In The Darkness, You Are The Light I Need

Life has not slowed down for the young Andy since she returned from the Hallows. Things have changed, for better or worse, and the pup finds often finds herself alone in an endless ocean of faces. Wolves come and go and she knows that there are responsibilities that her father must tend to but, even when he is around, she feels often feels alone. There seems to be an unspoken rule that they do not talk about Zee and that, more than anything, hurts. It is as if her father wants them to pretend she never existed, as if, in the first few months of their lives, she had not held them, loved them, and cooed sweet words at them. Anger festers underneath the girl’s sadness and she finds it is beginning to morph into something new; resentment.

Andromeda tries to shove away the emotion fearful of the implications that it has but, the more he ignores the topic of their mother, the more that scary, unbridled feeling grows. As the pups gather around their father to sleep, the girl hangs toward the back, on the outer edges of the pile so that she can lay slip away easily once they are all in dreamland. The family settles and Andy closes her eyes, feigning sleep while listening as the breathing of her siblings and father even out and deepen. Only when she is absolutely certain they are truly asleep, the pup’s pale blue eyes blink open and a small, soft sigh rolls past her lavender lips. Silently, she stands and, because of her placement, isn’t difficult to detach from the pile and the girl is soon making her way swiftly and quietly down into the col.

The roaring fire calls to her and Andy moves to it, laying as close to the warmth as she can physically stand. Pale eyes search the dancing flames as she thinks back to a night on the plains, when the loss had been so fresh and the pain almost unbearable. She had sought her mother in her dreams, trying to bring her back so that they could talk one last time. But, she not found her and, instead of the wolf who had given birth to her, the young girl had brought with her someone else’s mother. Despite not knowing the woman, the ghostly apparition had comforted her, held her, and made her feel loved in those tender, sad moments that they spent together.

Her mind latches onto the woman as her eyelids grow heavy, the weight of sleep settling like a warm, heavy blanket across her body. Andromeda falls asleep with a name, unspoken, on her lips.

-in Somnium-

Warmth touches the young pup’s face, causing her to blink open sleepy eyes. A single word is breathed out as she lifts her head to groggily look around, “Zuriel?” Thick fog swirls around Andromeda or, at least, she thinks it is fog. Eyes blink rapidly to try and rid her sight of any remnants of sleep that might be lingering in them and a flicker of movement catches her attention. The girl stands, uncertainty rooting her legs in place as she waits to see who or what will appear.


"Andromeda Fatalis"