The air smelled different here. Not heavy with salt and blood, it was like breathing in the purest crystal waters deep in the heart of an oasis.
He did not miss the place he came from. It was scarred with torments and secrets he would not hiss out with his forked tongue一thought he carries each moment with him in scars running like lightning across his flesh. In the cloudy moonstone of his left eye, which was reduced to seeing no more than shadow. Eşref had been born miserable.
Stuck inside his dam, his hip wedged against hers. When he came out into the world, it was wrong. He would have a limp in his hind right leg for the rest of his days and because of his misfortunes Eşref suffered. It was custom, after all, for the weakest to be swallowed up. His siblings one by one chastised his existence until the spotted stallion no longer wished to walk the humid dunes of his homeland. But now he was here, wherever he was.
Eşref had no solid idea of his location. No reason to have washed up on these shores. He was a parasite and a refugee seeking asylum from the pale world he was born into. He knew death followed him. Each step he took it bit his heels, spurred him onward一
The meadow is wide and airy and full of sunlight. Other horses mill about the edges. He can hear laughter and conversation. He can smell them. They are too fresh, too alive. Eşref withers from the idea of them, tucking himself under the thick canopy of conifers. Here he could watch them from the shadows. He could hide his own face, albeit poorly, but enough for now. Enough for the vulture to decide what his next move might be and where his dark wings might take him.
He lifts his head only slightly, nostrils round and accepting. “Solucanlar gözlerini yesin,” he spits on the rough dirt beneath his hooves.