The season had blown by cold and fierce, which was not abnormal for Helovia, though the warning sent int he flames still suggested trouble - whatever the trouble was it wasn't the weather then. In fact, all of Helovia seemed to have hunkered down for the season. The gods were quiet, the herd had set itself into the work and the task of survival, and with time Ampere forgot the warnings and the troubles beyond the sands where she rarely ventured, not fond of the pale wonderland. She even managed to avoid Gaucho, and with the absences, she found a certain calmness.

It didn't seem real though. It seemed like she was just stuck, waiting, like a darkening horizon where no clouds gathered yet.

They still hadn't.

So Ampere flew on, at ease and taking her patrol in easy stride, yawning even with dullness rather than weariness. Still, her eyes were sharp, and movement near the sea drew her eye as anything near the herd's edges did. She circled down, landing not far once she recognized the shape as a herdmate. More than that though, it was Mesec.

"Hey!" she called out as she trotted up, wings flaring slightly as she was still laying them on her sides. "Long time no see," she teased with a smile, reaching out to nudge his shoulder good naturedly. She had seen the bird circling up above him, but that it was bonded to him had never even crossed her mind. Because Mesec, he wouldn't.

He couldn't.

[I wasn't sure if Lucius was really high up or right above him D: so I went with high]

As always she felt lightened around Mesec. His presence seemed to soothe her soul, grounding her wayward, sporadic lightning trails into solid beams of light cutting through the dark; he made her into something akin to the stars which could guide your way. She sighed inaudibly as his voice hummed against her ears, relieving tension she hadn't even noticed. How had she let him hide for this long?

In that moment, whether she even realized it or not yet, she decided Mesec was someone she couldn't lose. She hadn't know then, so long ago, just how fateful her meeting him on the beach had been. The moment proved pivotal, in the same way Gaucho bathing in the oasis with her became. There was no denying the sway of emotions she felt for the dark knight beside her, nor for the Wildfire. Yet, there was a clear difference in how they affected her.

His touch rippled across her like wintergreen, tantalizingly cool, yet numbingly warm too. Her hide shuddered in response, invigorated by it. "Always," she breathed with a laugh, their joke as present as ever. "I've yet to manage it, but not for trying." She didn't want to talk about weather today though. She didn't want the storm clouds to gather and the rain to fall, because it blocked out the stars and it hid the moon. If that happened, how could she avoid the fire?

"Mesec..." she began softly, after the jest and the smiles fell away into thoughts and desires that jumbled together. She had never done this before. Whatever she'd had before, she'd never had to think about it or tip toe around it. The feelings came and she acted, and the other responded, hot and sudden the way fires flared up. This was something gentle though, something more precious which took time and patience to cultivate, and she was afraid to lose it the way you lost a good dream when you woke up. She didn't know how to love darkness.

"I-" she stammered, then faltered. Her feathers flared in response as she felt a flush run through her. Shaking her head, Ampere glanced away. "I was thinking the Whatch could use a statue." Not what she wanted to say. She diverted away from the uncomfortable of the unknown, grabbing for anything she could relate to him, and the Whatch was the first thing aside from weather. "Some place horses can meet us easier, to ask for help. Do you know of any stone crafters?"

She didn't know what she was trying to tell him. That she wanted him to what, stay with her? What did that even mean? How could she ask something of him she didn't understand? He was in the herd, it wasn't as if she didn't see him; maybe the winter absence just made it seem worse, made him seem gone. That was it...

[idk]

It was right there on the tip of her tongue. That thought, those words, a committment.
"Mesec, stay with me. Touch me. Hold me. Keep me. Love me..."

They drifted away on her next breath, and then with his they they were lost to the ocean breeze for good. Somewhere inside of her their echo remained, sinking down deep inside her heart, nestled somewhere in the roots of her being where she hid her weaknesses and her truths. The absence of it hurt, the way something raw and abrupt does, like a skinned knee. She felt like she had fallen, and in the process shore off little outside bits of her heart.

How long could she keep it up before it got too small?

"I'm so sorry," - that was what she tripped on. Before that she had been walking, or running, maybe flying; but she'd been going, and it was great because there were no storms regardless of whether or not she could outrun them and whether or not he thought or she thought she could. Because for once there were none, and running didn't matter, and he was here and she was ready to tell him to stay.
Was.

"I'm so sorry."
She lurched, visibly, when those words left his mouth. Up until then her lips had drawn up in a smile, a response to his confidence in her, and to his helpfulness in her request. Gently those muscles faded into a face puckered with interest, while her eyes lifted up, curiosity intent in the blue wash of her face as she saw and trailed the bird descending upon them. She couldn't remember it now, but she would later when she replayed the moment back for herself like some kind of personal hell - she'd remember that she thought the bird was so beautiful, and what a treat it was that something so wild and free would choose to grace them with it's presence. For that brief instant she had been happy to see the bird, because what else could it be when it was Mesec?

What else could Mesec be besides her happiness?

"I'm so sorry."
"I'm so so..."
"I'm s..."
"I..."

Falling.

The softness with which they were spoken did nothing to silence the roar that they filled Ampere's head with. Like a furious wind they whipped and ripped through her, a hurricane blooming from her heart and winding up and around her lungs. She choked, gasping for air as she retreated quickly, recoiling from the sight and the sounds he gave and all the notions and all the horrible things they represented. Because if it was true, if Mesec had BONDED to that bird, then she had nothing left, or more appropriately - no one.

None but her son, but in a mind engulfed by the desire to have someone, her child was not on the forefront of her thoughts, nor was his loyalty to her heart. Instead she could only see the world Mesec had created for her crashing down around her, ripped up by the hurricane that brewed with those bird's wing flaps.
She responded by beating her own wings, upper body erupting skyward in an energetic rear that exposed the coils of energy running through her like a power line that had fallen down. All around her sand gave way to blue sparks, the little bundles of pure energy spitting and hissing in a wreath of emotional wreckage. At some point she started screaming, or shouting, or both, but an audible (or somewhat anyway) "NO!" bellowed out of her nearly empty chest. Her forelegs were thrown up like hands trying to block an image or keep at bay a storm which they could not hope to defeat (or both).
She became aware of her screaming amid the anger that stung her eyes. Why was she screaming? Why was she - air filled her up and took her away. Literally carried off by her own storm, Ampere rose into the air with a thrust of her bunched limbs, wings battering against the ground as she barely managed to jump aloft and away from him. Sparks trailed after her like a comet blazing through the night, and so Ampere was, burning up amid the night, a force of destruction turned in upon herself.

Her trust in that stallion was the dust she left as her trail, scattered there along the beach and the diffused lightning.