The Lost Islands
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Meadow

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there's something tragic about you
Posted on November 6, 2020 at 08:02:27 PM by Sabriel


SABRIEL

It was a still night - a breathless night - that surrounded Sabriel when she woke beside the reassuring warmth of her spotted companion. Content and whole for the first time in what felt an eternity. The silver mare would’ve been happy to slip back into dreams, secure in the cradle of Bondurant’s body. Lulled by the feel of his heart beating in sync with hers, and the steady rise and fall of his broad belly with each breath he drew. But the more that the white-brindled yearned towards blissful oblivion, the more that it evaded her - darting just beyond her reach like the tiny fish that could be found in the Fall’s pool. Inevitably, Sabriel yielded to the relentlessness of her thoughts with a gentle sigh, extricating herself carefully from beneath the arch of the bay stallion’s neck so that she would not disturb his peaceful slumber.

At first, she did not wander far. Circling Bondurant’s prone figure as a moon would orbit its earth, she hoped to placate her inexplicable restlessness with motion. Instead, her aimless wanderings only seemed to increase it. A feeling that was half warm glow and half cold, ashen fear filled the previously-hollow cavity of her chest. Suffocating on this strange combination of emotions, Sabriel glanced back at the stallion, as if to reassure herself that he was still there. That he was still real, and that what she had felt in the moments that they had joined was real, too. That it had not simple been the desperate aching of a broken heart that had brought them together - a possibility that terrified her nearly as much as the potential repercussions of their coupling.

Though just as still and clear as it had been only moments previously, the air around Sabriel seemed to become heavier; harder to pull into her lungs. For a few blissful hours, she’d been able to forget the image of her first son lying unmoving on the Cove’s beach. Now, it rose up before her like a terrible wave, threatening to bury her again beneath the vast ocean of her grief. Trying to escape the turbulent force, the black mare moved even further away from Bondurant, so that even the bright beacons of her silver mane and tail were lost to the darkness.

Sabriel?

Awareness returned to her abruptly, and the silver black froze like a prey animal that found itself cornered. Silence followed the sound of her name, however, and Sabriel began to doubt what she had heard - certain that she had imagined the familiar voice that had spoken it. But the scent that she inhaled with her next breath was unmistakable, sending an unconscious shiver trailing down the length of her spine. “Solomon?” she breathed, her pale eyes probing the shadows for the Cove’s king. The shifting of hooves amongst needle-strewn loam told her where to look, and she turned to face his silhouette, dark ears turning outward in uncertainty as he spoke again.

I’m probably the last stallion you want to talk to… Days - perhaps even hours- ago, this statement might have coaxed bitter words from her lips. But now, with the delicate shards of her heart swept into a more manageable pile, the venom that she sought slipped from her grasp. She was left clutching only sorrow, and - surprisingly - pity for the champagne stallion, whose own grief was clear in the haggard sound of his voice. Stepping forward, she approached the barely-discernable figure and extended her muzzle to brush lips with Solomon - finding comfort this time in the warmth of his breath, and the taste of his skin. Finding that she was ready to let go of her hatred in its entirety, even if the sorrow she felt over what she’d suffered would never truly abate.

I promise it won’t happen again.

“I know,” Sabriel murmured, holding her trust of the tobiano stallion out for him to see. Hoping that he could find some comfort in it, as she had found comfort in the kindness that Bondurant offered. “And I know why you are here, Solomon.” She continued, withdrawing her muzzle from the velvety kiss but pressing her forehead into the hollow of his throat. “And I forgive you. I - I think I forgave you long ago, before I even came to the Cove. But, Solomon, he-” A sob tore itself from deep within her, and she crushed herself to him harder, as if to blot out the sound.

“I didn’t love him, Solomon. I didn’t love him until it was too late.” The gold-and-white stallion might feel the telltale dampness of the tears that slid down her face and pattered onto his flesh, but Sabriel continued. Feeling a catharsis in the words she spoke, despite the pain that they unearthed. “He deserved better, Solomon. And a part of me believes that it’s my fault - that if I had found room for him in my heart, he might have lived.” She didn’t pause long enough for the silent stallion to argue or agree with her self-condemnation, but plunged onward, the soft syllables of her voice trembling.

“I left him to be reduced to bones by scavengers.” The words became a haunted whisper as she envisioned what the nameless child had now become, and her heart gave another painful throb in her chest. Squeezing the damp pools of her eyes closed against the agony, Sabriel spoke once more - and then succumbed to the silence of her tears.

“I didn’t even give him a name. And the world - the world will move on as if he never existed.”

4 | mare | mixed | silver black somatic brindle | 16.1hh


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