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  • Beqanna

    COTY

    Assailant -- Year 226

    QOTY

    "But the dream, the echo, slips from him as quickly as he had found it and as consciousness comes to him (a slap and not the gentle waves of oceanic tides), it dissolves entirely. His muscles relax as the cold claims him again, as the numbness sets in, and when his grey eyes open, there’s nothing but the faint after burn of a dream often trod and never remembered." --Brigade, written by Laura


    [open]  show me where the light is, any
    #1

    Summer in Taiga was warmer than Lilliana could recall it being in years.

    The Taigan Guardian had gathered her youngest set of twins and Reave and brought them to a secluded spot where they could spend the season. A small cove near the Nerinian border that boasted a beach whose waves could be heard crashing through the Redwoods and a few small islands that could be explored when the tide was low. During the height of Northern summer, the mother and her three children spent their days exploring the beach. The yearlings - Oren and Roselin - could be found exploring every nook and cranny of the craggy coastline. Reave sometimes followed and on other days, her smallest boy seemed content to walk the beach with his mother while searched for treasures that would wash up on their shore (seashells, driftwood, precious stones).

    Sweetness blossomed with the beach roses and despite the sadness of Brazen's loss, Lilliana found moments of peace with her children.

    On a night when the moon is full and the beach is wide open, a star ventured down from the midnight-velvet sky. 'The audacity,' it thought as it hovered on the pebbled shore (Leonidas never cares to compete with any glow). The light was a specter on over the waves and flashed in a pattern of dimming and beaming, acting like a beacon to whoever lingered in the copse of woods nearby. The star floated up and down in a series of motions that looked almost... impatient.

    Finally. Lilliana arched a brow (though not nearly noticeable in the dark) at the glowing orb when she finally approached. Oh? she countered before starting down the water's edge as the bonded continued with questions about what took her so long, why she never brought her children for their evening walks, and a myriad of other things that could occupy a mortal during daylight hours. The chestnut mare listened with an ear pricked towards Leonidas and the other flickering to the sound of crashing waves. Nestled between the sea and the star, Lilliana finds she doesn't mind the company.

    She's half-distracted, her thoughts turning over the trivialities of the day and impending changes that Yanhua and Amarine had discussed bringing to the Taiga. Her mind tracks back to the discussion of Tephra and seeking out relationships with the Western Isles. Leonidas - who shares her thoughts - hums inside her head with disapproval. Do stars have nothing to worry about? she wonders to her companion.

    We do, the floating light replies. But our worries are different from yours, I think.

    It makes her curious, what worries Leonidas has, but the young star has other plans. And before long, the pair are racing down a long stretch of beach that they know well; the cadence of hoofbeats clashes (and is nearly drowned out) against the surf. Is that as fast as you can go? Leo goads and surges forward, encouraging Lilliana to do the same. The chestnut lengthens her stride and finds herself laughing as she does, enjoying the sensation of her legs stretching out.

    (Lilliana has always prided herself on how swift she could run; the only child in her family to be born ungifted, the only one without any affinities to the Winds, she always loved the way that she and breezes came together in swift accord of a racing gallop that had left all the others behind.)

    There is no doubt that she is covered in sand and her mane is tangled by the salt air but the chestnut doesn't care. Her sides are heaving by the time they slow (Leonidas tells her that he let her win, this time), and she still laughing when they stop, not yet realizing the petrified forest with its colosseum-style pillars is so close by. Lilliana tosses her head to the evening sky and turns to say something to Leonidas when spies a shadow. Their sprint is still evident from the air that rushes from her flaring nostrils and there is no time to tell the star to dim his light, for her to vanish into the dark cloak of night. True to his beaming nature, Leonidas shines brighter, eager to see the stranger approaching them.


    Remember when our songs were just like prayers
    Like gospel hymns that you caught in the air?



