"I will see."

This time the darkness stays as he opens his eyes. It is the panic that forces him up, but once he realises that he stands on four hooves instead of two feet his racing heartbeat calms down again. He is back in the meadow, back to the place it all had started, and this time he awakes without her voice and presence. Yet Brynmor doesn’t seem to worry about that all. He was maybe kicked out of her gruesome little game, he still carried the terrors with him.

Milky white and unseeing eyes stare in the distance. He doesn’t register anything. Not the scents that are carried towards him or the cold winter wind that blows through his thick coat. Not even the sounds around him make him twist his ears. The images his mind throws at him consumes him completely. Some happily flashes from his fun time with both Dera and his friend, but he can also see Dera stumble backwards as she presses her hands against the gaping wound on her stomach. He sees the creature Jack leaning over her body and then he feels himself trembling with the animalistic urge of the werewolf as he kills his friend. And then they come again. Dera, his friend, his real life demon and last but not least he sees himself.

As the images keep repeating themselves his body starts to tremble and his ears are pressed tightly against his skull. Nostrils flare widely and Brynmor snorts loudly in an attempt to release some of the terror he experiences but what doesn’t leave him alone. ”I killed them…” is the only thing he can whimper.

"Through your secret."

"I will see."

Before he could only have guessed how horses looked like. He knew that they stand upon four legs that end in hooves, have a long neck and a muzzle. Yet the sick games had temporary given him the ability to see. In that short amount of time he had seen things he wished he would’ve never seen in his life. She had taken his sight again, but the memories remained. And they haunted him. If he only thought of to the cobblestoned streets the fear crept in immediately. Brynmor would relive the moment and the images would always end with the sick making sight of Jack the Ripper feasting on her intestines. If it was possible he would’ve puked again.

The more he sees and relives the more his anxiousness rises. His senses are numbed, all he can pay attention to is the chaos in his mind. Therefor he doesn’t notice her approach. He doesn’t hear the sound of the snow crackle underneath her hooves, he doesn’t smell her scent that the wind slams against him and neither and neither he does feel the warmth of her body as she now is very close. That is until her muzzle brushes his shoulder. Instantly she brings him out of his trance and she startles him. Snorting loudly he stumbles away, only barely maintaining his balance as the snow makes the ground slippery. Confused and with a racing heart Byrnmor tries to collect himself and as one ears turns backwards against his skull the other turns around as he tries to catch any of the sounds made by here. ’Your own fault for dozing off like that’ He hears the voice in his mind mutters, but he does not pay attention to it. It is the same with her question and instead he asks his own. ”Who are you?” His nostrils are still wide and the muscles of is flank are all tense.

The second voice – third if he would include his own and four if he counts the one of his friend – has his head abruptly turn to the side. Milky white eyes directed in the way he can only guess that the stallion is. ’Aawh, Brynnie, you should’ve seen yourself. Such a little baby that let himself be scared. Isn’t that so familiar?’ That is all what is needed for Brynmor to lose himself in his thoughts again, re-living the fear he had felt during his lone run through the cobblestoned streets while something haunted him. It had been his friend who had played a prank on him. As for the stallions appearance, it had also startled him and the snorting sound and tense muscles are evidence of that. He doesn’t reply, only tensely listening to what things they might do.

"Through your secret."

"I will see."

”What do you want?” he asks next. He is still tense and feels utterly uncomfortable with the current situation. Yet he couldn’t stop the relieved sigh as she told him her name. She wasn’t a shadow from the past that had come to terrorize him some more. He had only just awakened – or come back? – from her devilish games and it had left him a little shaken up. No wonder he was startled when she had suddenly appeared and touched him. Her touch has left a tingling feeling upon his shoulder and he still tries to calm his racing heart. ”You really are a pussy, Bryn. You let yourself be this startled by a little mare.” His friend humours him, but the graying male only shrugs it off, this wasn’t the time for a discussion.

Zojja’s answer to the stallion’s question is an answer he could’ve given himself. Well, that wasn’t if the recent happenings hadn’t left him in his current state. Before he had been bitter and defensive, always having the feeling that it was him – and, of course, his imaginary friend– against the big bad world. After all, he had been dumped in the corner of the kingdom only weeks after his birth and it had taken his ‘kidnapper’ three years to collect him. Three years of solitude and darkness, that would make you at least a bit crazy. Or in Brynmor’s case, quite crazy as he converses verbally with his imaginary friend, the voice in his head.

He let their conversation move past him, listening but also not listening at the same time. Or probably more like not paying full attention to their words. Zojja’s first reply had pulled him back out his thoughts and memories again, making him realise that he wasn’t alone. Brynmor was hesitant, moving away from them by stepping backwards – this time more carefully. He doesn’t like it when they were too close. Even though he cannot see at all, his other senses are developed better, but in order to be able to defend himself he needed space. The sound of their movements had to reach him earlier than their bodies.

”I can hear you perfectly fine.” The humouring words of the unknown stallion that had introduced himself as Lupei had hit a nerve. As he snorts loudly his ears press back against his skull and his lips part to show his teeth. ”And I’m the murderer here” he hisses as his eyes narrow. He moves his head, trying to glance in their directions, but he can only guess where they stand as he cannot see them.

He hears the crackling of the snow underneath Lupei’s hooves before the steam reaches him. In defence he raises his head, but his nostrils flare as he snorts to blow his steam back towards the male. ”I’m not stupid” he replies as he pulls back. ”Don’t treat me as such.” He lowers his head again, making his short yet sturdy neck slightly longer as he relaxes a little.

"Through your secret."

"I will see."

Her answer is the last thing he had expected. What kind of answers did she want that she had pulled him out of his thoughts and startled him. Little does he know what he had been mumbling out loud, that she had heard him while he had been lost in thoughts. And honestly, after the latest happenings he couldn’t even be sure that this was all real and not something that played off in his mind. All he knows is that he had lost the ability to see again.

For a short second he had felt the anger and bloodlust of the wolf, the wolf that had made him hunt down his friend. Once again the memories hit him at full force, but this time it takes Brynmor only a few seconds before he can collect himself again – during those few seconds he had been out of it, not registering a single thing. Uncomfortable his ears keep twisting, trying to find a balance between using them to express himself and using them to locate their locations. The first thing he registers is the returned, silent threat of the other male. Once again the graying male stumbles backwards, without losing his balance though. He is alert for anything else that Lupei might do, all focussed now on the signs his other senses could tell him.

If she only knew how stupid – or more like crazy actually – he really was. But that is a thing also Brynmor doesn’t know and therefor he relaxes as he hears Zojja speak. It doesn’t last long, as he flinches and backs away another few steps. ”I.. I..” didn’t meant too, but he cannot finish his sentence. He hadn’t meant to expose himself as such, it had been a slip of his tongue, something he still couldn’t really believe himself, something that haunted him. He wouldn’t ever have hurt them, if only Missy hadn’t showed up. As Zojja nears him his muscles tense, not knowing if she came to punish him or with a friendly gesture. It turns out the last and once again Brynmor offers her his own breath in return.

She retreats and then steps forward again and he can only assume she’s at Lupei’s side. In her case have done the same. Without throwing away his alertness he lowers his head a little, unseeing eyes cast down. ”He did. She didn’t.” His voice is barely a whisper, but still loud enough to catch. His heart cries and the sadness, pain and guilt rush over him instantly. First his friend had made him kill her and after his wolf had made him pay for that. But even though his friend had deserved it, he still felt guilty about it. Who was he to judge and sentence to life or death?

"Through your secret."