She searched, her gaze lingering, probing Maren for questions as it held the tiger mare steadfast. Tell me her face pleaded, desperate for an answer, any kind of answer. Gaucho's death had not been Ampere's first experience with it - as a warrior you face the risk of death every day, and are more likely to watch your comrades fall alongside you. Yet this is the first one that really shook Ampere to her core. This wasn't just a horse that died, wasn't just a life that ended, this was Gaucho for fucks sake. Gaucho the goddamn Wildfire, the undefeated, the long-lived Sultan, the servant of the Sun, the holder of her heart and father to her children. If he wasn't strong enough, how could any of them ever be?

Maren, to her credit, always did her job. Whenever Ampere sought wisdom, she knew she could count on the striped priestess to offer a substantial opinion. So you can imagine the crestfallen look that overtook Ampere when she finally got an answer from this holy mare in whom she placed so much faith. We aren't often happy with the answers we find, not when we know we ask hard questions.

Time took his flame away.
The God of the Spark certainly had a literal moniker, enough to make Ampere wonder if it was the God himself or just his enchantments that snuffed out her fire. Either way, it wasn't the Sun, and that helped steal away some of Ampere's anger.

With that wall of anger gone, the one Ampere was bracing herself behind, Ampere slouched into the hurt instead. Each syllable of Maren's words detailing the literal why of Gaucho's mortal end was like the tide pulling Ampere deeper and deeper into the sea, soaking her until she was waterlogged with misery.
Sickness
He couldn't fight any more
He wouldn't want this of you...

Ampere sobbed silently beneath the Diviner.
What about the sickness she felt? What about her lack of fight? Why was she still here then, forced to do this day in and day out without him, not wanting any of it either, not wanting this shame, this guilt, this torment of letting everything go only to find she was dropping into nothing.

"Damnit Gaucho," she moaned somewhere amidst gathering her breath, and that final damnation, seemed to quiet her, exhausted by the release of everything else already tonight. Her head swam among the alcohol still tinging her body, and she felt like she was drifting as she lay still on the sandy waves underneath the night and the tiger mare.

Maren stepped off and Ampere tensed up against the withdrawal of the warmth; it left her feeling bitterly cold, making the loneliness more poignant. Maren's tone was kind, her offerings more so, and Ampere pinched her eyes shut against the perceived pity, hating herself.

Ampere had come to ask for more, to demand answers for her son's betrayal of a departure, to wonder if she should fulfill her quest, to inquire about all the bullshit the Earth once told her. She was quiet though, too busy suckling on what Maren had given her - besides, she knew the answers to the rest if she thought hard enough. So instead, Ampere merely said "Thaaaank yu."

Eventually she'd pull herself to her feet and stumble into the temple to ride out the night, sleep soon to take her as the liquor tucked her in.