Zahra, Ilham, and Hanna

It was pride that turned angels into devils

The reprieve in weather – within which Zero was discovered, and the crow-mare – barely lasted the length of a single day. It was certainly not enough to thaw the frigidness from the hibernating world. It had only worsened through the hours that followed, days, perhaps weeks (she soon lost track). Daylight was weak beneath a heavy grey blanket across heaven’s doorstep and the sun seldom sank through the canopy to touch the hidden land below with its warming glory. It felt like the northern snow she had once traipsed amid was spreading, like a puddle’s girth into which rain constantly fell. Seeping slowly to drown anything not already prepared – well accustomed to the wrath of the icy season. The orphan foal huddled in grim shadow beneath the groaning forest roof, was hardly expecting this, her first Frostfall, to be quite so brutal.

A magnificent web that easily rivalled the span of surrounding boughs had been strung about the makeshift shelter discovered many days ago – a glistening signal upon which gathered frost-crystals, a beacon of life and beauty, when the weight of winter disheartened young hearts it beckoned chattering smiles across thin inky lips.

Zahra was cold, bitterly so, and her bony, fleshless body shook violently where it curled in a tight ball upon the furrow-nest their brother had helped dig. Camon had left early in the morning – the trips he was making seemed to grow in length all the time – and she was missing both his company and warmth terribly (even if he did not always reciprocate with the same level of childish affection). The physical battle to stay alive, she fought both bravely and ferociously, fuelled by each morsel the stallion returned with. Though she looked ever tattier by the day and her strength wavered precariously as the cruel fingers of hypothermia caressed her prickled, shivering skin, she rose to nuzzle Camon and dress him comprehensively in gratitude whenever he came back.

One morning amid a string of many the same, Zarha woke to the gentle nudging of her brother – a request for attention, and she was immediately surprised to find he had not yet left to forage. She turned her black nose towards him slowly; the bag she had given him (that which had been one her mother’s most valued possessions), was slumped beside her – a puny, pitiful defence that offered a small sliver of body reprieve from the breeze. The little filly smiled for him, brightly, and her movement spurred the cosy-warm kitsune cradled across her legs, also to lift her face. He spared no time for tender greeting (the sort which once she had shared on any and every occasion with doting parents), he rarely did, and summoned her from bed to find another.

“Alright,” she answered softly, though she knew in truth it was a matter of follow or freeze – Camon strained a smile and turned then to leave.

Stiffly and across uncooperative legs she rose beneath the heavy collar (she refused to remove it), trailing slowly at first, but eventually finding movement more freely. Not long after, the poorly clothed child was cantering gently by his hip, a clumsy, jolting speed that switched often between the rambling gait of his father’s lineage and that loping, long gracefulness of her mother. Perhaps eventually one would become more comfortable than the other. Ilham had retreated promptly into the toasty burrow crafted with web to the centre of her sister’s stunted mane, and Bird shadowed her older sister’s path from a distance, keeping hungry eyes peeled for the slightest flicker to suggest that breakfast lurked nearby. For the moment however, her stark white incisors held firmly the old leather satchel in their gasp.

The sweet tinkle of moving water drew Zahra’s interest almost as easily as it did the stallion she flanked. It was easily the most exciting feature of this endless forest that they had come across in days, and her nostrils purged breath after sharp breath as she searched ahead for the glint that might reveal its location. “Zis our new place?” she waffled eagerly, aiming an uninvited nuzzle beneath the long feathers of his wing. “Coz… I really like water…” she lied quietly through gritted teeth. It was a fear learned when she had slipped during a waterfall adventure when she had been even younger still (a memory blurred by magic, but rooted still deeper then such power could touch).

Not nearly as shy as she had been around the stallion (he had offered her vegetables now on many an occasion) and driven by overbearing thirst, Bird swept by her dithering sister. The bag fell with a muffled thump as she went and as the icy shell shattered well beyond the battering the puppy’s tongue discovered water colder than ever it had tasted before.