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Machinations, conspiracies, ruses and stratagems, unraveling and crumbling, carefully sewed pieces unlacing, no longer a stitched bracelet, just a tangle of knotted threads. Frustration, dissatisfaction, resentment burns in her heart, a passionate heat that sears her charcoal soul, singing and tarnishing her already unwholesome, blackened soul; angry for her failure, deficiency, her abysmal, deplorable performance. She watches the mare's eyes, luminous twin coins gold and yellow, untrusting and wary with good cause. Confutatis listens to the pretty-lipped mare laugh, a croak of rusted door hinges, and she answers in kind, proffering her own cracked chuckle of placid amusement, while her good eye shines with detest, disgust, antipathy for this winning mare. "A test," she insists, her voice hoarse and rasping, the cracking and breaking of stone, "to see if you truly care for your herd, if you are the indomitable fighter you have proved yourself to be." Her tone cracks over the compliment, bitter and acerbic. For a moment, she imagines herself disappearing into the Cimmerian darkness, becoming a shadow once more, but no; she cannot turn back now from the path she so thick-headedly was determined to continue on.
"I know how to win a war." Confutatis continues on, hoping to conciliate the mare standing uphill from her, form swallowed by the ceaseless darkness of the endless night. "I know how to make you win; I know how to teach you to conquer, to rule, to crush your opponents. Perhaps I am not the best at hoof-to-hoof combat, today, leastways, but I know how to bow the heads of your enemies." Skullface's eyes slitted, cataract-white eye gleaming, pale crescent in dark night. Will the spleenful mare dare to swallow her pride? Does she have the ambition, the passion, to wage war and to win? "I will leave, if you desire, golden girl. But I will not flee; I will return, I will hunt you, and just when you think you are safe, I'll strike you down. My name is Confutatis, daughter of warlords. Will you work with me?"
The Queen of Skulls winces as the tree creaks beneath her weight. Chips of bark fall from it, pattering on the earth and rocks. She shifts her weight forward, the buried trunk and roots moaning soft protests that grow louder.
CONFUTATIS
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Breaking Laws and Challenging Unbreakables [Challenge - Illynx]
