Close Encounters of the Furred Kind

[andhiswife]

She returns to Cabeswater, though she tells herself nothing will come of it. She believes nothing will come of it, and berates herself for even bothering right up until she steps over that invisible border between woods and Woods. Then it gets a bit harder to convince herself that anything is impossible. Cabeswater, much like the Woods she came from, has a very Possible sort of feeling to it.

Which is precisely why it's dangerous, but here she is.

She's not even sure why she felt compelled to visit today. Tromping around the forest never sent her home the first few times she tried it, and she can't bring herself to wish for her family's arrival. Maybe it's just been too long, part of her worried that she might forget the way back to the spot where she arrived. Maybe Darrow's starting to feel just a little bit too comfortable, and she wants to remind herself of where she really came from.

At any rate, it's peaceful and quiet out here. Darrow is so loud, and there's a difference between growing accustomed to it and liking it. Aside from birds, her own footsteps, and the paces she's counting under her breath, there's nothing - no traffic, no machinery, no snatches of overheard conversation. No tell-tale snapping twigs, either, so a flash of white out of the corner of her eye is the only hint that she might not be alone.

Greta stops in her tracks with a sharp, startled inhalation, peering through the trees. She can't help but wonder if it might be the white of a cow, or a steed fit for a Prince, though it's probably neither. "Hello?" she calls out uncertainly, then winces, immediately regretting the outburst. She's alone in a magical forest; maybe she shouldn't be drawing attention to herself.

Comments

[on_mans_road]

"What do you mean?" she asked, curious now that she was human again. Curious in a way she rarely was as a unicorn. She stayed close as they walked, remembering the way back well. She debated whether or not she wanted to return to the farm house and the familiarness of it and Biffy or if she wanted to go back to her apartment in the city. She felt lonely there. It wasn't as bad now that Daine and Kitten lived in the same building; she found the little dragonet delightful. But their presence also made her ache. They knew her. They knew her and could do nothing to change her back.

[andhiswife]

"Well..." Greta pauses, considering. It's a very musical sort of term, really -- not something she'd necessarily expect a unicorn to instinctively grasp, even if she has spent a fair amount of time in a human shape. Honestly, now that she thinks about it, she's not sure anyone but the Balladeer would be nodding in immediate understanding. Maybe it would be better to take a different approach.

"I mean that it's like... like knowing what to expect, overall, even if some little details don't go exactly the way you thought they would. You look at your life, and you just--you just know that tomorrow's going to go like today did, and so will the day after.

"Of course, it's a bit harder to say that here," she adds wryly. Darrow's too fond of throwing surprises at everyone. "But back home, that's... how it felt, sometimes."

As if a unicorn could really be all that interested in the dull, domestic grind. Greta shakes her head at herself, then flaps a hand dismissively, letting Amalthea off the hook. "Probably not what you meant."

[on_mans_road]

"No," she admitted. "I meant that time means nothing to a unicorn, but whenever I change, whenever I am human, I feel it. I feel it dragging on me, I feel it slipping by. I feel this body dying all around me." Amalthea shook her head, hugging herself as they walked.

"But I understand what you mean. I've felt that way before." Only as a human, though. Perhaps her life had been dull as a unicorn, but it was all her own, and she felt contentment. Time didn't touch her. "When I lived in Haggard's castle, I felt it. Like the days of my life were stretched out before me, and all of them seemed the same."

[andhiswife]

She almost rolls her eyes in an entirely self-deprecating sort of way -- because of course a unicorn would be referring to things like time and mortality and not the smaller mundanities with which she'd preoccupied herself -- but the thought of being able to feel yourself dying is so horrifying that she can neither blame herself for failing to guess at it nor feel anything but terrible that the truth is so ghastly.

"I'm so sorry," she says, closing the little distance between them so she can wrap an arm around Amalthea's shoulders. She's never been good at keeping her hands to herself when someone else is upset, always feeling compelled to reach out, to ground them (though being grounded in a mortal human body might be the last thing she needs). "That sounds awful."

After a beat, she adds, "Certainly worse than being bored," which now feels like a trivial complaint. That Amalthea still understands it almost makes it all worse; if she didn't comprehend it, at least it wouldn't be so obviously inconsequential by comparison. Greta presses her lips together, feeling small and ridiculous (so much so that she can't even manage to get distracted by the thought of living in a castle, which would normally prompt a flurry of questions).

[on_mans_road]

"Boredom is terrible," she counters. "I never really knew it until living in Haggard's keep. The endless passing of the days with nothing to change them. I would believe someone if they told me I'd been there for twenty years rather than a handful of weeks or months."

Amalthea looks at Greta, sincere. "Enduring mortality and boredom at the same time is something I should rather never do it again. I think I would so desperately want to run, wherever I could go."

[andhiswife]

Greta's expression wavers somewhere between gratitude and mild exasperation. It's nice to be understood, though coming from someone as generally unfathomable as a unicorn, it doesn't make her feel less small, or less ridiculous. Seeing Amalthea, even for just an instant, would have felt like an impossibly rich gift. Speaking with her, touching her, keeping her company, having her sympathy and understanding... there has to be a point where it's too generous, and Greta suspects they've already gone miles past it. At what point does it become a joke, with her own unworthiness the natural punchline?

She's not sure the Prince's attentions had her this hung up, quite honestly. But then again, the Prince had still just been a man, beneath all the charm and swagger and finely tailored clothes.

"It's probably why I was so keen to go in the Woods in the first place," she admits as she picks her way over some tumbled logs. Despite the dangers, she'd never been as afraid of the Woods as she should have been. The thought of their lives never changing -- that had been terrifying. "Well, that, and I knew my husband would need help breaking the Curse we were under. But even the last time, with the Giant storming around, it was--it was exciting." She glances over at Amalthea, a bit sheepish, like she shouldn't have enjoyed mortal peril so much -- or in preemptive apology for what she adds: "I'd expect living in a castle to be exciting, too, but it sounds like even that gets old."