Falls of the Hinterlands sontaim

lmk if this isn't okay! staying vague <3

atautsikut dominated this region with its height. in any direction, heda could see it.
the air shimmered with heat. insects trilled and chirred to one another. the sun came down hard upon her striped back.
it was hard to walk away. secretly heda wondered if this heat was a warning for her not to stray away. maybe it was god. but then her golden eyes shifted sideways toward @Bartholomew, and she knew he carried god. there was no hesitation.
heda trusted in that.
their travels paused in the afternoon. it was nightfall when they reached the crashing water. great halves of granite in varying shades made up the bank. heda leapt one of these and waded down into the shallows. "oh, look!" she exclaimed, gesturing up toward the rainbow arc which was bathed in silvery light from the moon.

<33

he missed the island the longer they were away, but made no comment upon it.

there was beauty to be found here, heda proved as much in the path she took them upon. the nighttime came upon them with relief from the sun. water cascading somewhere nearby.

the young hunter would see it first as he trailed behind her.

but he picked up his pace when she called out. "oh, look!" as he arrived on the scene properly. it was a sight unlike any other than he had seen. a rainbow in the night. his golden eyes did briefly widen, softening once more as he looked back towards heda.

i have never seen anything like it, he confessed in gentle awe. then dared to dip into the water, ankle deep for the moment. have you been here before?

heda shook her head, splashing noisily past him into a deeper part of the water. she sank into it up to her shoulders with a grateful growl. "you know, i really can't remember. i tried to explore some territories around when i was younger. got run off one place. really haven't spent a lot of time in the hinterlands."
it was beautiful here, and shaded both from the elements and from watching eyes. she looked over at bartholomew and something like a smile crossed her face. "thanks for coming with me."
heda looked back up at the moonbow. it filled her with a deep sense of appreciation for the world around her.

he enjoyed the joy she took in these travels. occasionally moments of doom and gloom cast long shadows, but here with the miracle of the falls, she seemed content. at peace, he may dare to think.

they would return to the island anew.

it is an honor. truly. i do not take the trust you have in me lightly, heda. he explained as he waded in after her. the moonbow shining high over them still. a cherished sight in the dark. a reminder, even!

her face warmed slightly. "well — you've earned it." being consistent and all, despite the fact that heda was still worried that one day she would wake up alone on their island.
maybe a little part of her spirit made provisions for such a time, if it ever came.
"do you know any stories about the moon?" bartholomew often had things to say in tale fashion, lessons to which she was not immune. now she looked for another.

she flattered him.

he dipped his head briefly into the surface. thought momentarily of how it felt like a baptism. his faith had undergone so much these last few weeks.

when he emerged she asked him of stories. and this he did consider with a thoughtful hum in his throat.

i do not know any. but there are songs, that mention the moon. songs of praise.

heda swam closer and playfully flicked water at bartholomew's shoulder, trying to miss his face. 
"i'm not a good singer. i have the worst voice," and here she proceeded to show him, exaggerating a caterwaul into the night. "but i bet god doesn't care, right?" her golden eyes searched his own.
heda was solemn.
"i want to know a song. i bet you're better at singing." and then she was back to her jovial self once more.

He doesn't, bartholomew commented carefully. it is the thought. as with all things. ones prayers did not need to be perfect, nor did the acts they did, but things must be thoughtful and tended to with care.

he sucked in a deep breath, feeling some near thought of sheepishness. why should that matter? heda did not judge. God did not judge.

to Him who made the great lights,
for His lovingkindness is everlasting:

this started in a low, slow rumble. warming up into something more rhythmic.

the sun to rule by day,
for His lovingkindness is everlasting,
the moon and stars to rule by night,
for His lovingkindness is everlasting.

