The night is still, a hush settling over the mountain. Even the wind has become nothing more than a quiet whisper, so unlike the harsh mountaintop winds Marceline has become accustomed to. The red mare dozes near the base of the mountain, tucked inside the forest, still sore and fatigued from her fight with Rafe days earlier. She feels like she had barely come out on top, but the effort had been well worth the prize, her pride inflating in her chest as she pushed Guneslenmek into the sea. As she had, she had thought of all the mares across the islands who had been forced to endure the same experience, and it only steeled her resolve to be the one to put an end to it. She hoped that her victory would show her sisters she was still capable of being a protector and avenger. If she could just work her way to the top, there would be nothing stopping her from having her revenge on the stallions that had wronged her - and her sisters.
Half-formed dreams of this idyllic future float behind Marceline's closed lids, lashes fluttering gently against her cheeks. Suddenly, a distant cry echoes across the mountain, a plea for help sent into the inky shadows, followed by the sound of hooves scrambling against hard rock. Marceline lifts her head from where she dozes beneath the splaying boughs of an old pine, red-rimmed ears swiveling forward atop her crown. Through the trunks of the trees she can see a distant figure, their pale coat cloaked in shadow. Is that...?
"Hollis!" Marceline shouts, the last dredges of sleep quickly shed from her mind. She bolts forward from the trees as fast as her injured leg would allow her, pain exacerbated from her previous battle. But she is slow, too slow, and before she can even break the treeline another figure is slithering out from the shadows, gaining on Hollis from behind. Marceline's ears pin and she pushes herself quicker, slinking up behind the pair. Red lips peel back to reveal blunt teeth and she snakes her head out, attempting to bite at the thick flesh of the stallion's hindquarters.
"Get away from her!" she hisses, ears pinned and eyes ablaze. Marceline pushes forward and attempts to insert herself bodily between the two, hoping to give Hollis enough time to escape further up the mountain, to get to Khar'pern and the others. "You do not belong here. Go before I rip the skin from that smug face of yours." She had already bested Rafe and Guneslenmek in battle. The latter, twice. She had no doubt she could, would, do the same to this foolish man if given half the chance. She pushes forward again, trying to use her body to unbalance the intruder, sparing only a brief glance over her shoulder as she cried, "Run, Hollis!" |