"But the dream, the echo, slips from him as quickly as he had found it and as consciousness comes to him (a slap and not the gentle waves of oceanic tides), it dissolves entirely. His muscles relax as the cold claims him again, as the numbness sets in, and when his grey eyes open, there’s nothing but the faint after burn of a dream often trod and never remembered." --Brigade, written by Laura
she got blood cold as ice
and a heart made of stone
The night grows colder as Ciri tells Leokadia about the lives and worlds she has known before Beqanna. As steam begins to rise from the heart-shaped lake, the cremello listens as carefully as she can, learning of the Underneath and then the almost unfathomable star-like existence predating that. Though she tries only to listen, Leokadia feels vastly inexperienced in comparison. Her pale eyes flick from Ciri’s shining ones, down to the movement of her lips and back once more. Absorbing as much as she can about her friend’s history and wondering what she herself offers someone who has experienced so much. What need does the scarred, star-trailed woman have for a friend like her? Surely Ciri has known hundreds of far more interesting mares and stallions and other beings. It is the first time the little mare has considered herself against another, other than her mother.
She finds herself deficient yet again and yet doesn’t mind because Ciri remains right beside her, leans into her touch so that Lo can settle her cheek against the warm dark skin above the other mare’s shoulder. Even if she cannot find the right words to say, there is a rightness and warmth she feels through that touch, and for a moment she is certain it feels the same for the both of them.
She hasn’t the ability to tell Ciri what to do about her anger. Not honestly. Not without admitting to the hungry, furious, self-inflicted emptiness, she’s been carrying around for years. Their friendship edges her ever nearer the many things she’s managed not to feel for so long. Raising her head to meet the eyes that seek out her own, her ears turn back in dismay but she doesn’t say anything about the anger that clings to her friend. Only acknowledges it, eyes softening as she continues to leave room for that anger because it seems like it should be there and like it should be allowed to burn for a little while in the face of everything that has precipitated it. Leokadia takes a single step a little nearer, three of her pale hooves settling in the snow again as she reaches her muzzle out to Ciri’s. “Then let us go and rest. Let me watch over you now that I am here.” The pause is brief before she exhales another word. “Please.” Leokadia does not misunderstand, she knows her friend does not just refer to the weariness of her body. Her outside wing has drifted down to the earth as they’ve stood together talking but she settles it upon her back again, indicating a desire to leave the lake and the burning tree and find a place they may rest. “It seems to be a comfort to others, having someone to rest beside. I can be someone like that. For you.” Leokadia is careful with uttering the unfamiliar offering, hope tangled up with a strange twisting in her belly, anxiety, and something else that makes her heart race away once more. Her meaning is not veiled or intended to be more than an invitation to rest together and the safety that comes with it, her eyes guileless in her pretty sculpted face.
but she keeps me alive
she's the beast in my bones
all of time and space, everywhere and anywhere, every star that ever was
It had not been her intention to make the mare beside her feel inadequate. If she had known she would have told her of all the ways she stood out from every other she had ever met before. It would have come easy, the way Lo settles against her neck and for a moment she forgets her anger while she tries to remember how to breathe. That flutter against her hungry heart steals the air from her lungs as she feels the warmth of her friend and remembers a different kind of heat. One that didn’t crave things like revenge and settling scores.
For a moment her lashes flutter and she feels a brief sense of peace.
There is no fight in her when Leokadia reaches for her with the offer of rest. Amet had offered her that once. She remembers vaguely what it had been like to sleep next to another, to feel safe in an unkind world. Her silver eyes slow in their constant rotation as she looks at the white mare, hesitating only for a moment, before responding with a single whispered word. "Ok.” She exhales softly, her breath eclipsed in a cold mist. It doesn’t even matter what interpretation Lo had meant, in that moment she agreed to all of them.
