rise, rise, rise like the day
*
Calliope could be a lion, a spark of darkness in the grayness that flashes like lightning when the sun just starts to brighten the blues and blacks of the night. The grass could be Velius for all that it grows untamed over the hills, touched only by the chill of the autumn and the drought seasons. There are no gods this day (not yet) only mortals that have risen far before the day. There is only a unicorn that flicks her tail like a hunter as she watches creatures both rise and return from and to slumber.
Then the other mare crests a hill and there is not longer just a unicorn.
They are alone, two horned mares with the last of the night-lights dancing in their eyes like fireflies. Calliope watches her come and her tail whispers like a whip over the brittle stalks of wheat. There's something in the way the other mare moves that suggests introspection, for her eyes have not yet spotted Calliope and the way her horn glitters like a black star in the gray light. Something about her suggests that she is lost to wander the fields so alone with no eyes to the horizon to spot coming dangers.
Calliope only watches the mare wander and keeps her own gaze roaming and ready across the fields. Part of her hopes to see a dragon crest the horizon, to hear a monster scream out at the coming of the day. It's been too long and her idle blood runs like white-water through her veins towards the ocean of her warrior soul.
But it's only the wandering mare that casts another shadow as the sun turns the gray to pastel hues. Just as there are no gods here there are no monsters to be found, only mortals brave enough to leave the protective walls.
Still Calliope says nothing as the mare passes close enough to touch and perhaps to tap her horn against the mare's antlers in greeting. Only the soft swish of their tails and their breaths breaks the quiet of a new day.
And still Calliope waits, allowing the other mare her introspection until she noticed that's she's strayed far too close to a unicorn that smiles like a lion might.
@Jezanna
