09-08-2021, 08:59 AM
Smoky tendrils writhe across her translucent skin, melting out of the shadows that bulge thickly from the jungle's canopy, and the mare's hesitation turns to a freeze except for the way her heart lurches so visibly, highlighted by the glow of her bones. Is this another test? There are no stars above to see if the Lion found his place among them, only darkness and a soft rustle of leaves, and Sintra turns her head desperately to find the source of the magic, but it remains doggedly in her blind-spot as if that is it's source.
Her throat tightens with the feeling of phantom fangs, of broken skin and the tickle of blood leaking down her long neck, of the panic that floods her helpless body when she cannot breathe through the pressure; when the blood cannot reach her brain and white fireworks explode at the edges of her darkening vision.
Sweat prickles along the sides of her neck, breath quickening, but when the stallion finally makes himself visible, stepping forward with that snake-soft admission, she feels... relief. All Sintra's fear is bound up in other things, other monsters, in men and gods and guardians, and though there is no doubt in his voice that he will kill her, and she believes him without question, she cannot find any fear specifically for him at first. What is another death except a reprieve?
Will you make it hard? There's an unexpected offer of autonomy in the question. Sintra, so inured to horror, so ready to accept that her life will be full of it, of torment, is prepared to simply offer herself to him as she did Carcinus, as she did the Lion. She is not afraid to die; she is terrified of coming back, and the silken thread of his words promises suffering. Can she make it difficult for him? Does he want her to? Will it be better or worse to try? She has so little power, she is not especially clever, not especially magical, but the colored light leaps to her skin in response, banishing the weakest of his shadowy tendrils, and Sintra, who has already died fighting, already died passive, does the only thing she hasn't tried yet.
She runs.
And she wonders, as she does, if he, too, will find his place in the sky when he kills her.
Her throat tightens with the feeling of phantom fangs, of broken skin and the tickle of blood leaking down her long neck, of the panic that floods her helpless body when she cannot breathe through the pressure; when the blood cannot reach her brain and white fireworks explode at the edges of her darkening vision.
Sweat prickles along the sides of her neck, breath quickening, but when the stallion finally makes himself visible, stepping forward with that snake-soft admission, she feels... relief. All Sintra's fear is bound up in other things, other monsters, in men and gods and guardians, and though there is no doubt in his voice that he will kill her, and she believes him without question, she cannot find any fear specifically for him at first. What is another death except a reprieve?
Will you make it hard? There's an unexpected offer of autonomy in the question. Sintra, so inured to horror, so ready to accept that her life will be full of it, of torment, is prepared to simply offer herself to him as she did Carcinus, as she did the Lion. She is not afraid to die; she is terrified of coming back, and the silken thread of his words promises suffering. Can she make it difficult for him? Does he want her to? Will it be better or worse to try? She has so little power, she is not especially clever, not especially magical, but the colored light leaps to her skin in response, banishing the weakest of his shadowy tendrils, and Sintra, who has already died fighting, already died passive, does the only thing she hasn't tried yet.
She runs.
And she wonders, as she does, if he, too, will find his place in the sky when he kills her.
@
Gale