She had been a monster and it broke her heart.

The painted girl stood beside a tree in the Threshold, staring forlornly off into the distance. It would be the distance that led her away, to follow in Alysanne’s hoof prints. Except she would not promise a return, the way Aly had done. How could she, after what she had done? Truth be told, she wasn’t entirely sure what had happened. She had been with friends, ready to welcome Ayelet to the herd when… She shuddered just thinking about it. The attack from Ranjiri. The bite wound on her neck was still visible, faintly, a scar that she tried to hide with mane that wanted to rest on the opposite side of her neck. The resulting chaos of some chunks of hair on the left and most on the right just made her look disheveled- a look she rarely wore. After all, though she had given up flaunting herself to get her wants, she hadn’t given up looking well-groomed. Until today. She didn’t even care.

With a heavy sigh, she shook her head, the metallic scorpion settled between her ears creaking and groaning its protest. Still, somehow, it managed to stay there, entwined in her forelock, tail twisted over its back, watching with this mysterious, lifeless eyes. Unfortunately, it was just one more thing to remind her of what a monster she had been in the weeks past, and the automaton would not remove itself from its position. Not that she had tried very hard.

Turning her head back towards Helovia, a sudden rush of faces flashed through her head. Tangere and her friends, Luken and Aaron, Accalia, Lena and her group, the little kitsune Imogen… They were faces that looked at her accusingly, angrily, judging her for what a beast she had been. And the death that had followed her… she shuddered again. How had she reveled in it just days ago? But they were not the only faces that passed before her. Mirage, Resplendence, Kaj, Aly, Brisa, Apodis and so many others. These faces hurt even more to see. How could she face them knowing what she had done. Did they know what she had done?

A single tear fell down her cheek. She was all cried out.

With a forlorn whinny filling the air, Kahlua turned back towards the exit from Helovia, a doorway into her own personal hell. It killed her to want to leave, but she couldn’t stay. It was for her friends that she took a step forward now- it was perhaps the only selfless thing she had ever done. But somehow her friends seemed more important now, and who was to say Lena’s cure was permanent? She could turn back into a scorpion beast at the drop of a hat. No. She had to go. That was all there was too it.

It hurt worst of all that she couldn’t even say goodbye first.

@[Kaj]

Scabs from Imogen's fire pulled at her front legs as she walked, the gentle tug reaffirming what she kept hoping was all a dream. But not matter how much she urged it away, no matter how many times she closed her eyes or bit her cheek or kicked herself, it didn't matter. She wasn't sleeping. She was living a nightmare, recovering from a trip to hell, and so lost in her sorrows that she wasn't even scared for herself anymore. Not out here, not in the Threshold. There were shadows behind every tree, cracking branches with every gust of wind, but all she could think was that it didn't matter anyway, because she was a monster, a freak of nature, a walking death trap. What had she done.

Suddenly, she stopped, a sound breaking the silence of her slow trek outward. Kahlua. Maybe this was the sound she had been waiting for. Maybe she hadn't wanted to leave at all. Maybe all she needed was a friend to come find her. Or maybe she was just weak. She turned, knowing the voice despite the husky, scratchy sounds that had infiltrated it. It was Kaj, no doubt about it. And when she saw him, she knew it was not only she that was weak, but him. But she was weaker. And as he hobbled towards her, she hobbled back, the burns preventing her from moving too fast, but not preventing her from this reunion that, perhaps, she had been secretly longing for.

As they joined, and Kaj brushed his muzzle against her neck, she tried to brush back, gentle at first, because she was scared. What if she should turn back, what if she should become that monster again, bite him, tear him to shreds, rip him apart and leave him mottled and even more broken. Gods. If she did that to him. A choked back a sob, but suddenly caution gave way to need. She tried to press harder against him, just her head into his neck, but she found she needed that warmth, required it to live. How long had she been alone? Spurred into motion by the closeness to another, the scorpion automaton moved down her neck to settled at her withers, but she hardly felt it. And eventually she remembered the pain in his voice, the way he had struggled to come to her, and she stopped pressing, murmurs of “I'm sorry, so sorry,” overlaying Kaj's voice as he started speaking to her again.

