[open] someone whose eyes are on the horizon

[Islay]

I am not made for adventure.

My family is just big enough (and thanks to Papa and his visits to the Den, we keep growing) and our island is just the right size for a girl of my stature. There are not many others my age - Bran has a whole trip around the sun ahead of me and I am still learning Narcisicus - but that is alright. There are others as well (and I particularly like our leader - I like to tell Papa that he looks like the ocean with his dark blue hide and the crest of pale hair that goes from his tail to his horns. He's a fitting leader for Islandres; he looks like the ocean and I like to pretend he is a cresting wave.)

Adventure does not come easily for me, but I  decide to go looking for it.
Mama likes to wander and I keep thinking that maybe I'll find whatever it is she enjoys so much about it. The thought even comes to the back of my mind as I tell Papa that 'I'll be back' (because he had worried the last time I wrapped myself in shadow and starlight and left our little paradise and didn't say anything).

There is also another reason for my wandering. I am looking for a piece of the sky. After chasing the fog and trying to find white feathers and attempting to collect sea foam, I decided that I will have to try something else. I decide to wander. So when the tide draws low, I take the sandbar that Mama told me of and I find Tephra. It is humid and green and vibrant; it is different from Islandres in many ways. (I even, briefly, consider climbing the volanco to see if its smoke could be a substitute for my quest from the Mountain. But there are butterflies and flowers and so much birdsong flooding the air, I leave the thought behind me and keep wandering.)

Is this why Mama's trips are so long? I wonder. The further I go inland, the more there is to see, and eventually, I am here. This plain of swaying grasses that suddenly remind me of home. The way they dance reminds of me the sea and so I think of the bird and Ocean Wave and Bran and Papa -

And, oh, suddenly I feel so very far away.

I can't even pull my stars and meteors and suns close to me, thanks to the daylight.

But then I smile. Because I am not alone. Her eyes are closed but I see the sun emblazoned on a girl about my age and I forget how far away I am because she is here. I am not alone.

Slowly, I approach and say: "You have the sun on your cheek." It intrigues me because I wonder if it is like my Magic, that her sun might be like my stars and that they can only come to play at certain times. I wonder, "does it ever set?"