He heard their words not, heard them turn to one another and discuss. All he could hear was the pounding of blood in his own heart.
The flower-girl read, the chamomile girl adorned with fireflies asked after his well being. He heard her, but could not respond. Did not have it in him to even think to reply. All he could do was gasp for air, trying to still the frantic thumping in his breast. But his panicked gasps did little but keep the panicked rhythm a tempo, the great heaving of his lungs keeping blood flow at painful levels in its haste.
After oxygen had wound its way back into his legs, he stumbled to his hooves, shaky, uncoordinated as a newborn foal.
He staggered a step forward, trying to walk around the women but his bony shoulder bumping against the flower girl as he did so. He stumbled away, hooves clattering in distress over the stone floor as his limbs shook beneath him. He had not meant to run into her. He turned his gaze to her, trying to stutter out an apology, but found that his voice would not work, his throat closing in on itself.
His jaws worked uselessly, the large canines of a predator looking all but useless in the trembling jowls of a frightened boy.
Auru turned away then, continuing to try and shakily walk his way to freedom, only for his legs to give way beneath him before he had even cleared both women, his body slumping to the ground and bony hide roughly impacting the wall as he leaned against it. He managed to keep his chest off the ground, his forelegs shaking but holding his torso up, but his backlegs shook uselessly against the ground, the panic rising to take him full force as tears pricked at his eyes, still gasping for breath but feeling like he could never get enough air.
His voice wouldn't work, he couldn't say a thing as his throat seemed to swell tighter and tighter.
Had it always been so hard to breathe?
He wearily began to lower his chest to the ground, legs unable to continue holding him up as a single tear rolled down his cheek, pupils but mere pinpricks in copper eyes as he stared into the distance, unseeing but for the fright that consumed him utterly and kept his body trembling like a leaf in a hurricane.
He also felt the first touches of shame trying to wind its way across his face in heated despair at the knowledge that he lay in the midst of the Court's seat of power, a full grown man, shaking like a foal confronted with a pack of wolves when there was Court discord and mutiny afoot.
There was war on the horizon, and all he could do was shake like a useless child before the gods.
@
OOC: I am aware that this thread is old but figured I might as well get up a reply and let y'all figure out what to do from here <3 Yeah tl;dr Auru tries to walk off to let them worry about it because he was just the messenger but the panic attack really sets in and he's currently on the floor
