Shenzi was as a creature apart, not belonging to the world she was trapped in, but neither willing to dare leave it for fear of drawing attention to herself. The scarred mare walked a very fine line these days, between keeping herself away from all the stallions that resided in the Lagoon and not traipsing too close to the borders, lest the beasts come slinking out of their dens to converge upon her. (There was one, above all, that she did not want to see, and yet it was for him alone that she became a meek, muted shadow of herself, even though it was far too late for anything she did to make a difference.)

She spoke, sometimes (when she felt most alone), to someone that wasn’t with her, not caring what any interloping bachelor might think of her for such a thing. What might come across as insanity to any observer, was, in fact, the only thing keeping her sane. It was during one such discourse ( “... The desert stretched for miles in all directions, and I know you’re not fond of the heat, but I promise you, if you saw it, you’d say it was one of the most beautiful things you’d ever seen...”) that her solitude was shattered by the most unlikely of sights.

Shenzi is caught off-guard at the sudden appearance of Nyimara wading through the waters toward her. “It’s you,” the words were a gentle thunder in her chest. “You came back for me,” Shenzi rasps. Again She stands, stiff and still, watching as the pale haired figure draws closer still. There is so much she wants to say, if Nyimara is really here, but all the most important things are buried beneath the weight of her guilt, her regret, and her shame. But though her body relaxes when the silver brown mare curled against her breast, the warmth of her, the scent, enough to convince Shenzi that this is real and not just a dream, her heart, broken by her own folly, only becomes ever more numb at the words she hears spoken from the silver crowned queen’s lips.

No, not Nycol. Not the boy Nyimara had left behind while she had risked herself to come here last time, to help her escape.

A dry sob catches in her throat, and she wants to rage - what kind of mare could do such a thing to a child who was innocent? But then she remembers how, in rage and fear, she had turned on Azizi and left him forever marked. A mare like her. In an attempt to steer her thoughts away from this Faolain that Nyimara cursed as a monster (and the monster she herself had become) Shenzi thinks instead of the time that Nyimara had found her, lost in grief in the wastelands of Salem, and how the silver bay mare had riled her up, refusing to let her wallow in misery.

Even as she tries to think of something sharp to say, (for, despite everything, or because because of everything, she cannot bring herself to set her teeth to Nyimara’s flesh, even as a last resort), Shenzi cannot find her voice. In this respect, she and Nyimara had been different back then, but not so any more - now they had both suffered the loss of a child. For all her savagery, for all her fierceness, for all her wanting to be strong, the brown barb mare could not help but come undone.

Numb as she is, with nothing left of her heart to break, Shenzi groans at a pain that blooms inside her chest. She did still feel after all. Icy guilt that chilled the blood in her veins, ragged grief that left her throat throbbing raw and something deeper that suffused her with a heat she’d never felt in the presence of anyone but Nyimara. She steps forward, ignorant of how the sudden movement jostles the slimmer bay mare because Shenzi is blind to everything for a split second, and all she wants is to be closer. Lipping at strands of the silvery mane of her companion, Shenzi simply arches her neck over Nyimara’s in a clumsy embrace.

You are with me, come the murmured affirmation, and the certainty in the sentiment is enough for Shenzi - more than enough. And she withdraws from the embrace, only to tilt her head, so that she can whisper in Nyimara’s ear: “Always.” She knows now, is convinced, that Nyimara holds no blame towards her in her heart for what happened to Nycol, nor does she bear a grudge for the way Shenzi denied her the first time (in the same way that Shenzi cannot bring herself to attribute her prolonged imprisonment here to the silver mare). So when Nyimara draws back, to look her in the eye and ask her question; ‘Are you ready now?’, there is only one word that rises to Shenzi’s lips. “Yes.” Her lips twist into a bitter semblance of a smile. “I will be free of this place soon enough. Tell me where to find you, and I will come.” It is a promise, one that (like her last one) Shenzi will not break.

But there is so little time, and suddenly Shenzi feels very vulnerable, and she casts her gaze about, desperately seeking for any of those sneaking shadows that she always sensed watching. Anxiety tightens a fist around her throat, and a glimmer of madness flickers in her eyes. As much as she wants to be with Nyimara, she wants Nyimara to go. She is torn again, though this time, her heart does not pull her away from the silver bay’s side. And in a soft, savage hiss, she makes another promise alongside a painful confession of her own

“I won’t let them have you, Nyimara. You’re all I have left.”