It wasn’t that she thought she would never be back, for an immortal mare who felt an almost constant pull towards the dark of her childhood home it would’ve been a foolish assumption. It was that she never expected to return without her other half. Without Makai. She hadn’t thought, not in a long while, that she would ever have to do anything without him. Yet, he had gone, quickly, with little more than an apology on his lips. With that stench of sickness on his skin, the Chambers familiar curse bleeding black in his veins, he had disappeared into the night. She had thought to follow him, reflexive in the way her heart beat for him, but her eyes had drifted to meet the solemn expressions of their children and found the desire to follow him had bled away. Malis would be able to keep up easily – and oh, she was so like her father, kindred in the darkness that seemed to follow them. But Ilka and Pyxis were young still, delicate, fragile, and trying to find Makai would take an unnecessary toll on them.

Her heart had broken that night, and it wasn’t a clean break, two halves that would knit themselves back together with time. It was like a dropped porcelain ball, shattering beyond recognition, the edges between pieces turning to dust and blowing away.

It was world-altering.

Her heart thudded dully in her chest and her blood felt cold and thick as it moved sluggishly through her veins. Inwardly, she felt devastated, confused, like her bones were these brittle, crumbling things and each step she took was agony. Each step that brought her closer to the Chamber, and further from him. But she couldn’t stay in the outer reaches of the Jungle, not now, not with the memories flickering like fireflies behind her eyes. A constant reminder of what should have been but would never be. And she would never return to the Falls, a place she had grown to hate despite her best efforts. It was impossible to know how much of that was her own feelings, and how much was an instinctive reaction as the kingdom had sucked the magic from her veins – consuming, for a time, her immortality and plucking her glorious wings from her withers like she were little more than an inconvenient insect.

She sighed, a shuddering sound despite her best efforts to trap all the feelings churning in her stomach and keep them from bleeding into the shadows of her delicate chestnut face lest she concern her children. Hers, not theirs, she thought in a moment of selfish pain. Those sharp green eyes, bright as mined emeralds, fell lightly over each of her daughter’s faces. Malis was the eldest, and so much like Makai that Oksana felt her stomach clench. The bay sabino had her mother’s bright green eyes, but all of her father’s darkness. She was strong and wild and vulnerable in a way that seemed to scare her, though she hid it well. Now, Malis gave nothing away as she travelled a ways behind the group with a flat, tight-lipped expression. Oksana suspected the girl was just as devastated as her mother, and certainly old enough to understand that he had left with no promise to return. Ilka had been born next, jet black just like her father, except with her mother’s white sabino markings. A perfect combination of the two. She was soft and kind and eager to laugh, much like Oksana might have been had she not first found life beside her dams dying body. Even now, on Ilka’s sweet, confused face, a small brave smile curled at her lips. Beside her was Pyxis, a miniature version of Malis, except much more of an enigma. She was the youngest, and Oksana didn’t think she really understand why Makai had gone or where they were headed.

Oksana turned her attention back just as the familiar outreaches of the Chamber came into view. She had no control over the way her muscles suddenly stopped working, the way her hooves landed and stayed in the dirt of the well-worn path. It was unbearably familiar, the sense of nostalgia nearly overwhelming. For a quick second she had a flash of concern, what if Rodrik wasn’t still king, what if Straia had gone. She should have kept better track back in the Jungle, but it had never seemed relevant. She smiled a tightlipped smile, just a rigid slash across her mouth. The idea of Rodrik giving up his reign seemed laughable. She needn’t worry.

Her wings stretched proudly above her withers. They were feathered today, the color of charcoal and fire, and some of the feathers even seemed singed near the ends. With her teeth gritted and her chin lifted, she made her way into the Chamber, following a path until the small group stood at the heart of the kingdom. She didn’t hear it at first, someone had told her once that only the loyal could, but after a few moments wrapped in that cold, foggy silence, she could feel in her bones that haunting thump-thump of the heart.

It was his father’s heart. The thought hit her like a punch to the gut and sent her reeling inwardly. It was ironic, was it not, that she felt an almost tangible pull to the place Makai hated most, to the place that had resurrected him from death and now claimed his existence. His blood was black because of the Chamber, his skin bare and his lungs rattled because this Kingdom wanted it to be so. She clenched her teeth so hard she could taste the metallic stink of blood on her tongue.

But Straia was here, and Straia was the closest thing to family that Oksana had. She was the brightest part of every childhood memory. Sister and best friend, and Oksana needed her now. So she waited, apprehension buried beside the heartbreak just beneath the surface. Malis stood cautiously at her hip, her frigid green eyes giving nothing away. Ilka and Pyxis stood together on the other side, nestled quietly beneath one of Oksana’s wing and against her already suspiciously swollen barrel.