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A chill on the air is beginning to gather and take hold as winter draws ever closer, darkness falling sooner and sooner every night. Jörmangandr doesn’t mind much. The forest climate and landscape are not so different to those she frequented in the outerlands with her father’s herd. Better to be on Luthien than somewhere like Tinuvel. Her grandmother’s brother and much of his family had resided in the bay and by all accounts it was a cruel and unforgiving place most of the year round. She supposed she would adapt if she were ever to somehow find herself on Tinuvel’s shores though she has no intention of doing so. The extremes of Tinuvel and Salem hold no appeal. Funny how fate had thrown Lyden at her upon arrival - a ticket straight to the forest home she had longed for since Olaf first begin telling her the stories. The gods surely smiled upon her. She hoped they would long continue to do so.
The coming winter will be her first with a child growing within her. She knows how tough it could be to keep herself in condition during winters in the past let alone now when she will be eating for two. She had been so adamant that she would not foal her first season away from Olaf’s herd. She had hoped to get settled and spend her first year becoming familiar with the island. She had planned to get back to full condition after the journey to the islands which had not been easy alone. She relented quickly however, instinct and lust quickly taking over common sense. Olaf had rightly scoffed at her naivety before she left, assuring her that he would be a grandsire come spring whether it was her choice or not. It was her choice despite her being loathed to prove the man right. She could see his smug, bald face in her mind’s eye and silently cursed him for knowing her better than she knew herself.
None of her plans have been going as intended. She had hoped to have mingled with the other mares by now or perhaps even got to know Lyden a little better but instead had been distracted by the lure of the forest. She had so far spent most of her days exploring all the places Olaf used to frequent as a child. A chance find of equine bones partially buried beneath a few years worth of forest growth left her wondering if they belonged to her grandmother. She knew the mare had been killed within her forest home but there were surely a great many others who would also have succumbed to death within its boundaries. Jörmungandr hoped that when her time came (a long time in the future), that she too would lay to rest beneath the forest canopy. Until then, she will have to make more effort with her herd – her ancestors will not be proud to learn of her neglect. It would not take much to seek out the bodies than wandered around her home so she makes a promise to herself to do just that next time she senses someone close by.
For a while she wanders along the banks of the stream before eventually wading downstream, trailing her muzzle through the water casually as she goes. The scent of the other forest stallion and of a young male (both unknown to her) hang heavy in the area and she concludes they must spend a lot of time here - though hints of Lyden’s scent are also evident. She hadn’t seen Lyden since briefly spying him slipping into the ocean bound for the commons (or so it appeared to her). She assumed he would be recruiting more herd members though she did not seek him out upon his return to ask if this were the case or if he had been successful – better to let him come to her. Always.
A ruckus downstream warrants a lazy twitch of her ears in the direction of the sound – obviously someone was around. The familiar sound of Lyden’s hoofbeats approaching and she figures now is as good a time as any to join the party. With a sigh and a shake of her head, she continues her stroll down the stream, following it as it curved round and the trees parted to reveal a colt on the banks, a large male not far from him on the ground and Lyden in the middle. “So this is where the men disappear to”
Mare | Clydesdale/Shire/Quarter Horse/Mutt
Buckskin [Ee/Aa/nCr] | Four | 16.0hh
Olaf x Chianti
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