She doesn't know how long she watched the waves break against the rocks. The salty peaks kept coming, endless, rhythmic, predictable, their sound soothing on her eardrums, the motion of them below something her eyes found they could focus on, while her brain worked through the tsunami of thoughts roaming through her mind.

Amaris couldn't think, she couldn't pinpoint a thought and dissect it, understand it, evolve it. Her thoughts were all like slippery bars of soap in the hot shower, unable to be held tightly, and once they did slip loose of one's grasp, they shot away and bounced around before settling uselessly in the steaming, burning shower of scalding water, irretrievable until the flood ended.

But this flood wasn't ending.

The frown lingered upon her brow, for she was trying, as useless as her efforts seemed to be. She was trying to come back, to work through this, get past this shock, this numbing, all-consuming event that seemed to have triggered a reaction she could not control or predict within her.

Dramyrth crooned ever so softly upon her back, greeting the arrival of the pegasus lady who usually stirred such things as affection and warmth within his bondmate. He purred in his draconic way, though the soft sounds faded as his bonded did not respond, as she remained vacant, staring, unseeing, lost.

Perxaps, the lilting, accented word triggered another flick of the dragnmare's ear, for she missed the whicker of greeting and even the mental nudges of her companion - she only just now realised they were joined by another.

And she expected to feel something, she wanted to experience the predictable affection, the warmth and tenderness that she always did to Yael. She wanted to remember what it was to have a friend, a confidant, a mentor to look up to - and the echoes of those feelings rebounded around her for a time, but they couldn't settle, couldn't gain traction within her, and she was left feeling more empty, more drained of everything than before Yael arrived.

Her posture tremored slightly, her wings sagged as her tiara bowed lower over the edge, not necessarily to better view the waves this time, but simply because she was fighting a losing battle against keeping her own body upright.

More words were spoken, more thoughts exchanged, and Amaris barely heard them, barely registered their existence.

For soon, none of them would exist anymore…

The world is ending…

Claws dug into her back. She had just shut her eyes, as if to listen to an important internal thought (of which there were none), and suddenly pain lanced across her spine.

It wasn't serious, or deep, just a pinch, a spike of sharp talons into scaled flesh, enough to draw droplets of silver blood where they poked. His mental prods weren't working, though the bond still allowed him to gauge where his beloved was at - and it wasn't good.

So he resorted to this, first. His next step would be employing his breath, but he didn't want to do that - and he didn't need to. He felt the muscles along her spine tense, felt her posture rearrange itself to look much more conscious, much more here, back in the present rather than in the dangerous nothing her mind had been just moments ago.

The pain stung, though not physically harsh, mentally it was a whiplash, a lance, a hot poker plunged into her heart. It was just what she needed.

She was by no means cured, or recovered. But she was 'back' enough to allow Dramyrth back in, to feel his comforting embrace, the intimate way he was right there, cocooning her own damaged, broken, empty self with his magnificence, his gleaming and powerful and strong soul and mind. It wasn't a permanent fix, but maybe, maybe it would be enough to patch her up until she could heal on her own.

Because she would heal. She would endure. She would survive, somehow, she realised.

They had spoken. Somewhere, she knew she had heard their words, though she could not recall them verbatim. Something about not giving up and disasters have happened before.

Amaris looked at the unicorn stallion and pegasus mare, and had a trivial thought (because she could think again, though all her thoughts seemed trivial and inappropriate) that if she had been a pure equine they would be representative of the species that made up the Gods. But no, here she was, ruining it all with her dragonsblood, her silver, tainted dragonsblo-

STOP, came the thundering thought from Dramyrth, as he was right there now, intervening with his deep mental voice and his powerful grip upon her mind, heart and soul.

She breathed, almost a sigh, mostly a deep breath, as if catching it again. Was she supposed to say something? To react?

What did they say again?

"I remember that," she said suddenly, her voice different from before, slightly more animated, though nothing compared to normal Amaris' warm, lilting tones. "I remember my magic leaving me. I remember the darkness... I remember thinking everyone had died."

She didn't know why she was telling them, why it was important to say all these words. The words didn't change what was happening now, couldn't they see, couldn’t they understand?

Was Mauja trying to comfort her? The idea rose randomly in her mind, as her golden eyes, finally focussing on something other than the waves below, focussed upon him. She remembered her mother's declaration that he was a wanted fiend, a murderer. She remembered him being present when she laid her mother to rest, she remembered their conversation, how she had been the one comforting him on that day, that day where surely it should have been her receiving the comfort and he should have been celebrating, if the stories were anything to go by.

Clearly, stories were just that.

And stories wouldn't save them now.

Was she meant to hate him? Meant to feel anything towards him? Meant to be comforted by his presence, his words, here and now?

She still couldn't bring herself to feel anything.

"I don't think they are coming back this time." She murmured, her voice hushed, as if afraid to say the words - her eyes were unfocussed, she was looking out over the ocean again, her gaze scrutinising the horizon. At least, she was not completely vacant anymore, but she was still not completely Amaris yet either.

The tears still dribbled out over her eyelids, and down her hard cheekbones, carving a wet path upon the fine fur that lined her angled façade.

Amaris