[private] take a look in the mirror

[Tarian]

Tarian had wondered about her that first morning. He remembers staying to one side of the clearing, thinking that how early the day was meant that there wouldn't be another horse nearby. And yet, there had been Altissima looking towards the sky much the same way she regards it now. His head turns slightly, following where her gaze floats up to the clouds. For a moment, he thinks that she is saying there is magic up there.

He's never been much of a daydreamer but he considers the idea, for her (even if he doesn't say so out loud).

Until a silvered ear pricks towards her and he looks back to the speckled mare. No, the magic would seem to be down here. It was with her. It twists something in him - not envy because any anger over the loss of his abilities has been long gone - and his blue eyes gaze at @Altissima with a new light. He'd known that she had gifts; that had been glaringly obvious from the way her eyes could change color or the way that she could dazzle the very air around her, as if Wildling had summoned her own galaxy of stars.

His mouth twitches a little, another small grin playing across Tarian's features because if there could be anybody to command the stars, it would be the woman in front of him.

But her gift has to do with the same sun that they stand beneath. It explains much to Tarian, who can understand now why she was out during that first, bright morning and why she is standing here now. Nothing to do with him but he can't help the way that he feels glad to see her, even if she had never planned on returning to Loess. It is such an odd thought to the stallion who had pledged his life and loyalty to that kingdom, never thinking that there might be something more. Never thinking that he'd be able to offer more than that.

The thought doesn't venture any further because suddenly, he is illuminated (and some part of him is terrified, had thinking of her done that that?)

"No," he forcefully tells himself out loud. But then he stops, finally drawing his wings close to his sides. How had she known that? Tarian has been taught to be wary of Magic but his encounters with Altissima make any doubts he has easily disregarded. Still, he can't quite bring himself to admit to an old injury that he never allowed to fully heal. Abrupt changes in the weather, long hours on patrol both served to remind Tarian about the shapeshifter mare he had battled during the Alliance.

"Just an old problem," he mutters, though the way he clearly favors one back leg is obvious. "It'll pass," Tarian tries to tell her, like the way that his hindlimb bothers him is more of a nuisance, like summer storms. There is a grimace that says otherwise and were it not for his current company, the Loessian might have cursed.

"Did it...," Tarian ventures uneasily, not liking how much he might reveal (or what her magic might have already told her). "Did it show you that?"

wow he is such a manchild lmao