Badr never really had a strong sense of property. Perhaps if asked if his lovely home of rolling golden dunes and the miserable collection of women that he had stolen via cloak and dagger were his, he would have promptly answered with something that screamed indecision. As a child, he had not been taught that men are to keep women, but instead that he should follow the indescretions of the land he was currently posted in. Survival was the most important thing, and perhaps by keeping a collective of company, he figured that this was how he would best secure himself a long life.

Even if his life had been filled with misery, anger, or hate, he would be proud to say that he had lived well beyond his prime and into old age. If the times ever came to that.

Quietly, he must admire the woman’s fire. Her outward hostility is a good sign of her vitality, and even though something inside the stallion was pressuring him to lean forwards and prod her shoulder to see what happens, he decides that this would cause unnecessary violence. With her cutting words, the stallion doesn’t respond with much, save the lazy flick of his tail over his legs, brushing the golden hairs across his ankles as he thinks for a moment. “I’d rather not call you just mare.” Not that he had manners, Badr was most likely not a gentleman, but perhaps there was a point where being hated was not a desirable status- though there was a long time ahead of the stallion, where he would no doubt shift from the indifferent creature he was into something a little more venomous.

Oh, his mother would be proud. She had been sour and bitter, knowing that Badr was her only son had been the only thing to bring a light of a smile to her face, despite her displeasure at his appearance. He was too lean, too wiry for her, with muscles that gathered across his shoulders and haunches in neat precision. He was not overly large, and there was nothing demanding about his presence of the way he carried himself, except his eyes. There was some sort of dark knowledge behind his eyes- a mind that was turning over everything those eyes took in and no doubt he was strategizing his plan. Whatever that plan was…