speak

She comes from the darkness with which she’s clothed, a game already playing about the paleness of her eyes—should he have expected something different? She was always fond of games, for whatever reason. He stifles the sigh of exasperation that claws at the back of his throat; he watches her, eyes of grey impassive, searching and voracious as ever. She beckons him to the beat of the carnal dance, the revelries he does not comprehend—he goes to satiate the curiosity of his bosom. He will learn this.

She’s grown. Darkness continues to cloak her form, wretched and bleak, deepened by the ravages of the wilds—but her form has remained full, her build broken from the mold of the frail wretch of girlhood. The curve of her hock, the line of her neck, the fullness of her chest—all these things draw the grey eye in a way that has eluded his notice before; they seem important now, indicative of some grand purpose, a testament to something imperative and urgent. He ignores this; it is not so easily forgotten, however. He meets her, facing her body, standing to her left, shoulderpoint to shoulderpoint; his eye continues to be drawn to wither and the line of her leg. It must be interpreted; he does not know this code.

How long has it been? Seasons have passed, most likely; he cannot tell, for the winter seems to cling to this place, her coat, the clouds around them, even as the hordes of the north converge upon them and flail to some intuitive rhythm. He’s waited to see if his little spider whore truly meant her allegiance. Perhaps she’s merely lucky he happened to be here—whatever. She’s found him now, and reaffirmed her place in his council. She’s not forgotten. Yet. “About time,” he growls a wretched whisper for her left ear; the threat within is groundless. A tease.

She dances something wild; he himself is not a stranger to the intricacies of movement. Have not his own mother taught him how to dance in battle, to move with liquid ease and precision. His mother’s grace has passed into his blood—diluted, surely, but he moves to the rhythm of the music with his own brand of poise. He keeps close to the spider; grey eyes dart about as they move to and fro, back and forth, swaying within the sea of a raucous detestable crowd. “Name these people,” he says in a low voice, for her ears only; the command jumps easily to his lips. He realizes, now, the folly of his childhood. Before, he only believed in the occasional band of traveling interlopers; the unicorns of the north appeared in his mind as an erratic group of eccentrics who adored the freezing cold; never before has he truly comprehended the idea of a colossal, organized group—a herd. Yet now his own father has pledged himself to one, and now he is faced with another—a herd his spider is supposedly pledged to as well. No, he will not let this ignorance go unchecked. He will learn this as well.


@[Jorogumo]