Black nostrils flared in his light doze— metallic red dripped and twisted into the shadows of his dreams. Though, as of late, the shadows had receded from his slumber; they had been filled with irregular spots of his dam and the blue-tipped wings of his child. So it was strange that the familiar smell and color of his warring days filled his mind. He was so removed from those times…

Dark eyes slowly open, navy depths bleary as they probe the gloomy trunks around him. Black-rimmed ears swivel, the white funnels listening attentively even in his sleep-muddled state. The night was old (or was the morning young?), why was there a scent of blood wafting through it?

The connection of the scent to blood struck his mind awake— who was injured? His head flew up to its great height, ears tense and swiveling as his now clear eyes rake the darkness around him. His nostrils flared once again, loudly taking in the night’s bouquet.

Without thought, ebony and ivory legs are moving, heavy hooves crunching the snow he wove through the mists. Though the snow was old and stained with dirt and hooves, and the blood bloomed brown in the low lighting, the metallic smell was enough for the King to follow. It grew stronger as he quickly tread towards the trees towards the cliffs.

He paused, as another odor began to make itself known amid the blood— no longer swamped by the metallic smell as he neared the source. It was familiar— vaguely so, but he couldn't place it amid the focus his mind had for the possible injury of another.

His body halted abruptly as he broke the trees, ears twitched as a laughter shattered the calm silence of pre-dawn. The golden shapeshifter from the Flats stood before him, the one he had burned when discovering his magic for the first time. A man of many faces— and of many new scars and fragile skin littering his gilded hide. New skin surrounded the sluggishly bleeding wound on his shoulder— the source of the trail the Elephant had followed.

Unease uncoiled and rose, ready to strike as anger, in his gut. Mbwene stirred in her warm nest of dried leaves as the emotions began to leak into her dreams. “Thranduil,” the low rumble was calm, but had a hardened edge, “I admit, this is an… unique way to attempt to join us,” though his words offered an explanation for the gilded man to take, should he wish to explain his presence in the herdlands, the creasing and hardening of the King’s eyes belied the dangerous ground on which the Laurelin stood.

Limestone cliffs crumbled so very easily.

Tembovu

you thought you could outrun the world