A gentle breeze gusted over my shoulders as if pushing me to make a decision or at least break free of the restraints that often hindered my every conversation or intimate moment. Listening to the sea rant and rave beneath my hooves, rocking the gentle soil into dancing slowly beneath the layers of ice and snow and bringing the landscape back to life, I felt the earth shift. It sang and murmured sweet nothing’s to Murdock and I as if it were a desperate prostitute seeking payment. It wanted to break free too… I could feel it. The winter had fettered it within a frozen prison of death and decay and as it shuddered and pulsed beneath us, I could feel the Edge’s heartbeat coming back to life. It was only a matter of time before the sun revived our home sake and our bodies as well. The winter coat and the sludge and dirt that colored not only our hides but our minds as well would slough away into nothingness and warmth. I was barely able to contain my excited for such a time… it was too near to ignore.

However as my thoughts strayed, so did my conversation. It had withered away beneath the icy silence and broken up our duet into solos, but I would not have it so and as with any other moment in life as of late I took the plunge and allowed an ounce of feeling to rush my bones. Everyone deserves a second chance? I was tempted to laugh or cry… I wasn’t sure which one suited the situation more, simply because someone had taken the opportunity to believe in me. Murdock knew of my follies and yet he did not deem me a traitor or a coward, instead he saw me for what I was- and that was a beast more than capable of being who he once was. Surely there was no shame in that. Had I not encouraged him only moments before to abolish the infamy that plagued us both?

Stepping closer to the face of the cliff, I peered down below at the coursing waters. They rolled in and out, time after time and something about their consistency made me feel at ease. In a storm they flourished and on a calm summer day they paled and relaxed until death seemed imminent. They too suffered the seasons which could easily be translated as their emotions and that made them no more inhuman that I. Aware of my moment of pure ignorance, I glanced back at Murdock with an apologetic gaze. I was in no way ashamed of my behavior because I was certain that he too understood the pains it took to settle your mind into figurative retirement. We were both merely waiting for something to happen, something that would make sense of our worth and our ability. We both possessed greatness, no matter how riddled with treason or reason it was…

I waited until the very last moment to answer his question… used one last moment to avoid the inevitable. I had shared so much now that there was little else to be afraid of anymore. But I feared so much in life and Essetia had been the one thing that caused me so much grief that I could not think of her without losing myself entirely. Her presence in my life had been missed but I also knew that seeing her would cause the hate and the anger that brewed so deep within to return… not because she had bred it, but because her mother had. The resemblance was so jarring between the two that I feared seeing her would mentally break me into oblivion. Like the sea, I could be affected… but a tsunami would cause destruction and lay waste to the land. I didn’t want to be the wave that tore her apart.

The feeling had left my voice entirely as I tried to force it from my lungs. I refused to look at the jet black stud because I was afraid of what I would find there. I hadn’t only abandoned a great nation- I had abandoned my child and she was out there somewhere waiting to be found. But of course, I wasn’t sure if I ever wanted to find her. “I came back… because of my daughter, Essetia.”

At least not now.

Thor