Island Resort

He left her in the woods sleeping to scout the hinterlands; a deep feeling of instinctual need had driven a strange compulsion home in him - he longed (and not wrongfully because it was natural) for mares and a land to support them, and he longed to give her things she had no desire to dream of for her self - sisters, sons and daughters, and land to live upon. He found a forest knowing that she loved the dense closeness of the trees but the scent of a stallion and his mare was still too fresh upon the air and he had no desire to fight over something as meaningless as land. What he found instead was the whisper of an inlet that deepened into a challenging channel that separated the mainland from an island. He wanted to give her denser forests and many shadows to winnow through and it seemed far too tropical here - too bright - too blue; he did not think it would suit her but it was all that was available to them with shores of soft sand and warm seas rather than pebbled beaches and cold waters - those things, he knew, were familiar to her.

Having swum the channel and learned the lay of the island so that it was beyond familiar to him across the hours of many nights, he determined that there was no finer place than this for the time being until he could win the forests for her. Damp and smelling of the sea, he returned to her time and time and when she asked him where he went during the nights he left her alone, he kept his first secret from her and it ate hungrily - painfully - at his heart until the last time when he had determined the land to be theirs. “Come. It is time we leave here.” he rouses her for the last time in that wood and herds her tenderly towards unfamiliar trails but he knows that she trusts him unconditionally and does as he bids, turning first here then there as he guides her with gentle nudges and softer nips. “You will have to swim.” he tells her, his voice gruff and thickened with emotion as he looks upon her shadowed face.

“Swim?” she questions him. She understands; has forded rivers swollen with rain before and enjoyed the broadness of lakes but she can hear the surf pound the shore, stirred up by a winter storm that pushes the sea higher into the channel. “I am afraid.” she admits and feels him sidle close, his nose brushing tenderly against her cheek as he breathes encouragement into her ears. “I will be right beside you.” he swears to her. “I promise I will not lose you.” and she believes him; her heart fills with determination and the sudden lift of her head is done so in pride as she steps into the sea and begins to thrust out with each leg finding a rhythm. There is but one moment when a wave taller than her gives her pause and leaves her wet and sputtering but he steadies her with a touch of his nose to her neck and she swims on, finding purchase on the farthest shore of the island.

Exhausted and emptied of iron resolve, she falls to the sand and tells him that she needs to sleep again - this has been too much for her and come morning, he can tell her all about the island he discovered for them. He stands over her with tenderness in his eyes as his teeth pluck the wet strands of mane from her face where the sea has made them stick, and presses them back against her neck. He tells her to sleep for she is safe and throughout the remaining hours of night, he listens to the storm-surf crash upon the shore and it lulls him into moments of sleep that are precious and few until first light finds him awake and alert, the mare still curled up at his feet.

crowbrother & rattlebone

Island Resort

The Herd

Alpha Stallion

Alpha Mare

Other Mares

Colts

Fillies