Pray it desires not You Posted on October 23, 2023 at 07:41:54 PM by Yael
The stallion who emerges from the fragrant pine trees is sleek and black. He moves with abundant energy, and were it not for the scars on his hide and the considerable muscles beneath the velvet sable fur, Yael might not have been able to take him seriously. As it were, she decides that his strength is obvious — not to mention his victory against her father — so she supposes he’s earned the right to be a little flashy.
He greets them courteously, his tone curling upwards in question as he does so. Her father greets him silently in response with a whicker, and Yael offers a near-silent whuff of breath to the second stallion. The dark bay mare remains quiet, watching the two interact, her amber gaze flicking from one sable male to the other. When Zurok asks if Yael is one of her fathers’, Fell shakes his head. She watches the set of his face; the determination in it as he proceeds to gesture with his muzzle toward Yael and then back to Zurok, the effort it takes him not to become frustrated.
Yael might have let the charades continue, if only to see if Zurok would puzzle it out himself, but she knows that amusement would come at her father’s expense. “Fell is my father,” she states, her voice smooth and to the point, but not unfriendly. “He’s giving me to you. Do you accept?”
Yael doesn’t know the details behind Fell’s decision, but she is aware of the roaned stallion who came twice to the Bay, once before she was born. He had tried to take Maziel, the blind mare Fell cared for, and Fell had fought him off ferociously. Two years later, the same stallion had returned with his own daughter, leaving her in Fell’s care. As far as Yael is aware, this was the first net positive experience Fell had had with another stallion, and she suspects this is his motivation: to replicate what he assumes to be a gesture of friendship and an acknowledgement of strength. Though Yael is no damsel, her father knows that Zurok is a respectable and capable match.
Yael gazes at him now, her gaze growing fiery and ambitious. She closes the distance between herself and Zurok, offering her muzzle in a more familiar greeting, her eyes all the while pressing into his. She is tall, nearly seventeen hands, and is under no impression that Fell will (or even could) force her into a situation she dislikes. She goes willingly, emboldened, hungry for experience and novelty.