yael

Yael, too, had been weak; the backlash of strong magic chewed her up and spit her back out on Helovia’s doorstep, leaving her without a sense of time or recent past. So very, very, weak, both in body and spirit. Almost a full season passed before she began to feel like she was at full strength again, and even then, the biting cold of winter wreaked havoc on her summer-land body. The former mage never stood a fighting chance against the barrier, and if that is the truth of the matter, then it is easier to accept than whatever guilt she’s held onto for almost an entire  year.

Her romanesque nose bobs up and down, until something gives her pause, and she glances up at the now shifting mass of ink. Break them apart? Is Kaos, then, the true form (whatever that means) of the Rift Gods, like when the Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers come together as the Megazord? For as many answers as he gives her, a hundred more questions pop into her head, and G-d, it seems like she could stand here forever, order some tea, and have all the intellectual conversations.

That, of course, assumes that they are something resembling equals, and Kaos goes on to dash right through that little fantasy of hers, calling the wishes useless, and marking a stark difference in their natures. “Perxaps to you,” she chides ever so gently. To Gods who already stand aloof from their creations, emotions must seem useless, fleeting, and childish. “But most of t’em are not eemortal. Zey t’ink deeferently about time, and deat, and relationsheeps…” The little golden mare is not so old that her mind has changed about such things; she still finds friendships and kindness terribly important to everyday life, even trying to go out of her way to offer small moments to everyone she comes across.

Can he see the truth within her tiny, relatively frail body? That the knowledge she has of the world has made her love it that much more? Her mentor gave her so much, showed her the endless miracles of life, the thousands of possibilities that lay within a single individual. How can she not want to work to take away the misery around her?

It is a thankless, never-ending task she sets herself up for, knowing full well that there will always be someone so walled off that they cannot be reached, and those who take delight only in pain and, well, chaos. Only in actively choosing a (mostly) unconditional love for her fellows can she begin to let those failures go without blaming herself. “And zat does not mean I should stop tryeeng, futile effort t’ough eet may be at times.” Her shoulders shrug, indicating that she knows how silly it may sound, but he isn’t down on the front lines every day, listening and watching and falling in love with the world around them. How could she ever explain it, when Yael, herself, does not completely understand the complicated ebb and flow of love she has for this life?

“But I suppose I should start vit my own faults... my own loneliness...” she says, meeting invisible eyes and an admission of weakness. Life would be better for her, if she weren’t quite so lonely. It is an unfortunate side effect of not being quite like anyone else.