It was one of those days, when he was neither here, nor there — a day ringing of remembrance, of that Orangemoon morning so long ago when he had stepped into the land of Helovia past. That time, he had been met with the desolate, abandoned Steppe, and a single, stunted tree, the likes of which did not exist in the Frostbreath today. That had been the day Irma's egg had been given to him, to rest around his neck in an odd cradle of static; his fated companion, who he for so long had thought died with him, when he had fallen from grace. At first, when he had walked the land as a ghost of himself, she had been there, a presence in the back of his mind, a comforting weight squeezing his shoulder with sharp talons.

But then, she'd gone quiet, and he'd been left alone.

When the bond had gone dark, her emotions cut off from him and vice versa, he had been sure he'd died: that up until that point, he'd only been comatose, but now, his heart had given out. Odd, then, that he had not lost consciousness, or that Irma hadn't disappeared. Instead, she clung to him like a dying man clinging to the wreckage of his life. She seldom strayed far from him, even when her wings had developed fully and she could hunt her own food did she fly in his shadow. Now, his gaze trailed her as she glided through the Birdsong sky, her barring shimmering a deep, metallic hue. They were both too white for this place, and yet they'd wandered south. Her eyes, a mirror to his own, kept watching him; he could feel them on his back. Many times had he caught the young owl eying him with something that seemed to be worried sadness, until she caught him looking and blanked out. Now, he could not escape knowing it, all the time. One day he'd woken up, and their souls had been restored.

So if he hadn't died when he'd lost contact with her — what then? What did that make him now? Undead? Too many questions, and no answers, nowhere. The bond mending had given him a few days of a different mindset, of no less frustration but a deep shock which had stalled his thoughts, slowed them down. For a few days, he had been able to breathe, and though he enjoyed it, he didn't understand it, no more than he understood why she had come back into his mind. Would they be abandoned here, lost in time together? He had no answers, and at some point he'd given in to the pull of his hooves, and ended up south. It was one of those days, when he was neither here, nor there. No twisted copies roamed Helovia with him; to the north, it was only him, the owl and the silent snow. To the south, it was only him, the owl, and the silent forest. He knew this to be the Dragon's Throat, but it was different — the ocean lapped against the shore much further inland, and surrounding the oasis was a majestic forest, but no tree quite as majestic as the one known as Dragon's Blood. Taller than any of the others, it loomed against the sky, a landmark even in these ancient days. He'd been in the real Throat before, though never this deep in — had only heard of it, from the Helovians, the travelers, the tale-spinners... But he had walked this Helovia before, and stared up at it: it spread its boughs towards the sky, drank in the sunlight. Slowly Mauja stopped, and raised his head, peering up at it the same way he always did when coming here. He was alone, all alone except for his owl, in this ancient forest from a time so long ago.

Gracefully Irma rode the winds upwards, settling neatly on one of the branches. Her eyes surveyed the green spreading out below her, occasionally dipping down to her bond-mate below. His own eyes remained firmly upward, thoughtfulness etched into every piece of his body.

And slowly, the boundary between this world and the other one weakened. A spectral shadow of the Ice King, as much of a ghost as you could find, haunted the Dragon's Throat.

( he's not back or anything, but basically you can see him and the owl, though he's transparent and sort of shimmering, nor can he be touched (you'll just pass through). while you can't really see into his world, you can get the sense there's tall things around you (the trees) at the edges of your vision, but if you try to look at them you can't see them. ^^ )