01-10-2016, 02:47 PM
The vestiges of her confidence worm themselves back into her.
He can see them drawing her taller and steadier, pulling her muscles taunt. Barely.
Her momentary eye contact is a small victory. Too small. He makes a low, disappointed growl in his throat, withdrawing from her. “I did not think so.” One day, when he circles her bright body like a mad dog, will he still be able to depend on her to acquiesce to him so quietly? It can take a lot to truly crush the soul. (It can take a lot – an impossibility – to revitalize it.) They all grow up. Browbeaten girls become headstrong women; they become vessels of their inborn carnality, fickle lovers and cruel mothers. In any other time and place, he would seek to act on his obligation to fell her at the larval stage of that hideous evolution.
That his brutality is held in abeyance is of some interest to him. Too easy. The ungainliness in her form does not stir him, it seems. Nothing in it reeks of femininity, but of utter childhood. And he has a certain soft spot, if you could call it that, for the young. So, he feels compelled to push her to the edge of that yawning gap, and leave her there, in the end, unbroken – but not unscathed. Bearing the marks of him on her, like his own tattoos of abuse.
And to one day meet her there again, different horses, both.
He likes the poetry in that. It is an epic. His opus, to be sure, with no reason to believe it will play out like that in the end. That makes it all the more imperative that he put her down now... but he is attracted to the slow burn. He must be the force that drives them towards their third act climax. He’s never played the long game before; he is an agent of whim and volatility, erased from the world by the will of his mind, he takes his hunts and prey as he finds them. At most, he has spent an evening stalking in order to get the lay of the land – find the weaknesses, the best place between sheets of armour to sink his blade. Some are worth more trouble than others.
Yes. He likes the poetry in it very much.
And there are so many ways to skin a mare.
“That is an ill way to conduct yourself, girl.” He smiles, though, crooked and mischievous. He was fashioned in the image of some wicked gift-giver, the harbinger of punishment for the naughtiness of children.
“But then… I wonder… Well, I wonder how she has not found you yet. There is nothing so determined as a mother’s devotion to her young…” She can eat his lie. If it were a full-throated truth, he would not be the man he is today, and what a shame that would be. He sighs, full of concern. “I wouldn’t be too worried, though. If anything has... befallen her, or she has… lost interest, well, at least you have me.” He laughs again, this time harder. “But you need a name…”
He relives these things almost as he walks. Like moving through a strange duality – at once the Meadow, as he knows it, and then a wasteland of snow and polar bears. He tries to press it down low, that invading, insatiable curiosity. That night, if it truly was only one night, was something far removed from here… but it clings to him. He smiles, and looks down at her, “How about Elve then, hm? That's pretty.” She bears the cast of that place and time, her red and green, though he is certain it is not related in anyway…
The weight of that name, he will not divulge. His dear fallen comrades. But then… he had not done it on purpose.
When she returns to her mother, she can carry with her the most indelible mark of all. He must follow… it would be a shame not to witness her mother’s confusion and horror.
He can see them drawing her taller and steadier, pulling her muscles taunt. Barely.
Her momentary eye contact is a small victory. Too small. He makes a low, disappointed growl in his throat, withdrawing from her. “I did not think so.” One day, when he circles her bright body like a mad dog, will he still be able to depend on her to acquiesce to him so quietly? It can take a lot to truly crush the soul. (It can take a lot – an impossibility – to revitalize it.) They all grow up. Browbeaten girls become headstrong women; they become vessels of their inborn carnality, fickle lovers and cruel mothers. In any other time and place, he would seek to act on his obligation to fell her at the larval stage of that hideous evolution.
That his brutality is held in abeyance is of some interest to him. Too easy. The ungainliness in her form does not stir him, it seems. Nothing in it reeks of femininity, but of utter childhood. And he has a certain soft spot, if you could call it that, for the young. So, he feels compelled to push her to the edge of that yawning gap, and leave her there, in the end, unbroken – but not unscathed. Bearing the marks of him on her, like his own tattoos of abuse.
And to one day meet her there again, different horses, both.
He likes the poetry in that. It is an epic. His opus, to be sure, with no reason to believe it will play out like that in the end. That makes it all the more imperative that he put her down now... but he is attracted to the slow burn. He must be the force that drives them towards their third act climax. He’s never played the long game before; he is an agent of whim and volatility, erased from the world by the will of his mind, he takes his hunts and prey as he finds them. At most, he has spent an evening stalking in order to get the lay of the land – find the weaknesses, the best place between sheets of armour to sink his blade. Some are worth more trouble than others.
Yes. He likes the poetry in it very much.
And there are so many ways to skin a mare.
“That is an ill way to conduct yourself, girl.” He smiles, though, crooked and mischievous. He was fashioned in the image of some wicked gift-giver, the harbinger of punishment for the naughtiness of children.
“But then… I wonder… Well, I wonder how she has not found you yet. There is nothing so determined as a mother’s devotion to her young…” She can eat his lie. If it were a full-throated truth, he would not be the man he is today, and what a shame that would be. He sighs, full of concern. “I wouldn’t be too worried, though. If anything has... befallen her, or she has… lost interest, well, at least you have me.” He laughs again, this time harder. “But you need a name…”
He relives these things almost as he walks. Like moving through a strange duality – at once the Meadow, as he knows it, and then a wasteland of snow and polar bears. He tries to press it down low, that invading, insatiable curiosity. That night, if it truly was only one night, was something far removed from here… but it clings to him. He smiles, and looks down at her, “How about Elve then, hm? That's pretty.” She bears the cast of that place and time, her red and green, though he is certain it is not related in anyway…
The weight of that name, he will not divulge. His dear fallen comrades. But then… he had not done it on purpose.
When she returns to her mother, she can carry with her the most indelible mark of all. He must follow… it would be a shame not to witness her mother’s confusion and horror.
Sorry this took so long! Considering we were rapid-firing posts like a couple of maniacs for a bit there.
![[Image: kkN1kfc.png]](http://i.imgur.com/kkN1kfc.png)