Knox!

The hunter runs on.

Wait!

He runs fast, too fast for his companion to follow.

Stop!

Every word falls on deaf ears.

The night drips with an acrid air and the darkness takes over everything. This is not the night he remembered running beneath years ago now. This night is something different.

He is too reckless to cloak himself but not foolish enough to rid himself of a disguise; under cover of Zekiah he is quick enough to run from his companion and leave her in the dust.

At a certain point, Manhattan stops running. After what seems to be hours, after his days of journey have stretched into aching stride and long night rides, she cannot follow him further. She has begged him to cease, to consider his reckless derailment and his anger, but she can do nothing for him now.

Would you listen to Aylin, the dog thinks to her bonded, the distance too great for the message to reach its mark, would you stop if you saw the truth--that this is why she left?

Knox doesn't hear her. Knox hears nothing. He takes over the night with a horrible drumming song, a deadly clamor of hooves in frost coated dirt, hooves carrying him over great distances. He doesn't stop, not until he reaches it--not until he reaches the North.

And there, he changes. For the first time since the night he lost his light to his own darkness, he senses Dovev's mind and lets it turn his heart.

The moon has abandoned you, Knox

Knox looks up at the black sky. The empty moon, the barest sliver of its white arc left behind, and shadow overtaking it. Shadow overtaking it like the dark has conquered his soul. Is it true? Has she really left him, forsaken him, and forced him to live in this wretched world alone?

He has no one. He has nothing. And this time, Manhattan is not here to correct his greed. His body shifts without him even realizing it, cycling through his forms as the snow begins to fall. He is so utterly and completely alone.

The hunter's body appears as the first's, lingering on the rough, old, white coat of the perlino. Here, in this massive expanse of ice beneath the dark cloak of night, he seems invisible.

But the faintest of sounds at his back and Knox is someone else.

The hunter's eyes flash to black and the body threatens to change entirely. His face snaps back to find the source of the sound and the mind of Dovev whispers darkness into Knox's once loved heart.

It isn't her. It will never be again. She's left you alone, you worthless colt, he says. And Knox knows it is true, and he feels in his heart a rage for all he gave his Goddess, and how little she gives him now.

That bitch.

—

[[Muriel only. Full permissions granted by Brit.]]