She dreams of electricity.

She dreams of blackness.

She dreams of endless days in isolation, in quiet, in a place once home and now prison. Perhaps part of her had known what had been to come when Vulgaris had found her on the island, wrapped tight around their daughter. Perhaps she had known that she walked straight into a trap, into a cage that would shut swiftly behind her. Perhaps she even wanted it, she wonders, when she is staring into the horizon. Perhaps she had hungered for a reason to be close to him and their children; a way to pretend all was well.

But she cannot pretend now and that numb emptiness only spreads further through her.

Her children do not spend much time with her here, and she is glad for it. She is glad that they do not have to see her like this, and it is more and more exhausting to pretend that all is well when they are near. She does her best, always. She smiles for them and tells stories and presses kisses on their forehead and into their jaw—tells them that she loves them, that they are beautiful, that all is well. 

At least, she does with two of them.

It has been weeks since she has seen Adna.

It is just one more thing to plague her, one more thing to trouble her. One more thing to chase her dreams as she spends her days in Loess, watching her serpentine once husband from afar, the crown resting so easily upon his handsome head. Once, she may have brimmed with pride for him. Now, she just fears.

So today is a day like any other. She wakes when the sun has barely crested the hill, her eyes gritty with lack of sleep and her lovely face thin, slack. She gets to her feet and her wings shift to the color of sage green eyes and bone armor and heartache. She pulls them close, a frown crossing her features for a moment—a brief second of clarity—before it drains from her and she can only inhale slowly.

Alone.

Her heart cannot decide on an emotion when she sees him.

His presence is an immediate electric shock and she feels that immediate, instinctual flood of love—that feeling of home, that feeling of belonging. But it doesn’t last. Not alone, at least. Because his presence isn’t one of safety anymore and that feeling of comfort is immediately chased by a deep-rooted fear. It is terror that she feels next as it works its way through her, chased close behind by a cacophony of horror and empathy at the sight of his mangled face, an inhale at the desire to do what she could to heal.

But none of it shows in the blank canvas of her face.

Nothing shows because the true edges of her have been dulled by heartache and her time in isolation; she is nothing but worn smooth, exhausted by the effort that it takes to continue breathing. She doesn’t notice the crimson dahlias that have begun to bloom in her mane and tail, their sweet scent captured in the small quarters of the cave. She doesn’t notice anything but the sight of him walking closer and closer.

Once upon a time, she would have met him. She would have stepped into his embrace and pressed her lips into the curve of his neck, would have explored the smoothness of his scales and the muscles beneath. But now she can only tremble, her legs locked as his chest comes to rest against her own.

Her wings curve and pull into her closer and she closes her eyes.

Tries to find some balance in her hitched breathing.

She focuses so much on it—tries so hard to not think about how painful it is to remember, how easy it is to pretend that nothing has happened—that she almost doesn’t hear his voice. She almost doesn’t heart his confession. But she does and her head spins with it. She blinks and takes a deep breath, her body still shuddering slightly, the physical contact painful when it had once been only sweet.

“Is this a trick?” she finally asks, her voice small. “Are you just trying to hurt me more, Vulgaris?”

Was it so easy to forget her? Forget their love?

Was he just trying to find another way to break her?

She closes her eyes and feels the familiar saltwater on her cheek.

“Why am I here?”