"But the dream, the echo, slips from him as quickly as he had found it and as consciousness comes to him (a slap and not the gentle waves of oceanic tides), it dissolves entirely. His muscles relax as the cold claims him again, as the numbness sets in, and when his grey eyes open, there’s nothing but the faint after burn of a dream often trod and never remembered." --Brigade, written by Laura
And in the darkened underpass I thought, "Oh Satan, my chance has come at last!"
The water clutches desperately to her coat, sinking its nails into her skin then into the flesh and muscle beneath. Winter’s chill is reaching down into her bones even as Valdis paces feverishly in attempt to stay warm. Her blue eyes occasionally flash to what lies ahead, but mostly she stares down in heavy thought until a familiar scent cloaks the inner lining of her nostrils.
She sees her mother pressed to Kagerus’ side as the snow falls around them. A weight pulls against her heart, confusion burrowing into her thoughts. The only two parents she has known through her childhood stand united together with open displays of affection. While a great part of her soul wants to embrace them, Valdis just roots herself and looks away. Mother has a family and children with Kagerus; she isn’t in that picture, not really. She and Velk are outsiders now.
If only she knew that it remains that way even with Castile.
Her jaws clench together in silenced frustration until a voice melts through the cold. While she blatantly trembles from the cold, she desperately tries to anchor her voice as her eyes narrow on him. ”Valdis,” she offers as she scrutinizes him, her curiosity piqued by the smallest trace of her father on his skin. Rather than verbally acquiesce, she merely agrees with a quick nod before sidestepping to press into him, mirroring her mother and Kagerus. They remain across the crowd, involved with others, and so Valdis maintains the distance, closing her eyes as she continues to shiver against Santana.
It’s with the arrival of the faeries that their mission is briefly assisted. They warm their bodies with a summer breeze. The heat soothes Valdis and strips away most, but not all, the moisture and water. A look of hope brightens her pretty face, but it falters when the frigid north gale returns, blasting them even more powerfully than previously. Shutting her eyes, the girl braces against the cold and musters her inner strength before ambling forward, battling the buffeting wind. As her forelock and mane whip around her face, Valdis turns her head to look back at Santana. ”Grab my tail,” her voice rises to be heard, ”We’ll go this way.” She tilts her head to the right hoping that he can see her through the sheet of falling snow, but as a precaution she adds, ”Let’s go to the right. We can stick together!” Somehow, her usual preference of solitude seems like a poor idea now.
A long moment is allotted for Santana to grab her tail or at least touch her in some way so that they may not lose each other. Valdis attempts only once to see her mother in the blizzard, but her vision is bleached by the white snow. It’s all she can see; nothing past her face can be deciphered, leaving her confused as she stumbles forward, shifting her body to the right with her head low against the gale. ”This sucks,” she mumbles under her breath as her body shivers and battles against the wind. Their path is obscured, their footsteps blindly treading on unfamiliar territory. All she can hear is the roar of the blizzard and her eyes stare only at the ground underfoot. Valdis occasionally trips over a rock or slips on a frozen slab of ice and snow as the frosty blanket thickens around them with every passing minute. The trek is perilous and difficult, but she presses forward in determination.
VALDIS
But then a strange fear gripped me and I just couldn't ask.
Something about the quest reminds Litotes of the burning of his home. The way his father ran into the fire but lost his hope: the cremello will not to do the same today. He thinks, as he stands shivering and alone on the shoreline, that he may be walking in the steps of his father. Running headlong into a freezing channel while feverous, no aid or hope in sight, is eerily similar to the way his father tried to save his mother - except, this time, there is hope (just hope he has forgotten).
Exhausted, forlorn, and (admittedly) depressed, Lie hangs his head to stare blankly at the ground. He cannot stop the shivering as it passes and passes over his body. How foolish he was, to take on this trek in such a state. Guarding the land of Hyaline as his sickness comes and goes is one thing - travelling miles upon miles in the cruel cold is entirely another.
Just as he thinks he may stop here, wait out the cold, or maybe die - a warm wind passes. Lie lifts his head, something resembling excitement passes over his face. The air seems to twist around his stomach, coddle and soothe him, whisper over and over again that it will be okay. His matted mane and tail drape and drip against his skin, but the wind persists in drying him. Though the spots his hair clings to continue to dampen, his body regains strength, and so his mind follows.
Lie straightens - warm, dry, and renewed.
