01-17-2017, 07:00 PM
Sinew knows that he gives her moderation; if only, because she lets him feed off her fearlessness. She is a meal for him that he reaches for like a starving man, because he cannot make her fear him. So she lets him eat his fill of her braveness until he goes off again, to haunt for those that do fear him. Even now, she can imagine how they quake in terror before his presence and something lusty and thick fills her throat and makes her smile devilishly back at him.
(She ignores the hungry look as the first pair of twins set off in the dust, their shadows large and strange. His appreciation of them will grow when they recover their true selves from the Mountain’s silence and stone.)
Her mouth remains fixed in that sly grin; she can taste his ire and triumph, both - how he hated the name she nearly crooned, and she loves his hate as much as she loves being his prize now. She knew she was a valuable thing, if only because she did not scare easily and she gave him sons from her pretty painted loins. He disapproves, and this is new because she needs neither his approval nor disapproval and it makes her smile all the more. “Yes,” she states boldly. “Jealous?” and she laughs, because she knows that he is and he isn’t - a small victory this, to make the goat-god envy that he left no visible marks on her, but does he not know that his brand has gone much deeper?
He touches her, and she is still beneath his explorations and revulsion of that scar on her neck. She can feel it inside him, the beast that slumbers and stirs, needs. “You need to feed,” she tells him, recognizing that it has been entirely too long since he last slaked his thirst for fear (or her boldness), and she encourages him to sup of the things that he denies himself. His beast is surely restored now that the crown of dust sits heavy and beautiful on his brow, how long has it been denied the pleasures of another staring in terror at the things he crafts for them out of air and imagination and deepest darkest whim?
But she snuck past him, sneaky as an animal and built her nest on the Mountain.
Built it, soiled it in blood and birth.
Brought them back down, to him - to their kingdom, to their birthright as base animals, not as goatlings and fanged colt-beasts.
She calls to him and he comes, all a-glower. Sinew cannot help the laugh that leaves her mouth, he looks so miserable! “Two,” she echoes, not acknowledging their sex though she has no preference for girls or boys, she is aware that he throws more sons than daughters - will have a bevy of cloven-footed and horned beasts at his beck and call. Her eyes though, never leave him as he begins to circle the colts, first one and then, the other. She thinks of predator and prey, and is of a mind to position herself appropriately if he thinks to harm a hair on either of the colts’ heads. Sinew will eat his flesh if he hurts their foals, their creepy perfect little colts (even the sickly one - Famine, she has seen the thing that he’ll become and Pollock will come to know his son’s true potential in time for the Mountain takes, it can give back and Sinew plots already at how to get those things back for them).
She moves to Famine, her lips touching his head in a mother’s quick burst of affection. It is true, she favors him more than Feast but that boy is large and hale and can take care of himself already. He creeps in to stand alongside his bonier brother, as their mother meets the giver’s eyes in a hard flat stare; “There is always more to them than meets the eye.” Pollock mentions the Mountain and Sinew rewards him with a wily look, “Yes, the Mountain.” How does she tell him that it was necessary to know the strange things she carried in her belly? Not once had they felt ordinary as they formed and grew in her womb.
“I had to know.”
(She ignores the hungry look as the first pair of twins set off in the dust, their shadows large and strange. His appreciation of them will grow when they recover their true selves from the Mountain’s silence and stone.)
Her mouth remains fixed in that sly grin; she can taste his ire and triumph, both - how he hated the name she nearly crooned, and she loves his hate as much as she loves being his prize now. She knew she was a valuable thing, if only because she did not scare easily and she gave him sons from her pretty painted loins. He disapproves, and this is new because she needs neither his approval nor disapproval and it makes her smile all the more. “Yes,” she states boldly. “Jealous?” and she laughs, because she knows that he is and he isn’t - a small victory this, to make the goat-god envy that he left no visible marks on her, but does he not know that his brand has gone much deeper?
He touches her, and she is still beneath his explorations and revulsion of that scar on her neck. She can feel it inside him, the beast that slumbers and stirs, needs. “You need to feed,” she tells him, recognizing that it has been entirely too long since he last slaked his thirst for fear (or her boldness), and she encourages him to sup of the things that he denies himself. His beast is surely restored now that the crown of dust sits heavy and beautiful on his brow, how long has it been denied the pleasures of another staring in terror at the things he crafts for them out of air and imagination and deepest darkest whim?
But she snuck past him, sneaky as an animal and built her nest on the Mountain.
Built it, soiled it in blood and birth.
Brought them back down, to him - to their kingdom, to their birthright as base animals, not as goatlings and fanged colt-beasts.
She calls to him and he comes, all a-glower. Sinew cannot help the laugh that leaves her mouth, he looks so miserable! “Two,” she echoes, not acknowledging their sex though she has no preference for girls or boys, she is aware that he throws more sons than daughters - will have a bevy of cloven-footed and horned beasts at his beck and call. Her eyes though, never leave him as he begins to circle the colts, first one and then, the other. She thinks of predator and prey, and is of a mind to position herself appropriately if he thinks to harm a hair on either of the colts’ heads. Sinew will eat his flesh if he hurts their foals, their creepy perfect little colts (even the sickly one - Famine, she has seen the thing that he’ll become and Pollock will come to know his son’s true potential in time for the Mountain takes, it can give back and Sinew plots already at how to get those things back for them).
She moves to Famine, her lips touching his head in a mother’s quick burst of affection. It is true, she favors him more than Feast but that boy is large and hale and can take care of himself already. He creeps in to stand alongside his bonier brother, as their mother meets the giver’s eyes in a hard flat stare; “There is always more to them than meets the eye.” Pollock mentions the Mountain and Sinew rewards him with a wily look, “Yes, the Mountain.” How does she tell him that it was necessary to know the strange things she carried in her belly? Not once had they felt ordinary as they formed and grew in her womb.
“I had to know.”