Wolf RPG

days and days of deciding!

the truth of her indecision was present only in her lack of understanding the day when she could know, but still was not yet warmed to the idea of that knowing. words changed to something she could devour and know, something she could touch and bend to make use of. the things The Giver and The Source said were regarded with some intrigue and yearning but--but!!!

on the fourteenth, deirdre suffered from a small cold. she was warned it would go greater to the point of taking her from this place should she decide to become Earth, an invisible nymph. but the clever witch posed a question to them: can i not do such things in this body? and they responded to her that she had the power in her that such a thing was indeed possible, that she was a witch of a long and ancient line that power had not skipped over as perhaps it had a generation before, that the forests and the rivers and the rain and the wind might still bend to her will if she truly put mind over matter in the literal sense—to wit, the answer was yes. it was only a matter of figuring out! and it would take time. deirdre, in an uncharacteristic moment of thoughtlessness, neglected to ask if her father was a witch and if he could teach her. her sniffles abated, and her dry cough was vanquished in one long sleep.

deirdre awoke, and heard for the first time. and not in the sense that she had in her beginning with Them. in that time, she had heard tones, and rolling things, and there was nothing about them that could be grasped. they were white noise, for the most part; pleasant and soothing. that went unremembered. for in her sleep, deirdre had accepted this life, had made her choice. she would stay with her beloved, and The Source and The Giver; she loved all three so much that she could not, even under the premise that she would one way or the other have a life with them. no, deirdre had acquiesced to herself at last: this life was what she wanted, in this body, where they looked at her and knew her yet did not, but would! as she would, with them! and when she accepted this with conviction, deirdre woke, and knew not a thing but for the three in front of her, and those that had came and went but were still a part of her life already.

and deirdre believed that this was all there was to her life, having forgotten she had lived many lifetimes before this one.

father... a whole word, not mumbled, not nonsense. it still lacked meaning to her, but it could be heard. later the attachment of word-to-thing would be understood. but now? now there was something physical here. a point to looking to him, watching his lips move, watching the shape they made and what that very shape brought. ...mother... her own pale lips parted slightly, trying her hand at mirroring him, but she listened still, no sound escaping her. ...earth... air... these words filled her soul. deirdre knew without knowing or without how that she could communicate with the dark shade beside her that she rest upon, and spoke, so beautiful... but to her awareness, there was no question it must have always been that way. it was belated, her realizing it. that must be what it was. these things coming from it, i wonder what they mean? (in being unable to differentiate gender, 'it' was everything, truly.)

she had different words for all these things, after all. snow, not yet heard from him, would be "the pale soft thing that falls from the mouth above." surely it was a mouth. things fell from it as it fell from their mothers or else their fathers mouth when it came time to feed! her names for the two before her had been forgotten, however. ...wind... these words were not droned on, but words she picked up on, words she grasped so far. deirdre would forget them, too, unless they were repeated. that she could hear them delighted the seraph cub, who truly smiled—for the first time—and laughed with delight at a word she found amusing, the one mentioned before, snow! deirdre marveled at the way the word connected.

and then came a truly gorgeous word: emaleth. deirdre did not know this to be the name of her sister, and said to any who would listen: e-hmmmm. mmmmmmm, her lips tickled as she tried it, not knowing that it was connected for as long as this life to the one beside her. try it, try! it makes this tickle, and she turned to her sister to move and (try to) bump her muzzle against the curve of her mouth, grinning.

In contrast, Emaleth had long ago decided that she would choose this life— that she would grow and learn the lessons that this life would teach her. Perhaps, as a result, her Forgetting had begun earlier than her sister's; that the connection to the Wise Ones had been broken and forgotten upon her rebirth, but for watercolor memories that presented themselves as dreams Emaleth could not yet understand. Perhaps that, too, was the reason she so easily accepted these moments of change and growth with ease— and Deirdre's reluctance to choose had kept her closer to the wisdom of the universe.

It was not that Emaleth was less intuitive, or less connected to the universe; she and Deirdre were as one, and would be equal if complimentary in their power— only that their paths wove in their own directions, weaving a tapestry in which they would always come together. With Deirdre's choosing, of this life, of these lessons, they would soon both be deaf to the universe and equal in their knowledge... and they would be required to learn it all again, though the power would always be there, a low current of intuition and whispers of ages-old memories within their blood.

