Az doesn’t feel right taking Paradise over in his parents’ stead, but he thinks he would have felt worse if he had let it go. He is technically an adult, but he feels so unprepared for leadership that it launches him back into childish uncertainties and the yearning for his (slightly misguided, but well-intended) parents’ guidance.

At least he isn’t totally alone; the twins, his younger sisters, make enough of a racket in their family’s corner of Paradise by the beach that he couldn’t dream of ever feeling lonely.

But… in a way, he is still lonely. Faeline and Fauna have a companionship with each other that Azrael will never have. He tries not to mind too much, even seeking out solitude on purpose to see if he can learn to like it. Eventually, he finds a sort of peace by himself, walking through the jungle to a favored spot by the falls where the rushing water sounds are soothing and companionable — until he is shocked to find another there, with him.

Azrael pulls up short with fright. The mare had seemed to step out of thin air. She’s about his age, long-legged and rich mahogany in color, and her ears curl together at the tips. He’s never seen anything like that. He wonders if she’s been living here this whole time; if she knows his parents; if she knows where they went. He’s not surprised he hasn’t seen her yet, though. The whole of Paradise belonged to him, technically, but in reality his sisters and himself had claimed only what they needed for the three of them, not venturing far beyond the edges of the little glade near the shore. She would have avoided discovery with ease.

Az gapes like a fool for several embarrassingly long seconds before he manages to pull himself together and utter a nervous “hello.” His ivory tail gives an anxious switch, and his ears dart to and fro, trying to decide what he’s supposed to do as a territory leader with a stranger on his land. In the end, he simply cannot figure it out, so he flushes and bobs his head in a polite greeting. “I hope I didn’t scare you out,” he says, trying to reflect his own startled reaction to seeing her, as if by flipping it she might forget the fact that he’d nearly leapt out of his skin.