They will not want me near, Cera's soft vocals came across the bond, and Ilaria sighed softly and brushed her tail gently against his shoulder, trying to comfort him with slow waves of reassurance across their connection. Cera had found that, with the composition of his colors, it was far too easy to blend into the horizon and watch from afar. As he was doing in that moment, staring at the two winged mares who had gathered on the shore, two of his dearest friends. Friends he had singled out in the disaster of a herd meeting that had transpired beneath Sikeax's new reign. They love you, Cera. All families fight. You cannot avoid them forever, or they will begin to think the same thing. Ilaria's motherly voice crooned in response, her own warm eyes on the pair along the sea's edge. Cera sighed softly. 

He knew she was right, knew if he began avoiding them out of misplaced guilt or whatever emotion it was swimming beneath the void of numbness, that it would only worsen with time. Potentially stripping away the friendships he so cherished, like acid eating away at the last of his emotional pillars. 

He shuffled into motion like a creaking, dilapidated machine. Rusted and forgotten, cursed to wander the sands for eons until he faded into disrepair and awaited his death. Golden Prince. What was he Prince of? The Throat? Whatever lineage he had conjured out of brotherhood and love did not grant him any sort of power over this land. But perhaps Golden was only too fair a judgment of him. For he was easily tarnished, the weakest of metals, prized only for its gleaming appearance. But even that faded too quickly with time, revealing that Cera was nothing but a continued disappointment in all ways. 

Had he disappointed Megaera and Ampere once again? How many times could he let them down before they decided he was not worth the effort, as so many others had?

They will only pity you if you pity yourself, Ilaria murmured firmly as he approached the mares. But Cera couldn't help but cling to the depression. It was better to hurt than feel nothing at all. 

But just as his lips were parting, not even sure what he was going to say, Megaera turned to Ampere and spoke in his place. 

”You’ll find me, won’t you? If ever I’m needed again?” 

Cera's mouth went dry, heart stuttering to a halt in his scarred chest, and for a moment his soul was awash in such instant agony that he could scarcely think. And then, like a tidal wave, it passed through and over him. Leaving him submerged, floating, numb. As numb as Ranjiri's departure and Gaucho's death had made him. 

Cera... Ilaria whispered, her paw reaching out as if to touch him. But she could not fix this. She could not comfort or shield him from this familiar, painful blow. Cera had withstood so much, but this would always be the one thing that could break him like no other. Abandonment. Isolation. Betrayal. 

"You're leaving." And he could not even summon surprise at how dead and monotone his voice sounded as it escaped the prison of his clenched teeth. Ilaria went silent, her eyes sad as she looked towards the two women. "Are you nothing without Gaucho? Is this not your family without your rank?" And finally his voice wavered, like gazing down into the ocean and getting lost in the endless darkness, as far as the eye could see. 

"I can't believe you," his voice shook, trying to sound accusatory but failing. Instead it only drew attention to the thick film of tears gathering on his hurting green eyes, the way his knees shook and his wings came forth to hug himself. 

Azeen. Onni. Wanyecha. Lynx. Mystique. Rasta. Amani. Hector. Ryuu. Africa. Bucephalus.

Hototo. Midas. Ranjiri. Gaucho.

Even Ampere had temporarily abandoned them. And here was Megaera, surely leaving with her mate and plentiful children. What about me? his heart screamed. Why am I not enough to keep you here?

"I hope you find whatever you're looking for," he forced himself to spit, knowing he could not stand there any longer without dissolving into tears and angry shouting like a child. So he swallowed and dipped his head to her, as formal as he could manage, trying to rip away the threads she'd sewn into his heart. He didn't need her. He didn't need any of them. They would all leave anyways, so he would beat them to the punch. He would rip out every piece he'd ever taken from them, even if he bled to death in the process. It would hurt less than watching them all leave, one by one. 

So Cera turned and walked away. He would not watch Megeara's back as she left him. She could watch his instead, so that maybe she would feel the dagger twist in her heart as it always did to Cera. And when he could not handle the bubbling fountain of emotion in his chest, Cera's long legs took him away from them, and his wings caught the air and carried him into a place where he didn't have to feel the pain of it anymore. So that maybe he could numb himself once more, kill and burn the child that forced the tears to his eyes, as if he was still only a few seasons old instead of a jaded man. 

Jaded. That should have been his title. The Forgotten. Anything would have been better than a tarnished prince of nothing.