[open] you're going home, you're rag and bone; any

[sochi]

there is a swelling storm and I'm caught up in the middle of it all
and it takes control of the person that I thought I was

It is difficult to shake the adrenaline that has begin to build in her bones.

It’s tough to abandon the natural instinct that rises like a wave within her, beating against her chest and tempting her to let loose, tempting her to give into the desire. She can feel the put of it, low and lingering, the desire to engage in more than conversation, to feel teeth against hide and the tearing of flesh. She is not a violent creature, but she is predator, and the chase awakens more within her than she cares to admit.

Still, the wolf that stands across from her does not strike her as intimidating or foe and so she leashes such desires, instead choosing to watch her with a careful, calculated gaze, her feline eyes sharp. “Both,” she answers, the syllable curt on her tongue. The truth was that she has no idea. She is rootless, floating in a land that is steeped with history and alliances and politics, and she still does not know where she belongs.

She doesn’t know if she’s meant to live this vagabond lifestyle with no connections. She doesn’t know if she’s meant to tie herself to a land, choosing to hand over her loyalty to the highest bidder.

She doesn’t know.

She doesn’t know.

It irritates her, and her lips rise in an unbidden snarl for a moment before she battens down the hatches on her emotions, wiping her features clean of them. She takes a deep breath before taking a step closer to the wolf, studying her expression, the dirt that stains her legs, the angular angles of her canine face.

“My name is Sochi,” she finally offers, letting it hang in the air between them before she finally shifts, shedding the tigress to embrace her equine form, deepening to obsidian and cerulean. She blinks quietly, the invitation for the other to do the same clear but the request never formally leaving her tongue.

sochi

it comes and goes in waves; it always does, it always does
we watch as our young hearts fade into the flood, into the flood