My response only came moments after I called out. I spun, wings unfurling at my sides and ready to grab the air and lift me away--or, if it was needed, fight. However, it was my name that left the lips of the one before me, and the familiar fire-orange of the brute softened my ready, and able, body. Hector. He approached me and continued to speak, his whole presence a comfort. Winter's bleak, desaturated shadow was pitiful in light of Hector, his head towering over mine like the story of the beast and his maiden. "I was lost."

I stepped forward, cloven hooves pulling me to close the distance Hector had chosen not to. I reached out with my dark lips, tugging gently at the tendrils of his mane. Should I expose my cowardice to him? Does Hector, a strong soldier, solid at the borders always, need to know my reason for fleeing? He had surely seen tears in my eyes before, in the froth of the ocean the first time we had met. Tears were weakness, and if I had been weak at any time it was then on the beach. Pulling back away from the orange tribrid I shifted my weight and decided. "When I came to Helovia I had just suffered a great loss. That loss still haunts me, in the darkest hours of the night and the loneliest moments of the day, but I had to run--when I left--I had to get away. The haunt was so great it shook each of my muscles and I felt cold down to the very core of each of my feathers. What I saw, in my waking dream, rocked me."

I turned my gaze away from the mammoth and looked back towards the cave. Long shadows cast on my features, seafoam eyes averted from the fire of Helovia and the fire of Hector. "It wasn't real. I see that now." I shifted again, unable to stand still as I cracked my chest open and watched the blood spill to Hector's solid hooves. "I am here, the only place I know is safe." The words falling from my tongue tasted salty and warm. The Dragon's Throat--Kri--had welcomed me among the ranks for my skill in battle, and now, alone as ever, my hooves yearned to serve the desert. "Have you ever had a night terror, Hector?" Using his name out loud seemed a sin, familiarities such a dark concept after my months of single travel. It felt wrong--although I knew it was not--to talk with this stallion in such a manner. Despite my background, living with the vagabonds of vagabonds, Ain had pounded the ideas of courtesy and respect into my very core.

Shaking my head, I turned back to face the brute. "I have been gone far too long, Hector, what happened in my absence?" How had the invasions gone? I turned back for a moment to looks at the entrance to the cave. When had that appeared? I returned my gaze to my brother, awaiting his response.