NIGHT WILL FALL AND DROWN THE SUN
WHEN A GOOD MAN GOES TO WAR
Scorch leaves his side as the morning arrives, off to an early start with the business of a queen’s life. He cannot deny he is a bit of a house-husband at this point (patrolling the borders of their home, encouraging his daughter and searching for the rest of his children, rubbing the tension out of his wife’s shoulders when she returns home from her day’s work) but he does not find shame in it. Their life together has a surprisingly familiar rhythm to it, even after death and revival, and he falls under the hum of their song easily.
So he presses a few sweet kisses to her bare shoulder as she leaves their thicket, perhaps more loving over his wife now that they have been separated for so long. Eventually, he too leaves the cool embrace of their thicket to investigate Nerine’s borders. He’s a protective, nosy son-of-a-bitch and it’s become his morning routine — wishing Scorch off, spending a few more sleepy moments in the thicket, then enjoying a lope around the perimeter.
Yet, as he is heading toward the border at a warm-up trot, he spots his hairless queen stumbling along a trail with her nose so close to the ground he wonders if her lungs are full of dirt. Confusion and, the heavier emotion, fear work through his body and the russet stallion turns to follow her closely, no doubt in his mind that his patrol with have to be postponed. “Scorch, what in the hell are y…?” His words are cut short by the sounds of childbirth ahead of them.
Pride nestles close to worry as he spots Vi’s blue body through the undergrowth. He steps closer to Scorch, his strong shoulder sliding against her side, until he is side-by-side to his wife as they watch the birth of one of their grandchildren. It’s a beautiful sight, one that pricks at the edges of his heart and brings the thought of tears to his eyes. The liquid doesn’t drop from his brown gaze, but there is a glitter that shines to suggest they could.
Had it really been long enough for Vi to give birth to her second child? He’s been gone that long? His youngest blue daughter had only been a child when he’d curled himself alongside Scorch’s body so many years ago and took his last breath. Yet now he is able to witness his baby girl (his beautiful, darling, sweet baby girl) labor through the delivery of her own child.
And, dammit, that child is beautiful. Although slick with afterbirth and his nutrition for the past months, the russet stallion can tell the colt will be a deep blue roan just like his mother. A deep, almost sickening, warmth fills the stallion and he presses a heavy kiss to Scorch’s shoulder, expressing the overpour of his heart onto her burnt skin.
He is not a man of motherly instinct (never has been, never will be) so he waits while the two females share a moment over the swoon of a newborn. He can understand their deep love on a superficial level, in the same way a deer might understand a rabbit’s behavior, but there is no need to wipe his tongue over the fluids of his daughter’s body. So, before he moves past the undergrowth, his brown eyes scan their surroundings for any signs of danger. Besides the songs of spring around them, there is little moving in Nerine’s landscape.
Satisfied, the russet stallion steps forward. “He will grow to be a stunner for sure.” There’s a chuckle riding on the tune of his low voice as his eyes watch the mother-son pair. “I’m very proud of you, Vi. You did so well.” He thinks of her precautions, especially after what he’s heard of her firstborn, Reshi. “You will be a great mother to Drustan… Don’t doubt yourself.” With that, the russet stallion steps forward to touch his nose to the boy’s blue rump (now clean of afterbirth and slickness, but still damp and ruffled from the tongues of both his mother and his grandmother). “Hello, boy,” he whispers, a deep croon of a volcano’s lava. “I’m your grandfather, Hestoni. Your family loves you very, very much.”
Hestoni
@[Vi] / @[Drustan] / @[Scorch]