Ilka and Illum had followed their other halves to the border when they left to fight in the raid. Both would have gone all the way to the plains, both would have chosen to stay close to those they loved, but it was dangerous for Ilka to travel so far while so pregnant, and Illum had been unwilling to leave her alone. So they stayed, waiting at the border for the smudge of a gold dust cloud to let them know that their loved ones were returning, that all was well. But the cloud never came, nor did Shah and Heartfire. Instead Illum had taken to the skies to appease his mother, promising to scout out ahead and let her know they were safe.
But that promise was broken for him when the warning came, urging the Desert inhabitants to leave while they still could, to leave before that option was taken from them. When he turned in the sky, altering his route back to home, back to his mother, he could see the ocean bubble and roil and spit along the beaches, could see the tide swell greedily until they had consumed the sand and still that was not enough. He had landed quickly beside his mother, with sweat gleaming against his flank and shoulders, and they had disappeared with the rest – fleeing confused and disoriented with worry burying itself so much deeper than it had before.
But impossibly, Illum and Shah had found one another, and after coming back to collect a very exhausted Ilka, the trio had found an empty territory nearby. Ilka had given birth to Augusta shortly thereafter and the secluded herd-land had become home. Even though Heartfire had not joined them, Ilka did not worry heavily. Their daughter was nothing if not resourceful, sharp and strong and everything her mother was not. She was certain the blue roan was unharmed, certain she would find them easily enough should she decide she wanted to. Illum, however, had grown distant and she could not tell if it was because he missed his twin, or if it was because of what he had seen consumed by the ocean, who he had seen consumed, when he returned to the skies to find Shahrizai. She didn’t press him though, and he seemed to find some solace in the skies here.
There is a sound to her left and she turns from where Augusta plays nearby to find the familiar blue of Shah approaching. The same softness that steals over his face etches across hers, too, and she curls into his embrace when he pulls her close. She can feel his sorrow like ice beneath his skin, feel it in the hunch of his shoulders and the tension that tightens his muscles and she tries to ease some of it by pressing her mouth to his shoulder to trace constellations of her love against the blue. “It’s okay, Shah,” and it isn’t, not really, not after everything they have lost, but she says it anyway because she believes it will be true eventually, “we can find the others and bring them here, it’ll be okay.”
She presses another quiet kiss to his shoulder and then disentangles herself from the warmth of his embrace, touching her nose briefly to the curve of his jaw as they parted. “You protected us, you kept us safe.” She shifts forward, walking up beside him so that her hip touches his and their shoulders brush. With a sigh she rests her cheek against his neck, quiet as her dark gold eyes drift back to their beautiful Augusta. “You’re everything, Shahrizai, I love you.”
ILKA
makai x oksana
@[insane]
<333