Again, they leave the Edge, this time to venture south.

The Throat looms before them on the southern horizon, glaring and resplendent in the sweltering sun. Copper child spares it a wistful glance, her mind preoccupied with spiritual concerns. She worships the Sun; does he loathe her now, see her as traitor, another in the myriad of fallen priestesses, neglectful queens? She fell from grace as quickly as she rose, tumbling down from her fiery zenith with the ferocity of a shooting star. I was only a child her mind rebels, but the protest is half-hearted; as soon as it rises it falls back down, listless, without any real commitment to its vapid defense. The truth is she was not even a child, for a child suggests something whole- and the girl is a snippet, a shard, a thousand fragments thrown to the wind, a simulacrum of a real soul.

This is why she left the Throat: to find the pieces she left behind, the little bits of embers that mark the trajectory of her haphazard path. It is why she turns from the Desert now, veering instead toward the lonesome dark. She has carefully avoided the tear in the earth, veering clear of these caves since their fateful escape, and even as she nears them she feels herself tensing, her body a bowstring, rigid and taut. At her side her brother quivers, though he does his best to hide his dismay. He would rather be returning home, crossing the bridge into the desert, digging for voles and pursuing old haunts- but he does not falter, does not yield; he is a valiant squire at his sister's side, a beam of courage to which she clings.

The entrance to the caves glares like a chasm, a nightmare; in her mind it oozes malevolence and malcontent. As they hover on its outskirts a breeze picks up, spiraling, brusque, around the cavern's edge. It seems to howl a contemptuous tune, shrill, a mocking laughter which rings through her ears; and the girl takes a cautious step backwards, black eyes wide and spirits high. Embers flutter around her like fireflies, luminous and evanescent, a fruitless shield; she falters, suddenly contemplating the virtue of this plan. The hole seems to grin at her, its cacophonous voice wheedling- 'Yes, little girl, little child, retreat. Be afraid, little girl'-

-darkness, beasts; she runs from Lace, runs here, a thing of bruises, of battered bones, and worst of all he's still there, still lost, a sacrifice to a demon she ran from like a coward-

-and she wants to yell into its depths, to tell it she is not afraid, to deny and deny until she believes the fiction, until the armor she pretends to wear replaces her own comfortable skin, her halcyon lilt, her naivete- until she is nothing but a stone, cold to the world but finally strong, finally someone who is not afraid no matter how that arrogance and bravado may chafe. She wants to forget her fear, to forget her shame. She has spent the years trying to be what she is not, and forgetting what she is.

She wants to leave these caves, to abandon the fragment of herself which she knows she'll find within. She does not want to think about what she's done.

She takes a step toward the hole.

"I am afraid," the girl admits. Low alto voice carries on the breeze; the cavern seems content to listen, almost curious to know what she has come to confess. "But I'm here. And maybe that's the first step to being brave."

stars and butterflies

There was never a true absence of fear – even the bravest, the strongest, the mightiest of demons, of angels, had things that drew apprehension along their skin, gasps tumbling from their mouths, hearts pounding, limbs trembling. The Songbird, for all her stalwart gazes, her honeyed glances, her perfected, composed zeniths, knew the taste of terror and trepidation. It breathed in the coils of her mind, when friends disappeared and she couldn’t follow them, wondering where they’d gone, if they’d return, if they’d stumbled out into the night and were never to be seen again – doomed, damned, consigned to oblivion far beyond her reach. It curled in the perfume of wildflowers, when she nestled in lilac, in lavender, in thistles, pondering who would be the next to leave her behind, if she was going to be swallowed by a vengeful opus, by a familiar face that detested her, by the monsters crowding the corners of her eyes. It fanned in the evening, when she slept, when she dreamed, hoping they would be in gorgeous hues and colors, when all that slithered behind her stare was a dungeon of mirrors and reflections – showing each and every face she’d perfected, she’d performed, she’d staged. But she conquered them in steps, in slow minuets, in compositions spiraling over the bright, sundry skies and the pale, waxen moon, in songs and sonnets clinging to days not wasted, not foiled, by the claws and rasps of history. Sometimes it was more difficult to see beyond the unrelenting forces she’d once scraped and seethed upon, the hatred she’d once billowed and serenaded, the selfishness she’d once employed and ravished, but the nymph tried anyway. It was all she could ever do – try, try, and try again – until one triumphant moment would come swinging in and she would’ve conquered the poignant spells glossing over her mind. It was getting better, bit by bit, piece by piece, for Lena was made of more than loss and secrets, more than specious intricacies and blossoms, soft petals and dulcet movements; she was resolution, she was perseverance, and she was tenacity, all on a rapturous harmony.
 
