Those pale, bright eyes meet hers, chips of cold glass in a frozen face, and Nym fights the urge to shrink back. Courage. It swells and pulsates beneath her dark veneer, an ebbing tide she can't hold onto. There's so much life raging in that wintry gaze; a fire that would belong more to red and orange than blue, a maternal caring the filly doesn't understand. How can this pegasus feel for what is not hers? How can she muster the slightest twinge of sympathy for someone she's never met before?

Lilómiel's chest vibrates against her shoulders, a dull, inaudible purr rolling in cadence to her heart's drumbeat. The silent sound rings and clamors away in the back of her brain, a shivering warning. Beware! Because maybe, however unlikely, the pegasus' benign interest was more malicious than it looked.

Nymeria's ears flick back uncertainly, audits snapping back to pin momentarily against her skull's crown. Simultaneously, her neck arcs in a sloppy question mark at odds with her composed—almost eerily still—features. Red eyes flick away from glacial blue, skittering downwards to land on her own small, familiar hooves. Silently she examines them. One, two, three, four. Four grains of sand. Five, six, seven, eight. Her focal point collapses inwards, and the tension melts away from her taunt sinews in the same manner of summer dew struck by the morning sun.

Anxiety quelled, the grullo's slender nostrils work wide; Lil chirps a welcome cadence, a fluttering and quiet trumpet. The notes wash over her, an elaboration on her symphony of familiarity.

And then it's interrupted by hooves drumming on sand and black wings and tossed-up dirt, voltaic eyes and a deafening presence, like a thunderhead or a stormcloud or a jab of lightning through the sky.

No subtlety.

Nym shrinks away, ears sloping back and tail flexing tightly against her haunches, jerked into a sudden and unpleasant fear by Ampere's arrival. There was a rather large difference between choosing to join a crowd as opposed to being swarmed by one, and it was a distinction she realized (imminently) she detested.

We'll get her back.
Eyes squint close and teeth clutch tighter.
I shouldn't have said anything.

She didn't want... someone else to get mom back. She wanted to be the hero. She wanted to save the day.

Nymeria wanted her mother's stamp of approval, and admiration, and love. Not for strangers to seize what should be her moment.

Blatant desire and conceit wage war, before she is sidetracked by Elsa's inquiry tip-tapping on her ears.

Who did it?
There's certain notes of fury begin to bud within a house of concern and well-meant care, an undertow unseen by the swimmers on the shore; but for now, she lets it wash over her, harmless. Maybe the pale pegasus was only feeding her curiosity. Nothing more, nothing less. And yet... that growing, fiendish... well, Nym didn't know how to describe it, but there was something gripping beneath Elsa's feigned control, something she wasn't sure she liked.

Still, she gropes for an answer.
In the passage of time it had all blurred together, dark features smeared in dust and shadow, burning flames and ash. It's difficult to pinpoint characteristics more tangible than wild and fearsome and primitive.

"I..." Swallow. Lilómiel's silvered talons hook gently, eight pricks to hold her together. "He was big, with horns like a deer and wings like a hawk, but mostly he was... loud." And not just verbally—but physically as well. There had been a certain way to his carriage that pronounced his swarthy muscles, sharpened his bones' edges, something equal parts captivating and terrifying... but mostly terrifying.

"I-I—" and she stutters off into silence, tail whipping across gray flanks. Ruby irises flicker away desperately, stumbling over sand and soil, searching for something to grasp her attention. Your name. Nymeria didn't w a n t to give up her name. It was precious; the sweet N melting into the 'y' and 'm', the eerie softness to the rolling end. You're being stupid. It wasn't as if Elsa was asking for her soul, after all. She just wanted to help her out... her and mom.

What if Elsa found mom? What if she didn't know what to tell mother because Nym had refused to tell her her name?

Choking down her bated breath, the filly moves closer to the snowy pegasus, attempting to use her body as a screen between her and Ampere. She didn't trust the tattooed mare; she smelled too much like burnt stuff.

"I... I'm not supposed to tell strangers my name." 'Cause, you know. Stranger danger. "... but since you're looking for mother, it's Nymeria." A weak smile twines on her lips, something faint and nervous and pitiful.

There was a snap of wings and a rush of cold air, a thunder of sound roaring for attention against the rumble of surf on sand. Her head belatedly snaps upwards, her subservient body language shredded by surprise as Edgar flaps his way down. Along her spine, her dragon recoils, muscles twitching and tying together until he readies himself into a hunting pose—prepared to surge into defensive action. Hardened ruby eyes, hawk's eyes planted in a draconian face, fixate on the white bird, claws shifting and sliding against Nymeria's fur in a pretense of aggression. Sharp anger licks against the edge of Nym's mind, a ragged blade chafing comfort away.

Elsa rolls her eyes, a glint of silver along blue.
It's more this capricious movement than Edgar's coo that relaxes the filly—even in their modest acquaintanceship, the pegasus is still more familiar than the odd 'phoenix'. And so, with a brisk settle down, Lil, the grullo lets her attention roll back to Ampere.

"She looks like me." Down to the skull marking. "And her name's Confutatis, but don't tell her I told you that. She might be angry."

Lil croons, replaying the black mare's questions in her head. Irascible, Nym shifts her weight, popping up a shoulderblade slightly, attempting to reprimand him gently by moving him off-balance. I know. His curiosity rubs against her cautiousness, hungering for whys.

But he doesn't need to know why, not when he can go combing through her brain anyways. She just hopes they don't notice she didn't answer the whole bit 'bout a place to stay. It might be nice to get out of the storms and her self-inflicted isolation, but she sure as hell didn't want to be packing up her bags and moving in with strangers looking for someone to solve their midlife crisis.

nymeria

what's a king to a god?