living beyond your years, acting out all their fears

He had been meandering across Luthien when he had first crossed Amberlyn’s path. Perhaps it was the ghosts that he’d visited in the Thicket - of his lost children and the life that had once been his - or perhaps it was just the season getting to him, but he had broken his stretch of solitude and drifted to sleep that night tucked close to Amberlyn’s side.

Of course, no beast can change its nature completely, and thus he had stirred hours before dawn and slipped away into the dark without a word.

Above all things, Starscream was a creature of habit, and it was his own vanity (not to be confused with paternal instinct, since there was no love in his heart for his once-sons who had proven to be disappointments to him, mainly because they were alive, while his sons sired by Naydra were not) that led him back to the Forest, to see if that night he’d spent with Amberlyn had been worthwhile after all.

The scents on the cool forest air were much the same - stallion and mare alike - but as before, Starscream had paid them no heed. He was not here to snatch away anything that did not belong to him, he held no desire for land or title. He was simply here to seek out one mare, and like a shark smelling blood in the water, he caught Amberlyn’s scent and followed it.

There was the smell of blood in the Forest too, but not from injured prey. From downwind Starscream prowled closer under the cover of the shade of the trees, and he had intended to stand guard in secret, knowing all too well that mares were very protective of their newborn offspring, but the crack of a twig beneath one of his chipped hooves alerted Amberlyn to his presence.

Rather than calling out to calm her and risk being heard by one of the other residents who might not take kindly to his being here, he simply moved forward, calm and relaxed, stepping into view, so that Amberlyn could see him. And there he halted, moving no closer, his honey gold eyes lingering on the mare a few moments, before averting to get a first good look at the newborn colt she was shielding.

At length, he spoke, voice low and even. “I will stay right here, if you want. To watch over him while you rest.”

xoxo
STARSCREAM