Seriswyn

And as Seris moves through the house and Aurea stands outside it slowly dawns on her what she's done. She didn't have time to be embarrassed, not when the other woman was looking at her from the doorway. "I don't....I just..." She chews at the inside of her cheek and her face feels hot so she looks over out at the night sky over her shoulder, listens to the noises out there to get her bearings. "I just followed my nose while in the neighborhood." Looking back to Seris, a soft and almost sheepish smile pulls at her lips. "Needed even more air if you'd believe it." Even Haven could feel suffocating, the air felt less thick when she was on four paws in the Wildlands.

Seris’ gaze lifted over Aurea’s shoulders to the wilderness beyond. Nothing of any interest had travelled through the woods, the animals engaging in dull chatter primarily for the sake of hearing their own voices. “They aren’t talking about you if that’s what you’re worried about,” Seris told Aurea, bound to honesty. Then, her expression took on a more skeptical air. It seemed like an extreme exaggeration to call Seris’ stretch of the wilds a neighborhood in any context. “You can come in, but the air is fresher outside the house.” House was also an exaggeration–it was more of a trunk–a thick one, and one magicked into an entire dwelling inside bending the bounds of space and matter. But still, the trunk of a tree.

#aurea #aurea 03

zelihatheflight

Date: Latest plot drop, troupe 4 Location: Haven, inside Zeliha's cabin at the border Characters: @seriswyn & @zelihatheflight Notes: :ahh: emoji

Zeliha had packed up. All her necessary belongings in the rickety forest cabin she lived in had gone into chests for transportation to the South. (Truly, it was only about 2 chests and her bag. The cabin remained furnished and ready for her to return one day, or for another to live within it.) Zeliha had had every intention of moving out to assist in war efforts against the darkspawn. Iskaldrik's borders had been quiet for months now, and the Healer and smuggler always went where she was most needed. But now? The news had whipped the Nightingales into a frenzy. Whispers, and messages came to Zeliha in droves, and her travel plans were all but abandoned, as were her intentions of telling Seris of her Southern relocation. This time, it wasn't simply temporary housing ventures in The Stumble Inn - the faiman had to go.

She had just finished explaining over tea with Seris, having invited her over for this purpose. "... You know what has been happening in the South, you know I was more needed there than I really was here once the Kossith were dealt with." Zeliha hesitated, glancing around her emptier cabin. The air was getting colder these days, autumn rising on icy breezes coming in from Iskaldrik. But the faiman hugged her arms as she looked back at the elve, seeking comfort more-so from her sadness than from the wind that snuck through cracks in her windows. "Now... well, now it looks like our people need me. Not a healer, really, but a relocator." (Relocator was just Zeliha's polite term for smuggler. Though, for the elves, it truly was just relocating.) "Regardless, I need to go, Seris... I needed to tell you first. Did they tell you what's happening in Avalon?"

Seris indeed knew what was happening across the various borders. Animals carried numerous secrets and much knowledge with them, and somehow it always found its way to her hovel in the Wildlands. She shifted slightly in her seat looking around the dwelling and tried not to let her mind wander or her slight discomfort get the better of her. “Indeed. You certainly do keep your cobbler’s pocketbook heavy, don’t you?” It wasn’t meant to be a scathing remark, but Zeliha always seemed to be flitting from one place to another. “I fear they will need both, making you just the person they’re waiting for,” Seris encouraged before setting her half-emptied mug down on its little saucer. She reached across the table and gave Zeliha’s hand a brief squeeze. “And I must encourage you, as always, not to forget who you need you to be in the midst of all of this.” Zeliha did forget her own wellbeing at times. “I have heard a general account of what plagues Avalon.” She would not ask her friend to put herself out to recount such terrifying news.

#zeliha #zeliha 02

Person: @seriswyn Location: Thee Wildlands It had been a childish decision and if her mother were still alive, Aurea was certain she'd be getting a lecture. But there's no mother for her out here but the moon and there's light at the border and she'd just killed a man and so taken a moment and then taken off into the woods. A run for herself, just herself, that had her shedding boots and her cloak on the path and what had started on two legs had ended in four. She didn't know how long she'd been going, but when she was back on two legs and frantically pulling clothes back in place, she doesn't have to think too hard on where she is. Knocking at the door, she exhales slowly, trying to appear less like she'd just had a panic attack in the woods.

