by adheline » Mon Oct 12, 2015 8:05 am
Username: Striped~Hatter
Name: Antimony
Age: 13 years
Height: 18.3 hh (Max height!)
Gender: Stallion
Rarity: Common
Folklore:
It was a dark night, the stars veiled by clouds and the moon full but hidden behind the tallest trees. It was the nights like these that drove herds to cowering in tight circles, knowing what materialized on the earth when the round moon was low. They knew because even the stars cowered from sight, and the elder Galingales shivered in remembrance of past memories. Oh, of course it wasn't them to encounter the Shan, no. It was those the knew. Nobody encountered the Shan - commonly known as the Moon's Shadow - and retained the ability tell about it. For the Shan fed on innocence, and without that, no creature can look upon another without the most morbid of thoughts, forget the storytelling.
All that was known was that it wasn't heard, or seen, or felt, but when it was near the ground grew cold and the air warm. One Galingale claimed to have seem a flash of blood red and an undeniable frost overtook her insides, but no one can be sure to trust her. After all, it was the next morning her closest friend came stumbling back to the herd with impossibly empty eyes, such events can blur one's memory from wild imagination.
Chance have it, this exact mare's great grandcolt was currently up and restless that night, when he suddenly realized how cold it felt to be lying on the ground. Hoping to be lulled to sleep with warmth, he stood and was curious when his left ribs were chillier than the right. He stepped to the right and felt the heat spread, thinking not even once as he continued to follow the comfortable feeling as it blossomed from his side, slowly taking over his entire small body. He only noticed his solitude when the warmth was consuming, all over save the hooves. He looked down to discover the distinctly freezing ground and his mother nowhere in sight.
Before the thought to run away fully processed, the disturbingly comfortable heat was replaced with a cold so unknown to him, so unearthly. A quick vision of blood and the moon and its shadow surrounded him, and despite the briskness of it all it was consuming and all over and he saw nothing but what he was too petrified to identify as the Shan. He quivered, and though he couldn't actually see the Shan itself, he knew it towered over him, knew it had long pointed teeth and sharp horns that curled around the ears just so in a way that was slightly longer than usual.
Then it was all gone, and all he could sense were the eyes in front of him: dark, empty, and shineless even in the dim moonlight.
His dam found him the next morning, after the moon had been replaced with the bright clementine sun. He didn't say anything, didn't even try to look at anyone save his mother, who looked into his blank eyes for only a second before backing off with disbelief and grief. And then the foal, at the mare's fear of him, went from a shell of shadows to a writhing mess of sorrow and pain. He was overcome with the nightmares that he feared most, and when he disappeared in blind darkness, he wasn't to be seen again.
Fact or Fiction:
I would love to say straigh-up fiction, but it isn't entirely. Of course, all the supernatural aspects such as the feeding on innocence is nothing factual, and he isn't old enough to have survived to terrorize generations upon generations of Gallingale Striders. So, it's not fact either.
The folklore started centered around a very distant ancestor of Antimony, whose name was indeed Shan. He'd found a sick glee in terrifying the young foals by describing a dark figure and then cornering then later in the night until they screamed and fled. Every now and then down the line, Shan's descendants would use his story and tactics to do the same, more so for the ability to snicker at their gullibility than to find pleasure in the screams.
Antimony heard of the folklore from a young age, told by his dam about Shan's tactics, and eventually started using it to his advantage. He cleverly warped the story to include the chills and warmth, the red, white, and dark. He then chooses those nights to linger in places until his warmth is present and leads young foals away from the herd, when their judgment is clouded by youth. He scares them more for the spirit of the story's thrill, not so much for personal pleasure or entertainment. Antimony wants to keep the story alive, and what better way to do so than act it out?
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To-Do
icons commish
rt imports, rpg edits
quite overwhelmed with life atm,
please have patience