With Altissima returned to her wandering ways, Tarian returned to his.
Though he had never stopped patrolling, sometimes the gray pegasus took on a second one. There were a few moments each day that he gave a brief report to Lady Oceane or her heir, Cheri, but after that? After that, Tarian would venture through the sandstone canyons and pass by the sagebrush and Joshua trees. Sometimes, he let his thoughts fly far enough that they might find the pale pegasus mare he found himself thinking of so often.
Life - for Tarian - had fallen into the idyllic rhythm of an ocean tide. His days were measured by the coming and goings of horses within Loess, by his daily (and sometimes nightly) patrols. The silver stallion didn't mind... it just made him more introspective (and thus, a little more irritable; it wasn't like Tarian to spend so much time brooding). When the Champion catches a glimpse of the ocean, it makes him think of his Mystic uncle and the gray horse stops, imagining that he can imagine the salt and brine wafting in from the distant coast.
All rivers lead to the sea, Tarian.
He hadn't understood what Jay meant then. It had been one of the last things that the Shaman had told him and Tarian frowned slightly at the words as he did at the memory now. His Uncle had greats powers in Liridon - abilities to unlock the secrets of the stars, to catch moments ahead and behind in time, the way to find connections like an astronomer might see constellations. At the time, all Tarian had wanted was to go home; he had been tired of the fighting and the death. His years as a soldier weighed heavily on him and it had been foolish to hope that Jay would have given his nephew a simple answer on how to find their home; how to get back to Paraiso.
Nothing had ever come easy for them.
(A feud, a war, a prophecy had depleted them.)
While he hadn't completely understood what Jay meant then, he tries to follow the rivers when he can. The peaceful calm of tributaries. The turbulent roar of rapids. Currents could be quick, in a race to run down the Loessian sandstone; they could be slow, peaceful - enjoying a slow pace as much as Ashhal enjoyed his naps. Water flowed much like life, he was coming to see.
This morning he wants the sea. He wants to sink into the cool, crisp shallows and wash the dirt away from his last watch. But Tarian stops because a glint of gold catches his periphery and the missing eye is hard to miss. The scars that mar his hide tell a familiar story to the gray pegasus and it earns a mark of favor with the old warrior. "Ledger?" the Champion gruffly asks. While he doesn't socialize with many of the other Loessians, he has heard enough of the Diplomat through their Southern Monarchs. "I presume." He tacts on, lifting his pale to glance over the other brute.
TARIAN
@Ledger