Board Thread:Roleplay/@comment-28358106-20181111180537

The hours slid by with aching slowness. The night passed, the autumn sunrise growing over the mountains and pouring the liquid gold of dawn into the valleys. Morning became the quick noon of the late year. Any other day, the Estate would have been bustling, but not today. Tirush had been mortally wounded, and in the solarium, a desperate struggle was being fought to keep her alive.

At one point, hours ago, there was a commotion. It became obvious when Tirush's egg was freed, as the tiny bundle, precious, fragile life, was quickly handed to Antoinette, cradled in delicate web silk swaddling. The Saintaur took off like a sunbeam and was gone instantly, carrying the precious cargo to the Hospital, where it would be incubated and assessed. It couldn't be cared for at the home; all available hands were tending to its mother, whose shadow darkened death's doorway.

The house was still. Lucida kept boiling the bandages and changing out the tureens as she was told, but she did so with unceasing, machine-like repetition, her emotions now suppressed. Nobody else had moved, and were gathered in the lower den, on the opposite side of the house, where they could not hear the urgent orders of their father, or the occasional pitiful groan of their second mother waking up briefly, before being put to sleep again. Everyone simply sat and stared at the ground, or at the wall. Even the normally buoyant Gemmi sat in Regina's lap, her ears flat, her eyes brimming. Her excellent hearing enabled her to understand what was happening in the far solarium. She had since stuffed cotton into her ears to stop the terrible sounds, but she didn't dare leave. Partha, having been told about her mother, simply sat in the middle of the floor, her emotions spent even if her tears were not. Aegis huddled next to her, each sister's folded wing pressed against the other, as if they were huddled against some calamity. In a way, they were.

Hours ago, Regina had made a plate of sandwiches, but these went largely untouched, their bread now beginning to stiffen as they sat on the settee side table.

It was not getting close to noon, and there was still no word of how things were going. Lucida knew that in and of itself could be a bad sign, but she didn't dare say so... 