the peace the evening brings [SULTAN]

[alynight]

Aly walked out of Shifter Academy, relaxing with the thought of having the sky above her instead of a ceiling. It was a comfort, a constant that Aly could always depend on, but at the same time, she felt a little...off, though lonely was how she didn't want to describe it. It'd been a while since she'd felt lonely, so what better alternative than being surrounded by trees and millions of stars? Taking a deep breath of night air, Aly couldn't help but lightly smile, both at the fact it was night and the fact that she didn't have to wear a coat even though it was January; it was always a pain to wear a winter coat in the massive crowds at Manhattan. That was one good thing about Hawaii, but it didn't make up for the fact that Juilliard was so far away, all the way in her home state of New York. Even after years, she still missed that school, but Shifter Academy had a forest, something Juilliard could only dream of.

The New Yorker walked towards the forest, shivering slightly. Maybe a tank top hadn't been the smartest thing to wear, but it was comfortable enough, and her scarf made up for it a little. Comfort was her main priority right now, and it was Hawaii, after all, she wasn't going to get frostbite or anything. Just seeing the forest though was cheering her up, even if she was a little chilled. Looking up at the sky, Aly was the happiest she'd been in a while. The only thing that was almost better was music, and she'd already tried relaxing with that, tried going to use the concert hall's piano. Alas, when Aly had gone by the concert hall, there'd been a lot of noise – a play practice or something – so she'd immediately been turned off. If it had been quieter in there, she definitely would have gone in, but a lot of people would just be unbearable at the moment.

Timing her footsteps to the rhythm Vivaldi's “Spring,”Aly was barely able to see the school, trees surrounding her. Just as she'd looked up at the stars, this time she looked up at a tree, and grabbed onto it. She climbed up the tree, gracefully, she hoped, and sat down on one of the sturdier branches. Leaning against the thick trunk of the tree, Aly listened to everything around her, hearing it all but hearing nothing at the same time.

Clothes.

[Sultan Zaafir]

[ OUTFIT ]

Sultan ruffled his feathers, perched high above the tree tops and the trails below. He'd always liked the forest, for some reason. He fought long and hard to keep his eyes open, as he was supposed to be sleeping. His first thoughts in the morning, faced with the rising sun, were always the words 'Way to say a big 'F YOU' to the owls of the school, SA.'

His clothes were far below him, in a heap on the forest floor. He could easily just hop back into the shirt and transform back, the clothes fitting him perfectly- down to the shoes and socks.

Golden eyes shone like two extra suns high above the ground as he set about looking for a rat or something. Something to fill his stomach until he bothered to go get dinner. He hopped from branch to branch before noticing a small mouse, jumping through the leaves with a wounded leg. The sight tugged at Sultans mind, the hungry predator slowly elevating- silently, with not even a whisper. He rose, and rose, before clamping his wings to his body and diving, grabbing the mouse by the neck and swooping in the nick of time back up to his branch.

After he finished his prize, Sultan sat deep in thought. He found it odd how if he were in human form, he would have found the taste of that rather repulsive, but as an owl it was as if fillet mingion had just been sent walking to your doorstep.

A sound from the surrounding woods startled him out of his thoughts. Crack. Snap. Rustle. Crack. Crack. A head of blonde hair could be seen from his place in the treetops, against the stark contrast of the dark forest floor with it's rotting logs and damp earth. He swooped down a bit closer, noticing it was a girl, looking terribly cold. Just as he was taking a closer look, she stepped over to the tree he was in and grabbed a branch, hoisting her self up- shaking the tree an awful lot.

Sultan quickly tumbled off, not expecting this to happen, and hit the ground with a loud 'thud'. He fanned out his wings, making sure when he shifted back he wouldn't have a broken arm to deal with, and grabbed his clothes in his talons. Flying up beside the girl, he dropped them on the tree limb and settled down inside them. Wit a few popping noises and the sound of rustling clothes, a large owl transformed into an equally tall guy, his hair messed up- showing where his head had hit, as well as a purple bruise blossoming from under his sleeves.

