She cut a path through the dense timber just to the south of the frothing, white waterfall; the marvellously concealed entrance to Hidden Falls which still intimidated her feeble soul terribly and defied all natural need to heed the cascading fury. Chipped hooves stepped with renewed grace and care, vigilantly straddling grassy tussocks along the way so that her direction could not so easily be traced - even if the soft, feminine fragrance of her presence lingered long after she had passed.

Emelda the Dreamweaver had instilled deference and obedience in her daughter, a tender-heartedness that had weathered well the earliest years of the child’s life; in fact, right up until her very first venture through the very forest whose gnarled shadows cloaked this latest wandering. Over time, the sinful and often spiteful existence of Helovian culture had eroded much of that early impression, the purity and naïveté; and where once a child of light and liberty had played frivolously and obliviously, a creature that had been broken and burned emerged – a shadow of the life which had been.

...Slowly though, that spirit the had been lost beneath grief and suffering was clawing back to the surface.

It was an adventure leaving the Falls without Rasta’s company. Through recent days her blind sister had become a pillar of strength and unwavering support, and Africa had steadied well by her nurturing side after the most heart wrenching end to the bond of first love. Of course Silas sailed swiftly through the canopy above, hardly willing to let her strike out alone; gliding and swinging between threads of new dawn light, though never straying far enough to lose sight of the dappled mare as she roamed through the mist veiling the forest floor.

A waking chorus lifted joyfully to welcome the morning and Africa was startled to a standstill, long black-tipped ears swinging tentatively all the while.

Though many trips had been made of late through the ancient woodland, both she and her guardian were more than aware of the danger lurking still at large – a murderer Midas had warned, and it seemed that the villain was yet to quench his thirst for spilled blood. It was for this reason she took such care to remain hidden, to move without sound and leave no evidence of her passing; with a tendency to attract tragedy, she felt due diligence on her part was a necessity.

A gentle nicker lifted through the songbird’s tune, and for a moment longer the Starry-Eyed hesitated to listen; to look with ever widening eyes through the sprawling mist and receding shadow for any other who might have been lingering nearby. Dull dappled pelt quivered nervously, as she wavered in place, but at the touch of her bonded’s reassuring grasp that tension soothed a little. I thought I heard someone, she whispered alone to him, and Silas nodded above ruffling feathers. You did...

Moments later a voice, quiet, but dissimilar to the first attracted her frantic ear, and cautiously she turned west through the forest to find the source. It took little time to find the two mares, and one it turned out was well-known to her; enough to rouse a sigh of relief from clenched lungs. Resplendence... The small, pale Edge mare was standing near to another, a stranger, and Africa blew softly through flaring nostrils as she approached. Lean legs slid alongside her herbalist friend, yet there was a pregnant silence about them, she thought, and the one-winged could not help but bow her head aside passively.