I want to see him burn.

It is sudden, this ire, and yet its presence is undeniable and furious, a roaring rage hammering away all logic and scraping each inch of rational thought from her cranium’s crevices. Lilómiel chirrs, crooning his glee, his maniac joy; his urges pound parallel to hers briefly before converging in the way of a tide. There is no care, no tenderness, to his mental attack, only a violent attempt to rip her away from her carefully constructed boundaries. Each of Volterra’s movements, brutal and swift—the flattening of his ears, the clouds curling from his nostrils, the way he takes his weight back and throws his height in her face—only adds the fuel of Nymeria’s flame. She fights for control, for her will, wresting herself away from Lil’s dark murmurings and scheming. Her uncertainty and insecurity, veiled by rage and clouded with her passion, suddenly pulsates closer to the surface of her mind.

‘Cause she’s living a lie and she knows it. 

Cloaked under layered resentment and rage Nymeria is crawling with doubts, with unacknowledged realizations, hiding from what she knows and does not want. There is a fact clamoring for her attention, a realization: that her mother has passed on more than just a wicked face and voluptuous body—that mother has also bred into her cruelty and malice, hatred and resentment. 

Rock slams up from the sand, a needle spire that seems ominous as a wolf’s bared fangs. Nymeria stares, chest heaving from her outburst, neck arched and nostrils flared; and something in her murmurs to back down, childish cowardice clawing its way towards prevailing sensations of domination. No. Back she thrusts it, towards wherever she buries it, once again choosing false security over truth, holding onto control when chaos is imminent. On her spine Lilómiel growls, lips curling back from winter teeth, smoke dribbling from his slick black nostrils. There’s a warning to that rumble of his—but seem as it may to be directed towards Volterra and Vérzés, it’s only for his bonded.

“Don’t tell me to control myself,” the filly mutters mutinously, cutting Volterra a sharp glance. There’s venom yet to her bite—but her tone itself has cooled, forcing itself back into an image of broken ice and chipped glass. It’s Volt, not anyone… important… but she isn’t fond of the way her control slipped so utterly from her grasp, the way she had squeaked and shouted at him like a fool where he had retained his temper. Since when was he the one in control? And here, pitted against him—they just weren’t the same anymore, and not a single piece of her liked that. Before she had always relied on him, sometimes in the callous manner a queen relied upon her guard; she manipulated him, to a degree, though never in a cruel manner… 

Well, that had just gotten much harder with the fact it almost appeared he had a brain now. 

Red eyes roll and she lets her ears slide back against her poll. “Don’t be so fucking dramatic, Volt,” she snaps, lashing her tail across her flanks. “You might think we belong to one another, and maybe we do, but I wouldn’t make decisions for you. And you shouldn’t do the same for me—not that I would let you anyways.”

With a final, exasperated snort, she lets the matter slide, refocusing on what they should’ve been discussing from the start. There’s tension still coiled in the tight fix of her neck, the hard flex of her jaw—and she can see the effort Volt is making to relax—but at least the thought of Confutatis imprisoned is enough to sober the two of them. (Although typical Volterra, all worried about the dragons. Doesn’t he get it? Mother first. Everything else? Second.) 

“Lilómiel can do it. He’ll camouflage better against the night.”