I felt him lean into me and my worries seemed to quickly melt away. I wasn’t worried about anything anymore. He seemed to be alright from the burns and scarring he had endured from the fight, enough so to swallow me up with him in this little limbo of content and happiness. I breathed a sigh of relief, feeling him reciprocate the feelings even more, and I began to smile into him. Then I heard his voice gentle but calm, speaking into my skin. “I’m glad to hear you care for foals, Rex.” and with that short phrase, I realized I hadn’t told him the truth before. I hadn’t told him about everything I had endured in my life and why I was the way I was. Perhaps now would be a wonderful time to start.

I nodded slowly, pressed up against his chest for a few moments before feeling his lips trace over my mane and withers, causing a gentle sensation of pure happiness to creep down my spine. I shivered slightly, and listened as he replied back to the last few words I had said. He was right. It would take more than a god falling on him to lose him. Mainly because I’d more than likely go absolutely insane as well and have nothing more in mind than to kill the god that had done this. I nodded to him, but said nothing. I wasn’t sure exactly what to say. I didn’t want to evoke worry into him that if I lost him I might as well be shipped off the lands because I’d be known as the one who went insane.

Clinging to him, I couldn’t help but want to be closer. All of the time apart was beginning to take a toll on me that I wasn’t sure how to handle. I heard his next set of words about a gift for me and my ears perked gently. Oh, so he had a gift for me as well? I had one for him but I was entirely unsure of timing and whether or not I should give it to him or not. I had found it previously just after the fight before searching for my warrior of a lover.

“First, I want to say that I love foals. I just.. I have a hard time being around them for awhile.” I said softly, slight defeat rushing through my lungs. I pulled my head back and gazed at his broad face; blue orbs searching his sapphire ones. “I suppose now is a great way to let you in on my past that I wasn’t so entirely honest about beforehand.” A slight smile traced the corner of my maw, a little joke that still carried pain behind it was very noticeable in this moment. I looked away from him for a few moments to gather my thoughts, staring off behind his shoulder at the towering bamboo from the maze around us.

Inhale… Exhale… Inhale…

“Back home, where I’m from, I wasn’t exactly a princess.” Beginning, I held off a sharp edge to my words. “I was a servant child. I had grown up serving my kingdom and the King himself. We were a land full of Equines that had dedicated the Uni’s as their Kings and Queens. But I was different, you know? I have a horn after all. I didn’t fit in. So growing up I always found this to be strange and the King always held some distaste for me. My mother had told me it was because a poor servant child had been born with a horn and that stopped all my questioning. However, at this point when I was serving the King, there had been talks going around. The neighboring land of the North which was inhabited entirely by Pegasi had been thinking of attacking us for our resources. So our King had reached out to them in hopes of negotiation.”

I paused, pain slightly crossing over my blue gaze as I spoke of the North. I lowered my head ever so slightly, almost afraid to look at Tembovu in the eye. “There was a problem with the negotiating. The only way the King of the North would consider it, is to combine the lands with a princess for his son. But the King hadn’t any children, as far as I knew. There wasn’t a Queen although many had spoke of her hushed around me and I never really knew why. Then my King had brought me to speak with him in private. During that time, he told me that I had been the princess he had with the Queen – My true mother – and during birth, I had killed her with my horn. Apparently it had grown more than most do at birth and it had detrimental effects.” I rolled my shoulders slightly, growing more uncomfortable at every pause.

“So, he introduced me then to the life of a Princess. The land growing to know that I had been the princess in hiding because of my deeds an innocent child had done. Though as I found out later, I was – absolutely – innocent. Now, as you can imagine, the King of the North was very suspicious. As should anyone be, really. It was very… strange. Either way, I ended up moving to the North. It was chilled, like the Basin. Snowy and full of crevices and caves as sleeping places. That’s where I met the Prince of the North. He was… kind for the most part. I don’t know, I felt so much pressure to continue the legacy with the Prince to make the King and Queen happy. After about a year, I ended up pregnant with his child.” Muttering toward the end, I nearly felt blind and blurred thinking back to it and nearly reliving it.

“They had... such interesting powers. They had fire breathers, creatures that could make anything grow that they wished. I was surprised by most of what I saw, but nothing was more surprising than the Prince’s. He could invade your mind and live your life and find memories you never even knew you had. It was such a terrible, dreadful experience, Temb. It was so painful and terrifying, seeing your life literally flash before your eyes nearly in death’s grip. That’s when we found out that I hadn’t killed my mother. As it turns out, my mother The Queen of the East had slept with the general of our military. And that’s how I came to be.”

Looking up to study his face, I offered a small half of a smile. “If anything I was only ever half of a princess. Half of military. Entirely a mistake.” My defeat was felt with each pause of my words. “And after that experience, I was traumatized. In pain, broken, terrified. I – I ended up losing the child. I lost him because I couldn’t protect him from the ways of his father.” The thought was fluttering through my mind, remembering the heartbreak of the miscarriage. It had been nearly two years since then. The poor child wasn’t even fully grown. I was unable to carry him to term, but I knew deep down that he was going to be a little boy. I never named the child, I wasn’t sure if I should have. Nor did I ever tell the Prince. Not since I had been banished. “They invaded the East and killed nearly anyone there that sided with the King. I was banished, but still carried a bounty on my head. I did my best to evade it and become someone else to not fit the description that had gone through the lands I was in.”

Heaving a heavy sigh, I pushed myself to him again. Crowned head brushing up against his darkened pelt of his chest. “I didn’t even name him, Temb. I couldn’t – I didn’t know what to do.” My words became more jumbled as the story went on, my phrases pausing in weird breaks as to not allow me to cry. But I kept the lump in my throat and swallowed quickly in the attempts to keep it from surfacing. This wasn’t supposed to be my pity party – but he needed to know the truth. And there’s nothing more saddening about my life than the absolute truth that I was terrified to speak of.




Rexanna