Novel
Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing,
She is hardly quiet in her approach, but still she is unused to her subjects paying much heed to her. An innocuous black raven is hardly an uncommon sight around here. She has grown so accustomed to the objects of her curiosity paying her such little mind that when this particular stallion actually deigns to speak to her, she is a bit taken aback.
Still, she is nigh imperturbable and swiftly recovers.
Perhaps he expects no response to his invitation, but she gives one anyway. A loud caw that echoes through the night without shyness. But that hat has caught her attention, and so she takes him up on his offer. She might have anyway, even if he had not actually made the offer. But then, ravens are often forgiven for far more than their equine counterparts. Flitting from her perch, she lands easily upon his neck, taloned claws clutching at mane and meaty crest. Hopping closer, she eyes the odd little hat with open curiosity, head tilting this way and that as the studies it.
And then it disappears in a puff of shadowy smoke.
Squawking loudly, she abruptly flaps her wings as she hops hastily backwards until her toes dig into his withers. With one last indignant squawk, she turns her head to eye him beadily. In her displeasure, she is hardly paying attention to his words until her offers her a name. The suggestion draws her pique short as her quick and flighty brain latches onto the offering.
Poe.
It seemed a good name, though she is rather terrible with names. Some days she has trouble remembering even her own. So the thought brings her short, stirring memories she had thought buried. Stirring recollections of an equine life, one no doubt not so very far removed from this curious stallion’s.
Novel. Yes, that’s it. Her name. Her real one, not the one he had so generously gifted her. A name she had been granted at birth, and one she had once shared so freely.
But perhaps she could be Poe for a day. Perhaps she could be Poe for a lifetime.
And so, she caws an agreement.
Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortals ever dared to dream before.