The Festival (Faith Please)

[Niv]

37th of Zi'da, Arc 716

A barrage of cheerful music filled the air, as the Festival everyone had been waiting for finally arrived. Niv was in the thick of it, dancing about in a long dress made from an eclectic assortment of brightly coloured leaves. The beaded necklaces she wore jingled about as Niv felt the beat from the nearby drums in her shoulders. Her hips shook and she twirled about, all while donning a bright smile.

Like all the dancers at the festival, Niv was paired with another. Her partner was a tall Tunawa male who wore a carved and painted lion mask, with feathered plumage for his mane. His oversized shirt covered in sea shell shards clattered about as he tried his best to keep up with Niv’s lively dance moves.

The location and the dancers were all a mix of Tunawa and human. It was a market place arranged in a fashion one might find in Rynmere, with stalls carrying all manner of products with eager shop keepers competing for attention. where It differed, was in the colourful fungi and twisting vines that had a contrasting scale only a Tunawa would find normal. The wild life shared this disproportion, a stray dog that weaved through the dancing crowds could easily be scooped up and carried off by the tropical budgie perched atop the stall that sold fragrant bars of soap.

“Change Partners! Squuuak!” The budgie announced loudly as it waved its wings about to get everyones attention.
Niv’s partner spun to the left and she spun to the right. Niv's glassy eyes grew wide in shock when she recognized the face of her new partner. Her face quickly went back to a smile once the initial shock subsided.
“It’s been a long time Faith.”



Art credit to Kidchan

[Faith Augustin]

Faith had never seen anything like this before, it was amazing to her. People were dancing and she really didn't know how to do that. She'd only ever danced once before and that was in a very formal ball with Tristan Venora. This was completely different and the sounds and sights were astonishing to the young woman. She was standing, her hair loose and with flowers entwined within it and wearing a pretty white dress, embellished with tiny flowers and accents of lace. The dress was sleeveless and tight fitting in the bodice ~ which showed two things. Firstly, Faith had no brands in this dream, her skin was pale and smooth, as though she had never been branded at all. Second, her figure was more proportionate ~ she had graduate from scrawny to slender, somewhere along the line.

She was doing her best to keep up with the dancing, but then the parrot had told her that there was going to be a cake later and had she made it? No, she said, she hadn't and the parrot made a screech of displeasure and flew off. How very strange, she thought, but she was too busy trying to dance. She was dancing with a man, but she didn't know who he was. He wore a strange mask which, every time she asked him to take it off he removed to reveal another. It was, frankly, odd. He was friendly enough and he told her that it wasn't his fault, it was the way that he was made. She didn't quite believe him until he removed his hand and gave it to her to show her that it was, in fact, how he was made.

"I have a friend who could use this. Can I keep it?" she wondered. He shook his head, removed his mask and handed it to her.
"No. But he can borrow that. He's probably got a hundred. Why aren't you dancing with your boyfriend?" he wondered.
Faith looked around and sighed, "he isn't here. I think he's building a mouse. He sees ghosts, you know."
The masked man nodded and spun away from her. There, though, in his place was a familiar face. How was it that they were the same size, Faith wondered. Was she small or Niv big? How strange.

"Niv! How are you? It has been a long time. Is this your dance? I don't know how to do the steps. I've never learnt to dance and everyone knows how to do it, even the frogs and they should be frozen," she gestured to two frogs in top hats, dancing together. They were completely out of time with everyone else and totally doing their own thing, but that was fine because, at the end of the trial, they were having fun.

[Niv]

► Show Spoiler

“I’m about as happy as a bird who just caught a big juicy worm!” Niv proclaimed joyfully with a exuberant stretch of her arms. “I hope you can say the same friend.” the memories of their last encounter were hazy at best, which was expected considering it was a dream. Niv remembered there was something unpleasant going on in faiths life but until the memories were made fresh. that’s all Niv would know. Faith could have just as easily revealed that she was secretly an ostrich as far as Niv was concerned.

