The scent of fresh rain filled their home, the soft patter a soothing lullaby to her rattled nerves with her bear-father here beside her. She lay curled against his back, petite muzzle kneading at a particularly stubborn knot in his shoulder. ”You work too hard, Daddy,” she scolded him softly, barely a murmur as she fussed through his fur, almost as though only speaking to herself. Really, now. What on earth was he doing to get so taut.
She sighed and gave up, leaning in to kiss his cheek and rising to her feet to shake herself out. Walking to the entrance of their cave, she stretched out her cramped limbs and splayed her wings wide, and then pulled them back in to drag limply at her feet. For a few quiet moments, she just stared out at the downpour, wondering how soon after it stopped would that familiar fog roll in and blanket their home in mystery.
It used to frighten her, a tiny child refusing to speak to anyone but the man that had found her and taken her in as his own. He was such a good man. She remembered once that he’d told her she’d have a mother too one day, and by that startlingly warm light in his eyes, she thought he meant someone very specific. Very important to him. It never happened though, she thought to herself as she glanced over her shoulder at him, her face somber and quiet. It never happened and she could see by the way he’d been recently that it wasn’t going to.
She wouldn’t ask him what went wrong, and clearly something went so very wrong. It might upset him to speak of it. Maybe her almost-mother didn’t love him anymore, or didn’t want her. Or maybe she fell ill and died, or she only chose not to show without a word and evaporated from their lives completely. Azar might never know, because she would never ask. He could offer her the information if he chose to, but so far they both just seemed to ignore the heavy silences that was so much different than their comfortable quiets.
She turned fully around and walked wordlessly back to him, folded her slender legs beneath her with a whisper of silvery feathers. Her coat was still predominantly bay roan, but the grey places were gaining a subtle shift in color, something almost silver instead of flat and ashen. Her dark hair fell loosely over her neck, and she peered at her father pensively as she thought through everything. Then she pulled on a soft smile, her green eyes warming for him with the love of a doting daughter. She deeply hoped he had not lost his dear love because of her, because she had been unwanted by her almost-mother. She would try not to think of that, but really couldn’t help it after being abandoned as a child. After being unwanted at least once already.
”I love you, Daddy,” she promised him quietly, snuggled up to his side and buried her face in his warm fur.
@[Siberian]