well someday soon when the spring brings the sun
i'll sleep, i'll finally
feel better when the winter's gone

The sea gladly swallows her whole, taking in her body with gentle fingers that dawn teeth of foam and ice-cold temperatures once she has submerged completely, making sure that she is aware that the sea does not like false senses of security and safety. It is meant to be full of live where few dare to push, and empty where many would expect to find things. Grasses rub against her legs like the hands of needy children, and she can feel her urge to fill her stomach with food that she could’ve easily found in the oasis, but work is more important. The shadow of the mare sweeps over her body and darkens the world only for a moment, sunlight pushing it’s way through as if it had been thoroughly insulted by her blockage.
Hobgoblin, waiting distantly into the sea, no more than five hundred feet from her eyes, hangs at the surface, gasping for air, spraying droplets of water into the air with each breath. The passing of Amara’s shadow is the end to his breathing session. With his hind flippers does he finally break the water’s skin, letting a quick blur of silver flash as his body dives deeper and deeper, reaching back around for Sikeax’s glowing beacon in the abyss.
The rhythm of the ocean holds her hand as a mother does her child, loosely holding onto her body as it moves her towards the isles, pushing her lazy strides with a grace that swallows her. She feels motionless, lacking of gravity, thinking that she could go as far as she wants. The only noises hanging in her are inside of her thoughts, and now does she see that having Hobgoblin is a blessing, for if she was to never bond to him and left to the sea, loneliness and the time itself would turn her into a diseased mind.
“Like Monster.”
She tries not to listen to the bad, even though she is, drinking in every word and letting them hurt her as they should, emotions free. No one would be able to catch her in such a state in the oceans, and if she wept tears that could fuel an entire river, the ocean would lovely kiss them from her cheeks and baby blues, telling her that her pain is safe in it’s endless belly.
Sand and underwater grasses bury themselves around and below her hooves soon enough, letting her brother be the first to break their silence, rising his skull from the waves, and then choosing to snort loud enough that it borderlines a yell. No longer do songs sing from his vocal cords when he pushes himself into the sea. He will sing for no one now.
Amara is there, waiting for them. The mental image hangs in Sikeax’ eyes as she hovers, breaking into lust as her teeth tear away the grass along the floor. She doesn’t care that it tastes funny, attempting to hurriedly get food within her stomach before making another journey. Hobgoblin, past all of her wants of him being with her, turns his streamlined body against the waves and leaves for the open.
She doesn’t pursue as the water splits for her, stabbing through with her horn until there is a break. The rest simply follows naturally.
As for her lungs, they cough to clear their passageways, preparing for the exchange.
Water slips from her damp body in thinning rivers, crossing her eyes across Amara’s body to look for signs of damage to the mare’s healing body that would have to be taken care of before they returned to the Throat. Everything seems fine.
“How was your flying? Did anything go wrong?”
There is a possibility that she is pushing her too far too fast, going against the obvious limits of the chestnut mare’s body like there was something to achieve. She promised to heal Amara, not destroy her, and if she was the cause of a setback due to reckless thinking then let it be so that it haunts her like the blood of a loved one resting on her hands.


"Talk."