The broken is found by Loretta not long after her master sends her away. His own companion shares brief exchanges, sending images to Knox as she learns of them. all muddled, all somewhat obscured by the secondhand source, they leave the colt lost and uninformed. What is it? he asks his companion, urgency striking the tone of his thoughts and creating a hazardous chord. Manhattan, what's wrong?

His companion is silent for a moment, staring out into the distance as if she will find his answer there. When she turns to look at him, it is with solemnity and sorrow. Something is wrong; something is very, very wrong. His mind screams at her, reaching out with urgency as he grows more and more concerned by the second. He watches as Loretta runs back from where she came, leading the way, but he does not move. He will not move, not until Manhattan tells him the truth.

An image of the dauntless flashes in Knox's mind, paired with flashing portraits of those whom Knox has, in his own way, once lead to death. The message is clear enough, but still his companion's voice rings in the corner's of his mind. Perhaps it is to emphasize for Knox the sad and terrible truth, or perhaps... perhaps Manhattan, too, must think it in such clear terms to believe it herself. Nonetheless, the words ring out:

Archibald is dead.
"No." A whisper.
"No." A desperate moan.
"It can't be!" The cry of the one left alive.

Knox wants to die.

Knox wants to fall right then and there, to let his body collapse and tumble to strike the earth in a violent display. Let him suffer in his final moments, let him feel the pain amplified. All physical hurt is gone; the aches from his challenge with Faelon fade. All that is left is terror and hurt.

If Aylin has taught him anything, it is to love—that he, a beast who thought himself so long to be nothing but wretchedness, can love. But he wonders, wonders as he begins to run after the red malamute, wonders as snow falls fat and heavy to sting his eyes and chill his blood, if this is the consequence of love. Is love no more than a buildup? He has not ever loved his brother until now—respected, yes, but never loved. As the forest shifts and sways around him, as he gallops through seemingly endless wood and feels the slap of a white bridle against his cheeks that grow wet with the product of his sorrow, he wonders why it is now that he chooses to love his elder brother.

Does he love Archibald because he is family? Does he love Archibald for his strength and quiet kindness, of which he has heard of only in stories? Knox cannot love his brother for how he knows him: Knox barely knows him. The realization that he has let so much of his life already go by without caring for his brother, for any of his family, enough to truly know them, is one he cannot bear.

As lost as he, Manhattan runs blindly in his wake. She cannot correct her master or ease his pain; she knows no better. Her own limited understanding of the world tortures her master far beyond belief; wrenches her own heart until it thumps slowly and painfully within her blackened breast. Somehow she runs ahead of Knox; perhaps it is the pain of Faelon's bucks that has slowed him, perhaps it is the heavy sensation grief weighing on his shoulders. He is too young for this, she thinks. They are all too young for this.

But then again, can anyone ever be ready to see their brother die?

The dark pair burst through the brush and into a clearing, shoving past Phaedra without any thought and then stopping shortly before the huddled figures resting upon the earth. The hot tears which streak across Knox's cheeks sting like an familiar fire. He has cried too many times, but he still does not feel the good. Now, as he lets his blue, panic-stricken eyes sweep across the unfamiliar mare and his Brother's huddled body, he needs a light.

But even as he watches, Knox catches the sight of breath ripple across his massive brother's hide. The information clears, the understanding reshapes itself and intensifies. He sees the mare lying desolate upon the ground as it turns white with an early snow—notes the curve of her sides and sees the stain of afterbirth littering the earth. For a moment, ever fleeting, a confused sort of bewilderment catches Knox's expression and grasps it tightly. He draws closer, his body curving to see what lies beyond his brother's hulking figure and beneath the curve of his powerful neck. Condolences fall from Knox's lips like the strange snow from the Orangemoon skies. He manages little, just drawing close enough to watch Manhattan lay to rest beside his brother and gently place his own cannons against Archibald's left shoulder and let him know where he stands, ever at his side. His own tears dry, the words long intended split the open, silent air. "Brother, I... I'm..." his voice quivers, trailing off. He has killed before, but he never should have. And this... this is some cruel twist of nature's fate, some wretched curse cast down upon a murderer's soul as it tries to perhaps live a life of forgiveness and regret. This... this is something young Knox cannot bear to see. Because in the dim, cold day, he connects; he dives headfirst into emotion understands the situation laid before him wholly and completely.

Archibald the Dauntless is not dead—his spirit is.

—
[[Control of Loretta permission given by Time]]