The rattling, clamoring of old bones sounded in his head, endless clacking clattering shaking chattering the only thing he could hear. (Or was that his teeth chattering as night fell and panic set in again? no, it must be the bones, it was always the bones, had always been the bones, but where had the bones gone?) Dark was setting in again, and with it his vision began to fade as it always did, always had, so slight in those early days he had thought it was only the nature of darkness to make seeing harder. Oh, but slowly, slowly it had gotten worse, until the darkness was all-consuming, swallowing down every bit of the light until there was nothing left but smell and touch and taste and the sound of gently rattling bones.

And his Gold. Always his Gold. She was never far from his side, especially once they’d realized the dark that came for him in the night was more somehow than the dark that came for others. Than the dark that came for her. More complete, making him stumble, making him crash into things she could still see, making him Vulnerable. He did not like being Vulnerable. But she kept him safe, his Gold, surrounding him in her scent, crisp and cold and jagged, sharp like ice and cutting wind. She was his shelter in the raging blizzard that tore away his sight and made the whole world new with the coming of dawn.

But when the whole world became new in truth, his Gold had vanished.

Oh, he had searched for her, spent as long as he could on the lonely peak of the newly-formed Mountain searching out her scent in the too-thin air. He had searched until his lungs were screaming, begging him to descend, his body threatening to collapse if he held out any longer. And then he had searched for her in the Forest, in the Meadow, in every vast stretch of new and untouched land, so strange, so unfamiliar. No more sign of the Chamber where they had been born, where they’d lived their whole lives in the outreaches, feral woodland creatures more tooth and fang than civilization welcomed. Nor was there so much as a hint of the Tundra where they’d journeyed upon occasion, to visit with Australis.

And just as there was no hint of home, so too was there no trace of his Gold. Not even a lingering scent in the air. Certainly no warm breath on his skin in the darkness, anchoring him until the return of the light. No soft touch of her lips or the velvet softness of her nose, no gentle brush of hip or shoulder against him. Not even so much as an impatient nip.

For the first time in his life, Sunder was alone in the dark.

It came again, as it always did, swallowing the light and leaving his teeth chattering the way the bones could not (for he’d lost the bones too, stolen away in the changing of the world, lost and alone and defenseless in the dark that devoured him a little bit more each time it fell). The whole world narrowed as it always did, but instead of becoming just him and his Gold, the only thing in the world was the rattling clamoring clacking clattering shaking chattering that echoed through his head until morning.

Light faded slowly back into his perception as the sky slowly turned from endless black to soft, muted grey. No fiery sunrise, no vibrant orange and pink and gold (nor Gold, though he always hoped half-heartedly that the sun would reveal her at his side even though he couldn’t smell her, couldn’t feel her, couldn’t hear her breathing in and out or the soft rustle as she shifted positions). Just grey, quiet, muffled grey that whispered of a too-dark day ahead, clouds hiding the sun and its precious light, casting shadows on a world already all too often drowned in them.

The grey only deepened as the day passed, clouds stealing away the crisp clarity of the world around him; it would be another day where the light barely reached him. Thunder in the distance confirmed what his bones already knew: a storm was coming, and bringing the cursed dark with it far too soon. He snarled at the sky, baring his teeth at the building thunderheads, snorting derision and an angry challenge. Fine, then. If the dark was coming, let it come.

Burying the rise of panic in his chest beneath a furious bellow, he stomped and snorted and charged forward, clinging to the dying of the light while he still could. Running through the tall grasses while he could do it without stumbling or crashing into something or breaking his neck when he couldn’t put it bend it back together. He didn’t recognize his mother’s silhouette without the wings that had been present his whole life, not until he was almost beside her and could see the familiar jagged edges of white along her legs, could trace the edges of her blaze with his dimmed sight as the first drops of rain fell.

“Mother,” he crooned in a voice full of gravel and grit, melody lost beneath the weight of grief and anxiety with his Gold gone from his side. “You look well.” Something in the emerald of her eyes had come alive in this new world, in a way he hadn’t quite seen before. He touched the velvet softness of his nose to her shoulder, breathing in her scent and letting himself feel almost anchored for the first time in months. “Have you seen Gold?” He meant to wait to ask, but the words slipped out before he could catch them, falling unbidden from his lips as the rain fell from the clouds. Of course he would ask about her. How could he not, when she was everything?