that's all there is

Father had gotten distracted, and it had been easy to slip away. She knew she’d pay the price for it later, in harsh words and him keep an even closer eye on her, but for now she’d decided it was worth the price. Father wouldn’t mean the harsh words, after all, even though he couldn’t help but say them. For quite early on, she had realized that he flung rocks when he spoke not because he wanted to hurt her, but because he got so worried or overwhelmed that he couldn’t figure out how to speak nicely. It was still better than mother, who had barely spoken to Noah at all, except to try and determine if she was ‘different’. Mother had quickly become exasperated when Noah refused to make plants and animals sick just to practice doing so, and she’d quickly delivered the girl to her father and disappeared.

As it turned out, despite his brusque demeanor, Rhonen made a better parents than Kellyn anyway. He cared about when Noah was tired, or hungry, or cold, or wet, and he didn’t ask her to make anyone (or anything) sick. In fact, he much preferred they both pretend not to be special at all, though he’d grudgingly admitted that she did have to practice just to make sure she could control it. Overall, though, father just wanted Noah to be a child, and that had been perfectly pleasant for a while.

The problem was that being a kid by yourself, it turns out, wasn’t very interesting. Games took at least two, and their trips to the playground to find other children were rare. So when he became distracted, Noah had slipped away, gliding through the meadow like a nymph until she was beyond ear shot of him calling her back. At six months old, she’s all fluff and legs, her coat growing in patches of deep winter hair and her mane and tail still bottlebrush baby hair. More fascinating, to her, is the long feathers that have begun to grow in alongside her downy baby feathers in her wings. Father doesn’t have wings – he doesn’t know how to teach her to fly, and every time she mentions it he gets downright tetchy with worry.

So, the girl trots up to the first mare she sees with wings once she’s free of father, nickering a bright greeting as she makes her way over. “Hi! Hello!” she prances a little, canters a stride, then stops in front of the golden mare, green eyes alight with curiosity. “I’m Noah,” she smiles a shy little smile, ears flicking to catch the sounds around them.

noah