White coils of hair fell in a tumbling waterfall down Celestine’s dark neck, so long that the ends trailed in the water. The ocean swelled around her legs as she pulled herself out of it, as though beckoning her back in. It caressed the tops of her thighs and tugged at her tail like a hungry lover, but as she had done with any other suitor, Celestine ignored its pleas and pushed onward. She strode forward in a gleaming halo of moonlight, until the shadows of the trees snuffed her out.
She did not know where she was, but this did not deter the tall mare. Celestine was formidable in height even for many stallions, and was wholly unafraid of putting one in his place for speaking out of turn, even if he did have an advantage in size. Though Celestine was tall, however, she had her mother’s desert-bred grace. She was slender and long-legged, with a chiseled, almost delicate face beneath the tumbling blizzard of a mane. Out of that defined face glared a hard golden gaze which rarely softened when it met another’s. It swept over the dark ground, yet uncovered by snow, alert for any movement. Her dark ears cupped forward to pick up any sounds in the night, but so far, her own soft footsteps were all she could hear.
She was alone.
Before her, some distance away, the rush of a waterfall slowly became apparent as she approached it. Celestine altered the course of her leisurely walk to seek out the fresh water, and when she did, she wasted no time lingering at the edges of its frothing reservoir. The midnight-colored mare strode right into its icy clutches, letting the cold fingers of swirling water loosen the brine in her coat. She shivered, but not unpleasantly. Celestine loved the cold.
As she twisted back on herself to groom the star-splashed fur of her flanks, heavy snowflakes began to fill her vision, one by one. A few landed on her face and in her pale eyelashes; many more landed along the curve of her back. A handful disappeared as soon as they touched the rolling surface of the water. The snow seemed to quiet the world around her, and in the peaceful silence, the waterfall above her was the only sound she could hear.
And then, the snapping of a twig.
Celestine’s white-shrouded head snapped around like a cat’s. In the shadows of the forest beyond, she could see nothing, until the glitter of eyes caught her own. The dark mare’s breath billowed around her in a cloud, steady and slow.
“Come to keep me warm, stranger?” she asked the shape in the shadows beyond.
Celestine
Don’t tell me secrets I can’t keep
[ mare | 17hh | Belgian Draft mutt ]