    There's a lot of nonsense - Lilliana races a star down a beach and they stop. Leonidas likes attention. Somebody talk to them <3
    but it's all in the past, love
    it's all gone with the wind
    Reply
    #2

    despite the overwhelming odds, tomorrow came

    The night was long, and I couldn’t sleep. It is not unlike most nights since I’d returned to Taiga. Perhaps it was the constant state of anxiety that was wreaking havoc on the rest of my health as well. In the middle of the day, it was easy to see the toll that it was taking on me. My eyes had sunken in, and the spark of life once within them was gone. I still smiled for Memorie, but the genuine happiness she had once brought comes fewer and farther in between now. She looks so much like her father that I often find myself doing a double-take, thinking it to be him. And it’s not that I don’t love her, because she is absolutely the most precious thing to me, but it’s not enough to heal a broken heart.

    It didn’t help that Yanhua was often busy these days, making his rounds, going on adventures into other lands, and…taking care of his other family. The thought leaves a resounding emptiness within me. It didn’t help that the giant redwoods made the world feel so large and me so small and insignificant. I felt completely alone, except for Memorie.

    In the darkness, I could barely see her little figure, curled up at my hooves. Filtered moonlight glints off of her ever so slightly, though, and I can just make out the little horns on her head. They had only just started coming in, and were still small yet. She also has her father’s coloring, right down to the same color mane (though her tail matches my own), and she shares his beard, his cloven hooves, and his stockings. She could have been his carbon copy, except for that tail. I love you so much, baby girl, I think to myself, though feeling entirely guilty at the same time.

    Just then, she shifts beneath me, uncurling her tiny head from her body, and I can see a glint of her eyes looking up at me. “Mama, I’m thirsty,” she says, though I suspect there’s more to her stirring than just that. I was almost certain she could feel my emotions, now. I had been watching carefully for indications of it ever since I’d first suspected it when I’d just returned to Taiga. She has so much of her father in her. I give her a sad smile. “Okay, little love,” I say, lowering my head to nudge her little butt, “Well, pick your little butt up, and let’s go find some water.”

    She scrambles easily to her little, cloven hooves. The first thing she does is gently brush my side with her velvety nose, then I step forward, leading the way. She had only been here a few days, so she had yet to learn where everything in Taiga is. I, however, knew that there was a little brook on the far side of a cove along the ocean shore, so this is where I lead her. Her little figure disappears behind me, and from there she plays with my tail while we walk. It isn’t long before the giant trees thin out, though their shadows are still long.

    Not hidden by shadows is a figure that races across the beach with a…ball of light? The sight is so utterly unnerving that it stops me in my tracks for a moment while I watch it draw nearer. Memorie seems content to stay behind me as the horse and the ball of light draw nearer. Suddenly, it stops, just close enough to shed a sliver of light on me, and then the horse turns to face me, and I recognize @[lilliana].

    Now, Memorie’s curiosity seems peaked, and she peers out from behind me, just as the ball of light brightens. It bathes us in its light, making us more visible to the other mare. “Lilliana!” I say, still slightly rattled by her presence here. Memorie slips in beside me, her little face lighting up under the glow of the ball of light. “Hi.” I’m not exactly sure of what to say to the mother of the stallion who had broken my heart.

    borderline

    Photo by Sharon McCutcheon from Unsplash
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    #3

    Leonidas, much to Lilliana's dismay, never hides his shine.

    He gleams and glows; beams and burns as bright on this beach as he might in the twinkling sky above them. It was their language, he once told the chestnut. That was how stars communicated (at least in his universe) with their brothers and sisters, to the fervent souls who prayed and believed and wished in the mortal worlds below. (To know a star's shine is to know his soul, he had told his companion on one of their earliest nights together. Nothing can hide in our light.)

    The Guardian flashes a lookup to the glowing orb, wishing once again that he wouldn't glow quite so brightly. But the young star is paying no attention to his bonded. He dances on the salt air - up and down a few times - before slowly drawing near the shape: @[Borderline]. Lilliana lifts her head to better see the pale mare and her vision adjusts to see the small mare revealed in the silver-blue starlight. She nods at the sound of her name, a confirmation that the willowy silhouette (that had been wind galloping down this beach) was indeed her.

