this is to one last day in the shadows; Mortal

[Neverwas]

I know you're trying to fight when you feel like flying.

I am loved beyond reason, beyond clause or condition, beyond even a shadow of doubt though shadows are all I know some days. Loved down to the marrow of my bones, down to the most broken parts of my shattered glass heart, down to the darkest parts of my soul. Love like that, sometimes it shines even enough light to chase those shadows away for a little while.

Today is one of those days.

I don't know what it was that made today a good day. Maybe it was waking up surrounded by the people who love me most in the whole world. Maybe it was listening to Argo's gentle breathing, or the quiet knowing in Leelee's eyes as she met mine and saw all the way down to those lingering shadows and loved me anyhow. Maybe it was the mischievous grin on Lissie's face, or angel eyes searching mine, or Mari's innocent smile, or the solid pillar of strength that is my dad. Maybe it was a whim of fate that made the sun shine brighter on my skin, sink deeper into my bones, lighting up what is so often shrouded in darkness.

I don't know, but that's okay. One way or another, by whatever twist or turn of fate made it possible, today is a good day. There's a smile on my face as I wander through towering trees, exploring for the sake of it instead of wandering anywhere and everywhere just to escape the smothering weight of misplaced love and acceptance. I want to see a piece of the world, to find out how tall the trees can get when they can put down roots and grow. I want to know how far this forest stretches, and feel the sunlight filtering down through the canopy to dance in mottled patterns on skin coated in dirt and shadows. I want to feel the breeze running fingers through a mane dressed in ashes and dust.

For the first time in a long time, my heart feels light. I close my mud-brown eyes, raising my head to breathe in the earthy scent of oakmoss and rich earth, so different from the Tundra's plains that turn swampy with snowmelt and are so exposed my skin sometimes crawls with the weight of eyes on me, eyes that could be on me. The closeness of all these oak trees feels like a tender embrace, and I feel tension draining from my body as I wander, happy for the first time in far too long.

If you love me, don't let go.

[Mortal]

MORTAL

prince of the chamber

Mortal is loved, of that he is sure, not because the words pass freely around the Chamber but because the actions of his parents assure him of such things. Mortal is loved and in that love he feels settled, he  welcomes it even, though he himself is hardly a boy of displaying such things. If they were to ask he would tell but often others do not permit themselves such actions, don’t exercise their right to knowledge, little as it costs. Even when his Mother secludes herself in the herd lands and his Father disappears into the dark recesses of the pines to mull over what it is to be King. Mortal knows that he is loved because he asks, he observes, he learns- Mortal is certain of things, that’s just how it is.

He’s always been an independent child, knowing what he wants and how he means to get it. Knowing that if he can not find those means, then he is to accept that he cannot. Today is a day of learning, of knowing what is beyond the Chamber and even still beyond the Meadow. With the sun on his back and the expanse of grasses falling away behind him, the black colt makes his way to the Forest’s edge.

Against the deep night of skin his mane falls bright and vibrant, more vivid even than the deep greens that hang over him. Spots of ash cling to the intense strands, though the Chamber had long since healed she was forever ashen somehow, spilling her scent of fire into their fur without an ounce to spare. Along his back wings folded but would one know they were there unless the looked? The fingers were easy enough to spot he supposed, tinted  black like his fur but the membranes themselves were wholly transparent, see-through and that was perhaps the only curiosity about the boy. Stopping is not a display of fear, because Mortal is not sure to fear something so close to home, it is simply because the trees that burst forth from the ground are ones he has never seen the likes of.

Before him are stretches of oak, and elder, and birch. Trees of different colors and sizes and types, and for now he knows them not by name. For now he knows how soft the leaves are dangling from the nearest one, big and green and fanned out wide to catch the steady rays from the sun. These do not prickle or poke at his skin, instead they caress him like a friend and why should a tree not treat him as such? It is a time before he truly enters the wood, delighting in the textures around him, watching the dapples of light filtering through to the grassy ground below to move gently about as the breeze caught the branches just so.

When he sees the other boy he does not balk, he doesn’t turn or cower but progresses. Mortal has not known fear and is quick to investigate rather than flee, upon closing the gap he offers a low nicker, a hello sorts as he flicks his tail and wonders just who this is. “Hello, I’m Mortal. What do they call you?”

dont wanna hang around the in crowd, the cool kids aren't cool to me

html by call