She didn't jump into the air, but she almost did when Pirate whispered and pressed a light touch into her. Still, her body went rigid, and a flaring wave ran across her feathers before they settled. She might have reacted more strongly if she hadn't grown more accustomed to his sneaky ways with their latest endeavors - she might have marveled at his invisibility if not for the cloak she had already seen.

A small smile crawled on her lips, continually impressed by the golden swashbuckler.

She hadn't the time to think on him as Raven continued however, her knowledge rather extensive compared to most Ampere had managed to ask about this event so far. Though, the way Raven put it, that the lands were taken by the gods, Ampere found little fault. If the Helovia gods were conquering, then death was a part of war. Ampere did not have qualms with war - she liked the idea of strength being matched with strength, of mettle being tested and struggle resulting in a clear outcome.

And that was where Ampere's base being interfered with her evolved ideals, because wasn't war in a way an attempt at theft? Wasn't conquering something a scenario where the strong rise above the weak? No, she thought, though she was not confident in her own response. There would never be pure equality in life, and she knew that. What mattered to her was the purpose behind exercises of strength, the greed that fueled it and the target that was to face it. When she marched to meet someone in a fight, it was never with absolute certainty. She trusted in her own skills and willed them to be enough, but there was a difference in facing a fellow warrior than facing a foal that would surely perish beneath her blows.

Shaking her head, Ampere tried to wrangle her thoughts and her purpose.
"Have you ever gone hungry?" she asked, glancing around at everyone. "This winter was hard. Even in my herd land I thinned. I hate to think how many of those in the wilds perished." Her features set in a hard line, grim.

"Have you ever had want of shelter, or water? These are things we all need, and prayers the gods surely listen to constantly. In the herds we are protected, but we have our limits. We couldn't take in all the Outcasts, but their lands cannot support all of them all the time. Perhaps we needed expansion."

She hadn't decided yet if this was justified or not, but she was thinking, and the winter had been particularly cruel - all the gods had vanished then, was it connected?

"Are the people of the rift happy? Did they fight their own god, or us?" She supposed they would eb the best to judge this situation. "Maybe we need to talk to them."

Dying gods and aliens were things Ampere wasn't familiar with, but war? War she knew, and in war corpses were not unusual.

Her attention was diverted from Raven as Fairylights spoke her name. Glancing over Ampere shook her head. "Not in any physical sense," she murmured. "I came as the fight ended."

[D: not sure what blood spot or hurt you're referring to Laine]

DARKEST EVE - BRIGHTEST DAWN
THE WHATCHING SHIFT - GOES EVER ON

THROUGH ICE AND FIRE - WIND AND RAIN
WE STAND VIGIL - BREAK THE CHAIN



IF WOUND DOES BLEED - IF HEART DOES SOUR
THE WHATCHING SHIFT - ENDURES EACH HOUR

HEAR US NOT - SEE US FEW
WE STAND VIGIL - 'TIL JUSTICE DUE