    She looks to the other Taigan while attempting to keep an eye on Leonidas, who has floated over Borderline and off to her side. He hovers and his glow turns blue, a shade similar to the mane and tail of the other mare. Look, he thinks, curious about his new discovery. What he reveals is a smaller shape, a smaller shadow that draws in the remainder of Lilliana's focus. The star illuminates the flaxen mane of the filly, her sprouting horns, and a chestnut coloring that favors her own. Her heart catches in throat, unable to be contained while the exertion of her sprint is still burning in her lungs. The little girl looks so much like Yanhua that she can't help but smile, help the look of adoration that replaces the concern she had for Leonidas' antics just moments before.

    "Oh," she murmurs softly, almost inaudible in a voice already turning tender with love.

    Like she had done with her two other grandchildren, Lilliana lowers her refined head in hopes that her granddaughter might come closer while glancing up at her mother. The flame-marked mare knows why she is out here; why she comes here night after night. Leonidas and his luminous energy would keep her children awake when they should be sleeping. (And if she's honest, she still doesn't know how to explain him yet. To do that would be to reveal more about her past than she ever has before.) Her expression grows worried for the pair because what else would wake them at this late hour?

    "Is everything alright?"


    Remember when our songs were just like prayers
    Like gospel hymns that you caught in the air?

    but it's all in the past, love
    it's all gone with the wind
    Reply
    #4

    despite the overwhelming odds, tomorrow came

    I find it odd that the ball of light draws nearer to me, as though out of curiosity. I had never before come across a star bonded to horse, so I don’t know that it is a sentient being, nor do I hear the musings that pass between him and @[lilliana]. So when he changes color to match my mane and tail (and that of little Memorie’s tail as well, the only physical attribute that marks her as mine), I startle slightly, pulling my head up suddenly.

    When I look back to Lilliana, she is looking down at the filly, her grandchild, and Memorie is looking back at her, slightly confused by this strange mare’s sudden interest in her. I take a small step back so that she is slightly ahead of me, now, and the light shines down on her even more. When she looks up at me, I give her a soft smile. “It’s okay, little love, this is Lilliana, your father’s mother, your grandmother.” And suddenly, Memorie becomes more interested in the chestnut mare, who she now sees bears a resemblance to herself and her father, who she’d met twice now.

    Memorie takes a hesitant step forward then looks back at me, and I nod my encouragement, so she takes another, more confident step forward and gently reaches her nose out to Lilliana. “Lilliana, this is Memorie,” I say, warmth and fondness making its way into my tone.

    Still, I remain slightly guarded. Maybe Lilliana sensed that, or maybe she was just worried about our late night wanderings, but she asks if everything is alright. For me, it is quite a loaded question, because if I’m honest, nothing is alright. I stood here before her with as broken a heart as a heart can be broken. I had thought that what Yanhua and I had was special, but then I learned he loved another. How special can it be if it is shared by another? And part of me feels like he loves her more than me. They probably had history together, too. How can I compete with that?

    I realize that my thoughts have wandered far from the conversation, so I give me head a little shake. No doubt she had only meant to ask if everything was alright since we were wandering around so late at night. And I also decided that she didn’t need to hear from me about my troubles with her son. Nay, she probably didn’t want to hear about those. “Oh, yeah. Everything is fine. Memorie just wanted to get a drink. I was just headed for a little brook on the other side of the cove.” I do my best to hide the pain that I feel resonating throughout my heart and soul.

    borderline

    Photo by Sharon McCutcheon from Unsplash
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    #5

    "Forgive Leonidas," Lilliana says first with giving a knowing look to her companion. But the way she speaks his name implies that the glowing orb has some kind of cognizance. It only dips once in acknowledgment before floating towards the filly again. "He's still learning manners," says the Taigan.

    But then her attention is drawn back to Memorie.