"That hurt a bit, you know." he said with a playful smile, his accent thick and charming.

[alynight]

As soon as Aly was situated on the tree, she felt like a klutz. She wasn't necessarily a graceful person, but when she was actually on the branch she realized it was worse than she thought. She could feel the branch shaking beneath her, and she knew she would need to be quieter in the future. As an owl, silence wasn't a problem, flying without a sound was like breathing, but as a human, Aly knew now that she had a lot to work on in that regard. Lightly sighing, Aly scanned her dark eyes from tree to tree, blinking when she heard a loud thump. As she shifted her weight carefully, she wondered what had happened, and her mind reeled with possibilities, all fairly realistic.

In what seemed like a blink of an eye, though really Aly had just been lost in thought, she turned her head and saw somebody. Startled, she stifled a gasp, sure she had been the only one in the forest. So much for that belief. So much for wanting to be alone. Her curiosity was piqued, just a little, though, and it would be rude to just leave or ask him to go, wouldn't it​? People were so hard to deal with, much harder to deal with than music. As well as being graced with exceptional hearing, Aly was also able to see fairly well in darkness, though not as well as when she was an owl. What she noticed though about this man were many things, including: that even sitting down, he was much taller than her; his eyes seemed golden; and he was very, very...cute.

Looks aren't everything, Aly thought to herself, knowing that this was how all those idiotic fairy tales started: someone falling in love with someone for looks, with their personality supposedly afterwards. Aly barely registered his words, but when she realized that fact, she stifled another gasp. Had she done something? Crap, crap, crap.

“I'm sorry,” she said sincerely, though her mind had yet to come up with an explanation for what she was sorry for. “Are you alright? No, that is, are you going to be alright?” she added, trying to be considerate, honestly sorry for whatever had happened, and trying to place what his accent was. She disliked most accents, though only if they were bothersome, but this one wasn't bothersome, this was one unlike any she had heard before. “Um, what exactly happened?” asked the owl shifter, blurting out something like she usually did. “No, I mean...I'm sorry,” she apologized again, making eye contact with him, trying to follow her mom's advice and interact more with people. Did rambling with someone who would probably get mad at her count as interacting with people?

[Sultan Zaafir]

Sultan rubbed his head awkwardly, smoothing out where his hair had been parted weirdly from his personal hug with the forest floor. A few leaves were to be found, and he quickly picked him out and ran his hands through his hair, as if a bird preening itself. He found a clover that fell out of the tangle of black hair on his head, and held it out to Aly. "A gift?" he said with a soft laugh, laying it down on her leg before adjusting his clothes a bit more, pulling his pant legs over his shoes.

Well she was rather adorable. Seemed sweet.. nice blonde hair that curled slightly, and wonderful eyes. She was kind of short, but that just made her cuter to him. For a moment, the Turk was a bit starstruck with the other shifter. Quickly regaining his thoughts, he fought for words, but it didn't seem so. After all, you got girls by being charming and suave, right? At least he thought the word was suave.

"I'm sorry," she said. "Are you alright? No, that is, are you going to be alright?"

"I'm fine." he said with a smile, revealing a single gold tooth in the corner of his mouth on the right side that glinted slightly in the light. "It's not like you knew I was there. I'm a large owl, but nothing distinguishing from owl, to owl, to me, to owl." he put it oddly, but only because of the partial language barrier.

“Um, what exactly happened?”

He looked over at her and picked at the bark of the limb absentmindedly, lost in thought with how to really explain. "Well, I was just flyin' around, bit bored.. and I was perched on a limb watching you- no creepily of course-" there it was. Awkward Sultan saw a pretty girl and the hamster in his head had to stop and stare instead of running on its wheel. "Just 'cause I didn't expect someone to be out at this time. And just as I saw you, you climbed up and knocked me off." he nodded. "Yeah. That's about right." Sultan shrugged softly, twirling his amber ring on his finger, liking the way the stone caught the bit of light peeking through the trees.

"I'm fine. However, there might be slight damage. I'll need your name for, ya'know, insurance reasons." he smiled widely and leaned back against the trunk of a tree behind him, making sure not to fall off of the limb he was sitting on.

