"But the dream, the echo, slips from him as quickly as he had found it and as consciousness comes to him (a slap and not the gentle waves of oceanic tides), it dissolves entirely. His muscles relax as the cold claims him again, as the numbness sets in, and when his grey eyes open, there’s nothing but the faint after burn of a dream often trod and never remembered." --Brigade, written by Laura
Keep a little fire burning; however small, however hidden.
Ellyse had spit Dahmer's name at Ledger before the young colt had fled from the pair. His champagne frame had moved quickly into Tephra's forest in search for Dad, hoping that if Mom was home, the second parent would be, too. He had searched for hours.
Visions of his mother's fight with Ledger flash through his head as he lay hidden in the copse of trees his father frequented. His champagne body is curled into itself and his hazel eyes stare unseeing into the distance. Bear-Ledger (once a father figure?), had tried to attack Smoak; his mother had arrived to protect him with a suit of diamond, and never mind the eye that was missing from her head. What had happened to them all?
He had found Joaquin and Joplin. Smoak had told them that Mom was home, that she looked a little different, but that she was still mom (his heart aches for her safety in whatever dispute she had with Ledger, hopes that he is not lying to the twins). He had promised that she would go find them, to satiate their aching bellies, and that he would be back later.
He hadn't found Dahmer, nor even scented him. The black stallion has not returned, so now Smoak hides inside the lava-side den his father calls home, and waits anxiously for Dahmer's return.
she is like a cat in the dark, and then she is the darkness
She ached.
She ached in a way she never knew possible –
She felt exhausted, depleted of her energy and worn to the bone – emotionally, physically, mentally. She had tasted blood, felt bone crushed beneath her own, and destroyed life – she had felt victory in her tender marrow, and she had felt more hopeless and more heartbroken than she had ever thought she could. Every piece of her humility, her self-awareness and her strength had put into question, and she had faltered as all sinners do, never going above, but always going beyond to bring an end to the anguish.
In the end, she had lost a piece of herself – a small part of her that had been given to another, only to be crushed, and left as nothing but ashes to ashes and dust to dust, scattered within the salty ocean breeze. The contentment that had filled her heart felt so far away, and so long ago – she had been in a different plane of existence, captured and imprisoned by a merciless God hellbent on destroying her willpower to live, to thrive – and he had taken so much from her. Her eye socket aches with the loss; her broken wing lay limp as the once pale ivory of her bloodstained feathers drag alongside her through the soft and fertile soil.
The piece of herself that had been lost was no longer – a gaping void in the bleeding hearth of her chest; he had made certain of it with biting words and a glowering stare – the memory of his abandonment still stirring her blood and feeding her with an edge of anger. He had spurned her and she had left him adrift at sea – the damage had been done; there was nothing but a sordid ember in the place of where a raging inferno once burned. The anger and the anguish keeps her moving, searching – stillness cannot befall her; complacency does not suit her. It never has.
Another piece of her aches still with the uncertainty of what lie ahead, and of what truth remains to be seen.
She had not seen any sign of Dahmer – of the one who had sacrificed himself to protect her, to spare her the pitiless and heartless torment she had been forced to endure – all for naught, but it had not been forgotten. She yearns for him now, to see him whole (unlike her – she is monstrous; splattered with bloodshed with a gouged socket marked with the outline of a bear claw - such irony – it was not lost on her that the one that should betray her would also be the symbolism of her disfigurement). The longing in her young son’s eyes had almost been unbearable – pleading for an answer; an answer she could not give.
Eventually, she found her son and daughter, Joaquin and Joplin – she held no answer for either of them, and hid her face in white-hot shame and frustration as their suckling mouths took their fill of her milk, until their bellies were round and full of what had been starved of them for too long. Though she ached to stay alongside them, to lave her tongue across each of their sullen cheeks and feel their steadied heartbeats across her own as they slept nestled in the dense vegetation along the base of the rumbling volcano, she knew she had to find Smoak, and that he would not be far.
He would be looking for Dahmer – he was aching as she was, and he needed her more than he ever had before.
When she does find him, he is hidden away within a dark cavern, draped in the scent of his father, and her heart tightens painfully inside of her chest. A softened and forlorn eye is watchful of him, its golden flecks glimmering in the pale light of the falling sun – in stark contrast to the darkness of filth and dried blood that seemed to have immersed itself into her golden skin. Quietly, softly, her voice echoes across the jagged enclosure and into the subtle darkness (it is a reminder of her imprisonment, once again – of Dahmer, crying out to her, while Ledger turned away and left her to die ).
”@[Smoak],” she murmurs to him, but she is at a loss, not knowing the fate of his father, not knowing anything but the blood, sweat and tears it took her to find him, to get back to him – she can promise him nothing, and her heart has never ached more.
