"But the dream, the echo, slips from him as quickly as he had found it and as consciousness comes to him (a slap and not the gentle waves of oceanic tides), it dissolves entirely. His muscles relax as the cold claims him again, as the numbness sets in, and when his grey eyes open, there’s nothing but the faint after burn of a dream often trod and never remembered." --Brigade, written by Laura
Krigare was not one for children, and as the foals stood in front of him begging to race, he found himself rather annoyed. The colts were eager to romp around with the stallion, he could tell. The way they fidgeted in place , tails switching excitedly was a dead give away.
With a chuckle the large stallion dropped his head to their level. The colts awaited his answer quietly.
"No."
His tone was firm, the joking smile that tugged at his lips settling into a straight line. The children's faces fell, as well as their movement. One began to beg, but noting Krigare's stone expression he led his friends off. Finally giving the stallion some peace and quiet.
Deep down Krigare was impressed that they even asked, for he wasnt very inviting.
He stood at a good 17 hands (tall for his breed), his pelt all dark browns and blacks, his long mane entagled with leaves and thorns from his previous forest abode. The only warm thing about Krigare was his eyes. The deep green mirroring the summer grass he stood upon now.
While Krigare did not quite know why he had come to the meadow , he was here. He stood quietly upon a hill, where he could watch others and not be bothered by anyone (well that was the plan at first).
Now that the foals had come and gone, he found himself itching to talk to someone for once. He scanned the meadows, trying to find someone he wished to talk to. Finding no one he simply sighed, maybe someone would come to him.
He set off, his long strides somehow graceful despite his size. His dark tail curled around his leg, the grass clinging to it eagerly, he muttered something of annoyance as it caught easily on bushes. (what a sight) His ears flicked from side to side as others called, chatting about themselves. He too wished to conversate with someone!
Spark is restless. She hasn’t been this way since before the Reckoning, or was it after? Time has become static for her, humdrum even besides the few momentous occasions that punctuate it. Like when did she become this morose? Peculiar, she thinks, but it came after learning that Giver had mistaken his sister for her and got fat and happy with twins. Could she blame him? He was beguiled through vile means, that much is true but deep down, Spark still harbors a small fire of anger that she stokes continuously so that the coals smoulder and smoulder - he should have known!
She gives a little shake of her head to dispel the thoughts that begin to trouble her. It does little to no good to start thinking of him now, he seems far more absent than usual - his smell faint upon the sulphuric winds of Tephra, almost like he’s more ghost than stallion. Spark supposes that it is because he is a father now, busy with his son’s upbringing and thoughts of the daughter drag-drowned into the sea by her hag of a mother. She feels sorry for the twins, unable to conceive of the pain of being sundered from your other half by someone so callous and cruel as your own mother. Her own twin was never far despite the few times they had gone apart but the decision had always been mutual rather than forced.
Spark just barely stifles a sigh - those thoughts again! Him, the foals, and their future that seems as barren as the black slopes of the volcano that her mismatched eyes look upon. She decides then to venture out from Tephra before she feels the urge to reclaim her other self - a new self that was only just discovered and the medicine hat mare still has no idea how she came to be able to mimic fire but she could. Just the thought of it made it surge to the forefront of her being, her heart constricted and her blood began to boil and she had to suck in breath after deep breath to calm herself down. It came more readily when she seemed to think of it or was angered…
Finally, she was a little calmer given that her twin was nowhere near her at that moment. He was her rock and steadied both her pulse and her breath when she could not, but she found that she didn’t really need him that moment… and sometimes, not at all now that she had the fire in her. It made her more independent and as such, she decided to follow through on that decision to leave the humid climate of Tephra behind for a little bit. Not that she had much of a plan as she stalked forth at a smart pace, but sometimes a plan was not necessary and she’d just see where the wind would blow her. Turns out, that was the Field.
To be honest, there is not much to look at.
She’s never come here, to find a home or help others do just that. It has been a place of overheard conversation but never enough to intrigue her. So why now? Because she is emboldened by the fire inside her, just enough to slip Spear’s careful watch and go beyond the volcano’s foreboding shadow to this - chewed on grass, through hunger and boredom both, she supposes, and clusters of horses to those that stand so painfully and obviously alone.
She can feel the sun on the black bonneted skin atop her head, black ears flicking to and fro as she listens to the sounds all around her. It seemed louder here than what she is used to. The rest of her is pale, besides the black shielded skin on her breast - a true medicine hat, just like her mother, once valued by the people on the plains or so her mother told her because of her unique coloration.
