As the days passed, Baratheon grew impatient and restless. The dry ground beneath him felt like needles piercing his hooves, the wind relentlessly cut his skin. But the landscape changed as he kept walking, turning the dry ground into grass and he even passed an occasional tree. It encouraged him, and courage was very much needed. The events of the past few months mentally exhausted him. Losing parents is never easy, not for him or any other creature, so why did he feel like he was the only one suffering? Why did it feel like the world kept pushing him down, head first into the ground to never recover again. Baratheon stopped crying during the days. At first he didn't, he cried his heart out. He felt how his heart bled dry, how his body shivered every time he passed a living creature, how he secretly despised every creature who smiled at him. What was there to smile about? What happiness was left in the world? Who needs enemies, when you have friends like he did?

But as the landscape changed, so did he. The dust, the mud, the smell of death, ... He nearly forgot how it felt when he found himself wandering around these woods. Little creeks finally gave him the oppertunity to wash away the dried blood that covered him for far too long. Baratheon felt free for the first time in a very long time, as he didn't only wash away the blood, but his sins as well - For a while. He knew that at night he would wake up shivering and sweating again, crying theres that ran out long ago. But not now. Today was a good day. In this moment, with his four hooves on the ground, he felt awkwardly safe. Baratheon was well aware of this illusion - you are never safe - but he took the time to enjoy it anyway. Such a refreshing feeling.

Other horses crossed him without words and Baratheon let them. There were no words needed right now and there was nothing to say anyway. Instead he crawled into the shadows to let his body rest for the rest of the evening while he enjoyed the pleasure of... Existing.

coward...runner...traitor...weakling...oblivion

The sun was already making his journey through the sky when Baratheon woke up sweaty. His heart raced as if he ran a thousand miles with no intention to stop, ever. But here he was. Lying in the grass like the nothing he was a week ago. "Great..." he muttered as he realised he needed to built himself up again during the day. It was time- and energy consuming, and it was exhausting to the bone. Nobody ever tells you this, but he knew very well that being happy consumes as much energy as being unhappy. It is as frustrating to tell yourself you're happy as it is to tell yourself you're not worth living. So he built himself again that morning. He took every brick he knocked down during the night and started building that wall again.

An hour passed and Baratheon didn't move a hoof. He merely blinked as he wanderd in his own mind, reconnecting the wires of his brain as they should be. "You are brave," he whispered. "Your mistakes do not define you. You are brave. Your mistakes do not define you. You are... HEY YOU, WHO ARE YOU?" he suddenly shouted with his rough voice in the direction of another wanderer. "Tell me?" He asked again. "Where am I? Who are you? What is this place?" All the questions he collected the past day came out like a train bashing everything else aside. Enough of this moping. Enough not-believing-in-yourself. He was ready to discover.