She was resting near Deirdre— as always— when the vibrations she became accustomed to clarified, as ripples in water disturb the image below until the surface became still and one could see the universe below, and formed sounds. Not the secret language she shared with her sister, nor the pure sounds of song, or cries, or growls— but sounds that meant something that escaped her understanding. It was frustrating, that; to hear father, mother, earth, air, wind and to know they had a purpose.

"i do not know," she responded softly to her sisters query, though she felt that Deirdre hadn't expected her to. It was a question posed to nothingness, as if it would be able to answer and alight in them an understanding. She, too, listened enraptured as the Bringer and Giver said for them these things, these sounds that had meanings they would soon learn to know. For once, it was Deirdre that first attempted to mimic them— that embraced this new change. Emaleth giggled at the sound her sister made, this one sounding similar to the vibrations in the womb.

"Mmmmmm!" she repeated aloud, pleased with the way it tickled her throat. Leaning against Deirdre, she felt it just as much as she heard it when the white creature made the sound. "what is it!" she exclaimed, this time babbling at her parents— as if they might understand— but they only looked kindly on, and spoke more words to the small witches.

Deirdre.

The dark child would soon learn that this word belonged to her white companion, and love it for its meaning— but for now, she attempted to repeat the sound, and delighted at the melody of it. "Eeee...yaah!"

deirdre listened to her sister, moving in an excited fashion all the while; this development was interesting indeed, and one she found she did not dislike from the first. the sounds presented to her were like jazz music, the way the syllables crashed in harsh chaos and yet produced such a peculiar and lovely sound that made her swing toward it! she appreciated every thing that came from their lips like never before. she could see that it had a point at last, whereas once the things they said were known to be emitted but simply never properly heard.

emaleth responded to her and the floppy-earned deirdre turned and stared for a moment, looking thoughtful. more change, deirdre realized, but this time did not shudder, perhaps accepting this at last. it was a resigned acceptance, but acceptance nonetheless; deirdre had forgotten the instruction, forgotten that the next development—at the point of speaking five words of the language of Them—was a point of no return. The Great Forgetting would be done, and that would be that! but for now, the twins still shared this tongue, and spoke it freely to one another.

deirdre was distracted when her sister mimicked her; her thoughtful repose was disturbed, and she fell into the moment again. deirdre could not help but giggle at the way it sounded from her sisters lips, and repeated her again, mmmmMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMmmmmmmmmm, before another loud laugh was released. deirdre could not help the joy that burst from her, and when another word came, deirdre watched her sister say it. rrrrrrrah! dee!!! her tail waved, as she found another word she quite liked. she yelled it aloud, dee!! deedeeeedeeee!!! mmmmmmmmmmdeeeeeee! she looked to her sister, it sounds.... funny!!! and she laughed again, so funny she found it, turning to grin up at the Giver, who gave them words.

At Deirdre's comment of change, Emaleth merely nodded— the Forgetting had perhaps claimed her more deeply than it had her companion, for there were times that the dark child could remember the stark definitions of change, and in other moments she believed that sight was a gift she had always owned. So, too, was she already beginning to Forget this new change— feeling as though that she always heard these words as such, though their meanings were currently beyond her.

"Eeeeeyah!" she cried once more, body wagging as her sister repeated the sounds as well. The descended into a cacophony of overlapping words, finding the sounds both ticklish and pleasant, "Mmmmmmm, eeeyaaaahhhh!" So, too, did Emaleth's voice gain in volume, as the sister's experimented and began to shout over one another, "Yah, yah!" She similarly fell into laughter, turning to look upon the Giver with pleading eyes, "more! give us more!"

the two girls looked to one another, deirdre watching her sisters mouth move and laughing as she mimicked or else made her own sound that then her sister might mimic. they were overjoyed, and though tone was something they could not utilize, volume certainly was. and so she would yell as her sister did, both of them testing limits eagerly and excitedly this time. their father watched them, listened to them; he paused in his story-telling to hear it all, and perhaps he knew on this day they truly listened to him, figuring it out the very same moment they had.

