As you watched the iridescent face of the turquoise shard topple over ridges of sand just beneath the ocean water, you had yet to notice the young colt approaching from behind. If you had, you would have admired the pale cornflower blue of his eyes or the deep marine dappling scattered about his right flank. You were hardly wreathed in color like the many specimens you’d seen all throughout Helovia, but your mother had called you beautiful nonetheless. It wasn’t until you had tuned to lay pale, nondescript eyes on the piercing cerulean jewels this stranger viewed the world from, that you truly understood what your mother had somehow seen in you. Of course, you also encountered your very first bought of true, unadulterated jealousy.

In your visceral struggle, you endeavored to avoid the mounting envy that curled your lips despite the colt’s good-natured salutation. His approach was inevitable as far as you could discern, so you rotated on your heels to better face him as he finished off his invitation to permit camaraderie between two such wayfarers. You couldn’t recall a time in which you’d met the boyish newcomer, but something about him struck you as familiar even if you weren’t yet convinced enough to put your finger on what that might be. Instead, you smiled, girlish and coy, before nodding loosely toward the underground cavern you’d somehow failed to acknowledge before. “Sure.”

The colt’s speech was still somewhat disconnected by youth and you imagined him a bit younger than you (though only by a short time) judging by his size. It made you wonder what the two of you could possibly have in common or what you might do now that you had taken to following him toward the two bright stones that marked the aforementioned underground depression.

As the two of you passed beneath the cave’s wide mouth, streams of sea water spouted from its lip. You were careful to avoid the runs, but still unable to evade them entirely. In your frustration over the matter, you darted ahead of the colt only to realize what a girl you were when it came to the elements. Sheepishly, you turned to regard the boy with another demure grin, “What’s your name then?” It had been quite some time since you had shared your headspace with anyone else, so perhaps you appeared awkward or strained, but to you it felt natural… even if it wasn’t. “I’m Gyda.”

Gyda