Home was the eternal green of the jungle. It was the warmth, the moisture, the way everything smelled of earth and dirt. It was the jungle cats stalking through the undergrowth and root systems, the cubs she had played with as a child. It was the monkeys shrieking in the trees, swinging wildly from branch to vine to branch. But home had never been the Amazon herself. Home had been something darker, a weight in her chest that pulled her to the northernmost edge of the vast jungle expanse. She had not noticed it at first, that sense of quiet longing curdling in her stomach, the inexplicable way her adventures had always brought her to that same tree line where her heart swelled with doubt and those emerald eyes flashed with wanderlust. But Makai had noticed it, she was sure of that now. She couldn’t help but wonder if it had anything to do with why he had left his family. She wondered if he had known that she’d followed him to his last kill, observing with silent, horrified curiosity from the nearby shadows.
Curiosity had gotten the better of her, and she had let it be her ruin.
Her shoulder bumped against the bark and sap of a hollowed out pine and she paused for a moment to look at the indigo hairs caught there. They were so bright, brighter than any sky she had ever seen, nearly luminescent. Her emerald gaze lowered to her legs, missing the stark and plain white where there was only blue now. There might have been a time when she would have been so delighted to be painted brighter than any of the jungle birds sweeping across the small patches of sky through the leafy branch ceiling. But now, after everything, she felt false, gaudy, fake. If she could have shed her skin, she would have. It did not make a difference to her that this was flesh and bone and beating heart, she hated the colors for the way they reminded her of that wretched plastic prison.
The copse of burnt out trees opened into a small pond with a thin stream that filled and emptied it. It was the only reason she came to this part of the kingdom. Most of the trees and vegetation had recovered from the volcano and subsequent fires, but this place hung at the edge of life like a graveyard. The small forest had been furthest from the volcano, so the fires had not wiped it out entirely. But the heat had scorched the grass and soil, had sucked any moisture from the trunks, and the trees had withered and rotted leaving only half-hollowed skeletons behind.
It was eerie, but it was solitude.
Malis eased from the boggy shore into the water until it swelled up past her ribs and over her back, swallowing everything but her refined indigo head. She stayed that way for a moment, not minding the stink of mud bubbling up as her hooves churned in the murky bottom. Then, sighing, she turned and heaved herself onto the shore, found a dry spot in the dirt where the grass had not yet returned, and rolled. When she got back to her feet, and turned back to the pond and eyed the reflection tentatively. Staring back at her was a slender creature, more sinew than flesh, with a look of quiet uncertainty flickering in the green of her eyes beneath a furrowed brow. But the indigo wasn’t so bright anymore, except on her face through the patches of dust-dry dirt. It was a muted dirty color, a better color. Her muscles relaxed a little. Even the gold and fuchsia of her mane and tail had faded out beneath the mud, though it was drying quickly in loose tangles against her neck.
The mud felt awful as she turned from the pond, and she struggled not to make the connection between it and the way her plastic casing had felt so tight and stiff.
MALIS
makai x oksana