she's in my veins again
The day was beginning to grow colder and the light began to slip behind the trees as Cinnamon drifted in and out of shallow sleep. He had thin, odd dreams, sounds from the waking world around him mixing in and causing a weird hybrid state of sleep and wakefulness. In some of them he dreamed about his old herd, and about the swim to the island, and about the months—or was it years?—he’d spent wandering alone after his family had been taken. The timeline of this latest part of his life was already tangled in his memories, and the dreams were even more confusing, especially when he dreamed of other hoofbeats. There had been no other hoofbeats after his family had been taken. He had been alone. Why did he hear hoofbeats? Maybe it was just his own heart beating in his ears, excited as it was from the dreams of his old life.
He realized, waking up slightly as he did, that it was not actually his heart beating but real hoofbeats striking the ground not far from him. Still groggy, he looked up just in time for a young colt to come crashing toward him, and he startled violently, pushing the ground toward the colt and vaulting himself to the side and away. As he caught himself, Cinnamon turned to face the colt head on and gather his legs underneath him. He was not scared of the boy, only shocked at his frenzied approach, and the bigger stallion flinched once again when the colt reared toward him and screamed as though Cinnamon was going to attack him.
“Calm down, kid, calm down before you hurt yourself,” Cinn barked, taking half a step toward him, but his movements were not aggressive. It occurred to him that he may be in another herd’s territory, and the boy was valiantly trying to defend it, but he looked just as shocked at running into the adult stallion as Cinnamon had been, not to mention the scents of hundreds of horses in this area that implied the constant cycling of newcomers and no set borders of territory.
“Are you okay?” he asked, trying to calm the colt down. “I’m not going to hurt ya, I was just napping. You scared me, but looks like I scared you too. Sorry, kid.”
