She’s spent a lot more time on the beach than anywhere else, and it shows in the sand clinging patchily to her almost constantly damp fur and the way she smells of seawater. Þoka won’t admit it but she’s tried a few times now to strike out into the waves again, and each time been struck by a panic strong enough to close her throat and make her feel like she’s choking all over again like when she first swam here. The blue roan tries the ocean as often as the tide but always ends up washed back up on shore.
Today she wakes from a nap, thinking maybe she’ll make it a little further this time, when a great hubbub (to her, who has been fairly isolated since her arrival) down the beach draws her eye. A riotously patterned beastie has just assaulted the ocean with as much force as she herself has in the past and, intrigued, Þoka shakes herself out and trots toward him. Nearby is the red form of Siobhan, a welcome sight if only because she is familiar, and a buckskin Þoka doesn’t recognize.
She slows as she comes upon the group, then halts as the gray-black-white stallion, just a youngling, goes to Siobhan to weep against her. Þoka’s ears swivel uncertainly. She hasn’t met anyone yet outside of Björn and the red mare, and this seems entirely too intimate for a stranger like her. She stands awkwardly for a moment, then steps up carefully to align herself with the buckskin. She nods to Siobhan in greeting but doesn’t interrupt the boy’s grieving. Instead, she glances curiously at the buckskin she’s chosen to plant herself near, wondering what she’s making of all this. |