Taking this moment of clarity to study his surroundings, the shifter notes the two paths ahead. One to the left, one to the right: both obviously meant for the participants to choose. He breathes in deep and closes his eyes to center himself. When he reopens them, there is snow falling. Lie turns his head sharply at Kagerus’ familiar call. He sees her staring at him (Solace at her side), but the storm assaults them with ice and snow (his vision blurs; he longs to travel with them).
Following his gut - that Kagerus and Solace will press forward and he can meet them halfway - the General of Hyaline walks precariously through the quickly building snow. The ice pelts him, cuts up his coat and instantly freezes the blood that ensues; the snow blinds him, pains his eyes and shortens his breathing. He has nothing other than an instinct and a hope that his leaders will do as they always have done: guide him.
Whatever it was - a thousand year old instinct or a stroke of luck - Litotes finds the side of Solace. He shouts her name, but knows his voice is lost to the storm, so he drops his head and tucks himself to her side. The snow is so thick and aggressive that he can hardly see Kagerus on the other side of Solace. All three of them push through the snow, bound by Hyaline and survival. When they come to a stop, Lie lifts his head to attempt to see what is ahead, then turns to find Kagerus when the storm is too powerful.
Through squinted eyes and pinned ears he can barely make out his leader’s question. He knew from the first time he saw the paths that right will be the way he goes; so he shouts, “Right!” as loud as he can then throws his head in that direction for good measure. Kagerus nods and moves to the left. Lie swallows his fear, gives Solace a friendly nudge as if to say good luck, and presses onward.
The snow makes their parting ever harder. Within one measly second, the General can no longer see the couple. He drops his head, slits his eyes, and trails his muzzle against the first layer of snow. Lie’s nose against the snow coupled with the terrain changing beneath his hooves keeps him on his path. He continues on like that: head down, ears pinned, trudging through the ever-deepening snow. The way it falls - it seems as if the storm is doing everything in its power to keep him from pressing forward: the wind pushes him back, the ice swirls and slices against his nape.
Lie stops, lifts his head to see what progress he may have made only to see someone that makes his blood run even colder than the surging storm: his brother.
The snow and ice whips in circles and lines, twirling and swaying to form the body of Pepsi (a ghost). The cremello is statuesque, frozen and solemn in the presence of his past. The two stare each other down - Litotes not once thinking that he is hallucinating, that the fever and storm combined are softening his psyche. He steps forward, one hoof after the other, and Pepsi dips his snowy head then turns and heads further up the path.
“Wait -” broken, croaking, sputtering . . .
He follows desperately.
i don't want your pity, i just want somebody near me guess i'm a coward, i just want to feel all right
Golden eyes watching our every move Losing time without the sun or moon
They stand there, shivering, on the icy banks of the northernmost island, staring into the blue-white of the landscape. The chestnut filly huddles close to his side, seeking warmth from the biting chill of the cold wind. He peers around them with mocha brown eyes, squinting against the icy air.
Then, as though the gods have taken pity on them, the wind blows from cold to warm, ruffling their sodden coats, preparing them for the biting cold this land promises. The blue and white of his frame dries quickly, his patchy coat thin and ragged enough that water does not cling too heavily to it. Though, in this clime, it certainly would not provide as much protection against the bite of the cold.
That is not something he can afford to worry about now, however. There is too much else occupying his tumbling thoughts.
The warm wind does not last long, unfortunately, before giving way to blowing ice and snow once more. With that foreboding wind comes a darkening of the sky overhead, those ominous clouds heavily laden with snow. Soon fat flakes are falling with vicious rapidity, the once clear landscaping becoming cloaked beneath a thick sheet of white. Visibility falls to nearly nothing, until Ether can barely see the russet hue of the filly next to him.
Fear spikes in his breast as he braces himself against the wind. He’d had only a moment to consider the landscape before the white had obscured it. In that time he had seen only two distinct paths, one falling away to the left, the other rising to the right. He hadn’t had time to try to discern where either might lead, and this lack of knowledge settles heavily into his thin chest.
He presses closer to Briella as he squints into the distance, futilely attempting to see more than a few feet in front of his nose. So distracted is he by this, that he barely notices the girl leave his side, tracking towards the left as she chooses a path to follow. It is only her words echoing hollowly into the wind that draws realization.
For a moment, he glances frantically into the the yawning white, her small form already swallowed by the snow. Leaping forward with a sudden panic, he follows the direction he had heard her voice. It seems like ages he searches those endless drifts of white (he couldn’t lose her! Couldn’t. He had made a promise), though in truth it is perhaps only a few moments.
