Rivaini

More than anything, she wanted to go to Faolain— to erase the chasm that had opened between them by pressing her copper body close. But in the brief silence that followed the choked syllables of her lover’s name, the silver bay was too afraid to move. Afraid that a single step was all it would take to break the spell of this moment, to erase the lie that her mind had conjured. Afraid that even if she was real, her little shadow would only pull away from her touch— and in doing so, break her. And so Rivaini filled her eyes with Fae instead of her body, devouring every curve of the slender body— and committing the changes she saw to memory. Faolain was thinner than she had been before, the padding of flesh she’d once carried all but melted away. Her features were more haggard as well; the black satin of her coat dull and faded, the inky strands of mane and tail tangled and unkempt.

But nothing could change that she was Rivaini’s shadow, her heart. And as that truth cut through the twisted threads of the red mare’s emotions, her body began to shake with the force of her desperate longing.

I’m sorry. I miss you. A single step separated these two lines of speech, but in the tobiano’s mind they were united. It was their meaning that took longer to reach her— piercing the canopy of her thoughts more slowly, like the raindrops that had pattered overhead only hours (days?) ago. And even when Rivaini understood, she didn’t. Not truly. Throughout the entirety of the storm they’d weathered, she’d carried only two certainties with her: the first, that Faolain was blameless in its conception.

And the second: that no matter how it ended, her heart still belonged where it belonged.

The dark Guardian drifted closer as the silver bay puzzled over her words, breaking them apart into their syllables only to mend them again. I’m sorry. She was, even without knowing her crimes. Even if she was guilty of nothing at all, she was so goddamned sorry. I miss you. Was it possible to miss someone of whom she’d never truly let go? Rivaini didn’t know for certain— only that it had hurt being apart. That it still hurt, even with the black ‘Teke bare inches away from her.

And suddenly— the invisible tether of her restraint snapping, the shackles of her doubts slipping away— the Andalusian surged forward, covering the short distance between them in a single heartbeat. Slipping her body around Faolain’s as comfortably as they had always fit— lowering her head over the smaller mare’s and tucking the small, graceful head into the hollow of her throat. “I thought— I thought...” She began, the soft whisper of her voice fading into silence. Swallowing the knot of grief in her throat, Rivaini tried again. “You always had me, Faolain, even when you weren’t here. You still have me. Always.”

Exhaling her breath in a gentle sigh, she touched her lips to the other woman’s mane— as if to seal her vow with that gesture.

mare / seven / silver bay tobiano / andalusian mix / 15.3hh