[..........................A MONTH LATER]

Darkness stirred with ponderous wings, thick as tar and thin as the first ice of winter. Time lost and found, she felt sluggish but hyper-alert, reeling in a whirlpool of fleeting thoughts and memories and observations, yet feeling as pure and untouched as a minute-old babe. Was the world always this dark—was every other sensation an illusion, a distraction meant to turn our heads while some creator dealt away our cruel fates, whittling and carving at our peace and prosperity until there was nothing else but fear and emptiness? She yearned to separate the strands and layers of all earthly deceptions to discriminate the true meaning of all these useless fancies and daydreams, but all she could reap from this endless field of aberration were her own biases and opinions and morals—useless things to the fledgling philosopher. Distractions, distractions, distractions. In the tumult and unrest of her stay in Helovia, had she become the very useless woman she had scorned? Lazy, pious, a baby machine? Where had she lost her ambition—could she ever regain it? Could she ever bring herself to abandon the very family she adored for the sake of reliving some juvenile fantasy? In her heart, Huyana knew she could never be like her own parents, whose presence had been so fleeting and brief in her life, whose absence caused a lifetime of fractured dreams. Lothiriel would have a mother to guide her and Deimos would have a wife—not passive (never the soft mother of his children, but a Valkyrie in her own right) but as gentle and relentless as the pattering of rain, and she knew that was why he chose her—he did not want some compliant girl, but an equal, a rain goddess. She was no broodmare, but a Mother; she would impart her own beliefs and dreams to her own children. Maybe they could continue on where she had faltered—after all, would they not have her blood, her thoughts, the same lightning in their eyes as she did?

Huyana could not tell if she had stood idle for seconds or months or years, but there was movement in the darkness. It was him; she knew it even before he proclaimed his presence. Languidly, she turned her face toward the muted sound of his steps, the soundless beating of his heart. As he came into view, a breath escaped from her mouth and turned into a wordless smile; she was glad to see him unscathed by whatever evil dwelt above ground. Huyana, he said by way of greeting, the wisp of his voice like loud ghosts resonating throughout the vast blackness. "Deimos," she murmured back, leaning toward him with affection in her eyes. Her quiet king of death, her Hades, who left ruin and corruption in his wake but offered the sweetest of kisses. Was she the raven on his shoulder or the stormcloud darkening the sky above him or the sword in his hands or the maiden who pined for his return while he slashed and slayed and slaughtered with the rest?

With a touch so tender, so zealous, the Reaper brushed his lips over the soft skin of her hip. Loth? he wondered softly, recalling their little flower nymph amidst the unwieldly darkness. The Haruspex's countenance became thoughtful; "Adventuring, I'm sure," she said quietly, assured of her daughter's safety for the nymph was already proving to be as strong willed and clever as her father. She paused, choosing to address the question which burned in her mind. "Was the Time Lord's portent true?" she wondered faintly, sadness making blue eyes heavy. "Is everything laid to waste above?" Is there any hope to regain our home? Is there any hope? were the questions left unsaid, portrayed in her weighted gaze. She exhaled softly, fearing his answer and feeling that the former fluidity of the darkness suddenly became as heavy as lead.