You keep moving, hoofstep after hoofstep taking you back towards the sanctuary, back towards your escape. Because you want to leave this all behind. Yes, you won, you proved your dominance, showed them why you deserve to be general but... does it really matter? You grunt as you limp along, your injured forelimb still burning on fire from the repeated assaults. You need drugs. Each step, the word echoes in your mind, pulsing out a rhythm, frustrating you to know end. Drugs. Drugs. Drugs. Drugs. It's like a chant, and you take it up, your mind begging for them, but you don't have them anymore. You want them, you need them, but need doesn't matter. The universe doesn't care about needs, or wants. The universe cares about itself. She is a cruel mistress.

You retreat down the opening of the cave, wincing terribly as you slip and slide on the stony surface. Your metal horseshoes don't make it easy, and with your front forelimb injured you look about as awkward as anyone could. All around, when you make your way in, you see horses. Horses to your left, horses to your right. Horses above you and below you, cramped up against one another, unnaturally close. You see the glass herb box you were banned from stepping near, you see the pain healing herbs in the glass basket you nearly shattered, but you are not allowed there, not allowed to take them, so you pass them by, the eerie glow of the magma making everything dance and swirl, adding onto the effects caused by your mind.

And through the pain, though you sweat and breathe so heavily, you keeping moving, keep trotting, keep running. You're running from Elsa, from the cramped conditions of the Sanctuary, from your past and your present and your future. You're running because you need to escape, because you can't stand all the memories that resurface and plague you, that poke at the most sensitive parts of your mind. You need reprieve, you need rest, but you know you'll never find it here. You keep going, forever, it seems like, until you find blackness. An escape.

The darkness here is oppressive, the only light the far-away twinkling from some above-ground surface. You're standing on sand. You sink into and it supports your leg, giving the injured one rest. But here the blackness, you find that your only friend is your memories. Even your boggart has secluded herself from you, seemingly understanding that you need this time to yourself. But perhaps time to yourself is not the best. Images of Kellian come back, floating before you, taunting you, teasing you, making your heartbreak for the too-many-th time today. You press your horns against the stony wall and take a heavy sigh. Something has got to give. You don't think you can survive much longer with your mind so functional.

@[Elsa]