that she'd seen all the Troll slaves do - and most of the tribe's subjects - toward the Frost King. But he wasn't doing it to avoid a beating, and Mysoken all but joined him on her own knees... She put her hand on his shoulder, gently, but he didn't rise until the other Elf was closer. Obviously, the Elf would be more apt to speak to another of her own kind.

This sunset-haired woman stared at Redback with a mixture of disgust and wonder. "Is that a Troll?"

"He is Redback, and I am Mysoken," his companion spoke in her scratchy way. Mysoken's eyes were still on the gigantic creature who tore the deer into pieces before the crunching of bone could be heard. "What... is that?"

"That's my dragon, Lorewrath," she said, "and I'm Rasp... What are you doing this far out in the middle of nowhere?"

"We might ask you the same thing," Redback finally said, rising.

"Hunting, scouting, watching for... well, for folks like yourselves." She grinned widely, not altogether trustworthy nor friendly in that expression, but certainly one that was better than a snarl or a curse. "I think you should probably come home to Bald Mountain with us, it's safer there. I think you'd fit in."

Redback glanced at Mysoken, who quirked her eyebrows up a little. "We.... need to discuss this a moment," she announced, and took Redback's shoulder into her hand once more, turning them around while Rasp looked on with a grin.

They did discuss it - and were interrupted by the dragon's mind! And, that dragon had apparently passed along their conversation to its rider in the meantime!

Eventually however, they did decide that it would be at least safer to be around people - and maybe dragons - than not. As long as they would not enslave either of them. That worry would abate quickly, once they got to Bald Mountain. That is, once they climbed onto the massive dragon's striped back and flew there! Mysoken had never imagined life in the air was so... windy, or fast, or... She clung to her Troll friend's back, buried her face, and waited until they landed to open her eyes again.

**

When they arrived to this Bald Mountain, it certainly was... both of those things. It wasn't much of a 'mountain', but it definitely was bigger than the foothills that they'd wandered away from all this time. There would definitely be snow on its treeless crest, but below there was a beautiful valley, lake, all manner of stone outcrops and...

Dragons. When the one they were on arrived, it gave a massive bugling to announce itself and its passengers. At that sound, like the horn call or bell of the Troll caverns, hands and hands of them came flying out of holes hidden among the rocks and trees of the peak. A larger, flatter area was available nearer the crest of the mountain, and it was to that Aerie that the dragon headed.

Surely they couldn't all fit on this ledge, it was a worry that Mysoken had and even Redback echoed. They dropped to the flat ground, Mysoken a little more thankful to be on it than her Troll companion. There were many eyes on them now, not just those hungry, huge dragons.

Elf eyes. And, they didn't realize it at the time, one or two Human. Apogee, their chieftess, came to appraise them, and did so with a quick but easily overheard conversation with her peers. One or two of them seemed to question that there was a Troll, but it was obvious even to those others who might know of the underground people that this one was special. And special enough to Mysoken that he kept his hand on her shoulder to reassure her. Even if they weren't allowed here, he would be there - strong as ever.

Not that she didn't have her own methods... she was asked, "what can you do? I sense quite a strong magic on you, but I'm not the right one to look you over." Apogee tilted her head, cowlicked hair pointing at the sky.

"I am a fire shaper," Mysoken said, "it's what I was made to do in the Frost Troll forges."

Several in the large group nodded slowly, either with appraisal or understanding. "We will only ask that it be used properly here, don't want to burn down the forest, right?" Apogee smirked.

Mysoken felt a little nervous but smiled a bit, it was a joke - and it had been so very long since someone other than her cruel captors made one (usually at her expense) she hardly recognized it.

Slowly but surely, over the course of the next few hands of days, they were led around the Holt. Shown this aerie or that cavern, where to find the food stock, where not to shit. And they were given a nook with sleep furs and fresh water, candles and a torch on the wall. It wasn't as extensively decorated or supplied as some they passed in the process, but it was more than the pair had had in eights of years, if ever.

Apogee was so casual when she told them they'd maybe find a good ledge or cavern for their dragon later. Like it was an assumption that they would have a dragon - like ... all of them? The entire group, the whole tribe, disparate as they were from different locations around Abode, had dragons as mounts or hunting partners or whatever it was that they had. They were not dumb animals, either - as Lorewraith demonstrated - they were very intelligent and compassionate, and served their tribe in the same way as any given Elf.

There was a bit of fear, there was a core of doubt in Mysoken. She knew that her ancestors were riders of elk, and there were wolf- or eagle-riders among those here, they spoke of such things. If Mysoken knew how to mount a deer it was only in as much as clinging on and letting it go wherever it would go. It was very clear that Redback truly wanted this to happen - he was starry-eyed at the thought, in fact, and it made Mysoken smile. It would be his confidence that allowed her to brave what happened to her next.

***

They looked concerned, the Tribal 'elders'. She immediately thought the worst: there were invaders, there were Frost Trolls, there wa--

"We've found a dragon, out there," Apogee said, nodding toward the deepest woods around the Mountain. "But we are a bit worried. And we think maybe, you could ... help."