    "Hello Memorie," Lilliana says to her granddaughter and smiles gently at the little girl. Despite the darkness that lingers at the edge of Leonidas' light, the familial resemblance between remains obvious. Lilliana looks at her and is reminded all over again what Yanhua had been like at that age. An ear pricks towards Borderline and hearing the warmth flooding the voice of the young mare makes her glad; she had looked rattled moments before.

    The filly reaches her delicate nose out and Lilliana does the same, extending it to almost brush against her granddaughters. Like before, she hangs back and lets the choice come from Memorie if she would like to come closer. When the older mare glances back up at the younger one, something about her still seems on edge despite Leonidas' starting to dim his light and the peaceful cadence of the waves behind them. She exhales a soft gust of air towards the filly and smiles tenderly, finding it hard to look away from the little chestnut.

    She still can't shake the belief that if everything was fine, then Borderline and Memorie wouldn't be here. They would be tucked away, safe and content in some hollow within the Taigan woods. Her blue eyes gaze down at the girl again and Lilliana feels the smile etching against her dark lips. "You must have been very thirsty to come to the ocean for a drink," the Guardian teases. They all know there is no drinking from the sea but some part of Lilliana likes the idea that they went searching for a brook and found the vast ocean instead.

    Borderline's face cracks against the shadows; fractures in a way that Lilliana has seen before (with Elena, Brazen, and Warden) and that she knows.

    Leonidas lifts on the salt air, twirling on a summer breeze and his companion asks her granddaughter: "Have you met a star a before?" Lilliana waits before adding, "He says that he likes your blue tail. It reminds him of a comet he once saw."

    When it seems like the star is occupied with the child, Lilliana looks to Borderline again.

    A gust comes rolling off the waves and she offers quietly, "I often come here when I need to clear my head." Lilliana admits, revealing that this has been a frequent spot for the Guardian of late. Glancing to check on Leonidas and Memorie, she adds: "The ocean is great for putting things in perspective." Her problems had always seemed so much smaller than any horizon (until Aela went missing, until Brazen died, and then Lilliana had wanted to burn the whole sky down).

    "Thank you," she murmurs softly, banishing the ache away by focusing on the present. "For all the healing you brought to Taiga after the fires." She looks back to Memorie and the way that her expression softens again says that is not the only thing she is grateful to @[Borderline] for. Watching the little girl brings back so many memories for Lilliana that she can't help but ask: "How do you find motherhood?"


    Remember when our songs were just like prayers
    Like gospel hymns that you caught in the air?

    but it's all in the past, love
    it's all gone with the wind
    Reply
    #6

    despite the overwhelming odds, tomorrow came

    So the ball of light is sentient. Though I had seen many things since coming to Beqanna, and had found gifts of my own, this was definitely something that surprises (and intrigues) me. I watch the star float up and down in front of me, as if nodding to the chestnut mare, and I can’t help but smile at the uncanny thing before me. I would have asked about him, but then the older mare’s attention is snatched by the filly by my side.

    I watch as she steps forward toward @[lilliana]. It makes me happy that Memorie has a family, and I can’t help but feel grateful to have this chance encounter for her to meet part of that family, despite how difficult it might be for me. I mean, when I had left, I didn’t care about anyone but my own feelings. Then the child had been born, and suddenly, I had begun to regret leaving, not for myself, but for her. Well, and a part of me missed Yanhua and wanted to find a way to make things work.

    Memorie closes the distance between her and Lilliana by taking a step forward and then reaches her nose up to touch the older mare’s nose ever so gently. Then she dances back with a giggle, smiling warmly up at her grandmother. “Hi!” She says brightly, and I can’t help but smile.

    I laugh a very forced laugh at Lilliana’s joke about being very thirsty to have come to the ocean, and I try to act happy, but by the look in the other mare’s eyes, I could tell she wasn’t buying it. Luckily the sentient ball of light’s antics draw the attention away from my pain, and Lilliana asks Memorie if she’s ever met a star before. A star! I think, amazed at such a wondrous thing. The filly looks even more dazzled than me, though. “A star?!” She exclaims. “No, I have not!” And when she relays the message from the star about her tail, the little filly bucks up her legs so that her tail flies up over her rump in excitement. “I got mama’s blue tail!” She continues, as if it’s the greatest thing ever. The exchange lifts my heart, and for a few moments I forget my pain, and a genuine smile breaks across my face.

