Desert

Shiloh had no words. Not for herself. Not for Temblor. Not for the monster that stood before her.

Watching them battle had been surreal. Rougaru's name had been frequently used to caution her as a young mare: don't go to the commons in fall or a monster like Rougaru might claim you, don't enter a strange stallion's land without an escort or you might be held prisoner by a stallion like Rougaru, and so on. So much so that his name had ascended to the same tier as the boogeyman: scary when you were small and gullible, and less so when you were grown and knew such tales to be mostly hyperbole.

Rougaru was real of course, but she had never imagined seeing him in the flesh. As she had told Temblor, even Feray's capture had seemed almost surreal to her, a story rather than reality. It was very much reality now, however.

The moment the silver-maned stallion had tried to cut her away from Temblor, Shiloh had been almost frozen in fear. She would have liked to believe herself the sort of mare that would join in to defend herself, to defend Temblor, but she had not. She had watched silently as the two men battled to this bitter outcome, and then had allowed herself to be herded into the ocean with a final, longing look toward the stallion she had begun to open herself to.

They said nothing on the journey, and Shiloh was not well versed enough in reading Rougaru's mannerisms to have any idea that his quiet was uncharacteristic. She was torn between wanting to play possum, and wanting to rage back at him. To take advantage of his battle-torn state to punish him for ruining the life she'd only just begun to truly envision for herself. In the end, she opted to remain silent. She knew little of him, and was not yet sure why he had plucked her from Paradise. In causing chaos, she could either be inviting his attraction or his ire, and she was not eager to endure either.

Given her family's history, it was logical to assume that she was merely to be a pawn against her father... but she didn't know how Rougaru would have come to know such a thing. It wasn't as if she spread such information around often. Apart from the meeting with Bathsheba on the beach, she didn't think she had even spoken her sire's name aloud since leaving home. Nor could she understand why Rougaru had sought her out over Rae. The little gray was an elusive thing, but Shy had coaxed enough from her to know that she had once belonged to the wolf king, and that - either through ignorance or luck - clearly did not believe him to be a monster. The question of why her still had no answer, but such a callous disregard seemed fitting for the stories she had heard.

With ears pinned and a tail that cracked audibly as she trotted ashore, she did as he bid, and did her best to impose distance between them. The last thing she wanted was to have him close enough to touch her again. He was larger than she had thought, and his caramel coat bore more scars than she could imagine any equine reasonably earning. Rather than making him seem impressive, it only underscored the malignant danger he exuded. Ironically, this very same aura was dimmed a moment later by his insistence on how futile resistance would be.

Shiloh remained silent. She had been raised in near silence alongside her mute mother, and in times of stress, words did not always come easily to her. Even if she had been able to untie her tongue, she had no idea what to say to him. Thus far, he was proving to be the childhood monster that had featured in all of her nightmares as a girl, and she doubted there was any crafty or witty retort she could come up with that would save her now. The only thing she could hold onto now was the hope that Temblor had meant it when he said that he would not leave her waiting.

The painted mare's eyes rose to Rougaru's, the expression on her face conflicted. She had nothing to say to him, and so she only nodded in appeasement, agreeing that resisting him now was futile, and turned promptly inland to seek out a place where she might come apart on her own. Shy made no great haste. She was neither running from him to invite chase, nor consenting to a further conversation, only seeking to adjust to her new circumstances. She understood it was possible that Rougaru would follow her, that his interest in her might have been genuine and not just coincidental, but she doubted it. Shiloh did not know him any more than she had known the stallion before him that had tried to separate her from Paradise, but she cocked her ears back to listen for his pursuit just in case.