"Mother's Embrace Casino welcomes you all to the Annual Masquerade Ball! We thank you for your patronage despite the continued air quality issues plaguing us as the Miasma grows heavy this time of year around the Rotround. Please ensure your masks remain on and that the air-filters are properly functioning." Bast lowers the piece of paper in steely claws, turning to Pig behind him, fastening the ribbons of his mask around his neck to obscure clown-painted features.
"What a load of shit. Lotta fancy talk for 'we didn't wanna reschedule.'"
"Pig, I didn't write the flyer. Besides, we can't have them recognizing us anyway."
"No, we can't have 'em recognizing you. Me an' mine aren't on the 'deny entry' wall. We've only got as long as it takes Sow to get Hymn on the stage to get into position, so come on, ya jingling fuckin' fool." The guardian grunts, rolling sleeves up his arms and examining the bandolier strapped under his wings one more time.
"...they were out of puppet masks." Bast mutters, peering from their shadowy corner to the party proper, Sow and Hymn mingling among the other revelers, Sow's gaze flickering across the strangers surrounding, all with features similarly obscured beneath masks of both necessity and mirth as the four of them. "There. That table- The wildclaw dealer."
"I hope you know what the hell you're doin', because if this goes like the last time-"
"I don't think there is a universe where it goes that badly a second time."
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A quiet night at the circus heralds something deadly on the horizon.- a Godfall without warning.
{Carousel, Magda, Sow, Hymn}
"Sow, darling, it's been far too long."
"I don't like to make pleasure visits to the sideshow, Caro. I ended up with seven children with that line of thinking- Hymn, sweetheart. this way." It's under a pale moon that Carousel and Sow have settled at the edge of a fleshy precipice to examine the Vaudemire Sideshow below- it's uncharacteristically quiet, this late at night, most of its denizens are asleep- even the lanterns outside Pig's Workshop snuffed for the evening, leaving only the sickly cast of moonlight to light a sea of canvas and banners, well worn desire paths from tent to tent truly visible from up here- and a reminder that the Sideshow's been settled in one place for some time now.
"I'm coming- uff." Sow stops slightly faster than Hymn is expecting, the pearlcatcher bumping into her side and carefully stepping back a moment later, blind eyes seeking the glow of hazy magic from the other women before she settles comfortably near the cliff's drop and tucks her pearl into the loop of her tail. "Thank you for inviting me along, Carousel."
"Ah, don't mention it, lovebug- you're the newest member of the cirque, after all, you should get to enjoy the peace and quiet away from its denizens too." the Cirrus reasons, settling comfortably as well to watch the wind catch and sway the strings of flags hung around the perimeter of the circus grounds. "Besides, you spend so much time harvesting with Pig that I fear you've forgotten the company of others who aren't lumbering murder machines."
"Hey now, I resemble that statement." Sow laughs, stretching her wings and settling into place behind the smaller dragons closer to the cliff's edge with a hum, a clawed hand moving to remove her face mask and sitting it aside, scratching across white-painted scales with an absent hum. "But I do it so much more artfully, truly, I can't blame you for forgetting, Caro." Sow chuckles, Carousel rolling her eyes. "In any case, I appreciate the break... Dethrone's got us chasing leads for his personal vendetta, and that's meant spending more time in Earth than I like to- the Marketplace is the best option for information, after all."
"No leads through Mother's Embrace?" Carousel offers, scratching holes in the ground below herself with an absent foreclaw. "I used to get some pretty capable information off of Timut, once upon a time."
"Not in this case- Dethrone wants someone specific, and nobody at the casino seems to know anything about him. There's a few craftspeople at the Marketplace who seem to have something they're not willing to part with for anything other than more money than either of us have ever seen in our lives, so he's running... recon."
"So Dethrone is casing the Marketplace, and you're here for plausible deniability?" Hymn offers with a playful twitch of her ears, Sow rolling her eyes and tapping her nose with a finger.
"Well when you put it that way, little lady, it sounds like we're doing something wrong. We negotiated as much as we could, but sometimes you have to put the pressure on- A few of them said something about an old wives tale about a tomb nearby- old old, apparently- but they were pretty loose lipped about it for it to be what we were after." Sow sighs, resting her chin in an upturned claw.
"I remember that story- something about a godchild buried beneath earth large enough to cause the fissure the Marketplace is in, right?" Sow nods, Carousel humming softly. "I knew a Skydancer woman who had an interest in the tale- claimed that she was going to discover the treasure of the tomb and claim it for herself- she had made some notable progress, last I saw her. I wonder if she ever found it..."
The conversation about old legends starts to fade into background noise to Hymn, the youngest dragon's sense of magic in place of actual sight keyed into the pale glow of... something, in the distance. It's a careful dance to stand up and clamor over Sow's much larger frame to move to the other side of the cliff carefully, leaning out and spreading her wings for balance to try and determine what the blue haze across the horizon might be.
"Something have your dander up, little lamb?" Sow questions, gaze following the pearlcatcher to the edge.
"Something's out there." She observes softly, pointing across the horizon line. "A glowing sea of... something."
