Clouds and Currents - VoK & HW 2021 Event Prompts

   Nahia had found another break in her part of the battle, and was once again waiting to fire off more rockets when she saw four figures approaching from the east. A black bird flying high in the sky, a brightly colored tomcat trotting along beneath it, and...
   Her eyes lit up.
   A blue lioness, who'd sprouted wings and fins since Nahia had last seen her, dragging along a cat dressed in mage's clothes by the scruff of her neck.
   She abandoned her post ran to meet them as they approached. Before the group was even in earshot, she was already yelling. "You're back! You did it! I knew you could do it, I told you you had this!" She stopped just short of crashing into Tamaya, panting and grinning. "Hah, man, you look... real different." She looked up at the bird circling overhead, then down at the cat next to her. "...Edgar, is that you? You're, like, way more orange now."
   Tamaya chuckled and pressed a paw into Lorena's back, restraining her, as she released her grip on the cat and set her down to speak. "Life's weird like that, right?" she said. Then she gestured to the sorceress. "Could you take her? I need to tell everyone to stop their fighting."
   Nahia hesitated for just a second, then nodded. "You got this, Tama." She grabbed the cat this time, and to her surprise, Lorena made no move to fight back or escape.
   "Thanks," Tamaya said. "Bring her to the shore." And she took off ahead of the others, Nahia following after, and Edgar staying behind, clearly not interested in stepping foot into the sea any time soon, for... understandable reasons, if Tamaya had guessed right about his sudden shift in hue.
   Whatever the case, it wasn't important now. As she approached the ocean, the fighting seemed to slow when she dashed into the waves, splashes at her paws, and then cease entirely took off into the air towards the titan. Huh. Seemed she didn't need to tell them to stop. Somehow, in spite of having changed so much so quickly, they could tell it was her. And if she was back, then that meant their jobs, with any luck, were over.
   The titan, too, paused in its attacks as it watched this being fly up to it, and the others backed off. It watched in confusion as Tamaya stopped before it, still flapping her wings, hovering in place, and called out to it.
   "Titan!" she said, then paused. "No... Epinoim. Epinoim!" she called again. "Cease your attack and come to shore! The one who's caused this has been apprehended!" She flew closer. "Please, come and see for yourself, and know that what happened before and has continued until now will not be allowed to occur again."
   The rock being watched her with distrust as she flew down to where Mintovo was perched on an ice floe. "Release him," she told the god.
   Mintovo raised an eyebrow. This hero... her changes were more than superficial appearances. He would have to discuss this with Bora before they left. But he nodded either way. "As you wish." And the ice around the titan's legs became water and fell into the sea once more. It looked down at its legs and took a lumbering step, as if testing to be sure that it wouldn't be frozen again.
   "Thank you," she said, nodding. The hero flew up to the titan again. "This way." She turned and began to fly back to the shore, turning to watch as Epinoim slowly followed her.
   The citizens of the sea poked their heads up to watch as Tamaya led the titan back towards the land, and those of the sky peered down from the air. In the distance, Bora looked up from his work on the scribe's island to watch the scene unfold, and, satisfied, he resumed his transcriptions.
   Nahia watched as the titan stepped toward her, and in spite of everything she felt some level of apprehension at the giant stone monster's approach. But when Tamaya landed next to her, she was overcome by a strange feeling of calmness and security. Right. Tamaya could do this. They could both do this.
   With some effort (oh, what she would give for the same opposable thumbs her foe was so lucky to possess), Tamaya grabbed Lorena in her claws and took to the air as the titan stopped before them, waves breaking around its rocky feet. The cat could only squeak out, "Please don't drop me," in response, to which Tamaya rolled her eyes and snapped that whether she died here or not wasn't either of their choices to make.
   "Epinoim," Tamaya spoke, holding Lorena before the giant, "this witch has been siphoning your magic and your life from you for far longer than most of us here, and certainly longer than the people of these kingdoms-" She nodded to the sky, sea, and shore. "-have been alive. But she will do this no longer. Her wand has been burned to ash by a spell she cast with your own strength, and, knowing the truth behind this now, you have my word that I, and all the people of these worlds, will not allow such actions to reoccur." She held her gaze steady with the titan's. "Should you see fit to end her yourself, I will gladly let you. Her actions have taken much of my life from me as well." She broke eye contact with the titan for just a moment to glare at the feline in her paws, then returned her gaze to the stone being. "Should you not, however, we give you our word that she will be held accountable for her actions in our own way. We ask only that you not take your anger, however justified, out on the innocent people of these kingdoms, who were unaware until now of the actions taken against you by their ancestors, and by her." Her gaze softened. "You are right to be angry," she said, softer now. "I am too. But please, don't hurt the rest of them. Lorena, I don't care what you do with. But the rest? They didn't know any better, and the ones who fought you here today did so only to slow your approach enough that the true culprit could be captured."
   The titan watched her for a minute, as if expecting a trap or a trick. But when she made no move to do so, simply looking back at it, it turned away, as if uninterested, or perhaps just... accepting. And, slowly but surely, it began to walk away, and aside from the shaking of the earth from its mighty steps, less magic than it was simple force, its influence on the realms began to fade.

   The next few days were perhaps the most peaceful Tamaya had ever been able to experience in her life, or at least the most peaceful she could remember. Once Lorena was handed over to Detective Latimer (with the threat that, should Tamaya ever catch wind of her practicing magic again, she would ensure her death was just as slow as a natural one, but far more painful), Tamaya... well, she didn't really do anything. The kingdom of the sea set to repairing the damage from the whirlpools and the impact of Epinoim's great footfalls nearby - He'd strayed closer to the kingdom than they'd have liked, though luckily never set foot within the gates - while those of the sky, largely safe from the titan's magic up above, worked to assist those they could on the land. Nahia set to catching up with Edgar, and managed to make another friend at some point; another blue lioness, this one with a horn like a seashell, sweet but clumsy and a bit forgetful, and a bit set on following around their group like a lost cub. Mintovo helped to tend the injuries of those who'd faced the titan, icing wounds with his magic... and fraternizing with the mortals at every opportunity. Bora remained on the scribe's island, doing what he could to preserve the records that remained, and adding his own accounts to the stones and pillars that dotted the black sand.
   But Tamaya? For those first few days after her showdown with the sorceress, and her confrontation with the titan?
   She just slept. Peacefully, for once. Perhaps for the first time since she was a cub.