Desert

If someone would have told him that his sire would come washing up on his shores one day, Rougaru would have beat them within an inch of their life. It has been so long now since last he saw his father on the Shores of Ora and even then he had begun to show signs of age. The chocolate stallion had long given up the idea of ever seeing the grizzled old dog again. In fact, he firmly believed that somewhere out there, the beast’s bones had long since returned to the earth. As fierce as he had been, not even Hound could outrun the sands of time.

And yet as he surged fiercely towards the shores to chase off the stallion that dozed comfortably in the bright sunshine, Rougaru is in for a rude surprise. Despite the years that have separated them, the scent of the old stallion is still as fresh in his memory as if it had only been yesterday that Ora fell away into the sea.

Hound.

Like a dunk in the cold ocean that surrounded Tinuvel, the muscular stallion comes to a screeching halt that would have made even the best reining horse proud. Here he was thinking he had left all his ghosts behind in Atlantis. ”Not possible.” he murmurs to himself as he approaches the sleeping roan with a bit more caution. Hound was gone just like mother and Ora and Zjeena and Monster. This was just his mind playing tricks on him. It had to be. At least that is what he continues to tell himself as he gazes down at the stallion. He prods the sleeping form with a hoof, as if to confirm his suspicions. However the figure does not dissolve into a pile of disturbed sand or evaporate into nothing more than a wisp of mist still clinging to the early morning dawn.

”What is this?” he asks, more to himself than to the muscular stallion at his feet. ”Da? Are you… really here?” he asks, tilting his head once more towards the stallion in disbelief.