The Holiday Circle

[Greetings creatures of Elaisha! This shall be a festive/holiday type RP. All are welcome to join in, but let's keep the battles to a minimum please! Lets make this a temporary truce time. Just remember to take turns and not get too far ahead of the other users!]



Vega, wearing a leather strap of sleigh bells around her neck, trotted and jingled through the thick pine forests. It was all blanketed in snow from last night's storm. It was perfect and untouched; save a few squirrel tracks and Vega's own messy trail.
She was searching for an acceptable spot for all the others to gather. Ducking branches and padding through, she emerged into a small cozy clearing. Circular, exposed morning sky, and trees arched as if to cradle the area from chilled winds.
Perfect! she thought.
Quickly, she began shoveling snow out of the area with her large paws until she reached the dirt and dead grass below. The jingling of her endeavours permeated the forest.

Off in the forest there was a quiet sound of ‘hup!’ followed by another’s girlish giggle, that were quickly smothered. Seconds later a snowball barrelled through the trees, flying way too straight to be thrown naturally, and struck Vega’s hindquarters with a whump.

“And that my Pip, is how you throw a snowball,” declared a loud voice, backed by a bark of laughter.

With their cover blown, the pair broke into a run and trotted into the clearing, each with mischievous glints in their multiple eyes. “Veeegaaaa!” Alkyone called cheerfully, bounding over a just-cleared pile of snow. Red, green and white ribbons adorned her horns and were wound about her forelegs, and a large red ribbon was tied in a neat bow about her neck, almost lost in her fur. “Long time no see old girl,” she greeted with a grin.

Pipistella, close on her heels, ploughed straight through the mound of snow, scattering snow everywhere, with a broad, if sly, grin on her face. Glittery ice sparkled in patterns throughout her braids, no doubt placed there by Alkyone, and a couple of silver ribbons were tied around her horns.

Vega jerked on impact. Being lost in her snow-clearing work and constantly jingling made her an easy target.
Her good friend Alk and her little Pip trotted into view.
Of course it was her, She thought to herself with a private grin.

"My, don't you two look fashionable!" She exclaimed, "It is missing something though.." Before any of them could answer she crouched her bottom down and used her stubby tail to flick powdered snow in their faces.

"Much better!" She said through her toothy smile. A suitable revenge for the snowball and making a muck of her snow pile.

((well I haven't done this in a wile. Lets see how this goes))

From a small distance. Reza starts playing in the snow, building a snow fort so she can hide from other shinlai and maybe throw snow balls at them too (She can be a pain). Reza just gathers all kinds of snow just to build those walls high up into the sky, then she realized that she didn't make a door so she can get out. "Oh crud." she said out loud wile she is in side.

The striped shinlai was hidden from sight by the layers of snow that had accumulated now winter had come. Her eyes flickered back and forth between the shinlai that had gathered in the forest, but she did not rise to join them. Despite the temporary truce between the Darkbloods and Dalians for the time being, Esther could not shrug off the feeling of awkwardness and uncomfortableness. How can they... act so happy? Her green eyes stared at the shinlai around her in a mixture of wonder and longing. We were just tearing apart each other so violently not so long ago... she pondered and we can just forget that all happened? her brown tail swished back and forth, carving an arc through the snow.

But as she watched the shinlai dance about around her, she couldn't help remembering when she used to be like that. When she and Tris and Jingu would run around, playing in the snow just like they did. Without a care in the world. And she missed it. Ever since she had officially signed up with the Darkbloods.. well, life had been rough. She wasn't even an adult yet and was spending the most of her time clawing at other shinlai who didn't share her beliefs.

Maybe she needed a break.

She slowly stood, shaking the snow off with a shiver and swish of her tail as she brought herself to full height. She shook her head, scrunching up her face in an attempt to drive away the itch that was bothering her from her new mask. Her old one had been maimed beyond repair in the fighting that had broken out in Talin. Much to her despair, the wood that had made her old mask had been burnt and scorched into a small, fragile, and crisp hunk of charcoal. Her mask had, however, been the only thing that had saved her from hideous scarring. She had yet to become comfortable with the new red mask that adorned her face.

