Her hesitation at first is a real, palpable thing to Walter.
It strikes him like lightning, intense and bright, as he settles alongside her in the cave. If he could read her mind, (how many times has he wished to have an explanation to go along with the feelings his empathy provides?) he would reassure her that he is no threat. He is the opposite of a threat, really. Besides, blood would never wash out of his snow white wings. The feeling from her dissipates as quickly as it comes on. Ahead of him, he sees as her eyes close for a moment, locking away her secrets under another inaccessible layer. She takes her discomfort too, though, and he is glad. There isn’t enough room in here to be a stranger for long.
The palomino makes a low whistle under his breath at her admittance of age. “Impressive.”“I’m nearing…eighty? Maybe?” He cocks his head, considering. Has it been that long truly? Has it been so many years since his mother abandoned him in the Den with only his parents’ names and his own? He tries to remember Ellen’s face but only sees the one who had come next. Morbid Reason. The lady with the dark, husky voice who had taken him to the Chamber. She had told him, “I’m not your mother.” And that was fine with Walter. As it turned out, he never needed one, anyway.
Wind howls outside of their shelter, the end of the storm still out of sight. With the rain making itself into a curtain at the rocky entrance, it seems like they are in their own space outside of reality. Like they are watching the world from a secret vantage point adjacent to it. Their combined body heat rapidly warms the scoop, so that Walter relaxes his strained wings. They fall and brush along Hestia’s ribs and flanks lightly as he feels the tension of holding them leave his shoulders. He looks over at her suddenly as she begins to answer his questions. She is vague at the first, but he reasons that she means the Jungle. Of course. She is like so many of the women here in that respect. In others, though, she seems nothing like them.
He doesn’t return with his own answer right away. He sees that his next question gives her pause, waits to see where that line of thought will lead them in her life story. She even looks at him before mustering up the words. Murdered. Tethered. Pollock. His encouraging smile dips into a dangerously straight line. Because anywhere else, the words don’t make sense. But here in Beqanna, where anything is possible and the lines are often blurred, (good and evil, right and wrong, magical and ordinary, life and death) her story is entirely believable. Walter sees the way it drags her through the muck to say it. Only here, in the impossible space of quiet reverence amongst the chaos outside, does she free the story that has ironically haunted her. He places a soft touch of his muzzle on her shoulder in understanding but says nothing.
Moments pass where he lets her come back into herself, into the present. He knows first-hand how difficult it can be to return when the memories bind one so tightly. She finally mentions the Chamber of old and it is something they can both latch onto. “Starlace was my hero as a child,” he says, his sides fluttering with gentle laughter. He remembers the capable leader she was, the machine-like kingdom she had run. He remembers her daughters fondly as well…but that was a story for another time and different company, perhaps. “I was too busy dodging authority to ever win her favor, though.” A wormy grin wiggles his whiskered lips. Ah, youth.
“Nerine is grey and cold and monotonous,” he says, looking towards the doorway and imagining he can hear the endless whitecaps on the shore beyond. “I never thought I would find a home that is exactly like me, but here I am. Here Nerine is.” It took him quite a while to make it his home, but now, he can’t imagine living anywhere else. Not in this version of Beqanna. The pegasus notices the way the dark mare curls into him. He is helpless to move away. They are finally warming and she’s just spilled her secrets – where would he go besides? Walter tries to paint her over in his mind, pretends she’s that familiar gold and grullo he loves. It is easier in their slice of not-reality, in their cave of secrets. Djinni had been gone so long, and even when she returned, she stayed away from him. How much longer can he wait for her? “I wouldn’t be anywhere else,” he echoes out loud this time. A crack of thunder puts an exclamation to the end of his admission.
Walter
you should come back home
@[Hestia]