His head hung low against the wild breeze encompassing the mountainous region, Taigi pushed on towards the peak. For what purpose? None, really, other than the possibility of redemption of self. More than anything, he wanted to believe that he did the right thing. But why was this so hard to achieve?
Painful, vivid images flashed through his head whenever he let his lids slide shut. I never even said goodbye. This sudden realization, though running through his mind for what seemed to be the millionth time, sharply tugged down at his already-present frown, forcing it into a horrid, aged grimace. His green eyes, once verdant and shining, were now dull and regretful.
I left her... Them... Alone...
A sharp pain struck his chest. It brought him back to his foal days. Back to that exact day, back to that forest. Back to an image of his mother, averting his gaze with shame, her eyes lowered, as she told him he couldn't come travel with her. As she told him she would leave once more, leaving him "in his place". He recalled this exact feeling chipping off a piece of his true heart, the symmetrical figure the two-leggers used to represent theirs that resided in a ball of emotion and sensation within him.
One cloven hoof before the other, he raised himself onto the mountain's ideally flat top, to face a darkening sky and another bone-chilling gust of wind. A ribbon of color was faint across the horizon, growing bolder and closer with the minutes he stared at its wonder. Aurora, the other travelers called it.