[alynight]

Aly furrowed her eyebrows a tiny bit, wondering why he had leaves in his hair. She still hadn't come up with a solution, though her imagination, like always, wasn't getting out of hand. There was something to be said about Aly, and that something was that she was a realist. She'd never had a huge draw to fairy tales, but unlike some people who called themselves realists as well, she believed in love. Her feelings for this fellow student weren't anywhere close to love, they had just met, after all, but she couldn't help but swoon internally, just a little, when he laughed softly and gave her “a gift.”

Letting out a quiet sigh, Aly was glad when she learned that Sultan was fine. She felt bad about whatever she did, but she would have felt worse if he had gotten severely hurt or anything. She cocked her head, though, when he revealed his shift. If that wasn't ironic, nothing was. A slight smile lit up her face, and she said, “So you're an owl shifter? Me too,” with a slight laugh. Thinking about it, it made sense for that to be his shift, especially when she looked up at his eyes from under her eyelashes. It was nice to meet another owl, even under the circumstances. “What kind are you? That is, if you don't mind me asking,” Aly added, wondering if it was rude for her to ask. She didn't see why it would be, but she honestly didn't know how people thought sometimes. But for Aly, sometimes meant almost all the time.

Watching her? Aly felt awkwardly flattered, though she wasn't sure if she had a reason to be. He had been looking at her because they were probably the only two in the forest at this time, like he said. Still, she felt a faint blush on her cheeks. Her face was only slightly pink, but with her pale skin, Aly was sure that it was evident enough. When he finished explaining, she relaxed a little bit. That wasn't too bad, at least. Gears turning in her head, Aly put everything together in her mind, and she nodded at him. “Oh, okay,” she began. “I really am sorry.” She nervously pulled the hair on the right side of her face behind her ear, but she was glad that he didn't seem to be mad.

A gentle laugh escaped her mouth at his words. Growing up, she'd heard many a pick-up line when she hung around the college students, but this one was sweet, at least to Aly, and very fitting for the situation. “Alchemy, or Aly; it doesn't really matter. Aly's just more of a nickname, y'know. And your name?” she replied, falling into the habit of cocking her head when she had a question.

[Sultan Zaafir]

Sultan laughed and smiled. She was so adorable, in odd ways. from how awkward she seemed to that dusting of a blush. It just reminded him how pale she was compared to him. He just wanted to put his hand beside- or on- hers and compare it for a bit. A small smile crept back to his face as he thought that, a blush matching hers as well. It wasn't easily seen through his tanned skin, but it was there. "You girls are so cute when you blush." he said with a small wink. When she mentioned being an owl, he clapped a few times and turned on the branch a bit to face her more.

"You too? Well 'hoo hoo' then." he cracked a smile, the same tooth catching a bit more light this time. "It's nice to meet another owl. I haven't before. So.. what kind are you?" he pulled his brows together a bit, waiting for an answer to his when he felt the need to answer hers.

It was an easy question. A Turk turned into a Turkish owl. Simple enough. "I'm a Eurasian Eagle Owl. Pretty much mainly native to Turkey, so it fits." he shrugged softly and looked over at her a bit more, smiling. When she kept apologizing, he held his hand up to stop her. "Nah. Don't worry about it. It's fine. I'm fine. Forget about it. It's wrong to start off knowing someone with something bad." he said with a soft shrug. It wasn't like he was seriously hurt, and apologizing constantly wasn't going to fix it.

"Alchemy, or Aly; it doesn't really matter. Aly's just more of a nickname, y'know. And your name?"

"Ooh. Mysterious sounding. I like that." he laughed softly. "Aly seems like an insult to a name like that." Flattery. Flattery. Flattery. Go on, Sultan. Don't choke on an owl pellet, or whatever it is you'd choke on. "My name's not as fancy. Sultan Aydin Ebri is technically my first name. You can call me just Sultan or Sul, though." he threw the ring up and caught it multiple times, looking off into the trees at whatever celestial body was up in the sky at that moment. Sun, moon, Mars, he didn't care- as a philosopher it all intrigued him.

