Climbing the Tephran volcano had ignited something in Lilliana.
It might be hard for Beqanna to believe, but the chestnut mare had once enjoyed tempting fate. Perhaps not as bold or daring as adventurous @[Wishbone] but she had done so in smaller ways. Lilli had always respected the borders of her mother's territory and her father's kingdom and never ventured outside them (save for that day with Frostbane). As a youth, she was as biddable and dutiful as a daughter of her bloodline should be.
But then Lilliana learned that while she didn't possess the airbending abilities of her ancestors, the wind talked to her in other ways. Lilli learned that her long legs gave her speed, that her chest held a large heart that gave her stamina. She learned to tempt the Fates with a chase. There were many days spent with her half-siblings and cousins and nephews where Lilliana convinced them to run with her. For her, there was no freer feeling than her hooves lifting off the ground. She could race with them for hours and even when all their sides were heaving, when they were were lathered with sweat and their manes hung limp against their damp necks, all she needed was a moment to recover, and then she could toss her slender head to the wind again. (Tarian would huff, 'Enough, Lilli.' Liam always found an excuse to leave their game first. Even Elena would smile after a while and say, 'Why don't we walk to the river? It always looks so lovely at sunset.')
She hadn't forgotten that spark - that feeling - but so much had happened since those lost days.
There had been the journey to Beqanna. There had been Wolfbane and his Curse. Lepis and her anger. Ghaul and his flames.
There had been motherhood and the sacrifices that came with it. There had been Taiga to lead and Brazen to mourn and Neverwhere to lose.
Then had come the Darkness and the monsters and there had been no time to consider anything else but survival.
That day with Wishbone, braving the steep incline of the volcano and even venturing to reflect on a past that she wanted to forget, had brought some part of herself back into the light. So when this stranger comes to the border of Taiga that peers at her with Wish's fearless gaze, Lilliana lifts her head. She recognizes those amber eyes. But the muted purple is unfamiliar. The smaller, sturdier shape of this mare is not like the long-limbed frame of her Tephran friend.
"Alright," she tells the eggplant-colored traveler. She studies her, searching beneath the skin for the blazing soul of Wishbone. (And Lilliana can't help herself. Her heart is simply too open and she has never learned how to close it. She opens herself up now, for the possibility that this is Wishbone despite the warning flaring within her. Those who have shed their skins for another have not been kind to the fire-gold mare.) She nods, waiting for the purple-hued woman claiming to be Wishbone to explain.
