Common

Leaving was bittersweet, but the painted girl did not turn toward home. She left the Peak's spires behind her without a second glance, using the shadow they cast upon the ground as a marker for her future. Someday she would follow her mother to the Cove and meet the stallion that had abandoned them both, but not yet. Not while her world was still off-kilter, her future undecided.

She loved the Peak and the sisters, despite her tendency to stay quiet and aloof, but a life of silent prayer on empty mountain tops was not for her. Hymn needed more from this life, even if she had no idea what more would even look like. She just knew there had to be something beyond what she knew, and if she had to go out herself and find it: she would.

The slender mare slipped quietly along the trail between her home and the Commons, ducking beneath the branches that had grown unruly in the long months of silence. She remembered traipsing along the well-worn paths when she was younger, back when the valkyries had been more involved in the Commons and the Crossing. Now, she rarely saw them leave their respective mountains. It wasn't for her to pass judgment on their inaction, but she did anyway. How could you enact change in the world if you did not go out and confront it? There was hardly corruption to be found if you did not look for it.

Still, she did not pause to dwell on the past. What mattered now was her own future, and it was laid out before her, promising a life all her own, full of possibilities. She could be someone's partner or friend or lover. A confidant or a challenge. A mother, maybe even, someday. All of them would be something that belonged to her far more than being the silent daughter of the silent mare of the Peak. As much as she loved her mother, she needed to be something other than her shadow.

The painted mare broke into the meadow of the Commons with her face lifted high. Various pairings of different horses dotted the open space, most of whom were clearly already enveloped in a conversation of some sort. In truth, Hymn had no idea what the accepted customs of the Commons were beyond that of the three Crossing territories, it was supposedly the most dangerous. She wasn't sure that she agreed with this; not because she doubted her mother's attempts to caution her, but because she personally believed that high risk also came with high reward.

And she was ready to find her own reward in the world.

Lifting her charcoal muzzle, Hymn called out, beckoning her future forward.

Pardon her baby image <3