It was quiet in the wilds again, which was precisely how Seris liked it. A few of the children who lived far out on the outskirts of scattered settlements seemed less frightened of her–a supposed wretch in the woods who turned out to be little more than a woman–but they certainly weren’t any more social now than they had been before. Thus, it surprised her when she heard a knock at the door. There was no one Seris expected–animals perhaps, but they didn’t knock. Her expression was clearly one of perplexity when she opened the door to find Aurea standing there. “What are you doing here?”

#aurea #aurea 03

dailymarvelqueens

CHLOE BENNET photographed by Eric Ray Davidson (2025)

#mirror

"It's not something easy to do, I suppose. Think of myself as this....Great Queen that everyone thinks I am. To me I'm just Aurea," Her shoulders raise in a slight shrug as she looks down at her hands as she put them in her lap and she can't pick at her freshly cleaned up cuticles. "Thank you though, for this, for the kind words." The tops of her cheeks burn somewhat and she laughs softly, smiling softly at Seris's reflection in the mirror. "I'm sure it sounds ridiculous, to hear that I still feel small." These great feats she accomplished, she didn't do them to get songs written about her or spread her glory throughout Taravell. "I just do what I think is right and hope for the best." Her hair truly does look lovely, she looks like herself and yet still regal. It's a good balance, it's one she thinks she really needs right now. As the elvhen stood, Aurea turned her upper body to watch her, her hand shooting out to gently reach for the other woman's. "I'd like that, I owe you a couple of drinks for this." Her hand squeezes Seris's in yet another thank you.

“You don’t change into someone else when you walk out those doors,” Seris reminded her. “You’re just you, whatever title or crown you are or aren’t wearing.” Seris studied Aurea’s face for a moment as the wolf thanked her and merely nodded. She did not want to be too long or bore or keep Aurea occupied when there were other matters that called for her. “I think we stay the same and the world just grows.”

The style was meant to be a halfway point–half of Aurea how she was naturally and half of the role she had garnered for herself. Seris didn’t speak but she hoped the woman would recognize the value in both. “Find me later then, if you insist on it,” she said, giving Aurea a brief squeeze back before making her exit.

Gratitude, it wasn't just about worry, but perhaps a way of showing her own thanks for everything Aurea had just done. It's not like people hadn't said their thanks, handed her gifts, but this felt somehow more personal, spoke to Seris as a person, that she'd offer her own act of service in return. When was the last time someone had taken care of her? Not because she was a queen, but because they cared? Outside of Althea at least. And Freydis, though each in their own individual way. "That's perfect, thank you." It feels stiff, her tone, not her circlet, it sits nicely the braids feeling secure. Her eyes went from the surface of her vanity to it's mirror to admire the way dark strands weaved around white gold and it's far prettier than anything she could have done herself. And for a second she just takes in her reflection, not seeing the tired wolf she felt she was, but a queen, well put together though weary and her chin raises just a little. The smile that pulls across her lips is almost shy as her eyes meet Seris in the mirror's surface. "Both actually, I have to thank you for both, and this is so lovely, I just-" Felt somewhat like she was getting overly emotional over what she imagined Seris must just mean as a small gesture of kindness. Tops of her cheeks tinted faintly pink, Aurea gave a soft little laugh at her own expense after taking a second's pause. "This is so incredibly kind, it has been overwhelming to see the support that everyone has had for my people, for me. I fear I'll never be able to thank anyone enough."

“Let me know if it pulls throughout the night, I can always move a pin or change something,” Seris advised Aurea as she dropped her hands from her work. She didn’t mind Aurea’s tone–she suspected either Aurea was tired or just bracing herself for an evening fitting into her role. Seris knew how that could be to a smaller degree. It wasn’t too often that she was expected to trot out a certain level of decorum when other noble Elvhen families visited, but she understood the pressures of being an eldest daughter until she ran away from them.

Seris sunk into the seat beside Aurea when she made eye contact through their reflections, presumptuous perhaps but Aurea could command her rise if she wanted to. “You don’t need to thank me, I don’t mind doing it.” She quieted again allowing Aurea the space to speak her mind. “You were in the unfortunate position of being what stood between the Arishok and what he wanted. Many would have crumbled where you held fast. As far as I see it, the whole of Taravell owes you their thanks, not the other way around.”

