Poe’s features increasingly clashed as time went on. Her skeleton had never really evolved beyond youth—a childish, cheeky face and a comically puny height—but her heavy-hipped figure, deep set eyes and comfortable gait matched her true age, which was closer to three years than Poe would like to imagine. They were a dense three years, there was no doubt of that, but her personality hadn’t matured or wizened in step as far as she was aware. She was happy to keep playing her games, taking long, steady steps backwards before this sullen boy, making up passing stories of his story, his reason. She didn’t openly react when he said (without regret or regard) that he could not read, but it certainly added to her wonder. He was not from these parts very likely—it was unusual for wolves in these parts not to know how to read. “Well,” she said, washing away any surprise she held towards his naivety. Perhaps he was younger than she thought. Perhaps he was an orphan. A true orphan, that was—not her psychological abandonment sort. It didn’t matter at the moment, and possibly never would, though. “If you are interested, I could tell you about both,” she offered, deciding to air on the unassumptive side. He didn’t seem bothered by this missing knowledge—or by her presence, or their cool-mist, whispering surroundings. “It seems only right that you should have the opportunity to know of your namesake,” she explained, only to switch onto another train of thought immediately thereafter. “Then again, sometimes that does more damage than interest. Living up to these things,” she said with her half-siblings in mind. Jude, the patron saint of lost causes. Meth, the raging drug. Broken little Rift. They had been doomed from the beginning, perhaps. “Curiosity killing the cat, I suppose,” she added, well aware that she was not one to preach such things. |