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The other child is unexpected – surely, Ru is as alone as she perceives herself to be. However, the fresh remains of the rabbit appear to gather more than one wandering soul today. The filly is presented with the images of flaming creatures – mythical beings, she assumes. Ru has no name for their bizarre configuration dancing along the stranger’s back. It steals her attention nonetheless; the feather-mare is intrigued and swept away by the simplicities of this unexpected magic. That the filly’s voice nearly misses her ears.
With a sharp inhale, one that burns her throat, the dunskin mare returns to the youth’s words (and how odd it was now, having grown just a little more, that she was no longer ‘one of them’). Her expression is one of curious observance, and the issue of the dead creature barely concerns the mare for the meantime. Wondering what might have compelled the youth to defend her. If it is a means to defend at all, or perhaps the filly was merely honest in how she perceived the incident. Pending how much she really saw of the simple mistake.
The swooping of Khairi’s wings, the sound of fluttering feathers and a needy gaze turns Ru’s head. A soft grin marks her suspicions of what has clearly happened to her mother’s body, eaten and savored by those who naturally fed on rotten things. This one, however, reeks of fresh meat – life, severed in unforeseen circumstances. An amused snort leaves her nostrils, just as the ground moves against the weight of a giant – one who heralds with a quickened pace, searching eyes, a domineering gaze that makes the girl’s head tilt ever so slightly. Ru shifts uneasily in her spot. Not because she was afraid, or startled, merely uncertain about the stallion’s intentions.
He is a father, although the girl holds no sentimental value for the word, a person, an idea. She had had one once, but he was lost to the winds before she’d ever breached her naked head into the world. Attached to no one, for the sky had jealously stole his heart. Leaving mothers to their children carelessly, without a second thought. So perhaps it’s a wonder that she finds this father is still around, with his child – children perhaps, by the gaze he sends the one named Kiada. They look strikingly similar. If not a daughter, than a cousin or relative.
Ru would have dipped her head in turn, when Kiada introduced herself – how quickly the children’s demeanors changed! But the presence of the taller stallion prevents her from doing so. Bristling briefly, when his eyes take in her differences – subconsciously scowling, Ru can feel the feathers on her neck flare without her command.
She was just about to forego the rabbit, allow the vulture – bird, whatever it was – snatch the giblets and things spread across the floor. But the oldest of the four appears pragmatic, commandeering, ushering her lips to press briefly together. Staring dumbly into his cold eyes, and thinking - why do they assume I killed it intentionally?
With a heavy sigh she nods to Khairi, nudging her nose towards the most concentrated piles of fur, bones, steaming fleshy things. Chirping brightly through her teeth - it’s all your’s. But a single word has yet to cross past her lips. And as there seems to be a question that hangs in the air, unanswered by the snow-feathered mare, she looks to them all and shakes her head. Parting her wings just enough to shrug them.
How would they interpret that? That she didn’t care? That she wasn’t sure?
Ru’s feathered tail twitched in the burning quiet, bleated by the subtle increase in her pulse. She left her turquoise eyes on the stallion, oblivious to his rank – for she was so new, so unawares of what her leaders looked like that she couldn’t have known otherwise.
Inevitably she felt the building anticipation of when they’d all discover her imperfection.
Everyone seemed to take it differently. It was hard to gauge just how soon it would dawn, and the realization that followed.
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