Blacktail Deer Plateau hollow

a stranger greeted her. a blue-eyed imp in varicolor, a daywalker with one paw in the world of night. like all daywalkers, she showed a proclivity for mundane questions. the listener regarded her with cool indifference.

"my husband."

as if summoned by these words, ingram appeared.

did he know? did he sense something missing in her?

was that shame she felt, to hear her title fall from his lips so easily?

"no," the skyrock burned, back on her beloved islands. "no, call me... almalexia."

at the blackwater islands, she was the listener. among her own chosen followers, she was eternal; their prophet. but here?

here, she was the dreadfather's wife. she was a stranger in unfamiliar lands. and without her skyrock, she was...

fading

withering

dying

changing. only changing. for him, as he had changed for her.

her eyes were only for him now.

"i suspect you have questions."