There were several caves on the Isle and she had found one close to the burned beach that she had liked to shelter in when the weather was too much. There is no running this time, her anger smoldering beneath her ravaged skin but kept at bay with the uncertain sensation squeezing around her heart. Her hooves clatter against granite as she steps into the alcove and turns around, looking at Lo with a sudden surge of nerves. Holding her wings awkwardly she tries to ease the growing tension in the small space as she jokingly says, “Only the finest palace in the kingdom.” Every muscle grows tense beneath her smoky coat as she glances around the small space, aware of their close proximity.
As she glances into her pale eyes, her heart stutters with anticipation. “Is this… Is this ok?”
09-06-2021, 11:40 PM (This post was last modified: 09-09-2021, 09:56 PM by Leokadia.)
Beneath the ripple of the aurora, Leokadia follows Ciri back toward the blackened beach. That mysterious celestial event lingers over them, a living river across the heavens, and the beauty of it draws her gaze once more. It’s not a long trip to the cave, and when they arrive Ciri moves inside at a walk but without hesitation. It smells like her here, like Ciri. Leokadia’s nostrils flare as she extends her neck to cautiously inspect the enclosed space. It is neither a large cave nor particularly interesting but Lo has never spent the night beneath any shelter but trees. She steps back, uncertain for a moment. It’s not like her to back away from the unfamiliar, and snorting at herself she moves into the space, joining Ciri.
Once she does, the two of them stand facing one another making awkward adjustments to their wings. Amusement does not register on the cremello’s face in response to Ciri’s joke, she is looking around quietly at the granite walls that feel close but not uncomfortably so. It is not the walls that make her feel pressed, held, secured there. It’s a sensation that makes her chest ache, her stomach twisting, flipping strangely. A flush rises to her light skin, but it is dark and Ciri will not see it, perhaps she would feel it if she herself were not so warm beside the little mare. They meet each other’s eyes then, starlit silver to moonlight-pale. Leokadia’s reply to her friend’s hesitant question arrives on a plume of warm fog. “Yes. I… like it very much.”
Ciri’s stars hang over them in the cave, reddish fairy lights. Leokadia’s wingtips drop to the floor the brush of her own blanket of feathers a comfort as she wills herself to relax. Her heart races away. Is it supposed to? Is this what it is to have someone to care for? As a...friend?
“Ciri…” Breathes Leokadia. Tension coils throughout her lithe body, and she knows that it is something beyond that. A painful shot of anxiety spears her heart and buries itself in her belly. It has been a long time since she’s felt such honest, certain fear. It doesn’t stop her from stepping closer, their muzzles so close that she can smell the sweetness of Ciri’s breath. Leokadia cannot remember what she was going to say, there are a million things that she could fill the silence with but any of it might break whatever is twisting into being between them.
all of time and space, everywhere and anywhere, every star that ever was
It’s just a cave. It’s never mattered before where she had laid her head to rest, where she had sheltered from storms or simply hid to get away from it all. She’s acutely aware of the space now, every stalagmite that hangs from the cavern walls and every drip from ice melting against the floor, every hiss of steam that escapes from the cracks and crevices. Her anxiety rises as Lo slowly takes it all in with her hard to read pale eyes and she finds worry suddenly spreading around the black hunger of rage. Her wings ruffle against her sides as she folds them against her, as she thinks of perhaps suggesting somewhere more open to bed down for the night.
Before she can open her mouth, Lo says her name in a way that stills her tongue and she finds her silvery eyes slipping down to where those large creamy feathers drag along the granite and wonders briefly if it would feel like a downy blanket again to be wrapped within those wings. The white mare steps closer and she tenses against the uncertainty battling against the invading storm of her feelings, her muzzle hovering close to hers. There seemed to be an unasked question hovering between them but she steps back and folds her legs beneath her before looking back up with a tilt of her head. Would she join her? Or would she feel more comfortable standing and keeping watch? She wants to ask but the words refuse to cooperate and she’s left just staring up at her as her heart begins to thrum a little faster.
“I…” She starts then stops, the red haze of her crimson stars casting them in an intimate light. “I’m glad you're here.”
