"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
Raxa, having settled down a moment, quietly listened to Djinni as she shared why she had left her home. It was startling, to hear that she had decided to come back with this place while her parents had left the kingdom. If that had been Raxa, she would've leaped at the chance to stick with her family, but that was her opinion. Who's to say anyways that it would've worked out like that? With Raxa's luck, even if given the chance to leave, her parents wouldn't have wanted her company.
The brindled mare could tell that Djinni seemed to be in thought now, about whatever, Raxa did not know. Perhaps she was briefly considering her future in this land now? Where would she go? Would she seek out another kingdom to join its... ranks? Or would she settle for joining a herd, content living out her days as a mother to the many foals stallions would no doubt have her sire for them?
The thought of that last one made Raxa want to squeal in irritation, but she held it in; no need to get Djinni worried or excited about anything that wasn't worth such thoughts.
Raxa thought that things were going well up until this point, when Djinni overstepped the brindled mare's personal boundary. She had hoped the question would never be asked of her, but also cursed her own carelessness. Of course Djinni would've thought to ask such a question, given that Raxa had asked the same one not moments ago.
A sigh escaped her as Raxa's wall closed off once more. She gave Djinni a hard look, her ears tilting back, the muscles in her back tightening.
"Let's just say I wasn't welcome because I was considered... they didn't think I was normal, and I had no reason to stay."
Without another word, Raxa turned and began to walk off, clearly wanting the subject to be closed.
Despite being well into adulthood (in years, it not mental maturity) Djinni has never borne any children. While she finds them appealing, the thought of having to carry – and then raise! – another creature is not something she’s ever been interested in. Her mother had always said that once she met the right mate and settled down, that children wouldn’t seem so bad. Djinni remains doubtful.
Her well-meaning probe into Raxa’s backstory is met with tilted ears and a scowl, but Djinni has already decided that she and Raza should be friends, so when the brindle mare turns to walk away, Djinni follows.
“That was rude,” she says, but there is no malice in her voice or expression. “I didn’t mean to offend you.”
The idea that Raxa – who besides her pretty coloring seems the very definition of ‘normal’ in Beqanna – wasn’t welcome wherever it was that she’d come from seems laughable to Djinni. There is no normalcy here, not in a land where horses can fly with the birds, swim underwater, and breathe fire. “You look perfectly normal to me,” Djinni adds. As she says it, her bulky chestnut build begins to shrink in size and fade in color, until she is the perfect mirror of Raxa beside her.
“This is you.” She says, pausing to gesture down at herself (well, technically now at Raxa’s self, but that doesn’t matter). “I think you look quite nice.”
“Although… I probably wouldn’t have been normal where you came from, would I?” Perhaps Raxa is from a place where horses lack traits. Djinni has been to such places, but she finds them rather dull. She’s been cursed as a witch and a demon in a few of those lands. “You can be as strange as you’d like here and still be welcome.”
"Too late for that," Raxa quipped, her ears set back and neck arched in a manner that made her mane sway, giving her face a dangerous angle as she turned to look away from Djinni.
Raxa pranced away a few steps until she was about a yard or two in front of Djinni. In truth, the brindled mare wasn't all that offended by the question that had been asked of her. In fact, she'd bee greeted by other horses before who started off by introducing themselves and then having the gall to ask for her life story right off the bat, instead of trying to learn a bit more about her at the current time first.
The fact that Djinni had the sense to wait served to appease Raxa's mind; she was grateful that the mare had at least talked to her before trying to get to know about her past. That wasn't to say that Raxa had to like it though; she did not like to discuss her past whatsoever. No one had the need to know where she came from, nor did show any right to intrude on her privacy like that. Raxa's body language had made it perfectly clear she didn't wish to discuss what had happened to her, so why did Djinni seem so persistent?
Wanting the mare to leave, Raxa spun on her hindquarters, intent on asking Djinni to go on her own way now. In fact, Raxa had been so focused on preparing herself just for that one moment that she didn't fully register Djinni's words until the two mares faced each other.