She was quiet for a moment before she stood. “I’ll allow you to finish preparing for the evening… I should get ready myself. Perhaps I’ll see you later in the evening,” she suggested as she moved toward the door.

"Why else would he want to leave?" Surely those years ago, Abelas wasn't trying to escape him, right? "Well, it varied, but the one I remember clearly was about human expansionism." It was a topic that thrilled Elris endlessly, human were so fascinating. "Well, give me time after all this is said and done and I would have started to introduce memory stones where you don't just read history but experience it." But it would take time that the chronicler didn't have to make work. "You could say I liked exploring ruins too much," he tapped his leg as if to indicate that was how he ended up with his injury.

“Your lessons could get…. Dry,” she admitted. There was no lying, but she tried to say it as gently as she could. “I don’t think because it was you, but because… some things are just a bore. No matter who is talking about them.” And Elris couldn’t help that. But then again, she hadn’t met Abelas, so she could not say for sure. Her brows lifted at the idea of the memory stones. “How are they made? Only through texts, or other ways?” Perhaps if they were carried through historical events, picture perfect records could be made. Or even through the mundane. She would have loved to be able to hold a stone and know the voice of her wife and child again rather than the clarity of those memories slowly slip away over time. And then, suddenly, Seris was all apologies. “That was not what I meant, I’m so sorry–I just meant it’s nice to see you here. Outside of Avalaon—outside of a library.”

“I know how that feels, my father harped on about passions ad how we should pursue them and it’s infuriating that he right.” No one liked to think that they were wrong and a Dalathor least of all. “You know he has an obscene amount of them? Anything that involves an animal will make him do anything that he wouldn’t have before. He tried to escape my lesson.” Elris would alway find him in the end and force the other to sit through the teaching. It was interesting to think about how different that friendship had been compared to his with Seriswyn. “You know I’m sure I could actually make that work.” Though he might have to make them read the book for him and he just look upon their memory.

“Your father was probably right as well,” she stated. It sounded nice, simple even, the idea of pursuing a passion. She missed the times when it was easier to do so: an extended lifetime, a world that was, generally, at peace. Now it felt like there was little time for anything between grief and defending oneself. “Are you certain that’s why he tried to escape your lesson? What was the topic?” But she too would have chosen exploring the wilds or passing her time with some beast or another over a lesson. “I’m surprised you haven’t developed some sort of seeing mirror that allows you to peer at your tomes and documents from a distance. From what I remember, it was rare to get you to leave a room that had a book in it. Now look at you.”

"Now your mother is wise. I may have to add that one to my repertoire." he would never stop furthering his treasure trove of potential inspirational quotes and stories. "Good, we have to keep despair limited." All it took was one shred of hope to undermine despair. "Well, you know i have been tutoring Abelas for years now." he waved off the question like the answer was obvious. "I might have to bring half the library with me." Elris loved solitude but he loved the smell of musty pages also. "You should be careful with such an open invitation, i might take you up on it."

“It always annoyed me when she said things like that, and every time she told me I would understand or appreciate them when I was older. Now I can’t find it within myself to be annoyed that she was right,” Seris confessed. Elris was right about keeping despair at bay, it kept the heart from giving up entirely. But too much confidence or refusal to accept reality was just as risky. “Ah, Abelas. It’s hard to imagine someone tutoring him when nearly everything I know about animal husbandry I learned from his texts.” She had not met the writer of the many texts she had relied on for what she knew. “I’ll have to build a second home to house that many books, perhaps you could consider sending someone to and from Avalon with your books and rotate them as you finish them.” An unserious solution to a somewhat serious problem.

"I hope it is the case also, but we can't lean too heavily on hope in that regard, as I fear it will only disappoint us." While hope was something everyone needed to keep going on but if someone buried their head too deeply, it would become delusional. "Hmmm, I think I know someone who would be jealous of that remote living. I never thought of the animals coming asking for aid though." Seriswyn's ability did make it easy for her to befriend animals. "If we see the other end of this I'd be honoured to visit you."