it was the thought.
heda thought bartholomew's voice was beautiful. it was the reverence in each word, she decided, how he shaped each note to be a praise to the lord.
"his lovingkindness is everlasting," she mumbled, a bit off-beat. but like his own thoughts, heda knew bartholomew would not judge her. and the god he worshipped would not either.
lovingkindness. all one word, pushed together. love and kindness.
if she'd had the notion of a dictionary, she would have put bartholomew into the definition of lovingkindness.
"where did you learn your songs? do you make them up?" water dripped from her shoulders and the points of her ears, almost comical save for her rapt expression.

there was no judgement.

not from heda, not from God. no one mocked his voice or the way which he strung his words. this was not his calling — singing — but he wondered if perhaps he should consider it!

sheepish in such a thought.

i suppose someone made them long ago. he confessed tentatively. but i learned them from my first home. my mother and father, their mother and father... perhaps heda could see where this was going.

i passed these things down in my own boys but...maybe there will be more to spread the words to, on the island.

boys.
his own.
children.
a wife.
heda blinked. surely he had spoken of them before. yes. no. no.
he was a father. something clenched in her gut, a ball of yarn with several different-colored strands all yanked in different directions. her brain shouted suddenly that he'd abandoned his kids, that that was the Bad Thing that had made bartholomew lay in the lion's den. 
because that was her experience with fathers. heda felt suddenly and viscerally betrayed by him, all the while grappling with the fact that this was illogical. he was not mahler. he was not her own unknown father.
and there was something else underneath it: a half-formed lump of vague jealousy.
she did not try to explore it. "maybe i could make songs." her voice was abruptly distant and she hated herself for it.
heda floated in the water very solemnly.

suddenly life dipped from her.

he looked to her, patient and warm as always. often times he left her to brew in these things with the knowledge that she would talk when she was ready.

she spoke of music, and he wondered if she truly felt the calling for it.

you could. he started with, slow and thoughtful.

what would you sing of?

perhaps her answer would reveal what was on her mind.

heda didn't want to talk any more. "um. well. i like birds. a lot." 
she began to haul herself from the water. a little ways off, the girl shook out her pale fur. the red stripe stood all on edge for a moment, tip to tail before she began to dry.
"maybe a song about them and how beautiful they all are." she smiled a little, humour returning to her golden eyes. "do you have a story about a bird?"

she removed herself from the water in the wake of his question and her lacking words.

he remained calm and warm. nothing akin to the water they waded in. or rather, the water he waded in now.

plenty of stories use the imagery and symbolism of doves. the purity and rareness of an all white one is perhaps the most...Godly imagery when it comes to the beasts we live alongside.

heda was nearly all white.

only tainted by a fiery strip of fur.

a sign? he had to wonder...

white fur. heda thought of her own, thoughts meandering along a similar path. 
and the strip upon her, blood-red. as druid's blood had been. as the scarlet shed from prey a half-dozen times.
"what about birds that are not all white?" her breath hitched as the emotions of the previous moment flooded her once more.
heda swallowed and looked away.

he did not turn a blind eye or deaf ear.

he saw things she may have wanted hidden. he would never compare himself to an upper power, but he certainly felt like he had the all seeing eyes of God, for only a moment.

there is nothing said either way of them.

his voice hushed now.

if you sing praises of them, if you paint them in the light of God, they are all the same. holy, divine, vessels of good.

bitter, acidic words leapt to her tongue. did god just justify everything? if you dressed it up, made it pretty enough, was any sin forgivable?
an exhaustion suddenly choked her, and she yawned, facing the moonbow once more. "i don't know if i want to be a vessel," heda said without resistance.
she dropped to her haunches, then her belly, chin resting against the earth as she surrendered to it all.

it is not a task for all.

she settled, he presumed for slumber.

the trip was long. emotional. ridden with so much beyond them. these early years were the hardest, he had learned.

he would be silent now besides for humming a soft lullaby.

if she wished to sleep, he would not keep her conscious.

fade? <3

<3

it took heda a long while to fall asleep. a thousand memories played behind silent lids.
but eventually sleep found her, and when it truly embraced heda, she dreamt of dark feathers and golden lions who wore the eyes of wolves and sang the songs of god.