Solira: The Ocean: alshain;

Alshain, one of very few who could make Enola smile, and laugh.

Didn’t fail now; she could hear his stride, cocky and quick in the sand, and turned to the sound, a smile warming her cool, graceful feature into something a little more personable. She could hear the laughter in his voice and she liked it, liked the odd sensation that some things don’t seem to change, and rather remain steady and constant and happily familiar (much like the sea, I should think). Even death could not dissuade them from this friendship of theirs, nor his subsequent disappearance – many months later again they stood near one another on the sand.

He was one of few, also, who was so lucky as to feel the gentle bump of her muzzle to his in greeting. She let her thoughts drift a little as they ‘embraced’, contemplating how this had come to be, but couldn’t remember when the shift had been made, when he’d grown on her, how he’d done it. He just had (perhaps as she had done to him) and once upon a time their narrators had discussed how useless it was to attempt to define such things as friendship. And she was no creature of self-analysis or self-doubt or even hesitation – so her thoughts dropped away and she let herself feel that rather feeble (but quite significant for my Vane, thankyouverymuch) sense of pleasure.

She pulled back, nodded to the General.

“Ah, my falcon friend… alive and well I see.” She added mischievously, “Yes, my timing is usually impeccable.”