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Winds tore through fur, his gravity pulled upward into the cold depths of his chest. Unrelenting and whirling.

The sensation of falling.

The man's vision remained blocked by a fury of white and the cold sheer of snow, a comet of winter born from the clouds. If only his mind hadn't been filled with fog...perhaps there would have been room for the haunt of death to linger within the forefront.

But time never cared for thought. Impact came inevitably.

Paws struck the earth, echoed by a crack throughout the ancient ice and a piercing shock that reverberated in his bones. The frost around Voss dissipated, softly falling to aching feet like cold ash. The surface of a glacial plateau was revealed. its chill...familiar. Its shape, not. The titan remained silent, his breath steady and head held low, as though he were waiting for another event to unfold...perhaps to find it all a vision. To be awoken by one of his subordinates in his boreal home. But nothing came. Only silence filled the space where the sound of voices once lied. The crash of waves rang rhythmically from far below, mirroring the fiery pulse in his limbs.

At last, pale eyes rose from the snow, ebony brows furrowed in a quiet confusion. This vast emptiness...

This was no realm of his.

Nor was it Regnum Caeleste. (the heavenly kingdom)

She hadn't meant to leave. Truly she hadn't. Though if posed with the question, if offered the choice, would she have chosen to stay? If only those fingertips could have caressed the edges of the cards to which fate had played upon her, forever a hand of schemes just out of reach from those soft curious pools of liquid honey.

Yet destiny had a way of weaving paths through the tapestry of life that often felt both enchanting and cruel. With each step she took away from the familiar shadows of her past, she couldn't shake the bittersweet taste of longing that clung to her like a half-remembered lullaby. Something warm and reminiscent of a time when her heartbeat hastened from within her chest and her head swam with a dizzying bliss. Was she supposed to remember something... or someone?

The question slipped away like smoke, swept off by the chilled breeze. There was an undeniable lure to the untrodden paths that stretched before her, to the possibilities that beckoned and whispered, reeling her deeper and deeper into the marrow of the icy fortress that expanded out from around her like mountain teeth. There was a certain thrill to the unknown, to forging a new self amidst the vibrant chaos, yet with each breath of the cool dawn air, she felt the ache of nostalgia settle deeply into unforgiving bones.

Would she find what she was searching for in the desolate peaks, or in the solemn winds that spilled eerie echoes into the morning light? The cards had been dealt, and while she couldn’t rewind the clock, she could play the hand she had, make choices echoing with intentions yet to be revealed. And so she moved forward, each step a declaration, a simultaneous embrace of possibility and an acknowledgment of a loss she couldn't quite grasp.

Henley's gaze lifted to the sky where the sun was swaddled mercilessly beneath a sea of clouds, its light almost blinding in the towers of ice that surrounded. Something stirred within her then, a crack that hummed lowly in the ground below. A presence? She squinted, peering through the glare of alabaster, her instincts sharpening and pulling her out from her reverie. Was it the breeze that twisted across the icy plateau, or was it someone else who had found themselves lost upon the barren scape as well?

"Hello?" Her voice rang out softly, barely breaking the stillness before she inhaled sharply, a sudden coolness brushing over her skin, tinged with quiet urgency. The gale whipping around her seemed to inhale with her in a collective breath, the silence thick and aching. Heart racing, she strained to listen, her intuition whispering a plead that her legs would run though she remained like a statue of marble.

Speech | Français ( French)

A voice skated over the glacier, gentle like the descent of an autumn leaf. Perhaps it could have passed as a part of the waves' song. But, subtly, his posture tightened. Something shifted within. He knew. He knew that he wasn't alone within this strange region...this kingdom of the unknown. The past lingered within the haze of his memory, unreachable. Any attempt to piece events together unravelled in his hands. But Voss knew that he must push forward. His disorientation vanished with the wind, pushed back into his depths to make room for resolve... and a touch of irritation.

The man raised his head, lured by the sound. He had never been one to drift from interaction when it would serve him more. Perhaps he could speak his memory into existence. And so he would start forth, the tinge of pain plaguing his muscles.

Rays of sun filtered through the clouds, veiling an ebony silhouette. They lied amidst the glare, still, as though they too stood ancient among the frozen world. A tall figure, svelte and draped in the scent of flora. Unfamiliar. But less unknown than the world he stood in.

The man halted. A quiet tension fell into the space between them, breathless and still. His chin tilted. Eyes of gold and aqua settled upon the woman, his look...reserved. As though his mind were occupied by something beyond. He took a heartbeat to study her form...perhaps searching for the outline of her face in his memory.

