Though spring is here and with it, warmer temperatures, the nights in the mountains are still cold.

He watches the sunset, blazing orange and red as it sinks below the western range, the light caught and reflected in his eyes. He hums while he looks on, head slung low between his knees, weaving his powers to draw on the energy of that magical moment, the split second before day turns to night. It fills his eyes, a warm, alien heat, flooding his mind before melding to his core. Sighing softly, he turns away from the ledge. He feels alive, rejuvenated by the strife that’s come to his homeland and the kingdoms beyond it. Absentmindedly he follows the paths of his father down from the mountain, the dirt hard-packed and slick underfoot. A northern breeze catches at the dreadlocked tendrils of his mane, sending a shiver down his spine, but it is the scent that the breeze carries that makes his hair stand on end.

Nera.

Set first, a magician second; he’d not been “on” – had missed her quiet entrance back into his home. Their home. He spins on his haunches, nose lifted, nostrils flared wide and wild. He cannot even recall the last time that he’d laid eyes on his bay roan lover. She had left him without looking back, her crown of flowers dead and dying in her hair. Disappeared, and he cannot remember why. Minutes pass with him standing there, shifting beneath the onslaught of memories, first one creature, then another, before finally settling back into the comfort of his own body. Tail lashing black hocks, he spurs to action, darting off into the darkness.

“Nera,” he says, the scent of live wood familiar and distinct in his nostrils. That single word does not betray the thrill he feels at seeing her, his ambitious little consort, nor does his expression pay heed to the burning need to feel her beneath his touch. He stops four or five strides from her, head drawn up, yellow-gold eyes regarding her with quiet contemplation. “You’re back?” Perhaps not the most eloquent, it is all he can muster in this moment.