I know this hurts (it was meant to); ANY

[magnus]

we all carry these things that no one else can see
they hold us down like anchors; they drown us out at sea

He isn’t sure where he is except that he is somewhere. The realization is sudden—the switch from nothingness to something a sear alongside the back of his lungs. For so long (years, decades, more even), he had gone without breathing; for so long, he had simply drifted in the waters. To breathe again was both ecstasy and agony, his battered lungs inflating with a gasp as the cold air flooded his nostrils. But he does not understand. Not yet. His limbs are weak, useless, and all he recognizes is the pain in his chest and the burning in his eyes. He is moving, but it is dark; he is being tossed, but he does not understand that either.

Saltwater pours into his open mouth and he is choking, shaking his handsome head, the tendrils of his mane roped and tangled around his eyes and down his neck. Suddenly, his mind registers the ocean, the abstract idea of it forming and triggering whatever instinctual drive had been burrowed in the back of his dead subconscious. He latches onto the instinct, white-knuckling onto the only thing that was clear: I need to survive. Lax limbs become active as he kicks himself upward, thrashing against the tide, fighting for air that seems more and more precious as the waves violently throw him side to side.

It seems like hours, but is only minutes until his hooves find purchase on the sand and he is staggering forward and then falling on his knees. Coughing, he rests his head on bended leg, breathing deeply of the air that was simultaneously both foreign and nostalgic. What happened to me? He finally manages to string his thoughts together, the formless emotions beginning to solidify. The beach beneath him causes his belly to stir, and he feels bile against the back of his throat; something was wrong.

Where am I?

Lifting his head, he struggles to clear his vision. Struggles to make sense of decades of nothing. He can feel his bones shake within him, and there is an ache that threatens to drown him more surely than the storming, tempestuous ocean. It hits him like a punch to the gut. The stallion rising above him. The scream that stripped his throat raw and…something else, something important, but it is taken from him quickly, as if his mind could not handle holding it for too long. As if the memory was so precious, so sharp-edged that looking at it was like looking at the sun. Still, he struggles to recollect.

There are more flashes, his body reacting as if the fight was in the present and not decades ago. He can feel the kicks and the bruises; he can feel the way his life had drained out of him. And then, he is gasping, because he remembers and it is worse than he could have comprehended. He remembers Trashlip, and he remembers the fear, and, oh, he remembers her. Joelle. The terror in her eyes and the way that he had not been able to protect her. He remembers and he burns. He remembers and it is like dying all over again.

Shaking, he forces himself to stand, still not grasping at why he was here—and she wasn’t. Something in him remembers the silence of his death and then a tug; something subtle but tangible. Something that was both beautiful in his unexpectedness but also painful in its existence. More memories flood in snapshots. He remembers a boy, young, his eyes at first hopeful and then frightened. He remembers the anger that had flooded him, blinded him, and the gut-wrenching fear when he had realized what he had done.

He is not sure why he remembers this, but it seems right.
It seems connected although he does not know how.

Wincing, Magnus begins to move, forcing himself to find his way away from the beach and all of its painful memories. His progress is slow and punctuated with long pauses where he fights to catch his breath again or simply ride through the nausea and dizziness. His thoughts are short, bulleted, painful. His death. Her death. It seemed no matter where he looked as if he was surrounded by it, and yet he seems to have beaten it—but not without cost. That much he is sure about although he cannot explain it.

When he finally reaches the meadow, it is midnight and mostly empty, except the stray soul. It has not changed much, if at all, and he cannot decide whether to be comforted or frightened by the fact. So much seems to be the same and yet it is altogether different. The air is alive with the unknown and while he may have been electrified with possibility, he cannot overcome the grief that wracks him. So he leans against a tree and he does what he had never had the chance to do in his life: he mourns.

MAGNUS

once king. once general. once dead.

