Meadow

Midsummer had been… promising.

The changing of the season had brought the memory of the golden stallion to the front of her consciousness. She tumbled thoughts of him over and over in her mind, weighing the terrifying prospect of commitment against the heights she might reach with him at her side, and as the days cooled and the color of the leaves went from green to deep crimson, matching her sleek coat, she found herself finding more and more reasons to make the short swim to the Dunes than to stay put and explore her options.

It would have been exciting, this possibility of adventure, had she not felt her own self-control slipping. Minthe was used to doing the controlling, to keeping others beholden to herself, but the dappled Adonis from the Falls persists, haunting the edges of her life like a mirage no matter how she tries to shut him out. She hates the way her body responds to the mere idea of him, her heart thudding like a rabbit in her chest and her breath coming short in her lungs. She hates that he takes up such space in her head, that he clings there, stuck, a burr she can’t quite reach.

At least, not alone.

The mare’s tail snaps with a crack against her sinewy hindquarters. She twists around the trees bordering the edge of the Meadow, idly wondering if rubbing her svelte form against the rough bark of the trunks would be enough to scratch the itch his image brings. The sound of a scuffle draws her attention to the field at her right, sprinkled lightly throughout with mingling strangers, and the squeals and clicking of dull yellow teeth serve as a much-needed reminder of exactly who Minthe is and what she is capable of. She is a force, a beacon for hungry, idiotic, slobbering men, and she has never not gotten exactly what she asked for at exactly the time she’s requested it.

If that’s not power, what is?

The ruby-red mare rolls her shoulders, tossing her mane from her face before trotting loftily into the open. The afternoon sun catches her, lighting her up like a wildfire in a sea of dry prairie grass; she takes no care to muffle her steps, swishing her long tail so that the smoky-sweet perfume of her heat fills the air in her stead. Her face remains carefully demure, devoid of the irritation and impatience rising within her every second she goes unnoticed. Not much longer, yet, and she can get a taste of the primal relief she craves, enough to hold her over until she can make a decision unclouded by inconvenient, cumbersome, and utterly insufferable urges. If she can get one hit, just one bit of chaos to stem the tide of her need, then she’ll be better able to negotiate a more favorable future for herself, no matter who offered it.