With visibility reduced almost to nothing, it isn’t until he nearly barrels straight into that he realizes he had found her again. He breathes a sigh of relief then, focusing his attention more fully on her. He would not lose her again.
The wind howls against them, and she seems to have trouble walking, her frail little body being pushed sideways as much as it goes forward. He too braces against the wind, but his bulk allows him more purchase, and so he places himself at her side, allowing her to use him as a crutch with which to move forward. Her whispered plea brings a heaviness to his heart, and he reaches down to offer her a reassuring nudge. “We’ll get back to them,” he promises.
He is not a fairy, but he hopes she would believe him anyhow.
As they walk, he realizes she had chosen the left path. He does not know whether it is a good thing or a bad thing, but he would not leave her alone out here. And so, to the left they go, pressing feebly into the wind as they try to find their way along an impossible trail.
It was a good thing that the Fey folk decided to offer them some relief, because there was not much warmth to be found between them. Valdis. She was as cold as he was and they shivered together for a moment before the wind went suddenly balmy. The icicles that had started to form in his mane and from his nose melted away. It circulated around them playfully, teasing feeling back into his limbs and soothing the frost from his lungs.
It was a taste of comfort that was torn away as quickly as it had come. It began as a glittering cascade of crystals drifting between them and the sun, catching the light like a handful of scattered diamond dust. It was pretty for all of five seconds. The flakes grew fatter and thicker until all the world was cloaked in white, obscuring everything beyond the girl who stood beside him. The now-violent gale was doing its best to weave witch knots into their hair as they looked at each other. Tana felt his confidence slipping.
What was he, without his gifts? He hadn't realized just how much the fire that roared within him meant, until it was gone. It was a loss as powerful as anything he'd ever felt, and that was saying quite a bit. Tana without fire, without flight... he wasn't anything special. Let alone a hero. The realization struck him hard, shivering there in the middle of nowhere. He might have lost himself if it weren't for Valdis' taking charge. To stay here would be certain death. To move on made death only a possibility.
Nodding mutely he took the offered length of golden hair in his mouth. To the right, very well. He could just make out the gleam of her mane and the outline of her face through the blanketing snow. It was already beginning to collect on their backs. If he didn't think about it too hard he could almost pretend the light weight was really his wings folded against his flanks. The hair between his teeth tugged forward, pulling him in stumbling steps westward.
Plunging into the torrent they walked single file, finding their way by touch on the hardened path. Patches of ice and drifts of snow added to the treachery the low visibility conditions created, and he slipped more than once. They made it further in this way than he wanted to acknowledge before he had to admit that he was in the better position. Valdis was acting like a windbreak, splitting the air current around them. It wasn't fair.
He dug into the packed snow, muscles coiled to push him forward with a longer stride. Against the wind it felt like more work than it should have been, but within a few paces he was able to trade his mouthful of tail for the tips of her mane. Shoulder to shoulder, the wind was noticeably stronger. Still, it felt better to be sharing the brunt of nature with his stranger-friend. Whatever trials were thrown at them, he was determined that he would carry his weight, and help her with hers as best he could.
“Hope rises like a phoenix from the ashes of shattered dreams.”
Dear lords, who had thought to turn an ice cube like island into a home? It’s freezing cold and there is nothing, nothing that would offer shelter from the howling wind. Normally the snow would melt underneath her hooves, her body’s warmth being enough to keep the frost from touching her, but it crackles under her hooves, and that is not a sensation Jinju is liking very much.
Dark ruby eyes look around, narrowed as her ears are pressed back against her skull, and her teeth chatter as her jaws are tense. Annoyance is the main emotion displayed on her features, as there is simply nothing to be seen, other than two paths, one leading to the right, and the other to the left. Little does the inky black girl know that soon the sight would be even getting worse, but for now, Jinju secretly revels in the warm breeze that wraps around her like a blanket. Instinctively she reaches out to it, trying to pull the warmth in her chest, but is left oddly empty when her attempt fails.
The fuckers.. she silently grumbles to herself, as an hoof stomps the snowy ground annoyed. Of course they’d give them only enough to continue, nothing more, and nothing less. But, she had to give them that, they did still know mercy after all. Jinju’s paper thin coat is mostly dry now, her crest and lightly feathered neck being the most moist parts of her body. Normally that should be enough to keep an equine decently warm, but Jinju is pulling on the short end, her coat being far too thin to keep her shaking and trembling body warm.
