Even in the height of summer, the Tinuvel winds were chilly against their wet bodies. Wade shivered and pressed a little closer to his mother, who walked shoulder-to-shoulder with him up the beach. The land sprawled before them in vast forests, which rose in craggy peaks that were harsh against the pale blue of the sky. Wade eyeballed the landscape with awe.
It was strange to think that his uncle - well, his great-uncle, technically - had once been held captive here. Diamant was unwilling to speak about that time - only in part because he could barely remember it - but Wade had heard snippets about it from his mother Jetta, as well as the many colorful speculations of his uncle Argento. All Wade knew was that Uncle Diamant had lived under a mare - a self-designed queen called Mariael - who had been strangely unwilling to let Diamant go. By the time Jetta had heard the news and swum to Tinuvel to give the queen an earful, Mariael had already released him, but had no idea where he had gone.
Wade still found it strange that Jetta would be willing to return in hopes of seeing Mariael again, but then, his mother had always trusted too easily. The least Wade could do was provide support, and a young, able body should she need protection.
Yet as they moved further inland, Wade noticed his mother becoming increasingly deflated, and he knew why. She did not need one of her visions to deduce that Mariael no longer lived here. There were no signs of the sprawling herd Mariael had once reigned over, nor any marks or scents that could be identified as hers. Yet there was something else: something sparse yet musky. A stallion lived here now, or had at least passed through here recently. And he was, quite possibly, not alone.
Jetta and Wade needed no exchange of words. Their blue eyes, stark against their white faces, locked for a moment and they knew exactly what they would do.
They settled in and made themselves comfortable in a small meadow fringed on three sides by towering evergreens, and split down the middle with a small brook gurgling through mossy rocks. After sating their thirst, they began to refuel their tired bodies with the strange tundra grass, and waited.
They did not need to announce their presence. If there was a stallion living here, he would find them soon enough.
2; mutt; buckskin varnish roan splash; 16.0hh
zevulun x jetta |