But as he said he had been looking everywhere, her voice started tumbling out, too many words trying to get said at once. She just couldn't wait. He had to know. The words had to be said, because what if... Oh god, what if. “You wouldn't want... I was attacked... My friends... Kaj... Aaron! I bit him!” And through those fragmented words, blue eyes straining to look into Kaj's own, she tried to tell him her story, and she was greeted with timely words. Hush. And something in the way he said it made her fall silent, the way he took control when she was losing it with every choice she made. Hush. She clung to the word, hung on it, grabbed it, repeated it, pressed it against her heart. Kaj was here now. Hush.

And the caves. She shuddered just to hear about them, to remember the monster that had attacked them, to remember the feelings that he had forced her to know. Her past, her brother, her family. Being alone. Perhaps he had not been so evil, she might have wondered, if she were in a state to think such things. Perhaps he had been an omen, a warning, and they had never listened. He had been the harbinger of the death storm that had followed, the spear point that had brought upon this whole darkness. And all she could do was look at the pegasus before her, body shaking, scabbed legs screaming at her to stop, hoping he wasn't telling the truth. The cave. Where.... Hush.

But the stallion was insistent, demanding she hurry, and she was so confused, the need for immediate action conflicting with her desire to just sit here and cry, to turn towards Helovia's border and run away where she wouldn't be a threat. But he was Kaj and she was weak, and she would always follow him. He was her king, he was her friend, he was something more that she could not name. But whatever he was, she knew, somehow, in head and heart, that she could never turn away from him. I only want you safe.

And because she was scared, because she could not help herself, she tried once more to press her nose against his neck, to feel that warmth, to know that he lived, to try and test herself, making sure she could resist biting him, making sure that she would not turn on him the way she had turned on everyone else. “Kaj... they're going to hate me,” she murmured into his skin, shaking her head, sighing, before pulling away. Nevertheless, she began to walk, turning back towards Helovia's Heart, back to the fire bit that boiled endlessly, back to the caves that were her living nightmare, back to the underground that hid demons and broken memories. But she could do this, with Kaj at her side.

And as she walked, the pull of the scabs against her legs reminded her once more of Lena healing her, of Imogen jumping towards her, of fire eating at her hair and flesh. Fire, which reminded her then of something else. Something he had to know. Because better he know now, before he braved the inky shadows for her, in case he should wish to disown her. “Kaj,” she murmured, even quieter now, voice shaky for so many reasons, as though whispering might make the worry she felt go away, repeating his name, to make sure he was really still there, not just a figment of her imagination. “There's something else I need to tell you...” She had been trying so hard to put herself in his good graces, to live as he had said she should live, to make things better with their unicorn brethren and not worse. She had tried so hard, worked through problems she had no solution for, come out on the other side. Had she gone to far. “Do you... do you know Mauja?” Hush.

Feathers brushed over her back as she pressed into him and the world disappeared around her. It was only her and Kaj, the forest gone, the darkness permeating Helovia disappeared. His wings were her safety net and for that moment they were two hearts beating as one, together in a tent of their own. Kahlua wished they could disappear from the darkness, be teleported to a land where shadows did not bite at your heels with every step, where the sun rose every morning and she didn't go to sleep at night screaming with nightmares. But as quickly as the thought occurred to her, it disappeared again. She knew that she could never leave here. Neither of them could. They had too many here that were friends and family. Kaj had to stay and protect the Qian. And she was bound to them all by her love. But he made it so hard to let go of that goal, he made it so easy to lose herself in the feathers.

How he could stay with her when she was so clearly a monster was beyond her, but she did not think too much about it. She was against him again, once more hidden in his feathers, once again feeling his warmth against her. But perhaps he knew something that she didn't, because he spoke and calmed her, his voice seeming to hold wisdom that she could not find in this terrible time. She felt bad for the pain he must feel in holding her the way he did. She had seen how he struggled to walk. She knew how it pained her to do the same. But in addition to being weak, she was selfish. She wanted him to be close, wanted him to stay by her forever. He was her guiding light in this midnight massacre. And he did not protest, so she didn't ask if it pained him.

She wasn't sure she believed him when he said they wouldn't hate her, but it was one more thing for her to hang on to, to try to trust in, to help drive away her fears, and so she tried to, she wanted to, she needed to. The way his breath brushed over her ears made them flutter, not unlike her heart, though she attributed it only to her nerves and stress. And then she found strength in the way he spoke, the way his warriors heart came out when he was determined. He was her brick, her anchor. They called him Storm Bringer but he brought no storm to her life. He was the wind, blowing the gale away. He was the sun, drying the rain.