Raxa, seeing that Djinni's words had been quite literal, let out a squeal of surprise, having not expected anything like this. She'd seen reflections of herself in water before, so it should not have been a huge shock, but what made it so was that the mare in front of her was like a reflection come to life.
Raxa wouldn't have been surprised if that was the case.
"W-wh-what t-the?! H-how d-d-did y-you d-d-do t-t-t-that?!" she screamed, rearing up on her hind legs a good few feet into the air.
Since Djinni has never been good at reading warnings, she ignores the dangerous angle in Raxa’s face. Only when the other mare spins to face her does she stop, planting her hooves in the soil earth of the Field.
The surprise in the brindle mare’s face is precisely what Djinni was expecting, and while the rearing is new, Djinni has the good sense to take a few more steps back. She changes back to the slender flaxen chestnut mare she’d been when first approach (deciding that returning to her natural form might be just a bit too much).
“That’s my not normal.” She replies with a shrug, knowing that to play into Raxa’s obvious fear would probably only make the situation worse. Djinni is clearly not the best at making friends, but she is determined to not give up, despite the fact that she has offended, irritated, and now scared her new companion within an hour of first meeting her.
“I can change how I look, among other things.” There are several other things, but perhaps she’ll keep the long description for later. Well, maybe she could do something nice for Raxa, something to make Djinni seem like she’s not some randomly mutating freakshow. At least she can try, she decides, there is no harm in that. “One of the other things is granting wishes. Have you ever wished for something and never gotten it?” Of course she has, Djinni thinks – hasn’t everyone? Unfortunately for everyone else, they’ve never wished within earshot of this particular mare.
“Try it.” She says, tilting her head encouragingly. “Wish for something out loud. Anything.”
Ooc: so Djinni can technically grant wishes, but in order to not have to pause the thread to get owner permission for something fancy, if Raxa does want to wish for something, maybe keep it simple like weird colors or wings or something xD
Watching carefully as Djinni reverted back to the chastener Arabian mare she'd first met (if she really even was an Arabian), Raxa took a step back herself, snorting again, warning the mare to now keep her distance.
The brindle mare remained wordless as Djinni explained how she had done what Raxa had witnessed, before going on to explain that she could do a number of other things, including the act of granting wishes. For some reason, Raxa was a bit melancholy, as putting two and two together, a memory had returned to her.
When Raxa was barely over a month and still living with her parents, her mother had often told her stories, some she made up, some she didn't. One of those stories she'd told of was of a creature that could grant wishes, often referred to by those two-legged demons as a genie. Raxa didn't know exactly what that word meant or anything, but considering that Djinni's name sounded quite like that of the creature Raxa's mother had once told her about, the reason behind granting wishes became a little less strange.
Of course, Raxa figured that couldn't be the only explanation behind her abilities, but she wouldn't probe any further. It would probably take days if not hours for Djinni to fully explain how she could do what she could.
Recognizing she'd been asked a question, Raxa simply looked back up at the now chestnut mare, "Of course I've wished for something. Everyone has at some point, but the one thing I've always wished for is the one thing that I can never have!
"All these mares living here in this... Field, or whatever, always proclaim how great it is to have their own families and foals that look normal. Then they see someone like me, and do you know what I get? I receive glances of pity or suspicion. Some don't trust me simply because I don't look like them, and others feel bad for me because they know I probably come from a rough background. For all they know, I could've come from a happy family, and just wound up with this unusual coloring.
"Do you know what I want Djinni?! I want others to stop taking one look at me and assuming I'm either some otherworldly being meant to bring chaos or that I deserve pity! I don't deserve it, and I don't want it!"
She finished her statement with another rear, kicking out her front legs as her anger grew. Only when she finished her trade did she settle back down on the Earth, realizing what had just happened. Never before had something like that happened. Why had she done that? Why had she opened herself up to the mare like that?
Raxa had never before done anything like that, only because she didn't know who she could trust. At this point, she still didn't know if she could even trust Djinni, not after keeping her secret only to reveal it in the way that she had by switching from the chestnut mare to something else.
Instantly regretting what had happened, Raxa turned on her haunches and took off at full speed, intent on leaving Djinni behind and once again resuming her lonely trek through the meadow.
