It’s the way of life and death and war -- the only three points in existence. She knew love once or twice, or maybe she didn’t. No, she didn’t. She left them or they left her. There’s no such thing as love to her, it’s a myth, she was a myth once, too. They used to whisper about her and wonder if she were real or another figment of their imagination. Echidna liked being a myth, she liked being a monster. What is she now? That is a good question, she doesn’t quite know the answer anymore but it’s a good question nonetheless.
She’s wandering, not lost, but wandering. Her heavy feet dragging snow and ice and mud along with them. Echidna was born in the snow and she doesn’t feel the cold -- her coat is long and shaggy. Her eyes are small, pinched dots in her ugly face. They sweep tirelessly along the ground and look between the shadows, this place reminds her of the home she left so many years ago. It takes her back to a time when she was a different mare and her entire soul shakes, or maybe that isn’t true. Does she even have a soul? Oh, so many good questions.
The smell hits first, before anything else. Echidna breathes deep and exhales sharply and pauses just outside the inner ring of pine. She can see the other mare from here, watches her shiver and shake from the cold. There’s a smirk on the spotted mare’s lips, it lasts for only a second before the stony reserve of indifference reappears.
“You look cold,” Echidna says.
Quietly she slips into the clearing, she is small but bulky. She is built for the cold and it is obvious because she is primitive in design. Not sleek and shiny and smelling like salt. “You also look like you’ve got a lot on your mind, cupcake.” She says, her voice gravelly. Echidna takes a couple of steps around the other mare before she pauses, stands close enough that their noses could brush if one of them moved too quickly. But she won’t make that mistake, she won’t touch.
echidna
no care in the world