How long has it been? It feels like ages, but the season of fall, her birth season, caresses her face with brisk wind, ruffling a mane that still feels so foreign to her mind. She still hasn't accepted herself, hasn't accepted who she has turned in to. She can't even return to her old home. Denocte no longer feels like home, and instead it is Terrastella she has turned her heart toward, in an attempt to blend in, to hide herself in a way.
It's not as if her family knows she is here. Her boys... her daughter... her lover. It all brings a pang to her heart, a tightening to her chest. Araxes turned and ran from it all when she had woken up in a strange body, instead of facing it. Even now, it makes her legs weak as they brush through tall grass, brittle from the colder days, tickling at her belly as she pauses herself, and dips her head down. A mint hoof digs at the ground, picking at the hardened soil to dig up a root carefully and inch it into her bag, and she feels the tightening in her throat, the burning of her eyes.
She could never return, she had once told herself. Yet here she is, in Novus, the lands that feel like they had turned on her when she had woken up in this strange body. A body that was... her. Her, despite her adamant attempts to try and believe it wasn't.
A shuddering breath is taken in, and Araxes feels the shudder as her head lifts, and she shakes her head, long ears flopping in the brisk and bright autumn day before she blinks. Maybe she can return to Denocte in the future, maybe she can stop in Solterra and see --- no. She can't. Her legs shudder at the thought, and she feels the breath suck itself from her lungs a moment, and she slowly sinks down, almost disappearing into the browning grasses, her ivory and ebony coat shuddering as her eyes close and her legs fold.
A shaking breath is taken, and she feels the sob build up in her throat, and erupt from deep down, her heart aching. She's so close to home... but she's so far.
There are many memories and ideas that Briar can dwell on. The suffocation of her mother, the mottled face of her father, the killing blow of her mother’s head against a rock . . . This she imagines with a shake of her head, gemstone eyes sorrowful and anxious. The wine-stained mare has no idea what her bruised mother will do without her. Briar knows she has nothing left, and still she turned away from her without so much as a look back.
This guilt—insufferable, horrid, and such mundane guilt—writhes in her chest like a trapped and infuriated snake.
Still, the dark woman wears a smile on her face (even if it is painful). The grimace in her eyes is an easy tell to what actually races in her mind, but Briar hardly lets anyone get close enough to see.
Secrets are near and dear to heart: misgivings, mistakes, countless nights of restless shame. These quiet and solemn thoughts she keeps to herself, never allowing anyone to touch those barbs that stab deeper into her heart with each facade. That smile, though—that smile is just brilliant enough to distract from her thorny features.
Bright and sunny, that is what Momma called her.
If only she could see me now.
Ever persistent, that she is; and she sheds this mournful skin just in time to kiss the flowers that surround her hello. What fear that rested at the corner of her lips fades, and new healthy shimmer settles over her face. These late flowers have survived just enough of the autumn to greet Briar on her trek to find . . . anything (including these peachy petals).
It is the sound of a sob that jerks her head away from the colors reflecting on her dark muzzle. Concern is clear in the wrinkle of her eyes as she scans the tall grass to find the cry’s source.
The tall ears of a black and white creature find her gaze—the dark red woman sets off into a brisk trot, certain that she must help whoever else is mourning. A distraction from her own suffering, perhaps, though Briar certainly does not realize this.
“Uh . . . .hello?” she murmurs hesitantly. The young woman finds herself peering gently down at what appeared to be a heartbroken equine. “Do you need help?” It is a silly thing to ask, this Bri knows. She is just old enough to recognize that sometimes suffering does not mean immediate distress, and yet . . . she lingers.
Of all the things to expect... she does not expect to actually have captured someone's attention.
Shame burns white hot through her veins, and Araxes feels those long ears of hers drop down, her breathing quickening as she attempts to calm herself in some way. The voice that had echoed was female, and the steps were light, the grasses bending and swaying, brittle in the autumn as they broke and gave way for the other equine, and... exposed her.
The merchant digs her front hooves into the dirt, lifting her front half just a little from the ground, and looks up at the other mare, a hesitant smile on her features, and a slight quiver to her lips, her voice, as her mouth opens to allow her to speak again. "I don't think there's much anyone can do," she admits, her voice soft. What was done is her own doing, and her own burden to shoulder. She will not bother others with it.
"I'm sorry... I don't mean to distress anyone. I thought I was rather alone out here," she admitted, her shoulders shifting as she dragged herself up to all four hooves, delicately small. "My name is Araxes... I'm a merchant for the Dusk Court." She's not new to the courts by any means, though to be a merchant is certainly some sort of new extension. She'd rather be a medic or healer of some sort.
Peddling her abilities and wares... it feels wrong now that she's back in Novus. Doing it outside of these lands meant survival, and she only took what she had needed, never anything more.
A breath is taken, and the striped mare once more finds the mental box, carefully compartmentalizing her emotions, filing them away for later. She's come a long way from being the small and emotional thing she had once been when she had first stepped into Novus in the very beginning.
Briar can hear the quiet sobs that grow into real, pained screams. She can see her mom as she throws her head into a tree and falls apart—again and again, pale red fur ruffling by the cruel bark of a tree, spindly and broken antlers tangling in low-hanging branches, eyes bloodshot as snot drips from her nostrils.
Perhaps that is why she lingers.
Araxes, in her own miniscule way, reminds Briar of the mother that lives on in her head; and if she cannot save that mother, then perhaps she can save the piece of her this stranger holds.
“Are you sure . . .” the wine-stained mare whispers in response, blinking gemstone eyes down at the now weak-smiling woman. Briar simply shakes her head and smiles when the striped girl mentions putting her in distress. She does not feel any particularly distress, unless one considers her desperate need to soothe any aches distress.
Briar’s new companion rises to all four hooves, so she takes a couple of steps back to allow her room. The tips of her ears quiver when Dusk Court leaves Araxes’ lips. Bri’s eyes light up like the sun just breaking over the horizon.
“Araxes . . . lovely name. You’re a part of the Dusk Court? I, uh—I just settled into Terrastella as a soldier, though I must admit I do not know much of fighting.” This she admits with a shy smile and kick of her right hoof into the dry dirt. Though she knows little, an itching in chest begins to build, one that speaks of secret excitement with the idea of physical sparring. Despite her upbringing, there is an unforgiving and ferocious creature just rumbling to life inside of her.
“Are you new to . . . um, Novus, is it? I don’t much of the people . . . or the religion . . . or anything.”
Briar rambles in the hopes that it might distract Araxes from whatever she may be suffering through. She is young and naive but is trying her best.
