A shiver runs involuntarily down her spine and Lilli turns her head to look back at her slender form, frowning slightly at the way her body reacts to the chill in the air. Unlike her mother, she isn’t equipped for the frozen months and the crimson girl longs for the warmth of the sun. Her body craves its heat as the air comes out in ribbons of vapor from her flaring nostrils.
Lilliana sighs and then turns her head back to the patch of woods in front of her, her blue eyes scanning through the trees hoping for a sight or sign of Aten.
The wood is so quiet and a swiveling ear belies at how uneasy that makes her, on how it forbids herself to settle. (There is a stillness to this season that does nothing for her mind that races for questions.) Her weight shifts gingerly from one side to the other as she decides to move on, accepting that this request might be a foolhardy one. The lithe mare moves through another copse of pristine woods, made that much redder and imposing without the green of the leaves and ferns to vie for contrast.
She longs for something to break the silence. A bird to flap its wings. The wind to come rushing through and make the branches quake in response. But the forest seems so impossibly deserted. For a girl who had been one of multiple siblings, who had numerous aunts and uncles and cousins and who later had many nieces and nephews, the silence is something she has a hard time abiding where the echoes of family and laughter had once been.
Where her life had once been.
There is life here in Taiga. She can feel the hum of it beneath the forest canopy. There are children and families and others make their home within this forest. It is a start for Lilli and determined to make the best of it, she seeks Aten out today. Taiga can never be home for Lilli – that concept has long gone blurred and hazy in her mind. (If ‘home’ exists, it a feeling for her. It the peace she feels underneath the Hyaline stars knowing that her love and her secrets are kept safe within the heart of her golden cousin.) But Taiga borders Hyaline and as there is nowhere else for her to go, she has added Taiga to a list that has contained the names of places like Culloden and Paraiso.
It is the history she craves, a want for knowledge that has started to grow since her return from the Mountain. She’s always been an apt pupil. There had been multiple lessons on etiquette and diplomacy growing up, of histories and alliances and wars. But that history has been rendered useless here – what cares do the Beqanna residents have of Frostbane or Ostere? What difference is it to them about the threats and villains that have plagued her bloodline? What does it matter to them what Lilli has lost?
Beqanna is an entirely new place with her own set of heroes and villains. But the history, the stories that can’t be changed, hold an allure for the young mare to learn where her ancestors came from, what motivated them, what their stories were like. Maybe if she can find where it at all started, there might be a chance to find a way to mend the broken pieces of her that no longer fit within her chest like they once did. Maybe knowing where she came from could help her understand where she is supposed to go.
Beautiful, silly thoughts that Lilli refuses to let go of.
Finally, her pleas to the universe are heard and the baritone cry of a stallion rings through the woods. An unabashed smile finds her face then wiping away any of the disconcerting thoughts that had been there before. Blue eyes brighten eagerly as they find the familiar form of the golden stallion as he approaches and Lilliana goes to meet him where he paused. Her head tilts to one side as she glances up to him, ”Not an unpleasant one I hope?” And while the question is a playful one, there is concern behind her voice that speaks of not wanting to impose on him.
If this is a bad time, she can always come back.
But Aten gives no such clues and the mare ventures to her next question, ”When you were speaking of the fire the other day and when we spoke of the Dale, I was hoping..” she pauses here, trying to explain all the words that swim in her mind. Gently, slowly she offers what he has probably already surmised: ”I’m not from here but my family was once. I grew up with bedtime stories about the Forbidden Dale.” As probably many had, others who had called that place home and etched their memories into its hallowed ground. Shyly she asks, ”Do you think there is a chance that a piece of it still exists?”
A ridiculous wish but if there is one thing that Lilli is capable of, it is hoping in the face of adversity.
Lilliana sighs and then turns her head back to the patch of woods in front of her, her blue eyes scanning through the trees hoping for a sight or sign of Aten.
The wood is so quiet and a swiveling ear belies at how uneasy that makes her, on how it forbids herself to settle. (There is a stillness to this season that does nothing for her mind that races for questions.) Her weight shifts gingerly from one side to the other as she decides to move on, accepting that this request might be a foolhardy one. The lithe mare moves through another copse of pristine woods, made that much redder and imposing without the green of the leaves and ferns to vie for contrast.
She longs for something to break the silence. A bird to flap its wings. The wind to come rushing through and make the branches quake in response. But the forest seems so impossibly deserted. For a girl who had been one of multiple siblings, who had numerous aunts and uncles and cousins and who later had many nieces and nephews, the silence is something she has a hard time abiding where the echoes of family and laughter had once been.
Where her life had once been.
There is life here in Taiga. She can feel the hum of it beneath the forest canopy. There are children and families and others make their home within this forest. It is a start for Lilli and determined to make the best of it, she seeks Aten out today. Taiga can never be home for Lilli – that concept has long gone blurred and hazy in her mind. (If ‘home’ exists, it a feeling for her. It the peace she feels underneath the Hyaline stars knowing that her love and her secrets are kept safe within the heart of her golden cousin.) But Taiga borders Hyaline and as there is nowhere else for her to go, she has added Taiga to a list that has contained the names of places like Culloden and Paraiso.
It is the history she craves, a want for knowledge that has started to grow since her return from the Mountain. She’s always been an apt pupil. There had been multiple lessons on etiquette and diplomacy growing up, of histories and alliances and wars. But that history has been rendered useless here – what cares do the Beqanna residents have of Frostbane or Ostere? What difference is it to them about the threats and villains that have plagued her bloodline? What does it matter to them what Lilli has lost?
Beqanna is an entirely new place with her own set of heroes and villains. But the history, the stories that can’t be changed, hold an allure for the young mare to learn where her ancestors came from, what motivated them, what their stories were like. Maybe if she can find where it at all started, there might be a chance to find a way to mend the broken pieces of her that no longer fit within her chest like they once did. Maybe knowing where she came from could help her understand where she is supposed to go.
Beautiful, silly thoughts that Lilli refuses to let go of.
Finally, her pleas to the universe are heard and the baritone cry of a stallion rings through the woods. An unabashed smile finds her face then wiping away any of the disconcerting thoughts that had been there before. Blue eyes brighten eagerly as they find the familiar form of the golden stallion as he approaches and Lilliana goes to meet him where he paused. Her head tilts to one side as she glances up to him, ”Not an unpleasant one I hope?” And while the question is a playful one, there is concern behind her voice that speaks of not wanting to impose on him.
If this is a bad time, she can always come back.
But Aten gives no such clues and the mare ventures to her next question, ”When you were speaking of the fire the other day and when we spoke of the Dale, I was hoping..” she pauses here, trying to explain all the words that swim in her mind. Gently, slowly she offers what he has probably already surmised: ”I’m not from here but my family was once. I grew up with bedtime stories about the Forbidden Dale.” As probably many had, others who had called that place home and etched their memories into its hallowed ground. Shyly she asks, ”Do you think there is a chance that a piece of it still exists?”
A ridiculous wish but if there is one thing that Lilli is capable of, it is hoping in the face of adversity.
LILLIANA
i left home on account of snow
(buried all the things i know)
(buried all the things i know)
@[Aten]
but it's all in the past, love
it's all gone with the wind