[Ledger]

The Gates is too quiet. The Meadow is unusually still as well. He can’t help but be here, drawn as he always is. Constantly waiting for something to happen in his exhaustingly lonely life. Better a boring life then a tortured life but he lived them both constantly. One when he was awake, the other during the few times he dares to sleep. It’s midnight in the field and the breeze is barely pushing through the long grasses. Part of him is slightly longing for the glassy mare that he had met not so long ago here. With her tattered wings and even more broken soul. A kindred spirit that he desperately wanted to reach out and hold to his chest but he won’t for he fears he will shatter her. Another thing ruined at his touch, for everyone he’s ever cared about has fallen to a gruesome end. First his mother, than Librette. Then Magnus. Magnus. He has always struggled with the terrible guilt of not being there to save his father. To save Joelle even though she must have looked at him with her insides twisting. Yet had been kind to him all the same. Every breath he takes is in memory of his father, every day he doesn’t give up on life… It’s in honor of him. For Ledger would have ended his life long ago if he hadn’t seen Magnus’s disapproving face in his mind’s eye. If there was anything he wishes he could have back, it’s his father. For that brief moment of having him in his life was the one purest moment of happiness he has ever attained. The only time he ever had anything resembling a family. Flaxen tendrils from his forelock catch in long lashes, gold flecked eyes scanning the vast area and it’s few visitors. There’s a mare standing by herself in the open. A stallion and a mare in a passionate embrace. A stallion alone leaning against a tree….. He’s suddenly struggling to breathe, the air seemingly snatched out of his lungs. He is suddenly a lighter shade of chestnut, going pale as his eyes are wide with alarm. it looks as if he’s seen a ghost. And he has. This is a dream, another nightmare. I must be sleeping, I need to wake up. Panic spreading, his heart doing flips in his chest. He knows how this plays out, he’s dreamed this too many times. Shaking his head violently, his hooves churning dirt beneath him as he whinnies sharply, trying to wake up. But it’s not a dream. The air is sweet, not rotten. And Magnus is still there, all in one piece. Shakily he approaches him and everything he is feeling is exposed on the openness of his face. The one word hanging in the air (a wavering timid question) and it is filled with grief, anger, hope, relief, and something else he can’t put his finger on. ”Dad?” L E D G E R

[Camrynn]

so you wanna play with magic?

She is no stranger to the crackle of magic. How could she be, when she pulls it tight like a cloak around her shoulders? How could she be, when it runs through her veins more dearly than blood? She feels it like a part of her soul, like breathing, like a waking dream. And because she can bend the world to her will, she feels it when that world bends back.

From the Deserts, she feels the tug, so slight and subtle, like a tiny thread being teased out of place. It isn't much, just the slightest shift, but she still feels it. Something that once was not, now is again. Standing on a sunny dune, entirely at her ease, one black ear flicks with gentle interest. She shifts her weight, casting her magic out across the sands, out into the world, tracing tracing tracing until she finds the place where the thread –

Oh my, how interesting.

She'd had a keen interest in Librette even before she'd ripped her grandmother's heart from her chest and consumed its power to strengthen her own. She'd stolen her grandmother away for many years, keeping the old mare's heart beating long after the chestnut should've been dead. She'd sent her grandmother back to Beqanna more or less for shits and giggles, and she'd had quite a bit of fun terrorizing her (why yes, she'd once caused her grandmother's wound to stop bleeding instantly, and then birth an egg, which then birthed a bunny).

Never let it be said that Camrynn lacks a sense of humor.

But like all good things, it couldn't last. Camrynn had returned to Beqanna herself, and upon her return it had quickly become clear that her power was not enough. She needed more, and Librette had more to give. Or more specifically, Librette's heart had more. The old mare had been dead once before, and the Valley had brought her back, leaving a delicious little kernel of magic within her, necessary to re-knit her shredded heart (ask Carnage and Core about that one) and keep her alive. Camrynn had absorbed it, and being that it's terribly difficult to live with a shredded heart, Librette had finally died. Her granddaughter had made it fairly quickly and painless.

Never let it be said that Camrynn lacks mercy.

At least sometimes.

But now her grandmother was dead, but her bloodline lived on. And for whatever reason, Camrynn finds herself unbelievably intent on pursuing all vestiges of her grandmother. She's squirreled away three of Librette's daughters (and a little something on the side, but we're not going to talk about that). They're entirely comfortable and entirely outside the world: Valkerine, Aletheia, and Vivaine, the daughter of the stallion that had been so interestingly brought back into the world.

It doesn't take her long to comprehend the relationship her grandmother had had with the stallion. It all plays out like an accelerated movie within her mind, and she is immediately intrigued. She knew she was going to go to him the moment he appeared, and now it's more than time to make good on that promise.

