She was used to the silence, to the brooding, floating whims of everything and nothing all at once – and she wanted to fill it with song. She yearned to slash through the wickedness, the nefarious, capricious doubts and the mercurial expositions with a sweet aria, with an untarnished melody, with a flourishing symphony. But the nymph feared it wouldn’t cease anything, only delay the inevitable, only sweeten the sorrow. Her heart twisted amidst her chest, for him, for her, for everyone else who used to remain tucked amidst their Basin fortress with not a care in the world – because they’d held something together. They’d conquered loss, they’d persevered, they’d lasted and lived through being driven into dust, into dirt. She remembered each and every one of them (the good Doctor D’art, no matter his gruffness, his beloved nurse Kou and their bounty of children, Psyche, a viper, an asp, but so utterly capable, Mauja, flung from mirrors and time and tragedies), tied herself to their strings, to their souls, so that when they no longer lingered on this earth, so when no one recalled their names, she could. She’d tell the world about their conquests, she’d whittle and sculpt and entangle each and every story, every myth, every legend until they appeared in dreams and sonnets of the young, until they were living, breathing ghosts again.

And it seemed, no matter where Mauja ended up, he was portrayed as a wraith, as a phantom, weaving between the threads of his past lives and harsh, undying memories. Her eyes yearned to fall away from him, away from the torment and the pain burrowing beneath, but she forced herself to remain just and strong, an anchor of the snowfall and the springtime and the illustrious days spent in simple, rapt harmony; not wishing to be a curse, a haunting, poignant reminder of what used to be. She smiled when he did the same, matching his distinction with her assuaging, mending strokes, a futile caress, a balance of the disjointed, of the tarnished, of the discordant.

The grin smoothed to a fine line as he spoke, I stepped down after the last God battle, and the words caught over her throat in a harsh, unrelenting snag, eyes widening, honeyed gaze piercing and unmoving. He’d walked away from it again; from something he’d craved, from something he’d once had (and she’d been so proud of him too – so unsure but so proud anyway because he’d found a way to return to what he’d been). Her mind whirled with the whys and the disbelief (what could’ve forced him away? What could’ve bound him from that precious Edge? Hadn’t he loved it? Hadn’t he cherished it? Hadn’t it always been his?).

The answer to her silent inquiries followed thereafter; and her features broke into pieces, saddened, dismayed, piecing together the mess his life had become. Sno died. She recalled the filly, the child, the girl who hid amongst the mist and the fog, who craved her sire’s affection, who strived and lived along petulance, who’d been taken from their stead so many years ago (and they’d snagged her back, marching to the Throat, to Kri and her flock of predacious whims). From then on, she hadn’t seen her. She probably wouldn’t have recognized her – grown and steady, stalwart and strong, spotted and unrelenting – but Sno all the same. How she’d arrived at her demise, how she’d been snagged again (only this time by the Grim), didn’t settle along her mind; only how to bestow sanctum and refuge to the fallen daughter’s father, who seemed to be withering away at the seams. But what to say to a man who’d lost his daughter, who’d lost his throne, who’d lost (like so many of them) things that mattered, things that resounded, things that claimed and enticed? “Oh Mauja, I’m so sorry,” she said on a despondent, miserable tune, pressing forward until she was just in front of him, reaching and reaching, extending her maw towards his in a soft stroke of comfort, in what little solace she could provide.