MELITA
The honeybee youth listened, rapt and riveted, striving to earn her place within the group – yearning to be helpful, to have a purpose beyond a simple, bumbling girl longing for strength and guidance. Her eyes flickered over to Thereafter though, she shuffled herself back into silence, following the treads, the footfalls, the patterns in the pathways, lingering amidst the thickets, flanked on the sides by those she knew and trusted. Her attention wasn’t allowed to waver though, not on Fangorn (who wandered at her side, but made no fuss, just stared eerily into the landscape), not on the unknown, not on the reasons why they’d come to destroy the banshee (did she deserve it – this harbinger of death?). She had to pay homage to the surroundings, to the pulsing wave of mad keening suddenly overcoming the group – a command of get yourselves ready following thereafter.
Melita couldn’t fall apart, listening to the woman wail. The sudden reel of sadness was an overbearing nuance, cascading, rippling, through her soul and out her limbs – she stared in the direction of the sobbing, then shook her head, wondering why they had to bother the poor thing at all. Who did she call for? Who had succumbed?
As far as defenses, the ground resembled a quagmire, too soft and shifting to be able to mark a place of fortification and protection. “Should we go a bit further up?” She asked Arthur, a vivid whisper curled from her mouth, frowning slightly as her feet continued meeting mucky earth. “And what should we put out to keep her away? Fire?” Her gaze swept to Emmett’s sticks and saplings, gathered there, amidst torches. They could set them alight, and the banshee might not come near (she wasn’t certain what they were afraid of), leaving them a place of sanctuary and refuge if necessary. Remi’s words were an omen in the back of her mind, an assurance she pressed against her skull, against the torment echoing from beyond.
See I've come to burn your kingdom down
