Ouroboros Spine xlvvi. ringing in my head, when you broke my chest

again, so sorry for the delay and my brief health hiatus! Lótë is officially my main toon now and I should have more time for her. @Adrastus this is set for immediately after ‘Those lights’, it had just gotten a bit long and it seemed like the perfect place to end it.

He returns with Shikoba to see Lótë. 

Had she been able, the morning dove might’ve taken to fluffing and preening her coat not unlike her avian doppelgänger. She felt she’d gone half mad without him and her disheveled appearance would surely belay that — not to mention that caring for their newborn children while postpartum would have surely added to her unseemly state. But the puppies were napping, mostly (the howls had caused them to stir and Vairë was fussing softly),  and the new mother was loathe to disturb them. 

Aside from her depleted energy, Lótë couldn’t find it in her to care. Adrastus was here, he was home. 

If pressed, the Gamma would have been unable to answer which was more agonizing — labor or the short stretch of time it took the duo to reach the den. But she would’ve gladly suffered the contractions a dozen times over again if it meant bringing him back. 

It was hard to catch the sound of two pairs of footfalls — one set dragging with a limp — over her racing heart but the agouti’s ears flew up when she heard them draw near. The Baptiste hardly even had a chance to be nervous and then, he was standing right there — mere paces away.

She must’ve been in shock. All she could do was stare, peridots flickering as they scanned over and over the spiritbear’s pallid, freshly scarred bulk. He was like a ghost, the figure in her dreams come to life — jarring now that he was suddenly attainable and within her reach. 

She was afraid to speak. Afraid to move, to touch. Suppose she was sleeping and he vanished again. 

“You’re hurt,” the two-year whispered at last, swallowing thickly to get the words out. Even that seemed a shriek in the silence pressing against her eardrums.