VaLkA

mare / six / chestnut pangare / yakut / 13.0 hh

Even amidst the soft-death that was Tinuvel’s winter, Valka had never felt so alive.

The cold air crackled in her lungs, and— pulsing with electricity— teased the down of her undercoat until it stood on end. It formed a soft orange halo around the stocky little mare, or perhaps a series of tiny flames that licked at the pale-blue canopy of the sky. Beneath her, the earth was as unyielding as stone, and painted in a drab brown monochrome. But for all that the Bay was bare and bleak, its skjaldmær could still find beauty everywhere she looked. It was there in the frost-limned blades of grass that glittered, there in the white-capped swell of the sea. It was there in the vaporous clouds of breath that curled from her nostrils, and in the distant fangs of the mountains. Mountains that served as a wall against the conflicting contents of her heart— a wall that had since become more a product of the painted stallion’s will than her own.

With an irritated flick of her head, Valka turned east, her dark eyes probing the herd, seeking comfort amongst the familiar. Here was the rose-colored Ylva, shadowed as always by her sworn shield. There was Sæunn, her pale gold-and-white coat blending almost perfectly against the snow-pocketed tundra. Brynja, the white-masked girl who had come in search of Bjorn and stayed amongst the Hersir’s small herd. And a small number of others whom the red woman knew by appearance more than name: two mares, one a painted bay and the other a deep gold. A fawn-colored stallion who’d always haunted the periphery of the herd, but rarely made his presence known. They were fewer in number than they’d been only seasons ago, but stood close enough to one another that it was difficult to separate one individual from the rest.

In spring and summer, they might drift apart like floes of ice. But in the harsh reality of Tinuvel’s unforgiving winters, the Bay’s two herds became one.

Short-lived as it seemed destined to be, the sight of their unity stirred something within the Yakut. Tipping her small ears forward, the shaggy chestnut called out to the herd, her short legs carrying her down the bluff and into their midst. Meeting each individual with a pause and an exchange of breaths before she continued on to the next. Searching, searching for one in particular, even as she welcomed them all. Bacardi. The Hersir had already done much and more for the Bay, and for her. It was selfish to ask more of him, but she had to. Wanted to. Because the weight of her world had become too much to bear alone. Because she wanted to know that those she protected so fiercely would be safe even if she died in her next battle. Of course, it didn’t to Valka that she might avoid such a fate by staying forever in the peace and seclusion of the Bay.

The sea, after all, would always be the sea.