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 Posted: Fri Mar 28, 2008 11:44 am
 Small dark hooves padded across the spring grass and wary gold eyes peered about in the darkness. There was hardly a sound in the cool starlit night, hardly a Nequus stirring but for a small clump of Aeri in the middle distance.
The lack of people aided the dark-coated filly’s cause but the quietness of the world was not quite as beneficial. Each hoof had to be placed with meticulous caution on the ground to avoid striking a stone hidden by the gloom or cracking a wayward twig.
Tonight she could not be heard. Tonight she could not be seen. Tonight she could not be stopped.
Tonight, she was leaving.
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Posted: Fri Mar 28, 2008 11:48 am
 The filly was not being as stealthy as she hoped.
Slit pupiled gold eyes narrowed calculatingly and the tall mare who owned them moved from the shadow of one har-hrang bush to another. While the juicy-fruited plants were giving the Jala filly cover, they were also concealing her mother. Bastet peered at the sneaking figure of her daughter and frowned. So. She was off then was she? Lucky little Rit drek; she wished she’d thought to slip away from herd and duty at that age. If she had done, then her parents might have had more foals to mate off in convenient places, or perhaps her cousins would have been raised to expect that fate...
Still, that was past and fantasy alone. The point was that she hadn’t, and that her youngest had. Rather than day-dreaming about stupid could-have-beens, she ought to be getting on with living vicariously through her foal.
Shaking her head to herself, the well-muscled mare crept onward as swiftly as she dared until she judged herself to be some way in front of her purple and gold-striped filly. Once in place, the Jala drew herself back into the shadows and waited. When she heard the small sounds of a Nequus moving cautiously, she stepped out from behind the har-hrang bush with her wings half unfurled.
Looking down at the shocked features of her daughter, the purple-stripe mare smiled thinly. “Going somewhere, Sekhmet?” she asked evenly.
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Posted: Fri Mar 28, 2008 11:50 am
Sekhmet froze with one hoof in the air and her jaw open. How had she?... She’d swear blind she’d been almost silent; had her mother followed her all the way from their sleeping grove to here?
The filly looked up at the creature from whom she had inherited the stripes that adorned her face and rump. Closing her jaw, the foal gulped; Jala’s wide wings she was for it now.
“I ah... Hello mother... I ah... I was umm... I was going for a ah... a walk and I... and I didn’t want to wake anyone which was... which was why I was sneaking. What are you doing out here?” It was too much to hope that her mother would believe the lie but she had to try; this was the sort of thing you only got one shot at. If she was taken back to the herd now she’d be watched day and night until either her spirit was broken or until she was tied to the place by foals of her own.
It was a slim hope, yes, but she had to hold onto it.
Offering what she hoped was a winning smile, the black-winged Jala waited for her dam’s reaction and sent a silent prayer to any of the Gods that might be listening. She couldn’t be taken back, not now; she’d come too far to fail... Right?
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Posted: Fri Mar 28, 2008 11:53 am
Bastet tossed her head and laughed, the noise carrying oddly loud and sharp in the quite night. “Well,” she gave a grin, “obviously I was going for a stealthy walk myself.” Game little thing her daughter was, she’d give the filly that credit. Even when it was a plain as your hoof what was going on she still strove to carry out her plan, to steer her own course. Briefly, the gold-eyed mare considered putting the foal out of her misery and telling her she was free to go. In the end however, the heavily-muscled mare decided to play a bit more; wasn’t as though anything else of note was going to happen to her for a while so she might as well make the most of this while it lasted.
“So tell me,” the striped Jala mare nestled her wings closer to her flanks, “just where were you planning on going on this walk of yours? Once you get past that broad-leaf tree you’re out of the herlands you know.” It was a bit cruel, she knew, but she was feeling a bit cruel so there. It ought to be her slipping off into the welcoming dark of the night, her heading for a life of freedom and uncertainty away from obligations and the restrictions of what was proper and seemly. It ought to be her, and just now she couldn’t get past that seed of bitterness to release her daughter just yet.
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Posted: Fri Mar 28, 2008 11:58 am
Oooooooooooooh...! Bae’s bottom! Her mother knew, and what was more she knew she knew that she knew... or something to that effect in any case. Despite this, the mare wasn’t getting to the point. The elder Jala wastoying with her, and that made Sekhmet want to put her ears back and scream.
She didn’t though; the only outward sign of her anger was a slight tensing of her lips and a barely notable tremble of tension in her wings. “Don’t know,” she said stiffly, “wasn’t really making plans for the direction of my walk.”
She hadn’t been, not plans any more detailed than ‘away’ in any case. Didn’t look like she was going to get to follow through on that though...
Setting her jaw, the filly took a pace towards her mother and gathered her composure. “So then,” the gold-eyed foal said quietly, “can I get on with my walk now please? It was sort of a solo thing.” There, no way her dam could play about with that.
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Posted: Fri Mar 28, 2008 3:42 pm
Bastet raised her brows and took a step forward herself before lowering her head to be on eye-level with her daughter.
“Was it now?” she said smoothly. “Well there you have it then. Tell me Sekhmet, mimila, was it also a never-coming-back thing?”
Well there, games over, it was said, and soon she would have to say goodbye. The thought saddened her, but not as much as she felt it ought to. She’d miss the brightly-striped filly but... but that was it. No drama, no fuss, no wailing and flailing; just a feeling that it would be good to see her again, and that the world would be slightly less without her around. Well, that was what happened when you had mating and motherhood thrust upon you, now wasn’t it?
