As Dragomir had done for her not so many seasons ago, Ranjiri is swift to offer her comfort and concern for his lost parent. Her usual softness returns, concern rising from beneath her glower, and, though he’d have eagerly swam into her crimson eyes on any other day to bask in their offered care, today’s emotional state leaves her sympathy ringing with a sense of sorrow he can’t shake.

So, when she shuffles closer, her voice gently tending to each word, Dragomir feels his heart become a tight knot in his chest, the girl definitely right about one thing: he dealt with his pain quietly. Even when it feels like his heart is going to become mere dust before floating away, he keeps his tongue still.

She’d have gone with him?

So many parts of himself begin to writhe. Could she have? He thinks of Adalwulf, and the way of life that the otherwise upstanding and honorable man followed, and barely manages to withhold his frown.

No, Ranjiri could not have come with him. It eases the ache in his chest that, maybe, he’d been the one to blame for not being the man Ranjiri had chosen to keep as her own.

Her lips gently caress his cheek, where the tears threaten to trek. His head remains still, still as stone, his crystal eyes closing, really feeling the careful embrace, letting that dream settle down, warm and radiant, alongside the cold, bitter reality he found before him. Nodding in reply to what she says, he cannot find his words. He is sure she will understand.

His ability to speak retreats further within himself, glad that she’s talking now of her new life, to distract him from the life with her he’d gave up when he followed his siblings away. She speaks of her family, her mother, and her brother, and Dragomir tries his best to smile and join her in her joy. He wonders when she will mention the other part of her family, the part she has chosen, and made, but is not so eager to ask about them, either, preferring to hide in the unknown for as long as he may.

Roughly rubbing his cheek against his knee, he looks back up at her with surprise at what she says next.

"Czarina?" blusters the deeply voiced stallion, a proud smile flickering across his face, despite the cold, dark ache in his chest, "I am so happy for you, Ranjiri."

She’d be a great leader, he decided then and there, knowing from experience her bravery, and her ability to care for others with all she had. Even when others abandoned her, or abused the loyalty that bound them, Ranjiri was always there, waiting to take them back into her heart. She fearlessly charged into battle against Gods, and had always spoken up against, what Dragomir had determined through his own experience, anyway, to be the wickedness of the world.

Even though he feels genuine happiness for Ranjiri, the offer to live here, with her, in the shadow of the ache in his chest feels like too much; at the same time, however, he feels like he owes Ranjiri what he can give her, even if all he has is himself. She had, after all, always been his friend, eager to assist him through whatever tribulations he encountered, and what bigger trial could there be, truly, than ruling a herd? Having worked with Kahlua through a similar path, his heart cast aside for another, and his loyalty still tied fast to that which still beat in a woman’s chest, the crafter cannot help but inwardly dismay at the ironic luck he seems to have.

"I… I am not sure," he says, brows again knitting down, his eyes flickering down to his hooves in indecision, wanting so badly to ask the question he is equally afraid to know the answer to, "I wouldn’t want to be bothersome."

Or taken as a threat by a stallion who’s woman I clearly admire… he thinks, eyes trailing on her pregnant body as he lifts them back to her face.

"I have no desire to fight as a warrior should, and I am no longer able to make glass. While I can still work with nature itself, the items offer little in the way of longevity," continues the stallion, perhaps more to distract himself from his dark thoughts, than for any real purpose, "But if you need me, I can stay."

I want you to need me.

"I would do my best to serve the Earth’s people," sadly smiles Dragomir, "and you."

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