They maneuvered, one ivory fox, one sienna fey, into the lengths of the ancient catacombs, and the rush of memories clambered over her spine. There’d been the weeks spent in its confines, rooted and secured, protected and safeguarded, from those who’d been called friends (and in their place had been dangerous, treacherous, horrifying monsters, like dear, sweet Kahlua, who’d always grinned and smiled, then twisted around to bite her flesh). There’d been the hours tethered with Roland, glancing at lantern lights and fairy dust, taking in moments of strength and fortitude in little waterfalls and pools, dancing evenings and days away because it was better than silence, better than dismay. She avoided that particular room, not ready to face the resplendent glow again, afraid she’d be caught, trapped, once more. Perhaps there’d been stars in there too, and she’d just never noticed them.
 
Imogen puttered onward, ahead of her, turning and twisting around corners, remembering all the paths, all the trails, they’d traveled in the midst of disaster and ruin. As they rounded towards another aperture, faint, glimmering light guided their motions, the sound of a voice – a recognized pitch of vocals, sad and despondent – echoed along the cavern wall, bouncing, reverberating, intently into the Mender’s ears. She stopped for a moment, uncertain if she should be prying, if she should be listening, or if she should be wandering, wayfaring, further and further away, allow someone the privacy of their woes and melancholy. But the vocals were hauntingly familiar (in more ways than one), strong, then fading, a spring, a coil, of reverence and pain. I am afraid. Her gaze landed on Imogen for the smallest of seconds, and the kitsune’s eyes narrowed, cranium bowed, nodding, and they followed the light, airy crescendos, the beating heart of everything and everyone who’d ever lived (they were all afraid, in some form), peeking into the next room to see Tandavi, to see her companion, beasts she’d hadn’t seen in an eternity. "You've always been brave," she murmured before completely emerging into their midst, all rich veneer and lacquer, all petals and softness, might rippling on the warmth of her tenderness, of her generosity, of her swiftly, beating heart. Lena spoke again, "Tandavi," lowering her cranium on a note that sounded like reverence. "What are you afraid of?"

the songbird

The thinnest flicker of a golden ear; the lightest twitch of a dusted flank; these are the only promises of response, the only indicators that she hears them come, their feet pressing soft echoes against the enclosed sky. The fox is quick to turn around, large ears wiggling with pleasure and recognition at the site of Lena- and Imogen. The vixen, particularly, fills his eyes: Natraj bounds toward her on minuscule feet, fire dancing from all three tails. He does not mind that he is small, that she is grander; he dances toward her and draws to a stop, a toothy grin on his vulpine face.

Copper child remains unmoved, endless eyes glued on the gaping space. She recognizes the voice, of course; she sees the mare through her brother's eyes and recognizes them from that darkest night. Indeed, her mind is alight with memories: darkness reaching out cruel fingers to wrap around her throat. A monster striking through their safety, destroying the shelter they have built. Running, fleeing from the last thing she knows. Separation, isolation, hurt and despair. The girl shudders, a terse vibration trickling down her spine, but it is not with displeasure at seeing Lena.

The Fire Dancer owes the Songbird her life.

"Have I?" Alto voice leaves her lips in a murmur, the question genuine, the doubt sincere. She ought to turn around, she knows, to smile brightly at the mahogany mare, greet her with warmth and gratitude. Yet still the child looks ahead, her heart an unsteady beat in her throat. If she turns around, Lena becomes real, a thing of flesh and bone and emotion, fragile and beautiful and undeserving of this, this feeling that fills the copper child, the sudden overwhelming need to know, to question, to remember when she was good. Fire Dancer rarely speaks of her past, of the ghosts that follow in her steps. Flesh and blood - and she thinks of starlight, of a boy who rejected her strained confession - are strangers too her, something the girl struggles to touch, but ghosts...

Ghosts live and walk beside the girl. They are her constant company, the only ones who care to hear, to listen to her struggles, to counsel her in her grief.

If she does not look at Lena then the mare remains a ghost, and perhaps - perhaps - she will continue to care.

