Post by bramble on May 29, 2010 22:39:06 GMT -5
Characters involved:
Toyo, male cougar
The Stag, The Shadow (Spirit NPCs)
Location: Rolling Foothills
Mid Spring, RL day 5
------
Distant spring storms darken the far southern horizon, the late afternoon sky a still gold edged in purple-black that's illuminated by the occasional flash of lightning. The storm is miles away and there is a good chance it'll long burn itself out before getting this far, but to Toyo, the electricity is as tangible from the rise of a slope he sits on as if the storm was above him. He's alone, his eyes watching the lights across the sky even if his gaze seems further still. "...Paoro... I hope you were right about this." He murmurs to the wind, unknowing if anyone could really hear him. "...I still don't know."
The shadows under the storm seem darker than usual today. Perhaps something is within the air, or around it, but there is a tense atmosphere that seems to grow with each flash of lightning, each step taken, forward or back. The wind that brings the tempest picks up around the young cougar, maintaining a good strong gust even as it goes on. There's a message on the air, brought by voices that no longer speak in the words of this world, but it's only barely comprehensible. If one understood the voice of a falling tree, or a babbling brook, they may notice, but for now it is on the edge of perception.
Toyo is used to whispers, the voices that linger on the edge of consciousness or the shadows lingering at the corner of your vision. He is a seer, but, unlike many others. The voices of nature don't speak to him beyond the instincts of a wild thing. Others do. Those who have passed, the manifestations of feelings of hope and fear, perhaps even the voices who have yet to exist. Often, they are all one in the same, ranging from a joyful song to a horrific scream. As the wind thickens his dusky-black ears cup, his eyes returning to the present and slowly turning his gaze from one side to the other. His breath slows and holds, cutting out extra noise that could make it hard to hear.
These voices are from the side that Toyo may want to hear, but they strain to reach him. They are voices of life and the world around him, not the past or the future. The wind increases in strength, literally whistling in his ears, and clouds that seemed to be non-threatening now grow in the skies above him. One small, tiny word manages to reach him through the gale, strained and urgent. "Run." Then, the wind recedes. The voices from afar cease. But the clouds continue to gather overhead. There is an air of expectancy... something is waiting for him, and now, it doesn't matter which way he moves.
The single word causes the fur along his spine to rise and his claws grate on the stone. "Wait!" He calls out as the wind fades, his eyes wide and clearly showing the gold and blue in each, permanently caught between childhood and adulthood. "What do you mean run?!" But the voice seems gone, and the young cat is left to stare at the gathering clouds. He was told to come here, and now he's being told to go? Is this what Paoro told him Amaranth needed him for? Is there truly a danger? "Who are you?" He calls out as strong and as clear as he can manage, shoving down the rolling pit of fear in his stomach that makes his deepening voice catch and squeak.
As the afternoon is covered by rolling clouds the earth itself seems to grow that much colder. Time passes, somehow quicker than normal. Is it later in the day than it was a moment before, or was he just caught in a daze for a long time? A chill is felt in the next breeze, and there are no voices in this new swirl. It is a sound devoid of life, but yet it has a life of its own: grasping and reaching, seeking to steal something. Warmth, knowledge, bravery. The shadows of the shifting tall grass seem to gather and swirl of their own accord... and then, amazingly, /leave/ their positions, warping and twirling along the ground, moving towards Toyo. The jerky, aimless movement elicits an eerie giggle from the wind in this new, lifeless world that seems to be quickly enveloping the young seer. The snake-like shadows inch and roll ever closer.
He's seen spirits form from shadows, but this... presence... is not that. As a child he knew nightmares, memories of slain mothers and starved siblings, but this is different still. This is an unknown and he is afraid. His tail and fur alike are fluffed out, several jerking steps taken back to try and avoid the reaching tendrils that all too quickly appear ready to overcome him. The gibbering drives him back quicker, the cat curling back his lips and aiming a loud shrieking hiss at the snake-like forms, a paw instinctually reaching out to swipe ivory claws at the encroaching mass.
