Kore wasn’t alone, necessarily, but she did feel lonely.

Slowly but surely the Dunes were becoming more and more crowded. As the summer progressed, there were not one, but four other masculine scents on the wind, coming from the southeastern edge of the island, and now she was seeing long-limbed Akhal-Tekes and fair Arabian mares left and right. Kore kept mostly to herself; occasionally, she would spend time with Ak Burun, and she enjoyed her company, but the white-nosed mare didn’t much care for Kore’s games, and she often went off by herself. Kore never asked to go with her when she went on her own. She figured if Ak Burun - or any of the other mares now flocking like birds to Maslakhat’s golden home - wanted to spend time with her, they would seek her out. After all, she tended to stay within reach of the oasis most of the time. As the aching heat of the summer began to wane, and the breeding season came upon them, however, Kore began to grow restless, and the presence of the stallions in the south made her more and more nervous.

She had only been of breeding age for a few years. In Eleusis, Kore was even more heavily guarded once she went into season, and it wasn’t uncommon for her to be absolutely surrounded by attendants 24/7. Demeter would never let someone come even close to robbing her of her maidenhead; anyone noble enough to ask for her hand wouldn’t dare try to, not without her dam’s blessings, and those who would try a less honorable method would be hard-pressed to even find her, such was the depths of her concealment. To be out in the open like this, unguarded, with so many strange men walking around… it crept into Kore’s mind, peeling at the edges of her comfort. There was only one stallion she knew would never find her again.

The only place he could reach her was in her own head.

Kore slept fitfully that night, tossing and turning. In her dreams, she saw it, all over again: Phoebus Apollo’s form, golden and muscular, prone beneath her; the sick crunch of bone beneath hooves, and the warm rush of blood and gore; his body, tumbling over the edge of the rocks… and the sound of boulders, tumbling down the cliffside after him, soon echoed by the screams of so many others. Kore woke with a start, sweat prickling at the edges of her forehead, and centered wide eyes on the shimmering mirror of the oasis in front of her. She rose from her hidden spot beneath the date palms, shivering against the cold, and wheeled her slim body out and away. She had to run, to work out this nervous, restless energy teeming inside of her, and before she knew it she was galloping far and away across waves of moonlit sand. A part of her wondered if Maslakhat would chase after her, soothe her anxieties… but she didn’t look back to check. She knew - even if she didn’t want to admit it - that he probably wouldn’t. He wasn’t that sort of stallion, and anyway, he was too preoccupied with all of his brand new shining trinkets. Softspoken, timid little Kore couldn’t even compete.

The dark mare ran and ran. Her steps grew frantic, as if chased, and her breath grew ragged in her lungs as she stifled the beginnings of forlorn sobs, what little tears she allowed to escape flying from her cheeks and into the night behind her. Slowly, the dunes gave way to plain sand, and before she knew it, she was back on the beach, exactly where she’d washed ashore with Maslakhat over a season ago. The waves lapped up onto the shore, glittering in the silvery light of the full moon above, and Kore watched them almost scornfully, her whitecapped tail lashing against the supple curves of her hindquarters. Her chest heaved - from exertion or from emotion, she wasn’t sure - and as she paced along the line of the coast, the bay swore under her breath, cursing the name of the stallion from Olympus who had caused her and her loved ones so much pain.

Kore hadn’t known what these Islands, mysterious and unknown, would bring her. She’d hoped that, upon her arrival to the Dunes, the problems of her past - Apollo, Daphne, Demeter, all of it - would be buried like long-forgotten bones in the sand. All it seemed to do instead was drag them out and into the light.