Her invite had been impulsive, selfish - he is her friend, one of very few such friends, and she wants him here with her, dammit. But she is meant to be a warrior, who puts the herd first, who shoves personal happiness aside and concentrates on the greater good. Is bringing home a stallion who both kings hate really the best way to do that?

She supposes she had underestimated the stubborn-ness of men; she simply assumed they would all grunt a bit then shake hooves and make up. But, as she moves closer to the Edge, she begins to get cold feet (both literally and not, because the snow is rather chilling her fetlocks). What if they don't all get along? What if they come to blows, and it's all her fault for bringing Lace home? She can't even blame it on the cobwebbed male - not that she would - because it was most definitely her idea. She approached him first. She invited him, even when he warned her off.

But, as he's walking alongside her as he had all those years ago, towards a herd so familiar Nyx could patrol it with her eyes closed, she can't help but think it feels so right. This is Lace's home, like it is hers. He belongs here, and perhaps it's her imagination but does he seem to have perked up since they came into view of the main herdland? "Mind your step - there is broken glass all around. The wall met a, uh, sticky end." Dominus hisses from behind her, the memory of glass in his paw still livid inside his mind. He picks his feet up carefully, staring at the ground hard to hunt for shards.

At Lace's words, the ironheart chuckles. "Guilty as charged." But the laughter is forced, because she is bricking it. Mauja is going to flip his spotty little ass off. She imagines him actually getting so pissed off that his spots run for the hills, leaving him white and naked and shiny.

There's no going back now, however. She fights the desire to press closely against her cobwebbed compatriot, focusing instead on the horizon, waiting for the ice king to broach it and condemn them with his frozen wrath.

Preceeded by a vicious spire of ice that erupts from the ground in front of them, the king is come. The mare's ears pin and she throws up her proud head with a snort, rooting her hooves to the snow so she isn't tempted to flinch backwards and shame herself anymore than she already has by bringing Lace here. Then come two mighty swans of flame, and Dominus rears onto his back legs, trying to paw at one before they disappear with a fizzle. She has never seen her stone-faced monarch so animated, so alive; ice is burnt away by righteous fire, by sweat-soaked, indignant masculinity.

Lace retaliates in kind - first he bows, and Nyx sags with relief at the humility. Maybe it will turn out alright af-...or maybe not. A sun bursts into life above them, pulsing and humming with power, and the soldier gives a startled grunt. Her ears are so far back they're invisible, and tension etches itself across every hard muscle of her body. Typical men, having the magical equivalent of a dick-swinging contest.

Damn, she can almost smell the testosterone. And she's only slightly turned on.

"Lace," she hisses, eyes widening in horror at the cobweb-stallion's brash sarcasm. He most certainly hadn't exaggerated when he warned her he might cause trouble should she persist with trying to bring him home to the Edge. Bloody men. Couldn't they just be faux-nice to one another then have a good old bitch later, like women would? The temptation to bang their heads together like naughty boys is considerably strong within the ironheart.

What can she say? What can she do? She should just remain silent, let the stallions do stallion things to sort out their differences. Or should she apologise for bringing Lace here? No, because he's her friend and he deserves to live here if he wants to, but he's not doing himself any favours with his passive-aggressive, sun-summoning, look-at-the-size-of-my-dong behaviour, like he's trying to make Mauja snap and attack him to vindicate his earlier accusations. The silver rolls her eyes irritably.

She looks to Mauja, words bubbling to the tip of her tongue...but she bites them back. On this occasion, silence speaks a thousand words. This is something the two men have to sort out between themselves, without Nyx's interference. So she shuts her mouth, fixing it into a hard line, and just watches.

Lace replies, and Nyx's eyes roll so hard they nearly fall out of her damn head. You get the stick out of your ass! No, YOU get the stick out of your ass! The silver snorts, exasperated - but exasperation is just the tip of the iceberg, the outer layer of what she's feeling. Yes, their masculine stand-off has a certain humour to it, like two peacocks fluffing up their feathers and strutting with inflated tails and egos alike, but this runs deeper than that - this goes beyond what Nyx would call amusing. It is serious business; they could fight, she could be kicked from the herd, she could be condemned for her crimes and kicked away like a common dog. This is not a laughing matter.

She fidgets from hoof to hoof, nervous, antsy, tense. Lace continues, and he's hardly demure about his desire to live here. "What he means to say is that he would love to stay here, pretty please and thank you," she says, trying to sound lighthearted and diffuse the situation in spite of her pounding heart and dry mouth. But the words sound forced on her tongue, and her expression darkens into a frown. Stop trying so hard, she tells herself. She could dance around naked in front of the duo and she doesn't think that would distract them from their brooding rage towards one another.

And, like a coward, she stays silent. She sits on the fence, unwilling to side with either stallion, to argue the point of one of them. Yes, it isn't her place, but she should still say something, should tell Mauja to stop staring ice-spikes at Lace or tell Lace to stop pushing his luck and submit for fuck's sake. But she doesn't. The steel soldier is cowed, with her neck arched and tense and her nostrils flared wide, dancing from foot to foot with potent tension. What do I do?