Dawn was still hours to come, the sky flowing in Caligo's colours of deep blues and purples, so dark it was easy to mistake them as black. Reichenbach lay awake next to his porcelain prince, restless despite the peace hovering over Isorath's sleeping frame. Sleep had erased all the lines of concern and worry from the kirin's elegant face.. it left him looking rather young and altogether angelic. A smile lingered in the corners of Reichenbach's roguish mouth as he appraised his lover, then he shook his dark curled head and slipped soundlessly from their bed.
He approached the window, argent eyes matching the stars watching him from above. Rhoswen would be arriving with his niece an hour after first light, and he would meet her at the pass. Sleep had escaped him for visions of a dainty limbed girl with stars and a certain wickedness in her eyes — she would be smart and fiercely loyal... and perhaps plagued by a sense of being torn between worlds. Reichenbach closed his eyes for a moment, frowning.
A sigh escaped him.
The idea that his choices effected a whole nation — more than one.. was still alien and uncomfortable. There was rarely a moment that he was not reminded of it. Still... again a smile graced him, his eyes opening to stare toward the distant mountains, today he would meet his niece.
— x —
Dawn's light touched the tips of the Mountains as he strode through them, coins jingling and curls bouncing, an electric smile upon his velveteen lips. He arrived at their meeting point early, his long lashed eyes searching the surrounding area keenly before he settled, humming a pleasant tune to himself. His telekinesis worked quietly as he hummed, producing a small string of silver coins from beneath his ebony hair, the face of each marked with the image of a blazing star. His first gift, to his first ever niece.
Time had lost all meaning. The light undulated and lilted before her eyes, casting prismatic spells of heavenly colour against the offset of darkness that bore into the distance like a beast yet tamed. Her heart fluttered like a butterfly caught in a web, suspended within the reams of viscous, glutinous rope that tightened around her throat whilst the web's architect crawled nearer to suck the ichor from her veins. Trapped. Though Rhoswen had always been a wingless woman, she had never felt the absence of escape more staunchly than she did now. Was this a sick twist of fate for her to endure? Was the universe looming upon high, laughing at her misfortune and misjudgement? Denocte had haunted her heels for an eternity - and here she was: drifting upon leaden limbs back towards that godforsaken Gate. There was nothing in Rhoswen's possession to sum up the torment in her heart, no words to elucidate the fog that gathered densely to cloud her thoughts. On and on - the clacking of their hooves ringing high in chorus to hail her grief; the pass was as dank as ever, and even in this warmer weather the fireborne girl felt a chill settling into her bones. It was not often Rhoswen felt cool. She was a house up in flame: oozing basalt and brimstone, breathing hot ash from ruby-cast lungs. There was nothing cold about such a woman - until now.
The events of the last twelve hours could not be wiped from her brain; instead they circled, stuck on a loop she could not break, until she knew every moment with an intense familiarity that bloodied and bruised the inner walls of her flesh. The fingermarks of her shock were pressed like purpled memories on her auburn skin, gritted deep into the vessels until they split and haemorrhaged like a violet cloud. In a single day, she had brought life into this crude insurgent world, only to lose it mere hours after - not her child, but her freedom; for a sunflower will only wilt and die under the silver bloom of starlight. But she had dug her own grave - there was no escaping such a truth, if only tempered by the actions of Raum and Acton and the doltish fucking Davke. Rhoswen tried to reach within herself for the rage that had coiled between her ribs hours earlier in the shadow of Seraphina, but the reply she awaited never came: it was dormant, like a dragon slumbering upon gold. It was by a numb and robotic sense of resolve that Rhoswen moving, that and the silent skeletal child at her hip. The red woman glanced back over her shoulder at the girl, caught between admiring her soft roseate skin and fretting over the limp in her walk and the dull bleakness in her eyes. This had been an ordeal no newborn should have ever endured, but endured it she had, only the Gods knew how. Rhoswen turned back to face forward and felt a flush of pride breach the coldness in her chest. Maternal pride - now that was new.