If she could have held his wing over her forever, she might have, and so it was like he read her mind when he lowered his feathers over her back, protecting her from tree and shadow, from the chilly air that was blowing under the autumn sun. His closeness was her lifeline and she kept her side touching his, though lightly so as not to crash into him as they walked.

As he repeated the story he knew of Mauja, the girl was tense, trying her hardest to judge the sound of his voice. But she was never good at it anyway, and being so stressed, she just didn't know what to think. But whatever worries she had melted when he asked if the stallion was troubled. No anger, no judgment; a simple question. Is he in need of help. And finally, after all the shaking tears, after all the worry and stress, the painted girl found a smile. A small one, just the tiniest turning up of the corners of her mouth, but it was there, a smile in the darkness. For Kaj.

“I became his friend,” she started, looking to him. And because she was no secret keeper and couldn't be if she tried, the rest of the girl's words came tumbling out in time. “For you, because you were right and I was terrible to that unicorn at our border... I never got to say I'm sorry.” Her blue eyes looked towards his as they walked, hoping that she could find some sort of acceptance of her apology in his gaze. “He's innocent, it was an accident,” and she rambled on for a while, the story of how strong Mauja's phobia of fire was, how she sympathized because her family had lost their home and lives in the fire, and how Torasin had attacked first and Mauja had simply reacted out of fear, using his ice magic in response to Torasin's fire. Saying how it had been an accident that Torasin had landed on the large ice spike, how it had punctured his chest and how he hadn't had a chance.

“I forgave him,” she concluded. “I told him I would help him, when he came for his trial with the Qian.” She took a deep breath and finally said what she had been thinking ever since then, what seemed so relevant right now. “Fear shouldn't be a crime, Kaj.” She hoped he would understand, thought he might, but didn't trust herself to be right. She looked down and pressed her neck against his, if he hadn't left her side. He would understand... right?

How lucky she was, to have found Kaj and to have tumbled into his wings- both now in her terror and so long ago, when they had just met. Lucky, to have found the stallion that completed her in ways she never expected. Where Kahlua let her erratic emotions fuel her actions, Kaj was steady. Where Kahlua was trusting and simple of mind, Kaj was smart and logical. Where Kahlua was weak and scared, Kaj was strong and brave. But, where Kaj sometimes lost hope, sometimes found himself lost in depression, Kahlua was brilliant and bright, finding hope where she could; though, she could relate to his sorrows from time to time. How unlucky, then, that she didn't know what she had, could not put it into words, had no mind to do so. But words or not, she knew she was happier to have him near- and that was all that mattered.

And finally, that tiny smile turned into tiny laughter, a chuckle, just a whisper of a sound, but it was there, breaking through the darkness that awaited them beyond the threshold. The sound was brought on by joy, pure elation, that she had finally settled the matter. Kaj had forgiven her, would always forgive her, would be there for her even when she took a wrong step or fell victim to her tumultuous emotions. Perhaps lucky did not even begin to describe the good it did to have him in her life.

So it was that, while she would never have thought of any of the things he said on her own, she was glad for his opinion, for his consideration, for his trust in her. The heart cannot always follow orders from another. She tossed the words around for a moment, bobbing her head in agreement, as if she could ever disagree with him, and offered with a sigh, “It's just that it's terrible to always have to run.” The words were not meant as argument or to try and convince him, it was obvious he knew what she felt, perhaps even better than she had articulated it. Mauja's story simply made her think of her own, in some ways. If only there was a trial to rid her of the nightmares.

“Thank you,” was really all she could offer, in the end. What was there to say? She had been dreading the mountainous task she had set before herself. After all, how could she, Glazier though she was (or had been, she did not feel Lady Moon's magic flowing through her veins; perhaps she was being punished for her indiscretions as a wraith?), convince the others? Their hurt ran so deep, the memories of dragons so long... and advocating for Mauja, a partner on his side, would set her apart from all the others. Would they outcast her with him? The very thought left her heartbroken. But no, not with Kaj on her side. She had faith they would not throw him out to the wilds.

“And the others?” she said finally, happy to have set the trial in some sort of motion. “Did they.... did the rest make it out ok?”