She thought the gryphon was asleep.

Want fish.
"As long as you clean up the mess."

A pause, still and shocked. The well of silence that extends between them, an abyss of emptiness and disjointed minds, untouched despite their every attempt to bridge the agonizing crevasse... it ripples, and morphs, and then, in an audacious surge of kinetic energy, riots.

White and black and gold they run, leap, laugh, a deep exaltation overtaking them as gryphon and mare realize once more that they are one. The swell of emotion is nearly unbearable, crashing waves filled with aquatic ideas digging into the embankments of each others mind and tearing them down, until wants and needs and desires are shared and spread, flowing from one to another in a smoothly chocolate stream of consciousness. One tells the other of the emptiness, the worry, the joy, the fear; all the emotions she has endured since they were apart, and the other shares her own range of ideas and thoughts and images and words. And words, words- Reesheemah, croons the gryphon with avian affection and childlike adoration. "Kali," replies the mare with love as deep as her accented voice, laughing at the beak that plucks at her mane and preens invisible bugs from her thick winter coat.

She did not know how much she loved her companion until their bond was broken, and did not know how much she missed until their hearts retied.

In the distance, they can hear a dragon's cry. As one they breathe a name, caressed and delighted and reverent. "Mirage," they say, and Rishima lifts her hooves in a fluid, hurried, needy run. Her sister has come home. On long limb and wild wing they make their way though the woods, a girl and her gryphon on their way to see all become right in the world.

But Kali is weak, and soon she grows tired, too tired, worn down from her exposure to the demon's magic and the loss of her life to his sinister grasp. She falls onto the mare's back, protesting weakly to the rolling motion of her hips, so that Rishima is forced to slow to a walk, concern deeply lining the midnight of her chiseled face. Dimly chirps the hybrid, an attempt at reassurance - "Shh," the mare chides. "You just need to rest." In the misty light Kali blinks, and stretches, and settles down to nap atop her bonded's rump.

It is thus that they find them, the others, the waiting and the weary come to greet their restored leader. The golden dragon towers over them all, the two arrived, the one on the wing, and the stranger. She sees Lace, who stands tall despite being so bruised and broken. His honor saved her Kali; and someday she shall perhaps repay him for that sacrifice. It shall not be forgotten. There is Torasin, too, and she wonders what has happened to the love he once bore her sister, if he still longs for her as she suspects he once did, or if it has changed in the wake of time and turmoil and the sons I am told he sired. There is Ink, sweet Ink, the silent stallion who she really ought to get to know better. And then a stranger, a draft creature who stands beside Ink and speaks not.

And there is Rishima, and she steps out of the darkness and into the warmth of her herd, and wonders what caused such a miracle, but does not really care. The stealth of Deimos, his stupid attempt at escape - had it led to this? Does it matter? She wants to run to her sister's side, to examine the draconic body and soul and ensure that it is whole, but she does not. There are more urgent things to attend to, more pressing wounds. Lace stands beside Ink, and with a fluid motion she slides between them, not close enough to touch Lace, just close enough to offer him support, a warm exhalation ghosting over the shorter creature's ears and neck, a silent but heartfelt thank you and I'm sorry.

Upon her back, Kali stirs, cerulean eyes fixing anxiously on the sleeping white dragon as strains of concern chase away the heavy exhaustion that pulls at her soul. With effort she shifts, stands, and calls softly to the older beast, creeping across the gap between her bonded and Fajira's without a second thought - after all, this was her Lace - and laying a gentle claw on the little dragon's back.

She reaches behind her wing, and comes back with a long white feather.

Eat, she instructs, for Fajira and Rishima to hear, edging the black-tipped thing closer to the sleeping dragon's weary face. She does not quite understand that Fajira is unconscious, only that she is hurt, and that the feathers helped before. Eat, she says again, more urgently now. From behind her comes Rishima's deep voice, telling her to let the dragon sleep, but she ignores it - after all, she can help. Why would they stop her from doing that?