^{your heart is an empty room}

Deep inside you an instinct wakes, shakes you loose from the arms of a restless slumber. A moan crosses your lips but does not sound as pain contorts your face, makes it difficult to breathe despite the rattled gasping sounding in intervals from your throat, raw with sheer terror that has not quite set in yet. Struggling to your feet, you stagger forwards, almost losing your balance as you move, muscles taught and eyes wide as windows. You had never known child-birth, never known the pain of your body opening, preparing to steal new life from the swell in your stomach, never had the kind of mother to tell you stories so that you would know what to expect. But you do anyway, you knew from the moment those eyes of stained-glass and charcoal flew open, your mind conscious, that the moments you had been dreading had come.

And still, despite the waking knowledge buried within your very marrow, you fight what you know to be inevitable, stumbling forwards, legs threatening to give way beneath your weight, too heavy for the bird-like bones, lungs straining with every breath. Your mind is too numb to process the racing thoughts, the surging tides of emotions migrating through your veins; your heart too busy with regret, too stubborn to follow through with what every inch of you is screaming: lie down, succumb. There is a terrible sensation within your gut, one that sends your fading mind to the brink of something you had never before thought about: death.

Death - you do not feel it looming above your head, threatening a demise that you cannot escape - you do not feel faint aside from the pulsating pain that seizes every inch of your petite frame. You do not feel anything that would suggest that you would not survive to see the morning break; so why, why does the feeling cling so desperately? Another jolt of pain rushes through you, ceasing your movement down to the tiniest pinprick of motion from your eyes, and you can no longer fight. Even as you try to slide forwards some enormous gravitational force pulls you to the ground, crumbles you into an uncomfortable heap atop the cool, moist blades of grass. Fog swirls around you from the fall, creating shapes you can't care to name through blurry visions, hazy mind. A scream forces the lines of your mouth into a taut shape, though the only sound that follows is a soft whine, the scream stripped of the pain, the utter terror.

You can no longer fight the urge to push.

In my time on this earth I have learned a great many things.

The sky is blue. So too is the ocean. The sweetest grass to eat is green.

The sweetest blood to drink is that of a freshly killed gull.

Family is important. So important, that I never cease to surround myself with those who share my blood. Father, the strong, large masculine figurine who stands over us when we sleep, mother, the subtle shadow who graces us with her rarely given affections - and of course Semira, my nestmate, my sister from the womb. It is not often that we are seen apart, and this is no different. We wander in the wake of our mother, as we so often did, silently learning and observing all that occurs, sometimes not understanding everything until mother explains it for us later on.

Akaith flies above us, as she so often does, but she tumbles through the sky in a curious manner this night. It was not every night that mother allowed us to follow her, but something had called to her. Akaith sensed it, dear ones. We are to welcome a new sibling to the family this evening, is what she had said in explanation.

The process of birthing was a swift one, mother said. For if it dragged on too long, one was left prone, exposed to the elements and all things that may eat them for too long. It was not often that mother missed a birth of a beloved one, she told us, for Akaith was most in tune with the birthings going on in her territory or involving those she held dear - it was a draconic thing, they said. But Akaith did not know this mare well, nor did mother - she was new to them, but family all the same, living within the same mists and breathing the same salty air. She would be loved, and so too would the life she presented to this world.

"Mikali," my mothers voice is soft but strong, soothing and coated in warm honey as it exits her maw and delicately dances towards the ears of the fallen mare. We stay behind, as we so often do when the adults talk before us. "Focus upon me, Mikali," Mirage speaks again, lowering her crown to the level of the pale mare's and seeking out the other's eyes to hold with her own golden gaze. "Breathe, and push, and again - I know it hurts. You can do it dear, we are here for you." Even I was not sure how mother knew what to say, nor when to say it, but her words seemed to work with the rhythm of the contractions.

I had not witnessed a birthing before, and even now, I did not stare - I allowed the obsidian trimmed mare to keep her dignity, dignity that birthing tried to steal from her. I saw mother's approving glance come my way, and I knew that behaving with discretion in these sorts of circumstances was the appropriate way to behave. I would remember this day, this lesson.

The smell was a curious one to tingle at my nostrils then. I drank the air with interest, feeling Akaith settle upon my back with a quiet flap of wings, feeling her own happy, soothing emotions flow into be, albeit numbed by the fact that we do not share a true bond. The scent I tasted was that of blood and water, a heady, pungent scent, that also held within it a new, unique scent of its own - a new life. Now is the time that I walk along the treeline, head lowered to shrink my already diminutive body further down in size, to spy the body of the colt who now breathes for himself. He too, now breathes the same salty air as us, he will soon walk and live within the same misty forests. He is family.