can't bring me down [Bre!]

[Cy]

[Bre]

I, it's possible I . . .

Hands shoved in her pockets, dressed in loose breeches and a shirt that did nothing to reduce her boyish figure, Ro'za made her way to the gardens. Spring brought fresh food for the eyrie. She was glad. Pickled fish did not go well with pickled turnips, not that she complained about it. She did her part to keep moral up, even with flickered sightings of koxi. Things had quieted down though. There hadn't been a proper attack in months. Where the koxi gone? Had they found a better food source? Hardly. She still heard stories of people never returning home from the wilderness and mangled arms left to rot. Things to turn her stomach. Things to drive her from paperwork and letters and politics and distant pleas and accusations. She walked to clear her head and stretched her legs. Light exercise made her body feel more in tune.

The Phoenix caught sight of young Dareph quickly. She kept her eyes up when she walked, taking in everything around her. His distinct coloring immediately alerted her to one thing, though it took her a moment to place the face that jumped in her mind. That snarky candidate. She pursed her lips in a way she didn't like and gritted her teeth. She couldn't believe such an annoying individual had bonded to a red. How could someone so different from the reasonable K'huna handle such a volatile color? If he played his cards right and made his hatchling grow strong, he could end up a Commander, if a red ever succeeded in catching a gray. The thought angered her. Not rationally, but she wasn't one to care about rationality and morals. She cared about the survival of her eyrie and he was a threat to it. A rider who hadn't proven himself.

Ro'za stopped, hands folding into fists within the confines of her pockets. Her weight rested on her heels. It did not look like she was ready to strike, but she was. Ready to crouch and lunge and rip out a throat with her teeth. "Hey, kid;" she called across the garden patches. He owed her allegiance. Fealty. Respect. A certain understanding. Eceph's lessons, the gray's fine view of the big picture, reminded her that she needed to fix the situation, not make it worse, but it was hard to listen. Part of her just wanted to kill every useless appendage and be done with it. However, this boy was how a part of her eyrie, a part of her riders. Yes, hers, for she ruled them, as odd as it was to consider. It was her job to leave a legacy to remember. First Phoenix. First problems. What to do with candidates that earned her rage? New question to answer.

. . . have gone too far when it comes to you.

[Cy]

[/i] and the idea of being near her felt disturbing. He could remember the last time they'd ever directly interacted, the first and only time in fact, and he could recall the bold way that she'd touched and crowded and manhandled. He kind of despised her, just like he despised touching and crowding and manhandling. He'd hit her. If he continued on and she stopped him from passing, which he felt almost entirely certain that she would, he'd hit her, right across her damned jaw, and then the Gray would come swooping out of nowhere to tear him to shreds. Dareph would probably be upset about such an event.

'Mine, that is our Phoenix. You should respect her,'

Good point. So that just left one question – which action would be the most disrespectful, turning around to head the other way or continuing on in the hopes that he could ignore her and pass right on? Turning around would be a grand way to avoid her, but then she might lay chase and, while the idea of her having to either pursue him to get her way or simply let him go, he didn't like this notion. He also didn't like the possibility that his change in direction could be misinterpreted. He wasn't scared of her or her position in the Eyrie. He didn't need to curb his own agenda to accommodate her, he didn't need to go out of his way to suit her. She could move. And the mere fact that he was audacious enough to even begin to think such a thing of a stubborn wench like her was probably disrespectful enough in itself, let alone trying to ignore her.

That was the way to go. Clearly. Clenching his fists in his pockets, a pointed effort holding his eyes down to the ground where they'd been before, he picked his pace back up, though it seemed to hold a touch of terseness that had certainly not been present in his relaxed stroll of before. He'd just keep on. And when she made the move to stop him, he'd just do his best to not smack her across the jaw.[/ul][/size]

[Bre]

I, I can't wait for the day . . .

Ro'za made no move to stop him. Of course, it should be noted that she could probably outrun him, outbox him, and do a whole lot of other things better than him, because she was the Phoenix and she was awesome. Sure, she was more than occasionally a jerk who lacked a proper set of morals and whose guiding forces were an aggressive need for survival and a large simourv named Eceph, but she was still awesome. In the game of life, she won. Repeatedly. Because all of that sheer awesome and ability, she simply let Ze'el pass her, turned sharply on her heel, and fell in step beside him. She knew she was being annoying. She didn't particularly like being around him either. However, she jammed her hands in her pockets, putting her a few more steps away from a fight. Of course, she could always kick him if they started to brawl. Legs were handy like that.

"I was talking to you, kid;" Ro'za told him, as if he didn't know that. She didn't have a clue what she was doing, but she knew she was going to do something. It was good that he hadn't lunged at her to try and kill her with an icepick, but it wasn't going to work if he couldn't talk to her. Dareph could catch Laraph. Then he'd be a Commander. That was her main concern. She doubted that he would ever become a wingletmaster or candidatemaster. She held a little too much sway over those positions. However, he would doubtlessly be a watch lieutenant or something like that, so he was still a threat. A danger. The majority of her continued to encourage the idea of eliminating him, so she had to think quickly and hard to decide what to do. What are you supposed to do with a disrespectful redrider? Whatever could she possibly do with a disrespectful redrider?

. . . when all the bad things either stop, come crashing in.

[Cy]

[/i] in such effortless fluidity, in the casual way that she could set herself so in sync with him, but they weren't anyone other than redrider Ze'el and grayrider Ro'za. The only thing that existed between them was a spiteful tension and an undeniable battle for control that shouldn't have been a battle at all. Dareph was most dismayed by the defiant antics of His. He respected Ro'za and he adored his mother, but he remained silent as he tread behind the pair, warm brown eyes watching them carefully.

Light eyes shifted to the side, peering into the lower corner of his peripheral to study the left and right march of her stride, puzzled and agitated by both her persistance and the surprise of her doing what he'd not predicted her to do. His jaw tightened as he took a breath deep into his lungs, holding it there before releasing it slowly through his nose, turning his eyes back to the path, struggling to retain the casual roll of his own gait, keeping it from picking up to a brisk walk designed to get away. He was cool, he was at ease, he was everything that his knotted shoulders and tight fists said he wasn't. “I heard,” he bit out, clearing his throat slightly after the simple statement. He'd heard her talking to him, he'd acknowledged it briefly in a bitter glance upwards; it just didn't matter.[/ul][/size]