i am the vanguard of your destruction

Rain and the passing of time had erased d'Artagnan's scent from Helovia—even from this wretched stretch of forest lying upon its doorstep, the one, last piece of Helovia where the cherry bay had left his hoof prints before disappearing into the unknown vastness beyond. Mauja stood there, in the Threshold forest, and teetered upon the invisible line between Helovia and the world—hesitating, like one does upon a brink, leaning out over to peer down, before rocking back into the safety. There were no traces of the Doctor here. There had been no traces of him anywhere in the forest, where Mauja had hunted high and low, but there was nothing left.

It was like he had never even existed.

So Mauja gave up. Forlorn and dispirited he began to weave his way through the summer forest, head low. There was little of the once-Queen in his posture—little of regality and pride, just something bent and broken; bowed, frosted hooves scuffling through soft, wet loam and grass. Irma, the snowy owl, sat upon his withers, talons pricking into his flesh, but the blood upon them and upon his skin was old and dried, blackened. Diego was up somewhere in the air, floating just above the trees, searching for gods knew what.

In a way, he almost wished d'Artagnan had died. It would've been .. easier .. than this—this clinging, fucking hope that one day, in one year or ten or a thousand, he would come back.

(But he wouldn't. Mauja was certain of that.)

And still he kept on hoping like some kind of idiot, bumbling through the Threshold, knowing that he would never be free of this place because what if—

".. I would gladly show you to the Falls where you would be welcome to stay as long as you like." Something—somethings—flashed through the trees up ahead, colors that were way too pale to be d'Artagnan but still made his heart stumble in his chest. Fuck, he even stumbled on the ground, pausing to squeeze his eyes tight shut. d'Artagnan wasn't here. He wouldn't ever be here. So don't you dare cry. Tentatively, he blinked a few times. Crisis averted.

(For now.)

Someone named Hesperos went on, asking about the Falls whereabouts in a sort of roundabout fashion. Mauja shook his head, too tired to try to figure anything out, too tired to think when grief and strangling hope lay in every corner of his mind. Life had opened beneath him like a black hole and it took all he had to not just pitch headfirst into it.

"Most Helovians came from the world beyond," he said quietly as he slipped onto the scene, his voice a little rougher around the edges than usual. Odd, to see Brisa here after all this time—he offered her a nod, but had nothing more in him, so he did not smile. "Brisa." Then, his gaze shifted to the newcomers: a young mare, looking properly disheveled and travel-worn. The other, Hesperos, had a few healing injuries, but looked cleaner, better, more alert. Had they been traveling together? "I am Mauja, of the World's Edge. My herd extends the same offer."

[ @Kynareth @Hesperos @Brisa || Welcome to Helovia! :D Bird, I just figured I'd mention this about horse heights- there's 4 inches to a hand, so it goes 15, 15.1, 15.2, 15.3, 16, etc. So if you mean "nearly 16 hands/160cm" it should be 15.3 ^^ ]

i am the vanguard of your destruction

Brisa smiled at him—said it was good to see him—and he felt like a devil for not being able to smile back at her. Fuck, she deserved so much more (everyone did), but he couldn't do anything but stare at her with a detached and cold kind of pain in his eyes. The corners of his mouth twitched, as if trying to remember how to smile, but nothing came of it, and he gave up. He supposed it was alright—it had to be, because he couldn't do anything about it with lips as stiff as something frozen and dead. So better to simply look properly morose and battered instead of a grinning, heartless psycho about to stab you in the eye.

”Pleasure to meet you,” Hesperos was offering, and one of Mauja's ears flicked back hesitantly. Pleasure? He was proper and formal and all but he didn't exactly sound pleased, and the young mare was sidling up to Brisa. "Of course," he said quietly to her as she declared her allegiance to the Falls (—and made him feel like some kind of contagious monster). He had been through this before—and it hurt every damn time. Hells, he even glanced at the shadows, looking for Johnny, because the only thing he needed now to repeat his past was that candy-cane pony to accidentally lick in the middle of it all.

But of course, the sugary stallion was nowhere to be found—it was just Mauja and his demons made all too real.

Hesperos went on, and there was just something—something that was.. unusual. Odd. Different. Mauja had met everyone and no one here, kings and queens and travelers of dimensions, wanderers and vagabonds and murderers—and in all his time, no one had ever quite asked things this way. He blinked a few times. But what was 'this way' even? Gods, he was in no fit state to think, couldn't put his hoof on it, and so he let it spin away into oblivion. "Four, actually," he responded softly. "There has been wars, and no doubt will be again. Someone will always think they are better, their cause more just, their need greater, and whether out of desperation or arrogant greed they will act." He felt dazed, as if his voice was coming from afar, and it took much of his will to drag his gaze to Hesperos and focus it on the pale man. "Does this bother you?"

[ @Kynareth @Brisa @Hesperos ^^ ]