Sometimes she really resented her father for that. No matter how well she understood his position and the reasons for doing as he had done it was hard to forgive her sire for robbing her of her freedom.
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Posted: Fri Mar 28, 2008 3:48 pm
Well that was better, she supposed, now at least they were being honest. Still, a small part of her was disappointed that Bastet hadn’t believed her. She knew that her mother was far too clever to buy such an enormous whopper but... but still, until a moment ago that little part of her had had hope.
“Yes,” the black filly said bluntly, “it was. I’ve decided that I’m not going to risk getting shoved off to some colt or stallion I neither know nor love just for the good of the herd. I want my own life, ute, so... so I was trying to take it.” But that was over now. It was all over. She should’ve taken more care, been more sneaky or something to avoid getting caught... But she hadn’t, and it was over.
The stripe-rumped filly delated, her head bowing a little and her wings sagging. It had been going so well and now... now she was going to end up like her mother. It was all over.
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Posted: Fri Mar 28, 2008 3:53 pm
The gold-hooved mare made a small noise of approval and nodded her head. “Good for you, wish I’d thought of that at your age. Deciding to do the selfless thing and become some convenient stallion’s mate sucks, believe me...”
Maybe she didn’t feel for Sekhmet and her siblings what a mother ought, but she didn’t want them to share her fate. To hell with the bitterness, it was high time she gave any of them who wanted out her blessing and any help she could offer. Nobody deserved to be trapped in a loveless mating; not her, not them, not Diego.
The tall Jala shook her head slightly and sighed to herself over the unfairness of life in general. “Diego’s not a bad sort at all, you know that, but... well, I don’t love him and this life... Well it’s not what I’d choose for myself if I were given the chance.” he was a good stallion, a good stallion and much of the time she rather liked him but liking was not enough and never would be.
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Posted: Fri Mar 28, 2008 3:59 pm
Sekhemet blinked rapidly a few times and raised her head. “What?” Had she actually heard that right? ‘Good for you’? Her mother was... encouraging her to leave? It was so wild and idea that she could scarcely get her mind around it.
This wasn’t how it went. If it went wrong she was caught, reprimanded, dragged back, guarded, imprisoned, mated off as soon as possible to almost any brute who was even slightly advantageous. She wasn’t praised, she wasn’t confided in, her mother didn’t identify with her over the whole mess... right?
Wrong, apparently.
Well there you had it.
“So... So why did you accept riruy then? Why didn’t you run?” If she was going to be allowed to leave then the hows and whys of her mother’s life probably didn’t matter, but she couldn’t help but be curious.
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Posted: Fri Mar 28, 2008 4:03 pm
The powerfully-built mare sighed and shook her head again, the black strands of her mane fluttering lightly in the light breeze. “Ah. That. Well, actually I did run but... well, I came back. Since plans were already made for me, if I stayed away one of my cousins would have had to take my place at Diego’s side. I couldn’t let that happen, even at the price of my own liberty. It wouldn’t have been right. I had to come back.”
How she wished that it hadn’t been so. Still; it was so, it was done and there was no changing it no matter how much she might wish and regret and rail against her fate. She was trapped.
Pushing that depressing thought to the back of her mind, Bastet turned back to her daughter once more. “There aren’t any plans for you and your siblings yet,” she informed her, “and there might never be - I know your father doesn’t want you to have to be paired off as he and I were - but I couldn’t be my freedom on it if I were you. If you leave now, tonight, you get to make your own way in life without worrying about appearances, and you won’t have doomed anyone else in your place.”
Taking a deep breath, the slit-pupiled Jala stepped aside to clear her daughter’s path. “Go on now Sekkie,” she said with a slightly sad smile, “get on and get away while you have the chance. Good luck, mimila, I hope you’re happy; I truly do. Get out there and walk your own way... and live some life for me too, okay?”
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Posted: Fri Mar 28, 2008 4:07 pm
The strip-faced Jala walked forward slowly until she was level with her mother. Once there, she stopped and gazed out into the wideness of the nighttime world. It was all her’s, that horizon, her’s to chase and to push back and... everything. Anything could be her’s. Free. She was free.
A grin spread across the filly’s face and she turned to her dam. “I will,” she promised with a sincere nod, “and I’ll try to come back and visit, once I’ve set myself far enough away from the herd so as not to be a good bargaining piece... Goodbye then, ute, take care of yourself and of riruy and my brother and sister. I love you all very much, okay?”
With these words and a nod to her dam, the black-feathered filly turned her face back to the horizon and took off at a gallop.
As she passed the broad-leaf tree, she turned her head briefly to give her mother a last smile before focusing her attention back on the horizon and on her stride.
Free.
She was free.
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Posted: Fri Mar 28, 2008 4:13 pm
As the night swallowed the dark-bodied foal, Bastet gave a heavy sigh and turned away. Lucky little Rit drek; what she’d give to be racing off into the unknown rather than plodding back to the more central areas of the herdlands.
it wasn’t fair, but then what in life truly was fair and what right did she have to complain in the end? She had enough to eat and drink, more than enough if she wanted it, she and Diego got on most of the time, she had a loving family, some good and true friends... But it wasn’t enough.
Bastet sighed again and set off with a heavy heart for the copse she and Diego had taken to sleeping in.
It wasn’t enough.
Good though her life was it wasn’t enough.
The striped Jala paused and took one last longing look at the broad-leaf tree before bowing her head and setting off once more.
It wasn’t enough.
It wasn’t freedom.
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