The air curdled like spoiled milk, stank of rotting leaves and sunlight that looked like egg yolks. In the Commons the mares and stallions courted each other, found roots and solace in each other. At the edge of the field was a bachelor herd, but they seemed either to ignore Salka or fear her. She would not be surprised if it was the latter.
The grass maintained some of that Summer heat, and treachery made its way over the plain. But it did not find Salka. Indeed, Death herself feared Salka with such a magnitude that Salka knew without a doubt that she would leave this earth completely white. Not grey, not the speckles of snow on her black patches, but instead she would turn the white of a skeleton before fate could no longer refuse her.
Out of the throng of horses, Salka’s attention was suddenly ripped in the direction of one who was moving expressly towards her. A mare, black-toned and strong of bone, was headed to Salka with a mission. Guards went up, and eyes like ice warned the stranger. Salka had committed sins before.
Opposite to Salka, the stranger sported not the slightest rumour of white. She encroached from the earth like a shadow, until a strange sensation passed over the paint’s shoulders. She would have yanked away, slid like a snake from the other’s presence if not for the fact that she refused to show such weakness. There was a slight possession to the action, and the ears were back. Shackles raised, teeth clenched closely like lovers.
The wraith circled Salka, as though evaluating her. Finally there came speech; authoritative, cool.
“I belong nowhere,” Salka replied; and the voice that came out of her was not quite equine. Like the hissing of a geyser, the rockfalls on the mountainside, Salka’s voice came out inexplicably. When the mare’s question rolled from her lips, Salka didn’t respond. She didn’t have the answer, anyway- travel, fortune, none of it meant anything to her. Nothing had ever meant anything to Salka, not the path beyond nor the past that lay behind. Not the present either. Such mortal cares held no appeal to the vicious defilement that was Salka.