    When I look back to Lilliana, the mare seems more sober and offers me some gentle words of wisdom. I look out over the ocean as the waves come crashing in. For a moment, I just stare out into the great expanse, and it makes me feel so small, like my problems are just a drop in the giant ocean of life. “It seems like a good place to clear your head,” I muse.

    When she thanks me for the healing I’d brought Taiga, I’m surprised. I half expected her to ask me about my problems, but thanking me for what I’d done for the land was the last thing I expected. I give her a warm, genuine smile. “Of course. It is a beautiful land, and I want to do my part to heal what has been broken.” When Lilliana asks about motherhood, though, that’s when my face truly brightens. “Oh, Lilliana, I am more in love than I have ever been in my entire life, and I don’t think anything can compare. She makes me a better horse every day. I’m sure you can understand that.” I could tell just by the way she looked at Memorie that she knew exactly what I was talking about.

    borderline

    Photo by Sharon McCutcheon from Unsplash
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    #7

    Memorie flips her blue tail (which has become slightly illuminated beneath Leonidas' glow) over her hindquarters and Lilliana laughs. The girl seems to become emboldened by the attention of the star and it reminds her briefly of Nash, who had been cheeky even at Memorie's tender age. The older chestnut stands in the quiet - content to listen to wave song and watch her granddaughter interact with Leonidas for the moment.

    "And what a pretty color it is," Lilliana says, smiling at the little girl's antics.

    "I think it is," she offers to Borderline when the pale mare looks out the ocean. Turning out to look at the twilight sea, her expression turns wistful. "I'm rather partial to it," Lilliana explains with a rueful smile that remains mostly hidden in the dark. "It's been a favorite spot of mine for years," she says, thinking about how many tides had turned on this beach over the years with the slender mare for company. A soft breeze tugs at her curling mane, warm and inviting as it rolls away from the breaking surf.

    (Once upon a time, Lilliana used to come here to send her thoughts across the waves; 'I live by the ocean, Lilli.' Her cousin had said. 'If you are looking at the sea and so am I, then the currents might bring us together again one day.')

    Leonidas occupies himself with Memorie and Lilliana looks to her fellow Taigan, though she takes a step forward in hopes that her companion might keep pace with her. Borderline smiles and she returns the gesture before looking back to her bonded and granddaughter. What the blue-maned mare speaks of is a statement that she knows well. "No," she murmurs in agreement with the young woman. "There is no love quite like it.".

    They linger in silence for a few moments before Lilliana decides to share something with @[Borderline]. It's a sentiment she thinks the new-mother could identify with. "When the boys were born, I was terrified." Leonidas flashes a different color - almost violet in hue - to young Memorie and Lilliana shakes her head at the star. Show off, she thinks before coming back to the conversation. "I was so afraid I would break them somehow or do something wrong," she explains of those early days when it had been just her and Nash and Yan. "It was just the three of us and the family I came from was so large," something in her voice drifts away before she steadies it, before she offers a small smile, "I didn't think I could do it on my own."

    That was before, though.
    Before Pangea.
    Before Wolfbane.

    But she hadn't been alone, she reminds herself. That sense of family had prevailed in the end; even though she had been stolen away, Brazen and Elena had remained with her sons.

    The quiet settles again (as much can be found next to an ocean, anyway) between them and Lilliana waits. As a youth - not much older than her granddaughter now - she had accompanied her mother, Aletta, on the rounds of their war-torn home to speak with the residents who remained behind. Most had been families like her own, missing some crucial part of it by a war that called nearly half their population away to the siege in Windskeep. Everybody seemed to be missing a parent, a sibling, or a cousin. Reflecting back to those days, she hopes that offering some insight about her past might invite Borderline to do the same.


