They had been walking all night. Or almost, at least. It felt like all night. There were a couple stops here and there and Sacre had been rather pleasant as a tour guide. Or he would have been if he had a more willing tourist following him. Crake was still waiting for the ritualistic sacrifice to begin so he really didn’t give two shits about the twinkling lights in the sky or that land mark or another.

Most of the trip was spent in a grumpy silence, broken occasionally by passing remarks because despite the fact that he was pretty sure he had been invited home by the weirdest colt ever – at least he was going somewhere. Somewhere that had a lot of others, which was a big plus. Safety in numbers, right?

Unless those numbers were intent upon gorging him with their horns and casting him out so that the wolves could tear him to bits.

Well, fortunately Crake was smart enough to figure out that he had a better chance at avoiding a bloody fate if he was somewhat pleasant.

He kept pace with Sacre easy enough, though this was a lot more activity than he had been used to (like hell he was going to complain though) and perked up at the sight of the lake. Without reservation he almost threw his entire head into it and came back with a shock – COLD! Still, he was too thirsty and drank greedily.

Regretting it, of course, because no sooner had he tried to gulp down the entire lake did a great flash of burning pain attack his brain. Well that was nice. He certainly felt more awake now. And just then, his ruby-accented companion was all charming and happy.

Ruby. That was a better name than ‘Sacre’.

How does that even work? Shaking away the ‘you’re crazy’ look, Crake managed a bit of a smile as he looked around. “Yeah I guess it’s alright.” How enthusiastic was he supposed to get?

Now that they were here, he was probably going to have to come up with something else to say.

“So, Ruby, like… what is this place? You know, what type of herd is it? Is everyone like us?” The two colts weren’t exactly identical in many respects, but they had one feature in common – Crake even flourished his head a little bit to highlight it. That odd little protrusion that they had poking out of their foreheads.

Horn?

Yes! That's it.