róisín

The tension between the three of them is so thick it practically ripples in the air. Róisín can feel it vibrating across her skin, and down into the marrow of her very bones. She has never had a reason to trust anything that the Lagoon has said or done. Her distaste of the bachelors had been cemented before she was ever born, when Cullen had stolen her brother and Isabel from the Ridge, and had only grown since then after Cullen's repeated attacks. The ultimate cherry on top had been Tyr's challenge.

While the patchwork stallion had restored her freedom almost instantly, he had stolen the small measure of security her family had felt in the wake of Cullen's dethroning. After ripping away the red-gold girl from her family home, he'd turned around and all but forced Faolain to accept his 'vacation' in the Ridge, thereby leaving her family no place in which to rest without the fetid stench of the Lagoon and their lack of morals. Now, her family was scattered in more places she could count. Aislin was gone. Ailill and Naenia were searching for Akadi. Saoirse was god only knew where, and her mother and baby sister Aoife had returned to the Inlet.

And all of that together was, ultimately, unforgivable to her.

Still, Róisín has been the big sister - the peacemaker, the mediator, and the impartial judge - for far longer than she has been a Peak mare, and the instinct to listen to the adult speak has not yet abated. She may detest everything that Rade has allowed to happen in his short tenure as the Lagoon's leader, but she had come here with the intention of hearing him out... and so she would.

His claim of offering peace makes her suspicious, if only because she had never known the Lagoon to offer peace and was therefore hesitant to believe that he would uphold it. But the bare fact remained that it was she that had challenged the Lagoon first, and not the other way around. If he had intended to broker and uphold peace, his track record was (as far as she could see) better than her own. The thought made her uncomfortable, and her hide twitched beneath the weight of his gaze.

However, before he can specify the second thing he had offered, Oswin cut in next to her and the dun girl suppressed a disappointed frown. Your sisters... were quite determined to cling to the past, he claims and she stiffens in place again, her gaze cutting across to Oswin. Róisín still knew very little of the brave women that had come before her, but she had seen firsthand how defensive the golden mare could be when their honor was questioned in any fashion, or when comparisons were drawn between the Peak and the Lagoon.

Her doubt intensifies when he pats himself on the back, claiming that he had done everything in his power to let the past go. The fact that he had been the one to constantly bring up the past seemed to be beyond his grasp and her gaze narrowed but still, she remained silent. Rade had been the one to bring up the history between the Peak and the Lagoon first. Further, it was Rade that had brought their past fights into today's conversation, and in the end, it seemed to be Rade that was still clinging onto the evil that Cullen had spread across the isles.

Conveniently, Róisín opted to pretend as thought the vile ex-boss wasn't also a massive reason why she called the Peak home now.

As he elaborated on his understanding of the Peak, her frown deepened and her gaze flicked to Oswin again reflexively. The words that they had spoken to one another in the presence of Bane held more weight in this context, and it gave her the confidence to square her shoulders and meet his gaze.

"That may have been true in the past, but that is not our only purpose now. I have grown up watching the injustices the Lagoon has committed against my family and friends. They've stolen children and mares. Forced children on fillies and rendered my little brother half-blind in a hunt for vengeance." She worked hard to keep her voice level as she spoke, wanting him to fully understand what she was putting on the line for this conversation and for him to understand just how hard it was for her to even entertain working with him and his men.

"Even after you took control of the Lagoon, your men have plagued my family. I was a prisoner of the Lagoon for a time, and while my tenure may have been short, I can assure you that I have not forgotten the feeling." Her chin lifted in a display of confidence she didn't necessarily feel.

"You claim to work for empowering men, and you claim that we are so alike," she continued evenly, her small ears tipped back but not pinned. "But you hold just as many prisoners in your ranks as you did under Cullen, while we hold none. Why would we believe that you are any different now, just because you wish for peace?"

Her gaze rose back to Oswin and she inclined her head, the words that the palomino mare had spoken on the Peak ledge reverberating in her mind. "We intend to seek out injustices and resolve them when we find them, rather than vowing blind support on the basis of sex." Hardness belying her relatively young age solidifies in her gaze and she meets Rade's frankly, unsure if this was somehow overstepping her position as a mere sister but unable to stop the words from spilling out regardless. "I- we- would like to extend the same support to you, but I have yet to see evidence that you are worthy of it."

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

Image from Pixabay & HTML by loveinspired