Alienore floated low over the hills of the Soquili lands, her great twilit wings spread to coast along on the wind. Her bells jingled merrily, belying the strange and quiet mood that filled her. The sun was setting low over the southwesterly horizon, but slowly, steadily, starting to move back towards the truer west, its summer resting place. The first stars of evening began to glow above, brightening as the sun faded.
For the first time in years, she felt a purpose fill her limbs again. Perhaps not hope, certainly not love, equally as certainly nothing to do with her familial instincts. But a purpose that could get her going in the days ahead. And Karloff had had an idea that gave her that purpose.
Her sun-gold eyes skimmed the earth beneath her. After harsh snows that had kicked off the winter, it had warmed, and, despite the fact that it was still technically winter, she thought she'd glimpsed snowdrops earlier this evening. They were the first spring flowers, true, but it was yet at least a moon too early for such blossoms! Hope lived in their petals, a light at the end of a dark tunnel, the first rays of sunlight after a long winter's night.
Just as her life was beginning to be less bleakly lonely.
Alienore spotted no other Soquili immediately, and she sighed, angling toward the ground, spreading her wings to backwing as she landed. Drat. Well, they hadn't expected recruiting to happen too fast. After all, dedicating one's life to protecting the world from Skinwalkers wasn't exactly a life to consider taking on lightly. Sure, Ali and Karloff had both had difficult lives where Skinwalkers were concerned, as others had, surely, but it was a tall order, and a terrifying thing. But a thing that could change life in these lands. Give others hope, as this chance to grow strong in the face of her fears had given her a purpose.
She did not have time now to think on her failings. Or her failed relationship with her former lifemate, Blake.
Her dark blue hooves scuffed the yet-frosty earth lightly as she landed on an obliging hilltop, bare, but still starting to turn emerald with the first shoots, seeking purchase on the dark, seemingly lifeless soil. Ali flicked her long tail and tossed her mane. Well, insofar as she could, with such a terribly long mane and tail. Once she started working, if there was any way to tie it up, she'd have to look into it, so it didn't get in the way of life in this Night's Watch Karloff was keen to start.
She didn't notice at first the pale alicorn stallion with his faintly rainbow mane and markings down the hill from her, in amongst the copse of leafless oaks still sheltering a few patches of snow with all their might.
Hoshi Lockhart