Winter.

It was a time for stillness, for grey skies and misted breath, for sweet deaths, for pensive reflection. And yet here, even now, life reigned in full force; the field throbbed with it, hummed with it - the murmur of voices and soft whinnies, the crunch of frost beneath heavy steps.

Like a wraith, the dappled stallion moved amongst those others, listening, observing. With each ghosting step, the stud's ears swiveled here and there to steal samples of whispered conversations. With each rake of that bitter wind against his pelt, the male would pause, head lifting and nares flaring to taste at what news that particular gust carried upon it. And all the while, those flat, mahogany eyes of his scanned the horizon, memorizing the scene with all the curious dispassion of an analytical mind.

A rather passive study.

For a handful more paces did the one called Azael continue to meander in this way before a sudden lurch in his stride sent the stallion's tall frame into a measured trot, long legs devouring the ground with an easy hunger marked by both power and grace - his Andalusian heritage clearly spied in the elegant curve of his neck, the strength of his haunches. Driven by some unseen purpose, the stud shrugged off the bustle of the field proper as easily as he might have shrugged off a fly as he instead made for the dark comfort of the trees playing sentinel to the very borders of this meeting place.

With brisk steps did the stallion pass into that world of skeletal branches and snow-dusted evergreens, the scents of pine and juniper as heavy as unspoken secrets as they lingered there in the air. Only then did he slow, obsidian hooves relenting in their assault upon the frozen earth, before the dappled wraith suddenly halted altogether, his attention claimed by the flash of something just yonder, glimpsed between the gnarled spines of twin oak trees.

Something rather pink.

Pink. It was an odd color to spy in the very midst of winter, stark as a stain against the familiar backdrop of muted greys and dusty blacks. And yet spy it he did, though, of course, it wasn't truly an it, but rather a her.

A pink mare. How novel.

And yet even this mare's apparent novelty was seemingly not enough to tempt the silvered stud into an approach. Indeed, the Andalusian seemed quite content with remaining a mere hint of a presence in those pine-scented shadows, the flat sheen of his gaze hooked upon that female in the near distance, a passive bystander once more, mahogany eyes fixed upon her with the weight of his cool study..

And so it was that Azael's dark eyes were one such pair privy to the scene which soon unfolded: the sudden, mystical appearance of the chocolate-hued colt and the subsequent blood-laced nip he placed upon the withers of the pink mare as he claimed her, as he sealed her fate. And yet whatever words may have followed were lost upon the dappled stallion's pricked ears, those syllables having been swallowed by the wind currently dancing amongst the trees before he was able to catch them for himself. But no matter. One does not need to hear such an exchange in order to understand it.

Azael understood perfectly well.

But that did not stop him from lingering, from watching, from being little more than an icy statue firmly planted within the cool comfort of that copse, silent, unmoving. Save for the rhythmic stirring of his chest and the misty exhale of his breath upon that wonderfully frigid air, of course.