12-12-2019, 10:38 PM
<p align=justify>If she ceases to exist after this, she will be okay.
Her lids have fluttered closed (not before once last glance - just one last look at sunflower gold glinting in the desert sun) before it all falls away. Gravity pulls her away from the star she orbits and everything swims in that mist again. The fog of her mind, she has to assume. Even with the visions and this desert - this place where the sands of past and present and future swirl together - something in her has to search for the rational because she <i>knows</i> this is not her Elaina. She knows none of this can be real.
And yet-
when her eyes open again, the warmth of the golden woman still radiates nearby. They are not huddled together as they had been before. Boundaries have been restored where they stand and for a moment, Lilliana tries to forget the screams that are still echoing in her ears. <i>I'm so sorry that I couldn't save you too,</i> she thinks. <i>I am so, so sorry.</i> Maybe she shouldn't be. The anger of his hooves, the rage in his orange eyes had been enough to reveal his intent. It hurts her heart and the weight of the guilt of not being able to spare him a terrible fate, not being able to spare the midnight woman who had called out <i>Aida!</i> hurts her in ways that she never could have fathomed. (They are knives that come in from all angles and nestle within her ribcage, enjoying the torment they create as they twist and slice against her beating heart.)
She couldn't save them all and yet she would have, if she could.
She hates this desert for making her choose. It isn't her place to choose; not life or death. They are not <i>her</i> choices.
Lilliana is standing, silent as the events continue to replay themselves in her mind. The black mare. The cliff. The stallion and the dunes.
The flame stands in quiet reverie with her, the two of them lost in their reprisals of the events that unfolded in this desert. Maybe the palomino mare has heard her thoughts, perhaps the magic has told her that Lilliana had withdrawn so far in her mind that there is no way for her voice to emerge. <i>'He was going to-,'</i> comes an unfamiliar voice that echoes within her, that touches lightly against the fringes of her disbelief. A voice that does not need to speak of what he had meant to do.
<i>'He is,'</i> says a thought from the silent woman, this woman who talks without words ever leaving her mouth, <i>"<b>was</b> my son."</i>
Glass shatters in her heart.
Pieces of her fracture and Lilliana wants to know how you ever put anything back together after a confession like that.
Her face is engulfed with emotion, with sympathy and empathy and compassion because she cannot (will not) imagine what it takes to reach that point. The chestnut has been staring at the dipping valley of sand below them, has looked anywhere but at the mare she has saved because this vision is so <i>real</i> and so aching that Lilliana can't fill the holes in her chest fast enough. Oh, she wants to say. Another stupid, empty response in the face of so much emotion. <i>Oh</i> is the only word that comes again and again in this tethered connection between the two mares.
Silence. Sweet, blissful silence that might be numbing except for the vision that comes. This one is not as consuming as the one before, doesn't draw them in like the fog from the beginning. This is a treasured memory, like a photograph or video reel taken out again and again, watched and revered with love because it represents the best and most beloved moments. There needs to be no words between the pair to explain to Lilliana what this is; a dreamer knows love. Gold and black, intertwined, balancing a whole heart together. (<i>Day and night, light and dark, whole universes brought into existence because of this love</i>, their gaze says.) The chestnut needs to chase the stars away from the corner of her eyes and tries not to dwell too much in her own memories. Of her own reminders of gravity shifting and heavens being brought earthbound. Lilli blinks and feels that her eyes are damp, emotion that has been overrun from the quiet places of her soul. Her dark lashes are rimmed with tears and they have run down her cheeks.
<i>Bring her back,</i> the desert commands.
Lilliana blinks again and feels her heart twist.
<i>Reunite her. Reunite them.</i>
And this time it is not a command - this time it is a plea.
<b>"Ana,"</b> comes the haunted reply. Not strangled, not broken. It flows over the vowels with warmth, with want, with the longing of a lover. The midnight mare, the one who had hovered at the cliff and Lilliana couldn't save, is called Ana. She is a prayer on the tongue of this golden mare, made devout in love. Lilli has looked away from the vision now - torn her pained gaze away from the embraced lovers - and instead studies the flame, the way she burns so brightly for this mare. <i>You are her light in the dark,</i> she thinks.
<b>"Yes,"</b> says the golden mare. No thought was needed for this statement. <b>"I need to be there. Where she is. Home."</b>
Lilliana (<i>feels</i>) hears her heart tear out loud. The break, the shattering is audible.
But as torn as her heart is now, even if it lays in glimmering pieces in the dark places of her soul that this mare illuminates, the tearing sound is not her. It is a sound like the groaning of Taiga's pines in a westerly wind; of waves angrily churning against Nerinian rocks in a gale. A portal opens and it beckons, pulling them towards the unknown. It is a culmination of everything: a burning bush, the blue of the sparkling oasis, the cries of a stranger <i>is this enough?</i>
When her companion looks to her, there is a second she considers lying. (She considers <i>everything</i> at <i>whatever</i> cost that this desert begs.) Lilli thinks of telling her that Ana is on the other side, that on the other side everything is okay. She thinks of telling her that whatever she is looking for will be on the other side.
