Dawnlark Plains The silver apples of the moon

set directly after this thread!

blindly the red child fumbled through the twisted thicket, her eyes shut and tongue lolling in a panic. she felt frenzied, she felt sick: twice now she had stopped and thrown up in excess a white bitter foam that scalded her throat and settled in frothy bubbles on the forest floor.

she couldn't make sense -- she tried to -- every time a thought slipped coherent and tangible in her head it escaped, and somehow her feet were running without her willing them to. she was aware of her surroundings enough to know she was not home, and aware enough to know she had done something horrible -- but every time she tried to recall what it was, she was overcome with a new wave of sickness. she did not know how potent the jimson weed was as she carried it: how could she? and now, she was tasting the bitternest of her own medicine.

for the third time she felt her body seize and rebel, and for the third time she felt a thin strand of vomit dryly heave from her throat; she was thirsty -- so thirsty -- with a stumbling and somewhat neurological gait she made for the puddle, completely unaware of the adult that had just risen from it. she threw herself into the dirt and started to lap wildly, a dirty smear of rime and foam flecking her muzzle as she did so. when she was done she tried to stand and could not, and it was then she was made aware of saena: but it was not saena, not to her -- it was the white bear she had seen a month earlier. the child froze, feeling her heart sink deep into her chest. this was the end; this was the resolution for her crime, the payment for her actions. she squeezed her eyes shut and accepted it.