Meadow

Nyimara was furious. Furious with herself, for having allowed her emotions to run rampant in a single moment’s breath, angry for losing the battle with that damned spotted boy of the lagoon and angry with Cullen for ripping the Hills from beneath her grasp in the wake of her defeat.

She moves through the meadow with slow, stiff movements, her teeth clenched tightly behind her closed jaw. She knew there was a risk when she sent her message to the leaders of the lagoon about her impending threat, but it was what she had believed to be the right move. Had she known that it would lead to the golden mutt rising to meet her in battle she would have thought twice about it. Tyr had met her advances with skilled calculated movements. She had been foolish to imagine that her smaller form would make her more lithe and deadly in short distances. He met her short advances and returned in kind with power and force. She had hoped that the close distance between them would prevent the stallion from being able to use most of the power behind those muscles that bulged beneath his chimera coat. However he had been expecting that, at least that was the impression she gathered from the contact that his hooves and teeth left on her body. One blow in particular connected with the deltoid muscle and left quite a large bruise. Each step was painful but Nyimara did not complain, at least not beyond the occasional hiss as her hoof caught on a rock or dropped into a hole hidden by the yellowing grasses of the meadow.

There was always the risk that she would lose, however she had not expected what came next. Cullen. His name tasted sour and vile even now on her tongue. The thought that at one time, she had submitted to him and allowed him to climb upon her back to sire Nycol turns her stomach in knots. The damned beast took advantage of Raksha’s continued absence and Nyimara’s injuries. She returned from her defeat by Tyr to be met by Cullen’s scent markers on the Hills and his threat ringing over the horizon. It was a deafening blow. With a glare that shot daggers, the silver haired woman gathered Warduna and Nycol to her side, making a point of nuzzling the colt affectionately in full view of his would-be-dead if she got her hands on him, sire. Together, the trio turned back to the ocean where Nyimara guided the smaller figures through the waters back to the main island. Luckily the waters today are calm and there is not much need for her assistance in Nycol’s swim. Pain burned through her tired and sore muscles, begging her brain to give up and let rest envelop her in an endless sleep below the water’s surface. Determination fuels her, determination and anger that burns like a flame licking at the wounds she now sported as mercilessly as the salt water stung her body. Ears fall backwards as she drives herself and her children to what would be their home for now. The meadow.

Cautiously she warns them both of strangers, tucking Nycol into an uncomfortable dip in the earth beneath a large pine. He was hungry and bleated pitifully for the milk her body offered but Nyimara was in no shape to offer him sustenance now. With a reassuring nudge she turns from him, murmuring to Warduna to keep an eye on him. She needed some time to herself. She needed to free the beast and her outburst with Raksha sent the girl running for the hills. No reason to scar the only other two she had left so early. Life would do that to them soon enough without her assistance.

At first she is lost in the recesses of her mind, her body too exhausted and wounded to find release in the kicking of heels or sparring with strangers. Instead, she turns her struggle internally, allowing her thoughts to wander to the images of bloodshed and gore that the beast promised to come. She merely needed to get stronger; needed to care less. It is the bugle of her name over the shrieks and screams that draws her dark eyes back to the present and lift her small fluted ears amid the tangle of her muddy silver tresses. Dark lashes blink away the ghosts of past and present and instead finds a familiar face that hardens her expression.

Shenzi.

In a flurry of dust and a rush of air the woman is upon her. Dark eyes rise to meet the brown woman’s concerned gaze as her finely dished head is shaken to both rid herself of the voices and flush away the concern that lingered in her companion’s voice. Her dark muzzle travels down her neck and spine, ghosting over the new nicks in her skin. Anger rises in the heat of her words. Venom latches itself to the concave of her own throat like a lump of cancer. Small fluted ears turn back to gather Shenzi’s words, feeling the passion and the love that radiated there. Just as she had met the defeated mare in the Hills, now Shenzi’s fury fueled her own fires and stoked the flames until once more the inferno arose and refused to allow her to succumb to misery and defeat. Proudly she lifts her head, taking a step backwards to fix the dark woman in her steady gaze. Lips draw taunt as she tilts her jaw forward, ”You did not ask…. You never needed to ask.” she murmurs, her voice dropping in octave as she leans closer still to the woman of fire and heart. No, Shenzi never did need to ask. Nyimara would move heaven and hell for her just as she would have once done for Bjorn.

Fluted ears perk forward as Shenzi tells her that she and her son made an attempt at freedom. She tells of her return to captivity for the simple desire to keep the lagoon from her doorsteps, and yet Nyimara had gone charging into their midst. She opens her mouth to speak, but is silenced by the force of Shenzi’s whispered words as they breathe into her neck. Reckless. the word seeps from her lips like poison, snarled and hated in the delivery. The word is the only one that can bring a half choked smile upon her own lips. Carefully she cranes her neck into the dark woman, inhaling her scent as though it were the cure for her aches and ailments. ”You…” she murmurs, her usually lilted tones husky with the strength of her conviction, ”You are the cure for my recklessness.” Half cocked and wild eyed was her only understanding, her only control. Fire and hatred, brimstone and revenge were the reasons she knew. It was Shenzi she relied on to keep those emotions leashed to well thought out plans.

The dark mare nudges her cheek, the contact cool and soothing and gone too soon. She retreats a step and the silver witch is unable to stop the one that she takes forward just to feel the woman’s warmth for a moment longer. She suggests that Nyimara return to the Hills and despite herself, her mahogany ears once more bury beneath the thick mantle of her silver white mane. She would find no refuge in the hills any longer. Not now. However she did not dare to let that pass her lips, Shenzi had enough on her plate dealing with the mongrels of the Lagoon. Instead, Nyimara merely bobs her head, her dark gaze hardened and fierce once more. ”You will find your way, just as I will find mine.” she breathes, blinking slowly in the solidity of her words. ”They cannot break us, whatever they toss in our path. We will be together again soon and hell will follow in our wake.” she promises, stomping her hoof against the soil, ignoring the stab of pain that shot through her body. She would heal. Of that she was certain. It would not be long that they were chained down, not for much longer.

Reluctantly she takes a deep breath, memorizing the scent of Shenzi’s skin and growling at the stink of the Lagoon that hung there. With that in her mind, with the taste of war on her tongue, Nyimara would survive, she was certain. The lagoon may separate them now, but it would not keep them apart forever.