það var farið að skyggja og fuglarnir þagnaðir It was not yet dawn, but the night was not the pleasant cool of Tallsun in his home; it was stifling hot, like standing next to a furnace, warm winds pushing against his northerner's skin and forcing sweat from his pores. Tall as he was he saw above the grasses, and once, when he had walked aimlessly for almost half the night, he paused where he was and raised his head in the darkness. The clouds had covered up the sky, hiding moon and stars, and with the seething, wounded anger seeping through his blood, he thought it was for the better, that he did not have to look upon the bright silver sphere tonight. Flaring his nostrils, the shattered marble-hearted turned his head back, into the past, staring for a moment across the span of minutes and hours and into something else — recalling the bright flash of a bolt of lightning, a familiar shape upon the sea of lavender as the sun bled out in the sky.

Fool.

He blinked, flicked his tail, only to feel it tangle within the plants. In a display of emotion startling upon his statuesque face he grimaced, an ugly expression upon such a cold face. Flicking his head even higher he faced the way he was going again, and tore free of the stalks, leaving a few long, white hairs to tell of his passage.

He could curse himself with a thousand names, but stupid and naive definitely tied for the most apt one. He'd met the black-and-white stallion before, oh yes, he'd met him and marveled at his grace and his aura, at how others seemed so drawn to him, but as he bore nothing but a twisted, jagged horn upon his forehead, nothing had picked him out as a God to Mauja the Fool. In a fit of sheer and stubborn stupidity he'd thought him nothing more but a complex, enigmatic and charismatic stallion — powerful, definitely, perhaps powerful enough to cheat the workings of time and age, but ultimately, nothing more spectacular than a mortal. And his manners, certainly someone who knew his power and his worth, but then, lacking the arrogance of his brother Sun, or the deceit of his sister Moon.

Only, he'd had it all along, hidden deep under his static skin. Mauja had never even tried to put two and two together, but he surely would've ended up with three. What he had known, had not been enough to piece the puzzle together. He had been happier then, when Spark had been nothing but an intriguing gentleman recurring in the twists and turns of his memories, happier when he had not known the God had torn him from this life and thrown him into another, across time and space and age. Passing the last of the tall grasses, the ground turned hard and warm underhoof, and with the hot winds rolling against his face he felt water drip down his nose. His frost melted in the face of the Gods' mark on earth, and his control crumbled; the nearer he drew, the more the firelight reflected in his savage, wounded eyes.

Such a fool — not even Psyche's reveal of a new God had sent his mind spinning, and seeing him again tonight-? And at the same time, he wondered why it was such a big deal — why he felt so cheated that the stranger, whom he had thought had something in common with him, had turned out to be nothing more but a deceitful, trickery, callous and soulless God. Flaring his nostrils and grinding his teeth together Mauja stood upon the brink of fire, the winds tugging at his mane but not cooling him, the flames roaring below his feet and reflecting upon his pale hairs.

"Bjáni."

And the cracked King glared into the churning fires of Hellovia.
þegar úlfarnir opnaði augu hans í myrkrinu.