Gabbar
stallion . arabian . bay . 14.3hh . 6
Though her demeanor seems to deflate at his question, the yearling is no less polite in her response. Gabbar listens and wonders what it must be like to grow up with two parents as devoted as hers sound. He cannot even imagine. There is something, though, that he is familiar with— the certainty in her voice as she describes where her parents will place the blame should they discover where she has gone.
Gabbar knew when he broke the rules that discipline would follow if he were to be caught. While he understands customs are different here on the Islands, he has no knowledge of how mares and stallions raise their young. Perhaps it is the same as in his homeland: physical rebuke when a child does something the parents disagree with. Perhaps not.
“Nonsense,” he says with a big grin. “You can hardly be blamed for a sudden sandstorm. Unless Iç has granted you power over the winds?” he asks, eyebrow quirked in curiosity but a playful note to his tone. Of course she has not been blessed in such a way. To suggest such a thing —of an impure horse, no less!— is blasphemy among his people. Gabbar does not care. His grin widens; he feels a colt again, defying his people in such a way.
“I’ll walk you home,” he offers, mimicking her move to leave, prepared to continue moving. “It’s about time I see who else lives on Salem anyway. Lived here long enough.” This last he mutters and ends with a low snort. Had he not reached so many important conclusions about himself, he might consider his time spent in solitude a waste. He regrets it took as long as it did, but he does not regret it. “I’m Gabbar, by the way. It means strong, or proud. I was named after my mother,” he says, offering that piece of family history with a wry grimace. Iftikhar had certainly not condoned his existence, much less the name Rakkas gave him. It had been a bit of a joke among the soldiers but had worked out all right in the end for the graying chestnut— Rakkas had been selected as Iftikhar’s consort despite his bold move of taking Gabbar in to raise as his own son. Perhaps the red mare had chosen him because of that. Gabbar had never thought to ask about it until now, when he was miles and years away from everyone he’d once called family.
He pulls himself out of his thoughts with a quick shake of his dished head. Enough of that, he warns himself before he can start wallowing in the past. “You’ve a beautiful name,” he tells Indira sincerely. “Does it have any meaning attached to it?”
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