[omg okay now I'm sorry that this is extremely late ;___; sorry! why must I always do this??]

She hums quietly as black legs pick their way through the stone and moss, disturbing whatever thin layer of mist the sun allowed. It is a tune she had picked up on her travels, a song of strange and wonderful things - of lovely maids lost at sea and silver fish and dolphins glittering in the sun, although she has condensed it into a simple affair, a few notes which sound suspiciously like the call of gulls and the gentle coo of the ocean. And she - the sterling girl who sings so softly, walks beside the cliff, swaying with each step as if content to be alive.

But is she truly?

Overhead, dark clouds congregate in an ugly mass, dimming the sheer stone and the girl upon it. She shivers with cold, casting a longing glance towards the beautiful darkness of the sea. What a charmed life indeed; so close, separated only by a certain death. Dark feet edge closer timidly once more, nose thrown carelessly beyond the threshold of life and death, of land and sea. She shivers once more, not of cold, but the realization of how vast the world really is, how separated you are from the things that matter most.

And then black ears catch the shuffle of rocks far below what is allowed to the living. With much care, her curious face cranes over the edge, straining to see what is below. Seabirds, she thinks, inching closer, casting her eyes lower. A dark rump? A leg? The tuft of a leonine tail? An ear twitches; it appears to be fine, standing, a hard shadow cast on the pebbles which are lapped gently by foamy fingers.

Huyana swivels around, hooves clattering recklessly on the stony face of the Edge. How will she reach this stranger, so sullenly against the sea? Muscles strain and pull as she is lured into a trot by the intrigue of this mission and the desire to reach her steadfast teacher, so mysterious and babbling and silent. What will you teach me now?

Wandering closely besides the treacherous overhang, those blue eyes search for a berth, an opening, some form of getting to where that dark stranger lies. A smile flirts on her lips, too dark to be truly innocent, and too innocent to be truly wise, but all she sees is tufts of dead grass sprouting from thin cracks in the rock and ash blown by hot salty breezes onto the flat pane of grey. She lets her nose fall to the ground, nostrils flaring as she tries to find the scent of stranger, the disturbed charcoal dust billowing and churning irritably about her head. An inky ear twitches backward; this smell is strange, something she has not found since the fall of Anarore. Death, and the rainchild recoils instinctively, nose wrinkled repulsively. There is a trail of it- sour and bitter and terrible and she follows it like a bloodhound.

It takes her dutifully to a narrow passage etched into the cliffside, and one stray step would prove to be fatal. With grace like water flowing down a steep brook, cloven hooves descend and silver-clad muscles roll and strain with effort. She can see the tides swirling onto the rocks rounded with centuries of erosion, sea foam and algae clinging to the pebbles. The smell is stronger here; it wafts into her nasal cavity and threatens to overpowerher, yet she stumbles from the path and into the shoal, suddenly faced with a monster of a man, as tall and dark as death itself. He broods like a rock against the sea, and she realizes the smell is from him, but he is not writhing in pain. The girl tosses her head back almost defiantly, blue eyes narrowed with curiosity and perhaps a little fear. She moves into the water, letting the ocean lap her black legs like a harmless dog. "You are death," rainchild whispers, although not to him specifically, not to anyone but the infinite expanse of blue.