as emaleth encouraged more, deirdre nodded her head exuberantly. in the minute of quiet, it seemed their father might grasp the point, and continued with his story. deirdre leaned forward, as though this would help her to both hear and concentrate, and as he spoke, deirdre caught the words: wind... snow... a... rain...

impatiently she looked to her sister, shifting, and then speaking, ayn, ayn!!!!!! ayn nooooooooooooo, deirdre grinned at that, too, these words fun, and then she combined what she had heard thus far, mmmmm-ayn!! dee mmmmm, ayn, raaah! eeeem a noooooooooo, and over the babbling, she heard, tree... and she said, ffff-ree!, unable to know how to move her mouth to form tr quite yet, and unknowing that she had spoke a different word entirely. meaning would come later, but for now to say it felt like enough.

Emaleth fell quiet as the Bringer now spoke the words that they drank with as much exuberance as they drank of their mother's milk, staring up at him with wide blue eyes, her small ears straining to hear. This was a change that was unnoticed by the child, for it was an involuntary instinct— they swiveled awkwardly to catch the sounds that fell like droplets from the Bringer's lips. She was not prepared for the shrill interruption of her sibling, however, and started at the sudden noise— tumbling backward in surprise.

But children had short attention spans, and Emaleth soon toppled forward and back to her feet. "Noooooo!" she joined in, exhilarated. "Nooooo—" she began again, extending the sound, until it sharpened to a sustained note, and her small voice rose in a youthful howl. The sound brief, Emaleth then repeated more words, shouting rapid-fire, "Aaaayn! Deeeeyah! Mmmmmmm! Ffff—eeee!"

her hooded ears also seemed to twitch, the movement subtle as she cocked her head which moved all the way to the left, and then the right in its tilt. when emaleth joined in with her again, deirdre looked to her encouragingly, spurring her on with giddy nods and giggles, and when her sister howled the cub lifted her head and ooooooooo'd with her for as long as her lungs could take the song that gaily came from her!

deirdre heard her father say emaleth again, but was only watching her sister as she repeated, efffffff! mmmmm-efff- aaaayyyn! she toddled nearer to her sister, as exultant as her father often was when she said deee-aahh!!! first, these words would mean something to them with their supposing, and deirdre tried her hand at conversing this way. what do you think aayynn means? or ff-reeee, her babble was laced, now, with words she had heard and collected as best she could pick it up on the first day, and would come to be that way as they assumed its meaning in the only way they could: relating sound.

if she had to guess snow—no, in their case—she would guess it to be a synonym for The Otherworld itself, because it was a lovely word, and sounded all encompassing. wind—'in' to her, for now—she would call, at first guess, The Bringer (her father), because it sounded like a thing of power. rain—'ayn', as they called it—felt like The Source (her mother); it sounded like something that surrounded, and it had a feel to it that was pleasant and sweet as it echoed from her palate that tasted like the milk given, as she imagined a form for the word. but then, it was more than that, too! for snow was not just one thing. she did not know that all these things had labels. she looked to them and knew them in a place that did not require verbiage. he presented a simpler, efficient thing for them (that she did not yet realize) to house the untamed and ever-growing world that they themselves had known in so many different words—internally, she lived in circumlocution because that was what she knew.

emaleth to her was not a word or a name. her sister was never directly called or referred to by deirdre, because her sister had always known. and emaleth, to deirdre, was boundless and beautiful and good and love and happiness and soft and sweet and energy, her eternal spring and summer, her fountain of youth, her balance, the other side of the world, the sun and the light of day, a part of the circle, the end and the beginning, her yang—and these were words she did not know, but words she felt and called different things, too! that what they spoke was the structure of the things thought in thousands of ways was not something she grasped. she only grasped that she heard it and that it was there and that she could hear differently than she once could, and that she wanted to, also! the mystery made things more appealing, for once, but perhaps it was due to the two shadowy beings she considered as everything guided them through this. no invisible force, no speech of insight (she had forgotten).

she knew their safety, their shelter, and that they gave and would continue to give, and that this was the latest gift they shared; deirdre would not turn away from it, for she so wanted to be a part of them, to understand!