Romina is a bit of a daddy’s girl.

She’s not ashamed of her deep love for her parents. They were beautiful souls, and she idolized them. There was no pedestal taller than the one she had placed Ashamin and Hotaru upon. Though she considered those outside of her family - and to a lesser extent the ‘family’ of the Basin herd - to be far from important or meaningful, she reserved her overwhelmingly sincere love for those who had nurtured her from birth. The ones who had looked past her oddities and loved her anyways. If Romina could grow to become the perfect mix of her parents, she would live life happily. Though she was undeniably close to Hotaru partially because of the fact they lived together, Romina did not forget her nomadic father.

Perhaps it was the cold to drive her once more from the haven of the mountains. Certainly it had inspired many of her previous travels. Though she had been born into the frost and frigidity of the Basin, her thin form and spring coloration seemed to determine her preferences for her. Whether her distaste of the Northern climate would decide her future path for her or not was yet to be seen. But she knew even in her youth that she would not leave without her twin by her side. Yet she was confident in the fact that he would follow her. To the ends of the earth, if she so desired. Where one treaded, the other was not far behind. Today however, she does not have her brother’s companionship as she wanders into the wilds. But it does not mean she is alone.

Alice is a lurking companion as graceful legs pick down the mountain paths, bounding through the thick snow of the steppe with a sneering pout on her pretty face. She is grateful that her abnormalities at least allow her to traverse the snow faster than her full-equine kin. But Romina will never stop hating the fact that one must travel through the snow drifts of the pass to reach the borders of the Basin. It does not deter her however, for she is on a mission. Alice keeps up easily, flicking here and there in her vision. A silent guardian. Allowing Romina her adventure, but keeping all threats at bay.

The forests and trees welcome her as she journeys onward, sheltering her from the sweltering sun that filters through the branches of different trees. They cast differently patterned shadows upon the forest floor, dappling Romina’s cinnamon hide like the fawn spots on her body. The sun arcs and sinks as the days go by, but Romina does not fear the wilds. She is young and carefree, unaware of the dark things that lurk in the night. The only shadows she knows are the ones she casts, the machinations that are yawning and stretching tentatively in her growing mind. In time, her mother’s manipulative nature will bud inside her, and her devotion to family (and only family) will lead her to the scientific manipulations of others. Innocent curiosity fueled by her selective loyalty. Until the day she is faced with the horrors of the world, when that innocence shatters and the diamond soul inside her - the strength of her parents passed down, a legacy, a mantle she will take up - demands that she conquer the shadows of the realm around her. So that she would never be weak again. And nothing was safe; she would utilize everything to protect herself and her family, and everybody else could burn beneath the fires of her might.

But those times will come far later. For now, she is a fawnling child drifting aimlessly through crackling grass and wooded undergrowth. Alice keeps her on the right path, for she only has a description and a direction. East. To the sun. To the bloodied lands and the crimson rivers where her father promised she could find him.

When she comes upon it, it’s unmistakeable. And far more alien than Romina had anticipated. Alice comes to her side as they slowly make their way into the trees that remind her of maples. For a moment she’s nervous, wondering how she’s supposed to find her father in this land she doesn’t know.

Alice seems to notice her hesitation, and lifts her jowls to the heavens to howl. Ashamin should at least investigate the noise. Wolves did not howl often in the middle of the day, and certainly not without the response of a pack. Nose twitching nervously, Romina calls out into the shadows.

”Papa? Papa, where are you?”