breathing dreams like air
Spring, summer, autumn, winter. They passed in dizzying succession, one right after the other. Promise found it hard to keep track, though not because the jungle didn't tell the story. Atlantis was not as dramatic as the Crossing, but she had her seasonal changes, too.
Rather, she found it hard to track because she found it hard to look away from her grieving mother. In the wake of their loss, Hymn had grown quiet and withdrawn, even from her own daughter. In a way, Promise resented her for it, though she tried not to. She resented that they'd finally found a family again, a stallion that cherished her as if she were his own blood, a home that was familiar and comfortable to them both, and instead of enjoying it and making memories and growing together, Hymn had done her best to disappear.
Caught in the in-between of being her mother's only living child and a growing adult herself, Promise had done her best to bridge the gap, but the ache to spread her own wings had grown unbearable in the past few weeks, the feeling exacerbated by her frustration. She loved her momma dearly, but she could not bear the thought of stifling her own life just to make sure Hymn wasn't alone.
Thus, on a quiet winter morning when the parrots were lazily huddled together and the monkeys hoots were soft rather than sharp, Promise left her mother's side and threaded her way through the jungle toward a far clearing. She hoped that in the solitude, she might steal a few moments of Annubis' time to ask him for advice and guidance before she made her next move, and - if he did encourage her to leave - to beg him for a promise, sworn on her own name, to take care of Hymn.