01-05-2016, 06:21 PM
***She waddles just past the verdant border of her home, past the fan-leaves and the brightly painted animals. Into mottled territory, bathed in near-dusk; a strange mix of exotic and common flora and fauna, just outside the jungle. She is too close to stray far – she knows the sensations of developing parturition: the restlessness and sweat dampening her flanks and neck, the contractions and want for seclusion. So she noses around buttercups and coltsfoot to pass time, every once and a while laying down to aid the positioning of her child. She nestles into dirt and wildgrass, her passenger shifting to make sure it is ready, head first. And then a breeze, sweet and gentle, brings her a hideous scent – her ears pin back and she struggles to her feet all too hastily, peering across the brush and bristling.
***Then an assertive yelp to her right, and she turns for a second in surprise to catch the blur of three canines relinquishing a limp carcass to a fourth, bowing low to him. She spooks off to her left with a shrill cry, her ears buzzing with whip-like cracks, chased into the elms by the primal move of self-preservation.
***Against her better judgement, she follows the thin trail of their hunt: drops of blood on a leaf, a pluck of soft, short hair; then a larger smear, the epicenter of struggle. Misplaced dirt. She slows, then is forced to stop, breathing heavy and taken by the strong clench of her birthing muscles. The rosy mare’s teeth clench, stifling sound, and she looks behind her. But they have been here already, and had likely been spooked themselves by her sudden movement. Her nose crinkles as the scent of blood, and a mix of animal fur, fill her nostrils. After a tense moment, Vineine exhales, released from the contraction, and turns to examine the ground in front of her. Near a small, empty hole in the ground is a bundle of hair and dry grass, carefully manufactured to insulate that ravaged den. With a blow to her gut, she sees a tiny flash of pink still curled up in it, wriggling for the warmth of her stolen siblings.
***She is reminded of a warbler nestling she had found as a filly, fallen and damaged beyond repair. She had gone to Elladora, imploring her to make it better, but the rosy mare had simply shook her head and whuffed on her daughter’s cheek, drying the tears on her fur. It had gone mercifully fast. Her first lesson from the Mother herself – nature takes indiscriminately.
***So she only frowns and walks towards it mournfully. The doe must have come to nurse them, smart enough to stay away from her vulnerable nest during the day. But they had found her, and them, all the same. Nature is not fair. She reaches down, her muzzle pressing towards the dirt burrow and that singular vestige of her mother’s pains and preparation. As her soft lip touches the hairless young kitten, she feels a shock (like that of electricity), pass between their flesh and she jerks back in surprise, snorting.
***The newborn rabbit twitches and then falls still. A deep, final stillness. An easy morsel now for whatever comes next.
***She cannot stay and agonize any longer. “This is how it works,” she whispers to herself, “this is how it works.” Shaken and falling deeper into the throes of labour, she makes quick work of her return to the understory of the Amazons, greeted by the nighttime chorus of bug-hums and -buzzes. She finds a protected and well sized clearing in the jungle underbrush near the more heavily occupied core, and drops to her knees, and then her side. Twice before. She pushes. Twice before; in the rain and in the melt of snow. But this is not right. She pushes, and something slips from her, all but entirely unnoticed, and with it the urgency to push leaves her, too. Nothing moves impatiently in her canal. Panic takes hold of her, and she is afraid to look back, but it cannot be helped. She lifts her head and peers over her own shoulder and belly, but she can see nothing there.
***“But…”
***She had felt every movement. Not like a phantom, but like she remembered. Twice before. She chokes on her breath and on her grief, carefully gathering up her legs and pushing herself up. Her nest is gripped in such utter dark, and there are tears to blink away from her vision. Her eyes take a moment to clear and to adjust. Deep-green and black, and something pale. Small, mere inches long. She steps back in alarm, unable at first to discern what it might be. What it might mean. But it moves. It moves. She steps forwards quickly, nosing around it and drawing her tongue cautiously across its impossibly pink body, pulling off the remainder of the amniotic sac.
***“I’m not sure I understand exactly,” she mutters softly.
***Not to her baby, but to the Mother and her strangeness. She had always believed death came with finality, almost certainly. Why the Mother chose to extend the circle this time, and through her, was a mystery she is afraid she will never be allowed to understand. As she begins to wonder how the Mother intends her to feed this child of theirs, the damp baby is a foal as expected. Without sound or a perceptible shift. But in place of her tail bone and short, coarse hairs, there is a scut – a short, soft looking tail, held a little upright. The topside is a milky buckskin, the undersides a bright white. She blinks, her mind crowded with questions and wonder. Even in the dark the mousy sister can see the similarities to Trystane – to Fiero. In the fold of dark, in her time, the buckskin reveals herself to be a girl. And stands up fast and strong, none the worse for wear.
