Restless, I wander, my soul writhing against the confines of these stone bars, the castle dungeon that kept us safe from the menace that crawled above. I am torn between obeying the mare called Circuta and my desperate need to feel my wings spreading wide, caressing the wind as it ripples past me. I long to feel the Moon’s soft light kiss upon my hide once more, to hear the stars sing their soft, lonesome song through the vast night.

Here, it is always night. The light is unnatural and false, a harsh orange that bleeds across the pelts of the masses huddled in the central chamber, a pale, flickering blue in the room in which I had met Quilyan and the other writers. It was not without its beauty, this is sure, but I am not made to live in a stone box. I am made to fly freely among others who know the joy of gravity’s release upon their bones, the subtle croon of the breeze as it slips past feathers.

My tail thrashes and writhes behind me as I stalk irritably out of the main cavern. I grow weary of being jostled and touched by the unworthy, so close to their stagnant breath and impure bodies. I grow weary of this life that I have found, the damnable hole into which I have been forced to hide like some weak colt rather than the proud princess that I am.

So many bodies would leave such a stench in so small of confines; it is the only logical boundary through which I can confine the rancorous snarling of my blood as my blue, ethereal gaze seeks out the narrow path between the gathered groups of my inferiors and those who could be better than the company they kept, if only they could see as I saw, if only they could hear the call of the black bell.

Into crystals I wander, the light refracting through the glassy walls and expanding deeper into the maze of walls and stalagmites that rise to and from the ceilings than it would otherwise. It is a room of splendor and fantasy, a place where my eyes flicker about to follow the trail of the lights deeper into the surely dangerous and confusing rabble of the labyrinth.

I wander deeper into its embrace, the gentle lull of its serene and winding paths. If I am lost, at least I will not have to look upon those I wish to maim and murder; I will be free, in a way. It will have been my choice and my actions alone that led me there.

So long as I do not trace myself back to why I am underground to become lost in the first place.

For many hours I delve deeper into the cavern’s serpentine belly, an occasional, useless secondary covert or scapular feather plucked and dropped to the glistening floor to allow me some sort of Hansel and Gretel trail to follow back out. The light blue sheen of the feathers trail quite elegantly behind me, dropped every few feet, and while I have many of them to use, I am soon short on any to spare and find I must desist on my travels inward.

I am surely not as wise as many women I have known, but I do know one thing of life; there are no coincidences. The Gods have built a path for you to walk on, and while it is possible to force a stone to crumble or to create a separate branch from the main road, the line is the same.

We end, always, on the same point we were born to find ourselves upon.

I move to turn back around to follow my feather trail back out, but something catches my eye in the motion; it is round, for the most part, and of a pale, ice tone with white and steel flecking all along its surface. A strange rock, I think to myself, curiosity pulling me nearer to the object in order to classify the stone for later reference, should the need arise.

What I discover is only further proof of my theory on life’s path – I had only enough feathers to bring me here. That was no accident of timing, no alignment of events born of random selection within the universe.

This was meant to be mine.

I look at it quietly for a long time, from a distance that allows me to ponder over the implications of this situation. There are no other animals around, decided with a quick application of my sensory abilities, not a scent rising to my nostrils of the scrabble of claws or paws. The egg has been alone for some time – it may not even be alive. But, from what little I remember of my studies on companion animals (the women of Elysia were not prone to keep bonded creatures, believing themselves to be above the common rabble of nature and finding the emotional connection between such a great being and a lesser one diabolical in its notions), these things tend not matter. By simply touching it, accepting whatever life may reside within the thick shell, I will give it purpose, and an existence.

The black bell tolls, tells me I do not need to become one with a maggot.

My true heart sings out with longing for someone who can understand me without a spoken word.

For the millionth time since I had been branded with the sinister marks of my people, I defeat the malicious call of the poison. I step forward to close the gap between the egg and myself, and gently touch my nose upon the surface of the infant’s cradle to roll it nearer to me.

I find that there is already love held in my heart for it, even at that first, tingling touch.

[ OOC: Birthday give-away prize for a newborn normal companion is going to Cealestis! :3 ]

Cealestis