life's but a walking shadow
Far to the west, the sun smoldered against the horizon, but it was the trail of smoke that drew Indra's gaze, a velvety dark streak against the deepening purple of the sky. Picking her way along the cliffside path, the unicorn paused, her golden eyes narrowing. She turned her face to the inland breeze, filling her lungs with that deep, raw scent so at odds with the brine blowing in off the sea.
Fire was a word every horse knew—less a thing than a call to action, a rush of heat and need. In the riftlands, it had been but one among a thousand dangers, but Indra knew even so to be wary of lightning in a dry summer wood, of molten rock spilling down glassy black slopes. She knew as well as anyone did that it took but a single ember to turn forest and meadow to ash.
But there was another world, half-remembered, in which fire was a tool to be summoned at will, a gift by which to warm and craft and heal. The knowledge rustled in the back of Indra's mind as she followed the curl of smoke, and soon enough a flicker of light appeared, gradually resolving itself into a small campfire.
This was no wild blaze, come to scorch the earth and bring new growth. This was a fire that had been built, and tended.
It had been a long, long time since Indra had thought of the Ilati—how long, she would have been hard-pressed to say, for time in the rift had been a tricky, treacherous thing, and often the unicorn felt older by far than her four years. The shamans that had raised her, the swamplands that had held her close—they felt less like the past than a waking dream.
But the men before her now were Ilati men, and the realization seared through her like a bolt of light, white and fierce. Impossible, impossible to believe that she had stumbled her way back to Terrastella after all of this time, all of her wandering. But the strings of bones, the mask, the basket full of herbs—
She did not know these two, but that meant nothing; there were always unknown faces among a herd which numbered in the thousands. But both wore marks of status among the Ilati people, and Indra dipped her head low as she approached the small camp, her iron feather winking in the firelight.
"Grandfather," she greeted the elder stallion where he lay, and, turning to the other male, "Uncle. What brings you so far from Tinea?" She hesitated, then went on, "I have been away for some time. Do you have any word of Nahane?"
i n d r a
@Turhan @
