Common

Of all the places Edith expected a voice to come from in the Commons, behind her had not been one of them, and she startled violently as the freckled bay stallion emerged. She swung to face him, her pretty face high and her sclera wide and visible as she blew out a startled breath. He was not particularly familiar to her, although she had seen him before. He existed with the rest of the herd in the Thicket, though never close enough in Ettie and Edith's close-knit bubble to have actually shared words.

The recognition helps, some, and the high, tense set of her shoulders relaxes as she chuckles softly to dispel more of her nerves. Her ears flick forward and then back, and she tries to hide the soft shape of her frown. "I didn't know you were coming with," she murmurs, almost an apology. His presence here left her confused, but she had decided to just accept it and get to know him in the meantime, when the arrival of another stallion derails her thoughts.

The brute is massive in a way that defies both logic and physics. He is as tall as her father was, but somehow twice as wide. Edith found herself shrinking back a step toward the ocean in fear. Perhaps if he had come with a smile or with any attempt at decency, she would have held her own, but he did not. He came in like a predator, and she reacted accordingly.

Her ears tipped back, and she put another few steps of distance between their bodies, though her gaze swung to the other Thicket resident in question. She had neither the strength or experience to fight off a creature like this, which left her only one option: to run. But to run without - she struggled for a moment for what to call the man who was neither friend nor family but still linked to her, somehow - him felt like cowardice.

"Let's go," she hissed under her breath, praying that their more slender builds would afford them the chance to run from the uncouth terror that had suddenly ruined her lovely chance to find a new home for herself. This wasn't at all how she had imagined her day going.