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GULL
these nights never seem to go to plan
As dawn breaks, the tundra is still, the silence only disturbed slightly by the rustle of your feathers as you glide overhead. A fresh blanket of snow has fallen overnight, and everything is perfect: white, unmarred, pristine. It’s beautiful. The illusion is only shattered by the bloody, tattered corpse that lies motionless amidst the drifts…and by the haunting echo of your strangled roar as you see her.
Everything is a blur. You don’t know how you make it safely to the ground, for it feels like you’re still falling out of the sky as you stand over her, white legs stained red by the blood still seeping through the snow. She is barely recognizable, for she has been savaged, and you weep uncontrollably as you see the gaping tears in her back where the four magnificent wings once rested. Her crowning glory has been stripped from her, taken as a twisted trophy by the bastard who murdered her. You are vaguely conscious that you are screaming, but the only word stamped in your mind and seared across your heart is NO. Not Muriel.
Even in death and despite her broken body, her expression is eerily peaceful. Roughly, you press your muzzle to her face, willing her to wake and speak to you one last time. But it’s useless, and even your most desperate prayers are in vain; the stiff body has been dead for hours.
Though her wings are gone, Muriel’s feathers are scattered about from her struggle, half buried in the snow. Carefully, you collect the bloodstained mementoes, the motion hauntingly familiar as you gently tug the last remaining feathers from her withers.
There is no question in your mind as to who the killer is and how they could have done it, for you know exactly who is responsible. Streaming eyes look north, narrowed in grief and hatred, and though your throat is already raw from your cries, you let loose a wordless bellow. You promise vengeance. The horned monsters will pay ten times over for what they’ve done.
And then you remember, with a sense of rising panic: the kid. What have they done with the kid? Surely Muriel wouldn’t leave him, unless…your heart constricts. You can never be sure, but you can only guess that she died protecting him. Had he gotten away? The snow doesn’t tell you, only stares silently up at you, refusing to yield the secrets and tracks that it has covered.
“Brigand?” you call, raising your head. “BRIGAND?”
@[Brigand]
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