“Shit” she curses under her breath, when the nice warm breeze suddenly turns cold, and at the same time the sky darkens as menacingly clouds bond together above her head. “Well screw me.” Within no time the sky is completely dark, and if that didn’t block her sight enough already, the thick snowflakes do.
Jinju does not hesitate any longer, the sudden blast of cold is enough to push her forward. Yes, walking into a storm is a stupid thing to do, but standing on the edge of the island could also get her killed. Without a second thought she takes the left path. When she’d reached Icicle Isle, coming from Nerine, her back is now turned in that direction. Going left would mean moving to the side of the island that ends at the open sea, while turning left brings her slightly closer to the mainland. Or so she hopes.
Her movements are stiff and slow, and more often than not Jinju is surprised by the snow in which is suddenly deeper than before. Ruby eyes squint, trying to keep the snow from getting in her eyes, which does not help her figuring out which way to go. The path is well worn out, but the fresh snow makes it harder to follow. It is inevitable that Jinju strays from it. Soon there is no path, just snow, and snow, and hey, more snow. “D-d-d-damn it” the grumbles as her teeth still chatter. By now Jinju is soaked all over again, and the wind cuts into her flesh without holding back. She needs shelter, and needs it quick.
By going back she would not find it, but neither continuing ahead into the nothingness, and, if she is quick, she might be able to follow her own hoof prints in the snow back to where she had accidentally strayed off the path.
Once back on the trail, her head is held low, as she struggles against the wind which makes her mane and tail angrily dance. Snow crystals stick to her coat, but especially her mane and tail are slowly becoming frozen, as the snow sticks together and starts to slowly turn her in an alive popsicle. Jinju has to find shelter, or the pond, sooner than later, or else..
11-19-2018, 06:17 PM (This post was last modified: 11-19-2018, 07:05 PM by Madelyn.)
So let your heart, sweet heart Be your compass when you're lost
Leaving the chilled water behind, Madelyn is still met with the cold.
The buckskin mare’s body shivers from the bitter, frozen land that surrounds her. She can fill the icy hands of the isle taking a hold of her, digging deep into her pores and engraving their mark on her bones. Despite the cold, she still wears her smile. A wild smile of happiness that could truly never be wiped off her face.
Madelyn gathers her thoughts now, leaving behind all traces regarding the weather. Thinking about the cold would do her no good. She had finally made it to Icicle Isle. Now it was time she found her way to the heart-shaped pond.
Her hazel gaze searches the area of the frozen ground that stretches out before her from the shoreline. Ignoring the cold and finally having her thoughts gathered, it has become clear to her that there are two paths. Both paths lead deep into the frozen isle.
The dreamer considers the path before her. Deciding which one would take her to the heart-shaped pond could either be left or right. Madelyn isn’t sure what path was the correct one. There were no visible signs to indicate which way to go.
Suddenly, there is a warm breeze. Odd, she thinks. Her smile widens though, as the warm breeze ruffles her coat. But she already knows who sends the wind. The mercy they show for them, despite bringing the plague, warms her. The faeries were always so forgiving, even times like these.
Madelyn thanks the faeries silently. However, she turns her focus back onto the paths at hand. She must decide. But what way?
The warm wind then suddenly blows cold. The sky above her darkens. Her hazel eyes look up to the sky, watching as snow-heavy clouds roll in quickly over the frozen land. Quickly, heavy flakes start to fall.
She turns her gaze back onto the path. Each of the paths are quickly becoming harder to see. I need to decide now! She clamors to herself silently.
Left or right?
Right or left?
The wind howls around her, blinding her from everything she had once previously seen. It pushes her forward. Madelyn stumbles to the left. Her eyes catch onto the worn ground underfoot of the left path.
Left it is then, she decides firmly with a nod of her buckskin head.
She moves forward onto the left pathway. Pushing forward through heavy snowfall that piles in front of her while keeping her head low. The wind howls around her, sending the heavy flakes and dry snow-dust everywhere.
Her gaze remains low, keeping an eye on the worn ground underfoot.
It was the only thing that would be her guide.
The only way she would get out of the storm.
To find the heart-shaped pond.
She was determined.
So, she presses on and continues to follow along the left pathway.
This world was cold and cruel. Nocturne quietly yearned for the warmth and safety of his dead father’s abdomen, but it had long since cooled and been left behind. Probably predators has long since started to devour his corpse, too; there was no comfort to be had there anymore. So he did the only thing he could, and carried on.