She appears silently on the edges of the silent meadow, and for a time she just watches him, her body cloaked entirely in shadow, black on black, invisible and quiet as the darkest depths of the night. She turns her head when she hears another approach, a boy, who comes upon them like a hurricane of sound. She sees him see his father (she knows, she always knows) and her lips turn up in the smallest of mirthless smiles. Ledger, onetime adoptive son of Librette. The night just keeps getting more interesting.

She hears Ledger's whinny, hears his impossibly tentative, impossibly hopeful question-statement to his father. And it's then that she steps out from the shadows and walks the short distance to join the two of them. In the darkness, her beauty is otherworldly: she is pure black, her only markings a gilded crook and flail across her chest and a line of gemstones across her left cheek like a necklace, shimmering gently in the patchy moonlight. Her eyes are a delicate shade of silver, echoing the subtle light of the night.

"I'm so sorry to interrupt." her velvet voice holds genuine concern. Up close like this, she can smell the magic all over Magnus. She looks to Ledger. "But I heard you cry out." Pausing, she looks between the two of them. "Are you both all right?"

CAMRYNN

co-queen of the deserts, magical, mother of badassery

[magnus]

we all carry these things that no one else can see
they hold us down like anchors; they drown us out at sea

Everything is the same and yet different—even the air is unusual. Magnus sighs heavily, feeling the weight of his loss, of his failures press onto his shoulders. He had not lived a particularly long life, but it had been an eventful one—and, unfortunately, so many of those events had been deeply disappointing. He had been a failure as a King, as a father, and, worst of all, to Joelle. He had let her down again and again, never living up to her expectations of him. She had deserved everything good in the world; he had just never been able to deliver that to her. All he had given her was pain. And when it had come time to defend her, he had fallen.

The memories are wraiths around him, and he can practically feel them on his skin. Shifting uncomfortably, he glances up and then stops cold. Magnus does not trust himself to move, to speak, to do anything but watch the now grown stallion approach him. His gold-flecked eyes burn bright and the muscles in his jaw twitch, but it is the only sign that he had even noticed the other. It had been years (lifetimes and deaths) since he had seen Ledger, but he would have known the other anywhere.

The buckskin stallion doesn’t speak at all until his son does, and when he finally responds, his voice is gravely and thick with emotion: “Son.” Taking an unsteady step forward, and then another, he reaches toward the stallion and wraps his neck around him, drawing him close to him. Ledger may now be grown, but he would always be the young, fearful colt that he saw in his memories. He would always be that boy with questions in his eyes; the one who seemed so unsure that he was deserving of love.

Feeling the world right itself, Magnus takes a deep breath and exhales, finally pulling away from his son. “Alright, let me take a look at you.” He nudges him with his nose, the smile ghosting around his lips the first genuine happiness that he had felt since crawling out of the saltwater. He is about to speak again when the mare approaches. Closing his mouth, he tilts his head toward her, obsidian-tipped ear swiveling in her direction. Had he known that she was a granddaughter of Librette, perhaps his heart would have raced. Instead, all he feels is the familiar pull of politeness, that old tug of manners.

“Indeed, we are,” he says smoothly, surprised at how quickly it came back to him—the years and years of Kingdom training falling back into place with familiar clicks. “Just a happy reunion.” His golden gaze flickers toward Ledger before it moves back to the magician before him, “My name is Magnus.” There is silence for a moment as he considers her, eyes lingering on the jewels of her cheek and the silvery shimmer of his eye, but he had never been particularly drawn to magical things. He had lived his entire life without traits of any kind—relying simply on his own grit and muscle to power through. Magnus liked to think of himself as a simple man. The world could have their tricks. He just wanted the quiet.

MAGNUS

once king. once general. once dead.

