another mind, another soul, another body to grow old. it's not complicated.
It didn't escape Otem's keep scrutiny that Aurelia's entire countenance had changed, though she couldn't quite pin down a reason as to why. Was it because the golden-touched mare was as manipulative as Otem could sometimes be? Was she just putting on a show? Had the transportation through the portal made her irritable, but now with her hooves on solid ground she was much better? Inwardly Otem sighed. Like her mother before her, Otem found the consideration of the emotions of others to be a cumbersome task, but unlike Isopia, Otem did think it was necessary. How else were you supposed to make your way in the world?
However before the mulch coloured filly could come to a conclusion, Aurelia began recounting what had happened to her, and the story she told was much more interesting that Otem's deductions about Aurelia's state of mind. As the mare mentioned the slaughter of the gods, Otem's heart clenched as she thought of her own mother throwing herself into certain death to try and make the portal safer for everyone. Past that, she hadn't actually given it much thought. It didn't seem possible that Helovia even existed anymore, but apparently it did in some way. Though could the destroyed husk of their homeland really still be thought of as Helovia, if it really was as Aurelia described it?
"Ah.." Otem murmured, indicating that she was still listening. Not so long ago she'd asked the creature that guarded the heart of the labyrinth if there would ever be a way back, but he didn't seem to know. Now it seemed as though even if there were, there wasn't anything to go back to.
Aurelia's question caught Otem off guard. Perhaps it was because of the mare's abrupt mood-change, but the girl hadn't expected the golden mare to be particularly clever. And yet the query that left her lips was an especially apt one, and one that Otem had never actually thought of. Clearing her throat and trying not to let her surprise colour her features too much, Otem shook her head. "Actually....I don't know. It seems sentient but .. it doesn't seem to have a body, or at least not one that I've seen. It just .. is, and then things usually happen." Otem shrugged, still trying to disguise her unease at how caught off guard she was. "You could try? Seeing as it hasn't come yet?" Otem looked around, as if expecting the thing to appear on cue.
Flicking an ear back to catch Aurelia's question, Otem smirked slightly and shook her head. At least this was one thought Aurelia hadn't beaten her too. "No, actually. And that's part of the problem I think ... We all came, and Kisamoa told us to explore and when we did ... well, there was no where to come back to, to tell about our findings. Everyone just sort of disappeared." Otem eyed Aurelia for a moment, as if sizing her up (which in fact, she was). "Anyone could start one, I suppose." The girl allowed, fishing to see if Aurelia was the type to bite at this idea.
The ball of light at Otem's side suddenly began to pulse and expand. The light intensified and then dimmed as this process occurred. Having witnessed this once before, Otem knew what to expect and tried to appear nonplussed in the face of such a magical transformation. Where there had only been one orb, suddenly there were two. One floated towards Aurelia, and the other stayed where it had been at Otem's side. "Oh right. There's also that." Otem nodded her ram-horned skull towards the orb. "They are supposed to help cleanse the lands."
The Portal
