The new land required exploration. And one morning after spending most of the night awake with Tobias, Aaliyah sets out alone leaving him to slumber in his cool shadows while she explored the new world in the sunshine.

It was completely different to anything she had seen before. She could remember where everything had been with a pristine clarity. The warm sand between her toes pushes her back into the past. Her mind lingering on memories of the days when she was young, barely past her father’s leg, and it’s like a knife to the heart.

Russet and obsidian masked eyes close for the briefest of seconds as paws sweep gracefully across the ground. Further and further away from the trees and out in the bright sunlight. Aaliyah tries to reign in the emotions flooding her. She hadn’t expected coming here to be so hard. For so long she has been so strong and had to hold so much in. And perhaps it is strange to some that she would choose let her guard down out in the open in broad glorious daylight.

But that is the only time she can. Out in the middle of the open plains, with the warm sun beating down on her ivory form, it is the only place she knows her boy will not come and even though she loves him with all her heart this is not a time she can be around him.

Facing the lake she lets her careful composed mask crumble and fade away. She whispers an incomprehensible string of words in the ancient language she learned so long ago over and over again. Each a blessing for those she lost. Her eyes seem to fill with tears but she won’t let any fall.

Squeezing her teal and black splotched eyes shut Aaliyah murmurs a final goodbye for her mother. And an apology for not being the daughter she should have before her life was cut short.

A soft sigh escapes her lips as she looks out over the water. What would happen now? What would they do now? Tobias would grow hungry and if the land had truly returned to its former glory then packs would form soon, meaning better protection against dangers, particular her ‘danger’ which needed to eat. But for the moment she forces herself to relax and closes her eyes to the world, shutting everything out. And then she just breathes.