The Lord arrives alongside her, his dark figure imposing as usual with the same aura of blasphemed devilry radiating from him. As has become normal between the two, the man puts himself a fair distance away – something she thinks very little of because it is most satisfying for both of them to simply avoid one another if at all possible. Certain resentments harbored in her heart against her fellow leader left her wary of him, unsure of his ability to lead when the people would need a spokesman (for he was surely efficient at frightening away most opposition with his surly and dark demeanor) and still boundlessly offended at his use of his potentially lethal magic on her (though he surely knew how to use it by now and she had thrown a tantrum on the floor more so than been truly wounded by the incident).

He gives words to the mare who presents herbs between the two proud mountain rulers and herself and herd mates, allowing Illynx time to run her eyes across the myriad things that have been delivered to them as a sign of good will. It is not the first time the Edge has brought gifts, and she certainly won’t mind if it isn’t the last; she rather enjoys looking at the pretty blue scorpion that the once Glazier Kahlua had crafted for them, and the access to herbs that were not common in the northern lands was a welcome one.

She feels their suspicion when her eyes lift upwards to meet the dark mare – Lakota, says Evangeline – with a smile and a nod of gratitude to mirror the words that the Reaper instilled in the air. The third member of the party is one that she faintly recalls from the stories of Helovia’s past, but has never seen – and he too is sadly without a crown upon his brow as the two women who accompany him. Her smile gains a deeper edge of sincerity as her own jokes and humor make their way into her thoughts; it seemed that their friends beneath the Moon harbored quite a few equines.

Almost enough to say they were selective in their gathering, if she was the sort to start nasty rumors, and it didn’t change the fact that their king was a winged thing and that she knew there to be other mixed breeds among their fold; still, even she had a hybrid or two now, if she could assume that not all of her kin were entirely honest about whether daddy had been an undesirable mutt or mommy a winged whore.

If they had come to her mountain and taken in with the laws that kept it, she could accept such mistakes in their lineage – after all, they looked of clean enough blood for her liking, and that was all that mattered. In so far as Aithniel was concerned – the only obviously ill fit member of their fold – she would be the first experiment among many. Destry had fled, too proud to see the faults of her being, but Aithniel saw the truth more clearly than the poor child of Delinne had. There was hope for her, and hope for all others to follow in her path, if her heart could be changed, her path redirected.

She weighs their suspicions and her thoughts all while smiling her friendly politician’s smile and taking in what Evangeline has to say. It is not the answer she wanted most immediately, but it will do; it is an extension of the temporary peace constructed between Deimos and Mirage and has even opened a further door than the simple cease fire had.

They are steps forward, and promising ones.

”I would be delighted to accept such terms,” she cheerfully quips, ”and thank you for the gift of these herbs, they are splendid. Do expect a messenger baring plants of our own and metals in the near future, as a fellow gesture of kindness between my people and those of the Moon.”