Stone Circle and still i felt like i was only losing

just tucking this in my threadlog for reference since i am so behind with indra, ugh. tags for reference, but RO! <3

it was bearclaw all over again.

a bitter sort of deja vu slunk into indra's warped heart as she prepared @Laurel's den, heaving rock from dry earth in gritted grunts. just like last year, laurel's sides grew -- only this time, there was no joy in witnessing her sister's transformation.

useless as xan had ever been, he had never done to her what the bastard in the woods had. what indra would not give to be back there, with a man indifferent to their lives but not violent.. at least then they had not been shown how cruel the world was.

indra was not strong enough to see the beauty in new life, regardless of its conception. she saw only a gathering blight, and resented the quiet lives that blissfully grew in laurel's belly.

selfishly, but for her own sister's good too, indra hoped every one of them was stillborn. she hoped they slipped between laurel's damp legs and never took in their first breath. drown them, indra begged of her sister one evening, feeling nothing but hate for the lives that soon would arrive. i will do it. you won't ever have to look at them. she promised, steeling herself for that dark night and the reprehensible act she would do for her sister. yet for all her begging, laurel would not relent; the children inside of her would live, despite their aunt's misgivings. with a sorrowful shake of her auburn head, indra accepted laurel's decision.. but she still wished she could do something to make things different.

the lives in laurel's gut were not innocent, not if they shared the blood of their bastard father.  you know what happens to kids whose parents don't love them, indra had implored, to no avail.

indra was stalwart in her opinion that laurel was better of quietly ending their lives before sorrow ever blotted it.. but her sister saw differently, and eventually indra stopped broaching that dreadful topic. she turned her sights once more to readying laurel's den; to stocking the cache, and instructing @Marten on what he might expect once laurel's hour came. she informed @Valette of where they were nested, and carved in that stony soil a meager den not so far away for herself and marten.

but mostly, indra waited. waited for the familiar signs, for those bastard, unloved children. she waited, her hands tied, for that god-damned deja vu -- the drop of her sister's belly, and the seclusion that marked laurel's earliest hours of labor.