"But the dream, the echo, slips from him as quickly as he had found it and as consciousness comes to him (a slap and not the gentle waves of oceanic tides), it dissolves entirely. His muscles relax as the cold claims him again, as the numbness sets in, and when his grey eyes open, there’s nothing but the faint after burn of a dream often trod and never remembered." --Brigade, written by Laura
all these voices in my head get loud
i wish that i could shut them out
i'm sorry that i let you down
Hyaline. In another life she might have been born here, or not. In that reality she likely would not have existed at all. Anath cannot know her distant and meaningless connection to this land, and it is unlikely any other will. She does not look like her dam and who would care anymore if she did? She is just an orphan of little worth or consequence.
The mountain valley appears around her bright and foreign in it's summer glory. Amazed, the girl feels at home at once even if she is not meant to. The sunlight that warms her small back a welcome all its own. She is too young to get the sense that she is little more than a Prince's pet, probably as easy to discard as a frog caught along the shore. Every new experience becomes Anath's idea of normal.
A vast expanse of green soft grass extends out around her little body. It's the largest space she has ever stood in and she unconsciously tugs a little sunlight down around herself. It is an ephemeral, twisting wave of light, warm and comforting over her back and then weaving about her little tricolored legs like a contented cat would. Trotting away from her arrival point until her feet sink into clover, Anath peers down toward the lake. Insects drift lazily between white blooms and her attention is soon drawn to these. The light she called to comfort herself breaks into a half dozen tendrils to chase and play with the little creatures. Pastel striped bees and white moths with stuttering wings are followed gently from bloom to bloom by the seeds of sunlight and the girl's warm green eyes.
anath
let you down
For Malik or any . I had to write this on my phone.
The news that Malik had adopted someone, especially a non-shifter, had not sat particularly well with Mazikeen. It had been annoying enough caring for just Malik and Bolder throughout the winter and now - though partially her fault - the number of wayward foals inside of Hyaline is growing beyond her tolerance level.
She had teased Gale about having eighteen children but she was thinking it would be spread over a hundred years or so. Not all at once. The fact that she did not have to care for this one, at least, helped - that was Malik’s problem and responsibility. And while Mazikeen had every intention of making her son be the one who kicked his new friend out when the time came, she cannot help the small bit of curiosity as she watches the bits of light dance away from the filly and across the wildflowers. Having a girl here just doesn’t seem fair after having to give up the only one she cared about, having Gale help Malik bring another one home further made the wound sting.
It’s difficult to puzzle out whether she actually cares anymore but the bitterness remains and it is not hard to focus it on this light-wielding creature, especially while her son is occupied elsewhere for now.
Mazikeen watches as an eagle perched on a tree some ways away before feeling motivated enough to approach. She lands, shifting into her horse-self - her twisting horns barely even seeming to glow in the light of day as she slowly walks towards the tri-coloured girl.
Her red-orange eyes are rare to blink as she stops a few strides away and she looks over the filly with a critical gaze. She had intended to at least pretend to be warm at first but her voice still sounds unimpressed. “So you are the pet my son brought home.”
08-14-2021, 06:49 PM (This post was last modified: 08-14-2021, 07:01 PM by Anath.)
all these voices in my head get loud
i wish that i could shut them out
i'm sorry that i let you down
The sound of Mazikeen's voice seems to call the wisps of sunlight back to Anath. The filly turns toward the mare quick but clumsy, surprised out of her play. She might be innocent of fear but her companion sunlight, now coalesced into just three warm translucent shapes, slithers over her little body in a quick anxious way. The light is conjured, not alive or independent of her but the absent way she moves it around her very young self could almost convince one otherwise.
"My name is Anath. Malik is my friend." What is a pet? She does not ask, just bites the inside of her lip and looks back at the white mare anxious but unflinching. Of course Malik must be the son she speaks of, she is grown and big like his father. Anath may not seem a clever thing but she is learning quickly, maybe not quickly enough for a girl in her situation.
