Mom might be right - any

[Offspring]

something has been taken from deep inside of me;
the secret I've kept locked away no one can ever see.

  As he spares a glance towards the mirror image of himself (though smaller, weaker than he – she was youthful, after all, and naïve), with a trickling of blood traversing the long plane of his broad face, his searing eyes burn into her. The fire inside of him is burning brightly, attempting to seep out through his skin (and it does, but only slightly – a flicker of flame, illuminating the feathering at the base of his thick, heavily muscled legs with fire), and it leaves his chest with a deep, dark ache – so deep, it may as well be his heart bleeding out from within, pouring hot, blistering magma – or so it felt.

  The surge of heat exerted to aid in the healing of her would does not come without a price, however – and he is tired, weary, and worn. The fire is something he so often suppresses, and it is both mentally and physically wearing on him to wield it – though it is mostly the mental back-and-forth that stirs fatigue within. When the unusual creature beside him begins to weep, his heart clenches, wanting to comfort or console her, but not knowing how – after all, it had been he who caused the blistering welt along her side, where soon her wound would heal – even though it had not been him who had caused the wound to begin with.

  And then, Jinju moves forward, placing herself in between he and her mother, snarling at him. His gaze darkens, boring into her own with indiscernible emotion, but he is too tired for the fire to flare up within – and he is grateful for it, because the rolling sensation of bitterness is nearly too difficult to contain, and he knew that if it were not for the fatigue, he would burn her very flesh in that moment.

  ”If it were not for me, your mother would be little else but a bleeding, dying pile of bones on the forest floor,” he growls through bared, yellowed teeth, his upper lip curled. ”do not mistake the power my bloodline has given you for strength, Jinju. You stood by and did nothing when you could have helped her yourself. Do not be so mistrusting.”
   
  There is a stillness of silence as the antlers seemingly vanish, drawing back into her body as if they had been constructed from her own tissue and tender bone, and though blood is still splayed across her ashen skin, she is some semblance of herself – though he knew little of what she was, or much of who she was before falling into a delirium of heartache and sorrow. For a moment, his eye catches her – a searing red, with a deep green, and she breathes a few gasping words of gratitude, before pressing into her daughter’s embrace.

  I owe you a life debt, she murmurs, but he says nothing at all – she owes him nothing, and perhaps she already knows that, but he knew too well how magic might become useful – as would an alliance.

  He does not say another word – only a brief nod, and a wayward glance towards his estranged daughter (by blood alone, it seemed – she was nothing like him), before his dark figure immerses itself within the shadow of the thicket, disappearing – and then he is gone.

wounds so deep they never show; they never go away.
like moving pictures in my head, for years and years they've played.

Offspring

Grumpy Offy - blame the whole fire consuming him thing. :| Bad temper right now.
He's no longer active in the thread. Carry on.