Falls
Force-claiming is not allowed here. This is a peaceful, neutral area meant for socialising.
Posted on April 29, 2015 at 00:54:00 AM by Silver
 incomplete without you When Dogun had told her the truth of her son's absence, grief had gathered in Silver's heart, turning her warm blood gelid in her veins. The cold of Tinuvel had filled her, frozen her, until the white mare had felt as if another blow, another loss, another betrayal could shatter her into crystalline shards. How could you? She had wanted to shout at the Pony King, to strike him. He was my son, and you traded his freedom to atone for your failure. But her tongue had turned rigid, and her lips numb; Silver could not say the words that lingered in the shadows of her mind. She could only turn on legs that were wooden where only moments ago they'd been weak. She could only walk away, carrying the twin burdens of her sorrow and silence with her into the sea as she left the Inlet forever. Winter was exhaling its last icy breaths when the white mare washed up on the Crossing. Both pregnancy and age had taken their toll on her body; Silver's joints were aching and arthritic, and - with the exception of her gravid belly - she was little more than pale skin stretched over bones. But the blizzard was not the first storm she'd weathered, and it would not be the last. Broken-down as she might appear, the old woman's will - and core - were made of adamant. With quiet determination, Silver clung to life, finding strength and purpose in the restless movements of her unborn foal. But she feared the imminent arrival of the child as well. Will I be able to find love for him? Silver often wondered as she stood beneath the shelter of a weeping willow, her vision filled with the memory of the man who was this child's father. Or will raising this child be an act of duty? It was Olaf's forceful presence she remembered more than his face; how the weight of him had nearly buckled her legs, how his teeth had raked over the skin of her neck. At least she had loved Bastian's father, if only briefly; the colt had been her last tenuous hold to that happiness. Olaf had not been brutal, but neither had he been gentle; he had simply been there, a wall of warm, unyielding flesh and a scattering of seed planted in her belly. But she needn't have worried. If anything, Silver loved her daughter more. With neither family nor friends to share her heart, it was given entirely over to the golden filly from the moment of her birth. But there was a strange melancholy to their bond as well; the white mare could not forget the child that she had lost, and often wondered whether she should seek him out. But Silver was terrified to let Olive out of her sight, or to lead her too close to the Lagoon - lest the filly be stolen from her side as well. Torn between son and daughter, the pale mare could only compromise by lingering on the Crossing - for there, at least, it was possible that Bastian might find her. Slim chance though it might be, it was the last sliver of hope she had to hold on to, and she could not let it go. Then it happened. The deer trail was so slender that the draft mare and her weanling child could not stand abreast, so Silver urged Olive ahead, guiding her through the twists and turns of the path by touching her muzzle to either the left or right side of the filly's flanks. The whisper of the Falls was just turning into a dim roar when they turned a sharp bend and almost collided with a young stallion. The musk of countless other men clung to his auburn coat, unpleasant and overpowering in these close quarters. A bachelor. Silver's ears immediately flattened, and her lips lifted in warning; with Olive standing between them, threats were the most she could offer. The bachelor stumbled backwards, his burly body clumsy in an achingly familiar way. For a heartbeat, their eyes met - eyes that were precisely the same deep shade of brown. "Bastian?" Silver breathed. The bay stallion froze, his body tensing like a bird poised for flight. It was then that the old mare saw the pale scars scattered across the boy's once-perfect coat, and her heart twisted in her chest. "What have they done to you?" She whispered, pressing her muzzle into the pucker of a half-healed wound on his shoulder and tasting the salt of tears on her tongue. |
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