"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
She is better now, not well but better. It's like fluid build up, when you pull the syringe back and take copious amounts out of the stomach - it's relief but it comes back. Prague still isn't sure how she ended up pregnant, other than the obvious happening she doesn't remember his name, what he looked like. Was it consensual? She was probably a little too promiscuous to claim that even if that were true.
She remembers Scorch babbling about her losing her mind, she remembers disappearing into seemingly thin air to appear at the beach; ready to die, ready to be reborn but nothing happened, instead she gave birth to a man-child. She came from older times when it wasn't as welcomed to be a man in the jungle. This child, Firefox, he burned his mother from the inside out - literally, she is now recovering. It felt as though her entire body was a delicate structure of ash, ready to fall at the slightest breeze. Traited children are harder on the magician, Firefox had fire immunity but Prague finds this rather senseless - couldn't she have aided in something better than that? Perhaps it's a fitting trait since her progeny often got themselves in the line of proverbial fire it's quite possible nowadays to be in the line of literal fire.
Firefox was not a newborn, he was approaching the year mark and she grew more agitated with his nursing each day. Soon he would need to leave the Jungle, despite he hasn't been raised much in it. She is trying to do better as a mother but it's a slow process. Any progress is better than her most recent attempts. "Come, Firefox - it is time to learn about where you come from and who you will respect," she says sending out 'feelers' to those sisters of hers that she was no harm nor the boy. She was simply bringing him back with her, a woman on the mend.
"You will live with us here for another year at best, what is your first impression? You are lucky to have an ancient mother, I can tell you much about this place," she chuckled to herself, knowing that young children didn't care about history or the like. She softly sighs, hoping that she heals instead of get worse.
it's raining fire, and i can't help but stand in it as i yell my sins
The first things he remembered were colors. Green of the jungle, gray of momma. So much green, much more green than mommas gray. Dark greens and light greens, so many different shades. Then there was noises. Screeching and screaming and roaring from all directions. For the first few days he’d been scared, but that passed quickly. Sometimes momma was a giant cat, and the colt felt a great sense of importance when he wandered the jungle in the wake of a silver lioness. His momma was special, and therefore he was special. At one time he would have been a prince of this jungle, though of course he had no way of knowing that. But there was one thing missing, something he couldn’t quite put his finger on. While the jungle certainly affected his other senses, he couldn’t feel it. At least, not like everyone else seemed to feel it. Any other the other horses he’d seen (admittedly they’d been few and far between, momma always seemed to drag him off to the farthest flung corners of the place) had been sweaty and somewhat uncomfortable looking. Even momma looked like that sometimes. Not Firefox. He remained cool as a cucumber. If he knew anything of life at all, that would be odd. But he didn’t know anything, so it didn’t concern him in the least.
Today, they were moving into the clearer parts of the jungle. He hadn’t seen these parts, since momma seemed hell bent on keeping him from prying eyes for whatever reason. Though he was nearing his yearling birthday, he was still very much attached to her, perhaps because of his lack of interaction with other horses. He’d never met a child his own age, it had always been just him and momma, and occasionally a monkey if he could coerce it into playing with him. But he knew he was growing, and he only nursed occasionally now and got most of his sustenance from vegetation. “How many other horses live here? Why haven’t we met them before now, if I’m supposed to be so respectful towards them?” he asked, with somewhat of a tone to his voice. He furrowed his brows at her slightly as well, though he refrained from giving her a flat out glare. “My first impression? Its noisy here, and there’s lots of plants and trees. And there is something else I can feel, something old. Also, I think its supposed to be hot, but I don’t feel it. I don’t know what hot is.” He didn’t know of magic, or the magic of the lands, or even of his own trait. And since she wanted to ask a bunch of questions, then he could do the same.