[Ledger]

One of the things he had inherited from his father was his way with words, not having to say more then what was needed. “Son”. It fills his entire being with a flood of warmth and pleasure, words he never thought he would hear again. For a moment he wonders what his father thinks when he looks at him. If he sees some reflection of himself in the same gold-flecked eyes they both shared. Magnus sounds almost as unsure as he feels and then suddenly the stallion has closed the distance between them, his neck wrapping around his and pulling him close. He easily falls into his embrace, unable to keep the tears from his eyes. It was unmanly to cry but he didn’t care and couldn’t stop the rush of emotions from finally exploding from that box that had long been chained. His head presses into the warmth of his father’s neck, breathing him in and still not able to realize that this was actually happening. Magnus smells the same as he remembers with some added fragrances. Salt water and sand. And something else that he can’t recognize. His body shudders with his tears, with the years of turmoil finally coming to light. His father saw him as the fearful child of the past but he was right to do so. That fearful child had never grown up even if his body had. He is reluctant to leave his embrace but does so as Magnus pulls away. A weak smile finds his lips as he is looked over, suddenly feeling somewhat sheepish. He hasn’t taken the best care of himself. His flaxen mane and tail are tangled and messy, always carrying little gifts of twigs and burrs from his constant wanderings. His coat is dull and dirty, he was long overdue for a bath and grooming. Ears swivel forward as his father is about to speak but he is interrupted as another joins their happy reunion. His gaze is wary as he watches her approach. There is something about her that reminds him of something. He doesn’t connect it to Librette, not yet. Librette still lives in his memories with crushing anger. He would never forgive her for what she had done. Never. All those years ago when her murdering son had dragged his blood splattered body to her to take care of… She could have done so many things. She could have handed him over to his father to raise. She could have actually done the decent thing of being some sort of mother to him. Instead she just kept her son’s secret and kept Ledger alive with as minimal an effort as she could. No, what she had done was unforgivable. He tries to offer the stranger a smile but it is strained, feeling a sense of alarm and he steps closer to Magnus almost protectively. He won’t lose his father again, not when he had just gotten him back. Taking in the jewels that drape her cheek, the unique mark on her chest. She seems concerned but he can’t help but feel that rolling sense of panic that he senses when things aren’t safe. ”I’m Ledger. We’re ok. ” He offers slowly as he tries his best to be polite despite the fact he wanted Magnus to himself and the ever spreading feeling of unease. There are so many unanswered questions he wants to ask but can’t with her here. L E D G E R

[Camrynn]

so you wanna play with magic?

It's quite clear to her that politeness dictates she should leave. It's clear from the way they embrace each other, from the way they melt together like, well, father and son. It's clear in the way the boy looks at her, as though he thinks she's a threat. He hasn't quite placed her yet (she wonders if he ever will, she looks and acts absolutely nothing like her grandmother, resembling her mother far more, and Verily hasn't been seen in Beqanna for years). It's equally clear that Magnus is more neutral about her presence. Every bit the legendary man of many talents that the memories she's plucked from the collective consciousness paint him to be.

She should absolutely leave, she knows, she should absolutely let them have their moment together. But she doesn't want to let them slip away, doesn't want to let them escape – not while Magnus reeks of magic, and not while Legder and Magnus both are so tied into the bloodline of a mare that she's rather oddly fascinated with.

But she is practical first and foremost, and practicality sometimes means yielding what you want at the altar of what you have to do. And so she nods to the both of them, a gentle acknowledgment. "I'm Camrynn." Her velvet voice is respectful, delicate. "I'm glad you're both all right. I have some small skill with healing, if either of you are at all hurt." It's entirely untrue – she has quite a great skill with healing, the ability to even raise the dead without batting an eye, to heal any wound, to knit the dying back together. It's all in a day's work for her. But to brag in front of them serves no one and accomplishes nothing, and she's not much of one for futility.

Ever so briefly, she considers all that she could reveal to both of them. It is fascinating to her to think that the three of them are so intertwined, and the two of them think her a stranger. What would happen if she revealed herself to be the daughter of the stallion who killed Ledger's mother? The granddaughter of the mare who had failed to raise him (exactly as she'd failed to raise every other child she'd ever given birth to, turns out she's just a really terrible parent. Was a really terrible parent, being that she's now dead and all). What if she revealed to Magnus that she'd been the one to kill Librette (most recently)? Oh she can only imagine the fireworks that would be caused.

But as it is, this isn't the time, and she knows it. Instead, she simply offers both of them a nod again. "If neither of you need first aid, well, far be it for me to stand in the way of a happy reunion." she smiles at the both of them, small but genuine. "I'll be on my way and let you two catch up."