The shadows dodge and jerk away from his swiping paws, still curling and coiling on the ground around the poor cougar, moving around him, hemming him in, almost trying to drive him somewhere. When he strikes a blow, it is like hitting an actual shadow. The paw simply passes over it, leaving no visible effect. Some of the shadows do indeed clump and combine into something more recognizable, their darkness revealing other places in swirls of dark clouds. Wild and untamed... but grey, desolate, and frightening. As the tendrils slither between his futilely batting paws, they snatch at his own shadow, and somehow it is this that produces a tangible effect: they yank, and he feels the same happen to him. They whip at him, and he would feel the same sting. The ones that clump together before him create a hazy silhouette, a shadowed outline of something resembling a wolf, that /crawls/ out of the unrecognizable world beyond. Toyo can see straight through the monstrosity, like a sketchy drawing come to life. It looks right at him. "Silence," it says. "Let me give you... silence."
"I want nothing of yours!" Toyo snarls out into the hazy face of the un-wolf, his fury and frustration overpowering fear as the physical pain and sensations sting his body. He has always been a shy child, daresay meek, but the knowledge he is alone and that this threat is very real brings a change to the cat as he thrashes, still striking out with useless, but almost as bound to this spot as his assaulted shadow. There is no one here to help, no old friends living or dead. He is alone, and he has no knowledge to fight this being. "Leave me!"
"Mine?" the shadowy, living sketch asks innocently. "No. This gift is ours. It is all ours. But you can See. You can Hear." It begins to advance on Toyo. "But these are the wrong things. Let me show you the truth. Don't be consumed by the death that you feel all around you." It comes closer, now, becoming more solid, more black. The shadows continue their attack, unabated. "We can free you from the voices. You don't want to be swept away. You hear the dead. I will show you where they go. It is beautiful... just... come... and you will understand... /everything./"
"I hear them, and I /welcome/ them." Toyo snarls his defiance, spitting at the encroaching shadow-mass. He has known the negative, but he has known so many good spirits. Paoro, Skelaghe, the owl... but... never his mother. The one he wants to see more than any other, the one cruely stolen from him and the last to ever call him by his real name, bidding him watch his siblings until she came back. She never did, and he never found her. Does this creature know where she is? The blind hope burns in his chest, making his eyes water and he is forced to look away. "...you could show me lies, and I might never know they were false. How can you show me anything? What do you want from me?"
"The truth," the shadow says quietly, almost tenderly. Its smaller parts still wriggle and writhe threateningly, ready to put the cougar down if he begins to run. "We can show you why you have these powers. Why you must suffer through loss and yet hear the echo of lives gone by... come with me. I will tell you everything. Just come with me," it says, sounding rather impatient. "It must feel terrible. Knowing you are so close and yet can never truly know the other side... where they wait... where all of them wait. For you. Come." The wind and the shadows increase their activity, and the not-wolf trembles, as if it must keep itself from pouncing. But through the wind comes that small, urgent voice once more. "Run!" it says in a barely audible whisper, and then is swept away again.
One of the cougar's paws raise as though preparing to step forward, to accept the invitation. Oh but he wants to know, despite the danger. He can't help it. All that he can do, but he doesn't understand it... but what if he did? What could he do? He shakes with the effort of keeping still even as his eyes try to catch a glimpse of the world beyond and perhaps that of a familiar face. But that voice returns, that whisper so much more familiar to the voices he knows. Fear once more swells up in the cat and with a throttled cry he tries to break away again, to try and wheel away and escape from the shadow-wolf.
All at once, the moment Toyo attempts to escape, things become threatening once more. "You will not escape!" it yells, and lunges after Toyo, and suddenly its maw and its teeth are frightfully real. The shadows whip out to attack the cougar as he springs away, and he can feel them grasping, tearing, clawing at him. "You think you're special?! You think you can just peer into the depths of /our/ minds and feel our pain? You represent /everything/ that is wrong with this world! And you turn your back on your own fate!" it howls, not even moving its legs as it chases after him. "How will it feel to die by the claws of the very creatures you want to see most in this world?!"