A stray breeze swept through, swirling around him, and he couldn't quite tell if it was warm or he was just delirious, but he didn't die so maybe the first thing. He certainly never got warm or cozy, but at least it mostly dried him off for all of a minute. Then, in what was clearly the way of the world, it turned on him, icy cold and bitter instead of gentle and warming. Dark clouds rolled quickly in, and snow started to call with a vengeance.
Naturally. Nocturne just glared at the oncoming storm with weary eyes filled to their silver brims with resignation and the barest hint of annoyance. Of course it would wait for them to arrive and then bury them in an avalanche of snowfall. It was the only logical outcome.
Just two paths had stretched out before him before the snow began to obscure his vision and the world began to narrow once again to the space immediately surrounding him. He stumbled forward into the right-hand path, mostly just hoping he didn't freeze to death in the doing. Heart-shaped pond. Had to find the heart-shaped pond. Here was getting he found it by stumbling into it, because that was just how life seemed to work. That or froze to death ten feet from it, not that he'd ever know it in this blizzard.
It fell heavy and thick, weighing down his pale little body, making him further prone to gleam in the moonlight if he lived to see moonlight again. Which at this point was anyone’s guess.
Her dappled markings are dark with water, and the tendrils of her mane have begun to freeze into icicles. She is tripping along the beach and discovers other arrivals. Briella, Santana, Ether, Leilan. These former travel companions appear and she moves toward them hoping to find Wane. He is a stronger swimmer than she is and must be with the others already. When she does not pick him out she pauses, does not join a group, and then the fairies' mercy keeps her still.
Even on this distant edge of Beqanna magic reaches, rescues these many souls from hypothermia and death.
Dried, warmer, and more clear headed, she looks up the beach where two paths lead away into the snowy landscape. Wane is not there. Before she can weave through the others and look for him, a storm roars to life. The isle is unhappy with her many trespassers.
Blinded, Eszka calls out to those she had known were close to her. She walks forward, blinking against the gale as it strips the tears from her eyes and finds no one. The tide, whipped up by the storm, lashes against the frozen shore and the mare shies away, bounding up the beach before the sea can reclaim her. Panting from the exertion of this flight after her hard swim she hesitates only long enough to guess her direction. Then, dropping her head low so that she might at least see where she is putting her feet she begins to seek out the trail-heads.
Alone. It's easy to feel forgotten in the white-out. These past days with Wane have fortified her and made it easy to exist in this scarred and half-empty body. She feels his absence like a fresh wound.
There is a moment in the braying of the wind that she is certain she hears him call her name, convinced that she can pick out his tenor in the storm choir. She arcs north, but cannot determine the direction his call had come from. Eszka decides that she has imagined it, her anxious mind creating the comfort of his voice from the whistle and moan of wind.
There can be no more lingering. She has reached a path. The right? It must be. She will go right.
For all the horses that had been on the beach only a few minutes ago she encounters no one. Several times there is a dark shape in the haze or a voice through the falling snow. Agnieszka resists the temptation to try and join these specters, she cannot risk being lead astray. Others have gone this way, she steps where they have stepped. The wind tries to take her off her feet, but she is strong and steady and only falters once or twice when a drift catches her off guard. She hopes someone is keeping Briella safe, blocking the wind for her.
Again and again her thoughts turn to Wane, she must trust that he is safe and is somewhere on the way to the pond. Another dozen steps and they will be together. So she takes those dozen steps and then a dozen more after that because he must be at the end of those.
A breeze blows across her coat, twisting between the damp guard hairs and reviving her numb skin. The shaking of her limbs and core stops, and the muscles across her back relax. Solace pulls the unnaturally warm air deep into her lungs, already sure that it will not last.
She wants to reach for Valdis, but her daughter seems to willfully be avoiding her, choosing instead an unknown colt- a colt who's appearance under any other circumstances would have raised many questions. Solace's heart clenches, the frustration on the almost-woman's brow is easy enough for a mother to read, and she feels helpless as the wind surges again, ripping her voice from her. Her own frustration bubbles in her breast, warming her if nothing else, and grinding her teeth together Solace presses into the storm as her daughter disappears into the snow.
Valdis had decided to leave her, but her hands were tied and it cut her deep to be so helpless.
From within a swirl of ice and snow, there is suddenly warmth along her empty side, and Hyaline's Caretaker twists her neck to discover who it is. Her general, the color of snow and as steady as the mountains, had come alongside her and gratefulness washes over her. She presses her lips and their residual heat to his cheek before he makes the wise yet painful decision to split from them to better their odds.
Pressed close to Kagerus' side, Solace tracks left. The path is inhospitable, to say the least. The only thing which keeps them true is the fact that the land beyond the trail is simply impassible.
