[open] there's no place like home | any

[sinew]

sinew.

Sinew knew the foal was overdue - long overdue, and she supposed it’d be as obstinate as the rest. It’s stubborn persistence to remain in her belly left her encumbered and cranky, and she had no idea why she decided to visit the field that day. But like the black mare unbeknownst to her, she heard the faint roar and crash of the waterfall and it sounded like wild discordant music to her ears. Okay, more or less the idea of soaking her swollen ankles in the water is what drew the small chestnut overo mare forth.

(Small might be an understatement - she’s only 14 hands high but she felt grotesquely huge in her midsection, like she carried twins or a large colt but she knew otherwise because mothers always know.)

She grunts; shoves others out of her way, or at least those less fortunate enough to scurry quickly out of her way as she barrels through their midst. None of them interest her, not really. They are too timid and temperate of nature - like mice and sheep, and she looks more for someone hotheaded and brash, or bold like herself. For a moment, she pauses - caught up in a memory, of the time she once stood here, shadowy and estranged from those that answered to their more natural herd instinct. She’d stood apart and he’d come to her, trying to wield his hand of fear and she’d squared herself up against it and just smiled slyly at him.

(Their kind don’t love much, but it had been the beginning of something and it is his get that sits stubborn and complacent in her belly.)

Sinew is so intent on cooling her heels that she barrels past the black mare and a very familiar champagne sabino mare. “Ahhh…” she says rather happily as she stands hock-deep in the water. She didn’t mind the lingering winter chill as the waterfall splashed noisily a few yards away, but she did roll a black eye back towards Lucrezia in acknowledgment before closing her eyes and lifting her face up towards the wavering light of the sun. “Lucrezia,” she says in a rather hospitable tone - must be the pregnancy that makes her more congenial than usual, though she can maintain a strong sense of diplomacy even when not at her king’s side.

An ear swiveled the black’s way as she picked up on the conversation; she made no apology for interrupting and decided to continue on with introductions since that’s apparently what she had interrupted in her haste to bask in the cold water. “I’m Sinew by the way, from Pangea.” By now, she has angled herself to face them and her black eyes seem to focus on a point somewhere between the two mares.

the only promises that ever make sense