DYING WILL BE LIKE WAKING FROM A DREAM → joiner

[Grimm]

[align=center][div style="font-family: arial; font-size: 12px; width: 310px; text-align: justify; line-height:120%"]When had last she indulged in the simplistic pleasure of company, echoed empty words bound in false sentiment, a trivial pass time but pleasant, soothed the aches nestled alongside her heart. Too long by far, even as tentative her reach into collapsing memory locating such proven an impossibility. Cause known, understood as inspected each fragment carved at with undisciplined fervour, behind only a gaping darkness, broken bridge populated with faceless husks. Each she knew, bore a familiarity that gently plucked at withered heartstrings, called to them with a tongue that knew only the taste of ash.

Her dreams their playground, her nightmares their stage, always there without reason, a beckoning call she could not answer for taken each in death as time, or possibly something or a less mundane origin, cut the threads from her mind.

Difficult to recall when last allowed her mind respite in sleep, a weariness that settled into bones that felt forgein, stolen mayhaps though unknown the cause to the thought. Too many the nights passed in a silence thick, her solitude pronounced and grown further difficult to bear. Reasoning plucked from nowhere, self discipline and the means to repair the spaces, the key lost somewhere in her mind, of that she had been sure. Her resolve crumbled beneath scrutiny, however, as internal as it all was, the quiet voice in the back of her mind worrying, picking at loose threads until it all unravelled.

Sigh bypassed her lips, harsh the short lived breath, teeth together drawn, sharpened as forced was it though a fine gap. Her annoyance mirrored in the press of ears, nose scrunched, narrowed what little eyes proved visible beneath furrowed brow. May as well she be a spectre for all the world knew of her, reveal in the anonymity it gave her. Neither did she bear knowledge of this world, nor the rare inhabitant avoided upon travels of their own, and the world her, among the undergrowth hidden until only the soil and towering pines knew she was present. Lonesome had she grown, however, tired of pursuits that seemed empty, mindless in a cycle of a repetitive nature.

There was no grace within her halt, surprise that which caused it, head arising only to tilt as inspected the oddity. Of course there was nothing to see, and Beau found herself grown further displeased, though her target was herself, nose twitching for a moment. It had been a scent. A few times she blinked in mild confusion, about gaze travelling. Her path had led her through a thicket of various trees, a wild growth left untamed with pathways that had perplexed her, here an end. It seemed rather the opposite, while the trees thinned and grew more sparse and boggy grown the ground, evident the muddy trails woven between stagnant pools.

Slow the slide of her paw across the ground, note made of how it shifted, elevation lost in favour of a short incline. Poor her footing, lost until her momentum, paired with the downward slope, left her to fall. The end saw her sprawled haphazardly, partially submerged in the vegetation blanketed water, soft the embankment that seemed set on further dragging her down. Struggle her rise, and her draw away from the shall pool left her fur coated in a thick layer of grime, regarded with what seemed more exasperation than anything.

[ATBASH CIPHER.]

ATBASH CIPHER

you laugh and smile at me, but you don't see a thing !

After the fall of Snowbound, Atbash hadn't joined any of the other groups. At the time, the savannah wanted to be alone, she wanted to find a place to rebuild her home, but as the days went by, she lost faith in her abilities to even gain a following again. After all, the tribe had only a few members in it at the time of its downfall and they all had scattered after the camp was set ablaze; how was she supposed to find them when she had no idea where they had all gone? So Atbash wallowed in her guilt and stayed by herself.

Then Caesar contacted her through telepathy, urging her to meet him so he can apologize for the things he had done. Atbash should have considered it odd when he refused to ask Vigenere to come and instead seemed more wary of their elder brother. But of course, like the naïve sister she was, Atbash agreed to meet Caesar, where she was once again tricked and held captive under Stryker's paw. Stryker had used her to get to Vigenere and when he killed the Tangler, Atbash once again felt guilt rise within her. So in a way, coming to Tanglewood was her way of trying to make up for what she had done.

The swamp was much different than the cold home of Snowbound, but Atbash quickly got used to it. She had been used to her paws being wet, given how she used to be surrounded by snow all the time, but the grime was... less than ideal. Still, the Shaderunner convinced herself that this was all to make up for what she has done and no amount of disgust would make her leave. Atbash hadn't seen or heard Beaumont's fall, but she did happen to cross the other female as she trudged along. "Oh, hey there!" The savannah called out, switching up her direction to approach Beaumont. "You okay?" She asked, realizing that the other had gotten quite dirty with the fall she went through. "Are you hurt, or anything? I can grab one of our medics." Suddenly realizing that Beaumont may not know there was a group living here, Atbash quickly added, "You're on Tanglewood's grounds, by the way. My name's Atbash Cipher."

female | shaderunner [shp] of tanglewood

© madi

[arrow]

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”Quite a lot of new faces crawling out of the swamp lately.” Arrow mused, watching Atbash tend to the newcomer before she had the chance. She nearly snorted in amusement at the silly little way the stranger was sprawled out, covered in the mud and grime that made up so much of the territory. A bit of a fall was her conclusion, landing straight into the muck that most didn’t seem to care for, and understandably so. She didn’t mind it, it was what she’d been wallowing in for her entire existence, after all. Even then, she wouldn’t have wanted to fall straight into it, never mind the fact the mud was often colder than it looked, and one wrong step could leave you in a pool that was much too deep, and it was more of a threat than an inconvenience to crawl out.

