K h a l d u n could not remember a time when the sky had looked more beautiful. Or perhaps it was that he had never taken the time to look and appreciate it before. For the god, the sky had been a thing of contention - a thing denied to him since cubhood and long after his sister had taken to the air.
Some gods, he had come to the grim conclusion, were not meant for flying...or much of anything, if he thought of all that he had accomplished since leaving the suffocating bubble of his mother's love. Fully grown - though it was hard to tell with his unfinished mane - Khaldun had still yet to take to the air, still yet to work any of his powers on anyone but himself, and still had yet to awaken to the fact that he was an immortal. The frustration with him ebbed and flowed from day to day, but it was always there, like magma, burbling beneath the surface, waiting to spume forth.
His eyes lowered and lidded, shutting out the beauty of a sky still out-of-bounds and instead, he tipped his ears to seek out the sounds of the females lounging around him. They had ceased speaking perhaps half an hour ago which was usually a sign that Najiyya was asleep. If she were awake, there would still be conversation, of that he was sure. Her chattering had annoyed him at first, but oddly, there was some comfort in it now.
The two sisters were lost, too. In a different way, but lost all the same. Born and raised in a pride where they had been mates to a high ranking male, they had never thought much of the world outside their territory or a life without their mate. And yet, despite everything, their pride had fallen apart and suddenly they were without their male. Without their sisters. Nothing familiar at all. They had been afraid and sad (angry, too) and that was how he had found them - for better or for worse. Now they were together and where once he had attempted to lose them, he had suddenly grown needy of them, too. Not that he would ever admit that, of course. He had his pride if nothing else and though it was battered and bruised, he was clinging to what he had left.
"You cannot sleep?" Faeqa's soft voice stirred him, his ears turning as she got to her paws and padded across to him.
He gave a huff in response and cracked open an eye to look at her. She was the more serious of the pair but being torn from her pride had softened her somewhat.
She leaned in to lick his muzzle, ignoring the way his face crinkled up in response, and then her body was pressed against his, her head against his neck; laid bare of mane. When she exhaled, it was part breath, part purr.
Khaldun shifted, awkward with her closeness, but did not move to push her away. Not when there was no one to see. Not when he felt as he did.
"Something has always been bothering you," she continued softly, her breath warm on his neck. "Let me help."
But no one could help. They could not save him from himself, not even his mother, who called to him over their connection every day. He knew she had been seeking him across the plains. Knew she worried for him, but he could not bring himself to respond to her pleas. Not before he had found himself. Not before he had proven that he was not a failure after all.
"Khaldun," Faeqa urged him.
He did not respond and after a while she let it be. He contemplated the sky until he drifted--
--and in the darkness of his sleep he saw a flash of rainbow wings and heard the screams of a creature that knew death was coming for it. Flashes of eyes in the shadows, teeth snapping, wild, fierce and unrelenting. Then the world was shrinking away, dancing just out of reach, and the wind became words that whistled distantly through his head.
Goodbye, it said. Goodbye dear ones.
He woke to its echoes, breathing hard. Both females were awake, looking at him in the way his mother had.
His mother.
He was on his paws now, panting in a distress he did not quite understand and for the first time since leaving home, he reached for the connection he had with his estranged parent.
Mother?!
Faeqa and Najiyya circled him, their nervous energy feeding him, and when one came close enough to brush against him he drove her away, his silent calls going unanswered.
"What's wrong with him?" he heard Najiyya ask.
"I don't know."
"Shall I try--"
"--Best to leave him be."
The tears of grief pricked sharp against the back of his eyes as he kept his head averted, his wings quivering as he tried to grasp what had happened. But what was there to understand about the message? There had been pain and farewells and...death. Someone had taken his mother's immortal life. There was no other explanation for the lack of connection he could find between them.
Just an empty space where she had once been.
A low moan of grief escaped him and, in a moment of madness, his slender wings opened wide.
Behind him, he was only partially aware of the two females backing away and then he thought of them no more. His wings were working and suddenly, for the first time in his life, the ground was slipping out from under his feet and that beautiful sky was his.
For the first time in his life, there was no frustration, just a heart-rending grief that he had, quite possibly, led to his mother's demise.