Springtime does not excite the same passions in the hunter as it might in his brother and others around him. He has no lustful youth, only the faded heat of emotional impotence. Archibald will have to be happy with him like this. The whole herd will have to be satisfied with Knox no longer himself, whatever that is, but a callous spectre. It is simply too hard to feel.

Continuing on, even just walking through this patch of the falls, is difficult enough. He snorts and snuffles, his nose dripping with the sweat that now coats him every time he wakes. His right side is a bloody mess, scabbing in parts, scarring in others, and infected in some patch or another. The eye is the most compromised part; the body fights it as it rots, and by some unnatural process seems to become hard like a stone. Is that the magic or dragonfire or his own power to give himself sight again influencing the damn thing?

No matter. Knox doesn't need it anymore. He doesn't need much to survive as a ghost.

His body sways side to side. Casually and without forgiveness he smacks his rump against tree trunks, letting their bark drag across his now thinned coat. Not sharp enough to scrape, but rough enough to irritate--every time he starts to let out a nicker he cuts it off with a bite, a sharp clanging of his teeth. Archibald's voice, uncharacteristically tentative seeming, is no surprise when it cuts through the wood and Knox's meditative state of injury. He snaps his head in the direction of his brother like a true hunter would to face its prey. He snorts, already impatient.

Fool. Aren't I meant to be the blind one? And yet I'm almost in front of him, and he doesn't see...

{Roanne:} Yuh cloak.

Oh yes. That old thing.

{Roanne:} Yuh fathurr or maguc?

Knox snorts and nickers aloud, loud enough for Archibald to hear.

Both.

Knox shrugs off the magic that had cloaked him in the warm dapples of the light without a second thought and pushes through the last layer of brush that separates him from where his brother stands. The right side of his face is a disgusting sight. "Archibald," he parrots back mockingly, waving his head low and side to side, something that looks sort of submissive and demented all at once. But he doesn't stay that way for long, and soon his body begins to shift. That same old thing appears, eyes gold and scars on his cheek still fresh like they were just made.

The Sentinel's body tenses and rises up. He steps forward, forward to face his murderer. His gold eyes flash and his head is risen like the sun of the forest he feels he once commanded with more power and influence than Archibald could ever conceive of.

"Archubuld."