viceofvoices | (no subject)

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There are four known clans of mer that roam the seas -- the Hamvra, serpent-like and gentle, attuned to the ancient leylines running through deep sea channels and floating unseen in the cool, blue waters; the Daku, the fiercest warriors and hunters, known for their large size and fearsome rows of teeth; the Boto, clever and quick-tongued with tails like dolphins; and the Tritei, the most colorful and human like of all the clans, lingering in ancient sunken ruins and holding the keys to a long forgotten past.

The only thing they have in common is how much they hate each other.

Rrhys hovers in the cold water above the meeting place picked out by the clan leaders, hand lifting to grip the huge fang lashed to his neck with a strong black cord of woven black kelp. Its carvings, tiny and intricate in shallow grooves into the bone, comfort him even now. He runs his callused thumb over the ridges he knows by heart, gazing down with dark, flat eyes at the nearly glowing white temple. It's domed roof was caved in thousands upon thousands of years ago, the white stone covered in barnacles and coral, but he can still feel the power of this place.

It's not like him to hesitate. Brow furrowed, he flicks his long, blue-grey tail and descends to the ruins, already missing the trident he was forbidden to bring.

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Sses, tail bright with beautiful concentric rings of ritual scar pocks, darts his way through the pillars of the ruins to inspect everything he can and commit it to memory. He counts himself as brash for a Boto (not least because of how many times he's been accused of it), but even he avoids these places filled with humming things that might be land flowers and warm orbs like those above the water's surface.

But.

Since this meeting is doomed anyway, he might as well bring as much knowledge back as he can, to reduce how much of it that's exclusively clutched in the rainbow claws of the Tritei.

Scarred brow lifted, Rrhys traces the movements of the quick Boto he catches sight of. Rather large for one of the chatterbox clan, isn't he? Ah, but he should know better than to fall into stereotyping -- Rrhys himself is hardly the heart-hardened bloodthirsty warrior he should be. That's probably why he was chosen.

He slowly sinks down onto a tipped over, crumbled pillar to watch and see how long it takes the energetic dolphin to even notice he's here.

No time at all, but Sses only looks at him and flips over once before swishing away and resuming his dizzying whirl of millennia-late spying. Or is it snooping? Stealing? He isn't hurting anyone so definitely not that.

Finally, done with the far side of the ruins, he loops around Rrhys and his pillar a couple of times. "Think you can catch me?" he smirks in the usual greeting between their people. When they actually use words and not mere rude body language, that is.

"I only chase something if I intend to eat it," he replies, his deep, growling voice too soft to be threatening. He smiles, despite himself. "I assume you're here as the Boto representative? What's your name?"

"Sses, you?" the sleek and muscular Boto replies, looping again and then smothering his exuberance enough to settle at the top of the broken pillar with his arms folded on top of it. Best not to alarm a Daku, slow as they are. They just get crazy.

"Rrhys." He holds out a black clawed hand, his forearm scarred and his elbow pointed into a long fin. The black kelp and bone armbands on his arms flutter with the movement. "Thank you for coming."

Or not.

Weird.

Sses extends his hand in a strong and confident grip that moves against the water's weight effortlessly. "And you. I'll do my best not to bait you, as fun as it might be to give the others a show."

His smile slowly widens, revealing far too many white fangs. "I appreciate the thought." Letting go of Sses' hand, Rrhys bends over to take a closer look at the scars on his tail. "So it's true...you do purposefully scar yourselves?"

Edited 2017-05-22 02:56 (UTC)

He curves up his dark and nigh-blue tail, fin twitching with suppressed energy. In the glow of magic flowers, the white pocks stand out bright and symmetrical.

"The elders keep lore and continue the tradition, though we... struggle with the why," Sses admits. "That is a piece that is missing for us. Though it doesn't much diminish the purpose and love we feel for the scars. In the end, does it matter if we know its origins?"

"Not if it makes you feel whole," he murmurs, reaching out to lightly run his claws over Sses' tail without thinking. Before he gets there, though, his fingers twitch and he pulls back with a sheepish laugh. "Ah, apologies. It's such an intricate design, I wanted to touch it. It reminds me of my hansit."

He tilts his chin back, thumb holding up the fang at his throat. "From the first hydra I killed."

Edited 2017-05-22 03:06 (UTC)

A cascade of bubbles follows his breath and tail swish as he rises higher to look at it. "Wow! Do you keep trophies of everything? ... Is trophy the right word? I don't want to be rude."

