 The chestnut mare’s begrudging admission elicits a satisfied nod. Good, another sibling.
“I hope it’s a girl,” Celina tells Lilliana, and this time when her seafoam eyes turn to the other’s broad belly there is satisfaction there. Tenderness even, at the thought of a little glowing one like Nashua. Wolfbane had not let her meet Nashua and Yanhua until they were old enough to wander away from their mother. This time, Celina thinks, she will find them younger.
Elio thinks she cannot disobey their father?
If that were true, would she plan this?
No, Celina thinks with satisfaction, she would not.
The satisfaction grows with the way that Lilliana trembles, the fear that Celina can nearly taste as her half-open mouth hovers a breath above the mare’s soft copper skin. When Lilliana speaks, her voice is quiet but stronger than Celina would expect. Something is not right. Why is she not more afraid? Is Celina not as frightening as her father? Perhaps Celina should have hurt her already? The timing of her torture has never been quite right. It is one of her weaknesses, her father has said, something she needs to work on.
Celina doubts herself, just as Lilliana tells her that she knows where Wolfbane is.
She frowns.
I’m sure you understand, she says, though Celina doesn’t. The relief of having found her father – or at least a way to find him – does not come with the relief that Celina had imagined? Why, she wonders, does she not want to find him? Her head shakes, a vain effort to rid herself of these troublesome thoughts. Thinking too much isn’t good for her, she remembers, it is better to listen and obey.
But how can she, if she does not know what the command is? Does her father want him to find her? Is he hiding from her? Surely not, not with how well she had done during their maiming of Elio! No, he would not hide from her. Not when he relies on her news, on her reports of how her mother and siblings far, how the kingdoms shift and change. He wouldn’t trust his hiding place to this flat-toothed mare, not even if she is the mother of his second-best child. He wouldn’t.
“You’re lying,” she says slowly, with realization and anger rising equally quickly on her dusty face. Celina cannot let her know how close she had almost come to falling for the ruse, how near she had been to accepting the word of a woman that was as much of a snake as her own mother. “You think I’m a fool?!”
Heedless of the damage it might cause to the unborn sibling that Celina is already fond of, she lunges forward, her wide mouth snapping and slashing at the mare she’s backed against the canyon wall. Her white wings flare out as she remembers to ‘use everything she has to her advantage’, an effort to keep Lilliana from fleeing.
@[lilliana]
celina
i'm that bad type, make-your-mama-sad type
make-your-girlfriend-mad type, might-seduce-your-dad type
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