    Remember when our songs were just like prayers
    Like gospel hymns that you caught in the air?

    but it's all in the past, love
    it's all gone with the wind
    Reply
    #8

    despite the overwhelming odds, tomorrow came

    As @[lilliana] explains her partiality to the cove, and as I look out over the vast expanse of ocean that stretches as far as the eye can see, I can’t help but feel more at peace. With myself. With the world. With my own little corner of the woods. I can see why this is her favorite spot. I feel like throwing myself into the waves, letting them wash over me as if they could wash away the pain within my heart, the confusion within my mind, and the emptiness within my soul. It’s almost cathartic.

    When I look at her, looking wistfully into that great expanse, I can’t help but think that she is beautiful; a mare with so much wisdom to give and such a big heart to give it with. “I wonder how many worries have washed up on distant shores?” I muse. I can’t be the only creature to ever walk the beach and wish to cast my worries into the ocean.

    Lilliana takes a step, as if to walk along the beach, so I move forward to join her. And for a moment we talk about motherhood while Memorie plays with the star, now trying to catch it. In the silence that follows, I reminisce on the moments that had made me stronger as a result of being a mother. When the older mare speaks again, the sincerity in her voice is evident. “I guess…I was never afraid of doing things on my own. My family–if you could call it that–was small. It made me think that I had to do things on my own. But after Memorie was born, I realized that I didn’t want that for her.”

    The talk of her boys also brings up the loneliness within me, though. I didn’t want Memorie to be alone, but what about myself? Though I had made the choice to stay, to try to make things work, I felt ever more alone each day. Could I make things work with Yanhua? Could he ever make me feel like I wasn’t alone? The questions torment me. They keep me up at night, and I think they keep Memorie up, too. For a moment, she pauses in her play with the star to look over at me, as if she can sense my distress. I give her a slight nod to let her know that I’m okay, and hesitantly she turns her attention back to the star.

    “You know what I was terrified of?” I give Lilliana a moment to chew on the question and wonder about the answer. “I was–and still am–terrified of failing her.” When I had left Taiga, it was with selfish intentions. As time went on, I couldn’t help but think of what Memorie was missing out on: the love of a father, the love of a grandmother, a family, a home–all things I was depriving her of.

    And how was I failing now? By being miserable, I tell myself.

    I cast my eyes back out across the ocean. So… the voice within me echoes, what are you going to do about it? I look back at Memorie, still playing with the star, and a soft, determined smile crosses my lips. “I guess…sometimes… I hesitate for a moment, “you just have to have faith that things will work out.”

    borderline

    Photo by Sharon McCutcheon from Unsplash
    Reply
    #9

    "Oh, I'm sure plenty," Lilliana muses along with Borderline with a wry smile.

    "My," she starts, remembering days long gone on this same beach. "My cousin and I used to love it out here. We had a few hideaways back in Taiga that we created but she loved the sea," the chestnut shares with the pale mare. "We had never seen the ocean until Beqanna," comes the fainter explanation of why the two girls from a place called Mumuring Rivers had gravitated towards this shore.

    Those memories with Elena - and along with Neverwhere after - helped negate a memory along this shore that Lilliana tries not to (ever) recall.

    Memorie plays chase with Leonidas and the pair of them move far enough down the beach that it leaves Borderline and Lilliana cloaked in darkness, with only the distant stars above them for any source of light. An ear flicks towards the pale mare as she listens (and some part of her aches to hear that the younger mare's family made her feel as if she had to tackle her problems by herself; despite the war in Windskeep and the years staying a stride ahead of the enemies her sire made, they had always stayed together). But there is a resiliency in the other mare to be admired. Despite the differences in their upbringing, Borderline comes away from hers with the knowledge that if she had to do things on her own, she could.

    "You don't have to," Lilliana offers gently as they walk and does her best to gauge the expression of Memorie's mother. "If that's what you want," she adds. "I want to Taiga to be for family. For those who need shelter or support or," she pauses, "sometimes it's just nice not to be alone."