“My mother used to say faith is just hope without working hands. But there has been no shortage of helpers pouring in. I’ve been tending to the animals in the livery, and horses are almost as honest as us Elvhen. Their riders are scared but not hopeless yet.” She hoped it might muster a little more faith in the future from Elris’ perspective, but it was a difficult thing as her own inner light of optimism had been extinguished for some time now. Her eyes narrowed and she looked confused. “Who?” she asked, curious to meet this mysterious individual. “Oh, you would like it. It’s quiet and the forest takes care of itself that far from civilization. You know you’re always welcome.”

Aurea made a mental note to find something amongst all of those treasures she was sitting on locked away that had moss agate. Seris was kind, what she was doing there was something for kindness's sake, she deserved nothing but kindness in return. "I'll have to find you something then, as a thank you." Reaching for her circlet, her eyes catch Seris in the mirror as the elvhen moves behind her, and she simply wonders. Kindness like Seris's didn't come from nothing and from what she knew of her home, of how the cavern was a place that suffered at the hands of the Cataclysm. Gentle hands moved through her unruly hair and there's something about it. About having just killed yet another tyrannical man and just having spent time scrubbing away dirt and blood from herself only hours ago and yet she is being treated with care. "If you could, that'd be much appreciated." Holding her circlet atop her, the moonstone in the center of it gleaming amongst the white gold crafted interwoven branches that made up the body of the thing, her lips quirked up into a smile. Another thing to add to the list of the other woman's kind deeds, paying attention to little details. "Forgive me if this is out of line, but why did you offer your help to me?" It's something that's been on her mind when it came to anyone who'd listened to her call to aid but she'd been too afraid to voice the question out loud, not wanting to look any gift horses in the mouth.

“You don’t have to trouble yourself,” Seris protested. The tone of her voice didn’t signal that such a gift was unwelcome or rejected, but rather that she hated to see herself become an imposition to Aurea in any manner. “Your ability to succeed earlier today was thanks enough. You fought well for all of us, and the restoration of peace in the Wildlands is as much as any of us should ever hope to ask of you.” She supposed from what she knew about Aurea she should assume if Aurea was inclined to give such a gift, she would. She was strong wield and determined, but still Seris hated the creeping thought that Aurea might have interpreted Seris bringing it up as a sort of request for a handout or payment.

When Aurea placed the circlet on her head where she wanted it to rest for the evening, Seris began weaving her long, dark hair. Some strands of the plaits were looped around the metal, locking it into place and integrating it into the small, intricate net of interlocking braids that overlaid the length of Aurea’s hair. Seris was quiet as she worked, focused and considerate not to tug or pull. Once she was satisfied, she looked at Aura from the front and carefully centered the circlet for the evening. “Is that comfortable? Is anything pulling or in need of adjustment?” Her own mother used to braid her hair so tightly from time to time that Seris suffered a tension headache the entire day long and her scalp ached at the sensation of touch for days after.

Seris’ brows furrowed at the question. “Why did I help you get ready tonight, or why did I come to Haven?” she asked, wishing to clarify before she answered.

"I think we are only at the beginning." There was so much more that could happen, if it would or not is a different matter, but everything could be a lot worse. "Now, if you were anything other than an elvhen I would have taken that as sarcasm," he playfully nudged the other. "With the way I obsess over history it's the friendships I look for, as I can sometimes be neglectful of them." There was a time he had been searching for twenty years on mortal history, he didn't contact anyone from Avalon... well, apart from the occasional letter to say he was still alive. "How have you come to be here? did you receive the message they sent out?"

“I hope that isn’t true, but if one of us knows better than the other, it’s you,” Seris conceded with an air of sadness in her tone. Elris held no shortage of knowledge, he would know the ills of the past and the full potential of how cruel the world could be. It was not often that Seris hoped someone was glaringly wrong, but it felt appropriate to wish for such a thing in this context. She attempted something a little closer to a smile when he spoke of sarcasm but it was a genuine comfort that he did not feel a friendship needed constant tending. Strong were the bonds that remained intact despite distance and absence. “No. I settled too remotely for that. The animals sensed something first and then spoke of the Kossith. When they became worried enough I set out for the closest village and learned more there.”

