wounded is the deer that leaps highest

wounded is the deer that leaps highest

Psyche the DarkEmpress Posts: 380

Deceased

Mare :: Unicorn :: 15.3 hh :: 8 (ages in Orangemoon) Buff: ENDURE

RayoDeSoleil

01-09-2013, 08:21 PM

They came to her, sometimes, in her dreams. Their eyes danced behind her closed lids, running rampant across a quiet mind, invoking pain, anger, and perhaps even fear. Not that she would ever admit to that.

It was easier to sleep during the day, when the sun shone easily above and warmth soaked into the land. But at night, the spirits came out to play, and she was helplessly at their mercy. She couldn't remember faces; no, only their bodies. And their eyes, haunting her, full of terror and anguish and some unknown emotion that she could not name. She remembered wings, legs, just bits and pieces, struggling to fit themselves together in her memory. And she remembered their screams, echoing through her mind. In her waking hours, such fear pleased her, told her that she was doing something right, doing something just, cleansing the world of its impurities. But in her sleep, their shrieks were the cause for something else.

The frigid tundra that had served as her home for so long flashed beneath her blurring pistons. Why she had come here, she could not be sure - only that she had come, silent and alone, traversing those caves that had become familiar. She remembered. The Plague had met here, her rallying cry heeded by many faces, both old and new. And outside, on the frozen steppe, Mauja had given it to her, only days before their meeting. He had given it to her and fallen away, fallen... where? Into space? Time? Both? To what purpose? Would he return? Was he dead? No, surely not... the FrostHeart, her once-partner, once-lover - or could she even call him that? - could not, would not succumb so easily. They had been beaten, yes, but Mauja was no quitter...

Or she had thought not. She wasn't sure of anything anymore.

Sure hooves guided her through the caverns, her reflection rippling and convulsing as she passed rivulets in the ice. Even in the spring, they were not melting, not so far north. It was a miracle that the Basin was as lovely as it was, all tucked away, a secret of their own. No, not a secret - not when the impures had been so quick to find them, so quick to take them from their newly acquired home. When would it all end? If she had not hated them before, she hated them now; they had done more, now, than just simply exist. As if that wasn't irritating enough, they sought out their betters, sought to punish and exile them. It was too much. It was unacceptable.

She settled, her maw falling to brush the ground, thin puffs of white flaring from her nostrils, fading into the air. It was cold, but it was bearable. Nothing like that Frostfall that she had spent here. Amber gaze closed, and she drifted into an uneasy slumber.

Eyes peered at her, pain clearly visible in the dilated pupils. She snorted, whirled, and was confronted by wings flaring before her, the wings of a pegasus, the bloody stumps where they should have been attached dripping rather profusely onto the floor. This, too, she turned from - and so it was, a never-ending twirl as she fought to escape her victims' hold. Something brushed her mind, briefly, a soothing whisper. A snort left her maw, and she gazed around, ever-circling, ever-moving. Don't stop or they'll find you. Again, the light touch in her mind called, and for once, she had a purpose within her dream. She surged forward through the darkness, searching, searching, she was always searching...

Something white blurred into her vision, faded out; she turned to it, slowed her travel (though where had she travelled to, really?). Again, to the side: she twirled. It was a form, and it began to solidify. "Mauja...?" The word was a whisper, and for a moment, she felt as though the gods were playing some cruel joke on her. Perhaps in her waking hours, she would remain strong, stubborn, hateful. But here, in her dreams, she could admit it: she missed him.

And, after all, it was her dream, wasn't it?