Meadow

For the first time in her life, she belonged to no one.

The thought was not a constant companion throughout the spotted mare's crossing. Often it slipped beneath the surface of her mind, drowned out by the practical demands of survival. Hunger. Fatigue. The sea itself. Darkling struggled particularly with the latter. Unseen currents fought her newly-won freedom of choice, and waves that had appeared small from the shore were tall enough to bury her. But there were times when the truth emerged beside her, brushing up against the bruise of her uncertainty.

Nobody was telling her where to go or what to do - and that left doubt to air its opinion of her every choice.

Of course, Darkling was no stranger to doubt. She was only a stranger to her own.

Fortunately, this niggling voice was silenced by the sight of a distant island. Darkling kept her eyes on it and swam. For the remainder of her crossing, she was spared her uncertainty in favor of a simpler challenge: reaching the shore before exhaustion claimed her.

And then she was there. Washing ashore beside the other refuse - bits of wood worn bone-smooth by waves, sea creatures in various states of decay, and tangles of seaweed that might be better-groomed than she. It was hardly the glorious sort of arrival anyone might hope for, but Darkling still counted it a victory. Only one among the many to come.

That said, she counted it from her bed of seaweed as the strength slowly returned to her legs.

When she felt able, the Knabstrupper mare pushed herself back upright. The sea continued to froth and hiss behind her as she took her first steps, but it was the earth that commanded her attention. A faintly-worn trail wove from the water’s edge into the forest, a sign that she was not the first creature to find this shore. Some of the tracks even looked like they might be from her own kind - though sand was hardly the most reliable of mediums.

Still, creatures were made predictable by their needs. The trail would likely lead Darkling to water. And wherever there was water, life was not far. So she followed the tracks inland, her dark ears twitching at every sound. For a while, she even expected her black-coated chaperone to emerge from the shadows and put an end to her wanderings. Then she remembered her freedom, and something unfamiliar stirred in her belly.

It was distracting enough that she almost didn’t notice that the trees had thinned, or the stream that murmured temptingly ahead.