Volterra knows the pain of a mother's bite, too; Confutatis was not a gentle woman, and countless times he felt the sting of her venom upon his hide. She was not a loving dam, not by any stretch, although she performed her duty well by raising her two darling warlords from children with potential to adults with power. And, like Colt, she did it alone. Tyradon hung around long enough to see his foals born, provide Nymeria with a dragon and Volterra with an amulet, and then he was gone; gone to rule his own herd in the wilderness with countless other offspring, with barely a thought spared for his two skull-faced bastards. Whether it was this that drove Confutatis to such harsh methods, or whether it was just her natural desire to purge any weakness out of her children, he does not know. He only knows that he remembers pain, suffering, burning tears against infant flesh. He does not remember love, affection, the tender embrace of mother and son.

So if Kid is to assume his father does not know what it's like to grow up with only a mother around, and only a mother with a penchant for violence at that, then he is wrong. The only difference is that Volterra embraced this burden he was born with; he strived to impress the World Eater in any way he could, and he likes to think he's succeeded.

Maybe she'll return, one day, and find him a king. Maybe she'll be proud of him. Maybe she'll apologise, or maybe his success will be a vindication of her methods. He loves her, of course, and in hindsight he thinks her methods were the correct ones. They certainly worked - look at him now. Look at Nymeria. No weakness dares to burn through their blood, and he has the World Eater to thank for that.

Where were you? asks Kid. He would ask Tyradon that same question. Why weren't you around to show me how to fight? Where were you when I wanted to know if these urges inside me were normal, or if I was an abomination? Why didn't you care enough to show me how to live? "I was not where I should have been." By your side. For the first time, there's a hint of bitterness in his voice; a droplet of shame, a pinch of self-loathing. I should have been there.

He wonders if Tyradon would say the same should Volterra have been the one to ask that question. His lips twist into a humourless grin at the thought; no doubt the warlord would simply have told him to man the fuck up and get over it, to point out that no harm's been done, that he survived, didn't he? What more does he want?

Part of him wants to echo that sentiment to Kid. Man up, boy, you're not the only one in this world who's had a hard life. But he doesn't. Cruel he may be, but he's not that cruel.

His thoughts are disrupted by Kid's next words. Sabre is gone. She's been missing for weeks. He growls, stomps a hoof. "Shit." He snorts, shakes his mane, his muscles thrumming with energy and a desire to hunt down his only daughter and bring her home. He has not even met the girl yet; she cannot be gone. The thought sickens him, not just for his own selfish ends (losing a daughter, a useful daughter, is a colossal inconvenience) but for what it will do to Kid, too. If Kid and Sabre as as close as Volterra and Nymeria....Volterra knows that he would happily trade his own life for his twin to be safe. If Kid feels the same...then Volterra owes it to him to locate the other half of his whole and bring her back.

The goliath disrupts his dragons' hunt to cast a mental bullet into their heads. Find her, he commands. They point out that they don't know what she looks like, and he sends them an image of Kid. Like him, probably. Like me. Just find her. With howls of disgust at having their hunt disturbed, both red and gold fly in different directions to search for a child they've never even met. "We'll find her." He leaves it to Kid's imagination to decide whether that 'we' is Volterra and his dragons, or Volterra and his sons.

There is nothing he can do at this precise moment - he cannot ditch Kid to search for the boy's twin, although he intends to join his dragons in hunting the moment this meeting with his son finishes. For now, all he can do is teach the child that is here what he's requested. "Of course. We can start with the language right now, if you wish. It is easier to learn when you are young." He fixes the boy with his ruby stare, impassive despite the concern held inside for his missing daughter.