Though her own heart fluttered between excitement and dread, the company was a welcome balm. She felt every footfall echo somewhere between her throat and her heart, each one precious. She could remember still the rhythmic, muted sound of hooves rising all around her as she walked with her nomad herd. She remembered the brush of shoulders and barrels, the errant hoof catching her rear pastern. Had she been angry when it happened? She couldn't remember now, but she missed her clumsy mares something awful. In the quiet moments she idly wondered if one would ever find herself wandering into a deep forest, coming upon a magical place called Helovia…

At the response to her forgetfulness, she flicked her ears, the nearest she could ever get to a blush. She wished she could be a bit more aloof sometimes, but she was cursed to her tells at this point in her life. Part of her could appreciate the flaws. No hero without flaws was worth an ounce of salt in her book.

Cool and comfortable. She pondered the answer to her (admittedly vague) question a bit absently, wondered how vast these lands were and how different each herd's geography might be. She hadn’t considered the physical demands of her whim to visit both herds. Her joints weren't those of a filly's, but she'd thought herself young and fit enough to make any journey she must. Now she wondered how mortified she would be if she failed in her mission. Thankfully, she had little time to dwell of her hypothetical failures as Africa had begun so passionately to describe her homeland.

She nodded, trying to wrangle the vast figure of Earth God in her imagination into some actual, tangible form. She hummed at descriptions of the lord and lady of the lands. She smiled, accepting that yes, wounds could be magically healed and, with little surprise, that Africa was possessed of the magic to do so.

For every word, Cheska listened with rapt attention, drinking in each ounce of detail like she was dying of thirst in some descriptionless desert. Somewhere in the back of her mind, a story was weaving itself into a tapestry as every piece of information came together. Gods and kings were built from every scrap she could gather and cobbled together in royal gold and forest green. She pictured the creatures. First there were hundreds in blues and purples, racing like rainbows through the lush forest. Then, she reconsidered a smaller, tightly knit family with foals free to roam. And dragons. So many dragons.

Once the mural was painted, and the words had run dry, she found herself almost aching to see the reality.

The reality, as it were, was a massive waterfall that crashed down and drowned all of her expectations. She'd heard the aural cues, of course, but the physical thing was so much… more. At the moment before Africa's words pierced her consciousness, she'd been left slack-jawed and wide eyed, struck deaf by the rush of water and mute by the sheer might of it. If she'd been led to a dead end waterfall by an ordinary horse weeks ago, she would have thought them absolutely insane and backed away slowly. Now, when everything was alight with magic, the falls were merely another mystery for her to solve. She cocked her head at Africa's words, meeting her gaze with a touch of wild delight. I never would.

She'd been struck by the first question, but the second drew a gentle bark of laughter from her as she stared at her host gleefully. "Neat?" she quoted, her drawl distorting the word a little. "Neat? This is… I mean it's… Well…" Stars burned out and hell froze over as the verbose storyteller was left grasping for description. She couldn't look everywhere fast enough. She'd expected some modest little patch of land and what she found was a paradise. And this was only the first stop.

She was mercifully distracted from her own nuclear meltdown by the appearance of a second mare. She maintained her place just behind her host, watching the greeting warmly. Her tapestry filled in a little more.

Cheska strode forward as she was summoned, head dipped demurely. "Thanks kindly. It's a pleasure, Rasta, Ettore." She tipped an ear toward them in acknowledgement. But when she lifted her head to meet the new gaze, she found a familiar lack of focus. Her favorite warrior mare had been blinded in one eye after a particularly vicious battle, and she knew how it pained the colossus some days. The cloudy lack of recognition was noted and accepted with little fanfare. Though her tact could be lacking, in this she was empathetic. "You have a truly beautiful home."

She'd never been so sincere for so long. Some kind of sarcasm muscle inside of her must be atrophying.

count] 812
tags] @[Africa]
ooc]