Toyo doesn't even look to see if the pain he feels is real. It feels real - the yank of fur being pulled out, the sharp tear of claws and teeth. His claws scrape and scrabble against the stone, dirt, and grass underneath his paws as he tries to flee. Flee his fate? His fate? And what is that? To die, to become some puppet of this force, to be broken? Is this what Paoro led him to fight... or led him into? He doesn't respond as he tries to focus on escape, eyes frantically searching the unfamiliar landscape. A tree is nearby and he takes a gamble, bolting for the old plant and trying to launch himself up the trunk and try to put some space between him and this shadow being.
"You ignorant child!" the dark shadow behind him jeers, its voice warped and monstrous, tilting between shrieking and abysmally deep. "I'll put an end to your miserable existence! Come to oblivion! Rest in cold comfort like the dead!" It reaches the base of the tree just on Toyo's heels, consuming the base as the shadows wrap around it. The tree... shudders. Wind whips through the branches, making it shiver and shake. "Plenty of time to speak to the deceased when you're one of them! The Balance will be restored... it will begin with you!" Any questions as to whether this is actually happening are quashed when the tree begins to creak and groan, threatening to fall. And then, far off, a glimmer of light appears between the hills, offering refuge from the void that is eating at Toyo's shelter. A calm voice cuts through the madness. "Come," it implores him. "This way. Jump!"
Toyo digs his claws into the wind-shorn wood as he feels the tree shake and tremble as the nightmare-being below destroys the flimsy refuge. The cougar curls back his lips, snarling at the form below with fury he cannot combat it. Still. He fought and defeated hunger and dismay, not once but twice, and the more the spirit wails the more it reminds Toyo of those very emotions. Maybe he can fight it. The gleam of light and the return of that whispering voice catches his attention and Toyo bunches his muscles. It's a long way down, but, it is the only way - one way or another. He lunges, leaping from the branch with all the powerful kick-off force his kind's massive hind legs are made for. It's a flat leap, aimed to carry distance and clear the shadows, and even as he lands poorly with a sharp sting of pain, he doesn't stop to think about it. He runs, runs as fast as he can, for that hopeful gleam of light.
"We will take your eyes!" the shadow intones, its voice horribly warped now as it breaks apart the tree, threatening to make it fall. "And you will never See! We will take your ears and you will never Hear!" But as Toyo's eyes latch onto the light, everything seems to be dragged towards it, rather than Toyo moving forward... and the shadows behind are gone. The forest, save for the stormy clouds above and the wind gusting through the trees, is fairly complacent. The light ahead is almost blinding, but whatever it was chased away the would-be murderer behind the cougar. "The forest is not safe for those with the Sight and the Hearing," it explains, and suddenly it coalesces into a strong, tall, and proud looking buck. It looks down at Toyo with a sort of anxious imperiousness, as though it has little time to waste on him and doesn't want to spare more. "There is only time to tell you the most important things." The buck takes a deep breath. "For he did not know that where his Sight ended the world went on, and two eyes were not enough to behold the ocean beyond, where tides must flow, and rain must fall, and the serpent's tail must meet the head. To the end he was. To the beginning he must go, and make the water flow. Do you understand?" the stag asked him urgently, anxiously.
Toyo limps to a slow stop as the winds and the light seem to carry away the shadows, his chest heaving as he tries to catch his breath and calm himself. His wide eyes settle on the stag as the great animal appears. His mind is spinning but then the new spirit is speaking and he tries the best he can to listen and try to understand. "....is...is it..." There's a frustrated hiss from the cat. First something tries to kill him and now he's being quizzed? "..end to beginning...end to... the passage of time, the seasons, of life?" He rambles, thinking aloud as he tries to make sense of the cryptic tale. "That... Thing needs... seers? To... continue something? ... or end?"
