róisín

Compared to the two, well-seasoned mares at her side, Róisín felt very small and very young. Their memories and experiences vastly outweighed her own eagerness, and she felt suitably humbled. It was a strange feeling for the girl, who had grown up as the oldest child in a veritable sea of other children. Bossiness came second nature to her, but humbleness? Not so much.

It surprises her to see that neither of them are as shocked by what she had shared as she had been. In truth, learning that the Peak women also casually imprisoned others for the sake of their own gains had (and continued to) shake her faith in the Peak itself. For so long, the Peak had stood for something pure, and good, and strong in her mind. To see that vision tarnished, even slightly, made her begin to question her whole reason for being here.

The young dun listens raptly as Bane goes on to tell her stories, and eagerly laps up all the information that she had shared. She shares of a time in which mares could not lead herds, which seems so radically wrong to the girl that she cannot help but shake her head. She'd spent nearly all of her life under the peaceful rule of Faolain and Rivaini, who had proven to be both more stable and kind than any of their surrounding neighbors.

However, as the champagne mare's conversation turns into discussions of family, Róisín finds herself growing still and uncomfortable. Most of the names that Bane had mentioned were from so long ago that Rói had never heard of them… and she couldn't help but notice that Bane did not name the Lagoon leader that she was related to. Given the fact that Cullen had been a villain from before Rói was even born, and she suddenly found herself suspicious of the champagne mare. It seemed rude to ask, and so she lapsed into a thoughtful silence as Oswin took her turn next.

Her discomfort is short-lived, as she is soon equally drawn into Oswin's stories of the times from before. However, as she describes her time as a ranked member of the Peak, Rói's faith in her begins to fade. The back and forth scheming that she describes is the same sort of underhanded and despicable behavior that she'd always attributed to the Lagoon - not to the sisters of the Peak. Again, her fantasy version of the Peak grows a little darker, and a little more tarnished and she frowns.

Even as Oswin goes on to smooth things over with a vow to make sure no one was oppressed by mare or stallion, the dun girl cannot get Oswin's casual phrase out of her head: I took my friend captive. She'd said it so nonchalantly - as if kidnapping your friends and locking them in place was a normal thing to do. As if it was expected and okay.

Róisín wasn't sure how to answer the golden mare's proclamation, but she could feel the weight of her silence hanging heavy over her shoulders. If she said nothing, wasn't she only allowing herself to be complicit?

"I will admit," she says haltingly, glancing between the two mares while trying to ignore the self-doubt that screamed at her to take the words back before she said them. "The more I learn of the Peak, the more similar we sound to the Lagoon." Her lips twist into a frown as her gaze skips over both of them and then outward, much like Oswin's. "And I grew up fearing the Lagoon… not because they were just, or because their cause was good, or even entirely because they were strong or mean or vicious... We feared them because they wielded their version of justice as if it was righteous… and I'm guessing they felt it was righteous because all of their brethren told them that it was."

And then more quietly, but no less firmly, she continued. "I wonder how many times the sisters have told each other that a cause was just, when no one else felt the same."

Uncomfortable with her own words, Roi's coat jitters as if shooing away a fly, and she lifts her mood to stop things from becoming so dour. "I know I am new, and young," she chuckled softly, her tail dancing across her hindquarters. "But I grew up with my father's stories of the warrior women of the Peak, and I grew up wanting to be like them." Seriousness did not fit easily onto the bubbly girl's face but it rested there now as she looked between them again. "I still want to be like them." Pushing a smile onto her lips that was just as genuine as it was hesitant, she summed up her patchwork thoughts. "So what are our next steps? Beyond our meeting, of course," she says in reference to Oswin, her gaze darting back to her.

mare . 3 . mutt . dun sabino . 14.3 hh . björn x siobhan . love

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