i am the mace, the map, the fall and the high
Just as she had changed, so too had he. It is the way of the world, the inevitable and unyielding hand of time pushing them always forward. Forcing them into things they might never have anticipated or dreamed of. Once he had speculated what the monsters might wish to do with them. Had imagined they wished to consume them and leave nothing but death and decay behind.
It turns out, he had been right. That is what had fueled him when he had answered the call for help. The call that, in the end, had banished them from this place before they could see their purpose through. The call that had resulted in his death and rebirth into something new. Something different. Though that which had been stolen from him had been returned, it is now encapsulated in the harpy eagle destined to haunt his footsteps forever. The bird that houses what little shred of conscience he has left.
Rune spies her first, as he usually does. Reave follows, pale legs sweeping through the heather and boggy grasses of the lower moors until he nears the cliffs. As it rises, it gives way to hardier, windswept vegetation, betraying anyone that lingers here. She would easily be able to see him coming, just as he could see her.
He is a strange sight now, though somehow fitting in the harshness of the landscape. Bone had ruptured mercilessly through his skin as he had grown, and now the colt she had once known had been consumed by a stallion carved of blood and ivory. The image he makes is tempered only by the soft glow of his armor, gentling the torn edges of his skin. But behind the fierce mask of bone, the vibrant blue of his gaze remains the same.
He grins as he approaches, though there is something wild in the pleased expression. Rune drops from the sky with the loud cry of a raptor. He lands heavily on the jutting armor of Reave’s hip, his immense weight causing his step to dip heavily as he steadies the new imbalance. He does not otherwise acknowledge the bird now staring fiercely at Mazikeen. As he draws to a halt, he greets the pale mare familiarly, “I’m glad to see you survived the monsters intact.” He tilts his head, grin widening. “Relatively.”
reave
@Mazikeen