There is something in the air here, a strangeness, foreign, dark and dreary- yet sometimes glittering of déjà vu, like dust motes in a sunbeam. Memories. Dreams. Ghosts. Try to touch them and they may as well not exist, yet they lay upon her skin like kisses, each one a loving blow from the ten-ton weight of history. She has returned home, but it is a home belonging to a different her, a younger her- and she wonders if this her could possibly find a place here, in a world where she so clearly does not belong.

She swallows, for she fears this may be true. Perhaps the World’s Edge is too changed, too thoroughly scrubbed clean of its sordid past, for any memory of the girl to remain. But if she cannot find herself here, in this place, then where?

She hesitates, halfway between the glass wall (something else I do not know) and escape. She has been lost for so long. Does she really think the Edge will remember her? That she will remember it?
I’m afraid, she confides to the fox who rests astride her back; and the kitsune rubs against her, his presence a warmth in her troubled mind. So am I, he tells her. But if not now, when?

Tightness rises in her throat, and something else, too. In the moonlight her body moves, a careful stride followed by one more, and one again. If not now, when? She repeats his words like a mantra, lets them fill her blood and fuel her bones. If not now, when? Her hooves move faster, sinew pulling harder. If not now, when?

I am finally going home.

On the trail of the wall of glass, the Fire Dancer runs. The girl stands out brightly against the eerie, muted tones of her surroundings. Wreathed in flickering embers and glowing stones, copper child is a bolt of fire, a copper wraith in a silver sea. It is apparent to anyone who looks that she does not possibly belong in these woods - and yet she does, for upon her face is the Moon’s crescent mark, obscured as it may be by the tangle of braids which hangs from her crown. She runs, and the light runs with her; she runs until her sides are heaving, her mind is racing, dopamine and adrenaline spurring on her steps. She runs until she reaches the gap in the glass, nearly passes it, nearly passes it, and then-

-and then she is through, and there is nowhere to go but forward.

Talk talk talk.

She makes it ten meters and is forced to draw short, her dance interrupted by – of all things – an owl. Fire Dancer’s hooves dig furrows in the earth, the startled expression upon her face echoed in the yelping of her displaced brother, whose claws bring bright pools of blood to the copper child's skin. At the same time a voice rings out through the night - is everything alright? - and Tandavi can only spin and stare, black eyes wide, embers jumping in agitation around her raised ears and down her spine. Is everything alright?- and the girl doesn't know what to say, so she says nothing, only stares, wild-eyed, trying to collect herself from the abandon in which she'd so recklessly indulged.

She is a child, caught by an adult while in the midst of a game of make-believe, and it takes her a moment to return from the land of memories and find her footing in the world of now.

It is the mare's voice which calms her down, melodious and familiar, and the girl finds herself returning to the present as easily as she left. Fire Dancer blinks away the last of her confusion and turns to the voice with a clearer gaze, recognition dawning in the moon-slashed face; "Oh!"

She is still pent up, anxious, and as she stands the ball in her stomach rises into her throat. A smile, unbidden, curls across her lips; she begins to laugh, uncertain, hopeful, a girlish giggle poorly dressed in the chestnut's deep tones. She had not expected to see this mare - though what she did expect was anyone's guess - and the jolt of a familiar face in a place her mind believes it does not belong (for it is not theirs) is unsettling, to say the least. So she laughs, and lets herself, though it is muted and slightly strained- laughs for a long moment, then takes a steadying breath.

"I suppose we do," the girl concedes, letting her head drop as she attempts to catch her breath. As she does her brother bounds gracefully to the forest floor, oversized ears spread wide above a vulpine grin; he is done trusting her reliability as a mount. The kitsune trots daintily toward the pegasus mare, fire dancing in graceful whips from his trio of tails. Show off, the girl teases him silently, and through their bond she can feel his cheerful shrug. Someone's gotta be charming when you're so weird!

Which, she thinks, pretty much sums up their lives so far. Natraj is charming, and Tandavi is weird.