    There had been other hopes as well. Lilliana had wanted Nerine and the Isle and Taiga to act as one; a unified North that wouldn't allow the trials of the past to happen again (at least not in her lifetime). With Popinjay taking leadership of the moorlands and the rift between herself and Leilan still unrepaired, she doesn't know where that dream stands anymore. She can only hope that an example coming from the Redwoods might set a precedent with the other Northerners.

    Lilliana tries to broach the subject of Borderline and Memorie remaining in Taiga delicately. It isn't as if she doesn't know about Amarine or @[Borderline] and the situation involving her son. There is very little that happens within her home that she doesn't know about. (But what would Lilliana say? She'd take the blame entirely; her boy seems to have inherited her graceless heart along with her blue eyes.)

    "That doesn't change," she shares as they continue to walk and the glow of Leonidas starts to turn in their direction from a few yards down the pebbled beach. Memorie's laughter comes chiming in a moment later. At least it hadn't changed for Lilliana - from Nashua all the way down to her youngest, Reave.

    She's grateful that Leonidas' light isn't close enough to expose how her expression stills, that her granddaughter isn't near enough to feel the emotions stirring in her chest. "There is rarely harm in hoping," Lilliana says carefully. "But it never hurts to have a plan."

    Remember when our songs were just like prayers
    Like gospel hymns that you caught in the air?

    but it's all in the past, love
    it's all gone with the wind
    Reply
    #10

    despite the overwhelming odds, tomorrow came

    It is a welcome relief to talk about @[lilliana]’s memories. It helps soothe an aching heart, that someone was willing to share their memories with me. I smile wistfully. “I had never seen the ocean until I came to Beqanna as well.” And now, I tell myself, I think I’ll come back again, too. Maybe I wouldn’t return to this beach, as it is special to the older mare, and I don’t want to steal that from her. But I could find my own space along the vast shoreline, a place where I could come to wash away my worries.

    I am glad for the darkness left in the wake of the star’s absence as it played with Memorie. It hides the pained expression on my face as I recollect the painful childhood memories of feeling alone and unloved. Yes, it had made me more resilient, but at what price? I’m not sure that price was worth paying.

    Lilliana’s next words strike a chord in me. What do I want? I had never really thought about that, because I was always thinking of everyone else. And if I was honest with myself, I don’t want to do it alone. The “it” being anything from motherhood to life in general. I don’t want to be alone anymore. In the choked moment of silence, the older mare goes on, and I am reminded that Taiga had felt like home, not just because Yanhua was here, but because it was the first place where I had felt welcomed…and not alone, it was the first place I felt like I had a family. But it was the next words that really hit home. “Sometimes it’s just nice not to be alone.” They reverberate like endless echoes in my ears, and I feel a tear roll down my cheek that I hoped the other could not see.

    For a few moments there is silence before the conversation turns to motherhood and fears we share as mothers. Yes, I think, that will never change. I could see myself down the road with a few more children to call my own, and I can’t imagine I would feel any less apprehensive of failure than I do now. “I should hope it doesn’t change,” I say with a soft smile.

    As we walk, I take a moment to listen to Memorie’s squeals of delight to have something as cool as a sentient star to chase around. Oh, the stories she would bring back to Cheri and Reynard. It makes me happy to share this moment with their grandmother.

    A plan. I stop for a moment, lost in contemplation. “Yes, a plan,” I return thoughtfully. Lilliana was absolutely right. I should have a plan. Not just for Memorie, but for myself as well. Taking care of myself would be the best thing I could do for the child, anyway. Between my encounter with Amarine and my encounter with Lilliana, I think I have a lot to think about in the coming days, but I definitely have a better sense of where I wanted to go.

    I smile at the other mare, an expression that shows even in the shadows that fall across our faces. “Thank you, Lilliana.”

    borderline

    Photo by Sharon McCutcheon from Unsplash
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