"I don't see anything." Carousel declares, moving to her feet all the same to join Hymn near the edge. "Maybe it's a traveling caravan?"
"No, no, there'd be a mixture of magic, that way, this one is... this one is all one color, and it's big, like it's all the same thing."
"It's an Emperor! Boo!" Sow teases as she joins the others, squinting into the distance. "I don't see anything either."
"I'm telling you, something is coming-" the Seer's insistence is cut off, sudden and without warning, by the presence of another on the cliff they've chosen for their rendezvous.
It is magic all-encompassing, it is a light blinding over Hymn's shoulder, and it is almost as hard to bear looking at for even those with their sight intact- and it is Sow who recognizes the form within it first, her shovel and cairnstones still hung amongst looping silk and finery. "Magda."
"How fare you, Sow?" The light-rung guardian doesn't step closer, simply lingers nearby- Hymn turns down and away- unable to close her eyes against such a flood of magic, it's everything she can do to seek some way to shy away from the brilliance so it doesn't hurt her head. "And I greet you, Carousel and Hymn."
"... Magda as in..."
"Yes, Carousel, which means I have very little time to get this message across: The circus needs to move- and the town you sit beside should be evacuated if it can be helped- another of your... Godfalls, approaches- and you lie directly in its oncoming path."
"A godfall? Great- we'll just-" Sow starts, Magda shaking her head. "What, you got a soft spot for whoever's dropping? Want us not to chase this one?"
"I have no fondness for my fellows in the pantheon, certainly not that which threatens in the distance now. But there is no victory to be won over some insurmountable titan, no large threat high above- a swarm, instead." Magda tries, her head and Hymn's turning in haunting unison toward the glow in the distance. "...you see it, don't you girl?"
"I... I see blue light."
"Look closer."
"I'm trying, it's hard to...." Hymn leans further forward, tries to discern something in the light. "...Wildclaws?" She murmurs. "Yes- it's... it's a bunch of wildclaws, all moving this way, all with the same magic."
"Drones- all bound to the same will. A God in a thousand pieces." Magda murmurs, and Sow shakes her head.
"... The INTERLOPER. I ran into some thronebreakers chasing him recently but-"
"His fall is imminent. He will not die easily. He will consume all that he can in the meantime. He already is."
"....they're shredding anything they find- beastclans- I- I see other dragons down there and-" Hymn declares, stepping back from the edge. "... At this rate they'll overrun the circus in...."
"you have two days." With that, Magda is gone as quickly as she's made herself known, Sow cursing under her breath.
"Spend how long being a cryptic old bitch and suddenly she's got words for days to try and talk me out of hunting a fall?" She scoffs. "Hymn, go wake Pig."
"And tell him to evacuate?"
"...Of course not. Have him meet me on Ridgespine Overlook- he'll know where it is- and to bring his cleaver."
"Sow, we just witnessed divine intervention and-"
"And I don't fuck with gods unless it's for a paycheck or a harvest, now she can tell me to get out all she wants." Sow spreads her wings, beating them once, twice, three times, before launching herself up into the air, holding in place for only a moment. "But she's not my goddess- and I need my hunting partner, so go wake Pig, send him to the Overlook, and you two can evacuate whoever you want afterward." She's gone a moment later too, vanishing toward another high perch closer to the oncoming swarm.
"...."
"I'll get the circus packing, Hymn, go get The Pig, it's fine."
Hymn spares a glance for the pack of wildclaws below, for their strange, unearthly movements among the glow.
Somehow FR pinged Pig's dad energy RIGHT off the rip. This does also imply the existence of Dragon IKEA which is a place I will be integrating into my lore IMMEDIATELY.
Runt being good at scrounging and Sow being good at throwing pebbles is also accurate. Though a pebble to a guardian is like a boulder to most other dragons so I do have some worries for those around her.
i commented on your page, but i got a screenshot of sow on the front page for you :}
SOW FRONTPAGE REAL!
she deserves it... her time in the spotlight....
Thank you for telling me both here AND on FR! this is the first time I think either she or Pig has made the spotlight, which means she beat him to it which is *very* funny to me.
Break away from rotten bones- bear the bleached white of the tower anew.
Sow got an accent update, and a canonical change from the nasty old skeleton she's been wearing for a while- the upside of it matching her apparel better is just bonus points.
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"this ruffle is tight."
"it will not kill you to dress nice for the festivities, Pig."
"you have no idea what will and won't kill me, woman, I've not worn a shirt since most a' the circus was a thought in their mother's head, and what's the point of this ridiculous cape-"
"it will not kill you to dress nice, but I might kill you if you keep up this complaining. we are here to make merry, and if you ruin our childrens' birthdays and sweet Hymn's hard work on this Riot of Rot celebration, I will spend the next one drinking out of a goblet made of your skull."
"...I like it when you talk dirty at me."
"Ugh. You are insufferable."
Happy Riot of Rot from the Horror Harlequins! (And a happy early birthday to the 2024 halloween piglets!)
for my own archives and ease of tracking it down (and the fact this is the first time I've drawn Sow, a mostly fullbody pig AND the return of runt,) I'm posting these separately. for the full context and little story attached to them, please go to the Original Post [here] instead!
