It didn't take long for Tephra to feel like home.
They had met with Tangerine and Svedka, and Solace's heart was full as she passed the hours with them. There was some exploring (at a snail's pace) and lots of catching up to be done. Solace hadn't been able to hold back her tears when she finally saw Warlight again, the first of two children she had lost to the afterlife, but her dark-eyed daughter had only laughed and taken it all in her stride.
But soon the changes in her body would no longer be ignored, changes that made her more inclined to linger by the healing waters of the Tephra's newest landmark.
Solace in soaking her tired legs in these waters when she realizes that her time is very, very close. Fueled by a nervous excitement, she makes her way to the chosen coconut grove, calling for Kagerus as she does.
The familiar process begins, and a colt is born just as the stars are coming out. Labor releases its tenacious grip on her body for a moment, and Solace reaches round to kiss and admire him. But the window is a small one, and the pegasus nudges him in Kagerus' direction as her head falls into the palm boughs, and her womb begins to churn again.
Hours pass, too many hours, and she breathes and strains in a seemingly endless cycle. One more push, she thinks, just this one. But as she cries out, no progress is made and the child will not come.
"Something's wrong," she says the words out loud before pulling air back sharply through her teeth. The child is sedentary, and her body is nearly exhausted. She knows it, and when she looks up into Kagerus' eyes, she knows they both know.
"We need to go to.." her sentence is ended prematurely as another wave of burning causes her to shudder, but she knows that her wife will understand.
we are the ever-living ghost of what once was
