08-25-2020, 10:02 AM
She can feel the change in the air when Beryl leaves. Lilliana deflates and falls against her as if the star-marked palomino was the only thing holding her strings tight, and Neverwhere keeps her silence, keeps her worries close and unspoken while Lilli grieves. What good is it to say anything? She can predict the future no better than her friend, and it's only a difference in nature that has made it seem as if she can. It's only Neverwhere's habit of introversion and distrust, of following her instincts, and the minute she stopped? Everything fell apart for her, too.
But perhaps it's easier to accept the destruction of everything when you've done no work to get where you are. Nerine means so much to Eurwen, and no wonder. She's worked so hard to protect it, spent years in silent service of it. Taiga means so much to Lilliana, and that is a small mystery to Neverwhere, except that she thinks Lilli's heart is big enough to swallow the world. Or, at least, it's big enough to try, splitting itself at the seams in the process. Perhaps that is why Neverwhere's scars don't bother her (she has never been beautiful, why start now?) but the scars and fatigue that dull the chestnut hugged tight to her side make her furious.
She returns the embrace, burying her muzzle in the thick red mane still full of witch-knots and red sand, and bares her livid teeth where Lilli cannot see. What can they do? I'll kill him, she thinks angrily, knowing full well that there is nothing she can do alone. She is less able to hide the edge in her voice.
"You're already home, Lilli. Taiga can wait." The Taiga still has Izora Lethia there to lead it, and Lilli's boys will be safer in Nerine, anyway. Lilli is safer in Nerine, "Stay here where Brennen can protect you, at least until you're stronger."
Can there be two of you? Lilli asks, and that elicits a laugh that breaks through the sharp anger in her chest. Why stop at two? The air wavers for a moment around them, shimmering strangely like the horizon on a hot day, and then there are two more dappled frowning mares. They stand strangely at first, as though embracing something invisible, but quickly pull themselves back to a normal stance and turn to look at Lilli.
And then, the air shivers again and Lilli, battered and torn, is standing between the dappled duplicates, peering back at Neverwhere and Lilliana. She is identical down to the torn flame flickering like gold foil on the Guardian's shoulder, but she does not know how to behave like Lilliana because Neverwhere does not know how to behave like Lilliana, and so this strange duplicate watches them frowning, her ears half-cocked and skeptical. Neverwhere returns the expression.
"I don't think that will fool anybody, do you?" And as she speaks, she pulls away from the Truth to study the Lie, reaching out with her muzzle to touch it to the soft grey nose.
It's a mistake to touch her.
Memory floods her. Her own memories - because the duplicate cannot have Lilliana's though it somehow has her magic. Neverwhere freezes and the other duplicates disappear, but the scarlet one remains, locked nose-to-nose like an electric pulse is coursing between them. Disjointed, uncontrolled, they come one after the other without pause.
A colt screams, his wing dislocates - Wolves howl in the woods - A porcelain-white mare wearing purple blooms remembers being a tree - the warmth of her dam's chocolate side - that same side melting into the rough bark of a tree in the forest and the scent of Neverwhere's own blood, crimson and bright as berries in the snow--
Neverwhere squeals and jerks away, striking out at the false Lilli with rolling eyes and falls back to the real one, banishing the duplicate back to nothingness. Sweat darkens her neck.
"What the hell was that? Lilli? Did you do something to it?"
But perhaps it's easier to accept the destruction of everything when you've done no work to get where you are. Nerine means so much to Eurwen, and no wonder. She's worked so hard to protect it, spent years in silent service of it. Taiga means so much to Lilliana, and that is a small mystery to Neverwhere, except that she thinks Lilli's heart is big enough to swallow the world. Or, at least, it's big enough to try, splitting itself at the seams in the process. Perhaps that is why Neverwhere's scars don't bother her (she has never been beautiful, why start now?) but the scars and fatigue that dull the chestnut hugged tight to her side make her furious.
She returns the embrace, burying her muzzle in the thick red mane still full of witch-knots and red sand, and bares her livid teeth where Lilli cannot see. What can they do? I'll kill him, she thinks angrily, knowing full well that there is nothing she can do alone. She is less able to hide the edge in her voice.
"You're already home, Lilli. Taiga can wait." The Taiga still has Izora Lethia there to lead it, and Lilli's boys will be safer in Nerine, anyway. Lilli is safer in Nerine, "Stay here where Brennen can protect you, at least until you're stronger."
Can there be two of you? Lilli asks, and that elicits a laugh that breaks through the sharp anger in her chest. Why stop at two? The air wavers for a moment around them, shimmering strangely like the horizon on a hot day, and then there are two more dappled frowning mares. They stand strangely at first, as though embracing something invisible, but quickly pull themselves back to a normal stance and turn to look at Lilli.
And then, the air shivers again and Lilli, battered and torn, is standing between the dappled duplicates, peering back at Neverwhere and Lilliana. She is identical down to the torn flame flickering like gold foil on the Guardian's shoulder, but she does not know how to behave like Lilliana because Neverwhere does not know how to behave like Lilliana, and so this strange duplicate watches them frowning, her ears half-cocked and skeptical. Neverwhere returns the expression.
"I don't think that will fool anybody, do you?" And as she speaks, she pulls away from the Truth to study the Lie, reaching out with her muzzle to touch it to the soft grey nose.
It's a mistake to touch her.
Memory floods her. Her own memories - because the duplicate cannot have Lilliana's though it somehow has her magic. Neverwhere freezes and the other duplicates disappear, but the scarlet one remains, locked nose-to-nose like an electric pulse is coursing between them. Disjointed, uncontrolled, they come one after the other without pause.
A colt screams, his wing dislocates - Wolves howl in the woods - A porcelain-white mare wearing purple blooms remembers being a tree - the warmth of her dam's chocolate side - that same side melting into the rough bark of a tree in the forest and the scent of Neverwhere's own blood, crimson and bright as berries in the snow--
Neverwhere squeals and jerks away, striking out at the false Lilli with rolling eyes and falls back to the real one, banishing the duplicate back to nothingness. Sweat darkens her neck.
"What the hell was that? Lilli? Did you do something to it?"
@[lilliana]
