The weight of what had passed between them was almost unbelievable.

There was a time when Nyi would have argued that the passion and adoration that passed between herself and the smokey blue stallion was insurmountable. She would give her soul for the stallion who she claimed as her own. He held her heart and yet in one single blow he had shattered the fragile object and left the remnants a crumbled mess at her feet.

For the first time in a long time, she felt lost.

She won her crown, won the right to stand at Bjorn's side as not only mother of his heir but queen of the ridge. In that victory, she also lost herself. Bjorn was farther from her than ever before. Once more that guarding wall that had so long been torn down now suddenly finds itself back into place around her soul. Sigurdr was gone. Bjorn was against her. She had lost it all for nothing.

Rage churned in her soul, her swift feet finding her once more pacing back and forth along the sandy beach beneath the shelter of the great cliff face. Ears rotate back and forth atop her skull, blocking out the roaring of the surf against the rocks and the aggitated call of the gulls that hovered overhead. There was a time, not so long in the past, when she had raced along the sandy beach, the ground eaten beneath her hooves with Bjorn in time with her pace. There was a time when those piercing blue eyes of his had once shown with adoration and lust sated by none other. He had once made her feel as though she were the only one alive who made him feel carefree and wild. Now, now she was the one who he met with calloused eyes.

SHe had always been the outsider, the one who never quite fit in with the herd and instead stood out like a prized display in a menagerie collection. There had once been a time when he stood in her defense against Ysabel... but now he defended all of them against her. She wanted to scream. To spill her tears upon the ocean waters so that their salty residue would never be detected. She wanted to tell the fates of her heartbreak.. to beg them to chance the course of fate but even she knew their answer. Change it yourself.

A heavy sigh falls past her lips as she pauses now, sides heaving and sweat glistening her coat. Sigurdr did not need her anymore as he had when he was smaller, when he kept close to her side or suckled greedily from her teats. He was nearly a yearling and even now she can see him fleet-footed and giggling as he charged down the beach. He did not need her.... but she still needed him. Despite herself Nyimara lowers her head to the white capped surf that lapped around her fetlocks, beckoning her deeper into the waters. The icy chill reminds her that she is alive and that despite what she might feel, her heart does indeed still beat a steady rhythm.