Red Fern Forest sempre viva, live forever

you do not know who is your friend

and who is your enemy

The child was all wrong. Where she should be exuberant and moving, she was deathly still while standing; where she should be curious, she already seemed to know everything, and where she should be afraid, she was not. Who had formed such a strange creature? Who had folded the mind of someone so young, smoothed out some corners, instilled such control? She was unlike anything he had ever met—defied every rule he thought governed this world.

He didn't know what to do anymore. Not that he ever had, but faced with something so utterly defying everything he thought he knew about anything—what could he do but grow still like her, hackles smooth, fangs covered, eyes simply lost? He gazed at her, at the unyielding, unapologetic stance, at her quietly determined eyes, and he wondered what he was supposed to say. Or do. Or, anything, when her lips parted to reveal words he did not know how to react to. He should've bristled. He should've lunged at her, to shake the demons from her mind, should've—should've anything, but words had never been his forte, either.

He should've been insulted, but he was just sad instead, staring at her and feeling like she was a losing battle—or perhaps one already lost, minutes ago, when he so swiftly passed his judgment born of trauma, forcing the heartless God-like entity of his childhood upon her. All these years later he was convinced it was devised only as a means of control, to justify all the wrong things, and he couldn't help but wonder if this Mother was fabricated for the very same reasons. Would this young girl one day be forced to walk to her doom, believing it to be a glorious sacrifice, uplifting her to the heavens and the stars..? He swallowed, slightly, once again overcome with the desire to steal this child and raise her with love and sanity, to anchor her straying heart in the rich, tangible soil of the physical world.

By someone who knows better than me, he thought bitterly. As if anyone else knows it better than me. I was the one who suffered at their whims. To, as a child, risk death by being called evil simply by virtue of his color was.. unpleasant, to say the least. His only saving grace had been Viemina, his mother who had wandered in from another culture, blessedly free of such stupid notions.

"Really," he said quietly after a moment, all his righteous fury spent; he was no smaller, no less pale, but he seemed subdued, somehow. Could he give up? The child was not his; should it matter what happened to her? Would it cause him sleepless nights to wonder how she fared, if she still lived at all, or if she'd been sacrificed as 'impure' when times became lean..? He blinked, head lowered. "Do you have any siblings?" he asked after a moment, even though he assumed she would decline to answer; why answer someone who did nothing but belittle her misguided faith, and nearly snarl in her face..?

Surely, in the warped way she viewed the world, he was all things wrong and vile and foul, but some small part of him refused to give up.

until the ice breaks.

let the stars above shine in your soul

As far as Bennet was concerned, that concluded matters; this white wraith knew little or nothing, and the only benefit to be found from continuing this encounter was for her own curiosity. She paused at his deflated response, though, and revised her own thought; it wasn't that he knew nothing, it was that he knew nothing of her truth, even though he seemed somewhat familiar with the concepts - who would react in such a way otherwise? A more empathic creature may have wondered what had so burned him, but Bennet cared not for the happiness of those outside of her circle. If she could walk away from her milk-siblings without turning back, why should she spare emotion for this stranger?

There it was - another straightforward question, and her ear flicked in the barest hint of discomfort as she found herself unable to resist responding to it. Far from understanding the complexities of what happened inside the heads of other wolves, Bennet had a rare moment where she was aware of this deficiency and disliked it; if he was laying a trap for her, she could not see it.

Thinking in circles didn't suit the little dragon, so she brushed it off and lifted her chin, finding the ever-present strength in her breast. It was an easy question, and curtly answered. "No."

bennet <3

you do not know who is your friend

and who is your enemy

His breath was cold in his chest. The mountain air drifting in from the foothills felt heavy on his shoulders, and the proximity to Rissa's grave weighed on his mind. How many children were to be lost..? His eyes softly went from beaten to sad, as if there was nothing he could do here—maybe he was wrong, maybe he wasn't. His heart ached and his mind ached and his bones ached, and suddenly, all he wanted to do was to return to Oak Tree Bend and lay his head on the snow-covered mosses and sleep. Damn the world, damn the wolves, damn the deities and damn the children.

Not that he could, though—ever a guardian, even of those who weren't his flock. The dark lady, though, she did not want his help—or maybe, he just hadn't asked the right questions, if there even were such. He blinked a little, listened to her steady no, as if the mountains themselves had been given voice through her slight form. Surely, her heart was a glacier... He blinked again. She almost seemed to swim in and out of focus, a trick of the light, a trick of his mind; he sighed, and finally found movements as his paws scuffed in the snow and turned the crust over.

Did he even have a right to save her, just because he thought she needed saving? His gaze flicked down, then back up again. Somehow, it wouldn't have surprised him if she'd disappeared in those precious, few moments. "What's your name? Who are your parents?" Steady though she seemed, it wouldn't surprise him if she fled at his questions, instead of answering them. Prying strangers are never a good thing.

until the ice breaks.

let the stars above shine in your soul