It was a calm, cool, clear Cloudsdale evening. The sun shone up low over the horizon, but the air remained as crisp as it had been that morning, even as the sky was painted with the colors of the sunset.
Summer Breeze stared out at the lowering sun and gave a soft sigh. It had been a day like today, fifteen years ago. Almost sixteen, the middle-aged mare chided herself. Can’t go and forget something like that.
Summer walked back inside her modest cloud home, making a beeline for her bedroom. She knew it was only going to hurt; it had been so long, and the wounds always opened themselves anew. Celestia knows she tried to stop herself. She tried to throw it all out, tried to lock it all away, but she just
couldn’t.
The pegasus dragged the box out from under her bed, placed it on top of said bed, and began rummaging through its contents. As always, it was a photo that struck the first chord.A photo of a young, daisy-yellow pegasus grinning widely as she leaned in close to the bulkier form of a gryphon, a smirk plastered onto his beak that radiated just as much joy.
Then, as always, the tears began to flow.
“Boreas...”~/~/~/~
About sixteen years prior...“BOREAS!”The gryphon flinched quite visibly, his amber eyes quickly focusing on the mare that loomed in the doorway.
Summer was bearing down on him in the blink of an eye, somehow managing to loom over the larger gryphon.
“Where have you been?” she demanded.
“You said you were going to be here at six o’clock! It’s eleven thirty-five!”“I got held up,” Boreas muttered, averting his gaze.
“For five-and-a-half hours?”“It was a Winds meeting!”Boreas snapped. “I had no choice!”
Summer’s gaze darkened.
“That’s funny, because Zephyr was here, and he certainly didn’t know where you could be.”“Zephyr?” The gryphon inadvertently flashed his teeth with his grimace. “Notus and Eury told me the whole meeting was his idea.”
“And just what was this meeting about?”Boreas froze. He stared at Summer for a moment, before quickly looking away and muttering “nothing.”
“I hope it’s not nothing,” Summer countered.
“You were supposed to meet my family tonight. I kept assuring my father that you aren’t just some ‘wild gryphon warrior’ and you didn’t even bother showing up because ‘nothing.”The gryphon turned further away. “C’mon, Breeze...”
“Oh no,” the pegasus shot back, moving to face him.
“You don’t just get to walk away from this one. These last few months have been the time of my life, and you promised you’d meet my parents ‘when the time was right.’ We found the right time, we set the date, and you didn’t show. What part of that do you really think you can just dismiss?”“I didn’t mean to!” Boreas snapped. “I love you, and I really wanted to do right by you, I swear it. They wouldn’t let me just leave, the meeting was specifically about me.”
Summer paused, looking at her lover carefully (he insisted on not being called a “coltfriend,” and publicly they just said they were “together”).
“What do you mean, about you?”Boreas seemed to stall for a moment more, trying to think of some way out of it. Then he sighed, his head hanging low. “They said I’ve been getting weak. Because of you.”
Summer’s mouth hung open.
“Wh...what?”“I bucked up on our last job in Stalliongrad. I bucked up hard. And they’re all convinced that I’m... that I’m losing my focus.”
“But... that’s nonsense,” she replied uncertainly.
“And what business is it of Notus and Eureas if you’re with me?”“It’s not just-” Boreas cut himself off. Summer seemed to understand regardless.
“Zephyr...?”“It was his idea,” the gryphon said softly, mournfully.
Summer Breeze felt like the entire weight of the world just slammed onto her back. Her legs buckled, just the slightest.
“You’re lying. And it’s not true,” she insisted, her voice shaking just a bit.
“Us being together doesn’t make you weak! Why are you even bringing up something this stupid?”“Because they said it was you or them,” Boreas said miserably.
Silence reigned in the house.
“No...”“You hate me,” Boreas concluded, looking away.
“I don’t hate you!” Summer snapped.
“I love you, Boreas! Why don’t you understand that?”“I love you too,” the gryphon insisted, anger rising in his voice, “but I can’t... I can’t stay with you! You can’t settle with someone like me, and-”
“The buck I can’t!”“You’re making this too difficult!”
“It shouldn’t be difficult! It’s a job! Why is it so hard to choose?”“They’re my
family!” Boreas roared. “The Winds took me in when nobody else would! I’d be turning my back on them!”
“As opposed to just turning your back on me?”Boreas didn’t respond to that. “...Breezy...”
“Don’t.” The pegasus turned, making her way towards the kitchen.
“There’s no point in struggling. Obviously your loyalties lie elsewhere.”“Breezy, please, not like this. I love y-”
Summer bristled, not bothering to look at Boreas and still radiating anger.
“No! Clearly you don’t! You can say you love me when you’ve gotten your stupid messed-up priorities straightened! Until then, you can get out of my house!”The gryphon’s wings drooped, and his shoulders sagged. “...I’m sorry. I’ll go. Just... find someone who loves you better. Some
pony, maybe; they seem better at it.”
~/~/~/~
And that was the end of it. Summer Breeze never saw feather nor fur of Boreas ever again. A few months later, the Four Winds were disbanded. She’d gotten her hopes up, thought he’d come back... but all she got was a visit from Zephyr. A visit bearing heavy news.
The worst part was realizing that Boreas would never know.
“Mom?”Summer looked up from her box of memories, a small smile appearing on her face at the sound of a familiar voice. She cleared her throat, making sure she wasn’t still choked up.
“I’m in my room,” she called out, standing as she did so.
As the older mare placed the box on her dresser, a young hippogriff entered the room. His green eyes shone with alertness, and just a hint of concern.
“The hay are you doing up here, mom? I thought we were doing dinner soon.”“Just... remembering,” Summer replied, eyes lingering on the box.
The hippogriff walked over, picking up a picture of the Four Winds posing on the edge of some military camp.
“Hey, isn’t this the group...?”“Yes,” Summer replied, already knowing the question.
“That’s your father on the far right, with the gauntlets.”“I still don’t get that. The others used regular weapons...”“He always said claw fighting was the one part of his clan he admired,” Breeze recalled.
“And... once he became set on something, there wasn’t a force on the planet that could stop him.”“Unlike you,” the son smiled.
“I could never see you being stubborn about something.”An awkward silence reigned, and the hippogriff realized that he made a misstep when he saw his mother’s eyes dull slightly.
“C’mon. You wanted to go out to dinner and celebrate my new job, and the reservation’s under your name.”“I don’t see why you put it under my name,” Summer noted, some of the light returning.
“They always butcher the pronunciation on my name,” the hippogriff smirked.
The pegasus gave a nuzzle, craning her neck to meet her son’s greater height, and moved to leave.
“Aestas, it was the one idea for a name I could get out of your father when he agreed to actually talk about it. Besides, it suits you.”“Sure, mom.” Aestas moved ahead of Summer, opening the front door for her.
“Such a gentlecolt,” the mare teased.
“I do what’s best for you, mom.”As they walked down the road to dinner, Breeze could only think one thing to herself.
You always strive for that, she agreed.
You picked that up from your father.