12-01-2016, 09:09 AM
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“Who are you?” A good question, and one Etojo had no sure answer for. Over the years, he had taken a moniker of many labels. Follower, loner, monster and now desperately lost. Though not physically so. Perhaps the den would’ve been a suitable home for himself, he could cower somewhere dark and shadowy, like a little abandoned foal whilst he waited for someone or something to pluck him from this self-induced misery, however unlikely as that would be. He looked from both filly to mare with a hard-faced glare which spoke his answer well enough, he wasn’t here to answer any questions. "I'm Clarisse. Clari for short." That’s nice, he thought, she seemed like a sweet mare. Innocent, perhaps a bit naïve to his intensions, whatever. She was clouding a situation which as far as he was concerned, should be as bright and straightforward as a clear day. He advanced on the pair, treading deeper into the hollow. He had visualised the plan over and over during the long journey just to get here. It was so simple. He goes in, he takes a child, either by emotional manipulation or force if it came to it - it hardly mattered which. And then he’d leave with his newly acquired asset. No one was going to interfere, not this time. “FOOL!” “What are YOU doing?!” It was as if an invisible force had reached out to wrap tight tendrils of trepidation around his body. He felt his chest become awfully tight, and the lub dub of his heart began to beat both frantic and heavy. And yet, no such force graced this moment, only sudden and unexpected recognition. Etojo did not need to turn to see her face to know who spoke those words. He knew her voice well enough, it came from his long ago past, and he had known it as soon as she scolded him fool. It hadn’t been the first time, and he doubted sourly it would be the last. And just like that, Lucrezia had shattered his marvellous plan into a thousand tiny shards of fail that could not, no, would definitely not, be reassembled whilst her presence remained here. Etojo ground his teeth together in annoyance. Suddenly, somehow, what he was attempting to do seemed wrong… no, that wasn’t it, the birth of his ideas were never wrong. Rather, the manifestation of it, in the here and now, wasn’t something he wished Lucrezia to bear witness to. The dark mare stepped forward. Clara, Careli, he couldn’t remember, but he had told her not to move! Etojo felt an angry kind of helplessness come over him. If Lucrezia wasn’t standing behind him, he would act on this type non-compliance with a bit of forceful insistence. But Lucrezia knew him only as a stubborn, conceited fool with silly ideas, and that didn’t quite fit with monster. "And you are?" the dark mare queried. “Lucrezia…” he muttered for her. Both an answer and acknowledgment, and he finally turned his head to look at King Rodrik’s daughter. The disapproval in her eyes had always cut rather deep. And as per their usual custom, Etojo boldly met her narrow glare with an even narrower scowl of his own. Whilst he cared for Lucrezia, even after all this time, she was beginning to ruin all his moments. In fact, Etojo wondered if there had been any time at all when she had held her tongue and refrained from voicing her displeasure for any action he had ever done. Unlikely. She had butted heads with him from the get go. “I was escorting them home.” He growled simply, perhaps too simply. A muscle twitched uncontrollably in his neck along with the lie. “It's a rather long journey, Clara here can’t manage on her own.” As he loomed with peculiar intention close to Clarisse, his mouth a whisper away from her ear. “Can you.” It wasn’t a question. “Look at the thing,” he tossed a nonchalant gesture towards the skittish foal child. “it’s obviously sick.” Referring of course, to the deep blue pigment of her coat. “What’s it to you Lucrezia? Do you need an escort too?” he jibed. As if Lucrezia needed anything from him, she was too fiercely independent and sure of herself. But the barb was meant to get under her skin. Anything that had ever eluded to an incapacity always had. |