12-04-2019, 11:54 AM
Beryl doesn't know how the thread that binds her to her mother frays with each decision that she makes - she is too young, really, to understand these things at all - but she clings to his promise of security. When she closes her eyes against the shadow-horrors she has molded, there is no comfort in that empty space. It is not like the shadow-realm where the Eyes circle around her endlessly, it is not like the darkness of night when they almost do the same, if she calls them. Beryl has found her peace with the-- Are they creatures? They whisper, sometimes, that voice like smoke, like rust, but Leilan never hears them, and she has never seen one speak, only heard the voice as though in her ear when nothing stands nearby.
No, when her eyes shut, there is nothingness and she falls into it without the funnel of Eyes to keep her afloat in space. When the darkness shifts behind her eyes, she tumbles until the firm pillar of his leg grounds her. It feels as if the whole world is spinning out of control beneath her, and without knowing it, sheathed claws extend again, curling into whatever lies beneath them, snow, ice, the frosty scales of his leg. Here, in Leilan's element, her kitten's claws do little more than graze the icy armor, only catching here and there in the space between.
His muzzle pressing into her side makes large brown eyes open wide and as quickly as she was falling, the ground is solid again underfoot, claws like cleats in the ice, her toes spreading across the surface. Leilan promises not to take her back and the golden lion-child finds no joy in the thought, but a thin relief all the same. No Pangea, no mother, no father, but he is here, and though the world she knew is far away, it is not so far gone that he has not heard of it. Perhaps some day, she will return.
But then, the memory of those hunters, shining in their black and bladed armor, and she shakes her head, small and resolute.
No. Never.
The memories of her painted mother flutter across her mind like torn tapestry, the thought of her sire a shining an unreachable promise. Mama would have wanted me to be brave, she thinks, though she is not really sure what it means to be brave, what it takes, and her feline face screws itself into a thoughtful frown before settling back onto the roan stallion, enormous before, but a behemoth beside her cub's body. She presses one paw - no claws - against his still lowered brow.
"Mama called me Beryl."
And then, through her fear and grief, her stomach growls softly. The soft rounds of her ears turn forward, tufted tail lashing side to side, and she stands up on her hind paws, balancing against him. His sly manner makes her forget the sadness of just minutes before, swept away on his sharp-toothed grin, and she returns it with her own, excited and completely ignorant of his meaning, ignorant of what is to come.
"A new food?"
No, when her eyes shut, there is nothingness and she falls into it without the funnel of Eyes to keep her afloat in space. When the darkness shifts behind her eyes, she tumbles until the firm pillar of his leg grounds her. It feels as if the whole world is spinning out of control beneath her, and without knowing it, sheathed claws extend again, curling into whatever lies beneath them, snow, ice, the frosty scales of his leg. Here, in Leilan's element, her kitten's claws do little more than graze the icy armor, only catching here and there in the space between.
His muzzle pressing into her side makes large brown eyes open wide and as quickly as she was falling, the ground is solid again underfoot, claws like cleats in the ice, her toes spreading across the surface. Leilan promises not to take her back and the golden lion-child finds no joy in the thought, but a thin relief all the same. No Pangea, no mother, no father, but he is here, and though the world she knew is far away, it is not so far gone that he has not heard of it. Perhaps some day, she will return.
But then, the memory of those hunters, shining in their black and bladed armor, and she shakes her head, small and resolute.
No. Never.
The memories of her painted mother flutter across her mind like torn tapestry, the thought of her sire a shining an unreachable promise. Mama would have wanted me to be brave, she thinks, though she is not really sure what it means to be brave, what it takes, and her feline face screws itself into a thoughtful frown before settling back onto the roan stallion, enormous before, but a behemoth beside her cub's body. She presses one paw - no claws - against his still lowered brow.
"Mama called me Beryl."
And then, through her fear and grief, her stomach growls softly. The soft rounds of her ears turn forward, tufted tail lashing side to side, and she stands up on her hind paws, balancing against him. His sly manner makes her forget the sadness of just minutes before, swept away on his sharp-toothed grin, and she returns it with her own, excited and completely ignorant of his meaning, ignorant of what is to come.
"A new food?"
Beryl
Litotes x Mehendi
@[Leilan]