DracoStryx Tributes | Badallaioc, Helagnus: Nokt - An Impressive Display

Tribute to Nokt - Prompt: An Impressive Display (dancing)
Laverito = Laverito (rider, witness for Badallaioc)
Teapot = the casua (owned by SheepMomther, witness for Helagnus)
Badallaioc = Badallaioc
Helagnus = Helagnus

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It would be a wet night: the worst sort of night.

A thunderstorm was brewing, dim and wet and occasionally rumbling a warning. Ahead lay a wide expanse of dark water, a lake bordered by smooth sandy shores and surrounded by sloping hills and ancient pine trees. Although the oncoming storm was gearing up to be a fierce one, the full moon still leaked light between gaps in the black clouds, and made the lake's waters glimmer. 

Beside them, Helagnus grumbled, shooting venomous glares at the sky. Upon Helagnus' white-masked head was a collection of wildflowers, which the casua had been steadily building upon despite all Helagnus' efforts to ‘accidentally’ shake the things off. Helagnus' stubbornness crumbled in the face of the casua's unfalteringly hopeful persistence. 

Laverito, carefully combing the short fur on his long ears, held back a grin.

Right on cue, the casua walked up to Helagnus and added a new wildflower to the collection. What could poor befuddled Helagnus do in the face of such earnest generosity but accept the latest gift? Although asking for gratefulness from Helagnus would be too much to hope for. 

Badallaioc, for his part, watched the whole exchange with a squint, expecting the train to wreck at any moment.

Before it could, Laverito squawked, “You are a powerful flier, Helagnus. And graceful on ground, too.”

Helagnus looked at him. Between the flowers and the compliment she seemed about to collapse into a confused little pile of orange feathers.

Badallaioc ruined it by huffing a laugh. "Helagnus, graceful? A bad lie."

Helagnus, predictably, rose to the bait. "More graceful than you! Clumsy rocks-for-legs!"

Badallaioc bristled, hissed, and spat. The casua looked from one to the other, seeming bemused. Laverito, who found it all terribly hilarious, goaded them all with an offhand comment: "Now how would you know? We've tested our speed already, but not grace..."

He probably should have done that after getting in Badallaioc's saddle, because Badallaioc walked off immediately, leaving Laverito jogging behind and failing to catch up. "Fine, then!" Badallaioc told them all. "I'll show you! I'd be more graceful with a missing leg than Helagnus will ever be!"

A profoundly insulted Helagnus stomped right behind Badallaioc and Laverito, and the casua trotted happily after them all. 

When Badallaioc paused where fallen pine needles turned to watermarked sand, Laverito took the opportunity to hop into Badallaioc's saddle. Helagnus also paused, but the casua didn't hesitate to trot all the way down to the lake's edge. 

There by the water, the casua began to move not like a predatory bird, but with all the grace and poise of a wild deer. Leaps and bounds, twirls and spins, the casua moved as if in an unseen whirlwind, kicking up sand and water with each dramatic gesture. It was a dance, yes, but one of pure joy, without need for boasting or bluffing.

“Better dancer than you.” Laverito couldn’t help but goad Badallaioc and Helagnus, just a little. 

Badallaioc scoffed. Helagnus, of course, took offense and promptly said as much. “Addled little trunk-legged, down-winged - that - that ground-pounder? How dare you!”

“With how you trample over every bush and into every tree? Ground-pounder is you,” Badallaioc scoffed, neck-feathers frizzing in obvious offense and disbelief.

Badallaioc did make a fair point. Many things Helagnus was, but stealthy? She treated subtlety the same way others would treat a deadly illness.

Helagnus huffed, squawked unintelligibly, growled, and then marched down to the edge of the water. The casua remained oblivious to the argument. Thankfully! Laverito wouldn’t like to see the friendly creature insulted. Though there wasn’t much he could do about it, direct or indirect, being that he was a snack-sized person traveling with three very large and carnivorous stryx. Irritating them a little was fun. Ordering them to be 'nice' — that was pure folly.

“That fool flier,” Badallaioc muttered, “is too easily goaded.”

“Ah? And you?” Laverito squawked snarkily.

Badallaioc had nothing to say to that. He walked down after the other two stryx, and the hare-demon couldn’t hold back just a few ear-flopping chuckles. Though, he muffled them behind a hand - blatantly laughing at Badallaioc had gotten Laverito nothing but trouble in the past. Non-lethal trouble thus far, to be sure, but...

