Too many shadows to live under. Encelia’s brown eyes softened. She held herself back from nodding in agreement again, although she nearly did. With the likes of her much louder, bolder, fiercer sisters and her prolific, mare-gathering brothers, Encelia had always felt as though she lurked in the shadows of her far more successful siblings. Even Kharin, an entire year younger than she was, seemed already destined to do something of greatness. Encelia did not want to hate her brother for being better than her, but a part of her sort of did.
It was because mother loved him from the start. It was because he never had to question his worth, or beg for even a scrap of affection.
Canis turned the question to her and Encelia blinked, pulling herself from her morose thoughts and meeting his eyes. “Oh, I don’t know,” she said, but her tone was thoughtful. She glanced off for a moment as she thought of walking back into the ocean, swimming back to Salem, and waking up in the Badlands again. She thought about the way she’d walk slowly around her birth-home, find nothing of note, be nothing of note, again, and again, and again, day, after day, after day. Encelia swallowed back the indignant tightness that pulled at her throat.
“I don’t think I want to,” she confessed, and her eyes flew to meet him. They barely knew one another, but for some reason she anticipated judgment, though he’d given no sign of doing so yet. She was so rooted in believing that she did wrong, she couldn’t imagine someone encouraging the idea of her essentially running from home. “I’ve never felt like I belonged there,” she confessed further, heart beating a little faster. With fear? With excitement? Encelia wasn’t sure which it was.
But then, she sighed. “Although… there’s nowhere else I can go but back to the Badlands,” she admitted, “I don’t know anyone else but my family.”
Well, she knew Canis now, but despite their growing understanding of one another, Encelia would never guess he would want her company badly enough to have her stay with him. She was absolutely certain he’d sigh and agree, wish her well and send her on her way. He had no other obligation elsewise, after all. Her mind couldn’t wrap around the idea that he enjoyed her company and continue spending time in it.
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