With Eyes Wide Open
01-12-2015, 02:28 AM
Walk | Talk | Think All he needed to do was look at her to freeze Anais in her tracks before she could fully reach his side, the slow, confounded way in which he brought his yellow eyes to her the very opposite of what she expected from him. It was Lebrah, undoubtedly, there was no other who shared his beautiful white coat marked with his two-toned feathers, nor the yellow eyes that seemed to bleed out into the fur surrounding them. This was him, it had to be, and yet... This was not her Lebrah. He moved differently, held himself differently, behaved nothing like the excitable, clingy, fully grown child that she had taken to caring for, had adopted as her own. He was, for lack of a better description, a stranger wearing her son's face. Confused, suddenly anxious, Anais drew back a hesitant step, her ears folding back against her head as worry and uncertainly suddenly manifested itself upon her face and caused her body to shrink, to shy, from the wolf that she had shared her den with. Even his voice was different, when at last he spoke, carrying the same timbre that Lebrah would have but speaking from the mouth of an aged wolf, a man and not the child she associated with his sound. She drew back yet again, her heart beginning to race, her breath beginning to come in more quickly. Who was this that spoke with Lebrah's voice? That wore his face and yet was so unlike her adopted son? She was so confused, so startled by the change, that she could barely make sense of his inquiry, only managing to respond with a quiet, shaken, "What?" Whatever strained composure the male who wore Lebrah's face had been donning appeared to quickly deteriorate, the whole of his physical being seeming to tense as he remained seated, shifting slightly in place. Noting it, practically able to feel the tension there just within his frame, the grey and gold girl's nervousness only grew and made her more wary. He was her son, she should have been just as comfortable with him as she had been the day before, as she had been earlier that day. But recognizing that he was a stranger, that there was someone new staring back at her from his eyes, made the nervous, frightened, fearful side of her emerge once again. She had been able to trust Lebrah, whole-heartedly and without question, but this Lebrah? He spoke to her again, his voice that was familiar and yet foreign so unsettling to her ears, though what he said was even more so. What did he mean "get back?" How he had gotten himself like--? But it clicked. He meant as she knew him, the Lebrah that was her son. Was he still there somewhere, sharing space with this stranger, watching her behind his other Lebrah's mask? His strained voice had broken, and again when he whimpered a plea for help. Anais shifted her weight between her forelegs, feeling in those broken whines a connection to the Lebrah she was familiar with. Maybe she was right to think him still in there somewhere. Scared but unwilling to sit by and watch her son - no matter what guise he took on - stay wrapped in pain, she drew closer. "I'm sorry," she muttered apologetically, unable to answer anything that he had asked and not at all sure what had happened to bring about the change in him. She wished she knew. She wished she knew exactly what had happened and why he was like this now, why this side of him was so different. Unable to do anything else, she reached forward to wrap her neck around his, to draw him to her as she stepped forward to try and hold him as he often wanted her to. It had always worked before; maybe it could even work now. "I won't leave you," she whispered, desperately hoping that her presence alone would work like magic as it had on the Lebrah that was hers. |
* Because he has become her protector, Glacier is allowed into any and all threads that Anais may be in, regardless of how they are tagged.