07-29-2016, 09:23 PM
The tundra is vast and white, and from where she stands up in the mountain, the trees scatter like dark constellations against the snow. There are birds in this sky, though they come far and few in-between, and she thinks she can see the glimmer of frost where it melts from the feathers on their backs. This must be why they choose not to come so far north. There are hardly any animals this far up, though occasionally she saw the flash of a thick white tail as a fox disappeared into a pile of snow and stone beneath one of the pines. She knew there must be others, bears or wolves, but none had ever ventured through the narrow gate to be trapped within the ice walls. Perhaps this kingdom felt like a prison to those who didn’t know any better, like being swallowed by a mouth ringed in ice teeth. For Australis though, it was home, it always had been- and she had never let these walls do anything more than protect her.
For a moment the bay girl thinks about slipping away to visit Sunder and Gold again. Though she was technically their niece, they had all been born around the same time. They met during one of Isle’s visits back to the forests surrounding the Chamber, back to visit Oksana and Makai, and Australis had taken an immediate liking to the black sabino colt. Though admittedly his sister was obnoxiously aloof, and for the most part seemed to disappear when Australis came around, she had taken to slipping out of the Tundra to visit as often as she could without her parents taking too much of a notice. She wasn’t entirely sure they would’ve stopped her, but she also wasn’t willing to find out. Lately it seemed like her parents were always on edge, Isle with little Eione nursing at her side, and Offspring with the ghosts he had carried home with him from wherever he had earned all those wounds. Leaving now felt a little too much like poking deliberate holes in the fabric of whatever was holding her family together still.
So with a sigh she shakes her head and stays, smiling a little when the bone snowflake bounced against the bay dapples of her dark neck. Sunder had made it for her, for the not-so-little tundra princess, taking a sun-bleached piece of bone and twisting it into her mane into the shape of a snowflake as unique as she was. It was a gift she loved, and she enjoyed the weight of it against her skin.
Carefully, the bay sabino mare picks her way along a narrow trail worn down by days and days of use from her own hooves. It had been awkward at first to come up here, awkward as a child until she had grown into her body. She wasn’t delicate like her mother, crafted from willow and sinew, nor was she quite as large as her father, built for war and battle. Australis fell somewhere in between, with legs that were solid with heavy white feathers, and a thick mane and tail that hinted at her draft heritage. But her body was long and slender in a way that made her look perpetually young, trapped just beyond gangly childhood. If she was beautiful, it was only in the way that wild things are.
There is a sound from up ahead on the trail and her dark ears flick forward curiously. But the wind is at her back, tangling fingers in the rope of her mane, and she cannot discern who it might be without a scent in the air. So instead she slows to a halt, her dark eyes brown and bright and wild beneath the silk of her forelock.
For a moment the bay girl thinks about slipping away to visit Sunder and Gold again. Though she was technically their niece, they had all been born around the same time. They met during one of Isle’s visits back to the forests surrounding the Chamber, back to visit Oksana and Makai, and Australis had taken an immediate liking to the black sabino colt. Though admittedly his sister was obnoxiously aloof, and for the most part seemed to disappear when Australis came around, she had taken to slipping out of the Tundra to visit as often as she could without her parents taking too much of a notice. She wasn’t entirely sure they would’ve stopped her, but she also wasn’t willing to find out. Lately it seemed like her parents were always on edge, Isle with little Eione nursing at her side, and Offspring with the ghosts he had carried home with him from wherever he had earned all those wounds. Leaving now felt a little too much like poking deliberate holes in the fabric of whatever was holding her family together still.
So with a sigh she shakes her head and stays, smiling a little when the bone snowflake bounced against the bay dapples of her dark neck. Sunder had made it for her, for the not-so-little tundra princess, taking a sun-bleached piece of bone and twisting it into her mane into the shape of a snowflake as unique as she was. It was a gift she loved, and she enjoyed the weight of it against her skin.
Carefully, the bay sabino mare picks her way along a narrow trail worn down by days and days of use from her own hooves. It had been awkward at first to come up here, awkward as a child until she had grown into her body. She wasn’t delicate like her mother, crafted from willow and sinew, nor was she quite as large as her father, built for war and battle. Australis fell somewhere in between, with legs that were solid with heavy white feathers, and a thick mane and tail that hinted at her draft heritage. But her body was long and slender in a way that made her look perpetually young, trapped just beyond gangly childhood. If she was beautiful, it was only in the way that wild things are.
There is a sound from up ahead on the trail and her dark ears flick forward curiously. But the wind is at her back, tangling fingers in the rope of her mane, and she cannot discern who it might be without a scent in the air. So instead she slows to a halt, her dark eyes brown and bright and wild beneath the silk of her forelock.