Bones held her mouth open like claws, tearing into the soft skin under her chin as her muscles strained against the unnatural angle they had her trapped. Her voice raised in desperation, pleading with her deaf Gods for mercy. Tears rolled thick through dark fur as her throat gurgled out a sob, saliva pouring down in unseemly rivets as her forked tongue lolled out the side in exhaustion. Paws clawed the ground for some purchase, for some sliver of hope that she might survive. Though, in her heart and soul, she knew there would be none, this would be it.
She was going to die.
Opalescent eyes squeezed closed, scrunching her features and driving her ears over her head. Her jaws ached as she fought again to close them, and a taste of blood bloomed in her mouth for the effort. As the feeling of a vine snaked against the inside of her mouth and she twisted, gurgling a prayer with renewed vigor, she was not going down silently. Her Gods would hear her death.
It was going to be her death, however, and her prayer was short-lived as the molten hot liquid ran through hollow vines, coating her and drowning her from the inside. As she coughed and sputtered, Sitara slit open her eyes.
She desperately wished she could see the stars one last time instead, all she saw were figures of shadow before the pyre.
Sitara was aware.
That's all she can recall; there was neither light nor dark, warmth nor cold, neither was nor wasn't; she was just aware. Her brain was a cloud, the awareness meaning very little to her as she studied the specks of light that had begun to flicker around her. The colors growing and morphing into pictures and colors she had never seen before.
Slowly, she became more aware of her own body, the slow blinking of eyelids first, followed by the swiveling of her head as she followed the flecks that danced around her. Soon, she was within her body, though it all felt alien. Had she always had so much? It felt as though the universe was on her, no, within her.
Life couldn't have always been such a weight, right?
She felt as if something was laughing, a voice coming from the nothing, indiscernible from male or female, young or old. Sitara twisted, her movement slow with her newfound weight, but it felt like the keeper of The Voice kept just out of sight. She opened her mouth to speak, but rivers of silver flowed from her. Sitara began to gag and panic as the laugh seemed to grow, the lights around her growing and swirling, blurring and sharpening. It seemed like a manic dance she was dying in the middle of, but for some reason, it didn't feel like this was the first time.
"Life has always been a weighty and bitter-sweet thing."
The words filled and consumed her in that voice that was of one but also many. Her head began to pound as the galaxies of lights and floating constellations of flecks fell away from around her. The spark of weightlessness left, letting her crash into the stark reality of the cold, the icy water seeping through her fur and gripping her in stiff tendrils.
Sitara's indigo brow scrunched with the effort of cracking open her eyes and moving her feet at the same time, the light of the sun overpowering her will almost instantly. She wasn't willing to greet that bright bitch yet. Pointing her nose back to the ground, she focused on her feet, and- Gods, why did she have so many?
Her muscles felt atrophied, and her soul felt heavier than anything should ever be. The second foot planting itself in the mud felt like a celebration all the effort that got her there felt well wasted as she managed to crack an eye open to look around her. She swam, both in vision and brain, her surroundings dancing and throbbing around her unnaturally. She felt she needed to swing around in time to set the world right, but her body was still firmly planted. The sun distorted as it fell from the canopy to paint dancing shadows all around her, the cacophony of life going on tickling her four ears as they swiveled to try and accept it all.
This was nowhere that Sitara had ever been before; the sounds of the birds, the smells, the slick salty mud beneath her feet, it was all unfamiliar to her. She blinked burning tears away as she let her eyes adjust, pulling her long body close together now that she was more aware of the strangeness in her situation.
Roots of trees towered and sank deeply into the mud around her, their sharp knots coming back up from deep within like tiny clones worshipping their God. Long fallen trees made a home for all sorts of wildlife and ferns, most of which seemed to stay off the ground she was currently occupying. Now that she noticed it, this whole area seemed like it should usually be underwater in a wetter season some trees and nodes still held the darker stain of water high on their bark.
Curiosity momentarily cleared a foggy path in her head, although her body still thrummed painfully to the sounds around her. She drew her legs into a more forward sitting position, her tail wrapping to grip her foreleg as tightly as possible in comfort as she considered her surroundings more carefully. Or tried to; her surroundings resumed swimming for the millionth lap around her brain. She decided she needed to pick a place to nap and hopefully wake up less bogged.
And Gods she needed a drink. She opened and closed her mouth longingly trying to get the taste of salt and bile out, the silver within flashing in the sun. With a deep groan, she raised her body from sinking further into the mud, clumps falling from her as she shook them loose in a grand exertion of energy.
Lumbering her way over to the closest tree with an alcove deep enough to house at least five of her, Sitara considered the opening before taking a deep breath. She held it until she felt the magic bubble into her lungs and lace the breath like smoke, the effect taking longer than she felt was normal. When she finally let go, the taste of magic sparked over her tongue, aimed at the deepest shadows beneath the tree.
NOTES!
THIS IS LONG AND IDK WHY, IT JUST HAPPENED, I'M SORRY.
SUCCESS:
Lights up that cave like it's never been lit before. Her blast is hot, but not scalding. (Think hottest side of bath water) The blast settles into an opalescent orb within the cave.
FAILURE:
FAILURE:
She blows basically a raspberry of light. (Think of the party favors with the strings)
