She is bathing when a sharp pain resonates inside her head as if she has been stabbed by a dagger of intense emotion. Lakota! Come! Loretta calls! Jerking, the lithe healer turns her crown instinctively to where she knows, without knowledge and only innate surety, Aodaun patrols. Her vision flickers between her own view of the waterfall and his, where Loretta is pacing and growling anxiously, snapping at the large bear in distress. Without a second to hesitate, unknowing of what Archibald could be calling so desperately for her for, the mare plunges from the depths of the water and sets off at a sprint across the pale grass of the Hills. She makes it to the borders fairly quickly, and in a blur of silver and snow her prince is at her side, and she is at the heels of Loretta as the bitch claws up the earth in her haste, leading the pair out of the Foothills and towards the South. Gentle rain cascades down onto her already wet coat, nostrils flaring pink as she tries to keep a level pace, having a sinking feeling in her gut that this wasn't going to be a short travel. To hasten her speed is to need to stop and regain her breath, but to slow might mean life or death.
Gritting her teeth she puts her discomfort aside and her shoulder muscles ripple as she flies across the ground behind Archibald's companion, worry gnawing at her stomach. What could be wrong? No, what could be so wrong, that Archibald would need her? It could not be for her poisonous abilities- Archibald was one of the finest warriors she knew, he could handle himself better than any other. So that meant her earthly powers, which meant someone was injured. Her heart quaked, her lungs burned, and her flanks were thick with foam and sweat as her legs quivered in pain. Ao was in similar shape, but he was in luck with a stride of a massive beast and the endurance to travel hundreds of miles at a comfortable run. The heat was not very good for him, but the lukewarm droplets falling onto them eased it for him.
By the time Archibald's massive frame comes into view, she's running on numb limbs and she can hardly breathe, but violet eyes are flints of amethyst in her stubbornness. Sliding to a stop, moist earth dug up in deep trenches around her hooves, she heaves and her frame quivers with exertion as she wobbles over to Circe. One of her best friends, by gods she should have been here why hadn't she been here?! At her side, a newborn is curled contentedly, but she can see the exhaustion and pain on Circe's face. Something is very wrong.
The second comes as she stands there, but there is little time to congratulate or check on the foals. Now, she has a life on her hands, and she gets to her knees to the fallen mother and coos softly in a raspy, breathless voice to try and calm her, even if she is likely only doing it to comfort herself. "It's okay, Circe, just keep still. They're so beautiful, you did so well," she sighs gently into her ears, eyes flickering over her friend's body.
Without hesitation she draws on the earth, her breath slowing and lungs no longer aching so badly as the strength of it flows through her, happily helping her before she has even directed it. In glows she can somehow see the damage done, eyes flickering over Circe's prone frame, and she presses her soft muzzle to the other mare's side just behind her elbow and closes her eyes. Whenever she shuttered her vision, it seemed to help, letting her wield the power she'd been gifted with more precision. She poured that strength, that near-tangible solidarity, into the body she was knelt beside from her own body, the transmitter of this miracle.
It was delicate work, repairing all which had been ripped and bruised, injured by the massive foals that had tried to kill her in their struggle towards life. Tissue is sewn back together, blood clotted and cells multiplied, and though the rush of healing had helped the drain on her energy only becomes a harsher toll on her body from the challenging, nigh-impossible distance she'd run. With a soft huff of air, breathing out, it's over. Lakota slumps away from Circe, pressing forehooves to the ground and wobbling up as unsteadily as the two foals shall in a moments time. Her head is low, but there is a weary smile on her face, even if she's not very attractive drenched in sweat and foam and shaking like an earthquake was ripping through her body.
Aodaun moved over to her from where he had stood guard, away from the twins and their father for fear of setting off a protective instinct in Archibald. He has grown so tall, so strong, since she first saved him so long ago. She gives him a tired smile as he lends her his shoulder, and she grants him a partial portion of her weight, gratitude evident in her visage. Looking over to Archibald she flicks her forelock weakly away from her eyes, and wishes she'd been bred for endurance and stamina, because like hell she'd ever be able to make that trip again at the speed she had. "Just...just give me a minute and...and I'll look over the twins," Lakota manages to get out, voice shuddering and breathless, but she's smiling because she did something, she was important, had a purpose, even if just for this one moment. She wasn't useless right now. She wasn't dead weight, and that was the best gift she could ever have been given.
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