Despite her winter pelt, Solace's body begins to shudder again and she wishes Kag could dream them warm and cozy back with their family - their whole family - Velk, Valdis, Abysm, Koko, Rhae, Will, Aegean. None were more or less their family, and the though of them is what keeps her spirits from plummeting.
It is clear that this is a test, that they will be subjected to the elements to pay some penance and there is no escape. The fairies didn't need them, this was all for show, she muses cynically as the frost bites her nose, but she was willing to give what the demanded of her even with only the sliver of information she had been given.
Solaces trudges on like a mule, and the minutes stretch impossibly long as the pain in her freezing legs playing tricks on her mind. She draws strength from Kagerus, trying not to think about what the next test will be. Squinting against the storm, she looks to her blood-and-bone woman, and what should have been an intimate whisper becomes a shout - but it is barely more audible than a murmmer.
"I love you, Kag." She says with all the force of her fear and determination behind it. She has no way to know if her words will find their mark, but she feels the power of them regardless and her head rises a little higher.
They were in this together.
For better or for worse.
S
olace
we're reeling through an endless fall we are the ever-living ghost of what once was
On the shore he shivers madly, his teeth chattering so violently that he fears he will break them. It is no wonder; he is a creature of sun and sand. His reckless swim from the cold coast of Nerine to the absolutely frigid Icicle Isle is likely the most foolish thing he’s done in his life – and he’s done plenty. He misses his dragonfire hot like magma within his breast, misses the soft leather of his wings curled against his sides. He misses the Beast, even (he’s lost without the soul he’s shared since before his cells split from one into two). He thinks if he could, he would shift and carry Wallace to safety in his claws, back to their new island.
But he knows he has to see this thing through.
Sabrael shuffles his feet in the snow as he contemplates death by instantaneous freezing. He doesn’t have to contemplate long, thankfully, as the faeries take pity on their hapless charges. A breeze like a breath of Ischian air washes over him. Goosebumps race across his speckled skin with the sudden temperature change. It brings a little life back into his limbs, at least at the surface level (he still feels heavier, like the ice has seeped into his marrow and grounded him). There is a chill he can’t shake, despite the glorious wind that swirls around him. He is not made for this place, it is clear, but he will have to adapt.
The land yawns into an indistinct white haze beyond the shoreline, as if winter itself is waiting to swallow them whole. He sees two paths, at least, trails carved defiantly against the otherwise nebulous land. Hmm, I wonder what Part Two entails, he thinks sarcastically, snorting into the grey air. He’s not surprised but still disappointed that smoke doesn’t curl away from his violent exhale – he always appreciates the added punctuation.
Just as his eyes are drifting towards his companions (hoping to spot brown and lace in the crowd), a storm kicks up and bears down on them. It’s a storm of his worst nightmares, all pelting snow and ice. He’d take a hurricane over this crap any day. But the big-bellied clouds are relentless in their unloading on the would be plague-stoppers. Sabrael hurries over to where most of the horses had gathered in hopes of finding Wallace, but visibility drops to virtually nothing in the span of a few minutes. He walks around anyway, trudging through the gathering snow, hoping to run into her.
The entire point of coming here was following her, keeping her safe from whateverthehell trouble she was getting herself into. Now, with the choice looming before him, the stallion can’t forge ahead until he knows his mission has been completed. It is obvious he is meant to pick a path, find a fork, see this thing through. But he hesitates. He hesitates while all the others move forward without him. He lingers in the hopes of finding the girl who never valued herself, has never counted her worth (she is gold to him while she sees only brown).
The wind howls and it is the loneliest sound he’s ever heard.
Surely, he’s the only one still waiting on the frozen shore like an idiot. The cold has returned to him doubly, triply, as the fairies’ breath has long since been spent. And what a waste it was to spend it on him. His gold-flecked eyes narrow against the storm, desperate for a weakness to exploit, but there is only white. White here, white there, white everywhere.
He steps to the left and his hoof crunches on harder ground.
A path. Finally. Sabrael breathes in a steadying breath and it’s as if ice splinters have punctured each lobe. It doesn’t matter though. Silence closes around him as he begins down his chosen path. He’s unaccustomed to the heaviness of it, the way it fills ears and blots out the rest of existence. His world spirals down to the small space he can see in front of him. The going is nearly impossible as he pulls himself over the alien terrain, slipping in some places where the ice has filled in the path after the passage of the others. He goes, though. On and on into the bleak white of oblivion.