She approached a large snowfort upon hearing a strangled voice of frustration from inside the entrance-way-less fort.

"Well, it most certainly looks like nobody will be hitting you with any snowballs," Esther said, smiling slightly. "But it doesn't look like you'll be hitting anyone either."

(ahdjsfhdj It wasn't supposed to be that long I just started typing and didn't stop OTL)

Pipistella gave a loud shriek, and dived behind her mother, “not the braid, not the braid!” she exclaimed, dodging the worse of the snow, claws scrabbling about on the snow to get a good purchase.

Alkyone took the hit good naturedly, the grin never leaving her face. And then shook herself fiercely, flinging the lumps of snow left right and centre, and looking for all the world like a fuzzy hurricane. “Seems like we’re not the only fashionable ones,” she commented, reaching out and flicking one of Vega’s bells with a claw. “So which poor farmer do you steal that from?” she added jokingly, then again she wouldn’t be surprised...

“Oh Pip, be a dear and put these up,” she added, pulling a small, by Shinlai standards, bag from her neck fur and tossing it to her daughter, before beginning to push snow towards the edge of the clearing with Vega.

Pipistella trotted between trees, pulling a multitude of ribbons from the bag, neatly tying them around branches as high up as she could reach, and stringing them between trees. Hopefully they were strung high enough for other Shinlai to pass underneath. Unless it was Rondun. The mischievous glint was still in her eye as she surveyed her work, the bright and cheerful ribbons were missing something, but she’d add that later. When there were more Shinlai to see her display.

Not that she was vain or anything...

Vega gave a good chuckle at the whole ordeal. Especially the little one scampering about.

"These bells came from a farmer named Nicholas" She winked at Alkyone. They both joined in clearing the snow. From the corners of her eyes she would watch Pip decorate the nearby branches.

As the clearing was almost done, Vega was pondering on taking down some nearby branches for the eventual fire pit in the centre. Not taking the decorated branches, of course!

Drawn by the sounds of metal and screaming, Nirasi charged between trunks in a spray of upset undergrowth and whiteness. His path brightened as he approached a clearing, vast and barely trodden, edged with colors and movement.

Every footfall jarred him, every thud spiking through his legs and pulling him desperately forward.

Not that he was ever great with on-a-dime maneuvering, he saw a fortification in the snow and angled to take cover behind it and assess the situation. There are definitely Shinlai here and it was definitely a showdown, he thought..

..which unfortunately distracted him just enough that he misjudged a step and went careening into the snow fort, flattening a bit of it and wiping out in a cloud of powder (and there in the rubble of this ice candy fort was a juicy Shinlai center).

Nirasi rolled over with a half-laugh, half-apology, and did what he could to see who he recognized.

((still getting the hang of this, but the idea was an unnecessarily dramatic entrance and a spiral into silliness..he is clumsy and merry and aware it's playtime))

Volpe huffed softly, his breath misting before him as he trudged through the snow. It was rather tedious and unnecessary work for him. His paws weren't wide enough to hold him above the snow, nor did he have the bulk to barrel through it. He was tall enough that he at least avoided dragging his belly through some of the deeper snow banks.

He pushed his way through some particularly thick bramble in his way, carefully and methodically making his way through the woods. He was significantly less cautious, with Iapto on his back to warn him of icy ponds and fallen trees, but by the rustling it sounded as if Iapto had pulled out her map. "Are you sure we're on route to the next city we're hitting?" Volpe asked, turning his head to fix her in a milky-eyed glare, "I thought we were supposed to be there by late morning and here it is late afternoon." He snorted and leaped over a fallen tree, jostling Iapto none to pleasantly where she sat just behind his withers. He huffed again, this time with frustration, there's nothing he hated more than water and as far as he was concerned snow wasn't a far cry from it.

