"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
the fight for you
is all I've ever known --
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She had missed her home. It’s been years, but from the second she slips across its borders it’s like she has never been gone. Immediately she is flooded with the familiar imagery of the autumn-colored trees set ablaze atop the hillsides, the rolling emerald sea of grass, and the snow-capped mountains that encircle like a guardian. This was what she had pictured as she lay beneath a familiar sky but in far-off and unfamiliar places, doing her best to swallow away the homesickness. It was hard, when it was all she saw when she closed her eyes. Despite the sadness and the longing to go back, she couldn’t shake the feeling that she needed to see what else was out there. It was a restlessness she is certain she learned from her father.
But she never found what she thought she was looking for, and so it is home that she has come back to. She inhales the sweet scent of the meadow, exhaling with a sigh and a smile that settles across her lips. But even as stands atop a knoll she can see that things have changed. Mainly, the faces. She knows that she will not see her mother or her siblings. They are all long gone by now. She is mostly sure that her father is no longer here, despite having the same immortality that she had inherited from him. Jarris never was one to stay rooted, and her mother only just barely being able to grasp onto him. If their love had not been so infinite and powerful Keiran isn’t sure if he ever would have stayed around. Without Plumeria here, she is certain that the gray-eyed stallion had disappeared. These thoughts cause her heart to constrict, the joy of being home briefly clouded by the idea that she was, in an essence, just as alone as she had always been.
One thing that she was certain of though was that for as long as Beqanna was here, it would still hold its same magic. Not just the magic that created traits and vibrant colors, but the magic that made everything here what it was, the thing that made it irreplaceable. The opportunities for love, friendship, and memories were still abundant. She just had to find them. With a breathy sigh and a hopeful glint in her dark brown eyes she begins to make her way closer to the heart of the meadow, not really searching for anyone in particular. Her eyes flick here and there, searching their gazes, but no one seems too keen on making eye contact. They were all preoccupied with their own conversations, and she finds herself growing discouraged. She comes to a stop near the stream, peering down at the water as it slips easily between the cracks of the rocks. With a front hoof she scuffs a pebble into the water, watching it sink to the bottom, and she sighs again, the hope slowly fading away.
It is a foreign concept to her for all that she has one. Hyaline is home enough to her now. Before that, the Meadow and the Forest had sufficed. She could not say though that she had ever set foot outside the vast breadth of these lands, or this world really. It never occurred to her to venture beyond the horizon and discover what else was out there. Strange too, because the wanderlust was there in her blood. It was just a call that she did not answer to but place a herd of deer in front of her and Keeper was off like a shooting star trying to run them down and learn their ways, which is something she could never do - you just can’t be a deer when you’re a lumbering hulk of a horse.
She’s not as large as that description implies. In fact, she is on the smaller side as some mares are. Most of the time she is lean, sparse in fat and thinned out from all the traveling that she does between Hyaline and the commoner lands. On rare occasions she is plump which suits her near-pony size. A better generalization is that she looks like any feral horse does - unkempt and sullied. Smears of mud cling to her legs. Abrasions of dirt are rife along her neck and flanks. Scratches from thorny thickets cross her skin. Knots in her hair compete with the sticks and bones that have become entangled therein. Keeper is a sight to see!
This is perhaps not the best time to be frolicking in the stream that cuts through a corner of the Meadow though. It is certainly not her best idea and doesn’t clean her up much like a dip in either of the two rivers she must cross to make it back to Hyaline can. If anything, her hair becomes matted to her neck and her thighs and more mud joins that which is already caked onto her legs as she leaves the stream shivering. No, autumn was perhaps not the best season to splash about in water that was already beginning to feel the oncoming chill of winter. Granted, the cold water had tasted good going down her throat and she had enjoyed pawing at her reflection because she is a horse after all and that’s what horses do.
It is quite possible that the plop of a pebble further upstream is what caused Keeper to turn in the chestnut mare’s direction. An ear flicks at the sigh, the sound so forlorn! She does not understand why so many come here that lack so much hope. More and more of them seem to be soured by enough sorrow to last them a lifetime and then some. Of course, she only guesses at the nature of that sigh - it could just be because the pebble was knocked loose and sank to the bottom of the stream quickly and had nothing to do with hope or a lack thereof at all.