"To make a new end and a new beginning," the stag insists, his voice booming and powerful, but clear and honest. There is no lie in his words. His regal visage is made forceful and rather frightful by the intensity by which he stares at the young cougar, and the light that had gathered in him flares up around the proud creature, lifting his head high. "You know so little of the world beyond. The shadows are not themselves evil. But evil they will /commit,/ and gladly, to achieve their end. All who are like you are in grave danger. /Everyone/ you meet will be hurt so they can get to you alone." He tosses his antlered head at a bush, and light seems to jump from his head to the bush. Shadows... or creatures made of them... that had been gathering scatter from it. "You must find others like you. You must understand the cycle. /The Cycle./ You must understand /us./ You must /widen/ your Sight. You must understand /everything./"
Toyo can only stare. Such a great quest for a young cat and the sheer scale of it weight down Toyo's shoulders and makes his ears flatten. "The cycle....understand you? How do I widen my Sight, how can I understand? I'm not... one of you." He asks in a quiet, strained voice, desperate for straight answers. Unspoken, but plain in his eyes, is another question. How can he ever do this alone? More and more, he's regretting ever leaving the pack behind. It was so simple then.
The stag stamps his hoof on the ground, and the whole world seems to shake in response, not heeding Toyo's confusion. "The first of many obstacles has come. He is not near you. But he can See, like you. He Sees you, now, and he hungers. He will take your eyes, and then your life. There is no time." He tosses his head again, and a forested landscape like what the beastly shadow creature had showed him appears next. Large, wilder than even the mountains around Toyo. "This is a dream. So you must dream to reach it. Find the Untamed Roads, and make them yours. Through them, you will find others like you. Only united will you see beyond your own Sight. Use your gift. Commune with those who have gone before and find the Roads, but be wary with your trust! Those who hunt you may be anywhere." He lifts his great head and sniffs the air. "Hurry to your destination. Warn them. Warn everyone. Know that nowhere you go is safe... it may be better not to stay in one place too long. That is all. I leave this world to you." And with another flash of light, he is gone. Toyo's briefing is over. The clouds are gray, but quiet, and the wind is gone. The young cougar is alone with his new, heavy burden.
Toyo, male cougar
The Stag, The Shadow (Spirit NPCs)
Location: Rolling Foothills
Mid Spring, RL day 5
------
Distant spring storms darken the far southern horizon, the late afternoon sky a still gold edged in purple-black that's illuminated by the occasional flash of lightning. The storm is miles away and there is a good chance it'll long burn itself out before getting this far, but to Toyo, the electricity is as tangible from the rise of a slope he sits on as if the storm was above him. He's alone, his eyes watching the lights across the sky even if his gaze seems further still. "...Paoro... I hope you were right about this." He murmurs to the wind, unknowing if anyone could really hear him. "...I still don't know."
The shadows under the storm seem darker than usual today. Perhaps something is within the air, or around it, but there is a tense atmosphere that seems to grow with each flash of lightning, each step taken, forward or back. The wind that brings the tempest picks up around the young cougar, maintaining a good strong gust even as it goes on. There's a message on the air, brought by voices that no longer speak in the words of this world, but it's only barely comprehensible. If one understood the voice of a falling tree, or a babbling brook, they may notice, but for now it is on the edge of perception.
Toyo is used to whispers, the voices that linger on the edge of consciousness or the shadows lingering at the corner of your vision. He is a seer, but, unlike many others. The voices of nature don't speak to him beyond the instincts of a wild thing. Others do. Those who have passed, the manifestations of feelings of hope and fear, perhaps even the voices who have yet to exist. Often, they are all one in the same, ranging from a joyful song to a horrific scream. As the wind thickens his dusky-black ears cup, his eyes returning to the present and slowly turning his gaze from one side to the other. His breath slows and holds, cutting out extra noise that could make it hard to hear.
These voices are from the side that Toyo may want to hear, but they strain to reach him. They are voices of life and the world around him, not the past or the future. The wind increases in strength, literally whistling in his ears, and clouds that seemed to be non-threatening now grow in the skies above him. One small, tiny word manages to reach him through the gale, strained and urgent. "Run." Then, the wind recedes. The voices from afar cease. But the clouds continue to gather overhead. There is an air of expectancy... something is waiting for him, and now, it doesn't matter which way he moves.
