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[Lorcan Gregory]

51 st Fall 516 av
Sunrise
Endrykas

Was he Drykas? Was he a killer? Was he a Warrior? Or was he something else entirely?

A season spent wondering had exhausted Lörcán to the point of insanity. Fighting side by side in the relentless, battering Zith attack, with the ferocious nomad clans had drawn Lörcán’s yearning heart towards the inspiring strength of the Endrykas kin.

It had also ripped asunder any snippets Lörcán had gathered about himself. Thrown into the frays of battle, Lörcán had discovered that when consumed with the ire to defend his life; a chilling wave of equanimity would wash over him – all of his uncertainties, his fears disintegrated the moment he wrapped his knuckles around the hilt of his blade. An intangible, arousing spiritual connection to the sharp edge of his Gladius arose the tick his skin brushed the cool, smooth metal.

It confounded him. It terrified him.

Rufio’s fortune reading earlier in the Fall still haunted Lörcán’s dreams. Her words spun around in his noggin over and over until he was sure he could feel her whispered breaths tingling upon his neck when she was nowhere in sight. His past held nothing but death and despair; did he really want to know who he was? What he could have done?

Syna’s radiating warmth suddenly blinded Lörcán as it filtered in through the gap of his tent flap; tearing his discombobulated mind from his inner turmoil. Shielding his eyes with his forearm, Lörcán groaned; tears gathering in the corners of his chocolate gaze as he attempted to conjure the will to rise to another day. He had spent the season of change stumbling like a child through a thick haze; the bleak fog of doubt clouding the way forward.

He felt truly lost in the world.

Nevertheless, he would not yield his life to the woes of depression. If there was one thing that kept him going; it was self-perseveration, the galvanising and continuing elasticity of Drykas ardour and a foreign need to help bolster their resilience.

He had come to accept that hidden beneath even the most charitable of his actions; there was always an underlying self-serving cause. Yet, his soul craved more; his soul desired a place within a community and he felt a deep rooted duty to uphold that community however he could. Was Endrykas now that community? It had been his home the last few weeks. The people had healed him, taken him in, offered their hands in friendship.

He had to make a choice.

Still, today he was not prepared to make such a pinnacle decision. To close the door on his memories would be to seal it shut forever. Perhaps, it’s a verdict better left for the thoughts of tomorrow; something still yet tethered him to the life that was. A gut feeling radiating from within. Was it family? The distant retention of his feelings for a loved one? He hardly knew.

Snapping his eyes open with a glaze of ferocious, lambent flames dancing within his hazel pigment, Lörcán clenched his jaw with renewed resolve. Laying in his bedroll as a pitiful, lost child was not a choice he considered an option. No. Leaping to his feet, throwing his blanket to the side with more force than was necessary, Lörcán grabbed his clothes and swiftly shed his darkened disposition.

Turning his chaotic spirit to the anon, Lörcán grinned with maddened spunk. Although he had made the decision to place one foot forward and still keep one firmly in place; he had to be prepared that his memories would never resurface and that meant forging a new life from the broken pieces remaining of himself.

To have a future he must secure the trust and respect of Endrykas and that meant doing something for the good of the community.

[Lorcan Gregory]

After a hastily, strewn together breakfast, Lörcán grabbed his pack and ducked into the morning rays of Syna; her beauty, lucent and unclouded was encircled by a crisp, cobalt sea. Sucking in a stimulating breath, Lörcán took a moment to revel in the refreshing, rare break from the usual, muggy heat or consistent drizzle. A heavy snort in acknowledgment of his rider's presence from Ahiro tugged the corners of Lörcán’s cracked lips into a small smile.

“Morn’n to you too, bud.” Dropping his pack to the mucky ground by his tent, Lörcán rummaged around for his grooming kit and brushes. “We’ve got a long day ahead of us, so best to keep you spick and span.” Digging out the curry comb from his kit, Lörcán carefully, deliberately edged his way to the Stallion.

Ahiro was really the only one in Endrykas that kept him partially sane. He knew the Zavian could never understand him, but Lörcán had fallen into a heartening routine with his partner. There was something familiar and wholesome about caring for the needs of another –an additional concept of himself that was contradictory to the rest he had discovered of who he thought he was.

Every morning he would tell Ahiro of the feelings and glimpses he remembered from his dreams – his ephialtes - the night before. Repeating vague scenes over and over in timing with the circular motions of the rough bristles against Ahiro's midnight coat – just as he practiced now – in the hopes that the memory would surface. Only for his expectations to be dashed with nothing but a blank void.

With a bit of force pushed into the comb; Lörcán begun flicking away the ground in dirt from Ahiro's neck - one hand firmly grasping a hold of the Stallion's yvas. His tumbling voice soothing the beast, he made his way across the Zavian's broad back and flanks; grimacing every now and then as flecks of smut spat into his face. Animal care was certainly not a glamorous vocation.

As he worked his way, nonchalantly across the Zavian's powerful form, his thoughts catapulted back to the day he had attended the Prayer Vigil before the sacred Wind Knotted Gates; though his stomach roiled with the memory of what had transpired after!

The Elder’s feared the coming winter. It hadn’t taken Lörcán long to see that Endrykas as a community pulled together as one in times of hardship. Food would be a scarce commodity come the tides of the chillier season. The tent city must stockpile all they can gather in preparation for famine and starvation.

Nodding to himself Lörcán committed himself to what he must do. To support the tribe who had buttressed him in his Bell of need; he would assist them in their survival over the long winter season. He would forage all the food he could carry.

Lörcán's face suddenly fell sour as a dour thought struck him. He was completely unacquainted with the edible sources of the Sea of Grass. He would need to seek assistance in his quest for acceptance into the Endrykas kin.