This seemed to be a pattern for N.asa at this point. Having one-nighters with mysterious stallions during season and conceiving babies for them. Rougaru had been the first. Kaari had favored her mother's appearances, more Arabian than whatever Roug was. She'd left the bay filly in Paradise with her father while she stole away for a few precious moments of silence in the Falls. She didn't know if she'd ever see Bjorn again. For awhile he was gone from the Islands. He'd explained to her that'd he'd gone north, to home. N.asa knew what home felt like. It wasn't cold like the Inlet. Home was the deserts long from the Islands. But that was no longer home she supposed. She knew today was the day. The contractions she'd felt had been going on for some time and before they'd gotten worse, she'd fled the mainland of the Islands to where she presumed she'd find him. He'd left her again. Not long after their coupling, but this time it was different for N.asa. This time, it bothered her.
The dark ebony mare barely pulls herself from the ocean waters, her body steaming from the heat of her skin against the frigid sea. Though it was spring, the Inlet was much further north and was overtaken with the cooler temperatures she wasn't used to. Her emerald eyes sweep the landscape of the cobble beach as she heaves her heavy body onto the shore. She'd barely managed to pull herself free from the sinking sand as the tide receded. She was exhausted. However exhausted she was, motherly instinct pushed her to move further off the beaches of the Inlet to ensure her babe wouldn't be born into the chilled ocean. She didn't make it as far as she'd hoped before the constriction in her barrel proved more adverse than she anticipated. With a groan, she gives into the pain, lowering her oversized barrel into the earth. The pace of the contractions were erratic and hard to track and the pain made her wonder why she had decided to do this again. Now slick with sweat, she lays her dished face onto the earth, hoping some form of reprieve finds her. But it doesn't. Instead the contractions grow deeper and more prolonged. With eyes screwed shut, she feels the pressure that reminds her it's time to push.
N.asa is unaware of how much time has passed, too enveloped in her birthing process that she doesn't notice that she's being watched from a distance. In a last exerting effort, she feels sweet release as the foal finally slides free of her body. Aching with exhaustion she briefly races her head to see the dark squirming form of what she and Bjorn created, splayed onto the earth, but thankfully alive. A gentle nicker escapes her, answered by a squeal from the wet bundle on the ground. "Hello Diana." She says gently. She nibbles gently at the filly's cheek, blowing her scent gently so Diana familiarizes herself with her. A twig snaps and the dark mare guards defensively over the filly, ears flattening into the confines of her tangled mane. "Who is there?" She asks boldly. |