”I’ve missed you,” is all she can say. It is the only truth she has left.
she rules her life like a fine skylark, and when the sky is starless
Keep a little fire burning; however small, however hidden.
He doesn't know for how long he has lain beneath the intertwined trees of the thicket, or for how long his hazel eyes have lingered on the slow rolling magma of the glowing lava stream a safe distance ahead of him. The sky has darkened, settling an orange glow on Tephra, but Smoak sees none of its beauty - he is lost in thought, relieved to the point of tears that his mother is home, but so cold with worry for his dad. The yearling colt sighs shakily and forces his hazel eyes to close where his head rests on his legs.
Smoak.
His eyes open immediately, full to the brim with unshed tears as he turns his gaze on Ellyse. She is tattered, broken. The gashes across her face draw his attention and the colt nearly sobs to think of the pain she must have endured, wherever she had been. Wherever dad is. He is on his hooves quickly, his dirt-flecked body moving to the champagne mare until they are nose-to-nose. He inhales her scent deeply and his tears begin to fall as she whispers to him. "I didn't know if you were... I was so... The twins..." he exhales a slow exhale before pressing his bone-plated head to her shoulder, careful not to press on any of her injuries "I missed you, too. I'm so glad you're home, mom." His throats tightens, forcing the colt into silence.
He tries not to cry, but it's too late for that, and it makes him feel selfish. "Are you alright, mom?" He doesn't want to cry because he knows it will make her feel worse, and she has already endured enough. He clears his throat and relaxes against her, but refuses to move away from the bloodied champagne mare.
she is like a cat in the dark, and then she is the darkness
His face is so innocent, and so pure – her heart clenches tightly within her chest at the sight of his unshed tears, brimming along the warm and gentle hazel eyes that were her own – but he is so much more than she is. Strength and courage and humility – he is perfection, and she can see it so much more clearly, despite the limitation of her vision, and despite the hollow emptiness of her weary heart. She can sense his sorrow, his pity, and there is an edge of shame hungrily feasting upon her bruised and battered ego – but she does not shy away from his stare.
When he finally presses against her, tucked against her chest, she is reminded of his youth – of his awkward, unsteady limbs carrying him carefree and gleeful through the dense vegetation and over thick rivulets of magma, bubbling and glowing with warmth. He has grown, and soon, testosterone will take away the edge of youth along his cheek and the innocence from his blithe smile – she is quiet, savoring his heartbeat steadying alongside her own, as her lips press a soft kiss against the nape of his neck.
”No,” she murmurs to him, honestly, though it causes her heart anguish. He is too young to see her as he does now, but she cannot take away her morbid wound, nor her bloodstained skin, her collapsed lung, her broken heart. He can see it all, written into the grimacing features of her once beautiful features, and she cannot lie to him – not when the truth is plain to see. ”but I will be,” and there is a small tendril of hope –
Perhaps, in time, she would.
”I know, sweet boy, I know,” she murmurs softly, soothing his aching heart, and the trepidation harbored inside of him. ”I am so proud of you,” she whispers, her voice quivering against the flawless crème of his skin, thinking of Dahmer, of the sacrifice he had made and of his disappearance - hoping beyond hope that he, too, would appear upon the horizon as she had. She couldn't bear the thought of her son's broken heart if he did not. ”I am so sorry.”
she rules her life like a fine skylark, and when the sky is starless
Keep a little fire burning; however small, however hidden.
He wants her to tell him that yes, she is okay. That he will awake from this horrible nightmare and he will have both of his parents, whole and unbroken. That the twins still have Ledger, that he hasn't lost his mind. But Smoak had seen it for himself, the rage inside the flaxen chestnut stallion, just as he can see the hurt and remorse inside of his mother now. She tells him that no, she is not okay, and somehow that makes him feel better. Perhaps it's because she trusts him, because he is no longer a little boy. It makes him proud.
But I will be.
He nods tentatively against her shoulder, inhaling the familiar, comforting scent of her mixed with the metallic tinge of blood. She assuages him the best she can and Smoak smiles gently at the attempt - there is a part of him, though, that cannot be comforted when she stands before him wounded, and Dad is nowhere to be found. The champagne colt lets another shaky sigh fall from his lips before he finally peels away from her embrace with confusion.
"You don't need to be sorry, mom," he says with a quivering lower lip, "You came back." And then he is against her chest again, unsure of what else to say, instead wanting to simply cry into her coat. Her absence had left a hollowness in him, a desire to sequester himself away, but the twins could not fend for themselves and he couldn't bear to leave them parent-less and sibling-less.
