like a jar, you housed infinite tenderness
and infinite tenderness shattered you

Mouse, mountain goat – what’s the difference when prey is Prey and the hunter sets his sights on you?

But what if the Prey grew a backbone, or reached back into a forgotten life and remembered a time when it was Not Prey, but the top of the food chain? A time when it could grow talons and breath fire and set a whole kingdom ablaze in its righteous fury. What happens when Prey is stuck between fight and flight, between the past and the present, between fear and grief and that stage of denial where we rage, rage, rage against it all; what happens when Prey has nothing left to lose?

Now, Prey is well aware of her inherent height disadvantage (to the majority of equine kind) and her slim frame – easily buffeted by the cold, she relies more on her great golden fluff of feathers to keep her warm than muscle mass or a thick coat. That might change in the future, but for now, Prey is hardly a thing to be proud of conquering. The ease of this is of no consequence to the Hunter though, is it? In fact, Hunter herself is a whole bunch of crazy packed into a liiiiiittle tiny package – and perhaps has that many more triggers just poised to go off. Prey freezes, stock still, as she watches the white woman pivot and search for her. Rationally, she should show herself, let the hissing and spitting hellcat know she has nothing to fear, and therefore, should let the harmless little mountain goat go.

But the white walker’s eyes tell Prey otherwise. There’s a maddening glint in them that she’s seen before. Seen it standing over her first grandchild, seen it in the shadows as it lashed out, she’s seen it because it always, always comes back. It is the insidiousness in the darkness, the opposite of her golden, angelic light! Hunter goes the wrong way at first, giving Prey time to gingerly step away from entangling, spindly boughs that would catch and hold her fast. One step, then two, while the horned banshee shrieks her dismay. It is slow, going and Yael has no illusions about how far she can go before her Hunter sees hoofprints. She cannot take to wing now – between snow and trees, its very unconducive to a clean getaway.

But what if…? Yael freezes again, and turns her invisible face towards the crimson-stained woman. With a deep breath, she opens her throat wide and ululates, crying out to the heavens the way the women of her tribe have done for centuries. Their throats brought sounds of despair – hers brings one of defiance. “Aye-yi-yi-yi-yi-yai!” resonates around the empty woods, bouncing off the ice and frozen rock, rushing through skeleton arms of trees and falling violently to the snowy ground.

Little mouse, indeed.