Mauja Frosthjärta

More came, distant shapes buffeted by the winds, surrounded by halos of mane and drowned out by the din of the divine gale. But he had no eyes for them, no thought to spare the other individuals who came to witness and mourn what the Gods were about to do.

In the darkness he found her, his black muzzle brushing against the white of her neck; she didn't shatter, she didn't come apart like the petals falling off a flower. Instead, she pressed against him, and he muffled a groan of relief and closed his eyes. She was still real. She was still alive. As long as she was, they'd be fine, wouldn't they? They'd get through it, somehow, and.. and Mauja was used to darkness, if not this compact. But what life was there in the darkness, without the touch of the sun? If the rest of Helovia migrated somewhere else, should he remain, a madman, cackling and declaring himself King of Nothing?

It wasn't a pleasing thought.

She pulled him from his reveries with a question he had no answer to. He sighed, softly, and tilted his head to press his cheek against her neck, slowly moving his body to stand beside her – the world would grow colder, but her warmth was like a trickle of life through frozen veins. As long as he knew others were alive, he would be alive, too.

The lull of silence was shattered by screams, and voices, as if they suddenly understood what had happened, the magnitude of this.. betrayal? No; he wasn't sure that was what it was, even if he would've labelled it thus in his bitterness. They were doing something, but what? He felt Ophelia shift beside him, and pulled his head away to let her move. He knew where she was anyway, and after the first screams had subsided he heard someone's flight, and the still-talking voices of some group who seemed to revere the Sun God.

"I don't think this is the end," he said after a moment, but his voice lacked the conviction he needed – but to say anything else would be to give in to hopelessness, and he had no intention of doing that. "But I be damned if I know what it is." In the surreal silence his quiet voice was barely more than a whisper, afraid of stirring up something in the darkness. Again, he swung his gaze around, and saw nothing. Nothing. It was familiar, in a twisted way, because they had dreamed of it, of fleeing the destruction of the world brought about by the pounding of his hooves, but that blackness had been lit by the scarlet roses around her feet.. and the gold leaking out from his scars.

"You were my light in the dream," he murmured after another moment, feeling awkward. "And..." What was he going to say? It had ended with him falling through the floor, spiraling into blackness, hardly the end he wanted to find him in real life, too.. nor did he want to put the burden of being "his light" on her, when she had other concerns. It was.. more along the lines of, as long as she was alive, he'd pull through. He lowered his head with a sigh. "I think we'll be fine, if we remember those who matter to us. I think it's too early to tell if the Gods expect us to do something.. so for now, I think we should wait, and gather our friends and families, and make sure they are safe..." Perhaps it would pass in a few hours, or a day or two, and if so, to make all sorts of plans of action was foolish, especially when they had no idea what was going on. But something, the darkness in his heart perhaps, told him that it wasn't going to end that fast.