- R E E M -
We don't have to reap the fear they sow.
The air was sweet here, so much sweeter than the sunbaked earth of the plains. The antelope-mare wasn’t entirely sure how she’d managed to find such a place. Eager eyes poured over the gentle hills and lush landscapes It was nothing like Dorobo, and perhaps it was just what she was looking for.
Reem missed her sisters, or at least the idea of them. Even when they had all lived together, Reem had been kept apart from the others. She hadn’t understood why back then. She did now. She was the black sheep. The bastard child. The stain upon the family’s good name. When she was young she’d been able to pass as a full-blood sibling. But as she grew, it became more and more evident that Reem was not of the same blood of her sisters. So she was kept hidden away, restricted from traveling openly with the family. She could not fault her mother, who loved her as if she were her own blood. But she could always detect that shadow of betrayal in her mother’s eyes. Raising the product of her mate’s infidelity couldn’t have been easy, but she’d shouldered it with such grace.
She’d been lucky, all things considered. But her family had since scattered to opposite ends of the earth after the fall of Dorobo. Her eldest sister had been driven from the Capitol, her fate still unknown to Reem. Her middle sister had disappeared into the forests, seeking refuge with the native tribes that had embraced her. And her parents had both been imprisoned for her father’s role in the corrupt system.
And Reem? No one even knew of her existence so there was no reason to even look for her after the fall. She was on her own for the first time in her lifetime. Free.
She’d taken full advantage. Now could finally have a life of her own. She stood, eyes alive with excitement, waiting to see what this place would bring.
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