Spark no more thought of herself unique than she did any of the stars in the sky because there were so many, just as there must be other medicine hat paints out there, and other mares small and entirely as wild looking as she is. Her fur is a bit rough and woolly, she lacks the sleekness that all the others seem to possess and her muzzle while slim is whiskered. To an extent, she could be considered pretty but things like that just never crossed her mind. What did cross her mind was the dark bay stallion that came striding off a hill, his walk long-legged and certain as if purpose drove him despite the inapproachable look on his face. His eyes betrayed him though, green and inviting.
Her face wore a frown of puzzlement; why look hostile but desire company?
Still, her own mismatched eyes (one black and the right is red, a trait inherited from her father but split between herself and her twin) trail after him and before she knows it, she is trailing after him too. “You don’t look too friendly but your eyes betray you…” she calls after him, much shorter than him and having to work twice as hard to keep up as she nears him enough to nose along his flank (not really, she’s just that close finally as she inhales his scent).
It had been many years since he had been accompanied by someone. Since he was with Senate come to think of it. He had only fond memories of the pale stag, his vibrant stories, and a laugh that echoed throughout the trees they pranced under. For his entire life the equine was the closest and only thing Krigare had to a brother. Though not all good things may last and they parted ways, leaving Krigare alone.
Amazingly, the dark stallion found this incredibly hard. He no longer got to hear his friends stories, or laugh at his jokes. He barely made jokes at all. For he had no one to joke with.
So Krigare walked forward.His hooves crushed the earth as he walked, faintly aware of the presence that trailed him. Whilst he was looking for companionship he was not looking for a shadow. So he continued on, allowing the equine to try and catch up to him. He could see her out of the corner of his light eyes, a small mare with markings he had seen only twice before. She was pretty he supposed, pale with the exception of her black chest and crown.
He was slightly taken aback when she spoke. Had he really seemed that scary? Thinking on it for a moment, he grunted. He must have. The dark coat mixed with the messy mane and tail...not too pretty. Had she said something about his eyes? The green that his mother had long adored, noticed by someone else? Krigare stopped walking. He turned to face the mare, taking her in fully. He could feel the tall grass below him waving on his legs, the wind blowing his dark forelock into his face as he breathed, studying the horse before him.
She was shorter when he looked her head on, his eyes trailing downward to look at her forwardly. How was he to respond to such an interesting statement. He had so many questions for the mare. He was intrigued at the least. He had not expected someone to approach him quite honestly. Yet here someone stood, speaking to him. He assumed she wanted to speak with him, she had after all followed him for a bit, finally speaking. He snorted as he thought of what to say.
After a moment his ears flicked sideways, brows furrowing as he squinted. If she wanted to speak then he would comply. After all, he had nothing better to do. Besides, if she turned out to be boring or annoying he could leave.
Hoping she would be as intriguing as she looked he finally spoke after minutes of silence.
"Who are you?"
He drawled , r rolling as he watched her. His head dropped to her level as he spoke, eyes now even with her own. He was just close enough to where if he reached out enough he could touch her (though he wouldnt). As he stood there, the wind gradually picked up, his tail now wrapped securely around his leg, the silvery scars that mapped them peaking out. The scars wrapped up his legs, and very few tainted his muzzle. They were details one didnt see right away. Though if you were to look closer there was no way you could miss them. He was remembering their cause now, ears pinning at the thought.
Spark could tell that ke knew she was there, trailing after him.
It showed in the way one of his ears flicked back to pick up the dull thud of her hooves on the ground as she shadowed him, though few shadows are as pale as she and almost flickering because the fire crested over her flesh like a wave, a reminder that it was constant, and there. She tamped it down, pushed it back beneath her skin until it moved back into her bones, marrow-deep and hot, pulsing like a second set of veins that made her itch and burn. Spark could tell too, that he never hurried up or stopped - kept to the same slow amble that allowed her to come alongside of him just enough for him to become even more aware that the shadow was not only that, but a small mare, just her - Spark.
He seemed a little shocked by her initial assessment of him, but she made no apology for it but he catches her by surprise when he stops and turns to her, regards her with those green eyes that seemed no different than the grass waving against their legs. Her stance mirrors his, and the wind that blows across his face also blows across hers but she is used to it - used to looking through strands of black mane that tumble down her long nose. She regards him as much as he does her; to anyone else, it appears that they are in a standoff but nothing could be farther from the truth. He grunted and snorted, made a lot of noise but said nothing at all and she almost mistook him for a mute until he spoke.
