Common

The girl of fresh snow can recall sitting upon her family’s mountain, beside her mother of crimson. Her mother would gently ask her daughter of a constellation and Jaci would point it out and say the shape it formed. Aquila, the eagle, Canis Major, the great dog, Leo, the lion and so on and so forth. Occasionally, a smile would slip onto the face of her mother with red hair and she would gently touch her daughter’s pale shoulder and ask ‘and where is the Jaci, constellation?’ The pair would laugh as the young girl would drawn a shape in the stars, blue eyes sparkling beneath the moonlight that ignited her pale form.

Her mother taught her how to love the moon and the stars and Jaci would never soon stop.

Head of white drops to the ground and inhales the scent of snow and stories yet to be told. She wonders, of how many who walked the path that lay buried beneath the snow of winter. Perhaps back and back and back, Jaci’s ancestors had walked upon the land, but even as she thinks this she knows it is not true. Her family had lived in their mountains for years and years, reading stars and predicting what the world would come to. Jaci is descended from scholars, great minds that spent much of their time puzzling about the world than actually exploring it. Jaci was set upon the path to become one of these great minds, but life set her onto another path, one of wonder and awe. She had been sent off with love from her family,

Jaci raises her pale head and her ears flicker around to the sound of someone nickering. Her slender body then twirls around, mane ruffling for a brief moment before falling back into place, forelock falling upon one eye. He calls her beautiful and Jaci tilts that dished face of her, big baby blues widening at his words. She merely laughs, at what he says because Jaci hasn't met many strangers and the strangers she has met have never called her beautiful. She watches him approach her and simply blinks at him with long, dark lashes. He was so prideful and strong and Jaci simply marvels at his confidence and his strength. On top the mountain, Jaci had never encountered battles or warriors and she is fascinated by his battle-worn body.

He grins coming over to her and nudges her side. She moves from his touch, almost bouncing off the light pressure. The only touches she had ever received were from her mother, father, and siblings. Occasionally, when the families of the mountains had gotten together, Jaci had played together, and there had been playful, but gentle shoves, light embraces when it was time for either family to travel back home. But Jaci had never had her skin of pale white touched by a fully grown male. She laughs, a tinkling sound, like little bells, or small chimes. “Why did you do that?” She asks, innocence holding her voice captive. She does not know what claiming is, she doesn't understand the rituals of other lands. Baby blues turn to look at him and she thinks, what a strange boy.

With his next words, she realizes why he walks, no, strides, with such an easy confidence. He was a king! Jaci dances in place on nimble, dainty hooves. She had never met a king before, kings lived in the stories her mother told her at night when Jaci would refuse to shut her eyes, not wanting to waste a night of stars and beauty. The pale girl reaches out to touch his shoulder, with a lightness that could rival snowflakes landing on eyelashes, or the flap of a butterfly’s wings. She wonders if maybe this is the way you greet in this strange, new land. But she quickly pulls away, as if her touch had been illegal or something. “I’m Jaci,” she says, her voice light an airy. “I’ve never met a king before,” she says, her smile is wide and there’s a sense of recklessness to it. And then she just looks upon him, eyes full of curiosity and bright with a joy of finding another on this snowy day.