After months afield, exploring and experiencing the phenomenon of this magical wonderland, it has all come to this bittersweet ending.

Uncertainty is the refuge of hope…

It is the essence of romance (he has learned this)…

It is the path to freedom…

But most of all, uncertainty has become Noah’s new normal and it is the greatest of his stressors. That warm morning – already it feels like a lifetime ago - he had left the sanctuary (couldn’t have imagined the level of truth in this), of Manangatang and shed a weightless existence free of actual accountability and freedom. Blindly he had stumbled upon the very same forest which now he strolled through, and had been claimed by natives to serve in their hierarchy. To him, still, it all seems to make very little sense, but for the sake of his dove, the winged stallion tries in earnest to appease this new style of life.

Brief discussions (more instructions, he feels bemusedly), with a soldier days following their return, has lead him beyond the frozen borderline in the north to find a recruit - someone standing in the dappled light of this old forest, who strikes him as uncomfortable, lost or equally out of place. For the better part of this newest journey, he flies out of preference, but as the army of straggly, stinking redwoods grows tighter, Noah is forced to descend and search more primitively at their feet. The afternoon is aglow, ageing, and the enormous trunks around him throw long dank shadows; he shuffles between them with rattling nostrils trained low to the ground – for bright scent clings to grass and bark, providing reassurance that his mission isn’t in vain.

As one hour bleeds painfully into the next with frustrating, futile slowness, he begins to tire of the whole idea. Thought wanders brazenly - stubbornly - back to the darling left behind and the strange metamorphosis surrounding both her appearance and mind, through recent months. He dotes over her the best of his ability, even stepping up his daily delivery of floral delights to each morning and night; the smile such small tokens lift, is enough to warm his heart through, and though she is decidedly more emotional than he can remember her being prior, the cosy, mellow security of their bond provides him self-worth. In her, he has found a purpose – a reason to pander to the strange whims of the Basin, and tie himself to their cause.

A sudden call on the wind summons his focus and brawn jerks to life suddenly, bright sea-green eyes flashing wide; Noah has been dozing, lost to the perfect existence of his angel, but as the female’s voice fades, he sends forth his own in answer, “Hello!” With haste limbs barrel forward and hooves thrum to the rhythm of a three-beat gait. His search now is narrowed to the nearest vicinity of that stranger, and he scours the rough wilderness for her position – at last, he finds her, crisp like the snow flanking the valley he serves – and her bold crimson stare fast ensnares his attention. The line he was fed, turns over and over in his mind, and without thinking – before even gracing her the courtesy of small talk – nervous tongue hurls it forth; "I am Noah… From the Basin. A soldier.

I mean, from Aurora Basin.

Uh…"

Stunned, for he has been rehearsing it tirelessly, Noah stands before her like a lunatic, muttering beneath his breath with eyes scattered erratically across the earth. "Sorry miss…. I’m kind of new to this thing... recruiting."

Noah

I was born a warrior
I was born a warrior