But she can't.
Even if she can't speak, the words don't even bloom in their bond.
The flame considers the portal ahead of them. <i>What is here for you?</i> prompts the chestnut. <i>If you stay here, what do you gain?</i> The regal figure pauses and stares at her, looking every inch the imposing blaze she is. Her features are unreadable and Lilliana doesn't have her gift. She has no way of knowing what this woman is thinking, of what she is wanting other than the ghost that must still linger in her mind. The palomino looks to the portal again, torn and unsure. Uncertain.
<i>I can't promise you that everything will be okay.</i> The thought is for her companion and herself. (It's something she has said to herself often enough, against the quiet of Taiga's fog and against the ancient places of her craggy shore.) <i>I don't know if Ana will be there.</i> And that thought is echoed with sadness - with the familiarity of someone who has looked for a cherished face on a million others and never found it.
Earnestly, she meets the amber eyes of the golden woman now. <i>I have to go back,</i> she simply states. Lilliana knows she can't stay.
Her attention turns to the portal and the healer walks towards it. A few steps that she hopes will encourage the other. Onward the crimson woman goes and an ear flicks back to hear the pillowed steps of hooves behind her. The golden woman follows. Together they venture towards the unknown and what waits. Lilliana feels the brief thrill of an adventure, of something looming that might change life as they know it and her throbbing heart (still raw, still hurting) leaps at the chance. Closer they come and she can feel the pull of it, another world waiting, waiting, waiting. So close and then silence behind her.
Lilli turns her head and glances back behind her shoulder. The golden mare is wearing that face again (if she had known she was a queen, she would call it noble). Gently, feeling the thoughts flow between them, her chiseled head dips. <i>What if... I can't find her?</i> thinks the stranger. That hope stills and her lips form a line as her thoughts pertain to what the palomino has asked. That sadness is back followed by her perpetual desire to ease, to want to take away all these hurts. She wishes that she could reply with certainty.
Her eyes are dimmed and she gives a gentle shake. <i>You might not.</i> Silence. Emptiness. Space.
Lilliana looks to the portal again as it ripples with things that might be. <i>The thing to remember is that if we're all alone, then we're all alone together.</i> She takes another step and then Lilli looks over her slender shoulder with a smile she might have offered to Kildare or Mina when they had been too shy to leave their mother's side. <i>I'll be alone with you.</i>
And with that, the golden mare walks forward. Together, they travel through the portal. In this place that holds so many memories of the past, they are moving ahead and that is all that matters.
If they keep moving ahead, they will be okay.
It is all they can hope for.
Her lids have fluttered closed (not before once last glance - just one last look at sunflower gold glinting in the desert sun) before it all falls away. Gravity pulls her away from the star she orbits and everything swims in that mist again. The fog of her mind, she has to assume. Even with the visions and this desert - this place where the sands of past and present and future swirl together - something in her has to search for the rational because she <i>knows</i> this is not her Elaina. She knows none of this can be real.
And yet-
when her eyes open again, the warmth of the golden woman still radiates nearby. They are not huddled together as they had been before. Boundaries have been restored where they stand and for a moment, Lilliana tries to forget the screams that are still echoing in her ears. <i>I'm so sorry that I couldn't save you too,</i> she thinks. <i>I am so, so sorry.</i> Maybe she shouldn't be. The anger of his hooves, the rage in his orange eyes had been enough to reveal his intent. It hurts her heart and the weight of the guilt of not being able to spare him a terrible fate, not being able to spare the midnight woman who had called out <i>Aida!</i> hurts her in ways that she never could have fathomed. (They are knives that come in from all angles and nestle within her ribcage, enjoying the torment they create as they twist and slice against her beating heart.)
She couldn't save them all and yet she would have, if she could.
She hates this desert for making her choose. It isn't her place to choose; not life or death. They are not <i>her</i> choices.
Lilliana is standing, silent as the events continue to replay themselves in her mind. The black mare. The cliff. The stallion and the dunes.
The flame stands in quiet reverie with her, the two of them lost in their reprisals of the events that unfolded in this desert. Maybe the palomino mare has heard her thoughts, perhaps the magic has told her that Lilliana had withdrawn so far in her mind that there is no way for her voice to emerge. <i>'He was going to-,'</i> comes an unfamiliar voice that echoes within her, that touches lightly against the fringes of her disbelief. A voice that does not need to speak of what he had meant to do.
<i>'He is,'</i> says a thought from the silent woman, this woman who talks without words ever leaving her mouth, <i>"<b>was</b> my son."</i>
Glass shatters in her heart.
Pieces of her fracture and Lilliana wants to know how you ever put anything back together after a confession like that.
Her face is engulfed with emotion, with sympathy and empathy and compassion because she cannot (will not) imagine what it takes to reach that point. The chestnut has been staring at the dipping valley of sand below them, has looked anywhere but at the mare she has saved because this vision is so <i>real</i> and so aching that Lilliana can't fill the holes in her chest fast enough. Oh, she wants to say. Another stupid, empty response in the face of so much emotion. <i>Oh</i> is the only word that comes again and again in this tethered connection between the two mares.
