It is dark. Not so unusual, here beneath the forest canopy. We are used to shadows and lurking darkness here. Still, it is not the kind of darkness that is light filtered through trees. This holds a colder grip on us, and I feel the memory of death play along my spine. It feels... familiar, in a way I do not like. Not one bit.
"Leave your toys, Calavera," I murmur to the girl at my feet. She is surrounded by the decayed carcass of what once was a fox, bones yellowed and brown where she had found them half-buried. She sulks a moment at my soft-spoken order, then rises obediently to her feet, and we go.
To the edge of the forest, where trees are thin and most days you can see to the mountain range. There is something different about the view today. The sun rose this morning, I'm almost sure of it. Now though, we stand in darkness, and hanging in the sky is the thinnest ring of white fire. My lips curve downward. "Odd..." I begin, but stop as soon as the word leaves my mouth. It is destined to be an odd day in more way than one, I think.
Muzzle lifted high, I inhale, draw in more of the scent that I had recognized. It has long been gone from these woods. Longer than I could reliably say. "Your back," I say, addressing the unseen. Calavera's head snaps to me, worry vibrant in her eyes. In the darkness, my skin crackles to life. Electric, alive. A beacon. And like the first night we met, the fragment of darkness separates itself from the mass of night, and I feel myself pouting into the black.
"What took you so long?" I ask @[Balto], huffy and petulent, like a child deprived of her favorite toy she knows she doesn't deserve. "I was sure you'd abandoned me." And that isn't a lie, though I say it like one. I look away from the solid night that is him, fussing with Calavera's mane, making it lie straight even when she whimpers at my tugging.
@[The Monsters] please meddle with Sab's Thunderbird Mimicry!
"Leave your toys, Calavera," I murmur to the girl at my feet. She is surrounded by the decayed carcass of what once was a fox, bones yellowed and brown where she had found them half-buried. She sulks a moment at my soft-spoken order, then rises obediently to her feet, and we go.
To the edge of the forest, where trees are thin and most days you can see to the mountain range. There is something different about the view today. The sun rose this morning, I'm almost sure of it. Now though, we stand in darkness, and hanging in the sky is the thinnest ring of white fire. My lips curve downward. "Odd..." I begin, but stop as soon as the word leaves my mouth. It is destined to be an odd day in more way than one, I think.
Muzzle lifted high, I inhale, draw in more of the scent that I had recognized. It has long been gone from these woods. Longer than I could reliably say. "Your back," I say, addressing the unseen. Calavera's head snaps to me, worry vibrant in her eyes. In the darkness, my skin crackles to life. Electric, alive. A beacon. And like the first night we met, the fragment of darkness separates itself from the mass of night, and I feel myself pouting into the black.
"What took you so long?" I ask @[Balto], huffy and petulent, like a child deprived of her favorite toy she knows she doesn't deserve. "I was sure you'd abandoned me." And that isn't a lie, though I say it like one. I look away from the solid night that is him, fussing with Calavera's mane, making it lie straight even when she whimpers at my tugging.
@[The Monsters] please meddle with Sab's Thunderbird Mimicry!