Carefully stepping over Beaumont, Arrow looked the poor muddy woman over for obvious injury just in case, a broken leg or any blood through the grime. She didn’t see anything, nothing at least to be in a rush to bring to Moth. ”It’s drier further in, we can hose you down, get all that shit off you.” Now that she knew there was no pressing matter, it was really, really hard not to laugh.

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[trojan g.]

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IT MUST BE BELIEVED TO BE SEEN

When Moth had first joined the swamp dwelling group, she had hated the mud and the muck. It had been clear on her face that she would rather be anywhere but there in the swamp, but she had found home in the territory, had found that she eventually got used to how dirty her feet would always be and how the area surrounding the town that they called home always seemed to be wet. She couldn't say she had ever fallen in the swamp though. Of course she'd been attacked here and fallen into stuff then, she'd been caught in a trap once even, but never just simply slipped and fallen.

She heard speaking at the border and came forth, eyes scanning the scene before her, a small smile creeping onto the reaper's maw as she looked towards the stranger. "If anything hurts, let me know, I hope your fall wasn't too harsh." It wasn't that hard to figure out if someone fell in the swamp luckily, but there was enough mud to break falls. It was the roots and twigs sticking up from the mud that was the issue most of the time. "My name's Moth, and as was mentioned before it's drier near town. If you're here to join I'd suggest following us to get cleaned off before the mud dries and cakes." If she wasn't here to join then Moth wasn't sure what to do, considering the other didn't smell of any group that Moth knew.

MOTH KINGMAKER - TANGLEWOOD - PENNED BY TIKKI - BIO

[sup]© tikki[/sup]

[wormwood.]

Aurum had resided in several groups throughout his life, although none had truly been considered home except for Tanglewood. His birthplace couldn't be considering anything even vaguely close to an actual home for the angel. Even though his original pride had been where his supposed "family" resided, he had never felt as though he truly belonged there. Partially because of his father's absence, partially because of his mother's cruelty, and partially because of the way everyone else regarded him with disdain. The only friend he had in the world back then was his brother, Poetking. However, things had... gone downhill from there, to say the least. In the end, even though the male had felt some amount of sadness when he had been exiled from his pride to go find his brother, he had actually considered it to be a bit of a relief. It meant that he was actually free from all the pain that the pride had caused him, if only temporarily. Back then, of course, he had figured that his stay within Tanglewood would be a temporary thing. This turned out not to be true, considering he had eventually found a true family, and a true home within the swamp-dwelling group. Even after Poet had disappeared, Aurum had only been minorly upset, since he knew he had others who cared for him.

That wasn't to say that everything was sunshine and rainbows all the time, of course. The luminary had gone to other groups in the past, both to help out as well as for more selfish reasons. After Moth's death, he had left and gone to the Knights of Concord, mainly because he was so overwhelmed with grief. He couldn't stand to be around the territory at that point, and had needed some form of escape. In the end, though, the Knights of Concord had never felt like home. The people there had been incredibly kind to him, and he was endlessly grateful for their company, but he had known deep down that he would eventually return. Tanglewood had needed him, and so he had returned, even with all the hardships that had followed. Injuries inflicted by the hyena pack, the subsequent takeover by the Coalition of the Condemned... some of it was truly hellish, but Aurum had still stayed. He had stayed because he did love Tanglewood with all of his heart, and he wanted to see them thrive.

Thankfully, it seemed as though Tanglewood was thriving, as of late. Not only did all of them - or at the very least, most of them - seem to be safe and happy, but they also had new joiners arriving every day. Going out to greet all of them could be a bit exhausting for the luminary, but he wouldn't trade it for the world. Although, if any joiners showed up while he was on pregnancy bedrest, he'd have to make sure to introduce himself to them later. Luckily for Beaumont, though, that time hadn't come yet, which meant that Aurum was free to follow the scent of his groupmates over to where she stood. The poor thing looked like a bit of a wreck, considering she had managed to slip and fall into the muck. Aurum couldn't help but wince a bit as he looked her over, the luminary wishing he could've been around to warn her about just how steep things could get. Seeing as it was too late for that, though, he instead settled on introducing himself, "Hello there, miss... sorry about that. Like the others said, you can feel free to come to our town. Even if you don't plan on joining, I have no problem with you coming to clean yourself up. Uh... my name's Aurum Kingmaker, by the way. I'm leader around here." He hoped that she would be alright, and wasn't feeling too sour about the whole falling into the mud thing.