stargazer, your head full of sky
you were not ready for goodbye
Was she frightened? Oh yes. Was her flight across the meadow bellowing like a warning siren undignified? Almost certainly. Was it cowardice? Sleia certainly felt a way about the decision to turn tail, but she also understood on a basic level that bravery was but one step shy of foolhardiness and cowardice one step beyond prudence. She knew the dead shadow in that creature's eye only from the old lays sung to her by her elders, and she needed help.
Thus, when her flight brought her nearly into the lap of an unfamiliar stallion and drew a small crowd of equally action-minded individuals, the copper mare found her spirits bolstered anew. She met the eye of each one in turn, borrowing their strength to keep her own heels from tapping.
"Coyote," Sleia said through shallow breaths, "a rabid one." Paranoia set in enough for her to curl one way then the other, craning her neck to make sure she hadn't been nicked and all of the white spots properly belonged to her. Everything appeared in order, but the glassy look in the animal's eyes continued to haunt her.
There are worse things in the world than something large enough to overpower and eat you.
Kolfinna urged the group toward safety; Sleia resisted. She had run this far on the wings of basic instinct: flying far and crying thunder could well have spelled the difference between her life and death when she faced the beast's slavering jaws alone, but the tide was changing. So would she. "There are still others out there. If some of us hunt the coyote together, perhaps it will give you time to lead them to safety. We might even be able to kill it before it has a chance to cause any more harm."
sleia *
hope is a butterfly, no net its captor