How could I possibly, I've never been near dragons until now... She bespoke, not able to find her voice.

"Oh, I think you'll know when you see them," Squall muttered with half a grin.

"Besides," Shatter said, looking right at Rasp, "we'll have plenty of backup for you just in case you need us." Lorewraith's presence might have comforted some, but Mysoken was still a touch on the intimidated side. Then she realized: well so would another dragon, right? At least she hoped so.

Faintly emboldened but far from confident, Mysoken did as she was bidden by the Holt's chieftess. After all, wasn't that how to get in good with them and remain here? She wasn't even sure that was the right way of thinking about it. They were good people, they were nothing but accepting (well... they were accepting of her, but Redback was certainly kept arms-length from quite a few of the Elves here), they were willing to trade and give freely the things that any of them needed.

Down in the deep forest, Mysoken felt quite lost. She knew that there were other eyes on her than merely the Elves and their dragon friends.

Those eyes glowed a brilliant green, just like the fire from its arched neck, and its ... wing arms. At first she'd thought it was just a trick of the light, it was sunny and there were places among the canopy gaps where brilliant light came down, illuminating the litter and ground below. Looking up to those gaps meant a fringe of bright leaves. (Which were, themselves, all but foreign to this northern Elfess, who had never seen leafy trees until traveling back from the Frozen Mountains.)

The dragon the eyes belonged to was shiny, white like the snow of her ancestors' home. But its belly, rich and dark. All of the brightness in this area was coming straight from the burning ... fringe, feathers? Wings? And also, from its mind.

His mind. Something extremely deep and rather intrusive came bursting into her mind, not like communication. Not like even those near-High-Ones that looked at her and her Troll friend with such disgust and disdain that it came through their mental contact. No, this was piercing, enveloping, pervasive... but also passive. Not as though it was attempting to rip through her (well, no there was definitely a feeling that this was on the edge) but more that ... this dragon's mind simply knew so much with a glance. So much about her.

She worried that it was too deep, but she was a Go-Back, and a survivor. She would weather this odd contact. And because she did so, she straightened and looked at those odd red and green eyes, and thought back to him.

We need to know that you are safe, so... are you?

Again it was more a feeling and a mental twist that led her to believe that this dragon was seeking something, anything, to hold on to. And then he spoke, in her mind.

I came here because my sire is here, because my dam is ... dangerous, she expects too much of us, I did not - I could not...

"Wait your what?" Mysoken blurted out, "your - your father is among us here?"

She suddenly worried, who would that even be? If this was his son?

She soon learned, because he appeared rather abruptly beside her. Startled, Mysoken nearly crisped the air with her magic. And with that done, too, the burning dragon sat his butt down on the ground and looked with what appeared to be adoration at her. He was pleased with the reception? She could tell, he was getting better at conveying his mood.

He wasn't looking at the odd white-feathered Elf that was beside her.

... Well even she wasn't looking at the Elf because he wasn't. He was a dragon, suddenly. Irathe was his name, she'd only barely been introduced to him. He took a hesitating step, as a four-footed and beautifully feather-winged dragon, with his nose pointing at this odd newcomer.

Whatever transpired between them was a mystery, Mysoken couldn't pry into their mental contact and was sort of glad for it. Soon, though, others began to show up.

The dragon balked. Too many, there are too many, I - I can't...

Irathe gently suggested with a bump of his own delicate and kind-feeling mind, that those who showed up to see this spectacle return to their dens or their fishing... "Give them space," he suggested. Almost everyone obeyed, but another of the strange tall elf-like but not Elf types. Who turned out to be ... Irathe's bond and partner - who was Apogee's dragon's daughter... it was so confusing.

It was confusing to the dragon, too, who knew only that his sire hadn't known of his existence until this very moment. If a dragon could squint with thought, he did, though. "I remember... someone whose eyes were bright like that..." He looked away, the white dragon's face growing a little green itself. "Oh. Well. I didn't realize that she was even like... like me, a shifter?"

Very clear to Mysoken, even if she'd hardly been around other Elves and definitely not around shifters like this weird family, was that Latodoba was a bit shocked. "When? When was that?" She asked, before she could stop herself.

But even Irathe couldn't really pin it down. Maybe it was last moon, maybe it was a hand of years ago. Maybe much longer. Either way, he and his 'new' son would discuss things later. For the moment, and for whatever reason, the dragon looked back at Mysoken.

May I stay ... near you? It will not be easy, I tend to... hurt things.

Baffled, Mysoken none the less took up the challenge. I'll be near, I think there is a good hollow over there? Glancing around, she started off toward a small rise topped with a boulder. It was another few days before they were fully settled, however, and a few other Elves helped get that rock and its ground into a liveable home. The dragon remained above, perched in a way that his wings weren't just touching all the trees. It did appear that they killed the grass and made the trees gnarl, one of them split as though lightning had hit it.

"We'll... work on that later," Mysoken said. "For now, just rest. We'll learn how to do these things together."