Keeper’s reflection appears right next to the chestnut’s and she notices the star on the mare’s red brow. It wavered just a little in the water, remnants from the pebble’s fall that still spun outward and away from them, growing ever wider into each other until gone. She lifted her gaze from the reflection to the mare herself, smiling just a little but never once asking for permission to join her - that was assumed just from the way that Keeper positioned herself next to the red mare, close enough that their shoulders could touch if they wanted them to. “That pebble might get lonely down there…” she says with a laugh before scuffing another one into the stream with her own hoof.
the fight for you
is all I've ever known --
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She was so focused on watching the ripples as they traveled across the surface of the water that she does not hear the other mare approach. It is not until her reflection appears alongside of her own that she realizes she has company, and the sight causes her to jump. ”Oh!” The exclamation is startled from her lips, her doe-like eyes widening even more as her gaze leaps from the water and to the mare’s face. But the alarm is quickly replaced by a bright smile, a mirthful laugh drifting into the frigid air as she shakes her head. ”You startled me,” she says, and she can feel the warmth of mustang mare next to her, and she does not shy from it. Keiran is very much her mother’s daughter, all glee and smiles. Her personal space was not something she minded when it was invaded.
”Well, I suppose it’s not lonely now,” referencing the stone that the wild mare had cast alongside of her own.”And neither am I.” It is said with another laugh, shaking her red forelock away from her eyes. With a delicate muzzle she lets her lips touch the mustang’s shoulder, noting the knots and bramble that have made their home in her unkempt mane. She smells of pine and mountain air, and it reminds her of her long travels. ”You remind me of the wilderness. Have you always lived here?” She realizes then that she has not introduced herself, a manner that her mother had always taught her as being terribly important. It was a trait that had been so strongly instilled into Plumeria from her countless years as working in the kingdoms – lands that were now long gone, much like everything else that was even remotely familiar. ”I’m so sorry, I never introduced myself. My name is Keiran.”
Concentric rings spread out and widen from where she had knocked the pebble into the water after it’s companion had long since sunk to the bottom.
There is something mesmerizing about watching these rings and ripples that both the mares seem to share, even though her reflection is now wavering next to the other mare’s and she has finally taken notice of Keeper standing beside her. Her reaction is not one that Keeper would have anticipated; she had made enough noise to make anyone aware of her presence but the red mare still acts startled. She seems to recover quickly enough with a bright smile that blazes across her mouth and a light quick laugh that doesn’t send Keeper shying off from her. Not that Keeper does those kinds of things, just if the chestnut mare had reacted snidely then she might have put a little space between them until sussing out the cause for such unnecessary meanness. But there is no meanness here, just a quick and easy companionship spawned from watching the ripples in the river.
“Sorry,” she offers by way of unsolicited apology. It seemed the natural thing to do for having startled the red unintentionally even though Keeper is not always a quiet moving mare. She can be loud as a clatter of rocks down a mountainside if she needed to be and other times, she could track and creep with the best of them if she put her mind to it. Most of the time, Keeper just moved and took no notice of the rest - she was, and often thought she was one with the world as much as a horse like her could be. Keeper brightens; “Nope, not lonely now!” both the pebble and the mare had companions, because she - Keeper - had seen to that!
She is rather blithe even beneath the explorative lips of the red mare that touch her shoulder and the warm breath that blows across her dunskin fur. Keeper knows the mare is breathing in her wild earthy smell and she can smell the mare in kind, horsy and alive but somehow not wholly of this place like Keeper has come to smell so strongly of Hyaline and her travels between it and the common lands. She either smells of mountains, forests, meadows or fields. Seasonal changes affect her scent too, sweat from the sun is stronger in summer and she smells more woolly and warm in the winter. Keeper notices this things, as most don’t beyond smelling like a horse or in this world, half a horse and half something else altogether.
(Like Keeper will soon smell, more musky like a bear. A smell she won’t ever be able to shake because she has been changed since her participation in a quest that left her rather… different. For now though, she is free of that bear-taint as she basks in the red mare’s pleasant presence.)
The little dunskin chuckles; “Always and probably far too long. My father jokes that I’m more wild than the rest of the family is or can be. Grandmother accepts it though, says that’s just how I was meant to be - wilder than the rest.” It never occurs to Keeper that the red mare doesn’t know who her father is, or her grandmother - they have names, but none that fall in the annals of Beqanna’s vast and storied histories, few of which even Keeper knows. “I’ve never left though… never ventured towards the horizon and sought what lay behind it. Have you?” She can guess that perhaps the chestnut has because she smells of here but as if from long ago, the smell is a bit faded - lingering, but faded, and she smells mostly of dust and long travel.
Oh, introductions. Keeper never seems to quite get around to those early on in the conversations she has. They tend to crop up later when she’s already decided whether or not the horse she’s with will be an immediate friend (she’s never had one not be, so she has no true experience with dislike or meanness - they exist, because like and niceness do, but Keeper is rather stunted in those areas of social interaction) and the names just come later, after all of that. But the red is practiced, skillful even in a rather diplomatic way that must have been learned and in part, bred into her nature as it was not in Keeper’s at all.
(How in the hell did she get a promotion in Hyaline then? Things like that just befuddle her because she does nothing but seek interactions with other horses because horses are creatures of herd and habit.)