Hmm, she mused silently to herself as he questioned who she was in a drawl that others might have found charming. Who are you? Good question, as she has often asked herself that very same thing but received no answer - not from the ears of deaf gods or the cold cold stars themselves. Only the wind bothered to answer her and that was only to shout her own question back at her, who are you who are you who are you? She realizes that he has lowered his head to her level, to look eye to eye with her. His head seemed bigger up close, draft influence she supposed, like her brother and her father but so unlike her, as diminutive as she now felt in his presence.
He made her small, or made her realize her smallness more keenly and the fire licked along her bones in a thrilling whisper as he seemed far too close to touch, promising to burn him if he did… “My name is Spark.” she says, choking back the flames that crawl up her throat longing to burn the skin up to ash and free her new elemental self but she swallows it back down, pushing it into the hot pit of her stomach as her mismatched eyes stare at him. She saw his ears pin back as the wind whipped up around them before she saw the thin silvery threads of scars that danced up and down his skin. One thing she never did was pry and she did not ask him how he came by those scars of his, even if she was more than mildly curious about them.
“But the question now is, who are you?”
There is a hint of laughter in her voice as she asks him, and a curl of a sly smile about her lips.
He could almost scream as she noticed them. He had grown to know the look well. The quick glance at the silver lines that marred him. Her mismatched eyes didnt linger long though, and that caused his own green hues to return to the grass below him. He awaited her reply quietly after this, too encased in his own thoughts to say anything. The silence that plagued him so hard to fight off. It was begging him to just leave, to be alone once more with nothing but the trees, and the forest floor. Her voice came soon after though, the silence fleeing. What had she said?
"Spark."
He repeated the name , the wind catching it and flinging it far from his reach. What a peculiar name. Though he supposed his was just as strange. So when her question arose , he wasnt sure how he wanted to respond. In his own head, he was nobody. A simple no one that passed through others vision occasionally.
"Krigare. My name is Krigare."
It had been a long time since he had introduced himself as such. It had always been 'no one.' or 'I dont quite know.' But he was compelled to tell the mare who he was. So he had, and a strange sense of being exposed came with this.
He nearly laughed. All he had done was tell her his name! He had not revealed some terrible secret that burned his heart to keep. He had not Offered her up a weakness to strike at, or his emotions to tear at.
He had told her his name.
The name that meant warrior. Something he had come to learn suited him well.
Spark observes how he nearly flinches the moment her gaze finds his scars. Scars not sickening to her, but badges of honor and courage - stories in the skin that attest to the character of the stallion or mare before her, and in this case, the stallion that is uncertain of how she’ll react to them. She reacts as she does, redirecting her gaze back to his face and away from the fine silver tales of what she must think can only be something terrible and back to those grass-green eyes of his. His eyes intrigue her as much as his scars do, set deep in the fine chocolate of his face but still nothing like her Giver, with his stars glowing around his head.
He repeats her name and her ears come forward to hear him offer his name to her right after that. Her keen hearing does not miss the hesitation, slight as it may be, in the offering of his name and she can only think of it as that - an offering, because he seemed almost afraid to tell her who he was. Spark can understand, names are sacred as much as blood and breath are to some. Her smiles grows softer, to counteract the now fiery burr that is her voice as she echoes his name, “Krigare.” It is foreign and strange on her tongue, but probably no stranger than he must think her own name is (as if somehow, her mother knew long ago when naming her daughter just how apt that name would prove to be).
“I’m guessing you’re not from around here…”
She’s blunt, never used to be but she’s changed - the fire did that to her, as her mismatched eyes roam beyond the chocolate slope of his shoulder to the field beyond them. “If you were, you’d probably have chosen to visit the meadow instead unless you’re looking for somewhere to call home.” Her eyes come back to him, refocusing on his face and the flurry of emotion that flits across it like shadows chasing themselves tooth to tail. He doesn’t smell like the any of the lands here, not that she can account for having smelled even half of them but he smells like she used to, of dust and travel and sometimes, herd.
“What are you looking for?”
Because they all have to be looking for something, right?
Relief came in waves when her eyes traveled back to his. He held her gaze in a hard attempt to read her. She who he found so interesting. His marked lips pulled into a small smile as she echoed his words. His name, long not spoken by others, was free once again. A name full of stories. She spoke once more, Krigare finding himself interested in her assumption. She was correct. The stallion was not from these lands. Nor had he realized where he truly was. He looked around quickly, noting how very odd this place was.
"You are correct."