The single word causes the fur along his spine to rise and his claws grate on the stone. "Wait!" He calls out as the wind fades, his eyes wide and clearly showing the gold and blue in each, permanently caught between childhood and adulthood. "What do you mean run?!" But the voice seems gone, and the young cat is left to stare at the gathering clouds. He was told to come here, and now he's being told to go? Is this what Paoro told him Amaranth needed him for? Is there truly a danger? "Who are you?" He calls out as strong and as clear as he can manage, shoving down the rolling pit of fear in his stomach that makes his deepening voice catch and squeak.
As the afternoon is covered by rolling clouds the earth itself seems to grow that much colder. Time passes, somehow quicker than normal. Is it later in the day than it was a moment before, or was he just caught in a daze for a long time? A chill is felt in the next breeze, and there are no voices in this new swirl. It is a sound devoid of life, but yet it has a life of its own: grasping and reaching, seeking to steal something. Warmth, knowledge, bravery. The shadows of the shifting tall grass seem to gather and swirl of their own accord... and then, amazingly, /leave/ their positions, warping and twirling along the ground, moving towards Toyo. The jerky, aimless movement elicits an eerie giggle from the wind in this new, lifeless world that seems to be quickly enveloping the young seer. The snake-like shadows inch and roll ever closer.
He's seen spirits form from shadows, but this... presence... is not that. As a child he knew nightmares, memories of slain mothers and starved siblings, but this is different still. This is an unknown and he is afraid. His tail and fur alike are fluffed out, several jerking steps taken back to try and avoid the reaching tendrils that all too quickly appear ready to overcome him. The gibbering drives him back quicker, the cat curling back his lips and aiming a loud shrieking hiss at the snake-like forms, a paw instinctually reaching out to swipe ivory claws at the encroaching mass.
The shadows dodge and jerk away from his swiping paws, still curling and coiling on the ground around the poor cougar, moving around him, hemming him in, almost trying to drive him somewhere. When he strikes a blow, it is like hitting an actual shadow. The paw simply passes over it, leaving no visible effect. Some of the shadows do indeed clump and combine into something more recognizable, their darkness revealing other places in swirls of dark clouds. Wild and untamed... but grey, desolate, and frightening. As the tendrils slither between his futilely batting paws, they snatch at his own shadow, and somehow it is this that produces a tangible effect: they yank, and he feels the same happen to him. They whip at him, and he would feel the same sting. The ones that clump together before him create a hazy silhouette, a shadowed outline of something resembling a wolf, that /crawls/ out of the unrecognizable world beyond. Toyo can see straight through the monstrosity, like a sketchy drawing come to life. It looks right at him. "Silence," it says. "Let me give you... silence."
"I want nothing of yours!" Toyo snarls out into the hazy face of the un-wolf, his fury and frustration overpowering fear as the physical pain and sensations sting his body. He has always been a shy child, daresay meek, but the knowledge he is alone and that this threat is very real brings a change to the cat as he thrashes, still striking out with useless, but almost as bound to this spot as his assaulted shadow. There is no one here to help, no old friends living or dead. He is alone, and he has no knowledge to fight this being. "Leave me!"
"Mine?" the shadowy, living sketch asks innocently. "No. This gift is ours. It is all ours. But you can See. You can Hear." It begins to advance on Toyo. "But these are the wrong things. Let me show you the truth. Don't be consumed by the death that you feel all around you." It comes closer, now, becoming more solid, more black. The shadows continue their attack, unabated. "We can free you from the voices. You don't want to be swept away. You hear the dead. I will show you where they go. It is beautiful... just... come... and you will understand... /everything./"
"I hear them, and I /welcome/ them." Toyo snarls his defiance, spitting at the encroaching shadow-mass. He has known the negative, but he has known so many good spirits. Paoro, Skelaghe, the owl... but... never his mother. The one he wants to see more than any other, the one cruely stolen from him and the last to ever call him by his real name, bidding him watch his siblings until she came back. She never did, and he never found her. Does this creature know where she is? The blind hope burns in his chest, making his eyes water and he is forced to look away. "...you could show me lies, and I might never know they were false. How can you show me anything? What do you want from me?"
