and i don't want your pity i just want somebody near me
The boy with the wings of gold is studying me. As if I were the pinned butterfly beneath the taxidermist's glass, and not him.
If I were any other girl, this would embarrass me. To be studied so intently, and with such a look! It was one of those looks that Elder would drag out with a purr—a look he sure gave me, wouldn't you say?—as she inspected herself in her ceiling-high mirror, and waited impatiently for me to agree. I would, eventually. With Elder I was always less on guard, and more of the brat she accused me of being.
"Did you kill the butterflies then?"
Even the hushed darkness of my mask can't quite dull the gold ocean of his eyes, made brighter by their frame of thick black lashes, and the way they are fixated wholly on me. I don't really wish to scare him away, because he is pretty—and like Elder, I have always had a weakness for pretty things. But I dislike the way he is not scared of me. I dislike that I am the butterfly under the glass.
“Yes.” My voice is sure and steady. I am not repentant. He is much taller than me and I despise how I must tilt my head up to meet his stare, even if he doesn't know I am staring back. Determined now, I step cautiously forwards, my butterfly braids brushing featherlight along my neck. I shift to the tips of my hooves to whisper into his slender ear, "Fourteen." I almost add for each piece of Ma's soul until I remember that outsiders are never to hear of our witchcraft.
Even if I can never go back, I wasn't raised a traitor.
Elder had warned us about the trickster ways of the outsiders. About the kindness, or the sincerity, or the concern they wear like masks to enchant you with (like ours but more sinister) only to gut you open when you finally hand your trust over to them like a bleeding heart. Hadn't Linus done exactly that to Dyani? Hadn't I warned Rook never to try it on me?
A shiver shoots up my spine, and I dart shakily back again, my mask wobbling in consternation.
“And what of you?” We are like two rabbits in a glen, each unsure if behind the rabbit's pelt writhes a hissing green snake. He shies away just like I had and the sight of it on another is almost comical. Had I frightened him? My tail pushes up against the rough trunk of an ancient oak. Strangely, I am not as comforted as I'd thought I'd be.
“Do you not like it when boys stand so close? You did not spook?” I frown, annoyed that he thinks me frightened. I am only wary. Ma has always praised me for my wariness. “Well—don't go away. I was only surprised.” I don't want him to leave me here, without Rook, in the growing dark. If he does I will sacrifice my pride and trot after him, a burr stuck to his side.
I nod grimly to myself when I reach this conclusion, before pawing at the frozen dirt. Winter is the season of death, and there are no daisies left for me to pluck; only butterflies, and the ones that stay for winter are never as pretty as the ones that leave in great blue clouds when the air begins to taste of chill.
“Don't you know what your stare would do to a girl other than me?” I ask him carefully, though my voice is not so rough as it is curious. Does he not know? Is he a rabbit wilder than I, abandoned to the cold, skeletal forest?
If he is—
Gingerly, I step out of the oak's bristly shadow.
If I were any other girl, this would embarrass me. To be studied so intently, and with such a look! It was one of those looks that Elder would drag out with a purr—a look he sure gave me, wouldn't you say?—as she inspected herself in her ceiling-high mirror, and waited impatiently for me to agree. I would, eventually. With Elder I was always less on guard, and more of the brat she accused me of being.
"Did you kill the butterflies then?"
Even the hushed darkness of my mask can't quite dull the gold ocean of his eyes, made brighter by their frame of thick black lashes, and the way they are fixated wholly on me. I don't really wish to scare him away, because he is pretty—and like Elder, I have always had a weakness for pretty things. But I dislike the way he is not scared of me. I dislike that I am the butterfly under the glass.
“Yes.” My voice is sure and steady. I am not repentant. He is much taller than me and I despise how I must tilt my head up to meet his stare, even if he doesn't know I am staring back. Determined now, I step cautiously forwards, my butterfly braids brushing featherlight along my neck. I shift to the tips of my hooves to whisper into his slender ear, "Fourteen." I almost add for each piece of Ma's soul until I remember that outsiders are never to hear of our witchcraft.
Even if I can never go back, I wasn't raised a traitor.
Elder had warned us about the trickster ways of the outsiders. About the kindness, or the sincerity, or the concern they wear like masks to enchant you with (like ours but more sinister) only to gut you open when you finally hand your trust over to them like a bleeding heart. Hadn't Linus done exactly that to Dyani? Hadn't I warned Rook never to try it on me?
A shiver shoots up my spine, and I dart shakily back again, my mask wobbling in consternation.
“And what of you?” We are like two rabbits in a glen, each unsure if behind the rabbit's pelt writhes a hissing green snake. He shies away just like I had and the sight of it on another is almost comical. Had I frightened him? My tail pushes up against the rough trunk of an ancient oak. Strangely, I am not as comforted as I'd thought I'd be.
“Do you not like it when boys stand so close? You did not spook?” I frown, annoyed that he thinks me frightened. I am only wary. Ma has always praised me for my wariness. “Well—don't go away. I was only surprised.” I don't want him to leave me here, without Rook, in the growing dark. If he does I will sacrifice my pride and trot after him, a burr stuck to his side.
I nod grimly to myself when I reach this conclusion, before pawing at the frozen dirt. Winter is the season of death, and there are no daisies left for me to pluck; only butterflies, and the ones that stay for winter are never as pretty as the ones that leave in great blue clouds when the air begins to taste of chill.
“Don't you know what your stare would do to a girl other than me?” I ask him carefully, though my voice is not so rough as it is curious. Does he not know? Is he a rabbit wilder than I, abandoned to the cold, skeletal forest?
If he is—
Gingerly, I step out of the oak's bristly shadow.
