The dragons have searched by air, whilst Volterra has searched by ground; as red and gold soar through Helovia and hunt for the faintest sign of a skull-faced child, their bonded has the less enviable task of searching the undergrowth and caves beneath them for her. He does not think she will be dead - because no child of his loins could possibly submit to death so easily - but he knows he has to find out, so at least Kid can have the closure of her body to mourn.

But thus far their three-pronged hunt has been completely fruitless. Volterra knows that, chances are, Sabra has left Helovia completely, and as he promised Kid, he will send the dragons across the border to hunt for her in the wilderness. He keeps putting off the day that he will do that, because his stomach holds a deep pit of unease about what lurks outside the comfort-zone of Helovian territory. What if the dragons inform him that things are so much better out in the wilderness? What if temptation leads him to abandon all he knows, and he turns into a roving vagabond like his father before him?

But he can put it off no longer. They have looked for Sabre for months without finding a single sign of her, and the longer he waits the more chance there is of something unmentionable happening to her. So he moves towards the Threshold at a steady canter, mane and tail streaming behind him and dragons glimmering like gemstones in his wake, his skull-marked face set int a stony mask of determination. He will find her. His firstborn daughter will return home.

There's a voice, and a flock of birds erupt from the trees. With joyous screams, his dragons dive after the flying prey, and the air is filled with the cacophony of terrified avians and delighted dragons. The behemoth allows his consciousness to drift into the minds of his companions and he watches through them as they hunt down the fleeing birds.

And there, out of the corner of one draconic eye, in a gap between the trees, he sees a blur of black, white and red.

Could it be? Immediately the leviathan's path alters and he trots towards the stranger, heart beating, eyes desperately hunting for confirmation....He sees a filly, a yearling, his heartbeat racing further as he works out the dates and realises that yes, this could be her. He can't help running his approving gaze over her, noting that she's larger than her twin brother, that she has the delightful face marking of Volterra's mother, along with a red splash that looks beautifully like blood; that she's sturdy, well-built, powerful. It's her. His daughter.

He moves closer, suddenly full of trepidation; how does one go about approaching their long-lost child? What if she holds as much hate for him as Kid does? But, he reasons, if that's the case, then he'll just have to deal with it. "Sabre? Are you Sabre?" His voice is a beacon of power over the shrieks of the hunted birds, and his body language is neutral and nonethreatening as he steps closer to his child.

But this is all in the future. Right now, he is just a stranger to her; it will take a lot to earn her trust.

As the leviathan says her name, she whips around and fixes him with a glare that Vadir would be proud of. He has to fight against the proud grin that tries its best to barge onto his lips, because it's good to see that his fiesty attitude has passed down to his firstborn daughter. Instead his face remains impassive, but there's a joyous twinkle in his eye as he continues to meet her gaze.

His attention only wavers when the ground nearby erupts into a pool of thorny vines, which whip ominously towards him as though about to snag in his flesh and hold him in place....until they tangle around themselves and form a slightly less scary bundle of spikes. A couple of fronds free themselves and wave threateningly at him, and he raises an eyebrow in their direction. "You have magic?" he says, obviously impressed - albeit not with her handling of said magic, but it takes practice. Volterra had almost died the first time he used his own magic, although the memory brings Isopia's face into his mind and his insides twist miserably.

Now, however, he has far more control over the blessings in his blood, and he even has a second magic - from the ground beside him comes a great golem the same size as him, horse-shaped and rippling with veins of molten fire. Its eyes are pits of magma rage and its stone form lumbers dully forwards a step, close enough for its lava veins to softly singe away a couple of the vines that the filly had created. With considerable mental control, the beast prevents his golem from attacking - as that is what his creations are driven to do - and instead has it trundle along to stand beside him again, glowing dangerously and rippling with monolithic strength. He's not quite sure what made him create it - a desire to show off to his daughter, maybe, and let her know that she comes from loins of power.

"I have been searching Helovia for you, Sabre," he rumbles, for even though she hadn't confirmed her name, her defensive reaction is all the confirmation he needs. "Your brother misses you." This is the truth; it makes him ache that Kid cherishes Sabre's company so much more than he does Volterra's, but the stallion knows the bond of twins better than most. He sees something of himself in Kid and Nymeria in Sabre, and that is why he has thrown his resources into finding her. "My name is Volterra." He hesitates for a moment to let that sink in; will she know his name? Know who he is? Just in case, he adds; "Your father."

Kid. That brings life into the filly, and with a painful twist of his gut Volterra is again reminded of the similarities between this set of twins and himself and Nymeria. "He is fine. He possesses far too smart a mouth for one his age, mind, but he is alive and well." The Gladiator gives a small snort of amusement as Kid's sharp words slip into his mind.

She steps forwards, demanding proof that he is her father. He does not flinch; he has been expecting that. Instead he lowers his head until he is on her level, and looks directly into her eyes out of a face as white as her own. "Look at our faces, Sabre. You did not inherit that skull from your mother - you inherited it from mine." It has often been a point of contention for him that he doesn't have Confutatis or Nymeria's perfectly-defined skull upon his face; his is simply a crude approximation of one, just a broad blaze with no teeth. But he passes the distinctive markings down to his children with great regularity, and there is no finer litmus test than comparing facial decorations.

Vadir chooses that moment to plummet from the skies and land heavily upon the goliath's back, her mouth full of feathers and bits of bone. With her eyes fixed upon Sabre, she slowly and pointedly swallows the remaining feathers and begins to carefully clean her glimmering golden scales with lethal, predatory grace. Volterra frowns. Don't scare the girl, Vadir, he warns. The massive dragon simply snorts smoke, and redoubles the painstaking cleansing of her gemlike scales. "Any hatchling scared of dragons should not be hatchling of yours," she points out.

The behemoth glances back to Sabre. "Unfortunately I have not seen your mother recently, so I am unsure of her whereabouts. Kid, however, I bump into regularly. Much to his delight." The sarcasm drips lazily from the stallion's tongue, but it's not venomous in the slightest. "He is an outcast, as I was until recently. To my knowledge, he has no fixed home, but I know he has been extremely worried about you." The beast's penetrating red gaze looks directly at his daughter. "Did your mother never describe me to you?" He's slightly hurt at this - he always thought himself so memorable.