Chapter Text
Once upon a time, a wind had both a secret and a lie.
Now, secrets and lies on their own aren't really that harmful, depending on the severity of what one’s keeping to themselves. Someone’s secret can be something another person shares openly, such as a recent surgery for an ingrown toenail or how their children never visit them anymore (Reasons may vary).
Secrets on the danger scale can go from jalapeño poppers to cigarettes, addicting and always leaving your face stained in some way, burning you up until the very last second when you're coughing everything out.
Lies on the danger scale go from a little choker around your neck with a pretty pendant to full on boa constrictors- and the lines between those two are very thin- so thin in fact that they’re considered cousins.
On their own, they’re not that bad. In a pack together, they can be harmful sure, but people often forgive quickly if you have a good reason behind it.
It's the natural symbiosis that causes them to be so dangerous. Lies dress Secrets up in layers of fabric to seem something it's not, secrets give more power to the lies, and like lovers, they long to be together.
The configuration needs to be perfectly balanced at all times, so delicate that when mixed together even after going through tedious unit conversion, it still has a high chance of going horribly wrong. It's like trusting a pyromaniac with your grandmothers wooden cabin the middle of a forest while you are still inside said cabin.
But if the configuration is perfect- the ratio is equal, and the balance is at its perfect point, my god does it work well. The secret stays safe and your well crafted lies, instead of acting like potholes and getting you at a random chance, are suddenly bosom friends lending a hand.
The Green wind, having kept many secrets and saying many lies herself throughout her life, had perfected this formula to a point where although she wore a heart on her chartreuse sleeve, her real one was stowed away, hidden by layers upon layers of green silk and wool.
All of her secrets had already been spilt, long bygone were the days where she sat down with her parents and admitted to all the tomfoolery that had led to them in fairyland, many a-night was spent with her lover the Blue wind wrapped around her body while they peeled back years worth of misunderstandings and miscommunication, heck, she had even gotten a cheeky kiss from Mallow when she had spilt the Elephants fiery hearts truth about a crush she had had years before.
Those had all ended well.
The first time, after she had finished weeping in her mothers arms, begging for forgiveness (Forgiveness for what? She didn’t know, but it seemed right to ask), she was carried back upstairs like she was still a little girl, tucked into bed with a kiss and the promise that they weren’t mad at her, and Nebraska could always be reached again on the back of a leopard if they ever wanted to go back.
Her father reassured her though, that they’d only go back to get their things, sell the house, and collect their last check from the veterans association. They had already spent what felt like a week away from their daughter, but suddenly she was not the girl who Susan had said goodnight to one Sunday years ago, but a woman.
Susan and Owen were not about let any other years slip by.
Woman.
Her nose curled, and she suddenly felt like she was thirteen again, alone in the school bathroom with blood on her thighs and no way to stop it. She suddenly remembered one night when she was shaken awake by a terrified Blue wind, who thought she was dying when really it was a period come early.
She had been silently on edge the days leading up to that moment, as only weeks prior after dancing all night in the Worsted wood she had with a familiar indigo body curled around her a ways away from the other guests, the taste of salt and spit in her mouth and a settling feeling of dread.
That was the second time, as after a night of revelry ended they had lain together and whispered secrets into each others ears, Saturday telling the full and honest truth, while she laid there as he held her, mumbling what sounded like what you’d tell a friend during a slumber party and listened to him guiltily as he chalked it up to sleepiness.
Before that- perhaps the biggest one she’s ever told, the one that came up like boiling bile was whispered right before the wedding, when she was being dressed and prepped. It had suddenly come out like an unwanted guest right as Mallow tucked a strand of hair behind her ear and called her beautiful- Mallow! Mallow herself!
She had gotten a tinkling laugh and a kiss on the cheek that was scrubbed off right before the ceremony began, but still laid there, underneath her skin, making her blush whenever she thought about it. She loved the Blue Wind. She truly did. Its just not everyday that a former enemy gives you a peck for fun.
This secret, this horrible horrible secret that roiled inside of her, also had a good ending.
Not just a good ending, but a great one. One that she always read about in her storybooks as a youngster, one that was expected of her from everyone, whether they knew it or not.
She hated that for some reason. This wasn’t…this wasn’t supposed to make her happy, wasn’t it? Was she supposed to feel overcome with joy the moment she first had the notion that this creature was alive and beating with life?
She was just so young, and had already began to barely live life before it had came it.
It was just so, so needy.
And so was she.
It writhed inside her like a parasite, chewing away at her internal organs until it broke through her stomach sack and ate away in there, until she always hungered and never felt quite full. Anything it didn’t like it would spit back up her throat until her nice green coat was dirtied, all while squirming inside of her with no way to escape, no way to chew through skin and wool, until she found out a way to deal with it.
The secret lay in the depths of the lonely gaol which she had started thinking about again, late at night, fear and anger rising up in her gut with no way to describe why that was the way she felt.
However, tonight would be the night that she got this mess all sorted out. September, with a wobbly mind full of pumpkin punch from Buss’s birthday bash, had stumbled out of bed and crawled over to a window where she pulled herself up and sat at the ledge.
Saturday slept soundly, like nothing in the world bothered him, which was mostly true, at least in Septembers eyes. She didn’t think he knew yet, whenever the parasite bothered her she’d instead go to the bathroom at the end of the hall rather than the one in their bedroom.
She’s practical like that, our girl.
September laid her cheek against the glass, listening to the sounds of the crashing waves outside. She remembered when she was still young, just barely a girl, watching the moon get cut open as blood rose above her ankles, and even before that when their first dog had a litter of puppies (The small and amiable dog one of them) and died before any of them were weaned off.
The two moons shone brightly, almost helping September as she packed a small bag, slinging it over her shoulder as Imogen silently waited outside of her door, knowing what her mistress was about to do.
She turned around once, before shutting the door and taking off into the cover of night.
She’d be back soon.
At least she hoped.