“Oh this isn’t my dance, it’s the dance of the festival.” Niv proclaimed as she preformed a nimble twirl.
“You just need to let the music do the dancing for you…”
Niv demonstrated by first stepping side to side with her feet in time with drums steady beat. Then her hips began swivelling along with the same beat but in a different way.
“That’s the drums doing,”
Niv began rocking her shoulders back and forth along with the flute of the snake charmer. Her arms suddenly got a life of their own and moved about in strange and seemingly chaotic ways. Though after a few moves it would become clearer that Niv was telling the music’s story using the language of hand gestures.
“That is the Flute,”
Niv began running on the spot as she slowly rotated, with her whole upper body moving about with vigour. Then seamlessly transitioned to jumping, twirling and even dropping into the splits with ease. The Tunawa did so to the tune of a foreign instrument Faith was unlikely to see. An elderly Sev’ryn was playing it as he sung an upbeat tune in Xanthean. The instrument looked like someone was trying to make a guitar by shoving a massive slab of wood into a drum. It made a strange but present sound that added to the festivals exotic flair.
“-and That’s the ibudo itaja.”

“Make sense? Now just keep your body loose and move with the music.” Niv motioned her hands for Faith to follow suit as she started to dance around the former slave.



Art credit to Kidchan

[Faith Augustin]

Faith looked at Niv and the movements she was making and the former slave shook her head. "No, I can't do that. It is beautiful music, though. I am afraid that my body doesn't move in that kind of way." Maybe it was a small person thing, Faith thought, but then she realised that she and Niv were the same height. How odd. She wasn't smaller, because everything else was the right height too. Yet, maybe that was... no, she couldn't work it out. But then, a smile lit her features,"I had a dream about you! Do you know, in that dream you were ever so small. How silly!"

Watching Niv dance, Faith stood and repeated the head shake. "I'm just not capable of that, I'm afraid. Not at all. You're moving in ways that... oh, did that hurt?" Concern creased her brow as she asked that question, it certainly looked like it should have hurt, she thought. There was no doubting it, Niv was very bendy. "I think I'll just, look, there's my stall!" Faith started to move towards the cookery stall which she was suddenly standing behind, having somewhere donned an apron and a very (very very) tall chef's hat. She brandished the spatula after she had put the small pastry down on to the serviette and handed it to Niv. "Eat it while it's warm or it melts."

This might seem like a ridiculous thing to say but the pastry was ice cream encased in a hot meringue and it was, in fact, delicious. Faith smiled and called out "Eggs, bread and an apple! Come get them!"

She smiled a beautiful smile to Niv, her face showing genuine delight. "It's his favourite breakfast I think. Would you like some?" She'd have to get in the queue quickly because Faith saw that there were maybe seven or even eight hundred people lined up, in a very orderly fashion.

"Oh, dear. Niv.... where did they all come from?" Faith looked a little concerned at the one basket of eggs. Oh well, she decided, and got started.

[Niv]

“It can move anyway you wish it to.. but if you don’t feel comfortable…” Niv trailed off a bit and tried to hide her disappointment that her friend didn’t wish to dance. The tunawa assumed Faith was just shy, and there was no room in dance for shyness. Niv wouldn’t push the subject any farther since she knew a person had to overcome these things on their own.

“Now that I think about it..” Niv’s eyes narrowed and her brows became strained as she struggled to recall a foggy memory. “I think I dreamed that everyone was bigger than me, including you" She scratched her chin and smiled in contemplation. "Dreams really are strange.”
One of the curly green vines that grew from Niv’s head sprang to live in the form of a snake. It looked at Faith with bright yellow eyes and whipped its tongue out to taste the air. A slight breeze brushed by and the snake hitched a ride, letting the current take it out into the festival.

“Whats this?” Niv dropped down into another split. “Oh I barely feel it.” She stopped to look down at the position of her legs, looking up at the one leg stretched perfectly in front of her and then looked back to see the same image. “hrrm yah this should probably hurt, but it feels natural right now” Niv shrugged her shoulders “Must be the festivals doing.”
Niv danced quite a bit but still wasn’t that flexible in real life. whenever she got close to completing a true split the bark in her inner thighs would start to scream at her. It was something she was working on.

