Falls

Autumn was upon the Islands fully now, and Emhyr felt more restless than usual because of it. Well, he'd felt more restless than usual for other reasons lately, but the season certainly did not help. Never would he dream of touching one of his father's mares, but the cloying perfume the Bay women wore made it difficult to keep himself around without becoming twitchy. So he excused himself from the herd and slipped into the sea, heading south towards the Falls and the solitude it might offer.

The sun hung high behind a thin veil of gauzy clouds, warming Emhyr's back as he pulled himself ashore near the vulcan peak, his mane clinging in a shadowy spiderweb to the arch of his neck. The Bay stallion followed the coastline south until he reached the border, then veered inland towards the Falls, its distant rumble his ever-present guide. The gentle death rattle of desiccated leaves and the steady reverberating thump of his own hooves were his only company as he made his way through the sun-speckled forest. The air, more humid than he was accustomed to on Tinuvel, pressed against him on all sides like a blanket. By the time he reached the Falls his inky coat shone with a thin sheen of sweat.

A sparing glance revealed no one else in the vicinity, so Emhyr indulged in the pleasure of immersing himself into the pond at the Falls' base, its jade waters cool against his heated skin. He stopped as the water began to lap at his belly and dropped his head to take a long, slow drink.

It made for a pretty picture - the great black stallion standing idly in the clear waters, the mist from the falls glowing where it caught stray tendrils of sunlight from the canopy above. Despite the tranquility that surrounded him, Emhyr still felt ill at ease. More and more frequently he had felt out of place no matter where he went, like an unbound buoy floating among the waves with no discernible direction. The Falls and the Meadow, once places of peace for him, no longer offered the same sense of serenity.

Emhyr did not want to chalk it up to the sudden and unexpected return of his mother, but it was difficult not to notice how his souring mood coincided with her homecoming. He should be happy to have her back and their family whole, but in truth all he felt was gnawing resentment, biting deep into him like the rending fangs of a wolf. It was a feeling he did not know how to get away from. The small tickling thought at the back of his mind, the one that told him the Bay might no longer be the place for him, grew louder and more insistent with each passing day. Perhaps it was truly time to consider untethering himself from his birth home and finding somewhere to call his own.

The stomping of hooves and the brittle snapping of twigs from nearby pulled Emhyr from his thoughts. One dark ear flicked towards the source, hoping whoever it may be would see him and steer clear. But their approach did not cease, and eventually the black stallion was forced to swivel his head in their direction and snap out a terse, "Go away."