There was a part of Sno that suspected that her father would shun her, ignore her because of every harsh thing she'd ever said to him. For evey ugly look she'd ever gave him. She was both surprised and thankful when she felt his neck drape over her own, his hair falling in a thick curtain over her eyes to shield her from the sight of her mother's body. She kept her eyes shut tight, unwilling to look upon her mother's corpse anymore. If I don't see it then its not real. Its not true.' She scarcely breathed as fire crackled to life and Psyche's body began to burn. She wanted to ignore it all, tell herself that none of it was true, that it was all nothing more than a very bad dream. She'd wake up and everything would go back to the way it had been.

The varnished girl would have continued to ignore the burning, ignore the crowd, ignore the way her heart ached with every beat had it not been for Ophelia speaking to her. Sno opened her eyes, shifted her head enough so that she could look at the pale beauty through a gap in her father's mane. Its real. She said nothing but leaned more into Mauja, prayed that he would stand strong for her just once when she needed him. He hadn't been there when Monster had been murdered, but this was different. This was her mother.

She probably would have remained exactly the way she was until there was little left of Psyche but charred bones, but there is always someone that has to make a scene. Sno's body straightened and she turned to look at the horned stallion who arrived, ready to cast the blame on Mauja. The girl cast a glance at her father, looked at his face, saw the sadness in his eyes that matched her own and she knew in her heart that he hadn't done it. He may not have always been there for them, but he did care, didn't he?

Sno's ears lay flat against her head as she turned back to Gaucho, her own bellow matching his. "NO!"She stamped a cloven hoof into the ground and snorted. They couldn't even grieve properly and she hated the antlered stallion for it. There was no way that Mauja could have done it, she was convinced. "Shut up! You don't know what you're talking about and you're ready to blame my dad! You're the one that did it, aren't you? You're just trying to make someone else look guilty." She couldn't know for sure, but she wanted so badly to blame him just because he was so willing to cast blame on Mauja. She was already convinced that it was because he wanted to cover his own ass, throw the blame off of himself and onto someone else. It was the oldest trick in the liar's playbook.

Ophelia stepped forward and Sno's ears tilted forward to listen to the older mare as she spoke and when she mentioned the snake, Mara, the girl snorted harshly. Again, he was trying to throw the blame to someone else, a dragon, owls, and that made Sno step forward. "Stop trying to blame everyone else." She hissed. It only stoked the flame of her anger and sudden hatred when he claimed that he hadn't done it. She hoped that he was lying, that Ophelia would point it out when she tapped into his walnut sized brain, because she wanted blood.


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