- May 5, 2023
- 484
- 199
- 43
// CW: Blood.
For the first time in a long time, her dreams are stalked by something new.
It's not a great black dog with an orange snout dripping pieces of her shoulder; it's not the thump of heavy paws behind her, hot breath on her ear, slavering jaws and open fangs. It's not the receding back smoked black, blue - buckle collar matching her own, something alive in the pit of her belly. It's not hard wingbeats and sharp talons and blood - spattered snow. It's not a spiky chimeric mane and wild, crazed eyes; bared fangs and a spinning world and a voice screaming the regards of a madwoman. It's not a golden shape smeared in stars—red - stained and limp on the ground, or worse, turning away, contempt glittering in a starry blue eye.
It's her.
Her of many moons ago, lilac - maned and red - collared, glittering pins clinging to round ears unscarred by claws. Her face is round and innocent, two wide green eyes unmarred by the strike of an enemy and glittering with energy, shining with hope. Her body is plump with kibble and empty of any trace of a scar—the deep grooves of a dog's teeth, wide tears of eagle talons, and so, so many clawmarks. Those legs, weak and without definition but animated by boundless optimism, are carrying her over a whorl - studded wood fence, towards deep groves of pine and dewy underbrush. It's newleaf, the world just lost its snowy coat, and she's following a smoke - stained figure with a face she can't quite make out.
Or the other her is. Because she is still here, watching silently as soft, uncalloused white paws carry the other her towards her undoing. No, no, no— " Mmph! " She tries to scream for her to stop, screams until her lungs ache, but nothing comes out but soft hums—great clots of blood coat her muzzle, drip down her chest, streak her paws up past the elbows. Coagulated clumps and oozing strands glue her mouth shut, drying red on her face, silencing her. She can't stop herself as she approaches the edge of the woods, lifts a pale paw for that last, damning step—
—and then she gasps awake, screams blessedly choked and dying in her chest. Sage eye blown wide, zig - zagging frantically around her, she realizes slowly where she is—home, in the warriors' den . . . her breathing slows, but the rabbit - quick thrum of her heart does not. Chest tight with unspoken screams, she slips out of her new nest, stumbles past the other sleeping forms out into the pale light of the waning moon. She shakes all the way to the stream, moving lazy and near - still in the windless summer heat, and stares down at herself.
Shredded ears. A winding scar where an eye should be. A gaunt face, weight ground off by grief. Snowy white paws. Pale muzzle. No blood.
These sights hardly comfort her, and she stares vacantly into the water, waiting for them to change.
Whether she wants them to, she's not sure.
For the first time in a long time, her dreams are stalked by something new.
It's not a great black dog with an orange snout dripping pieces of her shoulder; it's not the thump of heavy paws behind her, hot breath on her ear, slavering jaws and open fangs. It's not the receding back smoked black, blue - buckle collar matching her own, something alive in the pit of her belly. It's not hard wingbeats and sharp talons and blood - spattered snow. It's not a spiky chimeric mane and wild, crazed eyes; bared fangs and a spinning world and a voice screaming the regards of a madwoman. It's not a golden shape smeared in stars—red - stained and limp on the ground, or worse, turning away, contempt glittering in a starry blue eye.
It's her.
Her of many moons ago, lilac - maned and red - collared, glittering pins clinging to round ears unscarred by claws. Her face is round and innocent, two wide green eyes unmarred by the strike of an enemy and glittering with energy, shining with hope. Her body is plump with kibble and empty of any trace of a scar—the deep grooves of a dog's teeth, wide tears of eagle talons, and so, so many clawmarks. Those legs, weak and without definition but animated by boundless optimism, are carrying her over a whorl - studded wood fence, towards deep groves of pine and dewy underbrush. It's newleaf, the world just lost its snowy coat, and she's following a smoke - stained figure with a face she can't quite make out.
Or the other her is. Because she is still here, watching silently as soft, uncalloused white paws carry the other her towards her undoing. No, no, no— " Mmph! " She tries to scream for her to stop, screams until her lungs ache, but nothing comes out but soft hums—great clots of blood coat her muzzle, drip down her chest, streak her paws up past the elbows. Coagulated clumps and oozing strands glue her mouth shut, drying red on her face, silencing her. She can't stop herself as she approaches the edge of the woods, lifts a pale paw for that last, damning step—
—and then she gasps awake, screams blessedly choked and dying in her chest. Sage eye blown wide, zig - zagging frantically around her, she realizes slowly where she is—home, in the warriors' den . . . her breathing slows, but the rabbit - quick thrum of her heart does not. Chest tight with unspoken screams, she slips out of her new nest, stumbles past the other sleeping forms out into the pale light of the waning moon. She shakes all the way to the stream, moving lazy and near - still in the windless summer heat, and stares down at herself.
Shredded ears. A winding scar where an eye should be. A gaunt face, weight ground off by grief. Snowy white paws. Pale muzzle. No blood.
These sights hardly comfort her, and she stares vacantly into the water, waiting for them to change.
Whether she wants them to, she's not sure.
" speech "
" dream speech "
" dream speech "
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