He came from the south, muscles warm beneath the wooliness of his rapidly growing winter coat, breath steaming in the air. The paths of the Threshold had become more familiar to him in this last season than ever before, and he moved along the well-worn, meandering trails with ease, but never failing to remain cautious. Not only did the weary-footed traveler wander here, but the vagabonds and outcasts, wickeder beings ousted from their former herds. Ricochet was confident in his ability to fight off any ragged villains who might crawl in like vermin, but there was no point in being downright reckless.

The daylight was weak and cold, filtering in through the russet and gold leaves of birch and aspen and poplar. Ricochet did not mind the chill; autumn was a good season. The days were going shorter, yes, and the grass tasted bitter as the dying. On the other hoof, the twittering birds flocked away, the stallions were less likely to pick fights, and those entering the Threshold were more desperate for the safety of a family, knowing that winter was scarcely more than a few months’ away, and always creeping closer.

Guns led the way.
Ricochet followed.

It soon became clear whoever they were following had little interest in covering her- or his- trail. Twigs shattered, branches snapped off trees, leaves crunched and crackled. A set of hoofprints was left in drying mud- massive feet, this horse had, pressed deep into the soaked black soil. Not cleft either. Still, he didn’t dare get his hopes up. Pegasi could have solid hooves, or even unicorns. It wasn’t particularly rare.

The collie was silent as a mouse, drawing one paw after another carefully, brown eyes focused on something up ahead. With a twinge of apprehension, the Incendiary lengthened his step, teal eyes narrowing. There! Swinging black hindquarters, wide ebon hips that were feminine despite the bulk. Feathers, clotted with dust and dirt, swung about flowing fetlocks. She- for those voluptuous curves screamed she- was at least three hands taller than Ricochet. And her color… black on black on black. Thick black mane. Lush black tail. Gleaming black coat.

By now, she must’ve heard him, noticed him. The buttermilk boy halts, scuffing up dust with his forehooves, audits flicking forward curiously. It wasn’t every day he met a giant giantess. There was Archibald, the great fat lump, or the dragon-horse he had seen long ago when he invaded the Edge, full of rage and passion that he had expended on a cause he didn’t care for.

“Mare,” he rumbles, his voice a gritty growl not unlike his dog. “I am Ricochet the Incendiary. This is my dog, Guns. Who are you?”

R I C O C H E T - -
blam, you're dead

The sleek ebon mare drifts to a halt, the arc of her neck sharp and dark against the cracked bark of the trees, legs turning over one another as she rolls on her haunches to face them. Ricochet sees her eyes, dark and bold, lush lashes sweeping over shadowy depths; the dust coating chipped hooves, the glisten of the sunlight on her travel-worn coat. There is silence between them as she wanders deliberately toward him, striding lazily closer, and he lets it sit, heavy and grim in the air.

The black mare’s eyes remind the Incendiary of raven eyes, clever and sharp and missing nothing, studying him with a single-minded intensity that has him stiffen, turning soft contours into taut lines. In their quiet, he returns her gaze, with wolf eyes, all teal hardness, a smile carving wrinkles on his muzzle.

Guns drifts from Ricochet’s feet, lying at the gnarled roots of a gnarled tree, watching them with his bright eyes. From his outsider’s view, he studies them with a wordless intensity. The buttermilk boy leans forward ever so slightly, a subtle attempt of authority, though he never moves. He’s a commanding presence, all rippling muscle beneath his silken coat, and the border collie remembers the child he once was. There is not so much of that volatile colt anymore. A new side of Ricochet sparkles in the right light.
Guns wasn’t sure if this side was a good one.

Their face-off is interrupted by her languid voice, turning each word into an individual saying. Her voice is deep and rich and heavy; he has heard stallions with higher-pitched voices than hers. For a moment the dunskin considers her weighty words, spoken as if each has a higher meaning. Is she teasing him? At least she does not mock him with his scars and burns. He had always considered them a mark of his warrior status, a memento of his victories and defeats, the lessons he had learned with gore dripping from his wounds and blood sizzling in his blisters- since he had begun his forays in the Threshold, he had been met by plenty of mares who wrinkled their brow and scorned his greetings.

“Might be that he’s little, but that doesn’t mean he’s useless,” Ricochet answers with a grin, an unpracticed sort of smile but a nice enough one nonetheless; perfect for lightening the grim mood, like a sun coming out from behind bruised gray clouds. Over the seasons, he had tried several different approaches to greeting travelers: seductive, gruff, outgoing, helpful. It was best to try and be natural, he had found, treating them as potential friend rather than future enemy. Eventually, the shadows showed through the paint he had over their eyes, but he never let his temper get better of him the way it once had.

A laugh tears free from his chest like a bird fluttering from its cage, carrying freedom on it at Rhanna’s teasing. It’s good to let it fly. Too often his lungs press against his ribcage and his heart is heavy and his stomach is sunk.

