He cannot imagine not having all of his faculties intact.
To not see the world as it changes, the cyclical nature of the seasons and the battle for life in direct defiance of death. To not hear the songs of the forest, the humming of the bee and the chortle of a stream. To not taste the mountain water, to never know the sweet grass of a high glade pressed between one’s teeth. He cannot comprehend a life without words, either. Language is an art as much as it is a necessity – he’s grown up surrounded by the voices of his Dalean family. He’s learned the cadence of each voice, their unique flow and pattern. He’s implemented their tones and inflections in his daily life, mimicking certain sounds or phrases as he’s been taught. To not be able to do so is nearly incomprehensible.
Ramiel’s never come across someone like Adelphia in his entire life. His mother had told him that such horses exist – those without working lips, ears, and eyes – but he’s yet to meet one. He doesn’t think this mare is in any way affected until she doesn’t respond. He shakes his head a little because he’s wrong – she’s responded, just not in a way he’s accustomed to. Comfortable with, even, though it shames him to think so. Their culture has become so focused on wit and words and the deceit one can hide within them, that they’ve largely forgotten the time before they could speak. Their ancestors had had entire conversations with nothing more than their bodies. The air had been still between them, empty of the words that now congest their conversations.
The grey stallion finds himself responding to the mare, but it takes a moment. His instincts surface and he meets her outstretched muzzle with his own, if a bit late. She breathes him in and he wonders what she smells. Surely he’s drenched in the scents of his home: the evergreen trees on the mountain slopes, the coarse, dying grass of the hillsides. It’s likely as foreign to her as her smell is to him. Try as he might, Ramiel can’t place it anywhere from within Beqanna. That’s alright, he thinks, smiling back at her, I only wish she could tell me about it. He’s fascinated by the outside world, though he’s in no state to explore it just yet. The Dale needs him, and he wonders if this girl needs a more permanent home, too, or if she’s just passing through.
He does stare, though. It’s hard not to because he doesn’t want to miss a cue from the speckled woman. She seems to catch the fact, pawing at the ground in frustration. He pulls back immediately, not wanting to upset her more than he’s probably already done. Surely there’s some etiquette he should follow here – he just doesn’t know what that is. He frowns a little, losing himself in thoughts of rectifying their lack of communication. An idea comes to him quickly, and he is brighter when he looks at her.
“Can you mouth the words?” He says it slowly, as if she is deaf as well as mute. As soon as the question leaves his lips, he realizes his mistake. “Sorry,” he says, horrified that he’s probably offended her again. Ramiel reaches out and brushes her shoulder lightly, encouragingly. He’ll help her figure this out if it takes all day. It’s clear that she’s not okay, as his first question had asked after, but that will come in time, too. Perhaps it is this difficulty that is bothering her. “I’m Ramiel.” He pauses for a beat, wondering if she will try his suggestion. There’s got to be an answer, maybe this is it. “Who are you?”
r a m i e l
what a day to begin again