Meadow

Fall has drifted into winter. Not that one can really tell on Salem, other than the slight dimming of the sun’s oppressive heat and the tapering off of Kore’s cycle. She’d avoided pregnancy, thankfully, knowing she was both too young and not ready for the responsibility of a child… but at the same time, as the pale slim ‘Tekes around their shared oasis begin to show signs of pregnancy, a bitter jealousy fills her to the brim. Rather than happiness, all Kore feels when she looks upon them is the lack of care that had been shown to her, her failure to measure up as one worthy of courtship to the one she wanted it from the most.

To make things worse, her night terrors were becoming more and more frequent. The slim mare has taken to sleeping far from the rest of the herd, nestled deep in a bed of palm fronds at the water’s edge so that when she wakes, sometimes screaming, sometimes crying, sometimes gasping for air, she won’t disturb the others. The only thing that chases the visions of carnage from her mind is to run full-tilt towards the coast, until she feels as if she would rip in half from exertion. There she would sit, quiet as a stone, beneath the narrow trunk of a tree until dawn, alone with her thoughts and the sound of the waves. It’s all growing to be too much, the sand too hot, the landscape too desolate, the horses too proud and self-serving. This place, this so-called utopia, is beginning to feel more and more like nothing but a gilded cage.

One day, Kore is back at the coast, her tail snapping against her hindquarters. Restlessness washes over her, unbearable. She is tired of this island, the horses who claim to care for her but do not truly show it, the loneliness and the growing sense within her that she cannot trust anything or anyone. All she wants is a familiar face, one she knows will listen to her, truly listen, and not merely wait for their next opportunity to speak.

His voice, deep like thunder, rumbles in her mind. Always.

Carefully she looks back over her shoulders, eyes scanning the tops of the dunes for a sign of Maslakhat’s golden form. Seeing nobody, Kore wastes no time, and though she trots into the sea her steps grow higher as she shies away from the waves lapping at her heels. Fear grips her heart, familiar in the way it squeezes the air from her lungs, and as she goes deeper and her hooves leave the soft purchase of the sand below, she has to steady her sights on the large island upon which she washed up nearly a year ago, and not the memory of the horrifying tempest that brought her there. The water grows colder as she approaches, more brackish, and the brisk air chips at her thin coat. When she reaches the Crossing, midday has faded into evening. A fine dusting of snow covers the ground beyond the beach, and the banks of the river that spills out to the sea and snakes inland are laced with thin ice. Snow falls from thick clouds above, white glinting against stark darkness, and the only sound she hears is the soft crunching of her footsteps on frost-hardened ground.

Kore shakes the excess water from her hide, though it doesn’t do much to help her against the cold. She shivers, tucking her head close to her chest as she walks, though her eyes roam in every direction for the possibility of Maslakhat’s trailing form, or a stranger, or… someone… else.

The small mare makes her way for the shelter of the trees. Her body, thinner due to her exhaustion, weaves through them with ease, her tired eyes still peering around. After making the swim to the Crossing and looking for hours, her muscles are crying out with exertion. She finds a clearing within the woods, the dead brown leaves on the ground dusted with snow, and sighs, her warm breath fogging into the air before her dished face.

“Maybe I was wrong,” she mutters to herself, muzzle falling to brush dejectedly at the soil. “Maybe he didn’t mean it.” The thick-boned stallion had sounded so sincere, there on the beach, making his promises to her. Was it merely pretty words used in an attempt to entice her out of her home? Did they truly mean anything, or was she the only one who remembered them? Would he even still be here, on the main island, like he’d indicated? Kore isn’t so sure.

The Arabian stays in that clearing for several minutes, snowflakes falling on and around her. She could kick herself for her foolishness and impulsivity, and though her altercation with Maslakhat had made it clear he wouldn’t keep her on a short leash, she knows that going to the Crossing in the depths of winter without at least notifying him is pushing it, let alone the company she seeks. She’s too tired to make the swim back now, and is contemplating leaving the clearing to find a place to hunker down for the evening when the sound of hoofbeats, large and steady, fill her ears. Kore raises her head, ears perked and eyes bright, and turns towards the source of the sound. The moon is hidden by clouds, and she cannot hardly see anything through the trees, though she hears the stranger growing closer. Her voice, barely above a whisper and equal parts hopeful and terrified, echo in the stillness of the night, reaching towards whoever it is that rises out of the gloom to meet her.

“Aidoneus?”