Autumn was coming, cool, crisp winds to tug playfully at his mane and chase away the warmth during the long evenings. The sun still lingered to light the nights, and sheltered in their valley to the north the unicorns of the Basin were protected from the oncoming cold. Hot springs beneath their earth warmed it, made it green when all around was bleak white or the deep dark of the mountain crags. And the summers — with distaste he remembered the last one, when trees had withered, grass wilted and dried, crumbled to dust, how brooks and rivers had run dry. He was surprised they all hadn't sweated out the last of their fluids and become dried-out husks like the rest of the world. But the summer in the Basin had been pleasantly cool, always a shadowed cave to hide in from the sun's stark rays, and the winds blowing off the snowcapped mountains had certainly kept the temperature pleasant. All things considered, the Aurora Basin was not a bad place, but it was not home in his heart.

Back among the Threshold trees again..back south, where the trees were green. The few ones standing in the Basin were either deciduous, or hardy birch already turning the color of flames. Winter came early up north.

And sometimes, winter came south; Mauja, regal and graceful, was draped in the finest of snowy white, frost upon his horn and within his cool blue eyes. The trees rose around him, and once it had been familiar, a comfort, but used to the open expanse of the Steppe and the hidden vale, he felt confined, caged.. trapped. His alert gaze roved through the gaps, every sense alert, ears and nose twitching to each sound and smell. Of course, the predators of Helovia often chose weaker prey, but ever since the encounter with the giant wolf-beast, he'd been wary of forests. Flicking his tail, Mauja sighed and moved on, deeper. Paranoia only restricted you, yet it was sometimes hard to shake it off his back.

For some time he'd been heading towards someone, a mare by the scent of it, a newcomer. Though he could detect no smell of feathers, he didn't know whether or not she bore a horn upon her head. If she didn't.. well, he'd just smile politely and be on his way. And if she did.. his eyes narrowed a fraction, hooves finding a path through the winding trees. Glacial, but soft like snow all the same, Mauja swept through the forest until he found her: regal of build, bay in color, her mane and tail full and dark. She seemed to have a sound body, even though he thought she had the haunted look many newcomers had. Red bordered her eye, and rising proudly from her forehead was a horn fading to a black tip.

He whickered, the noise mostly just a rumble in his chest, as he did not wish to startle her should she somehow have failed to see his white body against the green backdrop. He stuck out like a sore thumb in these southern areas. "Welcome to Helovia, sister," he called when a little closer, drifting forward like snow in the wind until he stood some two yards off, his head tilted slightly to the side and his forelock sliding off it to hang like a veil before his right eye. "I am Mauja, of the Basin. What do you seek here?" A new start? A home? A home among unicorns? Peace, love, war, death, life, power? Few seldom spouted nonsense in response to his question, the one he asked them all as they came in here, but someone had to be the first, hadn't they?

The small smile he usually wore curved his dark lips, something warm in his blue eyes as he waited for her reasons — if she had any at all. Some just happened to come here, but they came to Helovia and no further. Only the ocean lay beyond their other border.