Lark spread her gossamer wings and sighed in slight irritation before turning to Spire. She shook, as if ruffling invisible feathers, before she called out to him. Her tone was even, melodious and as sweet as her namesake, but had a certain edge to it, like a thinly veiled threat. In that moment, Spire thought she was more reminiscent of a hawk.

​

"I could hear you from what felt like miles away. I know your shielding is among some of the best, which means you intended for me to hear you, and wanted my attention."

​

Spire smiled, but it wasn't warm. He turned his head in curiosity, regarding her as if for the first time. Maybe he genuinely was, if the rumors were true. Or, at the very least, she had forgotten so much about him that his behaviour did seem foreign to her. They had met before, and it was circumstance that they had both ended up being bonded to the same individual. She seemed to remember him, but she also seemed genuinely confused by the fact that he had specifically come to see her prior to her meeting the others. If she had remembered him better, it wouldn't have come as such a surprise. Spire often felt the need to investigate things that truly weren't his business. 

​

"Of course I did," he finally responded, his voice that carefully practiced neutrality that the others had become so accustomed to. "I wanted to know if you had let the Dream Eater take that which made you most interesting to me."

​

For a moment, she seemed nonplussed, and unsure of how to respond. It was true, when Orchid had come to her she had asked for the most painful memories to be stolen from her mind. She hadn't even hesitated. She couldn't remember what the memories were, but she knew that she had requested that Orchid take some, and the mare had seemed to understand which ones she needed plucked from her mind. Unfortunately, quite a few of those also involved Spire. She couldn't recall the connection, but she wasn't sure she wanted to. 

​

Spire seemed almost disappointed in a sense, but he quickly recovered and trotted closer, close enough so that he could lean into her mane to whisper in her ear. The closeness confused her, but she seemed frozen to the spot. She couldn't seem to decide if she wanted to lean into him, or run far far away.

​

"You were the warmth to my cold. The light to my dark. But I don't suppose you remember that either," he said, with a small half smile. 

​

She turned her head quickly in surprise and ended up cheek to cheek with the stallion. Her eyes widened in panic as they both stood there, frozen in time, but before she could pull away Spire had already withdrawn and trotted a few paces away, his back to her. She couldn't see the expression on his face, but there was something raw in his voice, something that she couldn't quite identify.

​

"It seems that the Dream Eater stole some of the best memories from you as well," he said simply, before he seemed to fade into the shadows of the wilderness.

​

Lark could feel a burning in her chest that confused her even more than the tone of Spire's voice had. She waited for a few moments, willing him back into existence, but she knew that things wouldn't quite be the same from this point on.