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She thought of nothing but the rake of cold air through her lungs, the stab of silver knives and the thrust of silver plumes from her nose. Long sheets of hair coiled and knotted behind her, dancing like Medusa’s snakes in ecstasy at the thrill of motion. Perhaps trees offered the comfort of shade, but this plain of ice bred laughter in the dark mare. It surged into her heart, a part of her like the dusting of snow white across her belly.
So Valka ran, and for a while she thought nothing of the dark shape now erupting from the pallid earth ahead of her. She angled toward it anyway, led by a sort of backward curiosity, and in some part she thought of running straight into it – driving the shape beneath her hooves and crumbling its mighty blackness.
Then the shape resolved into a horse.
No – not a horse.
Oh, there was something wrong with it! Some dragging growth hung low from either shoulder. The long tilt of Valka’s stride drew short. Her tail plumed high above her back, spilling dark and pale hair over coiled haunches. “Hang on!” it called her, voice like a leash choking her back – as if she didn’t mean to stop already, and simply thrummed around it lively with energy. The athletic spin of her delicate legs danced around the creature in quick order, and in silence she regarded him with the pale tilt of the grey eye, the wild eye, head lifted so the jagged spike of her horn arced like a crown above the eye. “What are you doing?” the creature asked, and at last Valka stood and puffed the heat of exertion from her lungs. Sweat steamed on the mare’s flanks – almost as if she burned inside.
”I was running,” she said, and her voice cracked dry with poorly concealed amusement. Are you a stupid thing? she wanted to ask, and eyed the clusters of feathers pinned to his sides. ”What are you doing?” Valka tilted her head. Her own ears flickered back and forth; the weight of her mismatched eyes was quick, fleeting. She devoured him with her gaze, hummingbird-swift, and displayed none of the foul temper he spoke with. No – it was more like curiosity inside her, even if he did kill her exuberance. ”This is not a place for one like you,” observed Valka quietly, and her eyes glinted with mirth.
So Valka ran, and for a while she thought nothing of the dark shape now erupting from the pallid earth ahead of her. She angled toward it anyway, led by a sort of backward curiosity, and in some part she thought of running straight into it – driving the shape beneath her hooves and crumbling its mighty blackness.
Then the shape resolved into a horse.
No – not a horse.
Oh, there was something wrong with it! Some dragging growth hung low from either shoulder. The long tilt of Valka’s stride drew short. Her tail plumed high above her back, spilling dark and pale hair over coiled haunches. “Hang on!” it called her, voice like a leash choking her back – as if she didn’t mean to stop already, and simply thrummed around it lively with energy. The athletic spin of her delicate legs danced around the creature in quick order, and in silence she regarded him with the pale tilt of the grey eye, the wild eye, head lifted so the jagged spike of her horn arced like a crown above the eye. “What are you doing?” the creature asked, and at last Valka stood and puffed the heat of exertion from her lungs. Sweat steamed on the mare’s flanks – almost as if she burned inside.
”I was running,” she said, and her voice cracked dry with poorly concealed amusement. Are you a stupid thing? she wanted to ask, and eyed the clusters of feathers pinned to his sides. ”What are you doing?” Valka tilted her head. Her own ears flickered back and forth; the weight of her mismatched eyes was quick, fleeting. She devoured him with her gaze, hummingbird-swift, and displayed none of the foul temper he spoke with. No – it was more like curiosity inside her, even if he did kill her exuberance. ”This is not a place for one like you,” observed Valka quietly, and her eyes glinted with mirth.
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