***In the orange of pre-dawn, Vineine leads her filly from their place of complete togetherness. Into the gathering spaces of her sisters. “We must find dad, soon, hmm Longear,” she whispers, blowing air across her new daughter's brow.
*magic-borne daughter of Prague and Elladora
****‘...Herself in the Heavens, her beam on the waves.’
- amazonian and mother -
***Then an assertive yelp to her right, and she turns for a second in surprise to catch the blur of three canines relinquishing a limp carcass to a fourth, bowing low to him. She spooks off to her left with a shrill cry, her ears buzzing with whip-like cracks, chased into the elms by the primal move of self-preservation.
***Against her better judgement, she follows the thin trail of their hunt: drops of blood on a leaf, a pluck of soft, short hair; then a larger smear, the epicenter of struggle. Misplaced dirt. She slows, then is forced to stop, breathing heavy and taken by the strong clench of her birthing muscles. The rosy mare’s teeth clench, stifling sound, and she looks behind her. But they have been here already, and had likely been spooked themselves by her sudden movement. Her nose crinkles as the scent of blood, and a mix of animal fur, fill her nostrils. After a tense moment, Vineine exhales, released from the contraction, and turns to examine the ground in front of her. Near a small, empty hole in the ground is a bundle of hair and dry grass, carefully manufactured to insulate that ravaged den. With a blow to her gut, she sees a tiny flash of pink still curled up in it, wriggling for the warmth of her stolen siblings.
***She is reminded of a warbler nestling she had found as a filly, fallen and damaged beyond repair. She had gone to Elladora, imploring her to make it better, but the rosy mare had simply shook her head and whuffed on her daughter’s cheek, drying the tears on her fur. It had gone mercifully fast. Her first lesson from the Mother herself – nature takes indiscriminately.
***So she only frowns and walks towards it mournfully. The doe must have come to nurse them, smart enough to stay away from her vulnerable nest during the day. But they had found her, and them, all the same. Nature is not fair. She reaches down, her muzzle pressing towards the dirt burrow and that singular vestige of her mother’s pains and preparation. As her soft lip touches the hairless young kitten, she feels a shock (like that of electricity), pass between their flesh and she jerks back in surprise, snorting.
***The newborn rabbit twitches and then falls still. A deep, final stillness. An easy morsel now for whatever comes next.
***She cannot stay and agonize any longer. “This is how it works,” she whispers to herself, “this is how it works.” Shaken and falling deeper into the throes of labour, she makes quick work of her return to the understory of the Amazons, greeted by the nighttime chorus of bug-hums and -buzzes. She finds a protected and well sized clearing in the jungle underbrush near the more heavily occupied core, and drops to her knees, and then her side. Twice before. She pushes. Twice before; in the rain and in the melt of snow. But this is not right. She pushes, and something slips from her, all but entirely unnoticed, and with it the urgency to push leaves her, too. Nothing moves impatiently in her canal. Panic takes hold of her, and she is afraid to look back, but it cannot be helped. She lifts her head and peers over her own shoulder and belly, but she can see nothing there.
***“But…”
***She had felt every movement. Not like a phantom, but like she remembered. Twice before. She chokes on her breath and on her grief, carefully gathering up her legs and pushing herself up. Her nest is gripped in such utter dark, and there are tears to blink away from her vision. Her eyes take a moment to clear and to adjust. Deep-green and black, and something pale. Small, mere inches long. She steps back in alarm, unable at first to discern what it might be. What it might mean. But it moves. It moves. She steps forwards quickly, nosing around it and drawing her tongue cautiously across its impossibly pink body, pulling off the remainder of the amniotic sac.
***“I’m not sure I understand exactly,” she mutters softly.
***Not to her baby, but to the Mother and her strangeness. She had always believed death came with finality, almost certainly. Why the Mother chose to extend the circle this time, and through her, was a mystery she is afraid she will never be allowed to understand. As she begins to wonder how the Mother intends her to feed this child of theirs, the damp baby is a foal as expected. Without sound or a perceptible shift. But in place of her tail bone and short, coarse hairs, there is a scut – a short, soft looking tail, held a little upright. The topside is a milky buckskin, the undersides a bright white. She blinks, her mind crowded with questions and wonder. Even in the dark the mousy sister can see the similarities to Trystane – to Fiero. In the fold of dark, in her time, the buckskin reveals herself to be a girl. And stands up fast and strong, none the worse for wear.
***In the orange of pre-dawn, Vineine leads her filly from their place of complete togetherness. Into the gathering spaces of her sisters. “We must find dad, soon, hmm Longear,” she whispers, blowing air across her new daughter's brow.
****‘...Herself in the Heavens, her beam on the waves.’
- amazonian and mother -
@[Fiero] He could probably just think to come check up on her, if you'd like him to pop in here! Otherwise they can meet in another thread somewhere!
]