The fact that she still cares for him abrades the very fiber of the Caretaker's being. The tenderness he offers her feels wrong, that the scent of another mare clinging to his skin even registers in her mind, feels wrong. It feels wrong to notice such things at a time like this, as her wife remained behind performing the duties of Heart, Ambassador and General with an aptitude that left Solace awestruck.
"You owe me," Kag's voice purrs in her mind, and Solace knows that she will also be left speechless by the end of the night.
But the way Castile melts Valdis' fears touches Solace, and although her gut instinct is to over-correct, she doesn't want to ruin her daughter's second interaction with her sire as she runs to him. You can't say that every time, some prudent inner voice reminds her, but his voice trumps her private one, at least for now.
Are you staying in the Cove, Solace?
"I will remain the Caretaker of Hyaline," she replies, resolute. She would not abandon Hyaline to whoever found it empty first. The day-to-day details still needed fine-tuning, it was true, but she didn't have to decide all that now. Her main focus at this moment was getting everyone to safety. "But tonight we will all travel to Silver cove," she concedes, with a pointed look to her daughter.
I’m not leaving you until you are all safe. I'm not leaving you again.
As he offers her this heady promise, stepping forward to lay a kiss on her brow, and she responds with the smallest shake of her head under his touch. His lips trail across the delicate white hairs of her forehead, and she bites her tongue, keenly aware that he did not answer her question.
No, she thinks, you will, and it's for the best that way. He may be ready to escort them to the cove, and she would allow it, but Solace knows that it won't be long before he unfurls those black wings and they carry him to wherever-the-hell it was he went. He would leave them before the night was over. She just hopes her daughter didn't hear that last confession, because she doesn't want Valdis to have her heart broken.
She's thinking of a gentle way to say this, drawing breath to move them to the safety as she does, but her son is suddenly between them. Stepping back with a jolt, Solace looks to Rhae then Castile as she steps toward the former instinctual concern. The buckskin boy's impulsive action would have drawn a good-humored laugh had the world around them not been in such turmoil. She still smiles though, unable to hide the joy and sheer relief she feels at finding another of her children. Solace reaches for the colt, seeking to sooth him as he glares, and also prevent a pissing match between her son and the dragon shifter.
Solace attempts to read into the meaningful look the colt turns to gives her, but before she can decipher it, he is (surprisingly) speaking up.
"Then we know we at least have one friend in all of this, Warrick will be glad to hear it." Solace knew of Magnus, he had been a re-occurring name in her father's history lessons.
But the tears in his eyes stir the mother's heart, and she reaches her wing around him, much as she had done with Valdis, curving her neck back to nudge her son encouragingly on the cheek. And for a moment he is completely sheltered from the world. Solace breathes in the rich scent of Tephra clinging to his coat, taking the length of a single breath to draws strength from him, just as he does from her.
Then the earth grumbles again.
Regal and collected again more Solace addresses her children and once-lover. Every minute the performance takes more energy from her. "Rhae, come to tell her now." She says, afraid of his true meaning her tone grows firm as her cerulean gaze sweeps across them all. "I must insist that we move this conversation to someplace safer," she says, and it is not a request.
we are the ever-living ghost of what once was
@[Castile] @[Rhaegor]
