02-27-2017, 10:17 PM
(Can he not see that he has had a greater impact on her than Tarnished had? As great as an asteroid striking the earth?)
Sometimes, she says things just to get a rise out of him.
Sometimes, she flaunts that scar on her neck just to show him that he’s never marked her like that.
(Because he’s marked her in deeper ways, in ways that need no visible scar - in ways that imitate them on four matchstick legs and creepy grins. In ways, his marks have been left on her brain and her heart - he cannot make her fear him, but he can make her follow him to the ends of the earth.)
He grunts; she can tell that he loathes his jealous urges and her motherly affections towards the colts. For it, she rewards him with a toothy smile except that her teeth are blunt and do little more than pinch, painfully. (The colts know this, they could cry about it for hours but they’ve learned that tears earn them more bites. She’ll make them tough and hard, like leather left in the sun for too long.) Sinew can see something in the mean narrow look of him that despises her motherhood, though she is not the root cause of it - no, his mother is to blame, but her lack has shaped him into the gift-giver that he is (he cannot deny that - the lack of motherly love had made him great!). She does not begrudge him the distaste that is plain on his face - she ignores it.
“Your sons,” she states plainly.
Feast is cloven-hoofed and has but the one wing on his right side.
Famine has but the one wing on his left side, for now.
“They are you divided into two parts - neither is wholly like you, but both have promised to be more than meets the eye. Especially him,” she nuzzles the top of Famine’s sad head, knowing that his father cannot see the things that she has seen on the Mountain. Fangs, the undead appearance, and the queer ability to disappear and reappear like magic incarnate - Pollock cannot see these things, but in time, they’ll make themselves apparent as the lopsidedness of their wings have. “They may not be able to induce fear like you but they will have other talents, other uses.” He is quiet, contemplative even, and she is gravid with pride (and the next in their bloodline) as she looks on.
Her lips touch the top of the first colt’s head - he is the larger, the more hale of the two.
“Feast.” for he is that, hunger and meat and he will be the end of many.
Her lips descend upon the second colt’s head - he is smaller, thinner, clearly sick but no less adored for it.
“Famine.” for he is as much that as his sibling is the fat meal on the table, he is scarce and malnourished in flesh only.
“Fitting, is it not?” she soothes the curls of growing mane trying to straggle down Famine’s neck.
It is clear that he is her favorite because he requires more attention whereas Feast does not, nor does he suffer because of it. That one even moves to his brother’s side beneath the grim black gaze of their father, as if in challenge of him in some small way. All of them know that Sinew would not allow the stallion to end the colt’s life - that is nature, but she is having none of it and they all know it, can see it in the wildness in her own bright black eyes (ripe in dream and fever, but she saw things in Time’s bowels that cannot be unseen and the single thing that she fears, still hunts - haunts - her).
Sometimes, she says things just to get a rise out of him.
Sometimes, she flaunts that scar on her neck just to show him that he’s never marked her like that.
(Because he’s marked her in deeper ways, in ways that need no visible scar - in ways that imitate them on four matchstick legs and creepy grins. In ways, his marks have been left on her brain and her heart - he cannot make her fear him, but he can make her follow him to the ends of the earth.)
He grunts; she can tell that he loathes his jealous urges and her motherly affections towards the colts. For it, she rewards him with a toothy smile except that her teeth are blunt and do little more than pinch, painfully. (The colts know this, they could cry about it for hours but they’ve learned that tears earn them more bites. She’ll make them tough and hard, like leather left in the sun for too long.) Sinew can see something in the mean narrow look of him that despises her motherhood, though she is not the root cause of it - no, his mother is to blame, but her lack has shaped him into the gift-giver that he is (he cannot deny that - the lack of motherly love had made him great!). She does not begrudge him the distaste that is plain on his face - she ignores it.
“Your sons,” she states plainly.
Feast is cloven-hoofed and has but the one wing on his right side.
Famine has but the one wing on his left side, for now.
“They are you divided into two parts - neither is wholly like you, but both have promised to be more than meets the eye. Especially him,” she nuzzles the top of Famine’s sad head, knowing that his father cannot see the things that she has seen on the Mountain. Fangs, the undead appearance, and the queer ability to disappear and reappear like magic incarnate - Pollock cannot see these things, but in time, they’ll make themselves apparent as the lopsidedness of their wings have. “They may not be able to induce fear like you but they will have other talents, other uses.” He is quiet, contemplative even, and she is gravid with pride (and the next in their bloodline) as she looks on.
Her lips touch the top of the first colt’s head - he is the larger, the more hale of the two.
“Feast.” for he is that, hunger and meat and he will be the end of many.
Her lips descend upon the second colt’s head - he is smaller, thinner, clearly sick but no less adored for it.
“Famine.” for he is as much that as his sibling is the fat meal on the table, he is scarce and malnourished in flesh only.
“Fitting, is it not?” she soothes the curls of growing mane trying to straggle down Famine’s neck.
It is clear that he is her favorite because he requires more attention whereas Feast does not, nor does he suffer because of it. That one even moves to his brother’s side beneath the grim black gaze of their father, as if in challenge of him in some small way. All of them know that Sinew would not allow the stallion to end the colt’s life - that is nature, but she is having none of it and they all know it, can see it in the wildness in her own bright black eyes (ripe in dream and fever, but she saw things in Time’s bowels that cannot be unseen and the single thing that she fears, still hunts - haunts - her).