violence
She has lost much of her imminent strangeness, as her bone-magic was taken - ripped - from her. She walks alone, now, walks quiet without the clatter of her bone-creature at her side. She misses it, will always miss it (does not know if it will return, or if it is gone permanently).
Thus, this mare cannot know the things Violence could once do, the necromancy. Once, Violence would have flaunted it, would have made bones dance until the girl’s eyes rolled back in her head from fear or delight, and Violence would have laughed and laughed.
But now she is forced instead to stand idle and size up the girl alone.
“I’m often lost,” she says, although the girl – Aletta – hadn’t asked, “especially now. The land ruined a lot of us. Were you affected?”
So polite. It stings the tongue, like vinegar. Politeness does not come easy to her. She is much more suited to whim and fancy, her own Id-driven delights, than anything so mundane as this.
“Does the meadow feel right, then?” she continues, although she doesn’t know where she’s continuing to, “does it feel like a home?”
It was her home too, once – but now she is beholden to the dark god’s wasteland. For now, at least.
I’d stay the hand of god, but war is on your lips