"The truth," the shadow says quietly, almost tenderly. Its smaller parts still wriggle and writhe threateningly, ready to put the cougar down if he begins to run. "We can show you why you have these powers. Why you must suffer through loss and yet hear the echo of lives gone by... come with me. I will tell you everything. Just come with me," it says, sounding rather impatient. "It must feel terrible. Knowing you are so close and yet can never truly know the other side... where they wait... where all of them wait. For you. Come." The wind and the shadows increase their activity, and the not-wolf trembles, as if it must keep itself from pouncing. But through the wind comes that small, urgent voice once more. "Run!" it says in a barely audible whisper, and then is swept away again.
One of the cougar's paws raise as though preparing to step forward, to accept the invitation. Oh but he wants to know, despite the danger. He can't help it. All that he can do, but he doesn't understand it... but what if he did? What could he do? He shakes with the effort of keeping still even as his eyes try to catch a glimpse of the world beyond and perhaps that of a familiar face. But that voice returns, that whisper so much more familiar to the voices he knows. Fear once more swells up in the cat and with a throttled cry he tries to break away again, to try and wheel away and escape from the shadow-wolf.
All at once, the moment Toyo attempts to escape, things become threatening once more. "You will not escape!" it yells, and lunges after Toyo, and suddenly its maw and its teeth are frightfully real. The shadows whip out to attack the cougar as he springs away, and he can feel them grasping, tearing, clawing at him. "You think you're special?! You think you can just peer into the depths of /our/ minds and feel our pain? You represent /everything/ that is wrong with this world! And you turn your back on your own fate!" it howls, not even moving its legs as it chases after him. "How will it feel to die by the claws of the very creatures you want to see most in this world?!"
Toyo doesn't even look to see if the pain he feels is real. It feels real - the yank of fur being pulled out, the sharp tear of claws and teeth. His claws scrape and scrabble against the stone, dirt, and grass underneath his paws as he tries to flee. Flee his fate? His fate? And what is that? To die, to become some puppet of this force, to be broken? Is this what Paoro led him to fight... or led him into? He doesn't respond as he tries to focus on escape, eyes frantically searching the unfamiliar landscape. A tree is nearby and he takes a gamble, bolting for the old plant and trying to launch himself up the trunk and try to put some space between him and this shadow being.
"You ignorant child!" the dark shadow behind him jeers, its voice warped and monstrous, tilting between shrieking and abysmally deep. "I'll put an end to your miserable existence! Come to oblivion! Rest in cold comfort like the dead!" It reaches the base of the tree just on Toyo's heels, consuming the base as the shadows wrap around it. The tree... shudders. Wind whips through the branches, making it shiver and shake. "Plenty of time to speak to the deceased when you're one of them! The Balance will be restored... it will begin with you!" Any questions as to whether this is actually happening are quashed when the tree begins to creak and groan, threatening to fall. And then, far off, a glimmer of light appears between the hills, offering refuge from the void that is eating at Toyo's shelter. A calm voice cuts through the madness. "Come," it implores him. "This way. Jump!"
Toyo digs his claws into the wind-shorn wood as he feels the tree shake and tremble as the nightmare-being below destroys the flimsy refuge. The cougar curls back his lips, snarling at the form below with fury he cannot combat it. Still. He fought and defeated hunger and dismay, not once but twice, and the more the spirit wails the more it reminds Toyo of those very emotions. Maybe he can fight it. The gleam of light and the return of that whispering voice catches his attention and Toyo bunches his muscles. It's a long way down, but, it is the only way - one way or another. He lunges, leaping from the branch with all the powerful kick-off force his kind's massive hind legs are made for. It's a flat leap, aimed to carry distance and clear the shadows, and even as he lands poorly with a sharp sting of pain, he doesn't stop to think about it. He runs, runs as fast as he can, for that hopeful gleam of light.