“Your stall?” Niv tilted her head and raised an eye brow in confusion as she followed Faith to the flagrant smelling shack. Fatih was suddenly wearing a large poofy hat and handing out odd looking food. One of the women’s creations was given to Niv, who looked at the foreign object with curiousity . Niv carefully looked at it from every angle and hesitantly smelled the confectionary. The aroma entered Niv’s nostrils and filled them with a warm and comforting but also completely alien scent. She quickly threw it in her mouth and sunk her teeth into it. To Niv it felt like she had just tasted sweetest and juiciest grub and it nearly brought tears of sap running down her eyes.
“What is it?” Niv whispered with the type of awe a child does when they encounter something wonderful but foreign. “Why is it warm but also cold?... is it magic?”

“Oh dear, you have quite a lot of people waiting for your food,” Niv looked back as the line up seemed to almost double in a matter of moments. “Can I help you in any way?”
Even in her dreams Niv didn’t know the first thing about cooking since her diet consisted of bugs and poisonous mushrooms. Though Niv was still certain she could figure it out if she had to.


Art credit to Kidchan

[Faith Augustin]

"Well that isn't true, you know. You can't lick your own elbow, no matter how hard you try." Faith was quite clear on that. "Also, you can't waggle your own ear. When I was a slave, sometimes my owners would instruct me to stand on the toes of one foot for breaks at a time. I never could. So there are lots of things that my body can't do, no matter how much I tell it to." Faith was quite sure that this was the case and the the flexible little Tunawa was wrong about what her body could do.

"I went to a ball, once, everyone was dancing. But my feet hurt. I'd like to be able to be as bendy as you, but I don't think that's in my nature, though. I wasn't raised that way. I imagine it's all about how you're raised, really. Bendy parents and all that."

Niv liked the pastry that she'd put in her hands and Faith shook her head. "It's not magic, no. It's what I do. I make food. I'm a chef. It's called a baked Viden. Frozen cream dessert wrapped in a meringue and then cooked, really quickly. It's good, isn't it?" She looked rather nervously at the people, but Niv was there to help and Faith nodded her head. "Every person that comes, give them an apple, a hammer and a piece of wood. Tell them to go over there and make a coffin." Faith was starting to get confused, in her dream and sleeping state. "But cook the eggs for me, Niv. Put them in the boiling water. Where's the boiling water?" Looking at the line, she turned back to Niv and realised that the small Tunawa had turned into an egg, but still had Niv's face. As the spatula flew up and hit her in the face in the dream, Faith sat up in bed and looked around blearily, before laying back down and curling up to go back to sleep.

[Rumour]

Name: Niv

Knowledge:
Dancing: How to do interpretive dance
Faith: Had a dream about you
Faith: Shy
Faith: Cook

Loot: N/A
Injuries: N/A
Fame: N/A
Devotion: N/A

Story: 4/5
Collaboration: 5/5
Structure: 5/5

- - -

Name: Faith

Knowledge:
Niv: Had a dream about you
Niv: Dancer
Niv: Bendy

Loot: N/A
Injuries: N/A
Fame: N/A
Devotion: N/A

Story: 4/5
Collaboration: 5/5
Structure: 5/5

- - -

Comments: Oh, goodness! Two of my favourite whimsical writers in one thread! The two of you really do write brilliant dream threads together. You do such a lovely job of capturing the whimsy and oddities of dreams, especially the ways in which dreams shift and change without warning. The imagery you both brought to the table was just fantastic and, while I did have to deduct a Story point for being less than 1500 words each, the story itself was a lot of fun.

Niv, you brought the setting to life with your description of the festival and the dancing. Niv is such a fun, light-hearted character and I absolutely adore reading about her adventures and interactions with non-tunawa characters. I particularly enjoyed her dancing, and also this line: "“Change Partners! Squuuak!” The budgie announced loudly as it waved its wings about to get everyones attention." Yaaaas.

Faith, you're also a natural dream writer. You seem very comfortable writing in Emea. I love how Faith simply accepts everything that happens to her in this thread, even with the imagery shifting and changing so quickly. One of my favourite lines was when you wrote, "Every person that comes, give them an apple, a hammer and a piece of wood. Tell them to go over there and make a coffin." LOL

Overall, such a fun thread! I hope to see the two of you write together again soon.

If you feel I've missed anything or if you have questions about your review, please don't hesitate to send me a quick PM. Thanks!