And then he spoke. "...Domina corvina," ( Raven lady)Voss murmured, his voice low and steady. A coat of pearl swayed in the wind. "How far am I from the taigas?"

Within this expanse... he knew the answer. But Voss also knew that he needed to return to the forests. There was business that must be done...debts that needed to be repayed.

He moved with purpose. What was once no more than a pale figure, nearly indistinguishable from the icy landscape, had suddenly and effectively closed the distance between the two. Increasingly his form appeared to grow as he traversed the horizon, until at last an enormous man had come into focus. Tall and broad shouldered, a pale figure against the blinding white expanse of surrounding ice was upon her.

Silence settled in between them, filling the cracks that ruptured in the space where her words had once laid. Henley blinked under the weight of his gaze, immediately feeling smaller beneath the intensity of those aqua-gold depths. The male remained wordless, his handsome features taut and stoic, until finally, a single phrase was spoken.

There was a familiarity about the stranger, the deep cadence of his voice, the way the syllables rolled off his tongue with a reverence and confidence, a power that seemed to hum low and steady against the frigid wind. It was a feeling she couldn't put a name to, the warmth it ignited inside of her, the way her pulse quickened and her breath grew short. And as his eyes locked onto hers, her heart leapt, her body seeming to recognize the pull even as her mind grappled to catch up.

Yet something about him felt different, an energy pulsing deep within his being. The air around him crackled with an electricity that set her hair on end. Was it fear? Excitement? Something primal and tense, perhaps a mix of both. For a moment, she could only stare, her senses humming, before the words he spoke reached her. Taigas? Domina? Henley's brow furrowed, a crease forming between her eyes.

For a moment she simply stared, taking him in as if attempting to reconcile his presence with her memories, an impossibility. As easily as the breeze would shift, the familiarity was gone again. A hollow place echoing with the pain of a memory that had once lingered there and could be found no more. One that had been washed away, disappearing again into the recesses of her mind as no more than dust particles vanishing into an empty corridor.

Henley shook her head, her lips forming a hard line briefly before she spoke. "I don't know where we are." The admittance was soft, delicate, as if she had been breaking the news to herself as well. "I'm not.. from here. I don't remember-" Anything. She looked at the ground helplessly, as if begging it to offer up some explanation, some reason she could provide this man wherein she hadn't sounded so much like a liability. Or worse, a target.

She exhaled a soft sigh, her chest tightening, as her eyes drifted towards the horizon before settling back on the man. A pang of longing had settled deep within her stomach, but for what, she couldn't hope to know. "I think..." She paused, her brows knitting. "Perhaps we've both been led astray somehow?"

Speech | Français ( French)

Voss

His eyes never dared to avert from hers, unwavering, catching even the quietest of movements with a stoic calm. He saw the faint furrow of her brows, the shallowness to her breath-- yet, still, no words parted from his lips. He merely observed as her honeyed gaze fell to the ice floor, searching, as if an answer lied hidden within its twisting veins.

She doesn't remember. Her admittance, soft and genuine.

And if he had not witnessed his own descent from the heavens-- unscathed, his windswept fur his only testament-- perhaps he would have labeled the woman a fool. But his birth into this strange land remained a mystery as well. They both were united in a dance of madness, placed in a world that seemingly reserved no place for them. Until memory served him, the two stood on equal footing.

The man allowed the word 'astray' to drift within his mind for a touch longer, like smoke in the atmosphere. A silent exhale left his lungs. He had yet to make sense of it all. The heat of the sun lapped at his spine, and Voss remained retreated in his silence, his gaze veiling his unspoken thoughts. And for a moment, his irises drifted to the world beyond. The wintery titan loomed, his presence as cold as the glacier, indifferent. Not quite welcoming...but neither dismissive. And, for him, that was enough.

"Only the gods know," Voss murmured, his tone blunt, each word coated in frost as his breath curled into the air. The man took a few steps forth, halting by the ebony woman's side and dipping his head to her shoulder. Proximity did not shake his composure. He took in her scent, sifting through the shelves of memory, trying to trace her notes back to some familiar region.

Perhaps in vain.

"...But to be led astray, you'd first need to have a place of belonging."

Yes. He knew where he was supposed to be. Where he belonged. And as one who operated under the code of the divine, a haunting thought loomed overhead: perhaps this was punishment. Voss drew back, gesturing his head towards the horizon's blue edge.

"How long have you been here? Where do you hail from?"