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10-06-2015, 10:12 PM
Tembovu
“Lately it's been the loss of my family.”
The semblance of calm he had begun to feel in the frigid dawn flees at the quicksilver’s words. He felt cold sink into his barrel. Colder than the icy earth beneath his large hooves. Colder than the air that condensed the breath around his broad muzzle. The cold rippled his thick, buckskin hide. Though, surprisingly, he kept his demons at bay and his face blank. That was unusual for the elephant.
Perhaps it was the possibility of hearing anther speak of a loss that struck his heart so deeply. To hear that another stallion might bear a pain such as his. These thoughts were selfish— heinously so— but somehow placating to the great antelope. For misery loves company. And though the giant would never (ever, ever) wish his loss on another, if Ciceron had already experienced a loss like his— well perhaps it would help to bleed the poison off. Or just commiserate together.
Tembovu really didn’t know. He had kept his past locked so closely to his chest. It had fueled the cold flame of revenge in Dorobo. And in Helovia, only Rexanna knew some of it thus far. He was trying to build a future here. He sighed, shifting to rest his other hind leg. It seemed, if wandering up the highest mountain in the darkest part of night was any indication, that his past would haunt him regardless of the future he built.
So maybe it was best to let it haunt him. To choose how it plagued him. So that maybe— just maybe— he could think of his mate and son with fond memories. Instead of images of their stinking, burnt bodies.
So his eyes, slightly darker despite the brightening sky, turn to the grey gaze of his morning comrade. “You’ve lost your family?” The question was simple. The tone was not. His deep voice was rough, with layers of meaning behind each word he tugged from his throat. There was a grave pleading in the lines around his eyes that asked the stallion to tell him. To reveal such intimate details to a stranger. But the meaning behind those words implied that there was no anonymity, no strangers, when it came to the acute pain of familial loss.
That pain did not care for race, species, color, gender. All who felt it were kinsmen because they had lost kin. It was the universe’s cruel, inadequate apology for ripping open gaping holes in the soul.
Tembovu blinked, releasing the stallion from his intense gaze, and looked to the horizon once more.
The semblance of calm he had begun to feel in the frigid dawn flees at the quicksilver’s words. He felt cold sink into his barrel. Colder than the icy earth beneath his large hooves. Colder than the air that condensed the breath around his broad muzzle. The cold rippled his thick, buckskin hide. Though, surprisingly, he kept his demons at bay and his face blank. That was unusual for the elephant.
Perhaps it was the possibility of hearing anther speak of a loss that struck his heart so deeply. To hear that another stallion might bear a pain such as his. These thoughts were selfish— heinously so— but somehow placating to the great antelope. For misery loves company. And though the giant would never (ever, ever) wish his loss on another, if Ciceron had already experienced a loss like his— well perhaps it would help to bleed the poison off. Or just commiserate together.
Tembovu really didn’t know. He had kept his past locked so closely to his chest. It had fueled the cold flame of revenge in Dorobo. And in Helovia, only Rexanna knew some of it thus far. He was trying to build a future here. He sighed, shifting to rest his other hind leg. It seemed, if wandering up the highest mountain in the darkest part of night was any indication, that his past would haunt him regardless of the future he built.
So maybe it was best to let it haunt him. To choose how it plagued him. So that maybe— just maybe— he could think of his mate and son with fond memories. Instead of images of their stinking, burnt bodies.
So his eyes, slightly darker despite the brightening sky, turn to the grey gaze of his morning comrade. “You’ve lost your family?” The question was simple. The tone was not. His deep voice was rough, with layers of meaning behind each word he tugged from his throat. There was a grave pleading in the lines around his eyes that asked the stallion to tell him. To reveal such intimate details to a stranger. But the meaning behind those words implied that there was no anonymity, no strangers, when it came to the acute pain of familial loss.
That pain did not care for race, species, color, gender. All who felt it were kinsmen because they had lost kin. It was the universe’s cruel, inadequate apology for ripping open gaping holes in the soul.
Tembovu blinked, releasing the stallion from his intense gaze, and looked to the horizon once more.
@Ciceron
Please tag Tembovu.
