Candle flame caught in a sinister wind, Tandavi falters on the brink of flight. Her body is lined with tension and hunger, one long limb cocked and prepared to spring, ears turned forward and black eyes wide. In the dark of the night she hovers, breath shallow and fast; in the wake of her bliss there is unexpected fear, the sudden concern that she has made a mistake, that in finding some other she has opened to pain. What if Lace is an agent of it- worse, and more probable, what if he does not want them here? At the cusp of liberation, the threat of destruction is enough to make her wary, to treat Hope as a smile with a shadow in its heart.
Still, drawn to the light like a fragile moth, she takes a cautious step towards the blazing fire. Natraj’s delight is a soothing touch, and though the fox’s small frame trembles in silent sobs, it is happiness and relief that he sends to the world, a beacon of hope in this abyss of dark. The boy holds Lace like a drowning man on a drifting board; unlike Tandavi, he does not fear rejection, but that the grullo isn’t real, and that the illusion will dissolve. A sleeper desperate for the last tendrils of his dream, Natraj clenches his gold eyes closed. The rumble of the subdued voice and hot breath on the boy’s back disperse much of the shadow’s fear, and his happy whimpers mingle with the crackle snap of fire.
At Lace’s words she pauses, black eyes blinking slowly as the gears behind them spin and whirl. Cautious she takes another step, no recognition flashing on the moon-blazed face. How long has it been since she heard another’s voice, besides Natraj’s echoing in her head? She has spoken aloud, counseling herself and her brother in an attempt to fill the silence, but her tones are a reflection of a frenzied mind, not the door to a treasure trove of secrets and knowledge, as she has come to value language. More words wash by and she feels their weight, finally processing her spiraling thoughts into a single response: "No." No, she has not seen Fajira. No, she is not alright. No, she is not gone. Not yet.
She watches him step and Natraj whimpers his protest, but lets the stallion go in favor of curling by the flames. Tempted by promises of warmth and respite, the hesitant girl lifts a delicate leg, poised before a thought strikes her blind, and she is compelled to ask. For who else could answer, she wonders, but Lace, who Aunt Mirage loves and Mother calls friend, who is a pillar of memory from the safety of home. In a moment of childish faith she lets herself go, the memory of the main question – the only question – that has plagued her thus far casting light in her gaze, the first glimmer of hope. "Where is my mother?" she asks of the man, and her voice rings soft with a childish trust, a vulnerability rarely found in the filly’s dark tones. This is the moment. She will finally know.
Then it all falls apart.
The beast descends on pitch-stained wings, a demon of Hell sent to cast them from their newfound joy. She does not notice until the shrill voice cuts through her shimmering hope, driving a chill down the waif’s thin spine and causing Natraj to leap to his feet. The creature is darkness in physical form, the evil come to catch her in her moment of relief. Terror runs bright in the red child’s veins, a cruel, paralyzing force that makes her and time stand perfectly still. In the year-spanning-seconds that tick through the air, several things happen separate from her control.
Three whips of fire leap from Natraj’s tail, striking out towards the descending beast.
The monster sets its course towards the girl’s frail form, where she stands hovering between in and out, under the makeshift doorway of the wooden wall.
Lace’s stored magic runs across her spine, and an unstable sun forms between the fiend and the family.
The new-born sun bursts.
And Tandavi runs.
She does not look back as she flees from the sight, but the bright glow of fire leaves spots in her eyes. Lace’s magic has sat in her body for seasons, and its release is a reflex, with explosive results. The filly feels heat singe her dock and she stumbles, thrown down to the earth outside of the fort, twenty feet away from the burst’s epicenter. In the shelter Natraj cries as the fire licks his coat. The sunburst was small and fast, with a radius of a single length, but it is enough to make the fox kit cry, and the pain is echoed by his sister’s soul. She can only hope to escape the beast. She has come too far, to fall prey to the dark.
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