leliel.


Muriel is gone.

Muriel is dead.

Why didn't you just lay down next to her and die, too? Its because you don't deserve to be anywhere near the corpse of the woman that you loved and didn't protect and you know it. She deserved so much better, so much more and while she fought so valiantly to protect the child she'd had with Gull you stayed quiet and kept the child quiet so the monster she fought wouldn't know she was there. You could have done more. You could have saved her. You could have fought and died in her place, but instead you let her and now her child is motherless and you don't even know where he's run off to.

Muriel would be so disappointed in you.

Ever since that night you've traveled all over Helovia, but you've never been back to that place where Muriel had been murdered and mutilated by the monster. Maybe you should go back and torment yourself a little more about how you didn't save her. But no. You avoid that place altogether and you end up at the beach where that mare Agrona had found you and told you that she'd help you find Muriel. What did you hope to find here? The same mare? Someone that would see you, the state you've let yourself get into, and take mercy on you and kill you?

The last thing you deserve is mercy.

"Help!"

The sound of the waves crashing into the shore is nearly deafening, but you can still hear a feminine voice calling for help. You heart flutters and for a moment you fool yourself into believing that its Muriel's voice you hear, but then the weight of her death crashes into you again and you gasp for air as if you're the one drowning.

The splashes that don't match the rhythm of the crashing waves draws you closer to the water, but you stop when you feel it lapping at your hooves. You wonder as you stand there if you can do this and why you should do this when you couldn't even save someone you loved. But she screams again and you find yourself moving without much conscious thought about what you're doing. You just follow the sound of her screams and her splashes until you finally find her, when when you do her flailing causes her to kick your chest and you grunt at her.

How can you save her? She's likely to drown you along with herself, but maybe you'd already known that. Maybe you were just hoping she'd be the one to sign your death certificate and end your miserably life.

"Stop!" You bark at her. "Stop struggling so much." You bite at her neck, hoping that you can bite and hold on so you can drag her back toward the shore and keep her head above the water at the same time. Somehow you managed to be going in somewhat the right direction. You're moving at an angle toward the beach, but you could be going further out into the ocean where you and the mare would both drown and it would be your fault.

Your heart is hammering in your chest by the time your hooves sink into sand beneath the waves and it is then that you finally let go of the mare's neck because you figure that she can walk the last few feet to the beach. You drag your skinny ass onto the beach and your sides heave as you struggle to catch your breath because you're so out of shape and not used to so much effort going into one particular task. Honestly, its a miracle that your body didn't give out on you and sentence you and her to death. "Are... you... okay...?" You ask between breaths as you gulp in air like a fish out of water.

"."