Chloe Bennett

“I suppose names do not, but they often do,” Seris responded after some thought. Names were significant things, she felt, especially in Elvhen. Or perhaps that had been unique to her branch. But if Lyklor did not care or did not know the meaning of his own name, it was not a matter she cared to push. “Mine roughly comes out to one who speaks for the trees, or for nature. I am from Varda’s Cavern, so… rather fitting if not a bit predictable, wouldn’t you say?” She smiled slightly, but it was a rueful expression. “I’m not too busy to help a new face, but if you prefer to move on alone…” she stepped out of the barn and laid out the path to the best place to put down his name for service. “If you struggle to find it, then make your way back here, and I will assist you. Stay well, Lyklor.”

despairlyklor

Why did it feel like the other could see right through him? Through this game of him pretending he was normal. But maybe that was the paranoia of him being found out. The fear that he would be chased away from civilised society if they were discovered. "I guess it is since you can talk to animals." Even if his name did hold meaning it wasn't like he could ask his family about it. "Thank you for the offer, but I should move alone." If she spent more time around him, her suspicions may grow, and he didn't want to answer any questions she may have to prove them suspicions right or wrong. "I will." His face was strained as he tried to say goodbye to the other without being rude.

End

#lyklor #lyklor 01

"I can not fault you for being distracted, I have been such recently as well. I believe this world will throw so much at us soon enough that we won't even know which way is up." Think of the world now, it has so many problems that everyone has different priorities. "Does friendship decay if left unattended? I don't believe so, and if so, were you really friends to begin with?"

Before, Elris would have criticised such actions for love, but now? He understood it now... well, at least he thinks he does. "I'm sorry for your loss... if you ever want to." he wouldn't have to finish the sentence for the other to know what he was offering, to relive a memory.

#sorry for the wait my hepplesworth #elris #elris 01

“You don’t think it has already?” Seris asked as she toed the dirt between where they both stood. Her voice was a mix between humor and fear. She might have posited that things could not possibly get any worse, but inevitably, they always did. But there were still pockets of hope in between, which was perhaps why not every soul in Taravell was forfeit to the Dark one. She glanced up at him, a hint of a relieved smile playing at her features. The Seris that stood before him weighed down by a cloak of grief was different from the adventurous, ambitious girl he had known in Avalon who was always in motion, always looking for her next new experience. “Wise as ever, Elris.”

“I know,” she said softly. “I appreciate it.”

"You'll have to wear them to the next big thing, we'll match." Moss agate would look good on Seris, she thinks, would compliment her eyes. It's something easier to think about now, after everything was over, going to ridiculous events around Lysara with her friends at her side. At the suggestion, Aurea's brows rose and she was taken out of her brief thoughts of the lot of them all dressed up with some ridiculous place to go in Eterna. "It's a bit in a state of constant unruliness, my hair," Althea legitimately always commented on if Aurea had brushed it that day or not. The plot twist was that usually she did, it's just when left loose with all of the things she did around Haven, brushing it was often somewhat of a chore. Aurea's expression is almost sheepish, but she's seen the braids of those that came from Avalon, the intricacies of them were baffling, she herself could do a quick three strand braid, she could pull it around her head. Anything else though was the work of a few unlucky handmaidens. "If you're up for a challenge, I'm up for it." It's a very kind gesture and she thinks that if Seris came all this way, it wasn't just to talk about scouting squads. A little time together might soothe the both of them back into some sort of normalcy after everything that'd happened.

Seris knew exactly where the jewelry she had mentioned was, undoubtedly unmoved within her room that had been kept like a crypt since she had left. Her family was not the type that would move on easily, and by Elvhen standards she was hardly more than a child when she left. They were not lost, but they were lost to Seriswyn now. “I don’t have them anymore,” she admitted, though it had been a nice notion on Aurea's part.

“It always looks nice when you braid it,” Seris stated absentmindedly as she collected the brush and took her place behind Aurea. She made quick work of untangling it, starting from the bottom and taking the time required with each knot or tangle rather than forcing it. Several minutes had passed before she gestured to the circlet. “You may have to hold it where you’d like it to sit most comfortably for you while I do the first few braids,” Seris said, waiting for Aurea to place it. “Just let me know if your arms get tired, we can take a break.” Her fingers worked quickly, careful never to tug or pull. “I could leave some loose if you wish,” she suggested. She had noticed Aurea seemed partial to leaving the long, dark length of her hair down.