As a child will, she shares an insecurity with this new adult. "I don't shift like him. He said maybe I can learn.” As inclined to hopefulness as the girl may be, she knows that this is unlikely. Her small ears flick to the side, disappointed. “I think I can only be this one shape, but I can do this." She ceases her words, calls more sunlight around herself so that the gold painted over her body glitters fuzzily. She makes it into horns like Mazikeen's, horns of eye-piercing, burning light and nothing else. Then she drops these, bends the light to make herself invisible in a flickering way, unpracticed. Despite this last poor execution, Anath is naturally gifted, manipulating the light as easily as she breathes.
Anath lets go of the last illusion and asks a careful question. “This is not as good?” She already guesses that these skills are not desirable as shifting. Anath was left behind for some reason, maybe it was this.
Of course Malik is her friend, her son has more of the original Gale in him than the two parents that have been raising him. It doesn’t bother her, how friendly and kind he seems to be - how sometimes it catches her off guard and brings memories of sweeter days and a future she had once dreamed of. These things do not make her sad as they once did, they cannot. That emotion had been purged from her as well as a handful of other useless ones that had only caused her pain in the past. A past she no longer feels any connection to at all.
Once, she would have been delighted by Anath’s display and her face would have lit up at the mimicry of her horns. But then, the Mazikeen that would have reacted like that would have adopted this tri-coloured girl and raised her as her own.
Now she sees the horns of lights and feels a bitter hatred for this girl who is not Sickle. Who is not the daughter she would like to see crowned with horns that match her own. She barely pays attention to the attempt at turning invisible, thinking instead at how it is past time that she retrieves what belongs to her.
Anath’s question returns Mazikeen’s attention to the present and her red-orange eyes focus on the girl with an intensity. “No.” Mazikeen states simply, neither soft nor harsh - answering as though it is a fact, watching for how this syllable settles on the girl. Will she be hurt by it? Will she argue? The ability to wield light is certainly a useful trait, and she wonders why Gale has not taken a piece of this filly’s heart yet to take it for himself.
She doesn’t ask that, though. Instead, another cruel question comes out, carried on a cool voice. “Why should we change the rules of this kingdom for you?”
08-15-2021, 12:34 PM (This post was last modified: 08-15-2021, 01:17 PM by Anath.)
all these voices in my head get loud
i wish that i could shut them out
i'm sorry that i let you down
It's just a single syllable, it should not mean so much. To many that word means nothing at all. For this small child it is the first hard cane to land across her back. It does not matter that she had already suspected that this was a lesser gift, are not all young ones eager to show off the new steps they take, the things they find their bodies and minds capable of? Now she knows that this is nothing to the way Malik changes his shape, of no consequence and she has made a fool of herself.
Anath does not know the word for humiliation, but she bares it, standing still and square before Mazikeen, her jaw tightening against the sting of cruelty. Her green eyes shine but she does not cry or challenge that single word.
The remaining light in her grasp glows small and dim upon her black and gold chest. Behind it there is an ache she will learn to ignore.
Coolly, Malik's mother speaks again and Anath is unsure how to answer her question. Her reply comes stumbling as she tries to reduce the offensiveness of it. "I don't know the-- I need to know the rules." Clearly she is in violation of them but does not know how. She is quick to understand that she is lesser, a lower creature than Malik. He is kinder than she realized, or maybe he really believes she can learn to be like him.
Anath knows she has asked for nothing, done nothing but play alone in the sun and show the white mare her light, are these things also wrong?
She should have asked the rules before. Couldn't she have been told her name and this? That there would be rules?
A sliver of respect appears for Anath for not crying, for standing her ground. It is not enough, of course, but it is something (she doesn't know what she would do with a crying child now, except want to wring its neck to make it stop). Mazikeen sighs when the girl says she doesn’t know the rules - the ones that she is breaking by continuing to breathe inside of these borders. Warmth doesn’t soften her tone, though it does change to one that is more matter-of-fact than cold. “Hyaline is a kingdom of shifters. There are only two who live here without this power but they have…” Speaking of Ryatah and Selaphiel is more difficult than it had been once, without the full depth of affection she had once felt for them. Pieces of it remain, or maybe this horned mare just dislikes going back on her word enough she is content to ignore their presence here. Mazikeen’s frown deepens in thought for a moment before she continues “They’ve proven themselves to be special, worthy of the rules bending for them.”