At last the girl stands up straight, wildness gone from her expression, though some of it lingers at the back of her eyes. "I don't think anything is wrong, I just..." she trails off, uncertain, words failing her as they so often do. She is happy to see this mare, to taste the soft citrus of her magic and see the green of it in the air. But she does not know how to covey this, not really, not the way she wants to, so she does not say it at all.

Instead she says in her alto voice, "I did not know you live here. I... I don't know who does, not anymore. Have you lived here long?" Do you remember me?

Natraj takes his sister's silence as a perfect opportunity to enjoy being admired. Forever friendly and unabashed, the kitsune grinned at the painted mare's praise, stepping forward to press his small face against the mare's offered nose. I like her, he informs the copper girl, his enthusiasm leaping through their bond; it fills her with a greater certainty, helps to still her thundering heart. That's good, the girl replies distractedly, but the fox has already moved on, his interest shifting to the curious owl. He throws himself on the ground before it (and, remarkably, the owl is smaller than him, a rare find for the minute fox), tails waving and chest pressed low, a friendly approach, an offer to play.

The girl does not understand his constant desire - and, even more, ability - to make friends. Envy stings her for a moment, followed by the usual dismissal: It's a companion thing. It's not just me.

Please.

She raises her head, tousled mane falling across her face and momentarily obscuring her eyes. The girl shakes to dislodge the braid, nearly missing her companion's response. Yet when she hears it the response is obvious, even audible, because the Fire Dancer chokes, her breath catching in her throat as surprise spreads vibrantly across her face. Four years?! And she says the names, the ones that twist like a knife and warm her heart. But that means- that means-

The girl is speechless, because four years ago she had been here, too, dancing and carefree, she and her brother little more than a flicker and shadow beneath the trees and yet... and yet...

"But I don't remember you," she whispers, and there is something of an accusation in her voice, not for the mare but for herself, for her memory, for the broken promise that if there was anything she had once known, she would know it again, now, once it stood before her. That every stone might hold a piece of her beneath its weight- but of course this is not the case, it was never going to be the case, and now the girl is left lost, uncertain, holding the threads of her past and trying to will them into a tapestry- but the picture is littered with holes.

Natraj welcome's Hamlock's advances, leaping and swatting playfully at the little bird as it flies past, one of his three tails grasped within its claws. The girl watches him carefully, fixedly, her attention locked on him in a valiant yet fruitless endeavor to keep her turbulent emotions out of her face. She listens to the mare with a gold ear half-cocked, the copper one still trained on the antics of the companions-

-That is, until the mare utters yet another familiar name. At once her head darts back up, some excitement and relief palpable in her face. "I know Kahlua!" Fire Dancer exclaims, her body twisting as she speaks, tail twitching and hips turning to bring the stone which hides among her braids into the paint's view. "I helped her, once. She gave me this." She gestures at the stone which glows in the night: yet another piece of the armor she wears in defense of the encroaching dark. Kahlua is a bright point in the copper child's memory, even if their encounter ended on a strange note. The girl frowns, moon-slashed expression furrowing as she regards the painted equine's abrupt retreat. "Is she well? I should like to see her again."

She hadn't realized the absence of the mare's - Alysanne's - name until it is spoken, and the girl repeats it softly, "Alysanne," a tentative smile on her inky lips. Onyx eyes regard the mare, a healer like her- though in a way she supposes she knows this already, given the nature of their most recent encounter. Still the confirmation relaxes the girl, and her expression opens, the embers which surround her settling into her mane. She has yet to be hurt by a healer. Part of her wonders what happened to Alysanne's friend, the one she had saved so long ago- did the mare remember that, at least?

Onyx eyes blink. She will ask about it later, if she stays.

If.

"My name is Tandavi. My brother is Natraj." She gestures toward the kitsune, who looks up from his play long enough to bark an eager greeting. "We were born beneath these trees. Our family lived here..." she trails off, swallowing, fighting off the surge of sorrow which clamors against her mind. From the corner of her eye she can see Natraj bounding toward her; he becomes a comforting presence at her hooves and in her thoughts, offering his own sorrow and bolstering her strength. The girl blinks, her eyelashes moist - but no tears fall. Not today.

"They're gone now," she continues, "They left, when the wraiths came. But we thought we might come back... for a little while. If we can."