Gabbar
stallion . arabian . bay . 14.3hh . 6
He senses that the mare is contemplative today, and so while he is heartened by her genuine reply Gabbar does not speak in the silence that falls after her words. It is not his place to disturb her peace. Instead, he takes one step closer to both the mare and the ocean and turns his body to face the salty water. It is an impressive thing, far more alive and vicious than his desert and a thousand times wetter. The first time he saw it, the bay breeder was stricken with terror. How did it not consume the beach, the grass, the world? What God kept that monster at bay, for the Walking Mare held power only over the land, as did Her daughter, and Uzay over the moon and the sky— nothing in the stories the seers told had ever prepared him for the sea.
And he had dived into it, legs stretching for uneven ground that sloped suddenly away from the shore to an alarmingly unreachable depth, to come here. As he must. And he will brave it again to finish his business— he already has, crossing the water easily on each swim between the Isles . Gabbar is no coward: mighty though the water might be, the Gods are mightier, and Gabbar fears nothing as much as the attention of his deities. It is not good to be under the direct sight of the Gods.
He snorts, the sound lost under the rolling waves, and twists an ear toward the pretty rabicano beside him. She is very close, and Gabbar is aware of how unaware he has been in the past few moments: the Arabian mare has closed the distance between them entirely and now their shoulders brush together, skin warm and firm beneath a soft coat. “Yes,” he agrees, mainly to gauge how far he could lower his voice (deep, like thunder, and easily lost in the rumbling of the water at their feet) but also to buy himself some time. The mare’s proximity is heady, overwhelming, and Gabbar misses home. It is easy to pretend he is there now, easy to forget Iftikhar is on the same Island and likely on her way back to the Dunes right now.
“It is a great place,” he says, turning his gaze back to the ocean as if he can see beyond the glittering horizon in the distance. “My people have ruled it for many, many centuries. We were the first to call it home. There are not many dunes like this— the land itself is mostly flat, the ground baked hard underhoof from Iç. In some places the sand is loose, but that terrain is favored more by the Akhal-Tekes with whom we share the desert.” Gabbar holds back a homesick sigh and glances at the mare. “Is there something more specific you wish to hear about?”
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