Eirlys wakes at the sound of a roar. Blue eyes wide in terror, she looks around for what could have possibly made such a noise and finds nothing but a rush of water so strong that it knocks her from her feet. Rushing water fills her nose, her vision obscured as her head goes under and she hits it against a rock. Eirlys can’t bite back a scream, the water filling her lungs and sending her scrambling desperately. Her feet finally meet the rocks below and Eirlys lifts out of the water, coughing and gasping, blood rushing from a cut above her eye. She struggles to regain her balance, bewildered at the way the water is suddenly up to her knees. Had the rain truly been so heavy? Maybe she’s just so numb to the stinging cold of the droplets that she hadn’t realized.
But it is as if the world has finally heard her pleas to take her out; what fate could be better than washing out to sea, being lost in the same way her life was lost to her? Vidarr had taken Rota, and Eirlys had faced Taurus and still..still she endured. Perhaps this is what will end things for her. She could drift out in the freezing ocean, let her heavy legs grow weak in the freezing spring waters, sink below the surface and finally rest. She doesn’t deserve anything so peaceful, but she does deserve death.
It would be so easy, and Eirlys is certain she will do it when she sees them and instead of going loose her muscles lock, bracing her against the strong currents. A tall bay and white mottled stallion is urging a small filly onward, bracing her against the rush of the water.
Eirlys lets out a choked sob at the sight of a father fighting so hard for his daughter – Taurus hadn’t ever fought for Anwen, and Vidarr thought the only way to save Rota was to disappear with her. Before she gives it any conscious thought, Eirlys is fighting her way through the water until she can stand before the pair. The current breaks around her, and sheltered between them the flashy little filly has a slim chance to get out of this. “Don’t let her fall,” she manages to tell the stallion as she casts her gaze around desperately for higher ground. How long has this pair been here, trying to get out of the water? How much longer can the small child last? “Maybe – maybe over the next hill? Upstream, not down.” She tosses her head in the direction she means, wondering if her presence will be accepted for if this stallion will chase her away from his child.