"We will take your eyes!" the shadow intones, its voice horribly warped now as it breaks apart the tree, threatening to make it fall. "And you will never See! We will take your ears and you will never Hear!" But as Toyo's eyes latch onto the light, everything seems to be dragged towards it, rather than Toyo moving forward... and the shadows behind are gone. The forest, save for the stormy clouds above and the wind gusting through the trees, is fairly complacent. The light ahead is almost blinding, but whatever it was chased away the would-be murderer behind the cougar. "The forest is not safe for those with the Sight and the Hearing," it explains, and suddenly it coalesces into a strong, tall, and proud looking buck. It looks down at Toyo with a sort of anxious imperiousness, as though it has little time to waste on him and doesn't want to spare more. "There is only time to tell you the most important things." The buck takes a deep breath. "For he did not know that where his Sight ended the world went on, and two eyes were not enough to behold the ocean beyond, where tides must flow, and rain must fall, and the serpent's tail must meet the head. To the end he was. To the beginning he must go, and make the water flow. Do you understand?" the stag asked him urgently, anxiously.
Toyo limps to a slow stop as the winds and the light seem to carry away the shadows, his chest heaving as he tries to catch his breath and calm himself. His wide eyes settle on the stag as the great animal appears. His mind is spinning but then the new spirit is speaking and he tries the best he can to listen and try to understand. "....is...is it..." There's a frustrated hiss from the cat. First something tries to kill him and now he's being quizzed? "..end to beginning...end to... the passage of time, the seasons, of life?" He rambles, thinking aloud as he tries to make sense of the cryptic tale. "That... Thing needs... seers? To... continue something? ... or end?"
"To make a new end and a new beginning," the stag insists, his voice booming and powerful, but clear and honest. There is no lie in his words. His regal visage is made forceful and rather frightful by the intensity by which he stares at the young cougar, and the light that had gathered in him flares up around the proud creature, lifting his head high. "You know so little of the world beyond. The shadows are not themselves evil. But evil they will /commit,/ and gladly, to achieve their end. All who are like you are in grave danger. /Everyone/ you meet will be hurt so they can get to you alone." He tosses his antlered head at a bush, and light seems to jump from his head to the bush. Shadows... or creatures made of them... that had been gathering scatter from it. "You must find others like you. You must understand the cycle. /The Cycle./ You must understand /us./ You must /widen/ your Sight. You must understand /everything./"
Toyo can only stare. Such a great quest for a young cat and the sheer scale of it weight down Toyo's shoulders and makes his ears flatten. "The cycle....understand you? How do I widen my Sight, how can I understand? I'm not... one of you." He asks in a quiet, strained voice, desperate for straight answers. Unspoken, but plain in his eyes, is another question. How can he ever do this alone? More and more, he's regretting ever leaving the pack behind. It was so simple then.
The stag stamps his hoof on the ground, and the whole world seems to shake in response, not heeding Toyo's confusion. "The first of many obstacles has come. He is not near you. But he can See, like you. He Sees you, now, and he hungers. He will take your eyes, and then your life. There is no time." He tosses his head again, and a forested landscape like what the beastly shadow creature had showed him appears next. Large, wilder than even the mountains around Toyo. "This is a dream. So you must dream to reach it. Find the Untamed Roads, and make them yours. Through them, you will find others like you. Only united will you see beyond your own Sight. Use your gift. Commune with those who have gone before and find the Roads, but be wary with your trust! Those who hunt you may be anywhere." He lifts his great head and sniffs the air. "Hurry to your destination. Warn them. Warn everyone. Know that nowhere you go is safe... it may be better not to stay in one place too long. That is all. I leave this world to you." And with another flash of light, he is gone. Toyo's briefing is over. The clouds are gray, but quiet, and the wind is gone. The young cougar is alone with his new, heavy burden.