Anathema had not improved since coming to the island. She scarcely ate, scarcely interacted beyond a distant stare that should not have belonged to one so young. Sometimes she turned her eyes on her blood-siblings for these long periods of time, but mostly, she stared at the new ones. They were strange to her.
She was staring now — at least until the subject of her focus moved in some way she did not like. Then Anathema flinched, and started to cry; not loudly, but perhaps enough to draw attention.
the boy had been at
@Heda's breast, suckling with greed. after being paired with
@Malakai for his feedings, the older boy had begun to knock him about every time he tried to latch, and so every chance he had to feed alone he did so with fervor.
once his stomach was full he separated himself from the den mother and returned to the sister, who he found crying.
he put his nose in her face and sniffed before licking her tears away.
The youngest children cried. They did that alot. Had Malakai been so loud and annoying just a month prior, too? It was hard to create such harsh feelings whilst being still so young and not understanding of them... but these pups, these witch spawn, if only he knew, seemed to be turning their world up-side-down. Dinah was distant. Mom and dad were tired. And Kai found his head hurting from their screams an awful lot lately. They were a Godly family and wherever these things had come from, clearly were not.
Malakai grumbles now as they squabble and roll around, loud. He snorts and exits the den as they do this as he had time and time before to avoid them. Maybe when he no longer needed the comforts of the birthing den, he would be able to avoid them entirely.
Anathema was a quiet child, and even her cries were quiet. Those, too, faded to nothing when she was approached by her equally quiet blood-sibling. His touch soothed her, at least for now.
She went silent and turned those haunted blue eyes on him. For a moment she did nothing else. But then, Anathema was taken by a rare urge: to touch him the way he had touched her. She turned her face away from him for a moment, eyeing him from the side of her vision, then turned her muzzle back to lick his chin once. The girl tilted her head, puzzled, expecting more somehow. But nothing really happened.
movement caught his attention; a weaving trail of orange followed the brother's shadow to the sunswept den mouth where his image remained just a few frames too long before being consumed by a million swarming flies.
the sister's warm tongue scraped across his chin. he put his nose under hers to raise her head and lock their eyes together again. he wanted to know she was okay. that they were all okay.
His parents seemed to have a love for them, mother even more so. Her body drained and yet she kept giving. Kai looks back to them now, one of the girls having settled down. She, along with her brother here, held faces of half colors. One of their other sisters had a staining of color only on her face. Much of them colored dark like the deep corners of the den which they slept. The last, mostly all blackened.
Malakai lifts himself taller, stretching on his toes. His siblings were beautiful, colored like the vibrance of the moon and/or sun, high in the sky as god watched over them. It was another of the many pieces put together to learn they were not truly family. They looked nothing like them. Turning, he peers at their silhouettes in the den. Maybe, maybe he would learn to like them like his brothers and parents did, eventually...