[div style="max-width: 360px; font-family: palatino; color: #2e8b57; text-align: left; padding-top: 8px; padding-left: 10px"]HOW DO YOU RUN FROM Y[color=#5d8e93]OUR OWN MIND?

Ash and dust... It seemed to follow her.  Her life a series of... Harsh events surrounding fire.  Watching the ashes that remained.  A hollowness in her chest, where she had held friends and family within her heart.  Mother.  Brother.  Kydobi.  Washed out by flames.

Perhaps that was the ashen city repelled the petite deer-fox.  The promise of ruins.  Emptiness.  The dust left behind by those she had never known.  The aftermath.  Before Jervis' reign.  Before she and her father arrived to the desert. 

It might as well be a graveyard and the similarities... To the place she'd been born... It chilled her to the bone.  Pushed her away from the city whenever she wandered too close.  Always eager to keep moving.  To focus on gathering desert plants or patrolling the worn paths.  Anything to stay away.  Anything to avoid the threat of those memories.  Lingering on the edges of her mind.  Nothing but fear and loss.

And she would've done the same today, had hazel hues not caught the blur of spots in the distance.  Confused.  Concerned.  Wings pressed close to her sides as hooves hesitantly trotted over the sand.  Chest tight.  Stomach constricted.

"Hy-hydrostatic?" Seemed okay.  Just... Staring off into the city.  The ruins.  The ashes.  "Are- are you okay?"

© MADI

[div style="max-width: 360px; font-family: palatino; color: #2e8b57; text-align: left; padding-top: 8px; padding-left: 10px"]HOW DO YOU RUN FROM Y[color=#5d8e93]OUR OWN MIND?

Aine breathed out softly, nodding.  Tried to keep her gaze on Hydrostatic.  A worried flicker in her eyes as he said it was scary.  She hardly wanted the boy scaring himself.  Especially when she agreed... Caught by the vision of smoke rising from the city.  Spilling into the clouds... The taste of charcoal and iron on her tongue.

Barely breathing when she blinked, hazel hues lost in the sky.  White clouds.  Four... Seven... Eight... Her legs felt shaky.  No smoke.  Just the scattered ruins ahead of them.  Scary.  Haunting did it more justice.  Aine shifted her weight from one side to the other, turning back to Hydrostatic.

"It was- it was before da and I came here." Two years now?  How long had it been?  "This city- it used to be the Pitt's camp." But the finer details, the personal history, she knew little of.  Nor why when the jungle offered more protection from the desert.  Even when the buildings stood, she wondered how hot it would have been.

"But the Pitt- we were- we were more violent then.  Hurt others.  Got into- into all sorts of conflicts. This- this is what... This is- this is the cost." Ash and dust.  Nothing but fire and death. "But we don't- we don't do that anymore." Most of them anyway.  Some still pushed their progress back.  She didn't understand.  Tired.

"You don't- you don't have to be scared of it, Hydro," she murmured.  An attempt to be reassuring, even though her feathers still felt ruffled.  "I'd just- I'd just watch my step if you ever- if ever go further in.  I don't want- I wouldn't want you coming in with a broken leg, yeah?" Not fun.  She knew from experience.  Recalled her father's frustration when she tried to avoid him.  Prolonged the setting.

"We can- we can take a closer look, if you want.  Or I- I could show you someplace less scary. My garden- my garden's back in the jungle.  A little closer to camp."  A dramatic change in scenery.  But she'd let him choose.  Better to have someone with him if he did want to see the city closer up, after all.

© MADI