She can see the weight of the world as it settles upon the youthful shoulders of Ruth and Lilliana takes a stride of purpose forward, not willing to let it linger there. It isn’t her weight to carry. This is all Lilli’s fault - if she had just listened to Neverwhere, if she had just left Taiga behind, maybe the events that came after would have played out differently.
But that thought wraps around her heart much like his tentacles had.
It rips through her and tears away every certainty she once had (friend her determined mind had once called him, what she had tried to describe him as to the Queen of the North.)
There is a flash of pain behind her blue eyes as @[Ruthless] looks to her stomach, something that has made Lilliana more conscious of late. If it were anyone else, the copper mare might have found a smile and managed a laugh from somewhere but her sunshine nature is hidden behind a cloud of judgment that she imagines must be building behind the hazel gaze of the younger mare. Perhaps her own shoulders should sag, perhaps the weight of everything that has happened should make Lilli falter under the pressure of Ruth’s rage.
Perhaps things would be so much easier for Lilliana if she knew how to fall apart.
Her heart twists and her chest tightens to see the anger there - the way that it fires against the chill of a brisk winter day in Nerine. Lilliana can feel it and it fuels her final steps as she comes to stop in front of the pegasus mare. Her face traces the lines that have formed on the tired face of Ruthless and the crimson mare gently exhales, releasing a breath she hadn’t known she had been cradling in her chest. "It’s alright,” she says gently, though it isn't. There is a part of her that has been lost in all this madness and she doesn’t know if there is any salvaging the last remnants of the dreamer she had been.
She had to grow up at some point, didn’t she? At some point, the dreams, the stars, the wind and its secrets… all of that had to come to an end.
Lilliana reaches over the neck of the golden girl and pulls her close. It is perhaps Lilli’s greatest flaw - the one she has always been so acutely aware of - and yet when she holds the girl close to her like this, Lilli knows she would do it all again if it meant keeping her safe. She would sell her soul a thousand times over and do so gladly if it meant keeping the darkness away from the shining pegasus. The mare from Murmuring Rivers harbors many regrets but doing what she had (what she thought was keeping Ruth safe) will never be one of them.
A frown forms when the girl asks if she has told anyone - if anyone knows anything out of the horses who had been there that day - and her heart twists again. "Some in Nerine do,” she admits, thinking back to the day that she had realized her boys had family here - that Brazen and Eurwen were an aunt and cousin of sorts to them.
"Ruth,” she tries again but what can she say? Her mind is blurred with a fog of words, of unspoken accusations and words that try to bind Lilliana into a single one. She has always refused that and does so now - "what happened that day…,” she continues, ”don’t carry it with you. The moment we let darkness stain us is when the light dims.”
The copper mare has to be careful with this - the light is just as likely to blind as the dark is prone to make one stumble. They are both needed to some degree to balance the other.
"I didn’t think he’d hurt you,” Lilli finally offers, choking out the darkness from her thoughts. She had never thought he’d hurt anyone. But then that has always been her problem regarding the former Commandant - she had never thought it through. Not until the day with Brennen and Jesper, when it had been too late and Neverwhere admitted that the striped stallion wasn’t well. It had come into the focus then - the realization that the insanity she had felt was just that.
Madness.
And it had carried over that day in the Field, spilled chaos in abundance that not only affected Lilliana but Fiorina and Ruth as well. "I’m sorry.”
But that thought wraps around her heart much like his tentacles had.
It rips through her and tears away every certainty she once had (friend her determined mind had once called him, what she had tried to describe him as to the Queen of the North.)
There is a flash of pain behind her blue eyes as @[Ruthless] looks to her stomach, something that has made Lilliana more conscious of late. If it were anyone else, the copper mare might have found a smile and managed a laugh from somewhere but her sunshine nature is hidden behind a cloud of judgment that she imagines must be building behind the hazel gaze of the younger mare. Perhaps her own shoulders should sag, perhaps the weight of everything that has happened should make Lilli falter under the pressure of Ruth’s rage.
Perhaps things would be so much easier for Lilliana if she knew how to fall apart.
Her heart twists and her chest tightens to see the anger there - the way that it fires against the chill of a brisk winter day in Nerine. Lilliana can feel it and it fuels her final steps as she comes to stop in front of the pegasus mare. Her face traces the lines that have formed on the tired face of Ruthless and the crimson mare gently exhales, releasing a breath she hadn’t known she had been cradling in her chest. "It’s alright,” she says gently, though it isn't. There is a part of her that has been lost in all this madness and she doesn’t know if there is any salvaging the last remnants of the dreamer she had been.
She had to grow up at some point, didn’t she? At some point, the dreams, the stars, the wind and its secrets… all of that had to come to an end.
Lilliana reaches over the neck of the golden girl and pulls her close. It is perhaps Lilli’s greatest flaw - the one she has always been so acutely aware of - and yet when she holds the girl close to her like this, Lilli knows she would do it all again if it meant keeping her safe. She would sell her soul a thousand times over and do so gladly if it meant keeping the darkness away from the shining pegasus. The mare from Murmuring Rivers harbors many regrets but doing what she had (what she thought was keeping Ruth safe) will never be one of them.
A frown forms when the girl asks if she has told anyone - if anyone knows anything out of the horses who had been there that day - and her heart twists again. "Some in Nerine do,” she admits, thinking back to the day that she had realized her boys had family here - that Brazen and Eurwen were an aunt and cousin of sorts to them.
"Ruth,” she tries again but what can she say? Her mind is blurred with a fog of words, of unspoken accusations and words that try to bind Lilliana into a single one. She has always refused that and does so now - "what happened that day…,” she continues, ”don’t carry it with you. The moment we let darkness stain us is when the light dims.”
The copper mare has to be careful with this - the light is just as likely to blind as the dark is prone to make one stumble. They are both needed to some degree to balance the other.
"I didn’t think he’d hurt you,” Lilli finally offers, choking out the darkness from her thoughts. She had never thought he’d hurt anyone. But then that has always been her problem regarding the former Commandant - she had never thought it through. Not until the day with Brennen and Jesper, when it had been too late and Neverwhere admitted that the striped stallion wasn’t well. It had come into the focus then - the realization that the insanity she had felt was just that.
Madness.
And it had carried over that day in the Field, spilled chaos in abundance that not only affected Lilliana but Fiorina and Ruth as well. "I’m sorry.”
LILLIANA
i met your demons but they do not scare me
(they will be angels once they learn to fly)
but it's all in the past, love
it's all gone with the wind