She saw it happen, watched the struggle from far away. At first she had taken the blurry black blotch on the ground for nothing more than a dark rock in the sea of snow, then figured it for a lone caribou hiking through the desolation. Curiosity peaked when it suddenly changed course, altered its direction and surged forward in a flowing lope that could only belong to one of her own kind.

How was she to know that the lone horse would turn out to be none other than her very own uncle? What was she supposed to do when his path led not to green grass, running water or pleasant company, but straight into an ambush? What could she do, when he was on the ground and she still far away, high up in the air and feeling as though she was at a standstill despite the wings beating hard enough to tear from the shoulders.

It was nowhere near the frantic drumming of her heart though, so loud that she was deafened to the roar of wind in the ears, Badger's desperate whinnies or her own furious, heart-wrenching screams. Erthë could do nothing but watch as her most favorite horse in the world was surrounded by monkey-like creatures, tied down by ropes and dragged headlong into nothingness, oblivion, there one second and gone the next. His voice was cut off and left regret, remorse and fear hanging like an echo, reverberating through the sudden silence and through the shocked, numbed part of her soul that still refused to accept the truth.

Badger was gone. Erased, picked up and removed from Helovia and her life as easily as one removes a pebble from the sole of the hoof. It was such a cliché but Erthë hadn't even known how much he meant to her before he was no longer there. An inerasable presence had suddenly become just that. Erased.

But she couldn't accept it. Panting, with the cold wind lacerating her throat for each ragged breath the filly fought her way over to the place where he had vanished. The trampled snow where she landed told the tale of struggle and defeat all over again, chilling her to the bone as hoofprints lay there, cut off in the midst of a stride - there one moment, gone the next. There, then not. Present, then erased.

Who could have done this? Who were those tall, narrow figures and what did they want with their ropes and shrill nasal voices? What did they want with her uncle, her Badger - didn't they know she needed him? Lost for words, for understanding of the situation, Erthë kicked about the snow as though turning it over might give her a clue on what to do. But there were no hints to be found, no scattered or discarded objects that might lead her on her way.

For the longest time she simply stood there, gazing dumbly into the void, waiting for the gentle gelding to return. But when the sun set she turned and began to slowly walk the long way home with her cheeks lined by frozen tears.

How powerless she was. It was about time to change that.

DANCING IN DARKNESS
to the sound of a drum