It was a sad business, that Erthë felt she was able to follow the reasoning behind everyone else's wishes much easier than the convoluted jumble of illogical leaps that founded her own. Was everyone else as messed up inside by the serval and its retorts? Glancing about she saw no one displaying such confusion - but then again, perhaps her own face remained as composed, as calm and collected as she perceived everyone else to be.

The dark, malevolent gleam in her eyes faded under the scorching remarks of the floating creature, replaced by a stubborn defiance that lasted mere seconds. Upon being called both childish, stupid and ignorant the filly felt her face slowly heat up with humiliation, the furious blush so pronounced that it nearly showed through the pallor of her coat. Stupid? So she was stupid, was she! Fine, then he was nothing more than a mean old git who didn't know what he was talking about!

Erthë snorted furiously and shook her head as the coiling smoke tickled against tender skin, roughly shoving aside whatever sensation of energy or refreshment it might grant her. She wanted nothing from someone who had to resort to insults to get his point across!

"No, it does not!" she blurts out, rebutting the statement of the serval with a heat she would later scorn herself for displaying. Why was she letting this creature get to her so, when she had been convinced mere moments ago that her reasoning was above scrutiny?

(Maybe because she realized it wasn't, and because she knew that the serval was right to call her ignorant?)

"But it doesn't suit me that her only option would be to lie to save her kid either! What does that solve, how does that make the violence end, how can the mate ever hope for a chance to change if he isn't faced with the reality of his actions? Maybe it takes the death of his child by his own hooves to see himself for what he is, maybe the loss of her baby will teach the mare to choose her partners better. Maybe nothing would change, and the name of the child would be added to the long list of other pointless deaths."

"Maybe, if the pregnant mare told a pretty lie and went back to her mate, the same child will live to be raised by one violent parent, one who is tied down by fear and ultimately grow up to lie and beat people up themselves."

Winded and with chest heaving from the effort, astounded by her own intensity on the matter, Erthë paused to catch her breath while staring fixedly at the serval - only vaguely aware that the group around her might be dispersing, that the event was coming to a close, that it indeed was quite pointless to keep arguing for a point that wouldn't gain her anything...

But perhaps it wasn't a prize she desired, so much as an acknowledgment that she wasn't wrong.

"I don't know what the right thing would be or what's more important, I don't know if anyone really knows. I just know there are worse things than death, and I think I'd rather die for truth than live in a lie and add to the circle of sorrow and hatred."

The young mare clamped her mouth shut after that, somehow weary now that the fire was burning out. Still stubborn she kept trying to stave off the rejuvenating sensations offered by the smoking feline; she wanted to feel tired, bruised and care-worn, wanted to relish the slight pounding in the head just a bit longer, like a child might enjoy wallowing in the tear-stained ebb of a tantrum. There was something fulfilling in the exhausted moan of her brain that suggested she had really used it, like a worker might go home with blistering hands and aching back and consider the day successful, regardless of whether the task at hand had been fully completed.

Maybe she wasn't right, maybe she was a stupid, ignorant child without a clue... but at least she had done her best to argue her case. She would settle for that.

Big girls cry when their hearts are breaking