Falls

Fury seethed and bubbled in her blood with each step that she took further into the Peak. Her child, so impatient to enter the world, fought against the constricting prison it was encased in, battering her internal organs with a ferocity that far outsized their age. Each time, Vanya weathered the contraction with a low growl, her ears pinned flat against her poll as she stalked to somewhere more private than the open field they'd stood in while talking to the babe's father.

In truth, part of Vanya almost believed that was their sire's proximity that had made the child so impatient, and she resented the pull that Rougaru had even on their unborn. It was bad enough that Drogon admired him, but to have yet another child enamored of him would be more than she could bear. Especially with the way he'd looked at her as he left, as though she were no more than an object that he needed to possess.

He'd ceased to see her as the vixen that she was, reducing her to nothing more than a receptacle for the child she had not wanted and the frustration of this realization burrowed under her skin. How dare he think less of her for carrying his spawn. Viciously she kicked out at a tree stump, taking pleasure in the way her delicate hooves landed against the solid trunk. She could imagine it was Rougaru, could picture his smug, self-assured face in the branches. Again, and again she kicked out at the stump until a contraction mid-kick sent her crashing to her knees on the rocky ground.

She cried out angrily, the rage leaving a high pitched scream that whistled from between her teeth. Frustrated tears began to pour down her cheeks in salty trails that gathered beneath her chin. She placed her delicate dished face against the ground and groaned, her body quaking beneath the onslaught of her child's birth.

Each new contraction, new pain, new inconvenience continued to solidify her hatred for the parasite in her body. She hated that they existed. That they'd bloated her once beautiful physique. That even before birth, they had a strong connection to and a stronger pull on Rougaru than she did. She hated that they were coming so soon after her son. She hated that she faced yet another year of caring for a needy, whiny helpless creature.

By the time the filly lay delivered on the ground, she'd been subjected to a large amount of vicious name-calling and vitriol. Even as the roan mare resentfully tore away the sac from the face of her first and only daughter, there was no amount of maternal softening that could override the hatred she had for the child. Not even the foal's indignant bleat at her rough motions cracked the armor around Vanya's heart, and it was only out of her own self-preservation that she push the foal to rise unsteadily to her feet and nurse. "Get up, Vivienne," she groused, her voice harsh.

While the girl nursed, Vanya thought. If she allowed the child to die as she sorely wanted to, Rougaru would never stop coming after her. She would have no measure of safety against his attempts to retaliate, and no way to bargain her way back into his good graces. And yet, leaving the child at her side made her skin crawl with revulsion. It was as though the elegant mare had crammed every single mistake she'd made in the past year into the small foal's body, blaming it for each and every problem that she'd faced. Keeping the filly close meant accepting that they were her mistakes, and Vanya was not quite ready for that.

Torn between the opposing options, Vanya simply allowed the child to exist for now. She suffered the child to nurse, but provided no other warmth or comfort to the wobbly newborn. Coldly she watched her daughter explore their small rocky surroundings for a few minutes until rushing her away from the scene of the birth. So soon after her encounter with Wasp, and relatively certain that Rougaru wouldn't circle back so soon, she ushered the filly to the absolute most northern edge of the Falls, where they might exist for a moment without Peak intervention. From there, she simply allowed the filly to entertain herself until she tired herself out, and then stood watchfully over her as she debated her options for the future.