A wraith, there upon the foggy beach, breathing in brine and water, drinking in the sound of it lapping against shore. His shore. Every so often, the mist around his muzzle thickened, a plume of white - life - drifting upwards to somewhere above his head. He felt detached. Distant. As if the black, warm body cradled against him wasn't here, as if Psyche, bright amber eyes focused on someone else - someone who wasn't he. An impostor. Yet Mauja's gaze, ever swirling, never showing, spun across the landscape, across the bodies, his black-tipped ears straining to catch the faint sounds of their heartbeats. Chests rose and fell. Time seemed to slow. "That's difficult to answer," she said, and he felt some faint hope flicker, and die out. Of course she would not tell. Of course she'd not rip open her black chest and spill her bloody secrets on his sands, bare the truth to him. She was just as secretive as he, clutching truth so close to his bones that the lies filled every void, making it near impossible to untangle everything - life, words, emotions, plans. Which parts of his schemes were honest, which parts things he did simply because the lies had etched themselves do deeply that he thought them to be truth? Psyche had wished to dance as he did, upon the knife's edge, cutting up her feet if she misstepped. She had wanted to lead the Plague but had abandoned it all. Of course she would not come home and tell him why.

He had no real desire to answer her, merely stared at her with a stubborn sort of look on his face - thinking, guarding his secrets, mixing truth with lie and making sense of nothing. Tamlin spoke, and like a robot, the father repeated some of the words before breaking into a harsh laughter. "Worried for your-? Pah," and his cold, calculating gaze settled upon the mare again. When on earth had Psyche cared for anything beyond her own advancement, and that of her daughter (or even that, as she had taken the filly and left)? She had barbed him, thinly veiled, about Tamlin's conception - the notion that she'd care for the snowcap colt was laughable. Mauja snorted, vaguely amused, and gave his head a minor shake. Tamlin was too young to understand. And if Mauja challenged her about it... his son would get caught up in the middle of a relationship war. He had no desire to put him through that.

"What do you want, Psyche?" he asked her tiredly. I gave you everything. Seed, trust, duty - I would have given you a crown, had you not left me. What more do you want to take from me? He could not believe it if she said she was back to exist, for him, for Snö - Snö wasn't even here god's sake! Snö had taken one look at Tamlin and bolted like a rabbit, and he guessed he should be thankful that Psyche wasn't running too. But would they ever get along? Lotus aspired for something, that much was obvious to the King, and Psyche would get in her way. Lotus would get in Psyche's way. Tamlin and Snö were tangled up in God knows what. If not for his children, he would've asked the Gods to turn back time and freeze the semen in his balls so he'd not be able to produce any child. Then maybe the subtle, warring mares would not seek to use him as a weapon in their striving for power.

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