“No need to apologize, I never seem to get around to introductions fast enough. Names always come later, they just have a way of coming out.” It is her way of apologizing and explaining in the same breath, followed by a laugh that is light and quick in the way it tumbles out of her grinning mouth. “I’m Keeper and it’s a pleasure to meet you. Shame the pebbles couldn’t stay longer to introduce themselves.” she adds with a delightful little cackle of mirth.
not knowing how deep the woods are and lightless
ooc: um sorry, got a little carried away with rambling there lol <333
the fight for you
is all I've ever known --
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She does not yet realize the drastic changes that have taken place here. She doesn’t know that the land of her birth – Heaven’s Gates – no longer existed. In fact, none of the kingdoms did. She doesn’t know that the magic of Beqanna had been fluctuating, giving and taking much in the same way as the tide, though her own immortality had remained untouched, most likely because she had been far out of Beqanna’s reach. From where she stands in the meadow it is only the faces that look different, but she knows she cannot stay in the meadow forever. The thing that she had missed the most when she had been on the other side of the mountain pass was having a home. A herd, or a kingdom. A group of unfamiliar faces. She wanted a purpose. Her travels had not fulfilled her in the way she had thought they would.
Keeper’s company was enjoyable, and she found herself relaxing alongside of her. Who knew that kicking a rock into the river would spark a conversation! She speaks of her family, and even though it brings a smile to her face there is a glimmer of nostalgia in her doe-like eyes. She missed her family. Her mother, her father, and her array of full siblings. Her family was the one thing she would give anything to have back. ”There’s nothing wrong with that,” she says in response to Keeper’s father’s view on her wildness. She asks of the outlands, and Keiran nods her head. ”I have, actually. I was born here, in a kingdom, but I always wondered what else was out there. It seemed like everything came so easy to everyone else. The kingdom life, falling in love, making friends.” It was how it had been for her parents, and even her siblings. Everyone had a purpose, except for her.
”I’ve been gone for years. I don’t think I have any family left, but I missed Beqanna. The world out there, it’s so different. It’s beautiful and untamed, but I couldn’t stop thinking about this place.” She realizes now that she’s been talking quite a bit, and she can’t help but laugh.”I’m talking a lot. It’s just been so long since I last had anyone to talk to.” She knew she had missed her home and being around other horses, but she hadn't realized just how much until she had met Keeper.
Keeper likes Keiran; the red mare is amiable from head to hoof to the point that even the silences that befall them are enjoyable enough. Smiles are shared between them like secrets that old friends familiar with one another keep, and sometimes, each of them seems to look into the river as if to find the pebbles mirroring them somewhere on the riverbed. What must the conversations of rocks be like? Keeper can all but wonder as Keiran answers her. She laughs, “I should hope not! My father often left me to my half-brother’s care, he seemed to be the only one able to corral me long enough at his side.”
The memory of a broad wing full of snowy feathers comes to mind. She used to nestle underneath it, tucked up close to his side as he’d bend his nose down to hers and blow the fuzzy little forelock off her face. Yellowstone would then laugh and give a shake of his head in mock horror at how muddied and mussed she always came back to him as. He’d ask her where she’d been and what she’d gotten up to, and she always told him outlandish stories about chasing hares into their warrens and squirrels up trees, or how she’d stand so still that she dared not even breath as the deer moved by her, shy and quick to flee if she even nickered to them.
Keiran’s voice draws her back and up from her memories of her older half-brother and pulls her gaze back from the river to the red mare’s face. It is like looking at a red reflection of herself - their eyes hold memories that both of them wish were not just that, memories, but something altogether more. Keeper can relate; not that everything had come easier to everyone else because she had no idea but she understood best that underlying want for purpose and somehow, Keeper had found it. Except that it had been like reaching for the moon, and she felt the light of it as a constant slip through her teeth.
“This world here is different too, but you probably noticed that.” she murmurs, because Keiran seems bright enough to have noticed that the face of Beqanna had changed, somewhat. Parts of her (she thinks of the land as female, of course) were still the same but so much of her had split, shifted, took on a new shape. Keeper laughs too; thinking that they could turn this into a contest of who could talk the other’s ear off the longest. It tickles her just to think that as the red mentions it has been so long since she last talked to someone. For Keeper, it is usually only a matter of hours - she’s got too much of that ancestral blood in her that makes long for the social structures of a herd of horses.
“No, no.” she is quick with her assurance. “I don’t think you’re talking too much, maybe you’re not talking enough if it’s been that long?” Keeper is also quick to encourage Keiran to talk more, to share of her time outside Beqanna and of her earliest moments inside it. Somewhere in there, she thinks, lies the key to Keiran finding purpose or at the very least, Keeper dragging the red mare home with her because Hyaline could stand to benefit from someone like her as much as Keiran might benefit from the beautiful landscape and kind souls that walk it.
But in due time, will Keeper work up the courage to mention this.
In due time.
