SCARECROW

Scarecrow can see the suspicion that washes over her with the same finality of the ocean waves. He expects this. After all, it was Fall and he had approached a lone mare who didn't appear to have been covered. Hadn't he and Cain just been speaking about much the tobiano regretted the rapes he had committed? About how Crow's own daughters had been traded off as broodmares after they'd been stolen? Hadn't Crow committed his own sins this season, spawning two more children he would probably rarely see?

She had every right to be wary of him as a strange stallion, and he would not fault her for it.

Still, he is not used to the haughty disrespect she offers him, literally looking down the elegant lines of her face to scoff at him. Are you kidding me? His ears flick back, not entirely welcoming being belittled for trying to help, but he does not bite back with sharp words. In fact, he's working over what she'd said - a sightless oracle - even as the pretty girl whirls away from him and begins stalking down the beach. Some magic critter?

The dunalino has half a mind to scorn her there and let this princess totter down the beach alone, in search of whatever mystical creature she thought was out there, but something stopped him. Goddamnit. I want to know her, rude or not. There was a pull to her he couldn't explain that had far more to do with the way she dismissed him than it did with the womanly sway of her hips or the scent that trailed after her.

"Not to be overly picky, but I think you'll find you didn't even ask." Crow says evenly, having matched his pace to hers so that they can travel parallel down the beach. He's positioned himself five to six feet away and a foot or so farther back. He'd even set himself to be ocean side so that with any luck, she won't feel like he's trying to herd her anywhere. "Unfortunately, you're not wrong in that I have not seen such a creature as you described."

"If you are certain she, or he," Crow amends after a beat, "hasn't washed ashore here, the next best places to look would be the Meadow or the Falls."

He moves along companionably for a few strides, flicking hear ear toward her to see if she has any more caustic words for him. After a beat he pauses, stumbling over his words slightly. "I can lead you to both- to either, I mean- if you like."

Crow wishes, not for the first time in his life, that he was more suave. He possessed skill at reading other creatures, at putting other creatures ill at ease or padding their comfort, but selling himself was not something he'd ever done with any skill. She'd look beautiful in the desert, a spirited creature like that. An image of her cresting a dune, a smile on her face and her hooves kicking up a plume of sand as she raced toward him flashed in his mind's eye. Getting a little ahead of myself, aren't I?

He clears his throat and then looks towards her again to read her expression, half expecting her to have run from him again.