sunset shadow and summer snow [open] - Printable Version +- HELOVIA || The Way to the Sun (http://helovia.com) +-- Forum: Out of Character (http://helovia.com/forumdisplay.php?fid=1) +--- Forum: Archives (http://helovia.com/forumdisplay.php?fid=11) +--- Thread: sunset shadow and summer snow [open] (/showthread.php?tid=6306) |
||||||||
sunset shadow and summer snow [open] - Valka - 03-14-2013
Birds scattered as the constant thunk-thud of her feet passed far below them, under the sweep of spiked branches and deep within the well of shadows on the earth. After a while Valka wondered if her steps spelled out some kind of pattern – a secret, unknown to her, but announcing bad news for all other life. She watched dark wings sweep across the sky and watched the sun fall slowly down. I am alone, she thought. The truth of it provoked a hollow feeling somewhere deep within the smooth cage of her ribs – not sadness, not quite, but… empty. Familiar. Valka paused the loud noise of her progress as the sun began its slow bleed into night: red fanning out behind the trees and spreading into purple at the very edges of the sky. Muffled heat soaked through the forest, fanned the hardened streaks of salt along her flanks. Her lungs sucked in air but the heave of her ribs proved brittle – uncomfortable. With an agitated flick of one ear, she recalled the lighter forest behind her and the chuckle of conversation. ”Why am I unlucky?” she inquired of no one in particular. Only the forest answered with its quiet shuffling of small feet and the unchecked spread of hungry shadows. Valka snorted, unimpressed, and flattened her ears at the dark. I am of blood bred from the wild lands like these, she told herself. I do not fear the dark, or loneliness, or anything… yet she shuddered when a crow quarked out hoarse warning just behind her. Perhaps that was the secret from which all the birds and squirrels fled: she was bad luck, made for one world and yet raised in quite another. She longed to rise on her hind legs and puncture the sky with that curl of horn on her brow, but the earth caged her down and history made her complacent. She had only the dream of great things – the noise of her feet in a dark place, the rush of her heart as she ran. Weary with more than just the strain of many days walking, she eased herself below the branches of a spreading pine and leaned her hip into its corrugated bark. Just above her head, a deep scar in the trunk warned of an unknown danger: big, old, likely past. Valka sniffed the bark in idle curiosity, filling her lungs with the acidic scent of pine resin. This place is old, she thought, and wondered how old – how many things had it seen? How many darknesses danced in its embrace every night? She ought to feel welcome within such a place, she told herself. Perhaps things like her would rise with the moon and laugh when they found their daughter here from so far away… Perhaps. In the fading heat, in this tired body, Valka found it difficult to believe much of anything. Perhaps a wolf would leap at her throat and she would die where she stood. It seemed just as likely. With a huff, she lowered her head and watched the sun set, watched the shadows grow, watched yet another strange land change around her without any notice of the unicorn it harbored. stock credit: elaineselenstock.deviantart.com | hellofascination1991.deviantart.com | burtn.deviantart.com RE: sunset shadow and summer snow [open] - Snö - 03-15-2013
RE: sunset shadow and summer snow [open] - Valka - 03-15-2013
Something ghostly moved between the trees: a flash of white, the rustle of dry brush. Valka’s ears drew up, intrigued. She recognized the shape for horse this time. The flash of adrenaline that accompanied her meeting with Sulwyn was absent; instead the young mare lifted her head and blinked through the trees at the ethereal shape now approaching. Shafts of moonlight painted the stranger in a cold, pale light – but even through the shadows she glowed. Head up, muscles tense beneath the dirty edges of her coat, Valka stood and watched and waited. The stranger greeted her, but for a long time that greeting went unanswered. ”You have a horn,” she said at last, her voice hoarse with awe and disbelief. The sudden tension strung throughout her frame, the way the moonlight glinted in her eyes – it might be read as fear, but it was something else, some bud of hope now bursting into bloom. Valka leaned into a single, shivering forward step and hesitated. Her nostrils flared, sucking in the scent of frost and spice – a smell like winter, like that blowing snow on the day of her birth. ”You are a unicorn, like I am,” mumbled Valka. She wanted suddenly to run but knew not where; she drank in the sight of the stranger instead, her eyes hungry – fervent. You’re beautiful, she