MOON SALTO I | katydid

Jan 1, 2023
320
183
43

Treading through the trembling undergrowth, the afternoon winds whispered its berceuse with a willowy and wavering songstress' weave. The allure of the springtide had called to him, with mother nature's melody peeking through the strings of snowmelt. The warmth had also started to return to the lands, and it danced along tapers of feathery fur. Chrysalispaw's mismatched gaze darted from each lichen-laden tree, tousles of moss drooping from bowing boughs as though they offered themselves to him. Still, it was unwise to just take any old soggy sod of moss, if working under Silversmoke's hawkish eye taught him anything. Seeking perfection, he found, was an arduous and almost-futile task. His tail tip dipped in impatient strokes, like a swan bobbing upon tranquil water. Undisturbed in temperate rhythm, gracile movements simply bided short-fused time. Any sort of upheaval of the waters was sure to send him into a flurry of fury. For now, he simply walked along the byways with a calico-mottled molly.

"Hurry up already. We need to get this moss to Dawnglare and Fireflypaw." He hissed to Katydidpaw behind him, tone trickling with that familiarly caustic venom, as an adder's fangs lie weary and wary behind its sheaths. Even as the sleighted hand tired of reaching for the blade, the metal did not tire of its prey. Irate sparks stared down at the shadow of their mother, as if she were more of a specter who haunted him than his own sister, a mirror of the woman who weaned them. In every spat, in every argument, he was reminded that she was more alive than his husk of a mother could be. If he tried hard enough, even the loudest sounds could fade into ghosts of thunder. He allowed diatribes to fester yet not fall forth from his lips, biting his tongue though it thrashed behind ivory bars, for his temper was a beast he could never truly tame. And why would he want to? His anger was the truth, and rightful the truth was.

@KATYDIDPAW