Common

she was alone, and she liked it.

Around them, the world was slowly returning to normal in the wake of the storm. The sound of other creatures mingled with dripping water and reminded her poignantly of the jungle in which she'd been raised. Despite spending all of her formative years beneath leafy fronds and hanging vines, Faelyn had no great feeling - good or bad - towards the jungle, or towards the residents within.

Her mother had not wanted her, and Faelyn knew it. Such knowledge had never been spoken aloud between them, but it was undeniably true, and grown ever more obvious when Roux was born. Her younger sister had been chosen. Wanted. Loved.

In her family, Faelyn had always served as a painful reminder. A cautionary tale. The living proof of a lesson. And while such an upbringing sounded lonely, Faelyn hadn't felt lonely. When the sadness crept in and wrapped her tender heart in a stranglehold, she knew that she only needed to look outward to find reminders of life's beauty. She saw it in the way sunlight glimmered over the scales of sleeping serpents, and the way some flowers bloomed with perfume while others flaunted scents so rancid she had to breathe shallowly when near them. There was an endless distraction to be found in the world around her, and in that, Faelyn had always found peace.

That one is meant to guide you home, Jabari offered, and her lashes fluttered briefly as her gaze danced to him and then away again. Home. Did he mean Paradise? Or did he have a home of his own that he wanted to take her to? Was this how claiming was supposed to go? For all of the warnings that Sonorae had impressed upon her eldest daughter, she had been scarce on the details, and it wasn't as if it were the sort of question she had wanted to take to Rougaru. Even if the silver-haired stallion had been her sire, she wasn't sure she would have wanted to ask him. Knowing him, he would have likely told her where to go specifically before he ever instructed her on how to find her own home.

She hummed softly to herself as she considered her options, and allowed her gaze to sharpen back on the red stallion as he spoke again. Faelyn is both unwilling and incapable of stopping the soft chuckle that emanates from her at his question, and she favored him with a smile. "Both, I think." She smiled in the direction the storm had departed. "There is nothing like a storm."

Without elaborating further as to why storms were particularly special, she turned to Jabari again, another question on her lips. "Where is home, to you?" Tone softening, she attempted to bridge the distance between her thoughts and her words so that he might follow along. "Tonight could be special, I mean. I came here to find a new home, and yet you haven't asked me." No frown marred her lips, nor censure in her tone as she finally reached the real question. "Do you not like me?"

mare - 2 - lusitano mutt - 16.3hh - dunskin roan blanket - tyr x sonorae - loveinspired