Silence. Sweet, blissful silence that might be numbing except for the vision that comes. This one is not as consuming as the one before, doesn't draw them in like the fog from the beginning. This is a treasured memory, like a photograph or video reel taken out again and again, watched and revered with love because it represents the best and most beloved moments. There needs to be no words between the pair to explain to Lilliana what this is; a dreamer knows love. Gold and black, intertwined, balancing a whole heart together. (<i>Day and night, light and dark, whole universes brought into existence because of this love</i>, their gaze says.) The chestnut needs to chase the stars away from the corner of her eyes and tries not to dwell too much in her own memories. Of her own reminders of gravity shifting and heavens being brought earthbound. Lilli blinks and feels that her eyes are damp, emotion that has been overrun from the quiet places of her soul. Her dark lashes are rimmed with tears and they have run down her cheeks.
<i>Bring her back,</i> the desert commands.
Lilliana blinks again and feels her heart twist.
<i>Reunite her. Reunite them.</i>
And this time it is not a command - this time it is a plea.
<b>"Ana,"</b> comes the haunted reply. Not strangled, not broken. It flows over the vowels with warmth, with want, with the longing of a lover. The midnight mare, the one who had hovered at the cliff and Lilliana couldn't save, is called Ana. She is a prayer on the tongue of this golden mare, made devout in love. Lilli has looked away from the vision now - torn her pained gaze away from the embraced lovers - and instead studies the flame, the way she burns so brightly for this mare. <i>You are her light in the dark,</i> she thinks.
<b>"Yes,"</b> says the golden mare. No thought was needed for this statement. <b>"I need to be there. Where she is. Home."</b>
Lilliana (<i>feels</i>) hears her heart tear out loud. The break, the shattering is audible.
But as torn as her heart is now, even if it lays in glimmering pieces in the dark places of her soul that this mare illuminates, the tearing sound is not her. It is a sound like the groaning of Taiga's pines in a westerly wind; of waves angrily churning against Nerinian rocks in a gale. A portal opens and it beckons, pulling them towards the unknown. It is a culmination of everything: a burning bush, the blue of the sparkling oasis, the cries of a stranger <i>is this enough?</i>
When her companion looks to her, there is a second she considers lying. (She considers <i>everything</i> at <i>whatever</i> cost that this desert begs.) Lilli thinks of telling her that Ana is on the other side, that on the other side everything is okay. She thinks of telling her that whatever she is looking for will be on the other side.
But she can't.
Even if she can't speak, the words don't even bloom in their bond.
The flame considers the portal ahead of them. <i>What is here for you?</i> prompts the chestnut. <i>If you stay here, what do you gain?</i> The regal figure pauses and stares at her, looking every inch the imposing blaze she is. Her features are unreadable and Lilliana doesn't have her gift. She has no way of knowing what this woman is thinking, of what she is wanting other than the ghost that must still linger in her mind. The palomino looks to the portal again, torn and unsure. Uncertain.
<i>I can't promise you that everything will be okay.</i> The thought is for her companion and herself. (It's something she has said to herself often enough, against the quiet of Taiga's fog and against the ancient places of her craggy shore.) <i>I don't know if Ana will be there.</i> And that thought is echoed with sadness - with the familiarity of someone who has looked for a cherished face on a million others and never found it.
Earnestly, she meets the amber eyes of the golden woman now. <i>I have to go back,</i> she simply states. Lilliana knows she can't stay.
Her attention turns to the portal and the healer walks towards it. A few steps that she hopes will encourage the other. Onward the crimson woman goes and an ear flicks back to hear the pillowed steps of hooves behind her. The golden woman follows. Together they venture towards the unknown and what waits. Lilliana feels the brief thrill of an adventure, of something looming that might change life as they know it and her throbbing heart (still raw, still hurting) leaps at the chance. Closer they come and she can feel the pull of it, another world waiting, waiting, waiting. So close and then silence behind her.
Lilli turns her head and glances back behind her shoulder. The golden mare is wearing that face again (if she had known she was a queen, she would call it noble). Gently, feeling the thoughts flow between them, her chiseled head dips. <i>What if... I can't find her?</i> thinks the stranger. That hope stills and her lips form a line as her thoughts pertain to what the palomino has asked. That sadness is back followed by her perpetual desire to ease, to want to take away all these hurts. She wishes that she could reply with certainty.
Her eyes are dimmed and she gives a gentle shake. <i>You might not.</i> Silence. Emptiness. Space.
Lilliana looks to the portal again as it ripples with things that might be. <i>The thing to remember is that if we're all alone, then we're all alone together.</i> She takes another step and then Lilli looks over her slender shoulder with a smile she might have offered to Kildare or Mina when they had been too shy to leave their mother's side. <i>I'll be alone with you.</i>
And with that, the golden mare walks forward. Together, they travel through the portal. In this place that holds so many memories of the past, they are moving ahead and that is all that matters.
If they keep moving ahead, they will be okay.
It is all they can hope for.
but it's all in the past, love
it's all gone with the wind