crystal;

[notathreat]

FORM: Crystal
SENDER: Ellie
RECIPIENT: All y'all
NOTES: N/A

Hey, guys. It's Ellie. Uh, acting Griffon keeper for the next couple of months. And since we've got a lot of new people joining, I was thinking- it might be intimidating to just go up to the Aerie and introduce yourself to the griffons alone.

They're mostly just big babies, but I know they don't look like it.

[Also, said babies can take off an arm if they feel like, but details.]

Riftwatch has some griffon riders who take good care of them, but they have favorite people they bond with and a lot of them don't have anybody special.

So if you want to come up and meet them, let me know and I'll introduce you. And if anybody's interested in learning to ride -- griffons or horses, or whatever else is in the stables, I can teach you that too.

[ooc; Griffon riding is an AC Reward that can be purchased here until the system is updated! It can be done without threading with Ellie or anyone else about it, but if you want to thread it out heyo]

Comments

[notathreat]

[Ellie squints one eye at Jayce, like she's not sure if that counts, but she'll allow it for now. That's better than some people have got. It's better than what she had.

She hesitates a moment before Viktor encourages it, nodding to herself. (She very resolutely ignores the silent byplay between the two of them. One, she can't fathom the layers of it, and two, it seems kinda. Not her business, quite yet.)]

Good idea, but Artie would get pissed if he found me riding some other griffon. Let me see if he's near enough to hear me.

[Give her a moment to step away to one of the large entrances into the aerie. It looks like a giant hole in the wall of the tower, though it's reinforced and there is a large door that can be closed and bolted against bad weather.

She grips the one with her good hand and leans out into empty space, heedless of the sheer drop below, and puts her other hand to her mouth, letting out a shrill, loud, carrying whistle. There's a moment before there's an answering screech, somewhat muffled, and a loud flapping of wings.]

Oh, here he comes.

[And he does. Artichoke is enormous, muscular, with dark grey plumage and gold-coin eyes. He alights claws-first and then shoulders his way in, shaking his wings and splattering Ellie with water droplets from the clouds.]

Hey! Brat.

[But Ellie's grinning, and Artichoke headbutts her in the chest enthusiastically, rocking her back several steps and knocking the wind out of her, only to rumble contentedly when she sinks her hands into his feathers to give him a neck rub. He stays there for a moment, then nips affectionately at Ellie's ponytail before he makes his way over to Viktor.

To lovingly attempt to preen the man's hair, of course. Unless he's fended off, he'll make it much worse.]

[pathlit]

[ He's all open curiosity, weight shifting to get a better look at who Ellie summons, but takes no step closer, kept in place by Potato's insistent head-butting for further attention. The curiosity settles into something less giddy and more contemplative as Artichoke arrives, the interaction between he and Ellie somehow allowing a simple fact to sink in a little deeper: that the man sitting on the chair, resting upon his crutch, has ridden this beast -- this beast with the same cut of eye, gold and sharp -- that this Viktor isn't truly the Viktor he'd sought after the night in the shimmer factory like an old comfort despite anticipating ridicule for his actions, and he is not truly the Jayce this Viktor had forgotten.

And he doesn't really know all of what Viktor may have endured in Thedas and he never truly did know what Viktor had endured in Piltover and the undercity.

They fall into step so smoothly, anyhow.

It's a peculiar realization -- one that stirs a faint ache within his ribs as he watches Artie approach Viktor with a fondness bordering on melancholic. ]

[grindset]

[As he follows Ellie with his eyes, a flicker of artless hope breezes past his reserve. It tips him into a lean, too, that he might see more of the sky through the great gap in the wall, maybe catch the rush of incoming wings. Indeed, he lights up just ahead of Artichoke's bustling arrival, and watches the knockabout greeting of Ellie with open fondness. When that big furred and feathered body turns toward him, he sets his crutch aside in time to receive it with both hands, and even holds his head at an obliging angle to indulge Artie's nigh pathological love of hair, mindful of the great beak rustling around his ear, unconcerned for whatever unfortunate avian styling may occur.

That is, until the inevitable tweak to his scalp. Then comes the Ouch, the tutting, an admonishment that falls short of wholly stern, and a final round of pats before the griffon sent back Ellie's way. His unserious frown returns to a smile,

only to fade gently as he realizes he's being watched.

Viktor is not the same. Never before has he struggled so deeply to maintain a sense of self. His arrival here is the shattered nucleus of a sprawling web, every day an effort to keep the cracks from spreading; at Arlathan he took a hammer to it himself, thinking to shed pieces that would only cut him to keep. How wrong he was.

Now, as he reacquaints himself with Jayce's attention, he finds he's nervous of the potential in it, of the likelihood of further loss. Either of them could disappear at any moment—he could rebuild this only to lose it again.

Jagged edges silently graze this lingering exchange before something prompts either or both of them to break it.]

[notathreat]

[Ellie doesn't miss the way Viktor puts aside his crutch for Artie; it's an open affection that warms her heart, actually. Artichoke is an affectionate guy, but he always loves the most on the people who love him, too.

He trills and settles into something more gentle and loving, fluffing up his head feathers and lowering his head to be petted, utterly unconcerned with the scolding. A nice little slow-blink of his big, piercing eyes.

He doesn't seem to want to challenge Potato for Jayce's attention at the moment, content.

Ellie, for her part, feels like she's seeing much more than she's meant to, a vulnerability between the two of them, a gap neither of them is quite sure how to cross. Lingering fear alongside all that hopeful want.

It prods at sore things inside herself, an understanding that grounds her to the moment.]

So,

[She says to them both, gesturing to the open, yawning gap outside the tower, all the gorgeous, glorious open air.]

You wanna fly?

end!

[pathlit]

[ Affection blossoms in the wake of Viktor and Artichoke's exchange, receding into a comfortable hum beneath his ribs as Viktor's attention turns onto him. Not knowing what to say-- not feeling like words are necessary in this very instance-- Jayce merely offers him a small, lopsided smile with an equally small and lopsided shrug.

Then Ellie's voice cuts through the space between. The ring of a bell he's content to answer. ]

Absolutely.

[ And when they return from this impromptu introduction to griffons, they may find Viktor surrounded by more of these creatures, some vying for attention, others napping near his feet. It is a sight that might make Jayce's chest ache with an old fondness long since buried. ]