Fantrolls

Shadah slowly blinked awake as scant beams of sunlight shone through gaps in the curtains on her moirail, Ferlic's hive during a rare pause in storms.

She rubbed her eyes with a sigh as she recalled last night's activities. She took Steume, her matesprit, with her to visit Fer on his rainy island for game night. She killed at monopoly, though her quads bested her at the other four games. Shadah's demands for recounts and do-overs only earned her their laughter and playful scoldings before moving onto the next game.

Between games, Shadah cooked and made snacks for them as they bickered back and forth without her present to make them behave. The only time Steume and Fer co-operated that entire night was to launch a two against one tickle attack on her after a particularly bad tantrum at losing another game.

Despite threatening to murder them both in their sleep, there was nothing but love in the room that night, and that same feeling of love persisted this afternoon.

She looked to her left where Ferlic lay snuggled against her, his wild hair that could be classified as one of the horrorterrors themselves barely contained with hair clips and a sleep cap. He was the first to ever see her as she is.

That night sweeps ago when she broke into his hive foolishly in search of legendary treasures was the first step on the road to freedom. With his powers as an empath, he saw her for the self-conscious and anxious person she really was behind the arrogant and loud façade. No matter how challenging she made herself to tolerate, he persisted until eventually he became the one person she had to rely on.

Shadah turned to her right to face Steume, who also lay snuggled against her. She showed her how it felt to be loved in a way she never had been before. It was a whirlwind of confusion and things she'd never experienced before. Being the emotionally stunted person she was, she'd attempted to murder Steume multiple times because of it.

It felt so long ago that the only forms of love she knew came in the forms of emotional and physical abuse. She groaned at how brainwashed she used to be. They were both there for her after she was forced to kill her lusus on her tenth wriggling day and had to rebuild her life from scratch.

Fer gave her shelter and care when she had nowhere to go and suffered withdrawal from her snakemom's venom. Steume helped her destroy her old hive, the last remnant of her previous life, and give her a new home.

They took care of her when no one else could, and she did her damndest to be there for them as well. They taught her how love is supposed to feel, and what a loving relationship is supposed to be.

They saw past her barriers and endured her loathsome attitude to find a person worth loving and teaching how to love. They showed her things -- Made her feel things she never thought possible for her.

They showed her that the way she'd been raised and the definition of love she'd been shown was wrong. Her lusus may have had good intentions, but she never truly loved her. No one who loved her would have abused her like Snakemom did.

Shadah sniffled as diluted teal tears formed in her eyes, though she didn't dare try to wipe them away lest she wake up her quads. She didn't bother cursing herself for being so sentimental as she would if either of them were awake.

The last few sweeps were the best of her life, and she had so many more sweeps ahead of her to enjoy both of them before they inevitably outlived her. Nothing else in the world mattered as long as she had them by her side.

She lied down between her quadmates silently crying before Steume started to stir awake, and she stifled her tears and sniffles. Steume half opened her eyes before more tightly wrapping her arms around her and pulling her against her body and rolling onto her other side, effectively stealing her from Ferlic.

She took a breath and allowed more tears to fall.