It seemed she hadn't been entirely alert either. Only at the sound of his voice did she look up, her dark locks falling around her face. The unease he felt at the difference in her scent didn't lift; her gaze seemed different, too. It was the same blue he knew, but it was the way she looked at him.. and he was uncomfortably reminded of Leyra; the mare had left under quite harsh circumstances and returned as someone else.. but Delinne? She'd been in the Basin the whole time. Whatever transformation Leyra had gone through, surely Dell hadn't done undergone something similar? Was Leyra even herself? Mauja felt his heart pound in his chest, a thousand questions springing to life, a thousand worries, but he had no answers, and the black mare in front of him — he was not sure if it was right to call her Delinne, even though she'd reacted to the name — spoke his name.. and he despaired, feeling as if the last candle of hope had been mercilessly snuffed out. If she knew his name.. spoke it so familiarly.. the possibility that it was just a stranger looking like her seemed almost nonexistent.

He felt his heart, his mind, his eyes, close off. Cold seeped into his body, settled like a frosted shield around his soul; his head came up a notch, white hair falling listlessly from his neck, and the blue of his irises seemed to harden. Unyielding, his gaze refused to give his secrets away. It was as if someone had sucked the life and warmth out of him, leaving a statue of cold, smooth marble in its place. If not for the wind tugging gently at his long hair, and the faint rise and fall of his sides, he truly would've seemed something of stone.

He definitely didn't know this mare. He didn't like the way she smiled at him, the way she approached, like a snake coming in to bite its cornered prey; was her mere aura poisonous? Would he wither and die when she came closer, shy away, like from fire? The sway of her gait had him wanting to take a step back and pull his head away, but he forced his frosted hooves to not even shift, and merely followed her with wary, frozen eyes. He would not run (something he really ought to learn to do), because.. what if. What if it was Delinne, under some spell? What if she was having a psychosis? What if she had been a monster all along? He couldn't ignore the fact that he knew her body by sight so well, and that it was her, down to the smallest detail. It made him want to scream and rip her skin apart, see if they had the same heart, but how could he know? How could he figure out?

Cold and haughty he stood, her black body near enough that he could feel the faint warmth coming off her; her voice was a hushed whisper, and only with great effort did he stop himself from shivering. What the hell was going on? It was not at all flattering to have this monstrosity call him handsome, and his teeth remained so firmly locked together he wasn't sure he would be able to say a single thing. He didn't want to, either. He just wanted to.. to.. well, what? Run home to the Basin and see if Delinne was still there?

Was hallucinating better than her being the mad one?

But then, Tvíburi — for he certainly did not want to associate all of this with Delinne-the-gentle — snorted, and some of the spell was broken. But she kept smiling, that predator's smile, and he had the sudden urge to kick her to wipe it off her face. To see a stranger smile at him that way with Delinne's face...

"I smell weird because I am weird, hálfviti." The words were past his tense jaws before he had fully thought it through, and once it caught up with him what he'd said, he wondered if he was losing it, too. "You're not Delinne. You can't be." His voice was rougher than it should be, like the jagged edges of a mountain, and he stared at her with cold eyes. If she'd just disappear.. like a shadow melting away in the moonlight...