Ultima
 Support was a way of life for Maude; like a grove of trees, she and her family had grown together, their roots intertwining, their branches melding into one breezy canopy. They uplifted one another, supported and enfolded each into a tightly knit forest, filled with secondary life that could never be attained were they separated. Without them, she was a lonesome tree atop a hill, and no love coursed through her branches now, but that which she carried in her own heart. It left her feeling quite desperate to meld her branches and roots with anyone, and the act of spreading her metaphorical shade over Otem was as easy to do as breathing. It felt right, to be the mentor, to tend to someone else, to remember her teachers and do emulate them as best as she could. It hurt less than worrying that they were lost to her forever, either trapped in a world inaccessible without great magic, or dead, like grinning, happy Doctor Sacre definitely was. Smiling when her new friend talks of the desert, and its numerous cacti, she really wishes she had got to see it before it had gone. Her father had called it a sea of gold. It sure sounded pretty. "Fire isn’t good for plants," ironically smiles Maude, her smile fleeting, the pain at recalling the death of the Gods piercing through her, and cutting her talk of natural balance and the odd way everything worked out so perfectly short, "did you know my Auntie Aelfwine? She lived there, until…" She drops off, not liking that topic a whole lot, and moves on. It seems like Otem is saying something excitedly when the nightshade bursts into flames, and all conversations are put on hold. Glad the plant hadn’t hurt the pretty earth-toned girl, but also quite ashamed of her plant’s behavior, Maude lifts her ears and eyes with tentativeness, glad to note that the winged filly is not upset with her, at least. The question she asks makes the ginger and cream girl bob her head in agreement almost immediately, looking back out at the horrible forest she’d first been thrown into. "Mhm," she concurs, her fear of this strange place cocooning her insides like a cold, clammy blanket of the smoke she talks about, "the black mist in the forest back there felt like it was, I don’t know, grabbing me, and now, my poor plants... I’m never going back in that terrible wood if I don’t have to." Her statement is said with as much bold certainty that she can manage, considering how deeply she now understands the reality that, sometimes, you have no choice but to follow a path. Terribly afraid to have to face that forest again, regardless, she tempts fate with her declarations, but is quite glad to turn the topic to home. She too is afraid the beach is somehow listening. "It was very beautiful," says Maude of the Edge, feeling her heart breaking apart into impossibly smaller pieces, tears coming to her eyes as she remembers it, shining, shimmering, alive in the mists, "filled with silver mist, not awful black stuff, and everyone there was happy. I…" Her words break away, and she stares at her cloven hooves, tears rolling from her eyes without abandon. I was happy there, she wants to say, it was my home. I was born beneath the branches of a tree called Trewdwellan, and everyday, my father and I would walk to the garden, and I would sing songs to miss Evangeline, daddy, Lyanna, everyone... Everyday… "I miss it all so much!" she mourns, tears dripping into the sand which darkens; though she feels ashamed to be so weak, her eyes clench shut, and her chin presses to her chest, as if she could smash the pain away, or smear it thinner, so that it caused her less agony to feel. With a passion for us we could not return? If equal affection cannot be, let the more loving one be me. |
Image Credits | Table
