Meadow

Winters bite was gradually getting worse, a fact he couldn’t ignore even as the sharp wind bit into his thick hide. As if to punctuate that point a light snow had begun to fall, those bright flakes beginning to delicately cover his dark body like they sought to erase his inky presence from the meadow and yet still he stood like a statue atop the small hill. This vantage point on the cusp where the brown grasses turned to soft sand at the ocean’s edge, the very point from which he had originally emerged from those choppy waters into what he now knew as the common lands. It was not the first place he had landed on the Islands, the seemingly fateful tides having swept him too far south originally and into the warm embrace of the Dunes. He could not have expected what he had found on the edge of that sultry land as brown eyes as wide as they were innocent flashed across his mind. How could someone he had exchanged only a handful of words with linger in his mind so potently? Surely she had bewitched him body and soul beneath the light of the moon that night before they had been interrupted… caught by the stallion who deigned to call her his own.

How he still second guessed his decision to leave her there, unable to forget how she had looked as that golden ‘Teke dismissed her so casually. The mixture of indignity and ire on her soft features seared into his brain before she had turned to flee back into those shifting sands. Even though he often yearned to retrace his figurative steps and cross that ocean once more the promise he had made her keeps him on the edge of the water. So much weight held in the singular worded vow he had made to the copper mare, so much more than he had reason to, and yet he cannot help but know he would do whatever she desired and it plagued him.

There is so much he should be doing instead of this daily vigil, his ochre eyes fixed on the far horizon and that spot of land visible there on a clear day. He should be planning his future, finding a place to settle and fresh start he had come to these islands to begin, but she holds him here. Even the first night he had spent in the meadow, the first night he had stumbled into her life, she had appeared like a vision in his dreams. It had nearly awoken him then by pure surprise, so accustomed had he become to being haunted by his father and those darker memories. Her mere imagined presence cast a light that could not be ignored and even then he had known that he would not be able to resist finding her forever. So he had compromised with himself and maintained the slightest hope that she would appear here, unwilling to admit that he was desperate to believe she too had felt whatever connection he had that night. Sure he attempted to convince himself he lingered for other reasons, connections to form and taking his time to understand the state of the lands around him, but in his core he knew there was only one thing tying him here now.

Sighing heavily he turned away from the shore, his large body demanding he give it the sustenance it needed to survive the quickly declining temperatures. No easy task these days, and he found himself frustrated that such menial needs took him away from his watch for her… even though days had passed and the beginnings of doubt were niggling at the edges of his mind. The towering stallion had always been confident, if not a touch proud or arrogant though certain experiences had tempered such traits for self-preservation, but the memory of her dark nose place so familiarly on Masklahat’s withers caused his heavy brows to furrow still. Shoving the thought from his mind he attempted to focus his attention on uncovering any greenery which remained, knowing that as winter progressed it would become exceedingly scarcer.

Finally, after nosing around edges of where the larger trees broke up the otherwise open terrain, he had found enough nourishment to allow his focus to return to the petite Arabian. Slowly his lumbering form begins the trek back towards the now familiar beach, his pace gradually increasing even as the sun sank below that horizon and seemed to mark not only the end of another day but also to his hope that today she would miraculously appear. It was then he came to a sudden stop, his feathered hooves digging into the new-fallen powder so abruptly that their weight sunk down into the damp soil.

“Kore?”

Her name is barely audible as it slips unbidden from his lips, the unmistakably sweet notes of her unique scent wrapping around him like velvet. There is no doubt in his mind that he could be her, but how? His eyes close for a moment as he surrenders to its call, stunned at how it wracks him so even as his large head turns to where the trail leads inwards. How? His golden eyes snap open in the vanishing light, unable to believe she had managed to slip past him in such a short time followed by concern that she was out here in the dark and alone. He is quick to pick up his pace once more, though now his heavy steps lead him inland as he follows the draw of her aroma and what feels like something else pulling from his chest though he cannot imagine what it would be. Not since Hera had he felt any such stirring of emotion in his batter soul, and that had not ended well, but he convinced himself he only wanted to ensure she was safe. Surely he owed her that much after she had lied for him on the Dunes, and for the first time found himself worried that she might have been punished for such actions. A fierce anger bubbled beneath the surface of his polished exterior for a moment and his steps came faster.

She was close now, he could almost feel her presence, her light drawing him in like a helpless moth to a flame. Oh what a privilege to be burned by her! As he enters the small copse of trees on the far side of the meadow he is forced to slow, his large body not made for such enclosed spaces even as his bright eyes search the darkness for any sign of her. His inky pelt melds into the night, but he knows save for the bright wash atop her tail she would be no more easily found and he pauses for a moment. It is enough though as he hears the barest whisper of his name from the darkness and somehow her sweet voice shakes him to his core. Did he dare believe she sounded hopeful, that she had come looking for him? “Good evening, Kore.” He forced an evenness into the deep tenor of his voice though the thundering of his heart belied his true feelings as he turned towards her. A few more steps taken now towards where her voice had originated and finally he could barely make out the faintest outline of her slender form, the feminine curves that while not the only thing that attracted him to her could not be ignored.

A part of him yearns to close the space between them, to reach out and touch her as she had that night on the beach. The memory of her featherlight nose against his cheek seared into his memory forever. “What brings you here tonight?” He doubted the protective stallion who had disrupted their first meeting had given her permission to leave the proverbial safety of his territory, and a part of him hopes she had come of her own accord. He had seen strength in her when they had first met, unable to overlook the fierceness in her petite figure during even their short meeting and despite the tears which lingered in her soulful eyes. It is those eyes his own of molten seek now in the shadowy darkness that seemed to roil around them, though his vision begins to adjust, and he can see her more clearly with every passing moment. "I hope I did not cause you any more trouble the other night." He would never forgive himsel if he had even inadvertantly broken his promise to her, and he would destroy the man if he had so much as land a harsh word upon her for his actions. A shiver passed over his scarred body and another thought surfaces for surely she had not been long out of the water from her trip, otherwise he would have seen her arrival. “Are you cold?”