Is it so wrong, I wonder, to confess a sense of relief? I had held power for so long, perhaps even squandered it, that the release of it felt even more exciting than it felt to procure it all those years ago. It was the greatest use of power, after all, to turn away from it. How many others could claim such a thing? How many others left their thrones through their own choice? Few, I know. They all end up chased away or dying in their little dens, tucked away from the world after so many years of standing atop it but never truly in it. Relief, that is certainly what it is to feel the grotto's rocks beneath my paws, to bask in the scent of foreign places and foreign things, to smell like salt and pine and loamy earth. I am more than just seaspray and politics now. It almost feels as if my former skin has fallen away like the autumn leaves. Perhaps I will be fortunate enough to weather and regrow throughout the winter.
It is not the Thunder King that I search for, but it is him that I find nonetheless. I catch his scent in the air, tangled up in the shadow of the grotto as I find my way to the grotto's maw. I peel away from the darkness and into the light, following Arturio's scent as I wonder why it is he is so far away from Diveen. It is unusual for leaders to leave their homelands, this much I know. Is he searching for somebody too? It is a good enough distraction from my own search, so I am quick to find him among the maze of stones.
"Ah, Arturio," I call out only when I am but several yards from him, not wishing to draw the attention of any others who lurk nearby. I lope towards him, offering him the slightest bow of greeting as my eyes find his. "What a fortunate coincidence that we both find ourselves seeking the company of the grotto. It has been some time." I pause some feet away from him, my head tilting then. I feel myself grin, amused. It is the first time I have met him as any less than an equal and yet, I do not feel any less equal than I ever had before. Perhaps I do not possess a throne by name, but I still very much possess one within myself. "Are you seeking something out here in the shadows?"