“I wasn’t sneaking up on you- didn’t you notice me long ago?” The Incendiary says lightly, ears flicked forward attentively. The hardness in his teal eyes have melted away, replaced by a good-natured gleam, though Evangeline flashes across his mind. It was strange… since he had had his fucking with Colt’s mother, he had, for most part, put the chestnut out of his head, but occasionally something came up that just rang with the memories of her.

“I’m afraid I don’t have too much luck with the girls,” Ricochet snorts, “I like to set other things on fire. Unfortunately, I don’t offer that information up for free.” He offers her a smile to take the elitist sting out of his words.

“What I can tell you is that you’re in Helovia. There are a few herds I could take you to, if you plan on staying. The herds, for most part, believe that all species are equal. However, if you don’t wish to join a place like that, I lead an outcast band myself. Only those of the equine race may belong with us.”

R I C O C H E T - -
blam, you're dead

Guns’ nostrils twitch, snuffling the dirt caught between his worn black nails, wincing. Blood beads on his front right paw, and he rasps his long pink tongue over the cracked gray pad, the salty tang of the crimson burning in his mouth. There is a whimper caught in his teeth, but he doesn’t let it free. The Incendiary had driven them both hard to the Threshold, momentary respite from the outside world where unicorns and pegasi reigned freely.

Her eyes flick to him momentarily, and the collie’s white ruff comes up, hairs erect, before she returns to her playful banter. With his inquisitive eyes, Guns keeps watching, wary of this enormous black mare.

Rhanna drawls on, sarcasm embedded heavy in her deep voice, weighing down each word. The dunskin’s ears swivel away from her, cautious. No matter how empty the forest seemed, the trees listened, their leaves whispering, the cracked bark of their trunks groaning, moaning stories of old, stories that took hundreds of years to recount. Maybe the glimpse of a shadow there was cast by a pegasus who listened soundlessly, cloaked from their eyes in wicked magics.
No, the mare was most likely dead by now, throttled by pain and devoured by infection.

The buttermilk boy’s attention returns to the giantess, and his teal eyes narrow as he studies her face closely, looking for ambition or traitorous intents, but nothing can he find in these soulless black eyes. What she said set did not settle him. What did she mean by sticky? With any luck, she means simply that life in a herd can be dull; he does not like to imagine the giantess going on rampage. It would be a bitter fight, to force her onto her knees and bring her to bow her head to him, watch her swallow the phlegm in her throat and hear the hoarse rasping of her exhausted lungs. And then her punishment. There was no exile for traitors- there was only death.

He twitches his ears dismissively, though he would not deny his blood was roused at the thought of such a bloody fight. It would need to be determined if she actually cared for the Norm before he would invite her there.
And anyways, his three or four companions did not qualify as a herd persay, for more reasons than one.

“We do not yet hold sway over a herdland.” Ricochet answers with distaste, a faintly beleaguered expression coming over his scarred face. “And I do not imagine you will find herdlife- what is it you said, sticky?- with me or my companions. We are fighters, not silver-tongued diplomats. I do not lead weaklings, unless they show the potential and capacity to better themselves.” Well, that was not wholly true. He would lead the old and the young as necessary, and he recruited all and any; but he did lead warriors, at least for now, executioners and crafters, and not much in between.

From the shade of his tree, Guns peers up at them, pausing from the vigorous licking of his pawpad, ears perking forward, head cocking in mild curiosity. His tail wags, slowly and softly, over the dry soil, stirring up dust from the top layers.

Eyes widen in surprise as the mare declares her distaste for the unnatural, and for a moment Ricochet’s breath catches in his throat, choking him there. Here in the mottled shadows of the Threshold, he has found a mare with the right ideas. Excitement overrides his senses; his hindquarters flex and he arches his neck, blowing out softly through his nostrils. He reminds himself that she is an arrogant sort of girl for admitting it in the open, that harm will come of revealing themselves too early, but it is difficult, so difficult, to ignore the heart-lashing elation that rises in him.

“It is good to at long last meet someone who understands,” he laughs, full of optimism. “Rhanna, come and join us. It is our eventual goal to eradicate the world of such abnormalities… but I’m getting ahead of myself. The first step is to add to our numbers. We are much too few to even conquer a herdland at this point in time.” Ricochet grins toothily at her. “Help me change that, and then the world.”

But he pauses, because he can’t lie to her, even if he doesn’t really like her all that much. It would jeopardize all the work he had done if she nattered to every stranger about her racism. “If you take up arms with us, you’ll have to drop such honesty. Helovia is not yet ready to learn about the Empire, our forces are not large enough to face the hundreds. I would ask that you hide your true feelings about skyrats and hornheads. Even some of my outcast band think we are only a group devoted to the welfare of equines.”

R I C O C H E T - -
blam, you're dead