WE'RE ALL KILLERS. WE'VE ALL KILLED PARTS OF OURSELVES TO SURVIVE.
Boudika felt pulled by inherent urges; an instinctual surge of life which beat, heady and seductive, in her very blood. It called to her; urging her away from conversation, away from civilised talk, from contemplation. This, her blood said, was a time of change. A time of precipice, of exhaustion—her limbs felt the ghostly remembrance of movement, the tingle that began in her hooves and ended well into her body, her muscles aflame, her flanks twitching. Boudika could not stand still and her movement became increasingly unsettled; she paced a small circle as Thana neared, her leonine tail flagging the air in a bright, spinning whir of copper. Then Boudika would cease; she would force herself to stand with rigid military discipline after rigorous exercise, remembering a time whence she stood in ranks, and a sergeant's quick baton would smack the hock of some restless cadet. She had worked so hard to reach mindlessness, but it never lasted long enough.
Everything about Boudika was slipping; she was losing herself, her rigidity, her discipline, her motives. So she raised her head in greeting, so still, so still, and then one hoof struck restlessly at the snow-damp turf.
Change was something forced upon Boudika, unbidden, as change so often is. It was something, however, she had yet to accept; and the never-ending presence of salt in her life was only an eerie reminder and now, this stranger, another. Boudika’s people were two-horned or elaborately antlered, with whip-like tails that ended only in bright plumes of hair. Her people were two-toned, or three-toned, as she was, with brilliant and brazen markings and eyes like pooled blood. No wonder she felt so predatory, so on edge; no wonder., as her eyes turned the bladed tail of the unicorn. Boudika was a monster-hunter, and had she not been led to believe that anyone who was not her people was a monster? Had she not been constantly confronted by the oddities of this Court, this Novus? There was something in the other mare’s eyes—her stillness provoked concern, but not only concern. There was a quickness, a sharp thoughtfulness, that suggested to Boudika there was more in the mare’s mind than she expressed.
Thana was intense, and her demeanour mimicked Boudika’s thudding heart; perhaps they knew one another on some inherent, intrinsic level. Perhaps they spoke a language shared between beasts, outcasts, foreigners—the language among wolves and wolves alone, or the snarls of lions among lions. Those knowing, heated eyes—they flayed Boudika to the bone. The earnest, prodding questions. ”I cannot go where I would like to,” Boudika answered, noncommittally… and then reassessed, adding in a heavy tone, ”I came from somewhere far across the sea, and I cannot run there.” The statement in and of itself condemned her. I cannot run there Boudika said, and cliffs flashed in her mind’s eye—cliffs, winding roads, treacherous beaches. It had been true enough in statement and in fact, at her homeland.
Her eyes cut back toward the other mare, focusing—she was not of the Night Court, as Boudika had thought, and she wondered if that meant she ought to do something? But it was not her duty, Boudika believed. After all, she was only a dancer. Her mouth felt dry, her muscles exhausted. Why ought she care if this mare was not of the Court? “I am Boudika.” Each of them offered a piece of themselves; a name, spoken with implications beyond the conversation, with weight beyond words. Vercingetorix had once told Boudika, as they had walked through Oresziah’s main city, that there was no changing nature. He had pointed out the differences between themselves and the merchants, with their hard, clever, goat-like eyes as they haggled for wares and bartered for exchanges. They have hard lives, sure, Vercingetorix had said softly, his lips at her ear. But they don’t move like we do.
The thought came back to Boudika with startling clarity. They do not move like we do. And this mare, she moved as Boudika moved, and spoke as Boudika spoke, and the overall feeling was rather ethereal. Perhaps it only means we are both hollow. But Boudika could not decide how to ask such a question, or even affirm that it was true—perhaps it was her mind, playing with her, making Boudika see slights that were not there. Finally, as the silence grew long and awkward, Boudika spoke again. “Where do you come from?” It was clear she did not mean the other mare’s court. Boudika could no longer stay still, and she began to pace a wide circle around her companion, one hoof and then another dragging through the snow in exaggerated lethargy.
WE'VE ALL GOT BLOOD ON OUR HANDS. SOMETHING SOMEWHERE HAD TO DIE SO WE COULD STAY ALIVE.
@Thana
