[open] on moonlit wings

[Cassiell]

Dark. Crisp. The autumn night enveloped him, caressed him, guided him onward. To where? Beqanna. Somewhere both familiar and yet foreign. Foreign because, in his twelve years of life, he had never once visited. Familiar because it was in his blood all the same. Like a phantom caress, Beqanna sang to him, called to him, drummed out an alluring rhythm upon his very heart. He knew within his soul the moment he had passed across those moonlit borders, though the land beneath him was but a ripple of shadow as he glided overhead.

Home. He was home.

Ears pinned, ebon wings still surging, the stallion surveyed the patchwork which sprawled beneath him, drinking in the sight. Meadows. Mountains. Forests. So much to see. So much to explore. But, ultimately, it was the latter which lured him in with its star-drenched boughs and impenetrable night unfurling deep beneath the ancient trees.

Down he dove, a dark wraith, his wings tucking in close as he nicked in between outstretched branches and gnarled trunks. Hooves of dulled bronze dug into the earth, leaving divots where he landed. Heavy. A giant of a brute. His head turned, golden eyes flashing in the night -- molten and sharp. Nostrils flaring, he scented at the breeze, testing the loamy air for any sign of life within this wood beyond his own.

Surely, he wasn't alone.

cassiel

temperance is a virtue