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01-05-2016, 02:09 AM
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Gull!
underneath it all, we're just savages Ever since Firebug had come to him with the news that, well, he’d knocked her up, Gull had been roaming the Isles equal parts smug and totally freaked out. On one hand: uh, hells yes she was pregnant—he was fertile, baby! What a stud! Not that there had been any doubt since Brigand, but it was always nice to know that one’s equipment was in proper working order. The sight of Parelia’s expanding sides had brought him a sort of uncontainable glee, and Gull secretly took as much pride in the baby belly as if he had sported it himself. But then, there was the other hand—and the what have I done?? hand had the nasty habit of squashing his giddiness. Excited as he was about his second-born-to-be, Gull remembered that this foal would be exactly that: the second. And what had become of the first, after his mother had been murdered? He had lost track of his only son so easily, let him slip into the far corners of gods knew where without so much as a goodbye. Gull himself had grown up without a father, and as far as he was concerned, he was perfectly fine. Muriel had done the work of raising the boy with what time she had had, but Brigand had lost his mother so much younger than he had. To be so alone, and so young…a flash of guilt burned in the dusty paint’s chest as he mulled the whole thing over. Should he have done more to guide the boy, taken him under his wing, so to speak? It would not have been so alien a concept, even for a fatherless bastard like himself. And so the emotions went, back and forth all season, tugging his heart this way and that like seagulls fighting over a wayward French fry. As Parelia grew farther and farther along, the feelings only intensified. While she may have looked ready to burst, Gull felt it. He couldn’t eat, couldn’t sleep, couldn’t even fly properly in his fits of anxiety. He was ashamed to admit it, but in the final days, he took to avoiding her, if only in the hopes that the saying would hold true for his problems: out of sight, out of mind. Of course, that didn’t exactly apply when Featherbrains took to following him on that sleepless night in mid-autumn. If Firebug’s bird was anything, he was vigilant, and the sight of him swooping overhead was enough to remind Gull of the responsibilities he was dodging. Still…it was an odd time of night for a hawk to be out, the stag thought. With a quickening pulse, he realized that Parelia must have sent him, and he arose clumsily. Was something wrong? Doing his best not to completely panic, Gull whinnied up to the bird, hoping that he would lead him to his mistress, if that had been his intention. Sure enough, the hawk set off through the night, with Gull following blindly on foot. The moon was bright, but the jungle was full of shadows, and he made quite the noise as he crashed through the underbrush. Thankfully, he did not have far to travel. He arrived just in time to see Parelia on the ground and his newest child sliding into the world. Gull had seen many births in his days, but somehow, this one was different. First of all, the foal was alive beautifully and gloriously so—he noted this as he heard its weak cry. And secondly, the realization crashed upon him, this child was his. He had been worrying and fretting over the very idea for weeks of course, but suddenly and inexplicably, it all seemed so dreadfully silly. Clueless as he might be about parenting, the foal who lay so helpless before him was irrevocably and undeniably his, his flesh, his blood, his. “We did good, Firebug,” he murmured, chest tight with pride. “We did good.” "talk talk talk" |
Please do not tag Gull except for in opening posts or spars!