Dawn's light kissed the mountain, and the light hummed orange, lavender and rose about the bedraggled pair as at last they turned the final bend of Denocte's treacherous pass. The sight which greeted them was bittersweet for Rhoswen: Reich, tall and debonair as ever - a relief to see a face she knew so well, but it did not quell the stirring of discomfort in her stomach. Had she ever imagined this day would come? To return to the Raven Gates with the intention to stay? Her chest tightened, this was wrong, so wrong. "Brother..." Feet away, Rhoswen halted, feeling the brush of her daughter at her side.They were a pitiful sight: dust clung to the sweat that had long since dried beneath the alpine night, their hair twisted and their skin dull from the fatigue that threatened to consume them entirely. The filly's legs trembled as she blinked nebulously up at the towering spectre that was the Night King, quaking with ravenous exhaustion, and Rhoswen caved beneath the guilt. Her throat burned and stung from the emotion that welled suddenly, terribly, and it was all the red woman could do to stop herself from buckling to the floor. Raum, her daughter, Reich, Sera, Bexley - their faces swirled round and round in her head, a calamitous cyclone that spun her with not an ounce of mercy.
"What have I done?" a whisper, a confession, lament.
@reichenbach here have a traumatised mama and baby, 18 hours post birth ;-;
He set his argent eyes on them instantly, darting quickly to the trembling filly with such a surge of joy he could feel nothing else. He grinned, turning his long lashed gaze to his sister — his grin faded, to be replaced by a concerned frown. They were both tired and sore, but Rhoswen looked... utterly exhausted. Her storm-grey eyes, so close in colour to his own, were washed out and held only an ember of their usual flame.
"What have I done?"
He did not understand her pain, even after so long. He could not fathom that his sun and rage-kissed sister would feel guilty, or grieved by what had happened... she was returning home, to a family that loved and cherished her. She was bringing her daughter home, to raise her as a true Denoctian princess. Certainly he knew that Denocte was not her favourite place within Novus, but she would adapt and grow to love the place she had once thought her prison..
Reichenbach swept forward, offering his strength to his sister as he always had — and always would. He did not speak... for he could not think of the right words to say when her darkest day was his brightest. To have them both home... he peered at Sabine again as they walked, unable to hide the gleam of excitement within his bright eyes.
As they moved he began a deep hum, a melody to make the day a little brighter.
@Rhoswen @Sabine <3 and then the gates close and ruin his happy moment cx
If Reich had been the gunsmoke, Rhoswen was the gun - their youth swayed like washing in the wind, peaceful and unassuming, as though if they tried hard enough they might be able grab hold of it. Wasn't that the deceit of peaceful things? They drifted like butterflies just out of your reach. And in that time between reaching and living, so much had changed. She was now a mother, a pyre, a lover, a liar and the world crumbled like soot and cinder between her hands. Once she had hoped Raum might have anchored her to something, anything, but it was so clear now: he was the catalyst to this all.
Reich did not speak, he did not need to; their bond shone in the lowlight of dawn, still glistening despite her grief. Her brother swept them both forward, ushering them into a land Rhoswen had refused for so long and - without surprising her - began to hum. The sound of his voice enveloped them all, binding them closer together between an invisible string that both soothed and restricted. If there had ever been another choice for Rhoswen, and her child, it was lost to them now. The red woman glanced down at her silent, weakened child, feeling a myriad of emotions that she did not want to explore, and looked - then - back to Reich.
Her voice, once made of magma and hot honey, drove like a stake into her brother's melody - gravelled and blunt. "She still has no name," this time she glanced out over the pass to swallow the view of Denocte, her heart chiming like a glass bell, "but I am thinking - Sabine."
@reichenbach sabine derives from the meaning 'woman of the people', rhos wants her to be happy in her court and her community<3
![[Image: Rhosheader.png]](https://image.ibb.co/f4HhMx/Rhosheader.png)
