Meadow

a lamb to the slaughter,
He said her name.

The little spotted mare sucks in air between her teeth. Holds the breath in her lungs until it begins to burn一how long had it been since someone had said her name? Not in wrath or war or hatred but in an almost gentle way.

She turns her face to him, looks at his white face. His eyes are old and she knows her own must be, too. Björn tells her how much he does understand her. There is a soft silence between them like snow.

His words echo her own. His voice is like thunder, like trees cracking and breaking down. Like the ice in the first fells of spring. Echidna keeps her focus on him. Her golden shell ears flick their attention to this stallion.

Yes, they were more alike than she could have imagined. “Then you deserve your naps in the quiet wood,” Echidna tells him, the faintest smile on her dark lips. “I know how it feels to want peace.”

Echidna sighs.

“But I can’t seem to ever find it,” her voice is low and soft, “the memories come back to me in the quiet. The screams of war and rage. The scent of blood in my nose. Their faces一”

She cuts herself off, looking away from him into the woods.