[private] It's nothing complicated, I just want to kill him

[avocet]

Why had his mother hated him? Avocet stands there, still and silent. The pair stand surrounded by wildflowers - flooded and nearly drowning in a colorful ocean of them - and the bay yearling frowns again. Mother hated you, Manikin tells him with a voice laden with a sweetness that even the flowers must envy. Avo frowns and shakes his head, away from the unnerving memory and away from the thought that Popinjay hated her only son.

But even as he pushes the memory away, it comes back in bright and vivid lightning strikes, the truth clashing with the lie.

Avocet - small, plain, ungifted -  as he slept beneath his dam's dark wing. A place that should have been a sanctuary for a young foal. But the face that Popinjay wears shatters the peace that should be there; the face that the shifter wears is one full of hatred. (Some part of Avocet still protests against this false-memory. Why would Popinjay hate him? He never brought his dam bouquets of the trademark flowers but Avocet tried to show her the most open spots he could find. He thought that his mother would have enjoyed more space to spread her wings and all the freedom she could find to summon her storms. It seemed to him that Popinjay would have enjoyed using her lightning strikes as firestarter offerings. He thought that his mother would have smiled more at wildfires than flowers.)

The thought burns away; it blazes across his memories and is replaced with Manikin and her beak blooming blood in the land of wildflowers across the face of their dam. She saves him (again and again; there isn't one time but many). She saves him and Avocet is grateful for all the times that Manny placed herself in the face of danger - a face that should have loved them. The flames are still there, burning in his velvet brown eyes but when he looks at his twin again, they are burning with love and recognition for all that she has done for him, for them. Who needed Popinjay, anyway? Suddenly, the disappearance of their mother no longer seems like a problem. @[Manikin] has returned and at this moment, she is all that matters. It is enough.

His sister shakes her head sadly, rightfully mourning the loss of her claws and Avocet feels his resolve tighten like a fist inside his chest. It hammers, demanding that something is done. That there be some kind of compensation for Manikin's loss.

He remembers.

"Should we go looking for them?" he utters darkly. "Or would you rather we do something else?"



and you thought we couldn't play siblings who get along.