Waking is an invitation to the terrible truth, and though Cynder does not want to, hoping to remain in blissful innocent sleep, she cannot fight the natural order of things, and all too soon her mind returns to her with the sun.
She blinks wearily at the light, prickling even with closed eyes and she is forced to turn her head, though the movement is clunky and ungraceful where she is awake before her body and it is slow to react to simple thoughts.
Her body is cold and sore and stiff where her wing had been injured, and though not broken, it still aches her and has made her rest fitful. As if she could rest easy with the ghost of her mistakes haunting her nightmares, and the embodiment of her failure laid beside her, frozen in eternal slumber.
Spyro's color has begun to fade from his scales. Or perhaps that is Cynder, and she sees the world different now; void of such bright beautiful colors that had once painted majestic colors across the sunscape and now everything is left monochrome, dull and drab.
They're three days from the World Crystal's cave, and the journey has not gotten any easier.
Cynder is exhausted, but it is not just from having to drag Spyro behind her; having fashioned a sled from the debris of the world's near collapse soon from reaching grass and fields; fallen tree branches taken and woven with willow twine that was strong enough to hold Spyro's weight; vines and rope twisted together for Cynder to pull because she was loath to drag her best friend and love by the malevolent magic that forces this journey upon her.
It was difficult, and Cynder was forced from the path too often; taking long winded treks through fields and through forests where inclines grew too steep and the sled would bar her passing as much as the weakness in her body.
Food was scrounged rather than hunted; Cynder finding it impossible to hunt when she could not walk further than ten feet from Spyro's side. She spent each night as close to the burning campfire as she could allow, searching for some semblance of warmth where the world had robbed her of it, eyes affixed to Spyro each time she laid down to rest.
As night drew in and sleep prowled the shadows of her mind, Cynder could almost believe he was only sleeping; laid on the sled she had made him, wings and tail tucked around him. In the darkness, Cynder could not see the way she had tenderly secured him with vines and twine so he stays attached to the sled when the incline is steep enough to pull him off.
Beneath the blanket of darkness, he was simply sleeping; Cynder a touch too far and she only needed to get up and walk over to his side and she would be encapsulated by his warmth, blanketed by his wing and they could spend the night under the stars just two young lovers with no care for the world's troubles.
But the dawn always shattered those imaginings, and Cynder was forced, time and time again, to her feet. To take the tethered weave into her mouth or loop it around her neck and trudge ever onwards.
Her shoulders burned, her wings ached and the malicious magic held no matter how much Cynder raged against it, growing taut when the vine stretched and Cynder heaved the sled up the steep incline of the valley hills that once she and Spyro had simply flown over.
When the hill peaks and begins to slope, the snake collars keep them close as the amalgamation of logs and branches twists down the smooth grass, breaking just a little more each time it is dragged over tree root and stony shore that Cynder cannot divert around; forced to stop too often to check the seams of vine and willow rope.
She hates that she cannot carry Spyro; that she is too weak, even when her wing does not ache her as it has before, but still not recovered enough to allow her to support both her weight and his. The sled is not grand enough; is not proper enough for the likes of him, but it is all Cynder can do, and it is all she is capable of as she takes the rope once more and pushes on.
When the rain comes, the journey is only made all the more difficult.
The valley cradles become bogged with mud, and the slopes are slippery; grass slick beneath her feet and Cynder has to drive her claws into the ground for a foothold all while pulling harsh on the tether to keep Spyro's sled behind her and not slipping all the way back down. The animals that she has been scavenging remain deep in burrows and dens, and the fish in the rivers are quick to grow wise to the way she hovers over the banks, leaving her hungry and aching.
The canopies of the forests they pass through do little to keep off the torrential rain, everything soaked and unlightable when Cynder cannot push herself to keep going any longer and wants for a campfire and the warm light to chase the day's exhaustion.
Each night, she wishes that, in the morning, she won't wake with the sun. That as her eyes close as she lays down her head, that her last thoughts will be of Spyro sleeping soundly next to her, but time and time again that peace is robbed from her and she is forced to her feet; forced to keep going; forced to push herself ever onwards.
But the rain was not the worst of Cynder's endless troubles.
On top of exhaustion and weariness, of relentless hunger and the pain and aches of her own body as she wore herself down each day with both the physical and emotional weight of having to drag her love over the increasingly treacherous terrain, Cynder is pushed further and further off course by the few lingering encampments of what remains of Malefor's army.
There are few and far between now that the darkness has been vanquished, but that is not to say that they have been completely eradicated. Cynder is not strong enough to fight all of the Grublins and Apes that stand between her and WarFang, but neither does that mean that she will take their anger lying down. She wishes she could—wants to, wants to give up, to let this all be over—but that would leave Spyro's body in the hands of an enemy that might do unspeakable things, and it is this what drives her to fight back when she finds herself cornered; reduced to snarls and vicious attacks; her magic returned and bellowed forth fire that raged over the ground, cindering grass and turning rock molten; black like her despair as it swallowed Grublins and ground alike.
The Apes were vanquished in the same detached prejudice that saw Cynder's pain like a scar on the world around her; magic softened by the glow of green magic that tethered Spyro by her side.
He had done so much to protect her that this was nothing in comparison, and yet it drew on Cynder's remaining energy to stand her ground and scream her rage against those that thought they could take Spyro from her a second time.
Around them, the forest burned, but Cynder and Spyro remained untouched; a path cleared before them leading to WarFang.
It was not hope ignited in Cynder's chest when she saw the way clear, but something reminiscent of the wind blowing in the right direction; the rain easing but not quite clearing up; the sun not warm but shining anyway and now her path saw fire spewed forth like poisonous despair, watching as it burnt oak and birch that towered high into the sky, reduced to nothing but cinder and ash; Cynder conquering obstacles with rage and hate and everything malicious inside her.
And if she knew that expelling such magic over and over would weaken her quicker, then who was she to care. All she needed was to get Spyro to WarFang; to give him the burial and remembrance he deserved.
It did not matter what happened to her.
It never did.
Authors Note: To the guest who keeps asking me to write Nudy Nick. Its NEVER happening!