And then she waits. The ball is in their court to decide if she will stay or if she will go. It matters little to her – she'll have her answers one way or the other, and she'll either listen in and spy on them or pick their collective memories later to understand everything that went on in the conversation. As it happens, the conversation they'll have without her there will probably be more useful to her than anything they'd say with her present. But believe it or not, her own self-interest is actually not what's motivating her here. She's actually preparing to leave (unless they stop her) because she genuinely wants to grant their wish for time alone.

That's as close as she's ever been to being nice. Usually when she's nice, there are strings attached. But this time, no strings, no nothing, just a mare waiting to see whether she's needed, or whether she's cleared to leave a father and son to work out years (decades) of things unspoken.

CAMRYNN

co-queen of the deserts, magical, mother of badassery

[magnus]

we all carry these things that no one else can see
they hold us down like anchors; they drown us out at sea

There are things about Ledger that remind him of himself: the gold-flecked eyes, the uncertainty, the quiet ways that he observes the world around him; however, there are more things that remind Magnus of Ledger’s mother, and that is something that brings a deep sadness to him, something gut-wrenching. And with it came the familiar: the guilt. It was as natural to him as the violence that always simmered in his veins, that ache for dark release that comes back to him slowly as death begins its slow release from his buckskin body. 

How odd to feel yourself coming back like waves upon the shore; to feel your personality filter back into your body through the coming seconds—and, with it, all of the burden of the past.

Not that he says these things to his son or the strange magician before them. They are tucked away in the corners of his mind, and he instead keeps his gaze neutral, picking up the protective stance of his son as the mare continues to approach them. Not that he needs protecting. He had been killed in almost the prime of his life and so he had come back in it. His body was still strong, the muscles ropy under his scarred coat—and he was growing stronger with each passing minute. As life flooded through him, he could feel it coming back to him and he almost groaned with the pleasure of it. It felt good to feel dangerous again.

So he takes a step forward, nodding almost imperceptibly to his son as if to let him know that he could handle it. This was not his first brush with magic, and he certainly wasn't intimidated by it. “Hurt is relative,” he says to the mare with a wolfish-smile, rolling his shoulders as the aches spread through him. There was small happiness with the pain; it meant that he was once again alive to relish it. “Although I do appreciate the offer.” He considers her for a second, almost allows her to leave so that he can have the moment with his son, but something stops him—something in his subconscious that he does not deny.

“You are welcome to stay,” he says in his rough voice, one corner of his lacerated lip rising into a half smile. “You look like the kind of mare who has good stories to tell, Camrynn.” His gold eyes flick toward his son before moving back to her. There was a curiosity gnawing at him, and he was not the kind of stallion who liked to let his curiosity go unfed. So he looks at her, hungry for something he didn't understand.

MAGNUS

once king. once general. once dead.

[Ledger]

He can barely remember Raaquel, the mare that birthed him. He had only just opened his eyes to be told he was loved by her and then with a blink of his eyes… A flutter of lashes… Her skull was open and bleeding, a lifeless carcass. All he remembers of her now is a gray mare with indistinguishable features, blurred and unrecognizable. But always blood trickles down her face. That never fades. Oh the guilt, if only he knew that perhaps the burden wasn’t his alone. That it was something that may have been passed from father to son. But then again…It would probably only intensify the anxiety anyways. That he couldn’t be stronger for both himself and Magnus. He tries now though even as his body shuts down. His brain suggesting that danger lurks nearby. He doesn’t know why she rather frightens him. Camrynn is beautiful in every suggestion of the word. However it has something to do with the trail of jewels along her cheek. Or something to do with the golden sign painted across her chest. Or just the look in her eyes which seems concerned, a normal look for the situation at hands right? Then why is the fur along the back of his neck prickling with discomfort? Her voice is rich like chocolate, offering a healing hand. He can’t help but give a soft guffaw of dismay which is quickly followed by a strained smile, not realizing it had escaped from him. The damage had already been done long ago. It was too late for all that now. It would be even worse for him soon but that future had yet to unfold. Magnus asks her to stay and his son looks at him with a wounded and questioning gaze. Why? Why does he want her to stay? He isn’t vocal in his unhappiness but it’s probably written all over his face anyways. He had never been good at hiding his feelings or emotions. So instead he remains silent but close to the buckskin, his cautious gaze lingering on the black mare and curved lobes pricked forward to catch any of these remarkable stories he’s father was seeking. L E D G E R