"I'm afraid of the dark," the girl confesses. "And I'm afraid of the light, of how I fade in it. I'm afraid to be alone, and I'm afraid to love, because everyone I love goes away. I'm afraid that it's my fault. I'm afraid that I cannot be good enough, or be strong enough, or be brave enough." Her brother looks sadly at the girl - Brave enough for who? - but the copper child does not turn back. Tears bite, and she closes her eyes.

"I'm afraid to hurt people, but I can't seem to stop. And I'm afraid of being hurt. I wanted to make the world a better place, but I'm afraid I never will. I just seem to make it all worse."

Guilt claws at the girl's chest, and relief, too- they merge with the doubt, the hurt, the hope, until she feels nothing at all, nothing but a casual curiosity as to what the mare will do. Lena saved her from herself once; is it too much to ask her to do it again?

stars and butterflies

They might have been mirror images, not by hues, not by colors, but by inward reflections, by souls drawn and matched. Perhaps they’d once been sketched by the same artist, a craftsman who’d sought the sienna, honeysuckle whims first and dreamed of her in fairy form, carefully sculpting wiles and valor but giving her no pathways in which to perfect it. Then came the Fire Dancer, courted more from embers and moonbeams, given life in the current sanctum and sanctuary, feeding her flames and no alternative venues but monsters and mayhem, smiling a little when she wandered down the same routes, the same twists and turns, as the other. Maybe, given the right moment, the right conjecture, they alternated, one being contorted into demonic verses, and the other distorted into the most beautiful of waltzes and minuets, conspiring to unravel and snap at the right instant, when their worlds crashed and collided, when their hopes and dreams fell apart, when they met each other again, beneath the press of earth and loam. They were a picture, a tapestry, a perfection of flaws – swept together by virtues and moralities, by mistakes and softness, by the weight of all the fiends they carried across their shoulders and along their backs. Lena would’ve gladly asked to have Tandavi’s and been moored deeper into the ground by the daunting burdens, by the cumbersome, emboldened threads, by the turns and trembles of her fears, brought them back to some holy light. She would’ve gladly sacrificed her contentment and given it to the girl who never seemed to smile, who seemed to hide behind muted masks and despondency, who was stalwart and strong and didn’t even know it. “Yes,” the Mender presided from her corner of song and sorrow, answering the echo as it reverberated along the walls.
 
Imogen rhapsodized in her own way, watching the other kitsune with his smaller, onyx figure and fiery tails, then chirping, gliding along the outer rim, running and rampaging in freedom, in liberation, as Tandavi and Lena ought to have done.
 
The nymph watched the companions for several moments, trying not to laugh, and then swiveled her ears back to the flame maiden as she confessed her consternations and apprehensions, already far more courageous than the Mender. Tandavi could admit her terrors, her frights, to the world, to the quiet, singsong shades of a friend, and Lena had rarely done such a thing – couldn’t bring herself to a piece of sanctum and sanctuary where the world wouldn’t stomp and press its dagger against her throat for being so weak, so foolish, so worthless. Her friend was none of those things, but the sylph couldn’t see past that, couldn’t comprehend why she should’ve been anchored to the dirt and stone, and why Tandavi should’ve been lifted up to the heavens. But the other femme could have peeked her way into the fey’s mind and seen just what she was – her lines, her words, her phrases, were certain and lacerating, a whisper drawn from the vacant hums of the Songbird herself. Her response was light and fair, form coming closer, so that a brown shoulder may have brushed against a crimson one, a portion of her soul to cling to. “We have much in common.” She smiled again, in the dark, trying not to furrow her brow, trying not to sink her frame, her figure, down into the cave’s swallowing pits. “So what do you want to do?” The butterfly mused, gazing up at the ceiling, at the press of monuments circling all around them. “We cannot be consumed by our fears – otherwise, we’d never be anything at all.”

the songbird

She paints herself in muted hues, a series of flaws on a crimson canvas, and waits for the judgment of her peer, the sharp reprimand, the dismissal, or the acceptance she craves. Is she brave for saying who she is, what she is, for laying her fears in the space between them and letting the Songbird sort them, weigh them, and decide if the girl is wanting or not? Or is she weak for craving validation, reassurance that all will be well, that she is as flawless and flawed as any living thing, her sins overshadowed by bold swaths of virtue? Copper child is not sure anymore; she is not sure of anything, except that she cannot hold herself closed any longer. She is a flame suffocating in her own smoke; she needs to know if she deserves to burn, if she is even capable of casting light.