09-09-2021, 11:11 PM (This post was last modified: 09-09-2021, 11:16 PM by Leokadia.)
Leokadia is keenly aware of every sound within the cave, Ciri’s breathing, the scrape of her hooves as she backs away. When she does, Leokadia’s eyes flick quickly away from her and she turns her face to train her gaze on a benign crack in the cave wall, attention rolling up to the ceiling. Hopefully concealing the confused expression that had tried to bully its way onto her usually unaffected features. The little cremello is certain she invented some feeling just now and is glad she has said nothing else beyond her lovely friend’s name. The wind is picking up, clawing around the mouth of the cave. Ravenous chill bites at Lo’s sleek skin and her wings shift to fend it off.
Ciri has curled up on the cave floor and when Leokadia looks her way once more she finds that the black mare is watching her. The way Ciri’s dark mane lies against her neck and around her face softens her features into something even more beautiful. Lo has never missed her mane, does not know that without it there is a sharpness to her appearance, offset perfectly by the soft femininity of her feathered wings. Does Ciri think her odd without it?
It stops mattering a second later. They don’t need to speak loudly, their voices bouncing back from the cave walls. I’m glad you’re here.“So am I. Leokadia says immediately, softly. Her heart runs away in her chest when she moves away from the cold and turns around to lie down beside Ciri, so that they are shoulder to shoulder on the floor of the cave. “We should bring some dry grass or leaves in here, so we can be warmer and more comfortable.” Says the smaller mare matter-of-factly. It takes her a moment to realize that she has implied that she will sleep here again. Inviting herself once more. Except she doesn’t worry about it, doesn’t wait for Ciri to scoff. Leokadia wriggles a bit, makes an annoyed noise as she untucks her awkwardly folded wing, and then spreads the other over herself. The liberated pinion flutters, and then relaxes over Ciri’s back, long white feathers whispering over her own starry wings and ebony skin. Tucking her chin and eyeing the other woman, Leokadia touches her own pale muzzle to Ciri’s dark one. “Still glad?” The words have a teasing quality, though her voice does not lilt or play like another’s would. Lo has always been so small and yet taken up so much space.
all of time and space, everywhere and anywhere, every star that ever was
She had yet to find the cremello mare lacking, in any way or form. The absence of hair falling from her arched mane is not missed, on anyone else she might have noticed. But on Lo, it is fitting as if the hair would only distract from the natural beauty already there. The snowy mare settles beside her and whispers back and Ciri smiles faintly, for a moment her red stars glittering with gold. Her companion mumbles about the sparsity of the cave and she chuckles softly while mentally scolding herself for her lack of hospitality. She had grown so use to sleeping out in the open or on rough stone that she had forgotten that other’s held different standards for comfort than she did. “I’ll work on that.” She says quietly, coming to the same realization that Lo had and glancing at her quickly.
The white mare is adjusting herself and suddenly she is enveloped in one of those large feather soft wings and it is exactly as she had thought it would be. Warm, fleecy. Safe. She is drawn beneath the comfort of her wing and while her heart thrills at the touch of another, her exhaustion takes precedence. Yes, yes she was still glad. Glad that Lo had not backed down or folded beneath her anger, glad that she hadn’t been easy to chase away. She can feel the soft brush of her muzzle against hers and Ciri moves in closer as her response, for warmth of course. Tucked beneath that outstretched wing, she curls into the other’s side and nestles herself until her head rests against that maneless neck, breathing her in.
Tired eyelids fall heavily over the slowing swirls of her metallic gaze but before she slips into slumber, she murmurs something to her. There is no promise she can make to spare her. No promise that she can make that Leokadia will not become hurt because of her (or by her) if she insists on staying. But there is one thing she can swear on and one promise she can extract in return. “If he comes here, you must leave.” She breathes into the softness of creamy fur beside her. “I’ll die again before he touches you.” She sighs and then there is only the gentle rise and fall of her sides and soft rhythmic breath that let’s Lo know that she is asleep.
