 Áshildr had come from snow to be met by more snow which finally gave way to sodden puddles of thick, brown mud. She paid none of it any heed. Dried, crusted earth clung to her woolly belly, giving way to wet dirt down her legs and matting in the feathers of her feet so that all colour was completely undiscernible. Winter drew closer to its end and spring began to claw at the door. The bleak greys and whites of the landscape soon became vibrant shades of greens, yellows and pinks as the early bloomers made their appearances. They passed her by in a blur, her focus on one thing; the lost islands.
She was a tank of a horse, thickset and powerful and most definitely not to be reckoned with. While her brother had been marginally taller and possessed some of the thick muscling of a draft, she dwarfed him completely in girth; not that she knew it mind you. Her brother was a stranger to her, the last time she had seen him it had been on their journey out of the islands after their mother’s death. She still remembered the look in Olaf’s eyes; the accusation. It was her fault Ársćl had been killed. She’d wandered off and the mountain lion had attacked, evidenced by the bald patch at the bottom of her mane and the faded scars that clawed their way from the middle of her back, tapering off at the hip of her right leg and the knee of the left. Ársćl had not been far behind her daughter but ultimately lost her battle. Her blind cousin had quickly pushed the wounded filly from the area and left with the rest of the family. Olaf had wanted to return to his father but was persuaded to stay anyway, at least for a little while. It was a strange coincidence that a wolf had almost had him soon after he was born, perhaps it was fate’s way of telling Kisei and Ársćl that they should not be having any more young. Ársćl had paid the ultimate price for not heeding that warning.
Áshildr could not dwell on that however, she had business to attend to. Life had gotten in the way of her return but she had always planned to come back and explain herself to her father and brother; if either still stayed on the islands. She knew Olaf had left Ragnarök’s party with the intention of coming back so she hoped he would still be here, and that he may have forgiven her in their time apart. Kisei, she could not be sure about but she was sure he would not have given up the forest easily so that would be her first stop in looking for him. First, she needed to take a few precautions to make the quest that little bit easier.
The bay mare knew that the peak was a herd for women and if she placed herself within their ranks, she would be safe from the attentions of stallions attempting to stake their claim on her. While she was fully capable of fighting them off, it would make her quest that much easier if she could pass through each of the territories with minimal fuss. As such, she found herself climbing up the steep, well-trodden mountain path of the peak, her wide hooves eating up the rock face with ease despite the stiffness in her left leg where the puma's claws had seemingly damaged a tendon. The scars from the mountain lion and a few general life wounds were not the only war wounds to scatter her body though. As a three year old she’d been attacked again, cementing her hatred for large cats. A snow leopard had caught her in the midst of resting, obviously seeing her as an easy target. She’d taken most of Áshildr’s right ear and part of the right nostril as well and left her with deep claw marks on her neck and right shoulder. Another scar ran from her forehead down to the torn nostril. All in all, the mare was a patchwork of scars and resembled an old doll that had been ripped and sown up repeatedly over the years. She liked to think it gave her character and if nothing else, it proved she was a survivor.
Scatterings of snow became thicker the higher she climbed but that was to be expected and was nothing she was not used to. The mountains of the homelands were always covered in snow whether it was summer or winter so the scant amount on the peak was of little hindrance. As the steep face gave way to a flat outcrop, she sucked in a deep breath. A familiar scent hit her nostrils like a punch in the gut though for a while she struggled to remember who it belonged to. She racked her memories and concluded it belonged to one of the other foals that had been born in the forest around the same time as her own birth. Distantly she remembered Kohle’s scent and Redbird had been the colt so that only left Jezibelle. She could remember very little except the name though.
She halted on the flat, reasoning that it seemed well frequented by heavy footfall and was likely to be close to the herd. She sent out a loud, deep bellow for whatever horse commanded the peak and dealt with the new arrivals. She did not wish to waste time. While she waited, her thick, black tail cracking impatiently across her rump, she reasoned that she would track down Jezibelle after being initiated. With any luck she may even be the one in charge and was sure to be able to shed some light on the whereabouts of their father. Silently, Áshildr applauded herself for being so clever.
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