even monsters are made of stardust
This forest is so unlike the one she has become accustomed to that it steals all of her attention at first. She forgets that she is a stranger in a strange land, for a time, and revels in the new space she has invaded. The trees run the gamut of red colors from the maples to the flamboyant. At first, she had thought of blood. Her mind started to recreate an entirely different forest on an island far, far away. She starts to wander down that path in her mind (starts to remember the fleshy trunks and the meat that swung from the branches, spraying crimson blood on and around her) before stopping herself with a sharp breath. This is a different time and a different place. She will never go back, can never return.
And isn’t that for the best?
Zosma follows the sound of water babbling happily through the woods. She parts curtains of hanging purple wisteria with her curving horns and lets the enormity of the forest swallow her. The air grows cooler the deeper she goes. It is a refreshing cool compared to the summer heat of the rest of their world. She is grateful for the reprieve after climbing the steady incline into this mountainous land. After a while, the winding creek grows into a tributary and the thick cluster of trees spreads thin. She’s able to loosen her wings from their tight position at her sides as she steps out into a clearing. Just as the demoness is stretching the kinks out of her taut frame, she hears a sound.
The high-pitched whinny comes from somewhere just ahead. Without thought, Zosma picks up the pace to intercept whatever child it is originating from. Because it would be all too easy to become lost in a forest like this, and even if she doesn’t know her own way, they could at least stumble around together. She finds the girl quickly. Her bat wings are already raised instinctively around her, prepared for fight or flight. She looks almost threatening as she towers above the filly, casting her red aura onto the other and staring with opal eyes. She’s about to ask the girl if she is lost when the hair at the nape of her neck raises.
Someone is behind her.
The demon spins around with bared teeth and flared wings. She doesn’t call on her shadows – not yet – but she is prepared to defend this unknown child with lethal action. But as quickly as she inflates, she rapidly deflates when her eyes find her would-be assailant. “Kagerus,” she says, bringing herself up from the crouched position she had been in. Her gaze softens slightly, appreciatively, as she regards her once-companion. There is no moonlight to set her aglow like the last time, but she’s tempting in the full light all the same.
She doesn’t say anything for a time, her eyes flicking from Kagerus to the leopard at her side to the girl behind her that she makes space for. Sanctuary. The word rolls around unspoken on her tongue as she tastes the offer of it – not that she has been offered anything yet. It’s not the reason she’s come. But that reason could have an entire life built here, the way she’s standing and owning this place. Hell, this little girl could belong to her and she could have read her all wrong the last time they met (when they woke in another plane). Her eyes land on the painted mare’s again and linger there. “I went to sleep one night some time ago. I was wondering if any part of it was real, or if it was all a dream.”
zosma