There is a small pause where she considers the filly before continuing. “Malik should have told you this before he brought you home. That is why he hopes you will learn how to shift. So you can stay.” Mazikeen’s mind is already drifting to her son and king, intending to find them soon to discuss this decision further.
She had been annoyed when she first found out - she had also assumed she wouldn’t care and there had been no way to anticipate how much seeing this unknown orphan girl here would hurt.
It is not fair to take her pain out on the young thing, of course, but Mazikeen doesn’t care about whether things are fair anymore.
Her next words are her version of kindness, her orange gaze drifting to the mountains that ring her home. “The snow will come soon and make travelling dangerous so you have until Spring to either be able to shift or give me an answer to my question. To make me believe you are special.” And here those fire-bright eyes focus back on Anath. “And if you can’t, you will leave.”
08-17-2021, 02:49 PM (This post was last modified: 08-17-2021, 02:53 PM by Anath.)
all these voices in my head get loud
i wish that i could shut them out
i'm sorry that i let you down
This is a kingdom of shifters, of only shifters beyond two exceptions to the rules. Two beings that are worthy.
She had not guessed that she, her entire self, was the violation. With turned back ears and fallen features she processes this, but says nothing in her own defense. Anath does not possess the razor sharp sense of fairness and justice that most children carry with them. That innate scale and balance that makes them stand up for themselves or others until an adult or life itself crushes it out of them. Her scale broke, tipped hard and stuck there, and it does not matter how she stands she cannot be weighed equally. Fair is whatever befalls her until she learns another way.
So even though Malik told her nothing, and Gale brought her up here, she is responsible for becoming worthy one way or another or being cast away. It will not be a bond with Malik or a fondness for the high valleys of Hyaline that make her pursue acceptance or tolerance. Anath cannot be left all alone again. She can fight it this time and will.
She has listened quietly, with a calm obedience that most do not display at her age. Grief and it's companions alter her features, for she is just a girl, her breathing quickening when her throat closes against emotion. Beyond this she makes no sound until she is given the time frame she will be allowed. Then she chokes out the words, forcing steadiness into them, though they still hitch a little.
"I understand. Can I ask two questions?" Anath's green eyes are bright, the gold in them sharp as she gazes up at the woman. She waits to be allowed her query, it looks like deference but truly she is trying to get her vocal cords to cooperate. "What is your name? And… and the names of the two, the worthy ones who do not shift?"
Mazikeen will know that she intends to seek these out, these worthy ones. She may have intended to set her on this path but Anath does not think so. Malik might try to help her, but his mother would not. " May I go?" She asks carefully, perhaps there is more she should know, but Anath wants to put distance between herself and the Queen.
Anath does not argue, does not cry out at the injustice, and Mazikeen isn’t sure whether she’s disappointed or relieved. She does not have the patience anymore to deal with a distraught child, nor any interest in pretending otherwise, so she supposes she appreciates the quiet way that Anath composes herself. It certainly spares the girl from immediately being considered as lunch, anyway.
A small nod comes as permission to voice the questions, though when they come they are not what she expects. Easy to answer, though. “I am Mazikeen, and the angels Ryatah and Selaphiel are the exceptions.” She didn’t have to mention the angel part, of course. Simply a hint to the young girl at where the bar was set. It might have once been affection that inspired Mazikeen to change the rules of their home for Selaphiel and any non-shifter children born here, but now the fact was that (as far as she was aware) everyone here was either a shifter or a powerful, ethereal creature.
Mazikeen blinks at the third, and likely final, question - breaking the intense focus of her eyes. It softens her scarred features slightly, the signal of the end of this interaction. She’s grateful Anath has no intention of lingering and she replies once more with a cool tone. “Yes. Come find me when you’re ready with an answer.”
@Anath just a short little reply since I think this is wrapping up! <3
. I had to write this on my phone. 
