i am a leaf on the wind

She is often here, and not often in the Edge. That should change. That needs to change. But still, she does not go home. Still, she wanders the Deep Forest. Some might find the darkness oppressive, the tangled roots beneath their feet daunting, the dense trees claustrophobic. But not her. To her, the darkness is a blanket; the roots a hand on her shoulder, reminding her to slow down and enjoy; the trees a hundred friends. Here, she can pretend that everything is okay. Can pretend that she’s alone simply because there aren’t any others around. Can wonder if the movement in her periphery is a horse, or merely just a deer passing through. 
 
Here, she can pretend her life is not in ruins.
 
So it’s not surprising that’s she’s here when the rattling starts. Not surprising that she’s noticed it’s unusually quiet tonight. At some point, the sun stopped filtering through the trees like little windows to heaven. She doesn’t know when exactly the daylight disappeared, when the night fell. She should go back to the Edge. She does not go back to the Edge. Instead, she follows the rattling.
 
Deeper and deeper into the forest - the trees growing closer, the darkness growing heavier - the farther she goes. It does not feel like the forest she knows tonight, though she’s spent so much time here. And certainly, that clearing, that tree wearing bone, has never been here before. Or has she simply never found this part of the woods before? It’s possible, but unlikely. She shakes her head, white and teal mane a windmill of color in the black air for a moment before settling back down on her neck.
 
She can’t decide if this place has always been here, if this place is real at all, or if it’s just another strange occurrence in Helovia. Like the rat man and his tent (she’s never seen that tent again). She still doesn’t know what all these things mean, what all these events might lead to, but she’s learning that the strange and unusual in Helovia often come with prizes on the other side. So she doesn’t leave.
 
The rattling draws her teal eyes skyward, greeting her with the sight of bones rattling in the wind. Ah, the wind. Once, she could have silenced the wind, could have silenced the bones (not that she ever wanted to silence the wind, it was too much a part of her, even now with the power stripped away). She falls into the sound, falls into the swaying of the bones. She’s gone so far in the comfort of the wind that she almost doesn’t notice the change in the breeze (too cold and strong for Birdsong), the other horses gathering, or the way the ground moves beneath her. Almost.
 
Her feet move of their own accord, accommodating the roots as they slither through the earth. Half a lifetime spent in forests has given her some skill with traversing roots, though half her attention is pulled to the ground to avoid the moving wood and dirt. Half her attention is on the base of the bone tree, the gleam of antlers catching her eye.
 
Feathers and teeth hang from the antlers, and her eyes follow them down to the skull of an elk creeping out of the earth. Than a middle that belongs to some creature she cannot name, missing something or many things, she isn’t sure. Finally, the rest appears, the rotting hindquarters of a black stallion. She is fascinated, and unafraid. Perhaps she should be, but she doesn’t care what lies at the end of this grotesque adventure.
 
He beckons her forward (all of them, but she swears those eyes are on her alone), and she comes, lithe and agile over the roots that lie in her path. He asks a question she’s starting to expect, and she answers in a quiet but sure voice. “What kind of game?” But it’s a question where the answer doesn’t matter, because it’s clear she’s going to play. What does she have to lose? Death would not be a terrible prize. At least then, she could join her family on the other side. 

watch how i soar.

lyanna