He came from the northern islands and swam the icy inlets. It was spring thaw now and the world was changing softly. Flowers were in bloom, the trees heavy with greenery一
The young stallion had been wandering the islands for a while now. He had been back and forth between the outer reaches. His spirit restless and contemplative. Çevik was his father’s son. The rumors of Fell were all he had. Fell was a mystery to him, a shadow passing in the night so quick and seamless he went without notice. Çevik wanted to know the stallion, regardless. He wanted to look Fell in the eyes (those of a beast, he had been told) and ask why一
And yet,
He didn’t want that at all. He liked being unknown to Fell.
To be his own sort of shadow.
Carefully he walks along the edge of the meadow. The grass tickles at his sides, beneath his belly. He is gaunt and lanky. His body is streaked with mud. His mane has grown unruly and wild in the last of the winter months and tangles about him in knotted bundles. What would his mother think of him now? Her darling all tattered?
Çevik stops in his tracks, lifts his head. Delicate ears swivel, one behind and one to the front, listening to murmur of birds. Of low voices from other horses. His nostrils breathe in the different scents, trying to unravel one from the other.