[alynight]

When he commented on her blush, Aly couldn't help but blush even more. Whereas her face had been pink just a moment ago, it was now red. She was fairly certain that the only guy to have called her cute before was her father. It wasn't necessarily a bad thing, it was actually quite flattering, Aly just wasn't sure how to react. How were you supposed to react when a guy said – indirectly – that you were cute when you blushed? Even if Aly wasn't so awkward, she was certain that she'd still have trouble thinking of a response. “Thanks,” she mumbled, though the statement came out sounding almost like a question.

Aly cracked a smile as well, and replied, “A barn owl, y'know, the one's with the white faces and dark eyes.” The 'hoo hoo' made her giggle slightly, but she didn't say anything about her inability to do so as a bird. The shree of her species wasn't exactly...enticing, and besides: did it really matter? It was nice to meet another owl! Nodding in response to the answer to her own question, Aly had finally placed a nationality to his accent. Sure, she'd lived in New York City, an American breeding ground for different nationalities, she'd never actually heard an accent like his. “Oh, really?” she asked, hearing his response, but she was more lost in his eyes than anything else. She smiled again, especially when he smiled as well.

Sighing in relief, Aly nodded yet again, and said, “Okay. Who's not worrying? That's right, me,” and cringed internally at what she'd just said. She hated feeling like she'd just rambled a little, that and acted like an idiot, but she couldn't really change anything now. More so than before, she was glad that he wasn't mad.

What was with this guy and making her blush? Aly felt like she was just turning more and more red the longer she talked to him. She honestly didn't feel like her name was that terrific. Growing up, she hadn't necessarily been picked on, but combined with her own anti-social personality back then, her name didn't earn her many friends. “Not as fancy?” she asked, raising her eyebrows. “Whatever you say,” she added with a laugh. “Sultan works, though. You look like a Sultan. My name doesn't...fit me as much. I always saw myself as more of a Melody or a Harmony when I was little. Alchemy is like...a hippie name? I'm not sure, I remember looking it up though, and it had to do with those philosophers-slash-chemists who tried to turn lead into gold.” Ramble, ramble, ramble, was that all she could do, tonight?

[Sultan Zaafir]

"No problem." he said softly, knowing exactly what she was referring to. At least one of his hints had hit it's mark, and from the looks of her, it had hit hard.

"I've never seen one of those kind of owls before. You'll have to show me sometime." so that was it? That was he stupid, indirect way of asking a girl out? Dammit Sultan, be true to your middle eastern-ness! "I'm pretty normal. White body with wings with a different shades of brown for each feather, and a multi-hued face. Eyes are the same." he nodded, cracking his knuckles a bit. "From what you've said, your eyes don't stay the same, do they? I can't imagine they would, It'd be pretty weird to see an owl with eyes as beautiful as yours."

He laughed softly, smiling at her awkward rambling. It was cute, really, knowing that just him being there could get her so worked up and babbling. It was.. rather flattering, actually- and of course he wasn't mad, it was an accident, she couldn't have known he was there- or that that owl was a fellow shifter- and it had helped him meet this adorable girl.

"I look like a Sultan? Like.. my name, or the actual ruler type sultan?" he always had to be sure, since number one; Sultan wasn't his birth name, and number two; he was really supposed to be one right about now. The first one showed him the name was believable, and the second one was more for the fact of he could really be a lost prince. It was more of an ego thing than anything else right about now, and until it was running his life, Sultan just liked to know.

He shrugged when she mentioned her name. "I like your name regardless." he said happily, almost a chirping kind of happiness to his voice. "It's unusual, and that makes it great. You could be another Brittany, or Christine, or Kayla, but Alchemy is nicer. More original." now he felt like he was rambling, going on and on in a vain effort to impress some other owl. That's how it was for owls, you had to impress them to get them. If your dance or whatever wasn't as elaborate as the next male, the female kicked some metaphorical dirt in your face and left. However.. by the way she was acting it was far from a vain attempt, but still. He was trying, and he was trying hard. Hopefully it didn't seem so.