Syrena

let the water take me

The mare that comes next actually asks the balls of light what they are doing. This thought never crossed Syrena’s mind, but then again, talking to anyone unless she had to never crossed her mind. So the balls of light shouldn’t take it personally. Syrena just didn’t socialize. Okay fine, she did now, but only because she had to. It’s how normal horses function in society, and she was now a normal horse stuck in society, even if she didn’t want to be.

Still, she was pretty much terrible at it. Unlike, it seems, the pretty black and white pegasus who just looks too damn kind. She might almost prefer the candy stallion. Almost.

More come, as they always do. Some with comments on their lips, some with looks in their eyes. Syrena watches them somewhat impassively, not really caring, but growing tired of the happy little balls of light. Still, she waits for whatever is to come. For whatever hideous thing rises out of the ground or fanged beast that comes to chase them. It seems so unlikely that they will only be greeted with cute little balls of light (though she doesn’t assume they aren’t deadly in their own right).

But deadly or not, they just keep playing, flitting around the black and white pegasus and chattering back to her. They seem pleased that she’s paid attention to them. And it’s only after they flit about the pegasus, covering her in glitter, that they notice the rest of the equines gathered. And then they start flitting around here and there, leaving trails of glitter. Syrena resists the urge to step away when one comes her way. She does not want glitter on her, but they might find that offensive. And she doesn’t need to offend the buggers.

Besides, they are now encouraging them all forward (oh, what a cluster that’s going to be), asking them what pictures they see in the water and the glitter. She bites her tongue, resisting the urge to tell them she sees water pollution. Just because she finds that little joke funny doesn’t mean they will. Instead, she makes her way toward the river, trying to avoid the others as best she can, and stares down at the glitter as it floats on what little water remains in the river.

It takes a while before anything emerges, but when it does, the image she finds is no surprise. Even here, even so far from the sea, the memories haunt her. But they are beautiful memories. “Sirens,” she says, her voice quiet, and though there’s little emotion to it, there’s something vaguely like reverence in that tone. Reverence mixed with just a hint of sorrow. My sisters, she thinks, though does not say it. “It’s the sea. Do you see how the water pulls away, how the horses form out of the seafoam on the crest of the wave? There,” she points with her nose, “She’s halfway formed, head and torso and front legs, the rest still a wave. And there,” she points again, a little farther left. “Another, but she’s fully formed. All of them made of seafoam and water.”

Oh, how she misses them. Oh, how she wishes they were not just imaginary things made of memories and glitter.

"words"