when i run through the deep dark forest long after this has begun,
There had been a time in her life that Dayé could have easily turned cruel; could have come lost within the wolf and the ferocity within it, finding her life steered by instinct and instinct alone. Despite this, the feral life - at least, one that required her to ignore the placidity of her equine spirit - did not grip the golden-blue mare tight enough for her to relinquish control to it, but to merely live within it, not as two separate entity but as one soul.
That warmth - the gentleness of a maturing mare - shines in the deep nutmeg of her irises as laughter spills from the white wolf’s lips to join her own. Dayé is beginning to notice that Mazikeen is slowly leaving behind the ways of a pup, her legs becoming slender and taller, while muscle begins to thicken the ivory and onyx of her easy to recognize patterned coat. The older wolf cannot help but return Mazikeen’s cunning smile, her own tail slowly wagging to and fro behind her. Soon she will be a pup no longer and, though there is no blood that is shared between them, Dayé feels a certain protectiveness over the young girl, displayed affectionately as she attempts to nip at her growing snout, her teeth flashing and then disappearing as her dark lips cover them so that her pink tongue only lightly licks her instead. “As long as it’s occasionally,” Dayé replies with a wrinkle of her nose, huffing gently as she presses her chin to the creamy rose of her chest.
Mazikeen’s question causes the dusty wolf’s ears to prick forward, her smile fading as her brows prick curiously. “Of course,” she says without hesitation, shaking out the thick fur around her neck with a quick toss of her head. Dayé watches the younger with a soft, mischievous glint in her eyes, pondering as she taps her tail nonchalantly behind her.
“Are you hungry?” Dayé grins, not waiting for an answer. The wolf pulls her paws beneath her to stand, shaking out her fur once, twice, before bounding into the copse of trees that border the cove where a snack would be easier to find.
Dayé
where the sun would set, trees are dead, and the rivers were none.
@[Mazikeen]