09-24-2020, 04:24 PM
Tornados from a butterfly's wing
At first all she could do was stare blankly at the coppery mare who approached. To pause with dizzy unawareness while her brain caught up with her eyes. Her black velvet lips parted several times before words finally came out, slow and tired.
"Auntie... Auntie, are you all right? Are you... You're bleeding..." There was more she wanted to say. There had to be words that would make it all better, that would heal the rift that had so suddenly crashed across them today. It was the red clotting blood on her aunt's leg though that absorbed her. Lilliana was never openly injured. Small cuts and scrapes, stings and bruises, they were easily swayed by her aunt's skills. Why was she still bleeding?
Others emerged from the mist. Faces she knew and loved, and had grown up with. It took effort to drag her eyes from the patch of muddy, bloody fur on Lilliana's leg. Effort, to meet Yan and Fetch's eyes, to look them over and catalog every mark on the chestnut's hide, to feel relief that her green and pink friend looked more or less untouched. To feel anything more than the cold, numb aches that had been sinking into her bones since the adrenaline had evaporated.
It was a shock, then, when their quiet gathering was interrupted by a bird-like creature, a mare who moved with a sharp suddeness that seemed unnatural on four legs. Ama could only gape for a moment, awe and horror choking her. That it was a brittle laugh that emerged next surprised her as much as anyone.
"Oh yes, asleep! If I'm asleep, then maybe this is a nightmare, and maybe when I really wake up my home won't be a burning wreck!" She shrilled, gasping for breath that refused to fill her chest completely. "Haven't you got anything better to do than gloat? Some other land to burn? Other horses to attack for no good reason?" Her words wavered, broke when she couldn't catch her breath. This was salt in the wound and Ama wasn't having it.
...Amarine