Lakota & Ktulu

The Poisoner & The Constrictor

Breath hitches in her brother's throat, and she gazes at him with all the love and trust that she always had, from the moment she'd first opened her eyes and found him shocked and staring back at her. He'd been the mother and father she'd never rightfully had, and she had imprinted upon him as she should have the mare who had birthed her. His face had been the first she'd ever seen, and she looked at him now with that same tenderness as she first had. Of course she remembered the song he used to sing for her, the one their granddam had taught him. He would wrap himself around her, so much larger than she even then, and he would sing it into her ears sweetly and softly, in a voice she wished he would reveal more often. Words of encouragement, of promise that she had a guardian angel looking over her, even when her angel was wrapped around her like a blanket of comfort and love. Even now she could recall the words, could sing them by heart and memory alone if someone merely asked. There were few things she held more precious than that simple little melody.

But his next words caused her to recoil as if she had been struck, violet diamonds wide and injured, and she backed away from him as if he were a stranger. Tears gathering in the corner of her eyes like stars across the constellation of her vision. The words, spoken in a language they had always had only to themselves, were far too cruel to be placed in the beautiful lilting accent of their homeland. The only thing beautiful to have ever come from such a wretched place. Something only between them, sacred and cherished, and he used it to rip her heart from her chest with his teeth. His touch was shrugged off as if it burned her, she felt betrayed, unwanted, as if her world was collapsing around her. Had she finally lost the one person she'd thought would always be at her side? What had she done, for him to turn his back on her in such a way? A singular tear escaped from the corner of her eye, trailing down the deep sapphire of her cheek, staring at him as if she had never seen him before. What had she done to deserve this? Did he hate her now?

He says her name and she chokes, bites out a single word that cracks painfully as it leaves her lips, "Don't." She can't bear to hear her name on his tongue, not now, not after he had taken everything she'd ever believed in and cruelly shattered it. Strong? He thinks she's strong? Right after he betrayed her in such a way, he dares to call her something like that?! Her ears begin to flatten slowly as he speaks. Anger hurts less, she whispers to her breaking heart, and she wishes she hadn't resorted to it so often in her years of life. It was her default, her coping mechanism. Being angry was better than having to acknowledge the agony waging war in her chest.

"Don't forget you?" she spits, poisonous like the mists that she wishes to summon, if only to knock him out and leave him there while she ran away to cry herself to sleep. The one person she'd always trusted and relied on, had told her to find someone else to cling to. "You just told me to find someone else, and you ask me to not forget you?!" Her ears have disappeared within the darkness of her mane, and she snaps her teeth at him threateningly when he moves to touch her neck. It will not hurt, if it connects, but she feels she must do it anyways, if only to keep him away from her. If he comes closer...it will hurt all the more, and she may not be able to keep herself from giving in and forgiving him, should he find a way to talk himself out of the mess he'd made.

"Killing me would have been kinder," she chokes, and it cracks once more, and she lets all her pain and anger throb in her voice like the beating of her breaking heart. Mist wrap around her ankles, and it surges across the dewy grounds towards her brother, a poison in mind that would not harm him, only make him drowsy and sluggish. It races towards Alleo like a snake, and as it approaches she turns and runs, and down come the tears, angry and self-loathing. She was a fool to think she was important enough to keep even her patient siblings at her side.