The desert had seen an increase in activity recently, and as a result Orhan had felt himself hooked, like a fish out of water, from his long period of listlessness. Every day now, twice a day – at sunrise and sunset, when the temperatures were cooler but there was still light to see the land by – the young stallion took to the sands and travelled the extent of his territory, checking for scents and signs along the border before circling back inland and visiting the smaller, disused oasis to the west. There he sated his thirst and checked that there had been no unusual activity there either, and then he returned to the sea, watching the expanse of the choppy grey waves for any sign of a head straining for breath amongst their depths.

During these times, his mental and physical arousal were at their peak, for he both dreaded and anticipated the day he would discover another horse on the horizon. In particular, it was the uncertainty he dreaded – the not knowing whether he would be faced with a friend or foe – and the possibility of procuring another herdmate he eagerly anticipated. Even when he was not patrolling his home – which ate up several hours of his day – he would often stand perched atop a tall dune, a vantage point that gave him ample view of both the large oasis his herd lived off of and the rest of his home, particularly the stretch of land that rolled unbroken in smaller dunes toward the beach. And there he would wait, hoping and wondering.

Why can’t it be you, Kazga?

Today Orhan’s return from his morning patrol had been delayed. It had been just a husk at first – a thin, transparent and papery leaf of skin, the shedding of some resident sidewinder that had passed through recently – but then he had seen the delicate impressions in the sand and knew at once he had to search for it. Snakes as a rule were stupid, but Orhan had encountered this kind before, and knew that it would be cleverly hiding away beneath a gritty blanket of sand somewhere. He would not tolerate a serpent so close to his oasis; it had to die, there was no doubt about that. So he searched high and low for the vile thing, beneath every rock and shrub, growing more agitated by the minute and fueled by the knowledge that his sire had died of a snakebite. It will not happen again, not if I can help it.

Yet his search was fruitless. Angered by his failure, and lathered unpleasantly into a sweat, Orhan crested the nearest dune and, turning to make way back to the oasis, almost didn’t bother to sweep his eyes across his home first. It was out of sheer force of habit that he did, and good thing, too, for his gaze quickly found and fixated on a sight that made his stomach drop: a tall, lean bay stallion, coat almost blindingly shiny and so close Orhan could tell he was still damp from his swim.

He stood frozen for a short time, body tense and head erect as he stared the other individual down. In the jumble of his mind, he did not register that this was a purebred: the first purebred Akhal-Teke he’d ever seen. He knew only that this was another stallion, and therefore an intruder and a threat to be displaced.

Slowly, he descended the dune, neck arched and ears flat as the sand slid out from beneath his feet. He stopped a few paces away – just out of harm’s reach – and eyed the dark stranger with distrust and impatience. “State your purpose.”