Gabbar

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stallion . arabian . bay . 14.3hh . 6

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As the purple sky fades into a velvet blue, Gabbar strides back into the ocean and strikes out for the islands in the distance. He is alert, nose up and away from the spray of the waves as he swims steadily. He bypasses Salem, breathing heavily but still energized by his need to find Nereid. She does not deserve him. He will not be able to live with himself if he does not at least try.

Gabbar still sees their retreating figures in his mind’s eye and follows that mental path until he reaches the last island. This must be where they went; he cannot imagine the stallion would force the mare —clearly worn out from her first journey— to swim out of sight and only then swing around and fight the currents and the waves in order to reach Atlantis, or chilly Tinuvel. Only an idiot would demand so much, and he does not think the stranger who stole Nereid is stupid. Gabbar pulls himself out of the water under the dubious light of the deepening dusk and stands for a moment, breathing heavily, to prepare himself for what is to come.

Every instinct demands he lope through the territory to confront the stallion immediately and with no more warning than the sound of his hooves pounding the ground, in much the same way as his home was invaded previously by his chestnut adversary. His whole body tenses with the desire to attack without mercy but he holds himself in place and breathes, breathes until his muscles loosen and then tighten again from chill as the wind blows across his wet coat. Only then does he move, sloshing out of the tideline and then trotting through short grass.

As he moves, his muscles warm and relax, and his dark coat dries. Gabbar trots with purpose through unfamiliar territory, tail flagged and delicate nostrils flaring wide to drink in the scents carried across the wind. He searches for the strange-but-familiar musk of the male he seeks, and instead catches a hint of Nereid’s sweetness wafting through the night. The Arabian veers to follow the direction from whence her scent came, dark eyes peeled for any sign of a horse on the night’s horizon.