thought but didn’t say. The other mare was like a frosted heath, like something from a story: light, lovely, sweet, and yet tinged somehow with the hard glint of frost. Perhaps it was some edge to her voice; perhaps it was merely the way the mare held herself – a stance full of grace and wariness, of feral intelligence. Valka wanted all of it. ”S-Snö,” she fumbled, trying to remember what the unicorn had said. ”My name is Valka. I’ve been in search of others like myself for…ever.” She nodded. Her mind spilled suddenly, relentlessly, over the best ways to impress a stranger – but it moved so fast it tangled and she was left standing like a dumb girl yet again. ”Are there… others like us? In your herd?” She dared not even hope it, yet she longed to hear it: yes, you aren’t alone. And more than that, she longed to be welcomed and not threatened like some skulking dog. A herd in the north, she thought, envisioning a gathering of unicorns all thick with winter hair, their long manes whipping in the cold wind, horns glinting in a sudden flash of sunlight. Let it be true, let it be true. Surely this was more than some cruel dream. stock credit: elaineselenstock.deviantart.com | hellofascination1991.deviantart.com | burtn.deviantart.com RE: sunset shadow and summer snow [open] - Snö - 03-18-2013
RE: sunset shadow and summer snow [open] - Valka - 03-20-2013
“Valka,” Snö repeated the name and on her lips it was almost majestic. Valka’s dark ears remained fixed forward, now drinking in every breath of reply Snö might utter. She sounded kind, thought the dark mare – kinder than any wild thing could be expected to behave. Snö was less like the wolf, less like the driving storm, and more like… something warm and alive. Valka studied the pristine horn that spiraled gracefully up from between Snö’s eyes. That looked cold, she thought, and yet far more lovely – more honed – than her own uneven horn. To be truthful, Valka suddenly felt dreadfully common; here she was no witch-daughter. Here she was merely another daughter, and though the other mare was smaller than herself this Snö looked strong, and oh-so-proud. Valka sucked in a small breath, an attempt at a sigh, and tried to keep her upright stance unwavering. Snö had been talking while Valka thought – talking about a herd of many unicorns! Of course they lived up in the north – they were creatures of wind and frost, cold and unforgiving. Excited, Valka stamped her forefeet. ”They would accept me?” she asked, eager to leave now and do no explaining. Mindful that she didn’t want to anger the other unicorn, though, Valka bit her tongue and settled just a bit. ”I… was not raised among our kind. I was raised by dull-witted horses of a herd far from here. I knew my kind was elsewhere, and that I did not belong with such ugly creatures, so I left. And now I have found you!” Pride sang in her voice, and glee. She was quite prepared to run north at a hard gallop until she found them – this herd of Snö’s. stock credit: elaineselenstock.deviantart.com | hellofascination1991.deviantart.com | burtn.deviantart.com RE: sunset shadow and summer snow [open] - Snö - 03-23-2013
RE: sunset shadow and summer snow [open] - Valka - 03-24-2013
Valka forced her limbs to still when Snö responded. Honored; they would be honored! The dark mare bobbed her head. Both strange eyes remained fixed on her conversation partner, though. Crimson light washed over Snö when she stepped into the light; Valka marveled in silence, wondering how she could ever compare with a creature so regal – so lovely and kind. Snö was everything a unicorn should be; everything Valka had quite imagined. In the dusk they were both lit by the sun’s dying flames, but Snö glittered. And she called Valka ‘friend’ when next she spoke! The empathy running through Snö’s voice was reassuring; it was in their nature to detest such common beasts! But Valka had been raised among them; she couldn’t help but wonder, even in the very furthest corner of her mind, if perhaps she carried some of their mannerisms, their common ugliness. She must try, she told herself, to be as great as she was meant to be. She must not speak of the horses too much. ”They take no pride in their bearing,” Valka responded, her voice cold – clipped. Remembering the teasing of the other foals, remembering Sulwyn’s warning about traitors… Valka’s ears pinned back against the long, strong muscles of her neck. ”I hope never to feign courtesy to them again. I should not be obligated…” she stamped a foot. ”I would be glad to be among my own kind. I’m honored by your kindness, Snö. I long to put all I have suffered far behind me.” stock credit: elaineselenstock.deviantart.com | hellofascination1991.deviantart.com | burtn.deviantart.com RE: sunset shadow and summer snow [open] - Snö - 03-24-2013
|