11-17-2019, 02:28 PM
Night comes early to Icicle Isle, even in the spring, and the thaw comes late. While across the rest of Beqanna a sigh of relief is spreading, birds returning to their roosts with an explosion of song to brighten the grey and mud of early spring, on the frozen island only the snow geese are returning, their plumage stark white against the snow and their calls something less than musical. It is a hopeless place for many, grim and unforgiving, and not, perhaps, the best place to try to raise an orphaned foal. One horse may eke out a bare survival, chewing tough lichen and mosses and the withered dried grasses beneath the ice and snow, but to find enough for two, and one a growing babe, might be considered less than ideal. It is lucky, then, that Leilan does not have to feed himself on roughage, and only needs to feed her, but as for all parents, these things are time consuming. Selfish in her helplessness and need, Beryl does not take much notice of the toll it takes on him, though also she does not blame him for the pang of hunger that cuts through her thin frame as easily as the fanged wind that scrapes over her skin.
On this day, with the help of a few rare hours of bright spring sun in the afternoon, he has been more successful than usual. The filly is curled up out of the wind beneath a small embankment, napping off a filling but not terribly satisfying meal of bark and a few early bulbs the stallion had dug up from the mostly still-frozen ground. It was a feat she would never have managed with her thin legs, but he'd made short work of the sun-softened topsoil. Sometimes she tried to help, but she hadn't the physical strength, and even her control of the yellow-eyed Shadows was still too weak to provide much assistance in the matter.
The sun is already setting, though, and the cooler air awakens her, long-lashed eyes fluttering open, blinking in the bright flash of sun that cuts through the dimming day and illuminates the rainbow that drips down her shoulder and forearm. The light looks deceptively warm, her coat glowing in it, but the temperature drops significantly with each minute ticking by. She lifts her velveteen muzzle from its place tucked behind her elbow and slowly rises with a stretch and a soft squeal. She arches her neck, leaning forward, and extends her back legs out behind her - first the left, then the right, and when they are planted back on the chilled earth once again, Beryl nickers to herself and gambols in a small circle, waking all her muscles from their slumber. When at last she comes to a halt, rich brown eyes seek out the familiar sturdiness of the scaled Leilan, but he is not immediately visible. A brief moment of fear threatens to overwhelm her - that fear of loss and abandonment that she carries tucked within her since the day she lost her dam - but then the wind bring his scent to her, not far, only hidden by hillocks of snow.
The golden child leaps forward into the the snow, clambering up the icy side of the bank and only once sliding back down it in a tangle of limbs and laughter. From here she can peek around the hills and valleys of snow to where Leilan is busy trying to find more to offer her when she awakens - he does not seem to notice that she has already awakened. Her laughter is muffled. I will surprise him, she thinks, giddly, eyes shining brightly. From her place behind him, she bows slightly, golden forelegs stretched ahead of her, pink-grey hooves pressing into the snow with a dull crunch, and white tail waving wildly with excitement.
And then, she leaps.
She leaps higher than she had meant to leap, but it still was not quite enough to summit the mountain of him. The child had not intended to leap onto Leilan at all and is bewildered to find herself clinging to his haunch five small claws on each forepaw snagging ineffectually at his scales. Her cry of alarm comes out as a strangled mewl and the lion cub drops away into the snow in a bewildered heap, only the gold-blue-red galaxy stain across her shoulder marking her as the same creature he rescued from freezing.
"Oh-oh! What? Help!" Her voice, returned but still slightly roughened by the sea, sounds strange and small in her rounded ears, her nose is too short, her whiskers are too long. The too-familiar feeling of panic rolls in like drowning under the waves and Beryl bares her canines at nothing in particular while the Shadows creep in close around her. What has she become?
On this day, with the help of a few rare hours of bright spring sun in the afternoon, he has been more successful than usual. The filly is curled up out of the wind beneath a small embankment, napping off a filling but not terribly satisfying meal of bark and a few early bulbs the stallion had dug up from the mostly still-frozen ground. It was a feat she would never have managed with her thin legs, but he'd made short work of the sun-softened topsoil. Sometimes she tried to help, but she hadn't the physical strength, and even her control of the yellow-eyed Shadows was still too weak to provide much assistance in the matter.
The sun is already setting, though, and the cooler air awakens her, long-lashed eyes fluttering open, blinking in the bright flash of sun that cuts through the dimming day and illuminates the rainbow that drips down her shoulder and forearm. The light looks deceptively warm, her coat glowing in it, but the temperature drops significantly with each minute ticking by. She lifts her velveteen muzzle from its place tucked behind her elbow and slowly rises with a stretch and a soft squeal. She arches her neck, leaning forward, and extends her back legs out behind her - first the left, then the right, and when they are planted back on the chilled earth once again, Beryl nickers to herself and gambols in a small circle, waking all her muscles from their slumber. When at last she comes to a halt, rich brown eyes seek out the familiar sturdiness of the scaled Leilan, but he is not immediately visible. A brief moment of fear threatens to overwhelm her - that fear of loss and abandonment that she carries tucked within her since the day she lost her dam - but then the wind bring his scent to her, not far, only hidden by hillocks of snow.
The golden child leaps forward into the the snow, clambering up the icy side of the bank and only once sliding back down it in a tangle of limbs and laughter. From here she can peek around the hills and valleys of snow to where Leilan is busy trying to find more to offer her when she awakens - he does not seem to notice that she has already awakened. Her laughter is muffled. I will surprise him, she thinks, giddly, eyes shining brightly. From her place behind him, she bows slightly, golden forelegs stretched ahead of her, pink-grey hooves pressing into the snow with a dull crunch, and white tail waving wildly with excitement.
And then, she leaps.
She leaps higher than she had meant to leap, but it still was not quite enough to summit the mountain of him. The child had not intended to leap onto Leilan at all and is bewildered to find herself clinging to his haunch five small claws on each forepaw snagging ineffectually at his scales. Her cry of alarm comes out as a strangled mewl and the lion cub drops away into the snow in a bewildered heap, only the gold-blue-red galaxy stain across her shoulder marking her as the same creature he rescued from freezing.
"Oh-oh! What? Help!" Her voice, returned but still slightly roughened by the sea, sounds strange and small in her rounded ears, her nose is too short, her whiskers are too long. The too-familiar feeling of panic rolls in like drowning under the waves and Beryl bares her canines at nothing in particular while the Shadows creep in close around her. What has she become?
Beryl
Litotes x Mehendi
@[Leilan] congratulations, you are now a cat-dad lol