lepis, comtesse of taiga
RUN AND TELL ALL OF THE ANGELS; THIS COULD TAKE ALL NIGHT
i think i need a devil to help me get things right
The wren she had seen earlier trills quietly and another bird answers, deeper in the woods. Lilliana describes her home, and it does not sound at all Like Lepis had thought: boisterous and loud and loving. The siblings and cousins she mentioned earlier were perhaps not as near as Lepis might have thought, and her own slow nod echoes the way that Lilli’s voice softens a little as she recounts memories. Icicle Isle without the ice, she says, and Lepis smiles at the thought despite herself. Temperate, perhaps, somewhere between the two island extremes that Beqanna seems to hold. The pegasus nods agreeably to Lilliana’s question about Loess – it was warmer than Taiga at the least, and certainly more so than Icicle Isle.
Once again Lepis, with her easily-wielded emotions, is in the dark regarding those that exist in her companion. There is something, maybe something that Lepis has said. But what – her longing for a family? She already knows that not everyone desires the same. That she has found a husband who feels the same?
Oh.
The realization is sudden.
So Lilliana has noticed after all.
The tobiano has done her best to keep Wolfbane’s absence from the residents of Taiga. She does not want them concerned, wondering where the Commandant has gone, wondering if they are safe with only a Protector. Yet Lilli has noticed, the same attributes that make her an observant politician making her equally aware of the suspicious emptiness in Taiga’s hieracrchy. Here Lepis has been speaking fondly of her husband, while Lilli politely does not bring up the fact that he is nowhere to be found
It is not comfortable to be pitied, Lepis finds.
She shifts uneasily for a moment before she settles herself, reaching for the perpetual brightness at the back of her mind, and for the lifeline that Lilliana offers by voicing her desire for a family.
“They are my everything,” Lepis admits to Lilliana, and this time there is no struggle to hide emotion like she had the frustration, no effort to bury the tender affection that fills every bit of her at the thought of her family. Gold, if she had to name it: like the yellow of happiness yet superior in every way. It fills her without any effort at all, a warm glowing that replaces the worry and embarrassment of a moment ago.
“You can still have them,” The Comtesse reassures the copper mare, now worried that the diplomat’s quiet voice suggests she might feel otherwise. Lilli is young (Lepis suspects this even with the many hues of immortality), and she is more classically beautiful than Lepis has ever been. She is clever and judging from her reluctance to accept Lepis’ judgment of relations with Nerine: determined as well. “You will find someone as wonderful as you, and you will have the family that you want.” Were they closer, Lepis might have reached out, offered a soft touch of affection. But for all the intimacy of their conversation, they are not yet much more than Comtesse and Diplomat who know the basic facts of each other’s childhoods.
So instead the dun mare offers another warm smile, unaware how her own motivation might mirror Lilliana’s.
@[lilliana]
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