His deep laugh startles a school of silver fish from the nearby wavering white flowers. Expecting a Boto to have no concept of personal space, Rrhys lets him get closer, finding he doesn't really mind it. "That's kind of you. No, not quite a trophy. A reminder, of the day I embraced death and was spared, of the strength I'm capable of."

Edited 2017-05-22 03:20 (UTC)

Sses peers at it from several angles, like a pearlsmith granted access to an exquisite specimen. "Will you replace it when you face bigger and more terrifying enemies? Or is the first special?"

"Isn't the first always special?" he purrs, dropping his hand and leaning towards Sses with a meaningful smirk.

The Boto blinks at him, then grins bright and dark-eyed. "Every one is special! A boring life if they weren't, ignoring the sweetness of every encounter just because it isn't the first!"

His smirk drops for a second, stunned by such over-the-top optimism, but then smiles again. "But if everything is special, then how can any of it be special? Doesn't it all blur together after awhile?"

"If it does, aren't you disrespecting the encounters?" Sses asks in return, confused. "We separate sorts-of-things into different categories, but within those categories surely it's easy to keep things separate."

Rrhys opens his mouth to reply, then closes it. "Wait --" He breaks off as something bright flashes in his peripheral, like the dawn breaking over the ocean's surface. He automatically tenses, eyes darkening, and looks to the side and up in time to see another flash of gold twinkling in a shaft of light coming from the surface.

The color shifts from gold to crimson to purple and back to gold as the light gets closer, and he realizes suddenly what it is he's seeing. "Tritei," he murmurs, rising up from the pillar. Dealing with Sses had been somewhat familiar, the grey blue black colors of the Boto like a hazy shadow of his own people, but this -- this is like looking at a living rainbow.

"I am, like, super literally jealous of whatever that is they're doing," Sses grumbles, knowing in his heart of hearts that it's just what a Tritei looks like. What a waste! If you can't swim like an trident's path, flashiness is absolutely a waste!

He laughs weakly, unable to look away as the Tritei's details fill in the closer they get. Long gold hair braided with opalescent shell fragments carved into smooth circles hovers around their androgynous face. Their body is slender but masculine, broad of shoulder and flat of chest, the scales smoother and smaller in clusters over alabaster skin.

The Tritei pauses some distance above them, half a dozen completely unnecessary translucent fins billowing around him from tail, hips, arms and shoulders, then tilts his head in a shockingly haughty manner. "You're the representatives?" he calls, his clear voice young and musical and undeniably arrogant.

Edited 2017-05-22 03:53 (UTC)

"No, we're the decorations," Sses snorts, fearlessly darting straight up at the Tritei without warning to loop and swirl around him in a cascade of moving water and sound, quick and agile. "Aren't you pretty?"

His finned ears flare in indignation, pale face turning red as he quickly snaps his tail to swim backwards. "Keep your distance, thank you!" he croaks, voice breaking, his bright golden eyes wide.

"There's no need for that kind of attitude," Rrhys rumbles as he slowly joins them, and the Tritei's ears drop, his color fading. As Rrhys levels out with them, he even goes so far as hiding a bit behind Sses.

"I'm not going to eat you," Rrhys says wryly.

"I'm not afraid of you!" says the boy, ribbon-like fins swimming around him as he darts up above Sses. "You just surprised me! Are all Daku so huge?"

"He's definitely super tiny for a Daku," Sses smirks, lying brazenly and proudly, swimming a lazy arch around them and coming back to his previous position. If the pretty creature wants to hide behind him, well, who is he to deny such a need?

"We can get bigger," he admits, unruffled. Rrhys holds out his hand, palm up. "My name is Rrhys, and this is Sses. Will you do us the honor of giving us your name?"

Bemused by the Daku's pretty way of speaking, the Tritei slips out from behind Sses and hesitantly puts his hand in Rrhys'. He has no claws, no spikes. There doesn't seem to be a single thing about this golden morsel that can defend or attack, unless it's by blinding colors.

"Felix," he says, and he doesn't shake Rrhys' hand. In fact, he's staring down at their hands like he's confused. "Well?"

"Well what?"

"Aren't you going to kiss it?"

Rrhys' brows lift in shock as he darts a questioning look to Sses.

Sses offers only a perplexed shrug, having no real answer. "Do you kiss each other's hands in your clan, Felix? Or is this an honour for the rest of us?"

He swims closer to the joining of their digits, then under to the other side. And back.

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