Posted on November 21, 2020 at 08:23:11 AM by Nzingha
hapo ambao asaa  Darkness. Ruin. Death. It had found them on the Shore - a calamity worse than the storm that the herd had faced over a year ago. Because when the heavens had split open and the sea had grasped for them, they’d stood together. United in the devotion they shared for their Warrior-Queen, and inspired by her strength. Now, Xiomara was gone, and the shaman could feel the bonds of their tribe beginning to splinter apart like sun-bleached driftwood. Their only hope had laid in holding faith to one another, but - it was the boy, the boy who had done this. The cursed child who was death born of death, an act so profane that Nzingha shuddered to think of it. What had her Queen done? Fritjof, his name is Fritjof. The spirit-speaker sought to remind herself. To remember his humanity, fleeting though it would inevitably be. When a woman such as herself or Xiomara conceived, there were only two possibilities for the child. They would either die before their first breaths, as the one who carried them had before their own birth. Or they would be saved, but not by a spirit of benevolence such as the one who’d spared Nzingha. Only evil would dare to defy death twice. Only evil could believe that something so twisted might bear a purpose - and that purpose was ruin. Once - before she had come to the islands - the shaman had been called upon for the grim duty of disposing of such a child. But Fritjof… he was the son of her Queen, the living blood and heir of the great Xiomara. And - pacing further down the beach than she’d ever vnetured - Nzingha knew she could not bring herself to harm him, not even for the purpose of sparing the rest. If the blue roan mare returned, then her wrath would be terrible to behold. And if she didn’t - was it not better to let the islands hold on to a single piece of her, even if that piece was cursed? In response to an unheard voice, her curved ears twitched - and then flattened against her skull. “Yes, they will die,” the shaman confirmed irritably, her white tail slashing impatiently through the air. “But only if they stay. I will tell them - I will help them see. I will convince them that is the best way,” she continued. And then, her voice dropping to a barely-audible whisper, “-the only way. Don’t ask me to do this, spirits. I have served you in many things, but in this - in this, I cannot.” Nzingha would not know - in that moment, at least - whether or not they would have asked her. Because in the next instant, the silence that enabled her to hear them was broken by an unfamiliar voice. Starting, the dark Marwari looked up into the eyes of another shadow. “Faolain?” The shaman echoed uncertainty, her skull-marked head tilting perceptibly to one side. It was not a word that she knew in her language or the island tongue, but perhaps this woman was as much an outsider here as she was. Her pure white coat - marred only by an odd patch of color that encircled her left shoulder and crept up towards her withers and neck - was certainly different than anything Nzingha had ever seen before. And where signs such as this were found, the spirits often spoke with a new and stronger voice. But there was blood. Blood and searching eyes, and a vague uncertainty that filled her suddenly-empty lungs. “You - what do you know of the darkness?” Nzingha demanded, one hoof clawing a furrow in the sand. “What do you know of these islands, and their fate?” Perhaps it would have been wiser for her to turn and go. But sometimes... sometimes, even darkness could provide answers. If the right questions were asked. NzinghA mare . eight . black sabino overo . marwari . 16.0hh  |
Replies:
- pay heed the squall - By charybdis November 24, 2020 at 09:36:48 AM
- kufa ni yetu sabili - By Nzingha November 25, 2020 at 09:32:59 AM
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