Listening with half an ear to Iapto's reply, Volpe heard a commotion up ahead and stopped short, the fur along his back standing up nervously. "Iapto?" Anxiousness clear in his body language and his tone, "What's ahead?" He asked, a slight growl to his voice.

Perched on Volpe's back with her feet tucked up under her bearskin cloak, Iapto was nice and warm. The thick fur had a slight dusting of snow, but it left no dampness on the fur. The rest of the cloak was spread across Volpe's rump, hopefully helping to keep him warm.

“Oh we’re on route, just keep heading straight, no worries,” Iapto replied from Volpe's back, she could make out figures through the trees, they were right on track. Although obviously Volpe had no clue... “Tree five strides ahead, right side is clear, left has brambles,” she added quickly, she didn’t want him to smack into anything. She sat up a little straighter and put two fingers in her mouth, giving a long low whistle, not loud enough to startle Volpe though.

***

Alkyone grinned back, before clacking her teeth and looking around the forest. “I thought I head running footsteps,” she said slowly, squinting in a bid to see through the trees. With three eyes her eyesight was poorer than most, usually she used Dagda as a look out, but the Elite’s had requested he stay behind in Talin to help heal the wounded. Technically she was meant to be heading back to Tieto, but needed some cheer after the battle.

Good job Vega was around.

By Vega’s side, Pipistella perked up, head rising and swivelling about as a whistle reached her ears. She held her paws close together, and channelled her energy, creating a small sphere of light, and with a flick of her paws, sent it whizzing though the forest towards her sister.

Durning her time, Reza starts making an entrance of snow fort. The Reza start hearing pounding outside. "huh?' she said as her ears perk up. The sound starts getting closer and closer until a large Shinlai tumbles into her snow fort, distrorying half of it as a large cloud of powdery snow gets on both of the Shinlai.

Reza shakes her head so the snow falls off but some still sticks and said "My fort!" Then she hears half-laugh, half-apology from the large shinlai.  She backs up a bit as she moves around so he can get up. "are you okay sir?" she asked.

"Are you okay sir?" she asked.

Puffing snow off his nose, Nirasi tucked his head and said "Better off than your fort." He glanced out over clearing and saw a couple familiar faces, then looked back at the new one before him with her jagged mask and bright blue eyes. "G-get down," he started to say as he hunkered down behind what remained of the nearest wall, "Don't worry, I can patch this right up and we'll be set! Learned a few tricks from Aurudon."

He swept broad paws through the snow and re-piled it in places with none of the finesse of what was there in the first place. "Sorry again," he said, "this is a great place to stay safe though, we can tag everyone from behind cover and no one can hit us it'll be perfect." He leaned up over the new section to flatten it from both sides and caught a snowball in the face. Ducking back, he talked as he made another misshapen wall, "Aurudon didn't teach me that...I've always been able to get hit with snowballs. He showed me this though," he said, creating tiny fragile icicles that sprouted from the snow.

And for all his efforts, he'd managed to make...a lumpy snow-urchin. "Okay I have no idea what I'm doing. Alkyoooone!!!" he shouted in a pathetic but super-manly whine. "Help?"

Volpe snorted. He absently shook his head, fine snow flying off his antlers. He picked his way around the obstacles Iapto warned about. He took her whistle to mean that company was ahead and briefly hoped it was company that he knew. The first clear shout he heard belonged to someone he never really cared to see, and he growled softly to himself.

He sensed of a ball of light zipping towards him, his own Light element allowing him to "see" it. Pip must be there too then? He liked Pip well enough at least. He conjured his own orbs of light, sending them back to Pipistella and following in their wake. "Alkyone! Pip!" He called cheerfully, "Fancy seeing you here." Nothing to fancy really. Volpe never cared for a run-in with his mother-in-law when La wasn't there as a buffer. Ah well, he knew that Alkyone wasn't terribly fond of Iapto either.