[open] someone whose eyes are on the horizon

[Islay]

My mother loves to wander and it is in her hoofsteps that I attempt to follow today. I admit, I've never really understood this great pull that she felt towards the unknown places she told us tales of. My orbit has almost always consisted of my father and elder brother, Bran. I have spent the first year of my life ambling after them while bringing along my stars and constellations and my eagerness to show them everything with my moonbeam smile.

(There is also Narcisus but I've learned that there is hardly anything that makes him smile. Still, I try because he came home day trailing after my father. There must be a reason he did, I've assumed. But he has little use or time for a girl with too many stars swirling about her.)

But this stranger - (not anymore, I correct myself) - Aestas doesn't seem to mind my company and I find that I am certainly enjoying hers. She is bright and every bit as warm as the sun that gilds her face (and I admit, part of me is envious. There are star-marked horses and I find myself wishing that I had something like them; like her). "You should come someday!" I tell her in a way that only an over-enthusiastic child can. Suddenly, my mind is already thinking about the end of our adventure here in the Meadow and it ravels around itself trying to discover ways to extend our meeting.

"We have beaches, quite a few actually." None of this sounds overly exciting, I realize. "and my Dad and brother are there." That part I add almost sheepishly, inwardly noting that there is nothing particularly interesting about that either. Glancing down, I try to recall the best parts of Islandres. I enjoy the nights because they are open and wild; on the beaches, there is nothing to contest with my beloved night sky. There are no branches or domineering trees to disturb the rapture that glows beneath my sky-blue coat.

Still, I'm trying (and struggling) with other things to tell her. "There is also an Erne," I add, because he is perhaps the most fascinating thing (to me) on our island. I've never met anybody else that can boast a bond with an animal and I momentarily consider saying we have a 'Gale' as well. How many other lands can make such a claim?

"What is Tephra like?" I ask. There are some things I know - like that is where we turn our eyes because the King of the West lives there. Suddenly, I am imagining a glittering court full of diplomats and battle tacticians and magicians. Perhaps @[aestas] is even a member of it; my mind is already dreaming up a fairytale existence about her.