(ORP) Haruspex's Nest Area

[Haruspex]

Haruspex, a household cat-sized griffon, has been living in Paz for some time now. The winter is harsh, but Haruspex seems to fair fine by building a nest in the trees that are very close to the lake of the town. The nest is high enough to be out of the reach of people, but is low enough to see. Something strange about the nest, it is made of gold and jewels and mud, instead of straw like most bird nests. If no one saw Haruspex, they would know immediately that this is not a normal nest for a normal bird. Haruspex wakes in her nest on a sunny but cold day, and she stands and yawns with a stretch and hops out of her nest and walks out onto the branch to look for fishies.









ooc: Anybody is welcome in the thread Start your own journey or meet Haruspex. Keep in mind (if you've ever seen the movie "Up", Haruspex as a mentality of the dog) Haruspex is happy, curious and mostly oblivious to nearly everything.

[Miss Malan]

Malan walked down to the lake near Paz. The inn she was staying at was decent but crowded and she wanted privacy for what she was about to do. More and more she was realizing that she had to master the magic she had just discovered. If she didn't who knew when a stray song or a word out of place would cause a disaster.

She found a comfortable spot under a tree and sat down oblivious to the strange gem-encrusted nest above her head. She took out her flute, her harmonica, a notebook, some old potatoes and a couple of eggs.

She wrote 'experiment one: potato' in the notebook. Then she placed a single potato in front of her. She fingered the simple wooden amulet around her neck and concentrated on the potato. Fly fly fly she thought. Just go up a little. Please.

She picked up her flute and began to play a simple melody, 'The flight of the little tuna fish'. Nothing happened and nothing happened. Then on the fourth chorus the potato wobbled a bit. Excited Malan played on, going to the fifth and sixth verse till she simply had to take a breath. Something had happened to the potato. But not the levitation she had hoped for. It was now tinged with pale blue.

Malan sighed. She wrote the results in her notebook and put the second potato down in front of her.

I guess I just have to keep trying.

[Haruspex]

Winter was no very kind to Haruspex. Fishies did not want to come to the surface in the winter. Sometimes because it was frozen, but mostly because the surface was too cold for fishies, so they stayed deep. Even though Haruspex has bird in her, that bird is not duck, so Haruspex greatly lacked the ability to dive deep into the cold water. Haruspex could only watch the fishies from the branch and see the shadows of them flopping around safely in their water.

Suddenly there was music in the air. Haruspex looked around to see where this came from, and it came from just under her. It was a strange melody that came out of a strange type of instrument that the woman held. The woman also had potatos too. Haruspex did not very much like potatos, but still watched just in case. Food was food! Haruspex never turned down food. Something strange happened with the potato, it started to dance. Haruspex was very busy watching this and suddenly distracted when a funny sound came from the lake. It sounded like a splash but it sounded like the kind that happened when something was pulled out of the lake.

Something did come out of the lake! It was a fishie! A flying fishie! Only the look in the fishie's eye was more panicked, and it flopped around like it did on the ground. Very excited, Haruspex screeched and spoke. The way Haruspex spoke was not like a talking animal. Her beak did not move to form words. Instead, she had a gift of projection that echoed through peoples minds. The voice they would hear is almost child-like, happy loud and excited.

*IT IS A FLYING FISHIE!* Oh! This was too good to be true! Haruspex leaped off the branch and swooped down to catch the floating fish just as it started to fall at the same time that the woman stopped playing her music.

[Miss Malan]

One burnt potato and several blue potatoes later Malan was just about ready to give up. She decided to try one last time before heading back to the warmth of the inn. This time she chose the harmonica. As she played the potato in front of her rose a little into the air and bobbed about to the music. 'It's working! It's working!' Malan thought and continued playing. Suddenly she heard a strange screech and the words 'It's a flying fishie!' arrived in her mind.

Malan yelped in surprise and dropped her harmonica. Had something gone wrong with her magic? Then she saw small creature that might have been a griffon swoop down and catch a fish over the lake.

Malan had heard that griffons could be dangerous. She backed up till she was standing with her back against a tree hoping she wouldn't be seen. She still hadn't noticed that she was standing right under a griffon's nest.

[Haruspex]

Haruspex flew back around, excited that a fishie had been flying and so easy to catch! She stretched her wings and tilted them to do a full round and come back to the two legged woman who pressed against the tree. Haruspex flew toward her and landed - not so gracefully- in front of her. Rather, it was a landing where Haruspex stepped on the tail of the fish, tripped over it, barrell rolled forward once and landed in a sitting position, still clutching the dying fish in her beak in front of the woman. Right away, her lion-like tail thumped against the ground when she projected again *How did Woman do that?! Woman has made fishie fly!* and Haruspex dropped the flopping fish in front of her feet *Do it's again!*

[Miss Malan]

Malan got a huge fright when Haruspex landed right in front of her. 'Oh no. It's going to eat me!' she thought. But the small griffon showed no signs of eating her. Instead words arrived in her head without passing through her ears.

I made the fish fly? But how...and who are you? Malan couldn't help staring. Once she realized that the griffon wasn't going to eat her she saw that it was quite pretty and even a little cute.

She slowly bent down and retrieved the harmonica from the mud.

'I'm Malan. I don't know about flying fish. I was just trying to get the potatoes to rise up a bit. I'm rather new to the whole magic thing.'

[Haruspex]

Haruspex went closer toward the woman, convinced that it was her music that made the fishies fly. After all, fishies didn't really fly on their own, did they? At first she seemed afraid, the way she backed away made Haruspex weary of her reaction. Finally the woman picked up her music maker and said her name. Haruspex chirpped in wonder and crept closer until she dropped the fish at the feet of Malan. Haruspex opened her beak as if some kind of smile, her tongue slopping out to the side.

*Haruspex is called Haruspex. Malan will eat fishie?*

[Miss Malan]

Malan looked down at the raw, bloody, still moving 'fishie' and gulped.

'Maybe Haruspex should eat the er fishie and I'll try playing something else.'

On closer inspection the griffin was really quite pretty she thought as she sat down resisting the urge to scratch Haruspex behind the ears. It didn't look as though it would eat her but you never could be too sure and she didn't want to lose a hand.

As she played the tingling feeling she sometimes got became stronger. It grew so strong in fact that she started trembling, missed a not and dropped the harmonica.

'That was weird.' The potatoes had all rolled together and were smoking a little. She tried picking one up and immediately dropped it. It was hot too the touch and smelled cooked.

'Did I do that or did you do that?' I couldn't do that before.

[Haruspex]

Haruspex looked at Malan when she suggested Haruspex eat the fishie. That was alright with Haruspex because if not it would go to waste and that was a terrible thing! Haruspex leaned down to pick up the fishie and ate it whole in a bite and swallow and nudged her head against Malan's hand as she scratched between Haruspex's ears and Haruspex purred. When Haruspex purred it was a large motor-like sound and sometimes even sounded like distant thunder sounds. It only stopped when the potatoes started to bounce around and smoke to which Haruspex wondered what kind of trick this was!

*Haruspex did not do it. Malan must have done this*

[Miss_Malan]

'I did that? But I've no idea how. The potatoes reacted to something I played but why didn't anything else? And why did it happen so easily with you here? Are you magic? What are you Haruspex and where do you come from? I mean, do you have er any family?'

Malan didn't usually talk so much but she was curious. She was sure Haruspex had something to do with her suddenly being able to cook potatoes.

'If you tell me your story, I'll tell you mine.'