Nyxa

For once she doesn’t want to be in Ischia. Ever since she’d arrived there it had felt like home, like where she was meant to be. Jah-Lilah had even come to her running, full of joy to see her spirit-daughter brought back into the fold of things and for a moment everything had seemed alright.

Moments are fickle things though, so she spends this particular one beneath the sea. Down here Nyxa is content to forget her troubles and forget them fully. They had no way to follow her beneath the rolling waves, down to the dark crevasses of rocky earth where light was swallowed whole. Her problems couldn’t chase her like so many fish through brightly-colored reefs, or slink from cold shadows with eight grasping arms to drag her down forever.

They remained afloat, where Hod was probably waiting for her in a gentle summer storm. “Dear Hod,” The yearling thinks fondly as she drifts with the currents, her seaweed tresses an undulating tangle of shimmering filaments that wrap around her nose and tickle her cheeks, “my last little tether to this world.”

And he is, so very very much. Weightless, legs immobile and wings yet unformed at her sides, the out-of-place girl simply enjoys the tug and pull without much of a destination in mind. From the feel of it, (she’s quickly learning about her new environment) it’s seems to be a looping sort of motion, tugging her swiftly towards an eddy that was situated offshore of Nerine. “Not making that mistake again.” The growing mare thinks instinctually, blinking open restful eyes to take in the soundless depths.

There. A shoreline looms ahead with steady promise and so she effortlessly gathers the liquid to her sides, waiting until the shape of her wings has fully formed before she uses them to propel her forward with eerie grace. Underneath the glassy surface of the water it’s like she’s gliding, the slow arc of her body every now and then mimicking the lazy flick of a tailfin. A mere few beats and her hooves will touch silty earth; perhaps this time she’s ended up where she was supposed to - in the Riverlands - and maybe the storm she left behind in Ischia has passed.

Wayward daughter of Canaan and Circinae

Nyxa

For all her secondary senses and inert predatory instinct, you would assume that Maugrim’s silent consideration of Nyxa’s swim would be easily discovered by the latter party. She should be focused, rather than lax, and should have sensed the change in the water from his nearness.

But she doesn’t. Still young after all, and dumb in the sense that every other situation she’s come across where she fell into dire straits someone else had been there to rescue, right, and put her on her way again. Wait, the voice calls out; Nyxa becomes immobile at the shock of hearing a watery tone and jerks around to peer into the glimmering depths. From her position she can see nothing but the striking glances of light, refracted from the choppy surface above but waving like a golden curtain down here beneath the waves.

Nothing, except for the strange apparition that forms like a sudden ghost some feet away from her.

Nyxa, initially, is terrified. She’s heard of ghosts and those who speak to them but figured it was more of a mystic, mind-to-mind ordeal where the deceased remained incorporeal. The seamare has never considered the thought that they (the departed beings of this country) might wish to make themselves known in order to haunt some poor, unsuspecting soul.

She also can’t begin to fathom why this particular specter would be choosing to contact her. Despite her fear, some moments have passed in silence and with the knowledge that her follower has yet to physically harm her, Nyxa realizes she’s in the spotlight. “What do you want from me?” She mouths, the cadence of her normal voice inhibited by the bubbling saltwater. Still, she doesn’t choke or find the action difficult - technically she could live underneath the sea, deep below where none could find her.

At her sides her water wings flick with movement only when they must, keeping her afloat while the backwards tug of the shore urges her to land. Now though (emboldened by her question and curious beyond belief) they slip down to propel her nearer to him, all while her thoughts battle to untangle the mystery of his origin. “Where do you come from?” She asks, giving up the fight in favor of a straightforward answer.

“Who the hell is this creature?”

Wayward daughter of Canaan and Circinae

Nyxa

The deepest, darkest parts… He says, solidifying with the phrase. “Good god, really?” Nyxa thinks, watching the subtle curve of his shoulders, then legs, then back to his strange face with those unnerving eyes.

But he doesn’t unnerve her. Not anymore, anyways - not now, when she can clearly see the shade of his mane (so similar to her own) enhanced with underwater accessories. The cream and spotted mare hardly protests herself as they drift nearer to one another, though his actions are certain and commanding where her own are in tandem with the currents flow. Everything about him fascinates her; Nyxa has never come across another horse beneath the waves, even her meeting with Ivar had been kept to dry land and nothing more.

“She claims me piece by piece.” The yearling bubbles, averting her eyes when the creature tilts his head. “I still have blood ties to the land.” She explains with a shrug. With a simple assumption on her end, she figures whoever this being is will take that information and do with it what they like. She could hardly explain it herself these days. “I don’t want to go there now, I don’t.” She says suddenly, the narrow tilt of her finely shaped lips hardening into a determined line.

“You say you come from the depths, like the sharks?” She asks again, a rhetorical question. “Can you take me there? I’ve heard many stories - krakens, whales, underwater unicorns …” Her thoughts drift apart like so much bracken on the waves. Once shy now sudden, the flash of her amethyst gaze slices upwards through the water to where he stands: the vision of a deity paragon, Poseidon himself.

“Take me there.” She says again, all hints of doubt smoothed free from her features.

Wayward daughter of Canaan and Circinae