He replied, nodding as she continued to speak. The statement was mundane. Normal for someone to say. A simple something she had pointed out. And then the word hit him like a million tons of earth. Crushing him entirely.
home.
He had not thought about anything close to the word in a while. He had simply considered the land where he lay to be his 'home'. But no. Those four letters meant so much more. Home meant a place to stay, to feel safe, somewhere where you no longer had to wander.
And that was all he had known. Wandering.
He opened his lips to form a reply but found his mind empty. He silently thanked whatever it was that caused her to speak again. Once more, his lips had no words to pass through them. He was speechless.
What was he looking for? This home she spoke of? A friend? That was what he had wanted at first wasnt it? But oh no. Now he was yearning to wake up to the same stretch of land each day. Alone or not. He was yearning not to see all new places for once. He was in need of this 'home' wherever that turned out to be.
"Truthfully? I dont quite know Spark."
Krigare found himself vulnerable under her gaze once more. He was always so sure of himself. So sure that wherever he went he would be fine. That if his legs finally gave and he found himself surrounded by wolves, he would be okay. That whatever it was that kept him alive would keep him safe.
Though now he was faced with real questions. Something she most likely didnt realize how much it impacted him. Because he had never had to think about these things. He only needed to think about where he was going, and that was nowhere. It was just forward. Onward until he could run no more, onward until he could no longer walk, onward until he could no longer keep his open or breathe clean air. Onward until the screeching of his burning body finally stopped him and he collapsed wherever it was until he found strength to go again.
Yet here he was, asking what he wanted. What he truly wanted, and like most.
His eyes hold hers, green like grass - like the plains in her mother’s stories. It is hard to look away and she is not the first to do so, he does, giving the field a good hard look as if seeing it for the first time. She cannot imagine what it is like to come from somewhere else and see this, even though she has gone from here to elsewhere at times, but she always came back.
Something about this place held her heart longterm and though she too, is given to fits of wanderlust, she always returned to it. But to see the field through his eyes, it almost seems to be in beautiful shambles - dust stirred by travelers’ feet, conversations both loud and soft, a constant flux of smells that belonged to horses from all over, and she realized that it was a bit overwhelming and strange. Spark almost pities him for a moment, to be so at odds with a place and a time as one like this that allowed a lot of them to be more than just horses with hearts and brains and the fur on their backs.
She felt fortunate to have been born to it, and nearly breathed out a sigh of relief but kept it back knowing that he’d have no idea why she was sighing and might misread it as boredom. That was the farthest from the truth! He intrigued her, probably as much as she intrigued him, as he mentioned how correct her assumption of him was. Then again, the mere fact that he looked large and out of place with his stern face had given him away. She nearly laughed at that, he was not as stern as he appeared to be, but rather quiet and almost gentle - a gentle giant! The thought of that, despite the fine silver lines up and down his legs, made her lips lift up in a smile.
Spark noticed his mouth open as if he made to reply but nothing came out. The smile pulled down into a little frown as she looked at him, her own mismatched gaze showing concern. Was he alright? It seemed her mention of home had hit a bit of a sore spot with him and left him considering if that was a thing he had always lacked. Most never liked facing these kinds of realizations, it was like a weakness and Spark was almost sorry that she had asked. She sensed his vulnerability and saw it as an opportunity to take the tiniest step forward, enough to brush her whiskery nose against his thick neck.
“I don’t think most of us know, but maybe I can help you find it?”
She offers, not in the least bit hesitant about presenting him with the idea of Tephra, her home but she pauses, and it seems like in that instant, so many things can come to fruition --
“You could come back with me, to my home.”
It is the smallest of suggestions, almost hushed as she looks up at him.
Her silence was unnerving, as though he had scared her. He was forming an apology when she replied. His eyes focused on her once more. It was hard not to ask why she had offered him this. he couldnt help but chuckle.
He had been offered something wonderful he realized. She had invited him to her home, and he was close to saying no. Simply because he didn't want to disappoint her when she realized how restless he was. He wasnt used to staying put, and though he was sure it would do him good, he wasnt sure if it would work.
"If that is what you wish. Then I shall go."
He had surprised himself.
"I make no promises that I will stay."
He muttered, watching her step forward. His nostrils flared, tail swinging roughly at his legs. Deep down he was dissapointing the part of him that still yearned to see the world.
"But I will go."
And so it had been done. He had finally managed to do something he truly wanted to do.
![[Image: krigare_by_voltum-dbctewi.png]](http://orig01.deviantart.net/7a05/f/2017/166/6/b/krigare_by_voltum-dbctewi.png)