Golden Plains

She tries, young mai, to show her love, to prove she cares. But somewhere she’d lost the love for her mother. Somewhere, in protecting the broken mare from the world, in keeping her safe for anything that would harm her, mai had lost the childish love that all children have for their parents. Nor did she dislike the older mare; the emotion in her heart was neither love nor hate.

Usually, the young mare is strong, is tough. She is normally fierce, with fire in her eyes. But when others ask of her mother, for some reason the spirit in the daughter leaves her, and she is no more than a little girl again, almost as helpless as emmie herself. When she speaks the daughter’s voice is cheerless, and her eyes star down at her own feet. “She’s broken,” the daughter says, by way of explanation, and her voice cracks, like a child about to cry. “she’s always been like this, she’s never been right.” Here the daughter pauses, and when she speaks again all the emotions that had threatened to burst earlier are hidden in that same dull monotone. “She doesn’t talk, so you don’t have to speak to her or anything.” Here, mai tries to smile, but the gesture is out of practice. "I know you wouldn't hurt her, but she's.. she just doesn't understand."

In truth, emmie had once been young, whole. She’d loved and laughed, been my starchild, my emmie, the one who knew only of the goodness in the world. But those days were long ago, before mai and the events of her conception and birth. Those were the days before heartbreak, before pain and suffering, before emmie’s love-filled world had fallen in shards around her. Now she looks but does not see, hears but does not listen, feels her own pain and heartbreak, her only comfort is her daughter beside her.

The young mare reaches out to her mother, taking a step forward and pressing her face against the older mare’s neck, though the gesture is cold, and for once it is the mother who flinches, backing away from the touch, wide eyes still focused upon the stallion. The mother makes little noises in her throat, like tiny whimpers to herself. The daughter again tries to embrace her mother in the same unfeeling way, and again the older mare backs away, eyes filled with fear.

With a snort the young mare turns from the mother, stepping away form the shivering mare to stand near evander, and when she next speaks her voice is cold, with just a hint of the little girl in it. “Sometimes, I think I hate her.” The daughter cannot look him in the eyes, and refuses to even glance to where she’d left the mother standing alone. She doesn’t have the courage to say it, to admit it to him let alone herself; but though sometimes she feels such disdain for the mother, sometimes, deep in her heart, she hopes emmie could be whole again, could be fixed of heart break and sorrow.

The mother, shivering with fear and cold, shuffles over to her daughter, pressing herself to the young mare’s side, head low. Every few moments she would give a fearful glance to the night-colored stallion, as if she’d never seen him before, as if evander were some sort of threat. Yet being so close to her daughter seems to give the older mare courage, for she reaches out the dark stallion, wide nostrils breathing in his scent.

“Ignore her,” the daughter mumbles to him, then snaps at the mother before continuing, “It’s just easier that way. My mother--Emmie’s... strange, so just disregard the things she does.”

emmie & mai