There is movement, but it is not the girl. It is the foxes, dancing at the edges of her vision, carefree and caring as their equid companions cannot be. It is the light, the water, the shadows on the wall that investigate these goings on with vauge curiosity, largely uninterested in the trials of the pair. It is Lena; Lena is moving, shifting, and the threat of reality closes tight on the copper child's heart. She braces herself against it, against the ghostly confidant's retreat, against the inevitability of isolation. Lena has indicated no intent to abandon, yet it is the girl's first assumption- so many others have left, have rejected her confessions. Why wouldn't she?

Skin touches skin: Lena is no longer a ghost; nor is she gone, and more than reassurances, than words, this is the validation she seeks. Fire Dancer clings to the Songbird's shoulder, for it is a raft in the darkness of her uncertainty. Gratitude blooms on her face, and peace; she turns to the mare with hopeful black eyes, and lets herself relax into more than her fears.

Lena the Songbird speaks again, and Fire Dancer sees the echo she casts, the reflections of herself in the soft assurances of the older mare. She nods, a careful smile curling onto inky lips. In this moment she is reminded of her cousin, of the warm scales and deep voice Amaris would press against her when she could not sleep. Of the love and acceptance she hadn't known to cling to when it was available, and now so desperately misses.

"No," she agrees, her voice an earnest, alto murmur in the flickering light of the cave. She barely knows Lena, but the girl holds to a memory and puts her hopes in the Songbird's arms, her own eyes open, her own heart ready and waiting to take on Lena's sorrows in turn. She turns to the mare, vibrant embers dancing in the space around them, passion and hope marked by the swirling sparks of fire. "But we cannot forget them, because without our weaknesses, how will we learn to be strong?"

stars and butterflies

“Of course. We don’t forget.”
 
Her voice echoed over the chamber, strong and decisive, forged from all the layers of hurt and damnation she’d seen, she’d scorched, she’d muddled and mired her way through. Each stumble had drawn her closer to something (she could hope, down in the dregs of her stalwart heart, that it had been for anything other than heartbreak), to lacquer and enamel courted in factions of kindness, of gratitude, and perhaps, of uselessness. But she’d never ignored, overlooked, or neglected a moment of weakness and ineptitude; they haunted her just the same, poignant and sharp, grating senses given a claw’s edge – when she’d plunged a little too far, when she’d loved a little too much, when she’d locked herself a little too deep and no one ever bothered to see if she’d crept out of her shell. Her flaws were piercing swords and rancorous stones, cast upon her hide, upon her soul, upon her essence, in tides of sorrow and neglect, in maelstroms of terror and horror, in days stretched between seasons and cycles. But she couldn’t see Tandavi’s, all those shards and fears she claimed; could only gaze upon her copper hide and see fire - that glorious element that flamed and fanned and engulfed (and then she wondered what she could do with it, how she could wield and court such lively embers into something more than trepidation). The sylph wanted to show her, somehow, someway, that there was more than apprehension and disbelief, but sometimes she too was so swallowed up by it, so drenched and drowned by the sheer weight of its cumbersome bearing, that she didn’t know how to free the girl from the demons snagging at her tethers. So she leaned against her, a broad, guiding shoulder, a warm, tender embrace, smiling and encouraging, full of promise and liberation, when she couldn’t find her own sense of deliverance. “But we do overcome,” she sang along the walls, listening to its gentle, reverberating echo, pondering over how she could snatch a piece of it for herself. Her gaze caught the hope, the look of aspiration, ambition, dancing over the fire maiden’s features, and she didn’t want it to go away, she didn’t want it to be strangled and snatched, folded over and crinkled. Her melody touched over the strange lights and fox tails, rummaging through bracken and midnight oil, all fairy and mountain inhabitant, like she dreamed of all those hours spent vanquishing foes. “We remember what it was like to feel weak, because we don’t want that sensation again.”
 
She peered a little closer then, so her brow might have touched upon the girl’s, so she could lend her strength and resilience (because some days it was all she had), so the hours wouldn’t seem so long and the moments wouldn’t feel so utterly broken. It was support and guidance, wishes and dreams, scepters and sonnets, spring and jubilation all sprung, laden, and woven together, the gentle grin still crossed and sculpted across her lips. “Which one do you want to conquer first?”

the songbird