She was here. He knows, as he always knows. It is the scent of the sea she leaves behind, spilled across the world. Yet, none are keen enough to pay attention to the secrets she's bleeding before them. Sebastien follows her scent until the steppe swallows it up. Pools of water pour over the stones. The sea always did have a way of hiding her from him. The silver bronc peers downstream from where he stands. There are hoofprints in the soft sand of the banks. He can't be sure that they belong to her because the water has stolen the scent. Sebastien frowns to himself because he has let her get too far away from him. Meira must have forgotten that she still belongs to him. It is the way of all things. Sebastien is destined to consume and possess those who are swept up in his gravity.

The bronc carries on, following the hoofprints until they vanish in the stream. The ones that are still visible beneath the flowing water are nearly indiscernible from the grooves carved out by the stones. Sebastien finds himself standing in the stream and peering down into the water. His gaze is caught somewhere between watching his reflection and peering beneath the water. Then all he feels is anger. It is hot, so hot it burns his skin. His tongue roves across his enamels. Sebastien wishes he could sink his teeth into her again. Make her beg the way she used to beg. He kept moving. Forward and down. Down along the falling stream of the steppe. 

How often has she turned him into a hunter? He wonders as he stalks through the swelling darkness and cries of the night. It is the element of the deity that is said to have cursed his house. Each night, he can feel the way she breathes down his neck with her moon. She cuts her teeth on the stars in preparation for the war that she will never win. The day will always crawl out from the crypts of night. This ritual will repeat each day, it is as inevitable as he and Meira.