There is one stark difference that the marwari mare who lurks like a shadow on the horizon, between these rolling Dunes, and the place that she had once called home. It had little to do with the climate and the terrain... In fact these were much what Naz what used to, and in part, that was why she had alighted upon these shores. The desertlands from where she’d come in pursuit of a traitorous prince were as harsh as life here in the Dunes was, and that was why they had been dominated by ones like her.

And yet, she had been an unbelonger still.

Here though, individuals came and went, unsuited to the demands of Salem, and carried away by the desert wind to kinder, more temperate climes. Others, disrespectful and unworthy, had been taken away, and Naz would see to it that these did not return. She would not about slander against Bahadir, for the Sultan of these sands had proved himself worthy in the eyes of the marwari. It was with a sense of purpose that she stayed by him. She watched over him as he’d recovered, helped him defend his lands, and now, she took to meditating on the promise she had made him, to help him find his family.

It had stirred joy in her heart, learning of Bahadir’s kinship with the mare Bhaskara. But this revelation had stirred up other things too, heavier thoughts that Naz kept to herself, for she did not wish to trouble her Sultan, nor allow herself to waver before him. And so it was, when movement in her peripheral vision drew her attention to the figure standing tall upon the crest of the nearest dune, Naz was pulled sharply from her brooding, and drawn forwards, where she lingered in the mare’s shadow, and raised her head, curved ears turned forwards and her blue-gold eyes wide with awe.

The mare perched above, surefooted atop the shifting mountain of sand, was a ghost of her.

So similar in colouring, and yet so different. But even from this small distance, Naz admired the sleek figure and sharp angles of the mare, finding familiarity in every line of her. Restless, the mare shuffled her white legs, felt the skin beneath her dark coat shiver as though from cold, even though it was still warm. “Kimsin?” The single word she whispered reverentially was loaded with emotion, and the sound of it, of what she considered her mother-tongue, made the stoic mare’s throat tighten uncomfortably. And as she waited for some kind of reply from the teke mare, Naz lowered her head in deference, and blinked to relieve the stinging that had started up in her eyes.