Meadow

Her name.

At first it is just a sound without meaning: soft and muffled, buffeting gently against the cotton wool of her despair, drowned out by her ragged sobs. Then, her breath hitches in her throat and her heart somersaults..

That voice.

So many have spoken her name in her lifetime—be it in rage or fear or love—but only a few individuals have been able to evoke such a deep, visceral reaction within her by speaking it. It has been many years since she last heard that voice, and the proud queen who had once received it is long gone, replaced by a shrunken, thin little thing with an expression of naked fear and desperation. This thing that was once Ylva cannot place the voice that reverberates within her like a promise: she only knows its significance.

She turns toward him, trembling, dark eyes glazed and shining with confusion—

—and one hind hoof strikes the edge of the cliff, sending a clod of earth crumbling into the sea. Ylva is gripped with the terrible split-second sensation of falling as her hooves scramble for purchase, and with a desperate cry she surges forward, directly into the stallion. She presses herself against him, shivering like a baby bird, the contours of her tear-soaked face pressed into the warmth of his scarred neck.

Far below, the sea rages even harder, the points of its gold-tipped waves winking like cut glass in firelight.

"Please— please, help me," Ylva wails, heaving and shuddering as the sea winds buffet them both, "Take me away from this place… Please… Anywhere…"