Common

The ocean was choppy, driving into the shore like jaws snapping for the legs of unwary prey that stepped too close, the autumn wind shredding spray off the whitecaps. Heartbreak bared his teeth back at it, churning just as restlessly where he stormed along the fringes of the sand. His sibling had insisted on going beyond the Meadow, pointing out that stagnation wasn’t the same as safety- that staying where they couldn’t be taken wasn’t the same as being free, with that infuriating placidity in their face that meant they already knew he agreed, no matter how much he fussed and barked against the change. He had to argue, though, until they were too weary from his tantrum to turn it down when he agreed on the condition that he be the one to venture out. They knew each other too well by now not to know exactly what the other was doing, but even so, that was also how they’d protected each other all this time, and it had worked this long, hadn’t it?

The Common was disappointing- almost boring in its passivity, its bland, bleak landscape, after the wide-open luxury of the Meadows; the secretive safety of the Falls. No one approached him, and whether this was because they weren’t so eager to subdue as he’d believed or simply because they didn’t like the look of him, he didn’t know. He hadn’t come here for a fight, but he realized now he had almost anticipated one, and now his speckled skin was itching at the denial, his muscles twitching, ready, at every voice in the distance. It wasn’t that he wanted to fight, though he wondered if sometimes Anathema believed he did. He’d started enough of them to justify their looks, but they didn’t understand the way he did. It was just inevitability. That’s all.

The sound of choked retching dragged him out of his darkening thoughts, and he looked up swiftly to the source. A little figure thrashed up to their feet down the shore, staggering away from the waves at speed as if escaping pursuit. They looked like a deer, but the desperation thrummed a familiar enough chord in him that he found himself trailing slowly after their hurried footsteps. They were making good enough time on him that, when they crested the knoll and their soft brown silhouette slid out of sight, he wondered if that was the end of it- but he followed anyway, not quite sure why, and when he reached the summit, there they were, waiting for him.

Not a deer, as it turned out, but a horse, the colour of a fawn rubbed with ashes. That made him pause, wondering if he would’ve preferred that they be some creature he couldn’t communicate with, but they were, and their amber eyes were wide and wet, and the emotion in them was real. With a huff, he hefted himself the rest of the way up to stand on equal footing.

“Hey,” he grunted gruffly, shifting to fix his good eye on them. He could feel he was scowling, and though it wasn’t their fault and might not be helping their distress, he wasn’t a gentle or calm enough thing to try to smooth his expression into something nicer. He wasn’t Anathema. “You alright? You-” he almost decided against continuing, but the words scraped out between his teeth despite him- “you runnin’?”