I dreamed of her, as she had been as a young girl. I brushed my muzzle over her perfect little face, drew in the milky scent of her baby skin, pressed kisses against her cheeks. She laughed as she had as a girl, loud and wild and fearless, knowing she was safe a hundred times over, the Princess of the Sadim. I walked her through the desert grasses, raced her along the dune tops, and taught her to swim in our Oasis.

I dreamed of her, but it was only a dream. It was only ever a dream, now.

I roused slowly, shifting my weight on the desert sands as I adjusted to wakefulness. I could feel my Husband nearby, and it gave me comfort to know that he was near. Even as I struggled to find my place again as his Wife, I did not doubt my affection for him. He was my other half, my soul-sewn. He was my rock in this world, and while my head still felt a little mixed up about the timing of it all, I was happy to have him back.

Wife, he chokes out, and I look to him in alarm, my eyes wide as I took in the tortured expression on his face. In the wake of all that he had told me that day in the Meadow, I had feared a moment like this might come. I looked for it beneath the bravado and the stoic insistence on gathering the family, but had not been able to tease this particular pocket of poison from him. I roused enough so that I could move near to him, brushing my muzzle over his shoulder in encouragement. He begins to let it out in starts and stops, excising the poison that has been eating him from inside out and I do not interrupt him, only rub small soothing circles into his skin.

I am only failing you again by asking this, he begins, but then continues on a different tangent, leaving me to wonder what great thing he must ask of me. I have little left to give him that I have not already given him, but I would give all that I have if it might make him smile.

He degrades himself, going beyond listing faults to all but claim he is a failure and it burns me to think he believes so little of himself. Our lives may not have taken on the course that our parents may have wanted, nor the course that might have been easiest for us both to bear, but he was no failure. The leagues of horses arriving to the Dunes at his request were proof enough of that. What other leader in this land could claim such loyal following? Who else could boast of such success in meeting and bringing desert mares home?

It certainly wasn't me from my spot along the dune tops.

He spoke then of changing our duties, of raising me to stand as his equal in the eyes of the Sadim and I hesitate, unable to speak for the lump in my throat. Logically, I understand his request. To the men of the Sadim, my title of Mira may place me as highest of women, but no higher than the lowest man. They come to me seeking advice and absolvement and my blessing for their misdeeds, but my opinion in the end is disposable. Rigel, of all the brothers, had shown me that my position was that of a figurehead, rather than one with any true spiritual power.

Even so, I had thought things different in our own household, despite my recent struggles to reacclimate to this life. While I might be silent outwardly, I had grown used to speaking to my Husband afterward, to help him chart our course forward in the privacy of our oasis, beneath the cover of the night sky. To know that in this endeavor, he had not considered me a full partner... stung. It was a confirmation of the feelings that had been eating me alive ever since we had arrived in the Dunes, and I struggled to find the words I know he needed me to say. He needed agreeance and absolution and gentleness first. He deserved all of those things from me as my Husband, and never before had I struggled to find them to give to him.

"You have not failed me," I finally murmur, dragging my gaze away from the velvet black of the horizon and back to his handsome face. "Nor could I ever tire of you, my Husband." I smile faintly, knowing the words to be true. He may exasperate me sometimes, drive me to madness with his ambition and outward focus, but he was still my other half.

I wanted to hide behind the obsequious nature of my upbringing, to armor myself with the tenets of my faith so that I could once again take my place behind his shoulder, but the words crumbled on my tongue before I could utter them.

"But I will give you the truth," I murmur, my tone unbearably anxious. I did not fear my husband. I did not believe he would harm me intentionally in anything that he did, even in high anger, but I had not been raised to use my voice. Learning to do so in any capacity as their Mira had been a journey, and I was woefully out of practice. But even here, between the two of us, saying anything contrarian to what he had uttered felt foreign and uncomfortable. "I do not know of how to help you, my love. My own struggles to adjust have not come from a lack of desire, but from an ignorance to your whims. I find out our plans at the same time as the rest of the Hous and stand silent at your side as you negotiate an alliance with a Queen we do not know."

Even this was not the direction I wanted to take the conversation and I shook my head with a small sigh. Such was the way of life for most wives that I knew. For me to chafe against it now suggested that there was something wrong with me, not him. More softly, I try again to explain. " I was alone for years, believing you to have either died or willfully abandoned me in Mahgrib. Then, the very day I decide that I will try to live again, to let the gods decide my fate... you reappear before me and explain the truth of all that transpired. And I was - I am - deliriously happy about such a thing, but it is no small thing to adjust to all of this-" I gesture broadly toward the various pockets of our family, scattered as they were across these eastern dunes, "again."

I stretch to try and touch his cheek if he will let me, fearing that he will be angry at my admission. I want so badly to be everything that he wants and needs me to be, but I do not know how to even take the first step. All I know how to be is the one that comforts him in the night, soothing ego and heart alike as he navigates the life he was born to live. I will learn, if that is what he wants of me, but I can claim no great skill with either politics or leadership. "I will learn to be whatever it is you need of me, so long as you are patient."