She heard the call from across the lake, basking along the embankment, striving for equilibrium and tranquility when all she could think about were the final moments of Kaos’ revelations. They bore and barbed against her, serpentine and loathing, and she tried to bury them back under her composed surface, where her eyes could stare dreamily at the water and pretend nothing irked, irritated, set her ablaze – but the emotions of her rage, of her bitterness, of her rancor (and subsequent failure at the silver mare’s dying breaths) weren’t enough to set aside. The Songbird tucked it away again, back into the waking tenors and trumpets of rumination, leaving it to simmer when she had the ability to pay it more due – hiding, once more, from the colossal remnants of her disastrous plunging. The thunderous bugle of Mortuus Nox was a blessing in disguise, bestowing distraction and purpose, instead of languishing in the nearby snow, incapable of conversing about what she’d seen, about what she’d heard, about the way life so cruelly blinded and slashed, lacerated and tore, at all of them.
 
So they flickered against the light, earthly beacons of a tireless generation, forging onward despite every ounce and vestige of destruction toiling beside them – she was used to adversity, eagerly, fervently, ardently clambered above it most days, baring her teeth or ensuing a grin, possessing earnest virtue over tragedy and tribulation; but eventually that too wore against her, echoed along the throng of her silence, of her eyes that stared at the ground and not at the trees, no matter how many times she’d been told to watch the canopies, the birds, the minstrels. They were not the first to arrive at the greenhouse’s welcome sight, and bowed their heads along the open aperture, winding away greetings and sincerities that didn’t mesh with the melancholy stored within. A forced smile reached her lips and curled upon her essence, a floating pretense easily rendered, casting her wholesome essence into the tender shoots and leaves, into the tiny gathering of those who wished to yearn (and she was grateful to the black stallion, who’d fought his demons and conquered the foes in his mind, who yearned to learn more and speak about the wares they held). “Hello!” She rang, a simple melody, a gentle beacon, one last shining light from the days where there’d been so few (afraid they were damned, consigned, to go out again) – pausing momentarily to glance at the stranger, then everyone else (sweet Tiamat, acerbic Albrecht), ready for learning. Her eyes landed on Mortuus as she brushed alongside the ocean mare, aligning her shoulder against hers so they were fostered and tied by elements, by strength, by vigilance, and she wouldn’t fall apart into a million tunes. “I’m keen to hear your wisdom, Mortuus.” Her faith remained gilded there too – golden and wondrous, dancing upon a harmonious string, waltzing along Imogen’s waving tails.