Through The Eyes Of A Child

[Celandine]

Open to one or two. I'll be using Celandine and Vaeron in this thread.

She looked like a child because she was, in reality, a child. Her soft chestnut brown hair was picked up and played with by the soft wind like an excited dog, eager for attention. Standing on the walls of her castle she was a maiden no longer waiting for her knight in shining armour, because he had already come. Come in the form of her mother that the lady in the grass green dress had told her about.

Celandine leant over the edge of the battlements, peering straight down to the steadily dropping cliff edge. What had been carved out was a path that zig-zagged down the cliff edge with sharp lines, and showed anyone watching where Celandine was if people approached the fortress. Up the only path, hidden amongst the trees, lost in the vast, rugged, mountainous landscape of where the Concordia forest touched the Jagged Peaks. She knew that far above, where the cliff became firm, buildable land, there was a permanent camp of at least ten women.

Hrrmmmmm.

A low moan, calling out a noise that echoed off the stone walls of the cliff-side fortress. Immediately Celandine stood up tall and rushed to the other side of the battlements, looking down into the courtyard. Her tiny hooves balanced her growing body well. Growing so much that in the past month at being in the fortress she had gained a full inches in height and now knew around a quarter of her species' language.

She let out a cheer when she saw her four foot tall (to the shoulder) juvenile tera'k - a bovine musk-oxen like creature from the high mountains, that her mother said was a traditional mount of fauns.

"Erik!" she cried out in joy and launched for the steps.

Very quickly she thundered down them, hooves making a clippity-clop noise. Running into the courtyard she launched her little arms around the tera'k, a small version of his father - Philomel's, Celandine's mothers, own. On his back was a waiting leather saddle, made with straps that could be extended as the creature grew. Usually he was not here, usually he was left to roam the fields to the front of the cliff. It was only when there was a planned trip out that Celandine found him with his saddle.

Looking around she tried to find the person who she brought her animal here. Expecting to see Gosling, her governess, she did not see for the first instance the image of her very father striding over and leading his own huge horse. Megladon.

Celandine's jaw dropped. Vaeron - she was not allowed to call him 'father' - never spent time with her alone. Still hugging Erik she stared.

"Are - are we ... Going out together?"

"While your mother is out fighting vampires you're going to get some real world experience, little princess," he grunted, bringing Megladon up beisde Erik. Erik, despite his bulk, shied. Vaeron gave him, then Celandine, a long, meaningful look. "Just with me. We're going to a mining town called Stonevale. That's all."

There was silence, and a stunned little girl.

"That ... Okay?"

She shrieked and ran for him, arms out. Vaeron cringed and was forced to suffer the joys of a miniature excited faun.

"No screaming or I'm not taking you anywhere."

Celandine bit her lip but still hugged his leg, looking up with enormous, adorable eyes.

He groaned and gestured to Erik. "Get on him. It's a long ride."