Thana came to the forest with the golden sapling wondering what all this wanting in her was for.
And oh, oh she left knowing the wanting as well as her own name and the curve of her bladed tail. It roils in her even now, between the walls and horses (because she is not a horse, she is not like them, she is not like anything in this world). Each step is heavy with it: all this weight of rage and fury and hunger. Thana is hungry. Hungry enough to open her mouth and swallow this kingdom whole-- bones, and guts, and flesh all at once.
Maybe if it was not a unicorn, maybe she wouldn't have been so hungry. Maybe she would have hunted the creatures for the answers in their blood too.
The world trembles behind her as she moves. Winter foliage turns to rot and drips fat, black drops of death ink on the thin snow cover. Banners turn faded and brittle as she walks below him. Thana sees none of it, cares for none of it, worries about none of it. She does not turn to watch the horror in the eyes of children or listen to the thud, thud, thud of doors slamming shut around her. There is only the beast roaring in her, the rot-magic, the rift-magic, the wild-magic, endless as the sea.
There is only the smell of spring in the air leading her on.
She must find him.
And then, oh then, it will be time to ravage all the beasts hiding away like voles.
Each time she bares her teeth the blood on her lips pulls at her skin and starts to flake. The streets pass below her hooves like a river. The merchants are nothing more to her than ghosts running from a unicorn made of death. She hardly sees anything at all until the smell of spring dissolves by the library. When she runs through the doorway the books closest to her seem to moan and moan and moan until there is the smell of molding leather in the hair.
Her magic, her monster, her terrible, terrible form only sighs at the smell of it. It calls this home. It calls this right.
She can hear them talking. There are words she can hear like poacher and killer and patrol. But all she can hear is you must hunt, hunt, hunt running through her over and over again. It's louder than her heartbeat, louder than the way it tumbles over itself at the sight of Ipomoea there, held together by flesh instead of root and torn muscles. She does not pause to worry at the aching of it before she presses her lips, still covered in dried blood, to his hip.
But her eyes, those vicious purple eyes of hers, does not leave the map. All she can see is red, red, red. So much red.
Thana blinks because she's wishing she was the unicorn in the forest. Because she's wishing she had a belly full of blood instead of a nose coated with some that has been long cooled. She's wishing she was the creature in the wood with magic in her blood, magic enough to tempt a killer.
She thinks a terrible thought. Her tail whines against the floor when she drags it over the stone. Over and over again it whines. If anyone shivers at the sound she does not turn to see. She knows why she is always wanting now. Oh she knows.
“Give me a direction.” She whispers the words.
And every curtain in the room starts to fray.
@Ipomoea @