The other casua paused, then twirled once and trotted circles around all the others with obvious glee. Always eager for a game, this casua!

Then, they began to dance.

Having other stryx sharing the stage made no difference to the casua, who moved with grace and precision. Here was an excellent showing of a practiced runner’s sure-footedness. Moonlight only did the casua's soft coloring favors. Now and again, the pale underbelly caught the light and gleamed almost like pearl. Sweeps of small wings punctuated grandiose motions. Brown feathertips traced random patterns through the night air. 

Helagnus, in what might be sheer stubborn opposition, moved with bold, clipped movements. Helagnus danced with tight twists and turns, and harsh sweeps of broad black-tipped wings. Frequently, Helagnus leapt into the sky, twirling her wings to send her body sharply upwards, before spiraling downwards. Each landing was a bone-shaking thump, followed by rhythmic beats of feet bleeding off momentum. If the casua was a wild deer leaping and bounding, Helagnus was a deer standing still, moving in bursts, alert and wary. Laverito kept that thought to himself; calling Helagnus a deer was just a different way to say 'please eat me'.

Badallaioc chose a more restrained routine (and Laverito thanked his lucky stars for it, being in Badallaioc’s saddle), not something with leaps or sweeps, but instead a careful, methodical, drumming prance, one-two one-two around the curve of the lake's waters. Then Badallaioc spun on one foot and drummed back the way he’d come. The sand was smooth at the water's edge, and Laverito enjoyed a rare showing of just how fluidly Badallioc could move if he truly put effort into it. Despite the force that made each step into an audible thump, the ride was a smooth one. Where the casua traced patterns in the air, Badallaioc printed them out in the sand. 

Helagnus might yowl and crow, and Badallaioc might mutter and grumble, but if Laverito was honest, all three stryx were magnificent creatures. All were lean and strong and well-preened, and in addition to generally being in great shape, each of the three stryx was gifted in their own ways.

The casua never once spoke, yet was nonetheless inclined to a certain emotive quality which shone under the full moon with every swish of that brown-feathered tail, and every high-stepping leap through the air. Every movement nearly sang with energy and liveliness and emotion. The casua didn't need to utter a sound. Not every stryx could do that. Most, in Laverito's experience, were like Badallaioc - bird-like and vague and subtle, delivering vindictive punishment if those vague and subtle signals were missed.

Helagnus, terrible personality notwithstanding, was unquestionably strong. There was ferocious power in the lashing of her black-tipped tail, and in the flaring of her broad wings. With nothing more than her movements, Helagnus transformed the gentle moonbeams into brilliant flashes and sparks, like stars bouncing off her feathers. Helagnus may not be subtle, but she was every bit as fierce a predator as any stryx should be.

And Badallaioc moved so fluidly under Laverito that once or twice Laverito thought Badallaioc had stopped entirely, only to look down and see the sandy shore still flowing by beneath them. Badallaioc's dance had gentled somewhat; he now pranced nearly soundlessly. Here was some truly admirable precision, to move such a massive body with such poise and stealth. If only Badallaioc could be bothered to move like this more often!

Unfortunately, even such impressive displays could not stop the bickering.

“Frou-frou,” Helagnus muttered between swoops. “Runners, all - all flippant. Wispy little cloud-things, stuck on the ground.”

Badallaioc retorted easily. “And you’ve got not an ounce of restraint in you. Not a scrap in your smallest bone! I’m shocked you haven’t starved yet, trying to call that sneaking.”

“I don’t sneak,” Helagnus snarled. “I dive. Out of the sky. Like a proper stryx.”

“Oh, that’s right, forgive me. And I suppose real stryx scream bloody murder while they’re diving oh-so-properly? That’s your sort of thing for sure.”

Badallaioc’s movements shifted from perfectly restrained poise into something more like a frenetic smith’s hammer on a sandy anvil, and Laverito, who’d had a lot of practice with this particular fun and engaging activity, focused on not falling off. Helagnus arched her wings in a dramatic display, head reared back, tail fanned to the utmost. The two argued as they danced, and gradually it happened that there was less to the dancing and more to the arguing.

Accustomed to the bickering by now, the casua continued to dance with grace, clearly in good spirits. Badallaioc and Helagnus, in contrast, were now having an aggressive dance-off. If it got any more physical than this, Laverito was going to have to abandon stryx, and would probably land in the cold lake water, knowing his luck.