She—she wore her holy perfection so well, fine mist droplets clinging to the white garb and making her sparkle in the faint wash of light from stars and halo—and it was like everything conspired to make her divine. The mist waved with her every movement, like trails of thought and memory, and whenever she turned the light struck her, outlined her in a faint shimmer, and all he could think was—

—I'm dancing with a tiger.

The holy and pristine had always frightened him—awed him, with its sacred perfection and hallowed air, but frightened him to the core—rank upon rank of white-robed acolytes, but it seemed so cold.

That was why he had taken up the bloodied executioner's axe, instead; he had left the priests to their holy rites and clean, sharp lines, and had hid behind the bloody visage of Judgment. He had worn it like armor—the only defense he had had against them.

And he had done filthy work before the world caught fire and he fled before he burned in the pit he had dug for so many others.

Who was she, this angelic mare lost in the fog, looking back at him with violet eyes and speaking hesitation for a second before solid words came out? What did she want—of him, and of the world? He could only see stars in her eyes—armor, a shield, as solid as his.

He wore confidence as a shield over pale blue eyes and a fragile soul.
She wore mystery as a shield over pale lilac eyes, and.. whatever she hid beneath it.

He had heard stories of sages, maybe even met a few, but none of them had had her rock-solid, iron-hard eyes. Even when they softened they seemed to burn, unforgiving, with some kind of fire.

But maybe she wasn't holy at all.

Maybe she was just another of his ilk—hiding behind whatever armor she had grabbed and put on, and it was just the shadow of her wings, the light of her halo, that screamed divine so sharply in his ears it made his skull ache.

“I remember that there was nothing left to see.”

If it was her judgment—she, the pristine white and he, the one clad in black-iron armor spattered with blood (is there bloodstains on your robes, priestess?)—if it was her judgment, it was.. depressing.

I don't exist.

All there was to him was the black-marked white fur, the ice on his horn and hooves, and pale blue eyes imitating life.

She had seen his body and there was nothing left to see,

because there was nothing else underneath.

But she kept on talking, the soft sound of her voice drowning out the ragged, rugged edge to his breath—few things hit as hard as the cruel words of strangers—and he listened, black-rimmed ears shearing softly through still night air. She—did she trust him? Or was she simply so secure in herself, that sharing such deep moments of her past did not lay her open for someone's straying knife to find?

She was a bastion of light and strength. She was a fucking fortress and he had never felt smaller weaker, more insignificant and stupid. He was Mauja—he was nothing. He had amounted to exactly nothing. He—

“But you didn’t. And, I think it was then, I began to realize you either didn’t care or didn’t see.”

“But somehow that night you were still the angel I needed.”

Night-angel, until the sun rises and burns the illusion away.

He wanted to cry, listening to the words of this mare covered in the scars of her birthright—because the softness of her voice was unforgiving and deadly, and because the words she spoke—he had no words for it himself, the blackness yawning wider in his soul, the sensation of falling, because—because—

A figure in the mist. Ethereal, a vision, but ultimately, heartless—there was nothing underneath the dew-on-his-skin, nothing beneath the pale lights burning in his skull, just, just a figure in the mist, a false-angel,

“You just are.”

His breathing was quiet, if just slightly too fast, and his eyes were the same frosty lights in the darkness, but the heart in his chest had cracked and blood spread over the thin ice. He felt.. empty. Dirty. Filthy and foul, violent and merciless, insensitive; what was he doing in the presence of something so powerful and secure?

She drank with her back turned. She drank the water soaked in starlight.

"You frighten me," he finally said, small and quiet, wariness and despair warring with the faint, flickering light of hope in his chest.

[ @[Maren] ]

lord, the demands you're making-
help the monster on two feet
walk him down the hall, repeat
and when he's strong enough to stand alone
you'll notice what big teeth . . .